Taliban Join Afghan Peace Talks

New York Times:

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Talks to end the war in Afghanistan involve extensive, face-to-face discussions with Taliban commanders from the highest levels of the group's leadership, who are secretly leaving their sanctuaries in Pakistan with the help of NATO troops, officials here say.

The discussions, some of which have taken place in Kabul, are unfolding between the inner circle of President Hamid Karzai and members of the Quetta shura, the leadership group that oversees the Taliban war effort inside Afghanistan. Afghan leaders have also held discussions with leaders of the Haqqani network, considered to be one of the most hard-line guerrilla factions fighting here; and members of the Peshawar shura, whose fighters are based in eastern Afghanistan.

The Taliban leaders coming into Afghanistan for talks have left their havens in Pakistan on the explicit assurance that they will not be attacked or arrested by NATO forces, Afghans familiar with the talks say. Many top Taliban leaders reside in Pakistan, where they are believed to enjoy at least some official protection.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[m2b]

08:50 PM on 10/24/2010

Something about this seems too good to be true. Diplomacy? No way! Who would've thunk it..

[mamacat]

07:45 PM on 10/21/2010

I would so love to see an end to this war. Let us concentrate on fighting Osama bin Laden, and stay out of Afghan internal affairs as much as possible.

Christians occupying a Muslim country? Whose idea was that? Oh yeah, I remember now - the same guys who lied us into the Iraq War.

[m2b]

08:44 PM on 10/24/2010

Let us concentrate on peace and not "fighting" anyone for chrissake

[2bad]

09:59 AM on 10/25/2010

Osama bin Laden, if the truth were known, probably had little or nothing to do with 9/11. He was used as "The Face of Terror". The right always needs that person or group they can point to as the boogie-man. The fear level must be escalated. The right needs Americans to be convinced they're threatened and their side is the only group who can protect them. Reagan did it with the Soviets and Boy George did it with bin Laden. Why do you think he let him go when they had him cornered? He needed him to be out there so they could keep the fear level high!

[General Armchair]

06:58 AM on 10/21/2010

I think Haqqani was responsible for the May 18 2010 suicide car bombing in Kabul that killed a US and a Canadian colonel, and two US lieutenant colonels, and their SUV drivers. This was probably the most successful military strike by the Taliban in the entire Afghan war.

This attack at the very highest levels of US command structure in Afghanistan went barely noticed in the press at the time, but the implications must have rung loud throughout the US military in Afghanistan. Given that somebody must have had "actionable intelligence" to put the suicide car bomber at the right spot at the right time, the security of our very highest level commanders in the heart of Kabul (and obviously in many other areas of the US effort in Afghanistan) was called into question, except nobody questioned it, at least publicly.

The NYTimes story mentions that earlier this year Petraeus wanted Haqqani put on a terrorist list. This request came in July, two months after the Kabul bombing, but not even three weeks after Petraeus had moved from Centcom to battlefield commander in Afghanistan.

I don't think this is coincidence.

[CFL68]

01:10 AM on 10/21/2010

Hey - anything is worth a try.

Maybe they have split into factions with some more amenable to peace than others.

Maybe its a ruse to sow distrust among different factions.

I don't see anything good coming from afghanistan. One side needs to win.

What really sucks is if taliban take over again, we will still end up supporting them indirectly through pakistan. We should pull out and let pakistan sleep in this bed they have made. But then that crappy gov't falls to an even crappier one and they still have nukes.

[pewty]

03:44 AM on 10/21/2010

"One side needs to win"---in war, no one truly wins......

[CFL68]

10:55 AM on 10/21/2010

Actually, in most wars, one party does win. They then leverage their authority over their enemies / civil society in one form or another, and shape the future.

Its important to recognize that the 'good guys' don't always win. A brutal dark ages theocracy may well prevail and re-exert control over Afghanistan. The weak and corrupt progressives could fail.

[omobob]

07:57 PM on 10/20/2010

If we play our cards right the US Military could suddenly find themselves out maneuvered politically by the Taliban. A tailor made excuse to leave if ever i heard. Another US foreign military disaster can always be spun into some kind of success. Doesn’t really matter. US citizens are not behind the Military Command’s execution of the conflict anyhow.

