Taliban says peace deal with US to end Afghan war is close

A PEACE accord to end America’s war in Afghanistan is close to completion, the Taliban has said, and a rough draft is being proof read and translated before being signed off.

Zalmay Khalilzad, Donald Trump’s chief negotiator, will leave officials to complete the final details in Doha, Qatar, and fly to Kabul to brief the Afghan government. He was then expected to head to Brussels to brief Nato allies before any deal was signed and announced, sources familiar with the negotiations said.

“We hope to have good news soon for our Muslim, independence-seeking nation,” said Suhail Shaheen, a spokesman for the Taliban’s political office in Doha. Details of the accord will not be announced until it is complete, but sources briefed on the talks said it was expected to see America withdraw troops gradually over 15 months if security conditions on the ground were met.

The Taliban will give guarantees Afghan soil will not become a launch pad for attacks by transnational terrorist groups, and they will also begin talks with Afghan leaders to discuss a wider political settlement.

The talks have failed to agree on a broad ceasefire, however, or whether America will keep a permanent counter-terrorism force in the country to continue targeting Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) and al-qaeda.

The Taliban and US have spent more than a year trying to reach a settlement, meeting for nine rounds of talks.