Afghan peace talks to resume after Ramadan

Taliban suicide bomb attacks in Afghanistan’s capital targeted a convoy of foreign troops and a compound of the country’s intelligence agency, wounding three people and killing at least one, Afghan and foreign officials said Tuesday.

Media quoted Sayed Zafar Hashemi, Ashraf Ghani’s deputy spokesman, as saying an Afghan delegation was being led by deputy foreign minister Hekmat Khalil Karzai.

LONDON: In what is fast becoming a game of cat and mouse, an Afghan delegation has arrived Islamabad in the latest bid to start peace talks with the Taliban, with there being no official confirmation on whether the militants would agree to take part. But the new talks were the first formally acknowledged by the Afghan government – that and the semi-public nature of the talks suggested possible progress after years of frustration in trying to bring the two sides together.

Rahimullah Yousufzai, a Pakistani journalist and Taliban expert, told AFP it was an “important development” but warned the process was still at a very early stage.

Kabul: A senior Afghan official has accused Pakistani helicopters of airdropping weapons to the Taliban militants in the troubled southeastern part of Afghanistan.

Pakistan helped the Taliban come to power in Kabul in the 1990s and has been criticised for continuing to support jihadist groups to carry out its foreign policy agenda.

It was the first official meeting since a 2013 attempt to open a political office for the Taliban in the Gulf state of Qatar ended amid an uproar over the flag the militants wanted to display. “The representatives of China and the US also participated in the meeting”, it said.

Regional experts believe that talks will end without any results because Taliban want to make Afghanistan an Islamic state with holy Quran as its Constitution on the format of Saudi Arabian form of rule. Representatives of the Afghan government and Afghan Taliban members are holding peace talks aiming to lay foundation to end the 13-year insurgency in the neighboring country.

The Afghan government “will speak during negotiations from a strong position”, Ghani said in a statement on Tuesday night.

Taliban had made a decision to distance themselves from the peace talks last month as well after Aziz confirmed that negotiations were being facilitated.

“The United States welcomes talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban”.

Many Afghans accuse Pakistan of maintaining links to the Taleban in the hope of keeping influence in the country.

Divisions within the Taliban over the peace process run deep.