[Buford2k10]

05:37 PM on 10/20/2010

I hope they put a tracking device on them, so the Predators have a good target.

[khanti]

09:20 PM on 10/20/2010

There are an estimate 30,000 Taliban fighters. So far using predators only managed to kill a handful of them along with some civilians because it is damn expensive to fight a war this way. When you bomb their leaders(if they are really their leaders) usually the head of their tribe then they will elect a new one but this time with greater hatred and vengeance. Hatred does not appease hatred.

[General Armchair]

07:57 AM on 10/21/2010

We will soon find we have killed those 30,000 several times over.

[riff4u]

02:36 PM on 10/20/2010

It will be interesting to watch the Taliban march out Karzai and hang him as the post- Soviet Afghan government did to the Soviet puppet Nagibullah with the nod of Washington. Now it's Washington's turn to watch their puppet go down.

[Durango]

04:51 PM on 10/20/2010

If treality was only so simple.

With a nod from Washington?

Where did you get that ONE?

[riff4u]

03:11 PM on 10/21/2010

Did anybody from Washington even speak out against Nagibullah execution? Besides getting the Soviets out of Afghanistan, getting rid of their puppet ruler as also on the agenda.

[LaBrayne35]

01:14 PM on 10/20/2010

Why I always thought that Afghanistan was the war Democrats supported 100%...that was what Barack, Nancy & Harry always said...they're going to cut the legs out from under our military here too? What a trick they played.

[pewty]

03:47 AM on 10/21/2010

HuH???? What a tule you are. Hope your sterile.

[Voting citizen]

01:14 PM on 10/20/2010

Taliban. Peace. Oxymoron.

[Bhokara]

12:23 PM on 10/20/2010

This means the square root of zero.

Filkins says in his report, the names of the three members of the Quetta Shura are being withheld, because if they were released, they would be killed by the other 24 Shura members.

Obviously these are not "peace talks," they're about three a-holes trying to find a way to Dubai. Until the Quetta Shura is on board, which it will never be, there will be no real peace talks.

[General Armchair]

08:05 AM on 10/21/2010

Karzai is the guy who told the West to go blow and he would appoint all members of the election commission, thank you very much, this after his bunch just got finished ripping off the August 2009 election.

I think a guy who shows as much ability to compromise (i.e., none) on something not all that important in the scheme of things, is not somebody I take seriously. I think everybody knows that Karzai and Wali Karzai are just doing their level best to loot OUR treasury before they flight out to Dubai.

[Ihaveadream]

11:43 AM on 10/20/2010

So they come in with NATO escorts and play nice so they get in on the dole. Watch as they line up for their welfare checks courtesy the US taxpayer debt that makes them millionaires like the kind of voter fraud Karzai and his corrupt relatives and friends.

You think we're going to leave anytime soon? Not a chance with all the bases and building going on. We're still going to pour $$Billions into that sh*thole so that the pipelines carry the oil and gas to China for the pay to play corporations.

[Ihaveadream]

11:44 AM on 10/20/2010

correcting typo : the King of Voter Fraud, Karzai

[Bhokara]

12:20 PM on 10/20/2010

I thought George Bush was the King of Voter Fraud.

[Fein]

11:39 AM on 10/20/2010

I thought 'we didn't negotiate with terrorists'?

Does this mean that the Taliban have been promoted? Or are they simply winning!

[AntoineHuff]

11:37 AM on 10/20/2010

So after 9 years of war, the US will hand back the country to the same people they removed in the first place. War is wrong, but useless wars is worse.

[americancolonyinhell]

11:54 AM on 10/20/2010

Very well said, antoine. Fanned.

[knightoftheroundtable]

11:31 AM on 10/20/2010

So why are we still in Afghanistan? Pakistan is an Allie of the Taliban, Kharzi is nutts and our government is devastating this country for what? Oh, yes, the military complex and elitist need to keep control.

[Kris Bui]

10:38 AM on 10/20/2010

Let them handle their business and bring ALL of our military HOME.