China’s foreign minister visited Afghanistan on Wednesday morning and arrived in Kabul to attend a dialogue between the sixth China and the Foreign Minister of Afghanistan and Pakistan, Xinhua News Agency reported.
The trip follows a visit to India by a Chinese diplomat, during which he met his counterpart and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Although Beijing had yet to release its own detailed explanation of the Kabul debate, Afghanistan’s Taliban-led foreign ministry reported that Chinese officials had expressed a strong interest in exploring and extracting the country’s mineral wealth.
The ministry also said that China has encouraged Kabul to formally participate in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) project.
According to a statement from the ministry, Wang Yi held high-level consultations with Afghanistan’s representative foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaki, and both sides expressed their desire to broaden their cooperation.
The Wang also reported that he noted that the two countries were working to promote agricultural trade and promote exports of Afghan farms to China.
“Wang Yi also said that China intends to launch practical mining activities this year,” the Afghan ministry said.
China was one of the first countries to maintain diplomatic presence in Afghanistan after the Taliban gained power in 2021, and has since sought deeper involvement with the regime.
For Beijing, Afghanistan’s undeveloped reserves of lithium, copper and iron retain great strategic value to enhance supply chain resilience in key industries.