Taliban Denounce Trump’s Move to Call off Peace Talks, Claim US Will Return to Negotiate

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Taliban fighters (file photo)

Taliban fighters (file photo)

Ayesha Tanzeem
VOA News
September 8, 2019

ISLAMABAD – The Afghan Taliban have denounced President Donald Trump’s decision to call off peace talks with the insurgent group, claiming American interlocuters were happy with a deal both sides had negotiated in Doha, and that September 23 had been decided as a date to move to the next step—the start of negotiations with other Afghan factions.

In a Pashto language statement Sunday, the insurgent group also claimed it will not give up its fight and that the U.S. will be forced to return to negotiations eventually.

Trump called off the peace deal with the Taliban in a series of Tweets, blaming “an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great great soldiers, and 11 other people.”

The announcement shocked the region that was expecting to see the formalization of a recently finalized draft peace agreement between Taliban and U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad.

Days earlier, Khalilzad had told Afghan TV channel Tolo News that both sides had agreed “in principle” to a deal but he needed to get it approved from his boss–President Trump.

However, several big attacks in Afghanistan, including in capital Kabul, led to instant criticism that the Taliban were not serious about peace.

Still, President Trump’s announcement led to a mixture of uncertainty and despair in a country that was hoping for an end to almost two decades of war.

“One tweet from thousands miles far, here thirty million people are concerned & uncertain about their future,” tweeted Ahmad Shah Katawazai (@askatawazai), an Afghan diplomat and writer.

“There’s a cloud on the horizon. Darkness seems to have descended. It’s not clear where we will go from here,” Badr Jamaluddin, an Afghan politician who participated in an intra-Afghan dialogue with the Taliban in Doha.

A spokesman for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani blamed the Taliban for the failure of the talks.

“We think that there was an opportunity for the Taliban to embrace a political life, they failed to do so, continuing violence while they were talking to the U.S. envoy in Qatar,” Ghani’s spokesman Sediq Sediqi told reporters Sunday.

Even prior to Trump pulling out of a deal, Ghani was known to oppose a process that seemed to sideline him and jeopardize his future in Afghan politics. In a recent article, the New York Times reported alleged shouting matches between him and Khalilzad over the deal with Taliban.

The Taliban had refused to engage with the Ghani administration, calling it a puppet of the Americans. What irked Ghani the most, reports suggested, was that the insurgent group had engaged with other Afghan politicians, including Ghani’s political rivals, in conferences like one organized in Moscow.

His administration had consistently offered unconditional negotiations to the Taliban, only to be rebuffed by the militant group.

“Whatever was going on in Qatar, after all those rounds of talks and negotiations that were going on for ten months, we expected an outcome that will lead to ceasefire, that could lead us to a direct negotiation with the Afghan government and the Taliban. Unfortunately, that we didn’t see,” Sediqi said.

Concerns about a deal that some feared gave too many concessions to the Taliban emerged from multiple quarters, including former U.S. diplomats.

In an article titled “How to Avoid Rushing to Failure,” published in The Atlantic last week, nine senior former American diplomats who knew Afghanistan well warned that the “initial US drawdown should not go so far or so fast that the Taliban believe that they can achieve military victory.” That would embolden the militant group, they said, making it less likely that they make compromises with their fellow Afghans, and jeopardize chances of a lasting peace.

They also warned of “an outcome worse than the status quo,” a return to the civil war of the 90s, which would leave large swathes of Afghanistan open to becoming havens for groups like Islamic State.

Several people who analyze the region expressed surprise over President Trump’s decision, calling off talks over the death of an American soldier, since neither side had committed to a cease-fire.

Michael Kugleman of Washington based think tank the Wilson Center tweeted: “One possible reason for Trump’s bombshell #Taliban tweet: He needed a pretext to back out of a deal that wasn’t going to work. He found one, and, in announcing it, sought to put the Taliban on the back foot to improve the USG bargaining position in potential future negotiations.”

