The office of the President of Uzbekistan confirmed that the Taliban officials were not invited to the ECO summit in Tashkent because the group is not recognised by the international community.
After the collapse of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, this is the second time that the meeting of ECO leaders has been held without the presence of representatives of Afghanistan.
The last time, Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, the former president of Afghanistan, participated and addressed the ECO summit, was in 2021.
Uzbek officials said that while Afghanistan is a member of the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO), due to the internal political changes in the country since August 2021, the country has temporarily not participated in ECO summits.
According to Uzbek officials, Taliban representatives can only participate in ECO summits when the group’s government is recognised by the international community.
The leaders of Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Turkey are present at the ECO summit.
Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the president of Uzbekistan, is the head of this round of the ECO summit.
The participants will discuss economic cooperation, investment, transportation, and the development of industrial cooperation during the ECO summit.
The Economic Cooperation Organisation, which is a regional intergovernmental economic structure, was established in 1984 by Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey, and its headquarters is in Tehran. Afghanistan and seven central Asian countries that had taken independence from the former Soviet Union received membership in the organisation in 1992.
