Taliban ‘has upper hand’ but will offer written peace plan
INSURGENTS SEIZE LANDS AS US FORCES WITHDRAW
THE Taliban plan to present a written peace proposal to the Afghan government side as soon as next month, a spokesman for the Islamist insurgents said even as they make major territorial gains in the breach left by departing foreign forces.
Hundreds of Afghan security force members have fled into neighbouring Tajikistan in the face of Taliban advances since the United States vacated its main Afghan base, centrepiece of US and NATO might for almost two decades in the country, as part of a plan to withdraw all foreign troops by September 11.
While the transfer of Bagram Air Base to the Afghan army added momentum to a Taliban drive to seize control over new districts, Taliban leaders renewed the long-stalled talks with Afghan government envoys in Qatar’s capital Doha last week.
“The peace talks and process will be accelerated in the coming days...and they are expected to enter an important stage, naturally it will be about peace plans,” Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said on Monday (5).
“Possibly it will take a month to reach that stage when both sides will share their written peace plan,” he said, adding that the latest round of talks were at a critical juncture. “Although we (Taliban) have the upper hand on the battlefield, we are very serious about talks and dialogue.”
Najia Anwari, spokeswoman for Afghanistan’s Ministry for Peace Affairs, confirmed that intra-Afghan talks had resumed.
Diplomats overseeing the intra-Afghan talks have repeatedly sought Pakistan’s help to convince Taliban leaders to offer a written peace plan even if it took a maximalist line, such as the restoration of hardline Islamist rule reminiscent of the group’s 1996-2001 period in power. “It is difficult to anticipate that the Taliban will provide us with their written document of a peace plan in a month but let’s be positive. We hope they present (it) so as to understand what they want,” said Anwari.
The European Union’s special envoy for Afghanistan, Tomas Niklasson, said last month time was running out and that a written proposal would be a sign of successful Pakistani leverage over the Taliban.
Last Sunday (4), more than 1,000 Afghan security personnel retreated across the northern border into Tajikistan after Taliban advances, the Tajik border guard service said, while dozens of others were captured by the insurgents. Meanwhile, militants killed three Pakistani soldiers close to the border with Afghanistan in the North Waziristan tribal region, where Pakistani Taliban fighters have been targeting the Pakistan military, security sources said. The militants fired on a checkpost in Spinwam district, in the latest of a spate of attacks on security forces, government officials and suspected collaborators in North Waziristan. The Pakistani military said it was looking into the report.
The rash of violence in Pakistan’s tribal lands has coincided with the Afghan Taliban’s offensive against the government in Kabul. Afghanistan’s government has regularly accused Pakistan’s military of providing covert support for the Afghan Taliban, which the Pakistani government denies.
The Pakistan government has said any peace deal with the Afghan Taliban should ensure groups, like the Pakistan Taliban, do not use Afghanistan as a safe haven for attacks on Pakistan once Western forces withdraw.
Two soldiers were killed last Wednesday (30) in the Dwatoi district of North Waziristan, after militants opened fire from across the Afghanistan border, Pakistan’s military said.