Iran backs Taliban attacks
Afghan officials say scrapped nuclear deal fuels backlash
Iran is ramping up support to the Taliban in retaliation against President Donald Trump’s decision to scrap a historic nuclear deal, Afghan officials said, and the battle for a strategic Afghan city points to that blowback.
Tehran directly supported a Taliban offensive last week against the western city of Farah that’s situated near the border between the two nations, Afghan government and police officials said. Fighters from the insurgent group crossed over from Iran, where they had been trained and armed, Farid Bakhtawar, the head of the provincial council of Farah, told Bloomberg.
“Iran is involved in the recent violence and was actually leading the May 15 battle,” Fazl Ahmad Sherzad, the police chief of Farah province, said by phone on Wednesday. “They have been directly funding and providing arms to the Taliban.”
The assault Farah that killed hundreds points to Tehran’s work to undermine Trump’s push to bolster security in the war-torn country and ultimately extract the U.S. from its longest war. Along with Iran, Washington points to Russian and Pakistani support for the group it has been battling since 2001, which Moscow and Islamabad have continually denied.
“Trump’s decision to pull out of the Iran deal poses a clear and present danger to U.S. war efforts in Afghanistan,” Michael Kugelman, a senior associate for South Asia at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, said in an email. It “gives Tehran a strong incentive to ramp up its military support to the Taliban.”
More than 300 Taliban fighters as well as dozens of Afghan troops and civilians died in the offensive on Farah before the militants were pushed back by Afghan forces and U.S. airstrikes.
In a fresh operation Wednesday, Afghan special forces killed at least 11 Taliban militants including two commanders in the Bala Bolak district of Farah province, according to a statement from the country’s National Directorate of Security.
Iranian support also gives the Taliban less incentive to engage in negotiations, which many in Washington and Kabul see as necessary to end the 17-year conflict.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed described the allegations of Iranian involvement as propaganda. “We reject the allegations of Iranian military assistance to the Taliban. Iranians have had some contacts with our political authorities to discuss Afghan peace only,” he said via text message.
“Iran’s support to the Taliban leads to further violence and hinders peace and stability for the Afghan people,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Monday in Washington.