“There is no truth in these published reports saying that the delegation of the Islamic Emirate would meet with representatives of the Karzai government in Saudi Arabia in the near future,” the Taliban said on their website.
Afghan officials, requesting anonymity, had suggested that the two sides would hold talks in Saudi Arabia separate from planned negotiations in Qatar between the Taliban and the United States.
But it was never clear whether the Taliban, who have so far resisted talks with the Afghan government, or the Saudis, who have conditioned involvement on the Taliban renouncing al-Qaeda, would come on board.
Taliban negotiators have begun preliminary discussions with the United States in Qatar on plans for peace talks aimed at ending the decade-long war. They have also announced plans to set up an office in Doha.
On Wednesday, the Taliban said they had not yet “reached the negotiation phase with the US and its allies”. A day earlier, a government spokesman in Kabul cautioned that no steps had been taken to start talks in Saudi Arabia. “The Afghan government is very clear on talks — we have always preferred Saudi to Qatar,” Akim Hasher, head of the Government Media and Information Centre, told AFP. “There is a possibility that the talks will take place in Saudi as well — Qatar is definitely not the only option.”
No comments:
Post a Comment