Pakistan continues to view the Afghan Taliban as "a relatively friendly and reliably anti-India element in Afghanistan", says a US Congressional Research Service report titled “Afghanistan: Background and US Policy In Brief.”

The CRS is a federal agency within the US Library of Congress that provides reports to aid US lawmakers and the legislative process. The report, which was updated early this month, claimed:

“Regional dynamics, and the involvement of outside powers, are central to the conflict in Afghanistan. The neighboring state widely considered most important in this regard is Pakistan, which has played an active, and by many accounts negative, role in Afghan affairs for decades.”

Pakistan’s security organizations “maintain ties” to Afghan insurgent groups, including the Haqqani Network, “a US-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) that has become an official, semiautonomous component of the Taliban,” the report said.

In this episode host Yaser Abrar discusses the topic with Saleh Mohammad Regestani, military affairs analyst, and Sediq Sediqqi, spokesman for Ghani.