Development or Conflict? The China-Taliban Alliance

Beijing makes a risky bid on Afghanistan’s natural resources

By: Salman Rafi Sheikh

In January, Afghanistan received its major foreign investment project since the country fell in 2021 to the Taliban, signing with the Chinese state-owned Xinjiang Central Asia Petroleum and Gas Company to extract oil from the Amu Darya basin and develop an oil reserve in the country’s northern Sar-e-Pul province.

The fact that it ha…