Afghan violence likely to continue
U.S. military leaders say deal with Taliban won’t stop all unrest in country
Washington — U.S. military leaders cautioned Monday that some level of violence is likely to continue in Afghanistan despite a major new agreement with the Taliban, as uncertainty about the terms of the arrangement overshadowed efforts to launch political negotiations next week.
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed reports of a bombing in eastern Khost province, two days after U.S. and Taliban leaders signed an agreement intended to lead to the withdrawal of American forces and peace talks among the warring Afghan parties.
“To think that there’s going to be an absolute cessation of violence in Afghanistan, that is probably not going to happen, Milley said at the Pentagon. “It’s probably not going to go to zero.”
Milley said the military did not yet know who was responsible for the bombing in Khost, which came as Taliban officials declared the end of a week-long “reduction in violence” period that paved the way for the signing of the U.S.-Taliban agreement.
The Taliban denied responsibility for the attack. Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry said three civilians were killed and 11 were wounded when a motorcycle exploded at a soccer field.
Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who held talks with Afghan leaders in Kabul over the weekend, suggested that U.S. officials would not allow isolated attacks to derail their attempt to shepherd the parties toward negotiations, which are supposed to begin March 10.
“This is going to be a long, windy, bumpy road. That’s going to be the nature of this over the next days, weeks and months,” Esper said, speaking alongside Milley. President Donald Trump spoke Sunday with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani “to congratulate him on the recent important steps made toward achieving peace,” the White House said Monday.
In the days since U.S. and Taliban leaders met in the Qatari capital to sign the agreement, which calls for the full withdrawal of U.S. forces within 14 months, there already are signs the three main parties have differing interpretations of central aspects of the deal. Ghani on Sunday questioned the timeline for the release of Taliban prisoners held by his government, which the deal said would occur within 10 days.
Esper said he instructed the American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Austin “Scott” Miller, to begin the initial drawdown of U.S. forces to 8,600, a process that under the U.S.-Taliban agreement is supposed to take place within 135 days. Asked what would occur if the Afghan negotiations were delayed, Esper said officials would respond to events and challenges as they arose. “We’re in ... Day 2, Hour 39,” he said. “And we’ve got to work our way through that.” Addressing the prisoner exchange, Esper said only that the U.S. commitment was “to enable, to facilitate that exchange of persons between the Taliban and the government of Afghanistan.”
Also Monday, the Taliban announced it had resumed offensive operations against Afghan security forces. Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, said the “reduction-in-violence period is over.”
“Yes, we have resumed our operations against the Afghan forces,” he added.
Mujahid did not address the future of Taliban attacks on U.S. and other foreign forces.
The Taliban, the United States and the Afghan government had agreed to a week-long reduction in violence in the lead-up to the signing of the peace deal in Doha on Saturday. That agreement brought attacks across Afghanistan down about 80 percent.