Five members of the Taliban terrorist organization are slated to touch down in Brussels late Tuesday for migration-related talks with E.U. officials after Belgium granted single-day visas to the group.
As Breitbart News reported earlier this month, the European Union invited Taliban representatives into Brussels for talks towards the repatriation of Afghan nationals in Europe. According to the Belga News Agency, Belgium is not publicly disclosing the date of the meeting with the Taliban, with E.U. sources claiming that it will take place on “Tuesday,” June 23.
Euractiv reports that Belgium issued the five visas in the late afternoon hours of Monday to the Taliban representatives. A spokesperson for Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot told the outlet that the five visas were issued after a security analysis from the Belgian State Security and military intelligence services “specified that it had no information allowing it to conclude that the persons concerned constitute a threat on Belgian territory.”
The visas, the Belgian Foreign Ministry reportedly stressed, are only valid for Belgium and not for the European Union’s wider Schengen free travel Area.
Unnamed E.U. officials told Euractiv that the talks will remain “strictly technical in nature” and will not feature political representation so as to avoid any “perception of formal recognition” of the Taliban government — as such, the talks are expected to take place as a “neutral venue” rather than on E.U. premises. While the Taliban has exerted uncontested power and control of Afghanistan for roughly five years, the majority of the world’s nations do not recognize the terrorist group as the government of Afghanistan.
Per Euractiv, the discussions are expected to focus on specific “cooperation mechanisms,” such as the identification of Afghan nationals subject to deportation and the issuance of travel documents for such ends.
The upcoming talks between the E.U. and the Taliban come amid demands from E.U. member states for a plan to deport Afghan nationals who were not granted asylum and should thus be legally subject to deportation.
On Sunday, the German newspaper Bild an Sonntag reported Germany had reached an agreement with the Taliban to conduct three deportation charter flights per month to deport Afghan nationals who have committed serious crimes such as rape and drug trafficking. According to the report, Germany also intends to complement the deportation charter flights with individual deportations through scheduled flights.
Euronews reports that the matter of issuing visas to members of the Taliban has become a point of contention within the Belgian government. Last week, Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot expressed to be against the European Commission’s invitation for Taliban members to Brussels, but argued that Belgium cannot refuse the visas in light of Brussels housing the European Union’s headquarters.
“Personally, I disapprove of the move to invite representatives of the Taliban regime to Brussels. I will not accept that the Belgian government invites representatives of the Taliban regime onto our territory,” Prévot reportedly told Belgian MPs, and added that any formal recognition of the Taliban remains “out of the question.”
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