Taliban visit Washington
A Taliban delegation has visited Washington and was received by some State Department officials. The Talib
delegation's meeting with U.S. Undersecretary of State for South Asia Karl Inderforth was arranged by the Unocal,
which is eager to build a pipeline to pump gas from Turkmenistan to Pakistan via Afghan territory.
"We made our position clear, namely that the pipeline could be useful for Afghanistan's rehabilitation, but only if
the situation was settled there by political means", a State Department official said on condition of anonymity. He
stated that the Taliban representatives were told that they should form "a broadly-based government together with
their rivals before the ambitious project to build an oil and gas pipeline is launched".
According to Taliban assessments, only one pipeline could yield almost $ 300 mm for rehabilitating the war-ravaged
Afghanistan.
The Taliban delegation included Acting Minister for Mines and Industry Ahmed Jan, Acting Minister for Culture and
Information Amir Muttaqi, Acting Minister for Planning Din Muhammad, and recently appointed Taliban Permanent
Delegate on the United Nations Mujahid.
A State Department official described the talks as "open and useful". He said that they also touched on the
production of opium and open poppy on the Taliban-controlled territory, human rights, treatment of women, and on
America's attitude to the projected pipeline. Asked whether there could be problems for the U.S. government if it
backed the commercial investments into a country, which is ruled by Islamic fundamentalists, who, according to
western standards, are oppressing women, the State Department official said that any real "political settlement"
would resolve this problem.
In the meantime, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright described the Talib government only a month ago as something
quite disgusting due to its policy of oppressing women.