(Bloomberg) -- President Vladimir Putin said Russia wants Taliban-ruled Afghanistan to join the international order as soon as possible to help strengthen stability in the region.
Russia has no interest in Afghanistan's disintegration because “there will be no one to talk to then,” Putin told an audience Friday at the annual Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, in response to a question on whether the Kremlin will recognize the Taliban regime.
“You need to think about the fact that the sooner the Taliban enters, so to speak, the community of civilized nations, the easier it will be to enter into contact, communicate and somehow influence and ask some questions,” Putin said.
Russia has courted the Taliban in recent years, inviting its leaders repeatedly to Moscow for talks even as the Kremlin has outlawed the group as a terrorist organization. Like China, Russia has kept open its embassy in Kabul as the U.S. and its western allies fled in the scramble to evacuate after the Taliban's lightning takeover of Afghanistan.
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