George Glezmann, who was detained in December 2022 while visiting as a tourist, arrived by plane in Qatar on Thursday evening before travelling back to the US.

His release was confirmed after the Taliban government’s foreign minister hosted US hostage envoy Adam Boehler and other US officials in the Afghan capital, Kabul.

The Taliban’s foreign ministry said Mr Glezmann’s release was “on humanitarian grounds” and “a goodwill gesture”, while US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the deal a “positive and constructive step”.

The meeting between the US delegation and the Taliban amounted to the highest-level direct talks between the two parties since US President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January.

Boehler was accompanied at the meeting by the US’s former envoy to Kabul, Zalmay Khalilzad, according to the Afghan foreign ministry.

Contact between the two governments has usually taken place in other countries since the Taliban regained power in 2021.

Qatar said it facilitated the deal to release Mr Glezmann.

In a post on X, Afghanistan’s foreign ministry added that the deal showed “Afghanistan’s readiness to genuinely engaging all sides, particularly the United States of America, on the basis of mutual respect and interests”.

Rubio said that Mr Glezmann, a 65-year-old Delta Air Lines mechanic, would soon be reunited with his wife, Aleksandra, and thanked Qatar for its “instrumental” role in securing the release.

He was pictured at Kabul airport on Thursday before boarding a flight to Qatar, accompanied by Boehler, Khalilzad and Qatari officials.

The James Foley Foundation, which monitors cases of Americans detained overseas, said Mr Glezmann had “periodic and limited telephone contact” with his wife while detained.

His health was also said to have “deteriorated significantly while he had been in detention”, and he had “medical issues that require immediate care”.

Rubio added that Mr Glezmann’s release was “also a reminder that other Americans are still detained in Afghanistan”.

One of those US citizens is believed to be Mahmood Habibi, who was detained in August 2022.

Before Trump took office in January, two Americans, Ryan Corbett and William Wallace McKenty, were released from Afghanistan in exchange for an Afghan imprisoned in the US.

Khan Mohmmad was serving a life sentence in a federal prison in California on drug trafficking and terrorism charges.

Funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), their scholarships were abruptly terminated after a funding freeze ordered by President Donald Trump when he returned to office in January.

“It was heart-breaking,” one student told the BBC, speaking anonymously for fear of reprisals. “Everyone was shocked and crying. We’ve been told we will be sent back within two weeks.”

Since regaining power nearly four years ago, the Taliban has imposed draconian restrictions on women, including banning them from universities.

The Trump administration’s aid freeze has faced legal roadblocks, but thousands of humanitarian programmes around the world have already been terminated as the White House dismantles USAID and cuts tens of billions of dollars in spending.

The students in Oman say preparations are under way to return them to Afghanistan, and have appealed to the international community to “intervene urgently”.

The BBC has seen emails sent to the 82 students informing them that their scholarships have been “discontinued” due to the termination of the programme and USAID funding.

The emails – which acknowledge the news will be “profoundly disappointing and unsettling” – refer to travel arrangements back to Afghanistan, which caused alarm among the students.

“We need immediate protection, financial assistance and resettlement opportunities to a safe country where we can continue our education,” one told the BBC.

The USAID website’s media contact page remains offline. The BBC has contacted the US State Department for comment.

The Afghan women, now facing a forced return from Oman, had been pursuing graduate and post-graduate courses under the Women’s Scholarship Endowment (WSE), a USAID programme which began in 2018.

It provided scholarships for Afghan women to study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), the disciplines banned for women by the Taliban.

Just over a week ago, the students were told their scholarships had been terminated.

“It’s like everything has been taken away from me,” another student told the BBC. “It was the worst moment. I’m under extreme stress right now.”

These women, mostly aged in their 20s, qualified for scholarships in 2021 before the Taliban seized Afghanistan. Many continued their studies in Afghan universities until December 2022, when the Taliban banned higher education for women.

After 18 months in limbo, they said they fled to Pakistan last September.

USAID then facilitated their visas to Oman, where they arrived between October and November 2024.

“If we are sent back, we will face severe consequences. It would mean losing all our dreams,” a student said. “We won’t be able to study and our families might force us to get married. Many of us could also be at personal risk due to our past affiliations and activism.”

The Taliban has cracked down on women protesting for education and work, with many activists beaten, detained and threatened.

Women in Afghanistan describe themselves as “dead bodies moving around” under the regime’s brutal policies.

The Taliban government says it has been trying to resolve the issue of women’s education, but has also defended its supreme leader’s diktats, saying they are “in accordance with Islamic Sharia law”.

