After Afghanistan pullout, US pursues long-distance diplomacy from Qatar
Without a diplomatic presence on the ground in Kabul, the United States will engage with the Taliban from a remote mission in Doha.
With the US military withdrawn from Afghanistan, the focus has shifted to what Secretary of State Antony Blinken has billed as the next chapter of America’s engagement with the Taliban-run country.
But outreach to Afghanistan’s new rulers will be complicated by the fact that US diplomats are no longer in Afghanistan. Embassy operations have relocated to the Qatari capital of Doha and will be led by Ian McCary, the Kabul embassy's deputy chief of mission.
How Qatar-based diplomats will oversee the delivery of humanitarian aid into Afghanistan and facilitate the perilous departure of remaining US citizens isn’t immediately clear. But it’s far from the first time that Washington has evacuated diplomatic staff from a host country in times of political instability.
After the Houthis overran much of Yemen in 2015, the United States suspended operations at its embassy in Sanaa and established a remote mission in neighboring Saudi Arabia. Similarly, the United States has moved diplomatic staff from Venezuela to Columbia and from Somalia to Kenya.