Trump Says He Canceled Secret Afghan Peace Talks

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Donald Trump

Donald Trump

By Steve Herman
VOA News
September 8, 2019

John Walker of VOA’s Afghanistan service contributed to this report. 

WHITE HOUSE — U.S. President Donald Trump says he has called off secret talks that were to be held Sunday at Camp David with Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani and “major Taliban leaders.”

Trump, in a series of Saturday evening tweets, explained he immediately canceled plans for the meeting at the presidential retreat in the state of Maryland following a car bomb blast in Kabul that killed 12 people, including an American soldier.

Trump said the Taliban carried out the attack “in order to build false leverage.”

The president added that if the Taliban “cannot agree to a cease-fire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then it probably doesn’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway. How many more decades are they willing to fight.”

Afghan president’s statement

Ghani’s office released a statement Sunday  in response to Trump’s cancellation of secret peace talks.

“Real peace will come when Taliban agree to a ceasefire,” the statement said, according to Reuters.

Ghani’s office said it was committed to working together with the United States and allies for a “dignified and long-lasting peace,” and emphasized the holding of the presidential election this month.

The Taliban spokesmen were not available for a comment.

Negotiations to reach a peace agreement have been underway for months between U.S. diplomats and the Taliban, who have rejected calls for a cease-fire.

Stunning announcement

Trump’s tweeted revelation of the planned secret talks and his cancellation of them stunned analysts.

“For months, U.S. negotiators had worked in painstaking fashion to get a deal. They were on the cusp of one. And now, seemingly, a single Trump tweet has yanked the rug from under them,” said Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia program and South Asia senior associate at The Wilson Center.

Kugelman tells VOA he does not think that talks are completely dead.

“Trump is a savvy negotiator and this may well be a ploy of sorts, meant to intimidate the Taliban and get it to scale down violence and come back to the negotiating table in a weaker position,” he says.

Trump’s tweet was completely unexpected in light of negotiations that had been continuing in Doha only hours earlier between U.S. officials and the Taliban — talks that the militant group characterized as very positive, according to David Sedney, executive chairman and acting president of the American University of Afghanistan.

“There’s a big, big disconnect” among U.S. officials, Sedney tells VOA.

“The people I talk to see the Taliban’s recent wave of attacks as a clear signal from the Taliban that the Taliban seek military victory and in that context many Afghans see a U.S. withdrawal agreement as enabling military victory because if this was a step towards peace, then the Taliban would agree to an immediate ceasefire,” he adds.

And Sedney expresses skepticism that the Taliban would have gone to Camp David unless they were essentially accepting an American surrender.

“I hope the Taliban have an immediate cease-fire — that’s what the people of Afghanistan want and deserve … but I don’t think it’s likely.”

A peace deal, which would be expected to see the withdrawal of 14,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, could end the longest war in U.S. history.

It is estimated 150,000 people — including 40,000 civilians — have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001, when a U.S.-led invasion ousted the Taliban from power in Kabul for providing refuge to al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden, who were responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.

Fighters for the Taliban launched fresh attacks on Kabul and two other cities over the past week. The group now controls more territory in Afghanistan than at any other time since 2001.

U.S. officials contacted by VOA following the president’s tweet declined to comment.

The American diplomat leading the effort to reach an accord, Zalmay Khalilzad, said Aug. 31, “We are at the threshold of an agreement that will reduce violence and open the door for Afghans to sit together to negotiate an honorable and sustainable peace, and a unified, sovereign Afghanistan that does not threaten the United States, its allies or any other country.”

A draft agreement between the American and Taliban negotiators was reached days ago, but a full peace pact hinges on subsequent intra-Afghan talks.

It was known before Trump’s tweets that Ghani had scheduled and abruptly postponed a trip Saturday to the United States.

