The Taliban-appointed Afghan ambassador to Russia officially assumed his post at the Afghan Embassy in Moscow on Wednesday, marking a new milestone in the deepening diplomatic ties between Moscow and Kabul.
According to the Afghan Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Mawlawi Gul Hassan arrived in Russia on Tuesday and held an introductory meeting with embassy staff the following day. Hassan previously served as the acting consul at the Afghan consulate in Quetta, Pakistan.
His arrival signifies the full normalization of relations between Russia and Afghanistan, following several years of cautious engagement. On Tuesday, Zamir Kabulov, Russia’s Special Envoy for Afghanistan, stated that Russia should begin arming the Taliban-led government to help combat ISIS-Khorasan (ISKP), potentially indicating deeper future military cooperation between the two nations.
Russia first recognized the Taliban government in a limited capacity in April 2022, when it handed control of the Afghan embassy in Moscow to the new authorities and accepted a chargé d'affaires to manage the mission. However, full normalization only became possible after Russia officially removed the Taliban from its national list of banned organizations in April 2025.
In May, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, Deputy Prime Minister of Afghanistan and a senior Taliban figure, led a delegation to the Kazan Summit in Russia, where a series of economic agreements, including gas transit deals, were signed.
Ambassador Hassan’s arrival makes Russia the fourth country to fully normalize diplomatic relations with the Taliban government, following China, Uzbekistan, and the United Arab Emirates.
Last month, Afghanistan and Pakistan also agreed to normalize relations and upgrade their diplomatic missions to the ambassadorial level after a Chinese-brokered meeting aimed at reducing tensions. However, neither side has yet appointed new ambassadors.
Several other countries—including Iran, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Kyrgyzstan—have accepted Taliban-appointed chargés d'affaires, while others, like Norway, continue to engage with lower-level Taliban diplomats as Kabul gradually emerges from international isolation nearly four years after retaking power.