KABUL: The Afghan government said on Wednesday it would free 1,500 Taliban prisoners, while delaying the release of another 3,500 that the militants say must be set free for talks to begin under a peace deal reached with the United States.
The Taliban promised to open talks with the Afghan government as part of the accord reached with the United States last month to end 18 years of U.S. involvement in war in Afghanistan.
The militants say the agreement requires the government to release 5,000 prisoners before talks begin.The government says the talks must begin and violence subside before it will free them all.
Sources have told Reuters the dispute arises in part because of different wording about the prisoner release in separate agreements the United States reached with the Taliban and the Afghan government. President Ashraf Ghani has issued a decree ordering the release of an initial 1,500 prisoners, with the other 3,500 to be set free as conditions are met, Ghani’s spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said.
“The Taliban want all 5,000 prisoners released at once, which is impossible,” Sediqqi told journalists at a news conference. The first prisoners would be freed on March 14, he said.
Suhail Shaheen, a spokesman for the Taliban based in Doha, told Reuters the group had never agreed that there would be conditions attached to the release of the 5,000 prisoners.
“If someone claims this, it will be against the peace accord that we signed on February 29,” Shaheen said. “It is properly explained in the peace accord that first 5,000 prisoners would be freed and then the Afghan dialogue would be initiated.”
Despite the accord between the United States and the Taliban, fighting has continued in various parts of the country.
“The Taliban will be responsible, not the Afghan government, if this process fails,” Sediqqi said.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. special envoy who was the key negotiator in talks with the Taliban, has urged both sides to sit down for talks. Taliban leaders told Reuters that their leadership council has also rejected an Afghan government demand that they give written guarantees that the released prisoners will not take part in fighting the Afghan government in the future.
Meanwhile, the formation of a negotiating team that is to participate in the talks with the Taliban as part of the intra-Afghan dialogue has been delayed due to continuing political consultations, Sediqqi said.
The composition of the team has been a bone of contention between the Afghan president and his main rival Abduallah Abdullah, who has refused to recognize Ghani’s reelection in last year’s presidential polls.
Abdullah, the runner-up who disputed the outcome in each of Afghanistan’s last three presidential elections, served as chief executive of a unity government since 2014. He held a ceremony this week to declare himself president on the same day Ghani was sworn in for a second term elsewhere in the capital. “President Ghani has told us he is consulting with Dr. Abdullah and other Afghan leaders and will announce an inclusive team in the coming few days,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Ghani’s spokesman announced that a decree had been issued to dissolve Abdullah’s chief executive post. Abdullah issued his own statement saying Ghani was no longer president and his decrees were not valid. The Taliban rejected the Afghan government’s attempt to resolve a spiralling crisis over the release of insurgent prisoners Wednesday, as Kabul warned it was ready to resume offensive battlefield operations.
The decree issued earlier by President Ashraf Ghani had raised hopes that Kabul’s offer to free 1,500 insurgents as a “gesture of goodwill” before talks begin, would prompt the Taliban to come to the negotiating table. But Taliban political spokesman Suhail Shaheen told media that “5,000 prisoners should be released as a trust-building measure, and … this should be before the intra-Afghan talks”, refusing to budge from a longstanding demand of the insurgents.
Any changes amounted to “a violation” of the deal struck between the insurgents and Washington in Doha last month, he added.
Even though Kabul was not a signatory to the deal, that accord stated that up to 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by Afghan authorities “will be” released before talks, prompting an angry reaction from Ghani. Ghani’s decree said the government would release 1,500 captives starting Saturday — but only if the insurgents cut violence — with plans to free another 3,500 prisoners after negotiations begin.
It was an attempt to resolve one of the long-running spats that has stymied peace talks between the insurgents and the Afghan government.
The Taliban announcement throws everything into doubt again, and each day of delay to negotiations brings more bloodshed, with the insurgents carrying out dozens of attacks across the country.
On Wednesday, the government warned it would resume offensive operations against the militants next week if violence continues, ending a unilateral partial truce put in place ahead of the talks. “The failure of this process will be on the Taliban,” Ghani’s spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said, adding: “We have taken necessary political steps but the other side still insists on violence”.
“Our forces are on active defence status but starting from next week if the Taliban keep violence on, we will retaliate,” he warned. In Afghanistan, the new week starts on Saturday.–Agencies
