The Trump administration is pleading with Taliban and Afghan government officials to begin peace talks as the country heads for a Syria-style civil war that includes warring rebels and a central government.
“There is no alternative to pushing forward with peace,” State Department special representative Zalmay Khalilzad said Friday.
Afghan and Taliban officials have failed to begin the negotiations contemplated by a U.S.-Taliban deal orchestrated by Khalilzad due to a stalled prisoner exchange process and continuing terrorist attacks. Peace prospects reached a new low after this week’s bombing of a maternity ward in Kabul. U.S. officials maintain that an Islamic State offshoot conducted the attack, but Afghan officials blamed the Taliban and called for a new offensive against the militant group.
“Neither the Taliban hands nor their stained consciousness can be washed of the blood of women, babies & other innocent in the latest senseless carnage,” Afghan Vice President Amrullah Saleh tweeted Friday.
Khalilzad reiterated the U.S. view “that ISIS is responsible for the attack on the hospital” despite Saleh’s insistence that this assessment amounts to “naivete” about the Taliban. The American envoy emphasized the importance of finalizing a deal while U.S. troops are on the ground, lest the belligerents find themselves in the kind of bloodletting that the Syrian people have endured since ISIS and rival rebel groups began fighting each other and the Bashar Assad regime simultaneously.
“It will be best that this inter-Afghan negotiation happen when we have substantial forces still in Afghanistan,” Khalilzad emphasized. “Both the Talibs say they don’t want an endless war and a Syria scenario, and the Afghan government says that they want a political settlement and negotiations.”
Khalilzad confirmed that the United States is in the process of “implementing the first phase of the agreement,” including the provision that calls for lowering the number of U.S. troops in the country to 8,600 by mid-July. He maintained that ISIS Khorasan, as the Afghanistan affiliate is known, conducted the attack on the maternity ward in order to undermine the negotiations.
“We are urging both sides not to fall into that trap but indeed to cooperate against terrorists, including ISIS,” he said.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani adopted an aggressive posture Friday, following the release of a government assessment that Taliban forces have killed nearly 500 civilians in more than 3,700 attacks since the signing of the U.S.-Taliban deal in February.
“Today, once again, there is a need for you to demonstrate your hidden power and bring out your swords from the sheath,” Ghani said in a Friday address to the national security forces. “We are not moving away from peace. Our objective is to prove that the power of our commandos shows them the power of the sovereignty of the law.”
