Muhammad Shoaib and Syed Basim Raza
From left: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Afghanistan’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, and Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar at a trilateral meeting in Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 20, 2025.Credit: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Pakistan
Kabul hosted the sixth China-Pakistan-Afghanistan Trilateral Foreign Ministers’ Dialogue on August 20, the first of its kind since the Afghan Taliban’s return to power. The dialogue was attended by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, and Afghanistan’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. The meeting came at a crucial time when Pakistan was expressing concerns over cross-border terror attacks from Afghan soil.
Beijing framed the moment in terms of its agenda of a prosperity-for-security bargain. China wants to ease trade, cooperate on resource extraction, and, above all, extend the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) into Afghanistan. Chinese officials are betting that economic incentives will tip the scales against terrorism. Islamabad, by contrast, came with a security-first agenda, reiterating demands for concrete, tangible actions against cross-border militancy.
Can Beijing’s economic inducements really press the Afghan Taliban to curb terrorism – or is China making a costly mistake?
China has long believed that economic integration can reshape security outcomes, whether abroad or at home, and this constitutes the core tenet of its Afghanistan policy. In Kabul, Wang’s pitch for the Afghan Taliban was focused on prosperity, and its centerpiece was the extension of CPEC into Afghanistan, linking Kabul to promising transit revenues, infrastructure, and connectivity under the umbrella of the Belt and Road Initiative. China has shown a readiness to invest in Afghanistan’s mineral wealth, which can provide the regime with an economic lifeline. It has also lowered trade barriers for Afghan agricultural products such as pine nuts and pomegranates.
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