More than one year since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, the country’s economic situation is deteriorating and Afghanistan is facing what the UN describes as the fastest growing humanitarian crisis in recent history.

In this Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) blog, “A Painful Dialogue with the Taliban” Kristian Berg Harpviken (Research Professor, PRIO) and Arne Strand (Senior Researcher, Chr. Michelsen Institute) argue that “Norway and other Western countries must maintain a dialogue. The situation in Afghanistan is bad, but it has the potential to become much worse. And those who have the most to lose from a Western policy of isolation are the country’s 40 million citizens.”

Harpviken and Strand unpack the abandoned promises of the Taliban, the Western response to impose sanctions, and what now for Afghanistan. Read the full blog here.

This PRIO blog post is the English version of an op-ed published in Norwegian in Aftenposten on 16 August 2022: ‘Den smertefulle dialogen med Taliban’.