Afghan President looks to Pakistan for help in peace negotiations with the Taliban

President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan arrived in Pakistan on Thursday after saying he wanted to explore how Islamabad could help foster peace negotiations with his adversary, the Afghan Taliban. Mr. Karzai’s arrival came after
he said Wednesday in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that his representatives had begun talks with the Taliban and the United States government, a potentially significant development suggesting that the Taliban were dropping longstanding objections
to face-to-face discussions with his government.

A member of the Afghan High Peace Council also described the recent Afghan government contacts to The New York Times this week and said that there had been an agreement with Taliban representatives to go ahead with initial peace
talks in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar, but there was no date yet for meetings.

Mr. Karzai said that “there have been contacts between the U.S. government and the Taliban, there have been contacts between the Afghan government and the Taliban, and there have been some contacts that we have made, all of us
together, including the Taliban.” The High Peace Council member, Haji Musa Hotak, said that “some talks have been started with the Taliban.”

“There is willingness among the Taliban, they spoke with their leadership and got them to agree to talks in Qatar with the Afghan government,” Mr. Hotak said. He added that there was no date set for future meetings and that it
was “too early to say what the Taliban want.” Taliban spokesmen could not be immediately reached to confirm whether any three-way meetings had already been held or more were planned.

Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the United States National Security Council, declined to comment on Mr. Karzai’s statement, but has made clear in the past that there are many steps that would have to be taken before substantive peace
negotiations could begin.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=12961

Posted by Hamza Jahangir on Feb 16 2012. Filed under Latest News, Pakistan, World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry