RASC News Agency: Swiss state broadcasters have revealed that four Taliban envoys were permitted to travel to Geneva on what was described as a strictly “limited mission.” Their assignment: to identify Afghanistani citizens convicted of crimes in Switzerland or those who had volunteered for repatriation. Swiss officials emphasized that the delegation’s movements were tightly restricted. The Taliban representatives were not allowed to enter Swiss territory beyond Geneva’s airport and were granted access only to carry out administrative identification procedures. The mission lasted two days and involved reviewing the cases of eleven inmates and two voluntary returnees. Officials described the process as “sensitive but unavoidable.”
The State Secretariat for Migration confirmed that most of the individuals were identified by the delegation, and preliminary arrangements for their forced return to Afghanistan are underway. However, several cases remain under review, highlighting the bureaucratic complications of deporting individuals to a country under Taliban control. Daniel Bach, spokesperson for the Swiss migration authority, acknowledged both the political and ethical difficulties surrounding such cooperation. He explained that deportation documents can only be issued if validated by the Taliban, since all travel papers from Afghanistan’s former diplomatic mission have been rendered invalid. “We are fully aware of the profoundly alarming human rights conditions in Afghanistan,” Bach said. “Yet Switzerland’s first responsibility is to protect its own society from convicted offenders.”
This operation follows a policy outlined last year by Swiss Justice Minister Beat Jans, who announced that convicted Afghanistani nationals would face removal from Switzerland after completing their sentences. Five individuals were deported before the process was disrupted by Taliban-imposed changes in documentation. Now, only papers issued directly in Kabul are considered valid a requirement that effectively compels Western governments to engage with a regime internationally condemned for brutality, misogyny, and repression. European governments thus find themselves in a paradox: while refusing to formally recognize the Taliban, they are nevertheless forced into functional dealings with the regime to implement deportation policies. Human rights advocates warn that such cooperation risks legitimizing a group that has systematically dismantled women’s rights, silenced the press, institutionalized gender apartheid, and driven Afghanistan into unprecedented humanitarian collapse.
Germany has recently permitted two Taliban consular staff to oversee deportations, yet Swiss authorities insist they will not allow a permanent Taliban presence. They underscored that the Geneva visit was strictly temporary and narrowly defined. Still, the symbolism of Taliban envoys operating, however briefly, on European soil is striking. For critics, it illustrates how Western governments’ security-driven priorities such as the deportation of convicted individuals are quietly creating back channels for Taliban engagement, even as these same governments condemn the regime’s barbarity. In effect, the Taliban are being granted a limited form of legitimacy not through diplomacy or recognition, but through the bureaucratic machinery of deportation. The very regime responsible for Afghanistan’s collapse is now being courted as a gatekeeper of paperwork an irony that underscores the weakness of international policy toward a country trapped under authoritarian rule.
