A part of Band-e-Amir, Afghanistan’s first national park, in Bamiyan province.

Massoud Hossaini/AP

Snow leopards and Marco Polo sheep have not been on the agenda for peace talks involving the Taliban, U.S. officials and Afghan opposition figures.

But going forward, should they be?

“If you’re not managing the natural resources well in Afghanistan, you are undermining the very national security and human security of the people,” says former State Department official Alex Dehgan, an evolutionary biologist and co-founder and CEO of Conservation X Labs, which works to develop innovative technology to address the human causes of extinction. “So thinking about this as part of our national security calculus is important.”

Conservation and protecting wildlife, he says, can…