“Afghanistan is experiencing gender apartheid, with women systematically excluded from basic rights, including education,” a student said.

She and her friends in Oman had managed to escape that fate, as the scholarships were supposed to fund their education until 2028.

“When we came here, our sponsors told us to not go back to Afghanistan till 2028 for vacations or to visit our families because it’s not safe for us. And now they’re telling us to go,” a student said.

Last month, White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly blamed the situation for Afghan women on the US military’s withdrawal from the country under the Democrats, telling the Washington Post: “Afghan women are suffering because Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal allowed the Taliban to impose mediaeval Sharia law policies.”

The decision to slash American aid funding has come under the Trump administration, and been implemented by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

And these women face a grim future, urgently seeking a lifeline before time runs out.

The 10-year-old’s life is limited to her one-bedroom home in Islamabad and the dirt road outside it. Since December she hasn’t been to her local school, when it decided it would no longer accept Afghans without a valid Pakistani birth certificate. But even if she could go to classes, Nabila says she wouldn’t.

“I was off sick one day, and I heard police came looking for Afghan children,” she cries, as she tells us her friend’s family were sent back to Afghanistan.

Nabila’s not her real name – all the names of Afghans quoted in this article have been changed for their safety.

Pakistan’s capital and the neighbouring city of Rawalpindi are witnessing a surge in deportations, arrests and detentions of Afghans, the UN says. It estimates that more than half of the three million Afghans in the country are undocumented.

Afghans describe a life of constant fear and near daily police raids on their homes.

Some told the BBC they feared being killed if they went back to Afghanistan. These include families on a US resettlement programme, that has been suspended by the Trump administration.

Pakistan is frustrated at how long relocation programmes are taking, says Philippa Candler, the UN Refugee Agency’s representative in Islamabad. The UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM) says 930 people were sent back to Afghanistan in the first half of February, double the figure two weeks earlier. At least 20% of those deported from Islamabad and Rawalpindi had documentation from the UN Refugee Agency, meaning they were recognised as people in need of international protection.

But Pakistan is not a party to the Refugee Convention and has previously said it does not recognise Afghans living in the country as refugees. The government has said its policies are aimed at all illegal foreign nationals and a deadline for them to leave is looming. That date has fluctuated but is now set to 31 March for those without valid visas, and 30 June for those with resettlement letters.

Many Afghans are terrified amid the confusion. They also say the visa process can be difficult to navigate. Nabila’s family believes they have only one option: to hide. Her father Hamid served in the Afghan military, before the Taliban takeover in 2021. He broke down in tears describing his sleepless nights.

“I have served my country and now I’m useless. That job has doomed me,” he said.

His family are without visas, and are not on a resettlement list. They tell us their phone calls to the UN’s refugee agency go unanswered.

The BBC has reached out to the agency for comment.

The Taliban government has previously told the BBC all Afghans should return because they could “live in the country without any fear”. It claims these refugees are “economic migrants”.

But a UN report in 2023 cast doubt on assurances from the Taliban government. It found hundreds of former government officials and armed forces members were allegedly killed despite a general amnesty.

The Taliban government’s guarantees are of little reassurance to Nabila’s family so they choose to run when authorities are nearby. Neighbours offer each other shelter, as they all try to avoid retuning to Afghanistan.

The UN counted 1,245 Afghans being arrested or detained in January across Pakistan, more than double the same period last year.

Nabila says Afghans shouldn’t be forced out. “Don’t kick Afghans out of their homes – we’re not here by choice, we are forced to be here.”

There is a feeling of sadness and loneliness in their home. “I had a friend who was here and then was deported to Afghanistan,” Nabila’s mother Maryam says.

“She was like a sister, a mother. The day we were separated was a difficult day.”

I ask Nabila what she wants to do when she’s older. “Modelling,” she says, giving me a serious look. Everyone in the room smiles. The tension thaws.

Her mother whispers to her there are plenty of other things she could be, an engineer or a lawyer. Nabila’s dream of modelling is one she could never pursue under the Taliban government. With their restrictions on girls’ education, her mother’s suggestions would also prove impossible.

Pakistan has a long record of taking in Afghan refugees. But cross-border attacks have surged and stoked tension between the two neighbours. Pakistan blames them on militants based in Afghanistan, which the Taliban government denies. Since September 2023, the year Pakistan launched its “Illegal Foreigners’ Repatriation Plan,” 836,238 individuals have now been returned to Afghanistan.

