[1/3] President of the United Arab Emirates Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan meets with Afghanistan's Acting Defence Minister Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob at Al-Shati Palace in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates December 4, 2022.
Ryan Carter/UAE Presidential Court/Handout via REUTERSKABUL, Dec 5 (Reuters) - The acting defence minister of the Afghan Taliban has met the president of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, for talks in Abu Dhabi on strengthening relations, his ministry and UAE state media reported on Monday.
The acting defence minister, Mullah Yaqoob, is the son of the late supreme leader of the Taliban, Mullah Omar, and the meeting with the UAE president is a rare encounter between a senior member of the group and a foreign head of state.
The UAE news agency released photographs of the talks that showed another senior Taliban figure, Anas Haqqani, was present at the talks.
The meeting with the UAE president comes after the Taliban, in September, signed a final contract for running Afghanistan's airports with the UAE company GAAC Holding, which had beat out rival bids from Qatar and Turkey.