Analysts in Kabul had told VOA that it was a signal that the government there was not happy with the U.S.-Taliban peace deal and that there were differences in finding common ground on the process between Kabul and Washington.

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Abdul Hakim Munib

Abdul Hakim Munib

1TV: Afghanistan’s acting minister for hajj and religious affairs, Abdul Hakim Munib, has claimed that he was physically assaulted by strongmen in president palace on Friday. Munib was humiliated and physically assaulted by six strongmen including former member of parliament, Mullah Tarakhil Mohammadi, and two incumbent MPs, a statement from haj ministry said. Click here to read more (external link).

Afghan Forces Retake Taliban-Held Key District After 5 Years

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afghansoldierAyaz Gul
VOA News
September 7, 2019

ISLAMABAD – Officials in Afghanistan Saturday announced that security forces have recaptured a key northeastern district from the Taliban after five years, as heavy clashes raged in provinces elsewhere in Afghanistan.

The Taliban has intensified attacks even as its representatives are engaged in a fresh round of peace negotiations with the United States in Qatar for ending the 18-year-old Afghan war, America’s longest overseas military intervention.

The Afghan Defense Ministry said the fighting for renewed control over Wardoj in Badakhshan province killed about 100 Taliban insurgents, including their key commanders. It claimed Afghan security forces “carried out this operation successfully without sustaining any losses.”

The ministry asserted in its statement that the Taliban’s so-called shadow governor, Qari Fasihuddin, was among the dead. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied government claims, telling VOA that fighting was still raging in the district and rejected as “enemy propaganda” the claim that Fasihuddin had been killed. It was not possible to verify from independent sources claims made by either side.

Badakhshan borders three neighbors of Afghanistan, including China, Pakistan and Tajikistan.

The Taliban has, meanwhile, continued attacks in surrounding provinces of Kunduz, Takhar and Baghlan, overrunning new territory and killing scores of government forces.

Mujahid said in a statement Saturday that Taliban fighters have besieged Qala Zal district center in Kunduz a day after capturing nearby Khanabad district. He said the insurgents have also made advances in Baghlan’s capital, Pul-e-Khumri, tightening days of siege around the city.

Afghan officials have so far not offered any comments on Taliban battlefield claims.

Heavy fighting, meanwhile, has been raging in western Farah province near the Iranian border. Both Afghan officials and the Taliban have made conflicting claims about the ongoing fighting in the provincial capital, also named Farah.

On Thursday, a Taliban suicide car bomber attacked a foreign military convoy in the national capital of Kabul, killing more than a dozen people. An American soldier and a Romanian soldier were also among the dead, bringing the total number of U.S. military fatalities this year to 16.

Controversy over prospective peace deal

Taliban and American negotiators say they have drafted a framework agreement after nearly yearlong negotiations that could lead to withdrawal of all U.S.-led NATO troops from Afghanistan in return for guarantees the Islamic insurgents will not allow transnational militant groups to use the country again for international terrorism.

The Taliban said Friday its negotiators have over the past two days held fresh meetings in Qatar with U.S. chief negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad accompanied by American commander of international forces, Army General Scott Miller, in Afghanistan.

“Both meetings were positive and resulted in good progress,” said insurgent political spokesman Suhail Shaheen without discussing further details.

Shaheen told VOA “not a single soldier” from U.S. and NATO missions will stay in the country under the withdrawal timetable outlined in the framework agreement with American negotiators. In return, he said, the Taliban has promised not to allow anyone to use Afghan soil against other countries. Shaheen, however, would not disclose the deadline for foreign troops to leave Afghanistan.

Khalilzad told an Afghan television station earlier this week the deal finalized with the Taliban “in principle” will have to be approved by U.S. President Donald Trump before it is signed. The document, he said, would require 5,000 American troops to leave five Afghan bases within 135 days.

However, the Afghan-born American diplomat would not say when the residual roughly 8,600-member U.S. military force will withdraw from the country. He stressed that the Taliban will also be required to participate in intra-Afghan negotiations over a permanent ceasefire and the political future of the turmoil-hit country.

