Washington backs Afghan-owned peace talks

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AT Monitoring Desk-KABUL: With putting weight behind Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace and reconciliation process, the Trump administration doesn’t see the Taliban insurgents to be ready for peace talks.

US directly ruled out direct negotiations with the Taliban insurgents, something sought by the extremist group in an open letter to the American government and people.

“We certainly saw this letter and are aware of it. Any peace talks with Afghanistan have to be Afghan-led and Afghan-owned. That has long been our policy,” the State Department spokesperson said.

Heather Nauert told reporters at her daily news conference: “The Taliban, unfortunately, don’t seem ready at this point to sit down and have conversations about peace talks.

“We hope eventually they will, because that is the best way to be able to have peace in Afghanistan,” Nauert said, responding to a question on the letter.

“Ultimately, we don’t see there being a military solution to the situation in Afghanistan. Ultimately, it has to be a political situation, a political solution,” she added.

“And that can best be done, if the Taliban are willing to sit down and have talks. Certainly, the US government could have a role in that. But that’s really up to Afghanistan,” Nauert concluded.

The militant Taliban have sought to enter peace dialogue with the U.S. government, in the wake of calls for closure of their Qatar diplomatic office. This comes as the militant group has repetitively refused the offers of the Afghan government for direct talks.

The Afghan government has often called on the Taliban to send their envoys and join Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace dialogue in order to reach to a durable solution to the decades-lasting war – which has taken its toll on the innocent Afghans including women and children. But the peace call always put downed to the deaf hears.

In the recent days after the U.S. came up with an agenda to close the Taliban’s Doha office, the militant group now solicits direct dialogue with the Americans – an analogy to asking for the key to a house from a stranger, not its owner.