Russia Could Be Arming Taliban In Afghanistan: Report

Russia could be giving arms to Taliban in Afghanistan, according to two videos obtained by CNN. Afghan and U.S. officials have suggested before that Russia had been doing this, and the videos add fuel to that fire.

The videos show sniper rifles and machine guns stripped of identifying markers according to CNN Tuesday. The snipers are Kalashnikov variants, originally a weapon made exclusively in the Soviet Union, but now relatively widely available.

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“Two separate sets of Taliban, one in the north and another in the west, claim to be in possession of the weapons, which they say were originally supplied by Russian government sources. One splinter group of Taliban near Herat (Afghanistan) say they obtained the guns after defeating a mainstream rival group of Taliban. Another group say they got the weapons for free across the border with Tajikistan and that they were provided by ‘the Russians,’” reported CNN.

In one of the videos, a masked Taliban fighter said the arms came from over the border from Tajikistan, and that they didn’t have to pay for them.

“These pistols have been brought to us recently,” he said in the video. “These are made in Russia, and are very good stuff.”

The U.S. commander in Afghanistan did not refute rumors about Russia arming the insurgent group back in April, suggesting that officials believed this was happening.

“Oh, no I'm not refuting that... Arming belligerents or legitimizing belligerents who perpetuate attacks ... is not the best way forward,” said Gen. John Nicholson at the time.

Russia has denied giving weapons to Taliban.

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NATO forces, consisting of mostly American troops, have been in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S. led invasion of the country. There are around 14,000 U.S. troops left in the country currently. The U.S.-backed government has control of 50 to 60 percent of the county, the rest is disputed or held by insurgent forces like the Taliban. While the U.S. had technically ended combat missions in the country, it is still supporting the government’s forces in their fight.

If Russia is found to be supplying weapons to Afghanistan definitively, it would be a role reversal from the 1980s. The Soviet Union was fighting a war in the country at the time, and the U.S. supplied weapons to the Mujahideen to fight them. Parts of the Mujahideen eventually became the Taliban.