Insecure Karzai torpedoes US-Taliban talks

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Insecure Karzai torpedoes US-Taliban talks

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Afghan government leaked details of the US-Taliban talks details.

29 August,2011 05:11 pm

Infuriated that Washington met secretly at least three times with a personal emissary of Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar, the Afghan government intentionally leaked details of the clandestine meetings, scuttling the talks and sending the Taliban intermediary into hiding.In a series of interviews with diplomats, current and former Taliban, Afghan government officials and a close childhood friend of the intermediary, Tayyab Aga is hiding in Europe, and is afraid to return to Pakistan because of fears of reprisals. The United States has had no direct contact with him for months.A senior US official acknowledged that the talks imploded because of the leak and that Aga, while alive, had disappeared. The United States will continue to pursue talks, the official said. Current and former US officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the talks.The United States acknowledged the talks after Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who apparently fears being sidelined by US-Taliban talks, confirmed published accounts about them in June, but has never publicly detailed the content, format or participants. The first was held in late 2010 followed by at least two other meetings in early spring of this year, the former US official said. The sessions were held in Germany and Qatar, he said.A childhood friend of Agas who spoke on condition he should not be identified because he feared retaliation, said Aga was in Germany. A diplomat in the region said Aga fled to a European country after his contacts with the United States were revealed.Collapse of the direct talks between Aga and US officials probably spoiled the best chance yet at reaching Omar, considered the linchpin to ending the Taliban fight against the US-backed government in Afghanistan. The contacts were preliminary but had begun to bear fruit, Afghan and US officials said.Perhaps most importantly they offered the tantalizing prospect of a brokered agreement between the United States and the Taliban one that would allow the larger reconciliation of the Taliban into Afghanistan political life to move forward. The United States has not committed to any such deal, but the Taliban wants security assurances from the United States.The talks were deliberately revealed by someone within the presidential palace, where Karzais office is located, said a Western and an Afghan official. The reason for the leak was Karzais animosity toward the US and fear that any agreement Washington brokered would undermine his authority, they said.Pakistan had also been kept in the dark about the talks, people knowledgeable about them said. An Afghan official with contacts with the Taliban said the insurgents decided not to tell Pakistan about the meetings with the United States. At the time of the leak, Washington had already offered small concessions that the US intended as confidence-building measures, a former senior US official said. They were aimed at developing a rapport and moving talks forward, said a current US official on condition he not be identified because of the sensitivity of the topic.The concessions included treating the Taliban and al-Qaida differently under international sanctions. The Taliban argued that while al-Qaida is focused on worldwide jihad against the West, Taliban militants have focused on Afghanistan and have shown little interest in attacking targets abroad.