20 June 2011
Outgoing US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has confirmed that the US is holding "outreach" talks with members of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Mr Gates said talks were "preliminary" but that a political solution was the way "most of these wars end".
It is the first time the US has acknowledged such contact and comes a day after Afghan President Hamid Karzai said peace talks had started.
The US is due to start withdrawing its 97,000 troops from Afghanistan...
Read the post »
08 June 2011
Afghan officials are asking the United Nations Security Council to lift sanctions against some 50 Taliban figures, a senior diplomat said on Tuesday, amid moves towards reconciliation.
The Council's Al-Qaeda and Taliban sanctions committee is expected to decide whether to remove the names -- who include members of the High Council for Peace set up last year by President Hamid Karzai to seek talks with the Taliban -- by the middle of this month.
Western...
Read the post »
03 June 2011
Britain and the United States are pressing for United Nations sanctions against 18 former senior Taliban figures to be lifted later this month in the strongest indication yet that the western powers are looking for a negotiated peace with the Taliban.
Candidates include the controversial former head of the regime's religious police, Mohammed Qalamuddin, whose officers were responsible for some of the worst atrocities under the Taliban regime. Officials...
Read the post »
03 August 2010
UN Sanctions Dropped Against 5 Senior Taliban, Reuters Africa, 3 August 2010
EXCERPT: "Five Taliban have been struck off a U.N. Security Council list of militants subject to sanctions -- a move sought by Kabul to ease reconciliation talks with insurgents, the United Nations said on Friday.
Their removal from the U.N. blacklist followed a review of the list of Taliban and al Qaeda members maintained by a Security Council committee. Two of...
Read the post »
22 July 2010
US Adds Haqqani Network, Taliban Leaders to List of Designated Terrorists, The Long War Journal, 22 July 2010
EXCERPT: "The US Treasury Department has added three top Haqqani Network and Taliban leaders to the list of designated terrorists for their support of terror groups in Afghanistan.
Nasiruddin Haqqani, Gul Agha Ishakzai, and Amir Abdullah have been designated as terrorists under Executive Order 13224 for 'supporting...
Read the post »
16 July 2010
Afghanistan Pushes at UN to Encourage Taliban Reconciliation, BusinessWeek, 16 July 2010
EXCERPT: "Afghanistan's government, encouraging reconciliation with the Taliban, is seeking the removal of 10 militants from a United Nations blacklist and welcoming the naming of a Canadian judge to review cases.
Zahir Tanin, Afghanistan's ambassador to the UN, said the 10 names were given last week to the Security Council committee that implements...
Read the post »
12 July 2010
Afghanistan Frees More Suspected Taliban, Reuters, 12 July 2010
EXCERPT: "Afghanistan has freed a second group of suspected Taliban prisoners in a peace offering to the insurgency after a review of their cases, President Hamid Karzai's office said on Monday.
The release of 28 prisoners from various detention centers came a month after an initial 14 others were let go from U.S. and Afghan jails in the wake of a 'Peace Jirga,' or summit,...
Read the post »
13 June 2010
United Nations Could Hasten Removal of Taliban Leaders From Terror Blacklist, The New York Times, 12 June 2010
EXCERPT: "The United Nations is speeding up efforts that could lead to the removal of Taliban leaders from an international terrorist blacklist, the top United Nations official here said Saturday. At a news conference, the official, Staffan de Mistura, the secretary general's special representative to Afghanistan, said the United...
Read the post »
02 February 2010
US Officials Grapple with New Plans to Take Some Taliban Members Off UN Sanctions List, The Canadian Press, 2 February 2010
EXCERPT: "Once considered so entwined that they were twin targets of a U.S. invasion, al-Qaida and elements of Afghanistan's Taliban are now being surgically separated, one careful stitch at a time.
The move by the United Nations last week to remove five former Taliban members from its official sanctions list reflects...
Read the post »
25 January 2010
U.N. Seeks to Drop Some Taliban From Terror List, The New York Times, 24 January 2010
EXCERPT: "The leader of the United Nations mission here called on Afghan officials to seek the removal of at least some senior Taliban leaders from the United Nations? list of terrorists, as a first step toward opening direct negotiations with the insurgent group. In an interview, Kai Eide, the United Nations special representative, also implored the...
Read the post »