The Afghan government, however, has expressed serious reservations and concerns over the perspective U.S.-Taliban deal after Khalilzad discussed its “key details” with President Ashraf Ghani during his visit to Kabul earlier this week.

Presidential aide Waheed Omar told reporters Friday the government believes the framework agreement does not effectively bind the Taliban to abide by their commitments. He said Afghanistan needs a permanent, not temporary, peace to avert another war in the country. Omar did not elaborate further.

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us_afghanistanDamon Linker via The Week: After 18 years of waging war in Afghanistan, the Trump administration is attempting to pull back. But critics have responded with outrage. What’s the point of trying to reach a deal with the execrable Taliban? How can we contemplate abandoning the Afghan government when the country could be plunged into civil war or worse? Click here to read more (external link).

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Afghan President’s Planned Visit To Washington ‘Postponed’

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Ashraf Ghani

Ashraf Ghani

By RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan
September 6, 2019

KABUL — Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has postponed a planned visit to Washington during which he was to discuss the U.S.-Taliban talks aimed at ending the nearly 18-year war in Afghanistan, officials say.

An Afghan cabinet minister who asked not to be named told RFE/RL on September 6 that the trip was delayed “by the U.S. government because of Mr. Ghani’s opposition” to the text of a draft peace agreement between the United States and the Taliban.

Tolo News quoted sources familiar with Ghani’s planned trip as also saying the visit had been postponed.

The report said the president was originally due to travel to Washington on September 7 with a delegation for talks with his U.S. counterpart, Donald Trump, on September 9.

The development emerged after the U.S. envoy negotiating with the Taliban, Zalmay Khalilzad, briefed Afghan officials in Kabul on an agreement “in principle” the two sides had reached following nine rounds of talks in Qatar.

On September 5, reports said Khalilzad abruptly returned to the Qatari capital, Doha, for more talks with the militant group.

The Taliban has so far rejected negotiations with the Afghan government, seeing it as a puppet of the United States.

While U.S. and Taliban negotiators appeared to be closing in on an accord to end the fighting, the militant group has been stepping up operations across Afghanistan in recent days.

Early on September 6, the Taliban launched an offensive against the western Afghan city of Farah — the third provincial capital to come under attack in less than a week.

The militant fighters briefly seized an Afghan Army recruitment center in the capital of Farah Province, officials say.

With U.S. support, Afghan forces pushed the attackers back a few hours later, local police spokesman Mohibullah Mohib said, adding that fighting was continuing on the outskirts of the city.

Ghulam Mohddin Khairkhah, Farah’s provincial security chief, told RFE/RL that the fighting around the city was sporadic.

Ten Taliban militants were killed in the fighting, along with one paramilitary Afghan police officer, according to Mohib.

Provincial Governor Mohammad Shoaib Sabet said that at least two civilians were killed and another 15 people were wounded in the attack.

Air strikes were carried out against the militant group, Sabet said.

“We continue to support [Afghan forces] as they thwart the Taliban’s attack on Farah,” said U.S. Army Colonel Sonny Leggett, a spokesman for U.S. Forces-Afghanistan.

Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi earlier said a “massive operation” was under way.

Farah Province, which borders Iran, has been the scene of intense fighting in recent years. In May 2018, the Taliban made a major attempt to capture Farah city but were eventually driven back by Afghan and U.S. forces.

The Taliban assault comes after the militants on August 31 attempted to seize the provincial capital of Kunduz in the north and sporadic fighting continued on the outskirts all week.

The following day, they launched an operation in the city of Pul-e Khumri, the capital of neighboring Baghlan Province.

Meanwhile, the national capital, Kabul, was rocked by two major bombings this week that have claimed dozens of lives.

With reporting by Tolo News, AP, AFP, and dpa

Copyright (c) 2019. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036.

