Afghanistan is experiencing one of the worst, harshest winters in the world. Le's make sure that we we help people through the winter. There is no electricity. The problem is is increasing. And we're dealing with an incredibly barbaric, inhumane group. So yes, let's act now.
Since the hardline militant group recaptured the Afghan capital Kabul in August 2021, the question of how Western powers should deal with the Taliban has become one with no easy answers. The Taliban is a fundamentalist movement, whose ideology has spawned violence and terrorism both inside and outside of Afghanistan. However, the country it now governs is one in need of urgent aid, where the plights of women and minority groups abandoned in a hasty retreat by the West mean that a refusal to engage by Western powers could become a disastrous long-term foreign policy error. For this debate, we ask: should the West work with the Taliban? Our guests are Shabnam Nasimi, Policy Advisor to the Minister of Afghan Resettlement in the UK. She is also Director of Afghan Witness, a platform dedicated to Human Rights reporting from Afghanistan. Joining Shabnam is Christina Lamb OBE, Chief Foreign Correspondent for the Sunday Times, Global Fellow for the Woodrow Wilson International Center, and author of books including Farewell Kabul, and Our Bodies, Their Battlefield. Chairing the debate is journalist, investigative reporter and broadcaster, Manveen Rana.
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