Russia has become the first country in the world to formally recognize Afghanistan's Taliban government. This improves the radical group's standing on the world stage, and puts pressure on the West to follow suit.

Afghanistan’s isolation on the international stage, largely because of the Taliban’s restrictions on women and girls, has left much of its 41 million people mired in poverty. As it struggles to attract foreign investment, the lucrative potential of tourism is far from lost on the government.

A former senior Taliban official told CBS News that while the move was welcome, "Russia and China can't financially support us the way the Americans did."