Abdullah Mustafvi
Afghanistan possesses an extraordinary, largely untapped mineral heritage estimated by geological surveys to be worth at least $1 trillion. The country’s complex mountainous geology, formed by prehistoric collisions of tectonic plates, has left behind over 1,400 recorded mineral occurrences. Afghanistan sits on globally significant reserves of lithium, cobalt, and rare earth elements (such as lanthanum, cerium, and neodymium). These are vital for the manufacturing of electric vehicle batteries, smartphones, and green energy hardware. The country hosts approximately 2.2 billion tonnes of iron ore and 60 million tonnes of copper. The Mes Aynak copper deposit is considered one of the largest unexploited copper fields in the world. Significant deposits of gold, high-grade marble, lapis lazuli, emeralds, and chromite span across central and Northern provinces. Over $200 billion of its estimated wealth lies in energy reserves, concentrated primarily in the northern Amu Darya and Afghan-Tajik petroleum basins. Since returning to power, the Taliban has shifted its mining strategy from localised, insurgent “taxation” (extortion of independent miners) into a highly centralised, aggressive state enterprise. It has made resource extraction the core pillar of its economic survival strategy.
Since returning to power, the Taliban has shifted its mining strategy from localised, insurgent “taxation” (extortion of independent miners) into a highly centralised, aggressive state enterprise.
Taliban administration lacks a sufficiently transparent legal framework for revenue collection, public expenditure, financial administration and budget management, and no effective independent institution exists to scrutinise its financial operations. The Taliban Ministry of Mines and Petroleum has signed multi-billion-dollar extraction contracts. It bypasses typical international procurement transparency, favouring rapid cash inflows over long-term sustainability. To bypass its lack of industrial infrastructure, the Taliban is permitting foreign entities to extract raw, unprocessed ore directly out of the country. By failing to mandate domestic processing or refining, Afghanistan loses out on the highest segments of the economic value chain, effectively turning its wealth into structural dependency and immediate cash. The Taliban uses its $1 trillion mineral potential as a geopolitical carrot. In late 2026, Taliban officials openly extended invitations to the United States and Western corporate actors to invest in Afghan mining, explicitly aiming to use resource access as leverage to ease economic isolation, lift sanctions, and unfreeze sovereign state assets. Domestically, the Taliban regime operates the mining sector like an armed gang enterprise. The regime maintains opaque financial accounting, and its lack of transparency has led to Afghanistan’s suspension from the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI). Revenue flows through elite networks and specialised “mineral mafias” rather than a transparent public treasury, raising concerns that the money feeds the regime’s security apparatus rather than public services. The rush for immediate extraction has worsened localised resource depletion, community displacement, child labour in dangerous artisanal mines, and severe environmental degradation with little to no regulatory oversight. The illusion of Taliban cohesion is increasingly fracturing over the control of Afghanistan’s lucrative natural resources, turning the country’s mineral wealth into a battleground for internal power struggles. This friction is most volatile in the northeastern Badakhshan province, where lucrative gold mining concessions have ignited deadly turf wars. Historically, local ethnic Tajik and Uzbek Taliban commanders managed these mines as semi-autonomous fiefdoms, keeping substantial revenue to independently fund their operations. However, a major administrative reshuffle replaced Haqqani-aligned officials with Kandahar-loyalists at the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum. This trigger prompted the central leadership to aggressively assert control over the northern assets. The ensuing crackdown exposed a deep systemic rift between the Kabul-based Haqqani Network and the ultraconservative Kandahar faction led by Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada. In a bid to bypass local power brokers, Kandahar deployed a 1,000-strong special military unit to Badakhshan, systematically arresting commanders’ relatives, destroying unauthorised gold-processing workshops, and forcefully outsourcing extraction rights to foreign entities. These aggressive centralising manoeuvres prompted heavy armed retaliation. High-profile defections and lethal clashes between rival factions ensued, such as the armed standoff involving Haqqani-affiliated commander Jumma Khan Fateh. By abruptly halting local operations under the guise of regulatory oversight, the Kandahari leadership has further disenfranchised regional networks. As a result, the strategic competition between Kabul and Kandahar over shadow finance has amplified structural corruption, transforming the race for gold into a potent catalyst for armed mutiny within the regime’s own ranks.
The writer is a freelance columnist.