Amidst this current phase of deportations, some Afghans are being held in the Haji camp in Islamabad. Ahmad was in the final stages of the United States’ resettlement programme. He tells us when President Donald Trump suspended it for review, he extinguished Ahmad’s “last hope”. The BBC has seen what appears to be his employment letter by a Western, Christian non-profit group in Afghanistan.

A few weeks ago, when he was out shopping, he received a call. His three-year-old daughter was on the line. “My baby called, come baba police is here, police come to our door,” he says. His wife’s visa extension was still pending, and she was busy pleading with the police.

Ahmad ran home. “I couldn’t leave them behind.” He says he sat in a van and waited hours as police continued their raids. The wives and children of his neighbours continued trickling into the vehicle. Ahmad began receiving calls from their husbands, begging him to take care of them. They had already escaped into the woods.

His family was held for three days in “unimaginable conditions”, says Ahmad, who claims they were only given one blanket per family, and one piece of bread per day, and that their phones were confiscated. The Pakistani government says it ensures “no one is mistreated or harassed during the repatriation process”.

We attempt to visit inside Haji camp to verify Ahmad’s account but are denied entry by authorities. The BBC approached the Pakistani government and the police for an interview or statement, but no one was made available.

Scared of being detained or deported, some families have chosen to leave Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Others tell us they simply can’t afford to.

One woman claims she was in the final stages of the US resettlement scheme and decided to move with her two daughters to Attock, 80km (50 miles) west of Islamabad. “I can barely afford bread,” she says.

The BBC has seen a document confirming she had an interview with the IOM in early January. She claims her family is still witnessing almost daily raids in her neighbourhood.

A spokesman for the US embassy in Islamabad has said it is in “close communication” with Pakistan’s government “on the status of Afghan nationals in the US resettlement pathways”.

Outside Haji camp’s gates, a woman is waiting. She tells us she has a valid visa but her sister’s has expired. Her sister is now being held inside the camp, along with her children. The officers would not let her visit her family, and she is terrified they will be deported. She begins weeping, “If my country was safe, why would I come here to Pakistan? And even here we cannot live peacefully.”

She points to her own daughter who is sitting in their car. She was a singer in Afghanistan, where a law states women cannot be heard speaking outside their home, let alone singing. I turn to her daughter and ask if she still sings. She stares. “No.”

Peter Reynolds, 79, and his wife Barbie, 75, were arrested on 1 February while returning to their home in the country’s Bamiyan province.

An American national and an Afghan were also arrested alongside the couple, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Interior Affairs said.

The UK Foreign Office said on Monday it was supporting their family.

In a statement, Taliban official Abdul Mateen Qani said: “A series of considerations is being taken into account, and after evaluation, we will endeavour to release them as soon as possible.”

All three foreign nationals had Afghan passports and national ID cards, he added.

The reason for Mr and Mrs Reynolds’s arrest has not been confirmed.

The couple had been running training projects in Afghanistan for18 years, including one that involved training mothers and children.

Their work had apparently been approved by the local authorities, despite the Taliban banning education for girls over the age of 12 and not allowing women to work.

The pair married in Kabul in 1970. They remained in Afghanistan after the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021, which saw most westerners leave the country.

Their daughter, Sarah Entwistle, told the BBC she had not heard from her parents in more than two weeks.

They had communicated by text after the pair were initially arrested, but contact stopped after three days.

Ms Entwistle and her siblings wrote to the Taliban to plead for their parents’ release.

“We recognise that there have been instances where exchanges have been beneficial for your government and western nations,” they wrote.

“However, our parents have consistently expressed their commitment to Afghanistan, stating that they would rather sacrifice their lives than become part of ransom negotiations or be traded.”

On Monday, she told Times Radio they were now “urgently calling on the British consulate to do everything in their power to get us answers and to put as much pressure as they can on the Taliban for their release”.

Peter Reynolds, 79, and his wife Barbie, 75, were returning to their home in Bamiyan on 1 February when they were detained.

The couple have been running training projects in Afghanistan for 18 years and their daughter, Sarah Entwistle, told the BBC she had not heard from her parents in more than two weeks.

It is not known exactly what the couple were arrested for but projects run by them include one training mothers and children, which had apparently been approved by the local authorities despite a ban by the Taliban on women working and on education for girls older than the age of 12.

The couple, who originally met at the University of Bath, married in Kabul in 1970. Since 2009 they have been running training projects in five schools in Kabul and one project in Bamiyan training mothers and children.

While the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021 saw most of their staff leave – along with most westerners – Mr and Mrs Reynolds insisted on staying put.

