The Afghan Crisis of the Future Greater Middle East

On October 20, 2021 the round table devoted to the crisis in Afghanistan was held at the IMEMO. Participants of the discussion were staff members the Center for North American Studies and the Laboratory ‘Center for the Middle East Studies’.

Presented review, based on that round table, analyzes the key issues related to the current Afghan crisis. First of all, the revision of the approach to this problem by regional powers that have disagreements and contradictions between themselves. Moreover, special attention is paid to the changes of the US policy in the region and the consequences of the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. Also, the article brings up questions regarding Taliban’s legitimacy and analyzes situation within the country at this stage. The views and interests were considered from various standpoints: as perceived by the main participants – the United States of America, Afghanistan, and the Middle Eastern countries involved one way or another – Turkey, Iran, Israel and the Arab states. The authors emphasize the fact that the Afghan crisis has created a new situation on a regional scale and a serious challenge for the international community primarily by the growth of the terrorist threat, the socio-economic crisis in Afghanistan and the escalation of the migration crisis.

The main presenters were as follows: BELKOV Evgeny A., BOGACHEVA Anastasia S., DAVYDOV Alexey A., Zimin Ilya A., IBRAGIMOV Ibragim E., LAZOVSKY Stanislav O., SAMARSKAIA Liudmila M., SVISTUNOVA Irina A., TYUKAEVA Tatiana I. The review of the main conclusions made upon discussion was prepared by ZHURAVLEVA Victoria Y., Cand. Sci. (Polit.), Head of Center of the North American Studies, IMEMO (zhvika@imemo.ru, ORCID: 0000-0003-1911-625X) and IBRAGIMOV Ibragim E., junior researcher of the Laboratory ‘Center of the Middle East Studies’ (ibragim07_93@mail.ru, ORCID: 0000-0001-9669-4243).