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Taliban in Moscow says 'occupation' must end for Afghan peace

Taliban in Moscow says occupation must end for Afghan peace
Taliban in Moscow says 'occupation' must end for Afghan peace

2019-05-28 00:00:00 - Source: Baghdad Post

A Taliban delegation met a group of senior Afghan politicians

in Moscow on Tuesday, insisting that international forces must leave

Afghanistan for peace to be agreed, amid gathering diplomatic efforts to end

the 18-year war.

The delegation, led by chief Taliban negotiator Mullah

Baradar Akhund, met politicians, including senior regional leaders and

candidates challenging President Ashraf Ghani in this year’s presidential

election.

“The Islamic Emirate wants peace but the first step is to

remove obstacles to peace and end the occupation of Afghanistan,” Baradar said,

appearing openly on television in what appeared to be a calculated move to

establish his legitimacy as one of the main public faces of the Taliban.

The Taliban, ousted by US-backed forces weeks after the

Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, refer to themselves as the

Islamic Emirate.

Mohammad Karim Khalili, head of the High Peace Council, the

main body charged with pursuing peace efforts, said dozens of people were being

killed in fighting every day and it was time for a “dignified and just

mechanism” to end the bloodshed.

Taliban officials have been talking to US diplomats for

months about the terms of a withdrawal of more than 23,000 US and NATO

coalition troops from Afghanistan and have reached a draft agreement on some

issues but no new date for the next round of talks has been set and many

obstacles remain.

Chief among these is the Taliban refusal to deal directly

with President Ashraf Ghani’s Western-backed government in Kabul, which they

dismiss as a “puppet” regime.

Meetings between the Taliban delegation and political figures

not formally associated with the government have been seen as a way of

preparing the way for full negotiations later. But those contacts are regarded

with deep suspicion by many Afghan officials who see them as undermining the

legitimacy of the government while reinforcing the position of the Taliban.

The group of politicians attending the ceremony to mark the

centenary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Afghanistan and

Russia included many of Ghani’s most powerful political adversaries.

Atta Mohammad Noor, the former governor of the northern

province of Balkh and a leader of the mainly ethnic Tajik Jamiat-e Islami

party, said it was in the interests of all sides to establish a good

understanding.

“We want to have good relations with the Taliban and we

expect peace from them,” he said.

However, the presidential election in September is expected

to put Afghanistan’s political system under heavy strain following bitterly

disputed parliamentary elections last year that drew widespread accusations of

cheating.





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