Taliban fighters detain a man for campaigning in the Afghan elections. British envoys want Karzai to reach a settlement with militant leaders. Photograph: ReutersUS In Back-Channel Talks With Afghan Taliban -- DAWN
ISLAMABAD: After fighting a bloody war in Afghanistan for more than eight years, the United States appears to have undertaken a re-think of its policy and has started engaging the Taliban in negotiations through Saudi and Pakistani intelligence agencies, highly-placed sources told Dawn here on Monday.
‘We have started ‘engagement’ with the Afghan Taliban and are hopeful that our efforts will bear fruit,’ a source involved in secret negotiations told this correspondent.
He said that four ‘major neutral players’ were engaged with the Afghan Taliban on behalf of the Saudi leadership and the General Intelligence Directorate (GID) of Saudi Arabia and the Pakistani leadership and Inter Services Intelligence (ISI).
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My Comment: I am very skeptical that such talks (if true) will go anywhere. The Taliban leadership have made it very clear to their followers that there is no room for negotiation with the Afghan Government and NATO/U.S. forces unless they are willing to withdraw. Since that is not going to happen, from their perspective there is no reason to enter into discussions.
But if there has been preliminary talks, this tells me that President Obama may be trying his best to ascertain what the Taliban are thinking, and is using the pretext of talks to get this insight. On the flip side, the Taliban are probably doing the same thing. They are trying their best to ascertain what President Obama is, and are using the pretext of talks to get their own insight thinking.
This is a breaking story, and I will have more information tomorrow morning.