U.S.’ Afghan exit hinges on Taliban talks
DOHA, Qatar — U.S. diplomats are trying to build on parts of a peace deal made with the Taliban last year, specifically classified portions that outlined what military actions — on both sides — were supposed to be prohibited under the signed agreement, according to American, Afghan and Taliban officials.
The negotiations, which have been quietly underway for months, have morphed into the Biden administration’s last-ditch diplomatic effort to achieve a reduction in violence, which could enable the United States to still exit the country should broader peace talks fail to yield progress in the coming weeks.
If these discussions and separate talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban falter, the U.S. will likely find itself with thousands of troops in Afghanistan beyond May 1. That is the deadline by which all U.S. military forces are meant to withdraw from the country under the 2020 agreement with the Taliban and would come at a time when the insurgent group likely will have begun its spring offensive against the beleaguered Afghan security forces.
Both of these conditions would almost certainly set back any progress made in the past months toward a political settlement, despite the Trump and the Biden administrations’ fervent attempts to end the U.S.’ longestrunning war.
“Time is really running out for the Biden administration,” said Asfandyar Mir, an analyst at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. “If there is no breakthrough in the next two to three weeks, Biden will have scored his first major foreign policy failure.”
The proposed agreement specific to two annexes of the 2020 deal, which were deemed classified by the Trump administration, is intended to stave off an insurgent victory on the battlefield during the peace talks by limiting Taliban military operations against Afghan forces, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the negotiations. In return, the U.S. would push for the release of all Taliban prisoners still held by the Afghan government and the lifting of sanctions by the United Nations against the Taliban — two goals outlined in the original deal.
These new negotiations, which exclude representatives from the
Afghan government, are being carried out amid a contentious logjam between the Taliban and the Afghans, despite pressure from international and regional actors on both sides to commit to some form of a path forward.
With May 1 just a few weeks away, there is a growing sense of urgency and uncertainty looming over all sides.
The U.S. has around 3,500 troops in the country, alongside thousands of contractors and international forces still on the ground. Withdrawing those forces and all their equipment by May 1 is, at this point, almost logistically impossible, experts and officials said.
The U.S.’ unilateral negotiations with the Taliban have drawn ire from Afghan negotiators, who see the side discussions as a distraction from the broader peace talks. Even if the U.S. and the Taliban reach a deal to reduce violence, it is not likely to result in a full cease-fire, said an Afghan government negotiator, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Negotiations between the Afghans and the Taliban, which began in September, have practically come to a halt as the insurgent group has remained reluctant to discuss any future government or power-sharing deal while the U.S. remains noncommittal about whether it will withdraw from Afghanistan by May 1.