Afghans, Taliban meet to talk peace
Meeting in Pakistan marks progress in quest for peace.
The two sides gather in Pakistan in what could be the start of formal peace negotiations.
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN — Afghan officials are holdi ng talks with Taliban representatives in the Pakistani capital in their fifirst official face-to-face discussions, which the Afghan president said Tuesday were aimed at starting full-fledged negotiations.
The talks in an unannounced location in Islamabad come after repeated informal meetings between Taliban and government representatives, most recently hosted by Qatar and Norway. But the new talks were the fifirst formally acknowledged by the Afghan government; that and the semi-public nature of the talks suggested progress after years of frustration in trying to bring the sides together.
Pakistan’s prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, called the holding of the talks “a major breakthrough” in comments recorded for Pakistani TV from the Norwegian capital Oslo, where he is on a three-day visit.
He said the overtness of the meeting was a positive development. “I hope there will be a positive outcome which will certainly be very helpful for peace and stability in Afghanistan,” he said. Since taking office in
September, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has made it a priority to find a peace settlement, even as fighting has continued in the war against the insurgency waged by the Tal- iban since their ouster in the 2001 U.S.-led invasion. Afghan forces are now bearing the brunt of the insurgency after the U.S. and NATO ended their combat role in the country at the start of the year, with Washington cutting its troop presence.
Previous efforts to start a dialogue stalled, however, largely due to lack of trust and confifidence between the two sides.
Ghani has enlisted the support of regional countries believed to protect, fund and arm the Taliban, including Pakistan, which is pressuring the insurgents to open a channel for peace negotiations, officials and diplomats said. Informal talks in Qatar in May ended on a hopeful note, with the Taliban expressing some flexibility over some issues.
Ghani’s office announced Tuesday that a delegation was traveling to Islamabad to hold the talks. One official said the government representatives include Deputy Foreign Minister Hekmat Karzai.