After their arrest, the couple were initially able to keep in touch with their four children by text message. The family knew that their parents were being held by the interior ministry and were assured by them that they were “fine”.

Three days later, however, the texts stopped. The children have heard nothing since.

Ms Entwistle, who lives in Daventry, Northamptonshire, told the BBC: “It’s been over two weeks since the messages stopped, and they were taken into custody.

“We would like the Taliban to release them to go back to their home and continue their work.”

She told the Sunday Times: “They said they could not leave when Afghans were in their hour of need.

“They were meticulous about keeping by the rules even as they kept changing.”

Their daughter told the Times: “My mother is 75 and my father almost 80 and [he] needs his heart medication after a mini-stroke. They were just trying to help the country they loved. The idea they are being held because they were teaching mothers with children is outrageous.”

Ms Entwistle and her three siblings have written a letter to the Taliban, pleading with them to release their parents.

“We do not understand the reasons behind their arrest,” they wrote. “They have communicated their trust in you, and that as Afghan citizens they will be treated well.”

“We recognise that there have been instances where exchanges have been beneficial for your government and western nations. However, our parents have consistently expressed their commitment to Afghanistan, stating that they would rather sacrifice their lives than become part of ransom negotiations or be traded.”

The Foreign Office is aware two British nationals have been detained in Afghanistan. But assistance is limited by the fact that the UK does not recognise the Taliban and has no embassy in Kabul.

Taliban official sources have told the BBC they arrested British nationals, who they believe were working for an non-governmental organisation (NGO) in Bamiyan province.

An official claimed they had been arrested, about 20 days ago, after using a plane without informing Bamiyan police headquarters or the border security forces.

The Taliban announced women would be banned from working for NGOs in 2022 and in December last year Al Jazeera reported the government had said it would close any NGOs employing women.

On February 7, just two days after their visas expired, her fears became reality.

A group of police officials, including female officers, raided her rented house, identifying her family as undocumented residents. Despite her pleas and attempts to show that their passports had been sent for visa renewal, the police took her husband away.

“I kept imploring, pleading for his release. I tried to show them my documentation and proof that we had applied for visa renewal, but they didn’t listen,” Ahmad told Al Jazeera.

The policewomen then told Ahmad to pack up her children’s belongings, warning that she would also be taken to a camp for refugees and deportees set up on Islamabad’s outskirts.

“I begged them not to do this. My children would be traumatised. But they eventually put us in a van and took us away,” she said.

After spending two days in a tent at the camp situated in Islamabad’s outskirts, Ahmad only managed to return home two days later by arranging a 60,000-rupee ($216) bribe.

“I had to ask my relatives, who came to check on us, to arrange this loan. Only then were we allowed to go home,” she said. For now, the family has passports back, with visas stamped for one more month, at the end of which Salima fears a repeat of the humiliating and scary experience they endured in early February.

Ahmad’s story is one of many, as thousands of Afghan citizens in Pakistan, many of whom fled following the fall of Kabul to the Taliban in August 2021, now face an uncertain future under a recent government notification.

In a two-page document issued by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s office last month, the Pakistani government outlined a three-phase plan to send back Afghan citizens living in the country.

The first phase involves the “immediate” deportation of all undocumented Afghan citizens. This includes 800,000 Afghans who did not enter the country on valid visas but who, since 2017, have been granted Afghan Citizen Cards (ACC) by the government of Pakistan itself.

The second phase focuses on Afghan citizens who hold so-called Proof of Registration or PoR cards, first issued in 2006. The final phase will target Afghan citizens who might relocate to third countries.

If the plan is carried out as envisaged, only valid visa holders will remain in the country – none of the other refugees who entered Pakistan under duress without proper documentation will be allowed to stay.

The notification in effect escalates a previously stop-start approach to expelling Afghan refugees. Originally implemented in late 2023, the plan has already led to more than 800,000 Afghan nationals returning to Afghanistan over the past 18 months, according to the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR).

History of hosting refugees

Pakistan has hosted millions of Afghan refugees since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Over the next 20 years, as civil war engulfed Afghanistan and the Taliban first took control in 1996, successive waves of refugees arrived in Pakistan.

After the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001 following the 9/11 attacks, the Taliban’s fall led to the establishment of a civilian government, prompting thousands of Afghans to return home.

Ahmad, who first moved to Pakistan as a seven-year-old in 1997, was among those who resettled in Kabul in 2010. After the family moved, she completed a business degree and started working for Afghanistan’s Ministry of Finance under President Ashraf Ghani.

