12^th Herat Security Dialogue (HSD-XII)
“Afghanistan: Reviving Hope; Synergetic Efforts”
24-25 February 2025 - Madrid, Spain

 

Afghanistan's decades-old conflict continues to remain stuck between competing interests and conflicting visions. The February 2020 US-Taliban peace agreement helped end the US's military presence in Afghanistan, but it did not end the Afghan conflict. Afghanistan continues to endure serious and severe political oppression, diplomatic stalemate, humanitarian crises, deepening security and terrorist threats and global isolation. While the people of Afghanistan, particularly its women and the neighbouring countries bear the brunt of the Afghan conflict, western governments also remain engaged in Afghanistan, via their diplomatic, intelligence and humanitarian networks. Taliban's success in outsmarting their western and regional interlocutors has not been translated in their ability to transition from an insurgent/terrorist group into a responsible modern governing authority.  The UN-led efforts for initiating a two-pronged process of "Intra-Afghan Dialogue" and "Regional-Global Consensus" have failed to bring the five permanent members of the UN Security Council on board, let alone other diverse global, regional and Afghan players and stakeholders. The region's early optimism to demonstrate "Regional Solution & Ownership" was also soon replaced by the region's entrenched divided interests and visions for Afghanistan.  The various anti-Taliban forces and groups' success in winning the moral and intellectual debates have not yet been translated into effective and organised resistance and alternative to the Taliban.

Amid this state of helplessness, division, suffering and uncertainty, the Afghan Institute for Strategic Studies (AISS) organises its annual flagship international conference, "Herat Security Dialogue-XII" . Per its founding principles and vision, the HSD-XII plans to bring together the representatives of key Afghan, regional and global stakeholders to exchange views on their respective analysis and more importantly explore synergistic strategies in tackling Afghanistan's multitude of problems. Primarily as an intellectual platform, the HSD aims to facilitate "Intellectual Consensus" about the way forwards in identifying the premise of an enduring political settlement.