NATO has not provided any documentary evidence in support of its claims that Russia supports the Taliban movement in Afghanistan. “There is no proof, it is mere rhetoric,” Zamir Kabulov, head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Second Asian Department, said at the NATO-Russia Council meeting on Thursday, as quoted by TASS news agency.
The accusations that Russia might be supplying Taliban first emerged in February, when General John Nicholson, US Commander in Afghanistan, told a Senate Committee that Russia had significantly increased overt and covert support for Taliban militants with a goal of “undermining the United States and NATO.”
Russian officials have repeatedly denied the allegations. “The accusations of mythical Russian assistance to the Taliban aim to distract the international community from Washington’s numerous mistakes,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement in September.