“I was happily living in Afghanistan at the time. My mother and two sisters relocated to the United States around 2019, but I was comfortable in Kabul,” she said.

However, the Taliban’s stunning return to power in August 2021 triggered another wave of displacement, with between 600,000 and 800,000 Afghans seeking refuge in Pakistan.

Pakistan  currently hosts nearly more than 2.5 million Afghans, according to government estimates. Among them, about 1.3 million possess a UNHCR-issued Proof of Registration (PoR) card, first introduced in 2006, while another 800,000 hold an ACC, issued in 2017. All of them, until now, held documents that for all purposes were deemed as certificates of legitimate residence in Pakistan. Now they face an uncertain future under the three-stage “relocation” plan.

Those who arrived after the August 2021 Taliban takeover have had to rely on visa renewals to remain in Pakistan, a process that is expensive, unpredictable and fraught with delays.

While the official visa renewal fee is $20, Ahmad says submitting passports through legal channels often results in prolonged confiscation or outright rejection, putting applicants at risk of detention. So they pay visa agents to expedite the process.

“We have to pay anywhere between 15,000 and 20,000 rupees ($54 to $72) to renew our visas. It used to be valid for six months, but since January this year, the government has only been granting one-month visas,” she lamented.

Once considered one of the Afghan Taliban’s closest allies, Pakistan has seen relations with its neighbour deteriorate over the past three years.

Islamabad blames Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers for failing to curb the activities of the Pakistani Taliban, or Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a group that emerged in 2007 and has since carried out hundreds of attacks against Pakistani security forces.

In 2024 alone, Pakistan has witnessed more than 500 attacks, resulting in more than 1,500 deaths among civilians and law enforcement personnel.

The Pakistani government has frequently accused Afghan citizens of involvement in these attacks and claims Kabul provides shelter to TTP, a charge the Afghan Taliban denies.

But the government’s recent notification suggests that Afghan refugees now find themselves in the middle of these bilateral tensions.

Afghan citizens holding PoR cards until now have enjoyed some rights, such as the ability to open bank accounts and the chance to register in Pakistan’s citizen database. Now, suddenly, they’re outsiders, and in the queue for expulsion.

In July 2023, following a visit by UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi, Pakistan extended PoR card validity until June 30, 2025. The latest government notification suggests that there is no plan, as of now, to extend their stay any further.

Ikramullah Jamil*, a 31-year-old Afghan citizen born in Pakistan, has lived there nearly all his life, except for six years between 2015 and 2021, when he relocated to Afghanistan with his family.

Jamil and his family had to move out after the Pakistani military launched a major military offensive in the country’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where they used to live.

But after the fall of Kabul, Jamil, the eldest among his eight siblings, chose to return to Pakistan.

“Because of my language skills and connections, I’ve been able to support our Afghan community since 2021. But now, with the government’s vague policies, I fear I could also be at risk of deportation,” Jamil told Al Jazeera.

Even the UNHCR isn’t entirely clear about Pakistan’s plans, said Qaiser Afridi, the spokesperson for the UN agency in Pakistan.

“We are constantly in touch with them [the government] to explain what exactly the plan is, but we have not been given a clear answer,” Afridi told Al Jazeera. “There are several categories of people who are documented and registered as per requirement, so what does the government mean by removing them from Islamabad or Rawalpindi?”

The UNHCR says more than 800 Afghan nationals, including women and children, have already been deported from Islamabad and Rawalpindi since the start of the year.

Praising Pakistan’s “generosity” in hosting millions of Afghan refugees for the past four decades, Phillipa Chandler, the head of the UNHCR in Pakistan, urged the authorities to be more considerate.

“Forced return to Afghanistan could place some people at increased risk. We urge Pakistan to continue to provide safety to Afghans at risk, irrespective of their documentation status,” Chandler said, according to a UNHCR press release.

Looming deadline

The government notification from January has also set a March 31 deadline for Afghan citizens awaiting resettlement in third countries. Those who fail to leave by then risk deportation.

Afridi called the situation “complicated”, noting that thousands of Afghans arrived after August 2021 with legitimate asylum claims or pending resettlement cases.

“There are people whose resettlement cases are still being processed, and others who fear for their lives if they return to Afghanistan,” he said.

Since  2021, nearly 500,000 Afghan nationals have contacted the UNHCR for assistance.

“We have issued documentation to these people; to show they are listed in our system. All we want from the government is to at least recognise this, and to not arrest or deport them,” Afridi said.

Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs earlier this month stated that “almost 80,000 Afghans” have already been resettled in other countries, while 40,000 remain in Pakistan awaiting relocation.

Jamil, currently working for a media outlet, had applied for the US Welcome Corps, a United States government programme for refugees.

“I applied for this programme last year and I even received an email from the State Department that my case will get processed. I had my first interview in December, and I was informed that my settlement process will start in a few days,” he says.

But with the new Trump administration in office, Jamil is unsure what the future holds for him, as the new US president has put a pause on the refugee programme.

“After the new president came in, I was informed that the programme is on hold. I don’t know what will happen to that. Now, my PoR is expiring, and I have no idea what to do.”

The news emerged after Ryan Corbett and William Wallace McKenty were freed. The Afghan, Khan Mohmmad, had been serving a life sentence in a federal prison in California on drug trafficking and terrorism charges.

A statement from the Taliban government in Kabul announced the agreement, which was concluded just before President Joe Biden ended his term in office.

Mr Corbett’s release was confirmed by his family. US media, quoting official sources, identified Mr McKenty as the second American.

The deal – reportedly the culmination of two years of negotiations – was done just before Joe Biden handed over power to Donald Trump on Monday.

“An Afghan fighter Khan Mohammed imprisoned in America has been released in exchange for American citizens and returned to the country,” the Taliban foreign ministry said in a statement.

The family of Ryan Corbett thanked both administrations as well as Qatar for what they described as its vital role.

“Today, our hearts are filled with overwhelming gratitude and praise to God for sustaining Ryan’s life and bringing him back home after what has been the most challenging and uncertain 894 days of our lives,” the family said.

Mr Corbett had lived in Afghanistan for many years with his family and was detained by the Taliban more than two years ago when he returned on a business trip.

There are few details about Mr McKenty, whose family have asked for privacy.

Khan Mohammad was a member of the Taliban taken captive in Afghanistan during the US’s military engagement. He was jailed in 2008. Joe Biden commuted his sentence just before he left office.

The Taliban called the exchange the result of “long and fruitful negotiations” with the US and “a good example of resolving issues through dialogue”.

“The Islamic Emirate looks positively at the actions of the United States of America that help the normalisation and development of relations between the two countries,” it said.

Since the Taliban took power in 2021, they have not been formally recognised by any government.

While the move is not likely to change relations between Kabul and Washington, more negotiations may follow – two other Americans are still in Afghanistan, believed to be George Glezmann and Mahmood Habibi.

The Taliban are also seeking the release of an Afghan who is one of the few remaining prisoners at the US’s Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

At a rally in Washington on the eve of his inauguration, President Trump threatened to cut humanitarian aid to Afghanistan unless the Taliban returned the military equipment seized after the US pulled out in 2021.

A US Department of Defense report in 2022 estimated that military equipment worth $7bn had been left behind in Afghanistan after US forces withdrew.

Taliban’s ascension was seen as a boost to the regional influence of Pakistan, long regarded as the patron of the Afghan group in pursuit of “strategic depth” for Islamabad.

This  doctrine reflected Pakistan’s military interest in maintaining a strategic hold over Afghanistan through the Taliban and using it as leverage against India, its traditional adversary.

Three years later, that calculation appears to have flopped, instead leaving Pakistan’s officials fuming at ties with Kabul even as the Taliban edges closer to an unlikely partner: India.

India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri met acting Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Dubai last week, marking the highest-profile public engagement between New Delhi and the Taliban. That meeting followed a series of steps taken by both sides that suggest a dramatic break from a quarter century of animus and distrust rooted in Pakistan’s support of the Taliban.

If this shift leads to an expansion of Indian influence in Afghanistan, that could strain Islamabad-Kabul ties, warned Iftikhar Firdous, co-founder of The Khorasan Diary, a portal tracking regional security issues. “Ultimately, the Afghan people, reliant on Pakistan’s borders, will bear the brunt of this tug-of-war,” he told Al Jazeera.

From  the 1980s when it backed the mujahideen against the Soviet Union through the first two decades of the 21st century, Pakistan was a primary backer of the Taliban, many of whose leaders found shelter on Pakistani soil.

India, by contrast, viewed the group as a Pakistani proxy, shuttering its embassy in Kabul after the Taliban first came to power in Afghanistan in 1996. It blamed the Taliban and its current allies in the government, including the Haqqanis, for repeatedly attacking Indian diplomatic missions in Afghanistan — the embassy in 2008 and 2009, and the Indian consulates in Jalalabad in 2013, Herat in 2014 and Mazar-i-Sharif in 2015.

