MOSCOW. Aug 3 (Interfax) - The presence of the Taliban movement (banned in Russia) in northern Afghanistan will contain the terrorist threats coming from that country, Russian Special Presidential Representative for Afghanistan and Director of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Second Asian Department Zamir Kabulov said.
"The very presence of the Taliban in those territories will contain the growth of threats coming from ISIL (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) and other international terrorists to Central Asian states," Kabulov said at a roundtable entitled "Afghanistan after the U.S. Forces' Pullout: Who Can Help Build a Strong State," organized by the Gorchakov Foundation.
"The Taliban movement does not pose an immediate threat to Central Asian states," Kabulov said. "The Taliban movement has been demonstrating by word and by deed that it is dealing with strictly domestic political tasks," he said.
There is not a single fact that demonstrates attempts by the Taliban to cross the Afghan border with Central Asian states or to threaten them, Kabulov said.
Meanwhile, ISIL and about 20 smaller terrorist organizations have been based in northern Afghanistan for a long time, he said.
"They could have taken advantage of the chaotic situation in northern Afghanistan and could have tried to use it to undermine the stability of the Central Asian states bordering Afghanistan. But it happened that the Taliban had very bad relations with ISIL from the very beginning and kept fighting ISIL through all these years," Kabulov said.