{"id":92333,"date":"2021-01-27T07:36:09","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T12:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/?p=92333"},"modified":"2021-01-27T07:36:09","modified_gmt":"2021-01-27T12:36:09","slug":"auto-draft-463","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/2021\/01\/27\/auto-draft-463\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran Hosts Taliban to ‘Exchange Views’ on US-backed Afghan Peace Process"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"VOA \u2014 ISLAMABAD – Senior leaders of Afghanistan\u2019s Taliban insurgency traveled to Iran Tuesday to \u201cexchange views\u201d on U.S.-brokered peace negotiations between warring Afghan parties.
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\nIranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said the insurgent team had been formally invited to Tehran for bilateral meetings \u201cto review (the) Afghan peace process.\u201d
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\nIran\u2019s official media quoted Khatibzadeh as saying that the Taliban\u2019s visit was \u201cpart of Tehran\u2019s policy to reach out to key Afghan parties in the Afghan peace process.\u201d \u00a0
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\nHe said Taliban visitors held talks with senior government officials and they were also scheduled to meet Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif.
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\"Taliban<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>
FILE – Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar speaks, bottom right, talks at the opening session of the peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban in Doha, Qatar, Sept. 12, 2020.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban\u2019s deputy chief and head of the group\u2019s political office in Doha, Qatar, was leading the delegation. \u00a0
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\nAn official Taliban statement said its delegation in meetings with Iranian officials would discuss relations between the two neighboring countries and \u201cthe current political and security situation of Afghanistan and region.\u201d It did not elaborate further.
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\nAnalysts say Iran\u2019s move to host the Taliban could be an attempt to demonstrate to U.S. President Joe Biden\u2019s administration that Tehran is keen to play its part in promoting Afghan peace to improve ties with Washington.
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\n\u201c(The) Taliban\u2019s trip to Iran is more for Iran’s diplomatic benefits vis-a-vis the new U.S. administration,\u201d said Torek Farhadi, a former Afghan advisor and political commentator.
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\n\u201cIran shows it can also be helpful in the Afghan peace process\u2026and show positive cooperation in the region. Iran wants to impress Washington,\u201d Farhadi wrote on Twitter. \u00a0
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\nIntra-Afghan Talks<\/strong>
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\nThe Taliban is currently engaged in negotiations in Doha, Qatar, with a team of negotiators representing the Afghan government, where the two sides are tasked to agree on a political power-sharing deal that would permanently end deadly hostilities in Afghanistan.
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\"Taliban<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Afghan Official: 600 Freed Taliban Prisoners Rearrested \u00a0<\/div>\n
The development could pose a fresh challenge to US-backed Afghan peace efforts\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

The so-called intra-Afghan dialogue has stemmed from a February 2020 peace-building agreement former U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s administration struck with the Taliban to wind down nearly two decades of Afghan war.
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\nThe pact, which requires all U.S. and NATO troops to leave Afghanistan by May 2021, has reduced the number of U.S. soldiers to 2,500 from nearly 13,000 a year ago.
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\nHowever, President Joe Biden\u2019s new administration has said it intends to \u201creview\u201d the U.S.-Taliban deal. \u00a0
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\nU.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan conveyed the decision to his Afghan counterpart on Friday. \u00a0
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\nA White House statement quoted Sullivan as saying his team wants to assess whether the Taliban was living up to its commitments to cut ties with terrorist groups, to reduce Afghan violence and to engage in \u201cmeaningful negotiations\u201d with the government and other stakeholders\u201d in the country.
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\"Afghan<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Taliban See Ghani as ‘Obstacle’ to Afghan Peace<\/div>\n
In apparent rebuttal, Afghan president refuses to relinquish power, again vowing to transfer power to his ‘elected successor’\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani\u2019s government, which was kept out of the U.S.-Taliban accord, has been critical of the document, saying it gave \u201ctoo much\u201d concessions to the insurgents and emboldened them to intensify battlefield violence instead of reducing it. \u00a0
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\nGhani\u2019s national security advisor, Hamadullah Mohib, on Sunday denounced the Taliban as a \u201cterrorist group,\u201d alleging the insurgents “do not want peace through talks and instead they are preparing to intensify battlefield attacks\u201d in the upcoming summer fighting season. \u00a0
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\nSullivan\u2019s opening contact on Friday with Mohib by phone, however, is being hailed by leaders in Kabul and raising hopes Washington will press the Taliban to cease hostilities in favor of peace talks. \u00a0
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\n\u201cA new chapter in our relationship with America has opened and it will continue\u2026a quick review of the (U.S.) deal with the Taliban will be done… and then a fundamental consultation will be done with us,\u201d Ghani told a cabinet meeting on Monday. \u00a0
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\nThe Taliban has denied allegations it is behind the increase in violence and instead blames Kabul for lunching new operations against insurgent-held Afghan areas to try to subvert the U.S.-backed peace process. \u00a0
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\nMohammad Naeem, the Doha-based spokesman for the Taliban, while speaking to VOA this week stressed the need for the Biden team to stick to the February 29 agreement. He said the document is kept to ending Afghanistan\u2019s \u201cforeign occupation\u201d and years of bloodshed.
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\n\u201cIt is in everyone\u2019s interest for the agreement to be implemented as it is. We reiterate to fulfil our commitments outlined in the pact and demand the same from the other side,\u201d Naeem said. \u00a0
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\nAl-Qaida Gaining Strength \u00a0<\/strong>
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\nBut a new U.S. report says the al-Qaida terror network is \u201cgaining strength\u201d in Afghanistan while continuing to operate with the Taliban under the protection of the Afghan insurgent group.
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\nThe findings are part of a January 4 summary by the U.S. Department of Treasury about its programs to combat terrorist financing and activities. \u00a0
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\nIt says al-Qaida \u201ccapitalizes on its relationship with the Taliban through its network of mentors and advisers who are embedded with the Taliban, providing advice, guidance, and financial support.\u201d \u00a0
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\nThe Treasury\u2019s report notes \u201cas of May 2020, the Taliban and al-Qaeda [sic] maintained a strong relationship and continued to meet regularly.\u201d
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\nThe insurgent group has not immediately commented on the Treasury Department\u2019s findings but it has rejected previous such allegations.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VOA \u2014 ISLAMABAD – Senior leaders of Afghanistan\u2019s Taliban insurgency traveled to Iran Tuesday to \u201cexchange views\u201d on U.S.-brokered peace negotiations between warring Afghan parties. \u00a0 Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said the insurgent team had been formally invited to Tehran for bilateral meetings \u201cto review (the) Afghan peace process.\u201d \u00a0 Iran\u2019s official media […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":92334,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92333","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latests"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"en","enabled_languages":["fa","en"],"languages":{"fa":{"title":true,"content":false,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92333"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92333\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92336,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92333\/revisions\/92336"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}