Afghanistan Times
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KABUL: The Afghan government and Taliban negotiating teams are yet to officially begin talks after one week of the opening ceremony.
The progresses have been very little in this regard and the two sides’ contact groups have discussed to resolve technical problems.
Najia Anwari, spokeswoman at the state ministry of peace, said Saturday that resolve of differences were mostly focused in the talks.
“The next session will mostly discuss the procedures of the next meetings and also to change differences to a common point,” she said.
Fawzia Koofi, a member of the Afghan government’s negotiating delegation, admitted that there are some points to be finalized.
“The contact groups discussed on the principles of the next sessions that make the base of negotiations. Some issues have been solved, while some others still need negotiations to be solved.”
The government wants case fire as priority in the negotiations, but Taliban insist that the war elements should be clarified first.
Roland Kobia, from the European Union office in Kabul, expressed concerns over the increasing civilian casualties, citing a UN fresh data that violence in the past five weeks was unprecedented in Afghanistan.
The government blames Taliban for the violence, but the insurgents deny accusations, saying their fighters “never” targeted civilians.
The UN Security Council in its Friday session, welcomed the intra-Afghan dialogues.
