Afghanistan's Karzai: US 'in peace talks with Taliban'

[Mabs]

Afghanistan's Karzai: US 'in peace talks with Taliban'

An Afghan policeman helps a wounded man away from the site of an attack at a Kabul police station, 18 June 2011 The comments came hours before an attack on a police station, which the Taliban said it carried out

The US is engaged in talks with the Taliban, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said, in the first high-level confirmation of US involvement.

Mr Karzai said that "foreign military and especially the US itself" were involved in peace talks with the group.

Hours later, suicide bombers attacked a Kabul police station, killing nine.

Earlier this month, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said there could be political talks with the Taliban by the end of this year.

The US is due to start withdrawing its 97,000 troops from Afghanistan in July.

It aims to gradually hand over all security operations to Afghan security forces by 2014.

Summer of fighting

"In the course of this year, there have been peace talks with the Taliban and our own countrymen," Mr Karzai told a Kabul news conference on Saturday.

"Peace talks have started with them already and it is going well. Foreign militaries, especially the United States of America, are going ahead with these negotiations."

It's always been assumed that the US is reaching out directly to the Taliban, but this is the first high-level official confirmation.

The exact identity of the Americans' negotiating partner is not known, whether they are talking to a go-between or to somebody with authority.

Neither is it known what is on the table: the assumption is that these are talks about talks rather than something more substantive.

No-one should expect quick results from whatever contacts may be taking place. The prediction from all sides - Nato, the Afghan government and the Taliban itself - is for another summer of hard fighting ahead, and probably many more summers after that.

He gave no details as to whether the discussions involved Taliban officials with US authorities, or a go-between.

Shortly after the announcement, a number of suicide bombers attacked a police station near the finance ministry in the Afghan capital. The interior ministry said there were three bombers, but other officials said there were four.

The Taliban said they carried out the attack.

The Afghan interior ministry said nine people were killed: five civilians, three police officers and one intelligence official. Twelve people - 10 civilians and two police - were also injured. The attack has now ended.

''A group of suicide attackers got inside police district one," Mohammad Ayub Salangi, Kabul's police chief, told the BBC. "We surrounded the area.''

One of the bombers detonated his suicide vest, while two others were shot dead by police. Some reports said a fourth bomber was killed in an exchange of fire with security forces.

Our correspondent says the attack is part of the Taliban strategy to strike at the heart of government.

Paradoxically, he says, the greater the likelihood of peace talks, the more Nato and the Taliban will press their military campaigns in a bid to ensure they go into negotiations with an advantage.

Meanwhile, insurgents attacked two convoys supplying Nato troops in the eastern province of Ghazni, police said. Four Afghan security guards escorting the trucks were reportedly killed by roadside bombs.
Sanctions list split

The Taliban's official position regarding peace talks is that it will only negotiate once international forces leave Afghanistan, and that it will only talk to the Afghan government.


Col Richard Kemp: "There is no prospect for successful peace talks with the Taliban"

Diplomats have previously spoken of preliminary talks being held by both sides in the continuing conflict.

The US has yet to comment on Mr Karzai's statement.

The UK said it supported "Afghan-led efforts to reconcile and reintegrate members of the insurgency who are prepared to renounce violence, cut links with terrorist groups, and accept the constitution".

"In view of the death of Osama Bin Laden, it is time for the Taliban/insurgency to positively engage in the political process," said a statement from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

Col Richard Kemp, a former commander of British forces in Afghanistan, said there was currently no prospect for successful peace talks with Taliban.

"The only possibility that could happen is if they as a movement are defeated and there's no prospect of that happening in the near future."

He said the objective of international forces in Afghanistan should be to encourage malleable elements of the Taliban to split away from the hard-core leadership of Mullah Mohammad Omar, thereby weakening the group.

On Friday, the UN split a sanctions blacklist for the Taliban and al-Qaeda, to encourage the Taliban to join reconciliation efforts.

Before now, both organisations have been handled by the same UN sanctions committee.

The UN Security Council said it was sending a signal to the Taliban that now is the time to join the political process.