Yet, a decade later, those equations no longer stand.

December 2024 saw Pakistan and Afghanistan exchanging strikes on each other’s territories, as Pakistan faced its deadliest year of violence, particularly against its law enforcement, since 2016. Pakistan said it was targeting Afghan bases of the Pakistan Taliban armed group, known by the acronym TTP, which Islamabad accuses the Afghan Taliban of harbouring.

Meanwhile, India appeared to have recalibrated its approach, engaging diplomatically with Taliban officials.

The first significant meeting took place in Kabul in November 2024, when JP Singh, joint secretary of India’s Ministry of External Affairs overseeing the Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran desk, met acting Afghan Defence Minister Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob.

A week later, the Taliban nominated Ikramuddin Kamil as their envoy to New Delhi, even though India is yet to formally recognise the current rulers of Kabul.

And after last week’s meeting between Misri and Muttaqi, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs described India as a “significant regional and economic partner”.

Some Pakistani analysts say Islamabad has no reason to worry — at least yet.

Asif Durrani, a former Pakistani special representative to Afghanistan, said that Pakistan and Kabul share a relationship deeper than what New Delhi and Kabul share. “India left Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover and has now returned upon assessing mutual business opportunities. Both India and Afghanistan are sovereign nations free to forge ties,” Durrani told Al Jazeera. “Pakistan may not object unless these relations become inimical to its interests,” he added.

Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan’s former ambassador to the United Nations, United States, and the United Kingdom, echoed this sentiment.

“Landlocked Afghanistan depends principally on Pakistan for trade as well as transit trade. Geography does not change just because India now seeks closer ties with Kabul,” she told Al Jazeera.

But while Afghanistan’s geography hasn’t changed, much else has, in recent years.

While India has poured in more than $3bn in Afghanistan during the last two decades, the primary trade route for the Afghan government remains the Pakistani border, where tensions have been escalating, as Islamabad’s worries about TTP attacks have grown.

The TTP, founded in 2007, shares ideological roots with the Afghan Taliban and has waged a violent rebellion against Pakistan. Data from last year showed more than 600 attacks in Pakistan, resulting in about 1,600 deaths, including nearly 700 law enforcement personnel. Most of these attacks were claimed by the TTP.

Pakistan has held multiple meetings with Afghan authorities, including a visit by its special representative, Mohammad Sadiq, in December after a TTP attack killed 16 Pakistani soldiers.

However, during Sadiq’s visit, who is serving his second tenure in this role, Pakistan’s military launched air attacks in Bermal, a district bordering Pakistan. The Afghan government, which denies sheltering armed groups, stated that the strikes killed at least 46 people, including women and children. Merely days later, Afghan Taliban retaliated, saying they targeted “several points” in Pakistan.

Lodhi pointed to Sadiq’s reappointment as special representative as a sign of efforts to repair ties. “Pakistan and Afghanistan are diplomatically re-engaging to reset relations after a year of intense tensions. Improved relations are a strategic imperative for both nations,” she said.

But the meeting between Misri and Muttaqi last week also included a conversation on a subject that some experts say could be another layer of complexity to Pakistan’s ties with the Afghan Taliban: development of Iran’s Chabahar port by India.

The  Afghan Foreign Ministry, in its statement on the meeting between Muttaqi and Misri, said they spoke about enhancing trade using Chabahar port, which can help otherwise landlocked Afghanistan bypass Pakistan to receive and send goods.

Chabahar is in Iran’s Sistan-Baluchestan province, just across the border from Pakistan’s Balochistan province — a resource-rich part of the country where Islamabad has long battled separatist groups. Many of these rebels have sought refuge in Iran.

Iran launched air raids on Pakistani soil in January 2024, targeting alleged hideouts of anti-Tehran armed groups that have found shelter in Balochistan. Pakistan also retaliated with its strikes.

While tensions between Iran and Pakistan following those strikes eased, Islamabad has long accused New Delhi of fomenting the Baloch nationalist movement.

Pakistan has cited the 2016 arrest of Kulbhushan Yadav, alleged by Islamabad to be an Indian spy operating in Balochistan. India denies the charges, claiming Yadav was abducted from Iran.

“Indian involvement in Balochistan and its support for separatists is a longstanding Pakistani narrative, underscored by Yadav’s capture,” Firdous said.

Against that backdrop, “references to Chabahar port and its involvement in Afghan-Indian trade will be seen by Pakistan as interventionist,” the Peshawar-based analyst added.

