Washington Post: After the Taliban's takeover of Kabul What are the concerns of neighboring countries?

Beijing has released photos of Foreign Minister Wang Yi shaking hands with Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, giving the movement strength and legitimacy among major Asian countries.

The Taliban's seizure of the capital Kabul sent shockwaves around the world, especially in Afghanistan's three neighboring countries: Pakistan, India and China.

The governments of the three countries have accelerated their diplomatic contacts with the Taliban in recent months in anticipation that they might become a major political force in Afghanistan, according to a report published by the Washington Post, writers Jerry Cheh, Rebecca Tan and Neha Masih. What the Taliban has done is exceed expectations, taking full control of the country and changing the geopolitical landscape of the region.

Victory of Pakistan

The Taliban's control of Kabul is a strategic victory for India, but it could also be a nightmare if the Taliban were to clash with the Pakistani government.

On the other hand, India is concerned about the situation in Kashmir and border tensions with Pakistan.

For its part, China has become increasingly concerned about the spread of militant groups that threaten Beijing's ambitious infrastructure projects westward across Eurasia.

In July, a suicide bomber targeted a bus carrying Chinese construction workers in northwestern Pakistan, killing 13 people.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi commented on the attack, saying it was with the help of India and the Afghan government. India has rejected this claim as "absurd". In April, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan attempted to assassinate the Chinese ambassador to Islamabad with a car bomb outside his hotel in Quetta.

Andrew Small, a researcher at the German Marshall Fund and author of "The China-Pakistan Axis: The New Geopolitics of Asia," says the ease and speed with which the Taliban seized power has led to varying levels of concern in Islamabad, New Delhi and Beijing.

After Pakistan facilitated the Taliban's return to power, "it likely didn't welcome the way things were done. "There will now be tougher Chinese positions and pressure to ensure stability in the neighborhood.

Pakistan's foreign ministry called on Afghan leaders to work together and said it had "consistently emphasized that a political solution is indispensable." China said it "respects the will and choice of the Afghan people," but Indian officials did not comment.

China's Changing Attitude

China's less hawkish stance on the Taliban is a change from previous decades, when Beijing expressed concerns that the Taliban were harboring Uighur fighters.

At the end of July, Xinhua published photos of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi meeting with Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the political leader of the Afghan Taliban, in Tianjin (French).

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian argued that the Taliban is a different political movement than the Islamic extremists operating in Pakistan.

Chinese state media reported on the "collapse of the two-decade-long US project in Afghanistan" and stated that the threats associated with Xinjiang Province are not what they used to be.

"The United States is an unreliable country that can abandon its allies at critical times, and the situation in Afghanistan epitomizes this," wrote Hu Zhijin, a senior editor at China's state-run Global Times newspaper.

Phoenix TV commented on the Taliban's takeover of the capital Kabul that China was prepared to deal with any fallout on the Afghan scene by pressuring the Taliban to publicly disassociate itself from "Sinjang-linked forces" and conducting joint military exercises with Russia and other countries in the region to strengthen border controls.

According to Dan Markey, a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, China's primary concern is security: the influx of refugees and fighters. "People, ideology, trained fighters - that's what's at the forefront of thinking."

India's concern

After New Delhi's longstanding demand for power-sharing in Afghanistan, concerns have increased in recent months following the retreat of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's forces. Some Indian officials have argued that a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan would make militant Islamist groups more powerful and violent from Kashmir to Xinjiang.

Devivra Hooda, a retired officer who commanded Indian forces in Kashmir until 2016, said he does not expect foreign fighters to pour into Kashmir from Afghanistan and create an insurgency as they did in the 1990s. India has significantly strengthened its border security in recent years.

But the Indian officer believes that "the return of the Taliban will boost the morale of Pakistan-based militant groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad and the Pakistani Taliban, and explains in this context that it is a moral victory that some terrorist groups may exploit to try to recruit more youth in areas such as Kashmir," he told the American newspaper.

New Afghan migration

There are 3 million Afghan refugees who have been living in Pakistan for more than 40 years, half of whom are recognized and assisted by international organizations, and the other half are considered illegal residents.

On the other hand, India does not host a large number of Afghan refugees.

And he reports According to a census conducted in 2016, the number of Afghan refugees in Iran is 1,583,979, most of whom are spread in the cities of Tehran, Mashhad, Qom and Kerman, amid expectations that the number is higher than that given that half of the refugees in Iran are unregistered, and Iran announced that it will establish camps to provide temporary shelter for Afghan refugees in three border provinces.

According to data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Iran hosts nearly 3 million Afghan nationals, of which only 800,000 are officially registered.

And it goes on Afghan refugees are flooding into Turkey as clashes in the country escalate between the Afghan government and Taliban militants. The Turkish Defense Ministry has also decided to reinforce its forces on the border with Iran in order to prevent illegal crossings.