The Taliban ruled Afghanistan before being driven from power by US-backed forces in 2001.

It had sheltered al-Qaeda and its leader Bin Laden

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13821452

 

[Mabs]

U.S. in peace talks with Taliban, Afghan president says
From Fazel Reshad, For CNN
June 18, 2011 -- Updated 1201 GMT (2001 HKT)


Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- The United States is involved in peace talks with the Taliban, Afghan President Hamid Karzai told a youth group in Kabul on Saturday.

"Peace negotiations with the Taliban and with other countrymen have been started," Karzai told reporters after his earlier announcement on state TV. "Those who accept the constitution, freedom, democracy and development of Afghanistan can take part in this negotiation."

Representatives of the government and insurgents have been in touch, but there have been no high-level meetings, Karzai said. He added there was no specific agenda.

U.S. officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

The United States has said that the Taliban and other groups should separate from al Qaeda, renounce violence and abide by the Afghan constitution.

The U.N. Security Council split a key sanctions list on al Qaeda and the Taliban on Friday with an eye toward reconciliation in Afghanistan.

The move makes it easier to add and remove people and entities from the sanctions lists. The council also established specific criteria for having an individual delisted. The vote was unanimous.

"It sends a clear signal that now is the time for the Taliban to come forward and join the political process," Mark Lyall Grant, the British ambassador to the United Nations, told the council.

At a news conference with Karzai earlier this month, outgoing U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates talked about making changes in Afghanistan.

"I believe that if we can hold on to the territory that has been recaptured from the Taliban between ourselves and the Afghan forces and perhaps expand that security, that we will be in a position toward the end of this year to perhaps have a successful opening with respect to reconciliation, or at least be in a position where we can say we've turned a corner here in Afghanistan," Gates said, referring to political reconciliation talks.

Gates made the statement during his last visit to Afghanistan as defense secretary. Karzai awarded Gates the Wazir Akbar Khan medal, the highest governmental award.

U.S. in peace talks with Taliban, Afghan president says - CNN.com

 

[wmdisinfo]

lol I really feel sorry for afghan government they will have the same end as the SOvit sponsored govt of najeeb when sovits left people found him hanging by street lamp and karazai wants to save himself but its too little too late for him

 

[Mabs]

I just fail to understand the US's strategy in Afghanistan or lack thereof. On one hand they want us to Do More and push into NW against the Taliban and on the other hand they are talking to the same people. I wonder if these are the good Taliban or the bad Taliban because as far as i remember, the US never believed in the Good and Bad Taliban distinction.

 

[wmdisinfo]

lol US Is A big fat WMD himself as simple as that 911 bahana afghanistan thikana and pakistan nishaana as simple as that

 

[Mabs]

And obviously we won't see those people on this thread who keep bashing the Pak Army and ISI to be Taliban sympathizers and in cahoots with them. They would come up with some twisted logic to declare this illicit US-Taliban relationship as Halal and mandatory. Never mind the glaring discrepancy between what US says and does, we just need to go into the Tribal belt and kill our own people mercilessly and without any remorse.

 

[wmdisinfo]

i call them the liberal generation of the stupid

 

[Mabs]

i call them the liberal generation of the stupid

You have to be considered a human first to be categorized as a liberal or a conservative. In my opinion if you do not care about innocent human lives, you don't qualify as a human. I don't put all the blame on them though because they are ill-informed.

 

[Meengla]

This bomb-shell news took many hours to reach NY Times after Dawn has this as the main headline.

So is Karzai lying?
Or is it that Americans field strong enough against Talibans to 'force' a compromise?
Have the Americans really 'lost'? Oh, the thought of the jihadis getting energized by this is very scary.

According to Michael Scheuer--the ex-CIA 'anonymous' guy of the Iraq-war fame, the West has lost. BTW, Scheuer hates AIPAC and the Jihadis with equal zeal.

Here is what Scheuer says.