India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri met acting Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Dubai on Wednesday, reports said.

In  a statement later, Afghanistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said they discussed expanding their relations and boosting trade through Chabahar Port in Iran, which India has been developing for goods to bypass the ports of Karachi and Gwadar in its rival Pakistan.

“In line with Afghanistan’s balanced and economy-focused foreign policy, the Islamic Emirate aims to strengthen political and economic ties with India as a significant regional and economic partner,” the statement said.

India’s foreign ministry said in a statement after the meeting that New Delhi was considering engaging in development projects in Afghanistan and looking to boost trade ties.

India, which hosts thousands of Afghan refugees, also said it will provide “material support” for their rehabilitation back home. Some one million refugees have been repatriated by Pakistan and Iran to Afghanistan since late 2023.

“In  response to the request from the Afghan side, India will provide further material support in the first instance to the health sector and for the rehabilitation of refugees,” India’s foreign ministry said in its statement.

Afghan officials say they have already begun distributing land among the repatriated Afghan refugees.

India also said it offered additional support to the Afghan health sector as the two countries discussed strengthening of sports ties, particularly in cricket.

No foreign government, including India, officially recognises the Taliban administration. Yet in June 2022, less than a year after the Taliban returned to power, India reopened its embassy in Kabul, sending a team of “technical experts” to run the mission.

Meanwhile, Afghanistan’s embassy in New Delhi was closed in November 2023 after diplomats appointed by the Afghan government ousted by the Taliban failed to secure visa extensions from their Indian hosts.

However, in November last year, the Taliban announced the appointment of Ikramuddin Kamil as its acting consul in Mumbai.

India is also one of several countries to facilitate trade, aid and medical support and has sent humanitarian aid to Afghanistan under the Taliban.

New Delhi has so far dispatched several shipments consisting of wheat, medicines, COVID vaccines, and winter clothing to Afghanistan.

Wednesday’s meeting came amid rising tensions between Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan, which last week launched an operation to destroy what it called armed groups in Afghanistan’s eastern Paktika province. Islamabad claims the Pakistan Taliban group uses Afghan soil to launch attacks in Pakistan, a charge Kabul denies.

The strikes killed dozens of people, primarily women and children. Earlier this week, India’s foreign office told journalists they condemned the air strikes conducted on Afghan soil.

India and Pakistan have long been rivals and have fought three wars over Kashmir since they won independence from Britain in 1947.

On Wednesday, the Afghan side underlined its sensitivities to India’s security concerns and said they “agreed to remain in touch and continue regular contact at various levels,” the Indian statement said.

The statement from the defence ministry on Saturday did not directly specify that Pakistan was hit, but said the attacks were conducted “beyond the ‘hypothetical line’” – an expression used by Afghan authorities to refer to a border with Pakistan that they have long disputed.

Several points beyond the hypothetical line, serving as centres and hideouts for malicious elements and their supporters who organised and coordinated attacks in Afghanistan, were targeted in retaliation from the southeastern direction of the country,” the ministry said.

Asked whether the statement referred to Pakistan, ministry spokesman Enayatullah Khowarazmi said: “We do not consider it to be the territory of Pakistan, therefore, we cannot confirm the territory, but it was on the other side of the hypothetical line.”

Afghanistan has for decades rejected the border, known as the Durand Line, drawn by British colonial authorities in the 19th century through the mountainous and often lawless tribal belt between what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Meanwhile, a security source told the AFP news agency on Saturday that at least one Pakistani paramilitary soldier was killed and seven others wounded in cross-border exchanges of fire with Afghan forces.

Sporadic clashes, including with heavy weaponry, erupted overnight between border forces on the frontier between Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan and Khost province in Afghanistan, officials from both countries said.

The incidents come after Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities accused Pakistan of killing 46 people, mainly women and children, in air strikes near the border this week.

Islamabad said it had targeted hideouts of fighters along the border, while Afghan authorities warned on Wednesday they would retaliate.

The neighbours have a strained relationship, with Pakistan saying that several attacks on its territory have been launched from Afghan soil – a charge the Afghan Taliban denies.

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) – which shares a common ideology with its Afghan counterparts – last week claimed a raid on an army outpost near the border with Afghanistan, which Pakistan said killed 16 soldiers.

No details of casualties or specific areas targeted were provided. The Pakistani military’s public relations wing and a spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediatel

“We desire good ties with them [Afghanistan] but TTP should be stopped from killing our innocent people,” Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a cabinet address on Friday.“This is our red line.”