The Taliban are willing to establish relations with all countries except Israel, a spokesman for the Islamist militant group has announced.
Suhail Shaheen told Russian state-owned news agency Sputnik: 'In a new chapter if America wants to have a relation with us, which could be in the interest of both countries and both peoples, and if they want to participate in the reconstruction of Afghanistan, they are welcome.'
But he went on: 'Of course, we won't have any relation with Israel. We want to have relations with other countries, Israel is not among these countries.'
The Taliban has a history of supporting al-Qaeda, which routinely makes threats against the State of Israel and uses anti-Semitic rhetoric in its jihadist propaganda.
Last month, Shaheen caused surprise when he gave an interview to Israel's Kan public broadcaster. Just hours after it aired, the Taliban spokesman tweeted that he had been 'duped' into giving it.
'I do many interviews with journalists every day after the falling of provincial centers of Afghanistan and the capital Kabul to the Islamic Emirate,' he said.
'Some journalists maybe masquerading but I haven't done interview with any one introducing himself he is from an Israeli media.'
US withdrawal from Afghanistan was contingent on assurances that the Taliban would not harbour al-Qaeda terrorists. However, there have been reports of Amin al-Haq - Osama bin Laden's former bodyguard who helped him flee the US invasion - arriving in Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover.
Bin Laden, now dead, masterminded the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington which caused the US invasion of Afghanistan, the ousting of the first Taliban regime and the subsequent two-decade intervention.
Foreign countries greeted the makeup of the new Afghan government with caution and dismay on Wednesday after the Taliban appointed hardline veteran figures to top positions, including several with a US bounty on their heads.
As the newly appointed ministers and their deputies set to work after they were named late on Tuesday, acting Premier Mohammad Hasan Akhund urged former officials who fled Afghanistan to return, saying their safety would be guaranteed.
'We have suffered heavy losses for this historic moment and the era of bloodshed in Afghanistan is over,' he told Al Jazeera.
Tens of thousands of people left after the Taliban seized power in mid-August following a lightning military campaign, many of them professionals fearing reprisals because of their association with the Western-backed government.
In Kabul, dozens of women took to the streets again to demand representation in the new administration and for their rights to be protected.
More broadly, people urged the leadership to revive the Afghan economy, which faces steep inflation, food shortages exacerbated by drought and the prospect of international aid being slashed as countries distance themselves from the Taliban.
The United States underscored its wariness on Wednesday.
'This is a caretaker Cabinet,' White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters. 'No one in this administration, not the president nor anyone on the national security team, would suggest that the Taliban are respected and valued members of the global community.'
The Islamist militant movement swept to power in a victory hastened by the withdrawal of US military support to Afghan government forces.
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