Here

Two simple truisms seem appropriate these days when discussing the Afghan war: “If you don’t understand your enemy, you will lose to him” and “If you do not kill your enemies, they will surely kill you”. U.S. political, military, and civil service leaders have neither tried to understand what motivates the Taleban and its allies, nor have they tried to comprehensively kill them. As a result, they now stand at the inevitable destination — the brink of a vastly humiliating defeat that cannot be disguised.

 

[Pak_Sher]

When US, CIA, Germans get in touch with and talk to Tailbaan they are called talks, when Pakistan or ISI talks to Talibaan, "ISI has links with the Talibaan", now we should say "CIA has links with the Talibaan" all along, they are talking openly now instaed through couriers.

 

[wmdisinfo]

You have to be considered a human first to be categorized as a liberal or a conservative. In my opinion if you do not care about innocent human lives, you don't qualify as a human. I don't put all the blame on them though because they are ill-informed.

1 is ill informed and 1 is called ignorant and pakistanis dosent think now when will they do they got tv web cell phones alot of stuff to inform themselves but they dont have time

 

[Mabs]

Move to encourage political process UN’s sanctions list for Taliban, Al Qaeda split


UNITED NATIONS, June 18: The UN Security Council has split the international sanctions regime for the Taliban and Al Qaeda to encourage the Taliban to join reconciliation efforts in Afghanistan.

The council unanimously passed two resolutions on Friday, setting up one new blacklist of individuals and organisations
accused of links to Al Qaeda and a second for those linked to the Taliban militia.

The two groups have until now been handled by the same sanctions committee.

But the international powers wanted to separate them to highlight the divide between Al Qaeda’s global agenda and the Taliban’s focus on Afghanistan.

The sanctions committee was set up in 1999 when Al Qaeda had influence over the Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan until they were driven out of power by US-led forces.

The new resolutions, 1988 and 1989, send “a clear message to the Taliban that there is a future for those who separate from Al Qaeda, renounce violence and abide by the Afghan constitution,” said Susan Rice, UN envoy for the United States, which led the campaign for the division.

Peter Wittig, Germany’s UN ambassador who heads the Security Council’s anti-terrorism sanctions committee, said the resolution sent “a strong signal of trust and support for the peace and reconciliation efforts of the government of Afghanistan”.

US President Barack Obama has set July as the target date to start reducing the 100,000 American troops in Afghanistan and Defence Secretary Robert Gates said this month there could be talks with the Taliban before the end of the year.

The new sanctions regime for those who pose “a threat to the peace, stability and security of Afghanistan” gives the Afghan government a say in the listing and delisting of accused militants.

An ombudsman also gets extra powers to recommend de-listings. The Security Council will have to vote unanimously to keep a person on a sanctions list if the ombudsman has recommended that the name be taken off.

Wittig called the changes a “major advance”.

While all 15 council measures backed the resolutions, India and Russia said there must be no easing up in the international fight against terrorism. “There must be no slackening of efforts to fight both Al Qaeda and the Taliban,” said Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin.

Separately, the Security Council’s sanctions committee is considering taking about 20 former Taliban commanders off the UN blacklist. The Afghan government had originally advanced about 50 names but withdrew many because it did not have the paperwork to back up the case, diplomats said.

A decision on those still waiting will be taken in mid-July.

The remaining list includes five members of Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s Higher Council of Peace, which he set up last year to seek peace talks with Afghanistan’s former hard-line rulers. One of them, Mohammed Qalamuddin, was once head of the Taliban’s religious police.

There are 135 Taliban names facing sanctions. The 254-long Al Qaeda list was cut by two this week following recommendations from an ombudsman.

One Sudanese-Canadian, Abousfian Abdelrazik, 49, went to the Security Council with a delegation of Canadian civic and labour groups in a bid to get his name taken off the Al Qaeda list.

Abdelrazik has been on the UN list since 2006 and subject to an asset freeze and travel ban. Detained after travelling to Khartoum on what he said was a trip to see his ailing mother in 2003, he has denied any links to Al Qaeda.