Taliban Conduct Attacks in Afghanistan Amid Peace Negotiations

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farahAyaz Gul
VOA News
September 6, 2019

ISLAMABAD – Officials said Friday Taliban militants conducted an overnight attack on the western Afghan city of Farah, the capital of Farah province.

There was no immediate word about casualties among Afghan forces or the Taliban.

On Thursday, the NATO-led military alliance said an American soldier and a Romanian soldier were killed “in action”  in Kabul, Afghanistan, raising the number of U.S. military fatalities to 16 this year.

The Resolute Support mission did not immediately disclose additional details, citing policy restrictions.

The announcement came hours after the Taliban took responsibility for a suicide car bombing in the city that the insurgent group claims killed foreign and local military personnel.

Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Nasrat Rahimi confirmed in a statement the blast killed a least 10 people and injured 42 others. He asserted all the victims were civilians.

The bombing occurred in an area of downtown Kabul that houses NATO’s headquarters, the U.S. embassy and the office of the Afghan spy agency, the National Directorate of Security (NDS). The blast destroyed several vehicles and nearby shops.

Meanwhile, intensifying public outrage at an overnight security operation conducted by NDS forces in eastern Afghanistan that killed four civilians prompted Afghan President Ashraf Ghani Thursday to dismiss the NDS chief.

Officials and witnesses said the slain men were brothers, one of them a government employee, who became the target of a Wednesday night security operation against a suspected Islamic State hideout in the city of Jalalabad.

The NDS in a statement took credit for the raid, saying these brothers were IS “facilitators.” In recent months, the spy agency has been increasingly blamed for conducting raids against civilian homes and killing people with impunity in the name of fighting terrorism.

“As a responsible state, we have zero tolerance for civilian casualties. I have regretfully accepted the resignation of NDS chief, Mr. Stanikzai who had had success in other areas of his work,” Ghani said in a statement. “The attorney general has been ordered to investigate the incident immediately to bring the perpetrators to justice,” the president said.

The Taliban said they also were behind Thursday’s car bomb attack near a security meeting of local and foreign personnel in the eastern Logar province. Afghan officials confirmed the killing of four civilians in that attack, saying it also injured 11 others.

The Taliban continues to launch deadly attacks even as its leaders are negotiating a deal with the U.S. on a foreign troop withdrawal from Afghanistan in return for security assurances.

There are roughly 14,000 U.S. troops currently stationed in the country, along with several thousand NATO allies there to train, advise and assist embattled Afghan security forces battling the Taliban.

The insurgent group also took credit for Monday’s suicide bombing on a compound in another part of Kabul housing international organizations and offices of diplomats. That attack killed at least 16 people and wounded more than 100 others.

Afghan media reported at least eight foreigners were among the dead, including a staff member at Romania’s embassy in the country.

Worries about US-Taliban deal

U.S. chief negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad told an Afghan television station on Monday his team of negotiators have drawn up a draft framework agreement that, if approved by President Donald Trump, would allow 5,000 American troops to leave five military bases in the country within 135 days.

Khalilzad, however, did not discuss whether the prospective deal with the Taliban has outlined the drawdown timeline for the roughly 8,600 residual U.S. forces.

After concluding the ninth round in his yearlong dialogue with the insurgent negotiators in Qatar last Sunday, Khalilzad traveled to Kabul where he shared details of the draft agreement with President Ghani to seek his observations before it is firmed up and signed.

A top Afghan presidential aide, Waheed Omar, told reporters Thursday the government has formally shared its reservations and concerns with U.S. officials about the draft agreement.

Omar would not outline exactly what the concerns were, but he said the government “wishes to reach a permanent and not temporary peace that would, God forbid, result in instability or another war” in Afghanistan.

Khalilzad has said the deal would require the Taliban to engage in intra-Afghan talks to discuss a permanent cease-fire and future power-sharing settlement.

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