July 19, 2025
How Russia Helped End the Taliban's Isolation. Bruce Pannier for National Interest
“When Afghan media reports on trade with Russia or the Lapis Lazuli Corridor, they’re saying this opens up a whole new trade route for them so they’re not dependent on Pakistan and stuff arriving in Pakistani ports and then coming into Afghanistan. So, for [the Afghans] it does have some significance,” Bruce Pannier, a Turan Research Center fellow and board member of the Caspian Policy Center, told this author.
“As far as a North-South trade route opening up that will connect Afghanistan with Russia, which could be used to bring Russian goods into Afghanistan, that should help the average Afghan citizen a little bit as far as being able to obtain basic wears and maybe canned food or something like that,” he added.
Read the full article on National Interest.