“Since my name has been on that list no one has given me any evidence about what I am supposed to have done wrong,” he said after meeting sanctions committee officials in New York.—AFP

Move to encourage political process UN

 

[Mabs]

^^^ I guess Uncle Sam is in full flow trying to somehow carve a way out of the mess that they have created in Afghanistan. It has now gotten the UN ( as usual, nothing surprising here) to sanction its dirty, under the table dealing with the Taliban.

Joke of the day: I could not find a plausible story In the major Western news outlets covering this story.

 

[Mabs]

TOI and The Hindu seem to be mum about it as well. I wonder what would have happened if it was reported that Pakistan was in talks with the Taliban. Funny how the world works.

 

[Al Bhatti]

CIA trains covert units of Afghans to continue the fight against Taliban

Shadowy, unaccountable forces accused of human rights abuses

20 July 2011

Covert forces of CIA-trained Afghan paramilitaries are being built up to continue the US-led war on the Taliban as thousands of US troops prepare to leave the country.

Members of one shadowy group of some 400 men in southern Kandahar province have given The Independent a unique insight into their training and secret operations against militants as foreign troops prepare to quit Afghanistan by 2014.

Senior figures within one of the forces revealed that they were taught hand-to-hand combat by foreign military advisers, were delivered to targets by US Black Hawk helicopters and have received a letter of thanks from President Hamid Karzai for their work.

Despite their apparent military successes, one of the groups, the Kandahar Strike Force, has been dogged by rights abuse allegations that have raised questions about their role when their foreign handlers leave the country.

"These forces are the most shadowy and the most unaccountable in the country and it's a serious problem [that] nobody's taking responsibility for," said Rachel Reid, a senior policy adviser to the Open Society Foundation.

Under a revamped counterterror strategy released on 28 June, the US said it intended to "ensure the rapid degradation of al-Qa'ida's leadership structure" – and those of its adherents – using covert tactics going "beyond traditional intelligence, military, and law-enforcement functions".

Details of the group's operation were given in interviews by three former members in a prison outside Kabul where they are serving sentences, along with 38 comrades, for the killing of a police chief in 2009. The shoot-out was sparked by the detention of a member of the Kandahar Strike Force. They are appealing against their convictions.

The paramilitary groups are concentrated in eastern and southern Afghanistan where they collect intelligence, secure the border with Pakistan, and launch raids on militants from al-Qa'ida, the Taliban and the host of other militant groups. Taliban sources have told The Independent that the Kandahar Strike Force is the outfit they fear most.

Atal Afghanzai, a former commander of the Kandahar Strike Force, said that he was recruited when he heard the Americans were looking for guards. He was billeted at Camp Gecko, a sprawling place in the hills outside Kandahar City that was once home to the Taliban leader Mullah Omar but now houses a cafeteria, pool and fountain with catfish. According to The New York Times, the CIA and US Special Forces rented it from the late Ahmed Wali Karzai, half-brother to the Afghan President who was killed last week.

Foreign military advisers at the camp taught hand-to-hand combat and put new recruits through ambush training, as well as teaching them English, said Afghanzai. Everyone, he said, from the cook to the Special Forces advisers, was "working for OGA somehow": an acronym standing for "other government agencies" and generally used to refer to the CIA. "We had day raids, night raids. Any time we received intel from the NDS [Afghanistan's security service] that there were 10, 20, 50 insurgents gathering in a house or a garden, we'd launch an op." He did not discuss specific operations.

The Kandahar Strike Force grew to a 400-man outfit and became so effective that, according to Afghanzai, "President Karzai sent letters of thanks."

Two other members of the Kandahar Strike Force, Basir, a former platoon commander, and Fazel Mohammad, a deputy platoon commander, also held at the Pul-i-Charkhi prison, said they were serving Afghan commandos in 2004 when they were recruited to a "special unit". They said their commander was approached by an American adviser.

Prison authorities and the judge who presided over their 2009 trial confirmed that they worked at Camp Gecko. Afghan and Western officials also confirmed they were hired as private security guards working for the CIA at Camp Gecko and that they conducted raids.

CIA trains covert units of Afghans to continue the fight against Taliban - Asia, World - The Independent