Taliban delegation to arrive in Islamabad today for Afghan peace process

FO expressed that the visit of the Taliban will provide an opportunity to review progress on talks.

ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) - Taliban delegation will arrive in Pakistan today (Oct 2) as US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad also visited, officials said, though it was unclear if they would meet for the first time since US President Donald Trump scuttled talks between Washington and the Taliban.

According to details, Pakistan has intensified efforts for the Afghan peace process. A high level delegation of the Afghan Taliban will arrive in Islamabad today. The visit will provide an opportunity to review progress on US Taliban negotiations.The Taliban’s political commission was also invited to visit Doha.

The Foreign Office spokesman Dr. Mohammad Faisal said that Prime Minister Imran Khan called on the US President to resume peace talks.

FO expressed that the visit of Taliban will provide an opportunity to review progress on talks between Pakistan, the United States and the Taliban. During the visit, the possibility of restoration of Afghan peace talks will be reviewed.

Dr. Mohammad Faisal asserted that the Taliban delegation is visiting Islamabad, and his meeting with Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi is being finalized.

Earlier, US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad arrived in Islamabad for talks with Afghan Taliban to restore peace.

According to details, Afghan Taliban delegation led by Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, one of the group’s founders, will also visit the federal capital to discuss “important issues”, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen said.

The Taliban delegation would inform Pakistan’s leadership of the factors that derailed the talks with the United States aimed at striking a deal allowing U.S. and other foreign troops to withdraw in exchange for Taliban security guarantees, said a Taliban official, who declined to be identified.

U.S. and Taliban said last month they were close to reaching a deal, despite concern among some U.S. security officials and within the Afghan government that a U.S. withdrawal could plunge the country into even more conflict and open the way for resurgence of militant factions.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid tweeted that the Pakistan visit would be the fourth leg of a tour that included Russia, China and Iran.

The US embassy confirmed that Khalilzad was in Islamabad "this week" for consultations following discussions between the US and Pakistan at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week.

Baradar is head of the Taliban’s political wing and usually based in Qatar, where for nearly a year the insurgents held face-to-face meetings with a US delegation led by Khalilzad.

The two sides were on the brink of a deal that would have seen Washington begin withdrawing troops from Afghanistan in return for various security promises from the Taliban.

Trump abruptly declared the talks "dead" last month, however, citing a Taliban attack which had killed a US soldier just day earlier.

The Taliban’s Doha-based spokesman, Suhail Shaheen, told AFP that the simultaneous visits to Pakistan were a "coincidence".

But when asked whether there was any possibility of the insurgents meeting with Khalilzad, he replied: "Why not? It depends on the Americans."

The Taliban are still ready to sign the agreement which Khalilzad and Baradar had hashed out in Doha, he said.

"We have not backtracked from the agreement, we stand for it. The Americans have backtracked and they will have to take the initiative." Talks were the only way forward, he added.

"There is no military solution to Afghanistan. The Americans did their best for 18 years... but they were not able to solve this issue," Shaheen said.

"Better to sign the agreement, and then we will have a ceasefire with the Americans, and then intra-Afghan talks will be started immediately" to discuss issues "including a future government and a ceasefire. So that’s the solution to the problem," he told AFP.

With inputs from AFP and Reuters