Kabul, Taliban to resume peace negotiations in Qatar

Kabul, May 31 (EFE).- The Afghan government and the Taliban are set to soon resume peace negotiations in Qatar, which have remained stuck for over five months, to try and end nearly two decades of war in Afghanistan, officials told EFE on Monday.

“It’s planned that the intra-Afghan talks will begin from the point where they were halted” around five months ago in Qatar, Najia Anwari, the spokesperson for the Afghan ministry for peace, told EFE.

“A number of members of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s negotiation team – who have been in Kabul for now – will travel to Qatar tomorrow and the rest of the team members will also join them soon,” she added.

Anwari clarified that the two sides would resume dialog based on a detailed agenda which had already been discussed previously, aiming to produce a “fruitful result for the people of Afghanistan.”

In a preparatory meeting held a few days ago, both Kabul and the insurgents had emphasized on speeding up negotiations and recommencing them soon, the spokesperson said.

Taliban’s political affairs spokesperson Naeem Wardak also confirmed the rebels’ willingness to restart talks.

“We are ready for the talks and there is no problem from our side,” he told EFE.

The intra-Afghan negotiations, which had kicked off on Sep. 12, came on the back of the historic peace agreement signed between the United States and the Taliban in Qatar in February 2020.

As per the deal, Washington agreed to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan by April 2021 – with the deadline subsequently postponed to September – in return for the insurgents committing to drastically reducing violence and participating in negotiations to end the Afghan war.

However, the talks had stalled in January as the Taliban insisted on the fulfillment of some of the conditions of their agreement with the US, such as the release of around 7,000 additional prisoners and removal of their leaders’ names from a United Nations blacklist. EFE

bks-mvg/ia