rferl--2019-08-12--Taliban Afghan Peace Talks With US Long And Useful Sides To Consult

Taliban: Afghan Peace Talks With U.S. 'Long And Useful'; Sides To Consult

U.S. and Taliban negotiators will consult their leaders following an eighth round of peace talks to end the nearly 18-year war in Afghanistan, the Taliban says.      Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the negotiations in the Qatari capital, Doha, ended early on August 12, adding: "It was long and useful. Both sides decided to consult with their leaders/seniors for the next steps."      U.S. officials didn’t immediately comment.      But on August 11, as Afghans were marking the Muslim festival of Eid Al-Adha, U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad expressed hope that “this is the last Eid where Afghanistan is at war.”      “I know Afghans yearn for peace. We stand with them and are working hard toward a lasting & honorable peace agreement and a sovereign Afghanistan which poses no threat to any other country,” Khalilzad tweeted.  “Many scholars believe that the deeper meaning of [Eid Al-Adha] is to sacrifice one's ego. Leaders on all sides of the war in Afghanistan must take this to heart as we strive for peace,” he wrote in a separate tweet.  Few details have emerged, but a U.S.-Taliban deal would cover the withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan in exchange for guarantees by the Taliban that Afghanistan would not become a haven for other extremist groups.      Such an accord would be followed by intra-Afghan peace negotiations on a political settlement and a permanent cease-fire.      The Taliban has so far refused to negotiate with the Western-backed government in Kabul, calling it a “puppet regime.”  As U.S. and Taliban negotiators appeared to be closing in on an accord, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani on August 11 said Afghanistan’s future “cannot be decided outside.”  Ghani insisted that peace was only possible "between the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the Taliban movement."      Washington has said it wants a peace deal finalized by September 1, and some U.S. officials have hinted at the possibility that the Afghan presidential election set for September 28 could be canceled in the event of a peace settlement and the formation of an interim government that the Taliban would join.      Ghani called for the vote to be held as planned, saying: “Without a legitimate and strong government that comes through an election, Afghans won't be able to achieve a dignified peace."      Earlier this month, the militants denounced the election as a "sham," and warned fellow Afghans to stay away from campaign rallies and the polls, saying such gatherings could be targeted.  On August 12, Afghanistan's National Directorate For Security intelligence service announced in a statement that 35 Taliban prisoners will be released as "a clear sign" of the government's "strong will" for peace.


rferl--2019-08-22--US Taliban Kick Off Ninth Round Of Afghan Peace Talks In Qatar

U.S., Taliban Kick Off Ninth Round Of Afghan Peace Talks In Qatar

U.S. and Taliban negotiators have resumed talks in Qatar to firm up a peace deal to end the nearly 18-year conflict in Afghanistan, reports say.  U.S. officials and Taliban spokesmen were quoted as saying that the ninth round of talks started on August 22 in the Qatari capital of Doha.  A Taliban member said U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, who has been leading the negotiations with the militant group since last year, also met one-on-one on August 21 with the Taliban's lead negotiator, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Associated Press reported.  Khalilzad is scheduled to travel to Kabul to "inform the top Afghan leaders about the peace deal and then finalize a declaration to end the war in Afghanistan," a senior U.S. official privy to the peace negotiations told Reuters.  Previous rounds of U.S.-Taliban negotiations have focused on issues including a U.S. troop withdrawal, a cease-fire, intra-Afghan negotiations to follow, and guarantees by the militant group not to harbor terrorist groups.  The Taliban has so far rejected holding direct talks with the Afghan government.  The United States formally ended its Afghan combat mission in 2014 but about 14,000 U.S. troops remain in the country, mainly training and advising government forces battling the Taliban, an affiliate of the Islamic State group, and other militants. Some U.S. forces carry out counterterrorism operations.  U.S. President Donald Trump said on August 20 that the U.S. military role in Afghanistan had basically turned into a "ridiculous" police force.  The next day, two U.S. service members were killed in action in the country, joining more than 2,400 U.S. service personnel who have died in the United States' longest war, which started with the 2001 U.S.-led invasion to topple the Taliban.


rt--2019-09-08--Afghan peace talks dead for the time being US wont enter any agreement Pompeo

Afghan peace talks dead ‘for the time being’ & US won't enter any agreement – Pompeo

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said that peace negotiations with Afghanistan’s Taliban are dead and that Washington will not enter any future agreement without “commitments” from the militants.  Appearing on a round of cable news shows Sunday morning, Pompeo told one of these, Fox News, that negotiations with the Taliban are dead “for the time being,” adding that Washington is recalling its special envoy to Afghanistan to work out its next steps. Also appearing on CNN, Pompeo said that the US would not enter into any future agreement with the Taliban without “significant commitments” from the fighters, who now control more Afghan territory than at any point since the US invasion in 2001.  Pompeo’s statements come one day after President Donald Trump canceled meetings with Taliban officials at Camp David. Trump scrapped the talks –which were planned in secret– after Taliban-claimed attacks in Kabul killed 12 people, including one American soldier, earlier in the week.  “If they cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway,” Trump tweeted on Saturday.  With diplomacy scuppered, Pompeo told CNN that “if the Taliban don’t behave...we’re not going to reduce our support for the Afghan security forces that have fought so hard there in Afghanistan,” a hint that the US may remain involved in Afghan affairs for some time yet.  President Trump dropped a similar hint on Saturday night, asking “how many more decades are they willing to fight?”  Prior to the canceled meeting, US officials seemed hopeful that an end to the 18-year conflict in Afghanistan was near. US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad presented a draft US-Taliban agreement to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at the beginning of the month, which outlined plans for a US withdrawal from the country in exchange for a Taliban pledge not to plan attacks abroad from within Afghanistan.  Trump’s revelation that the talks had fallen apart drew a wave of political and media criticism for even hosting them in the first place. Democrat and Republican lawmakers alike argued that members of the Taliban should “never” be allowed onto US soil. CNN’s Jake Tapper asked Pompeo on Sunday whether he would support a similar move from a Democrat president, especially one taking place days before the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.  “We have an obligation to do everything we can,” Pompeo responded, and told Tapper that he has always been “fully supportive” of Trump’s efforts to sit down with the Taliban.    Like this story? Share it with a friend!


russiainsider--2019-02-01--Maverick Trump Plows On Says Willing to Meet Taliban Demand to Withdraw From Afghanistan If Peace R

Maverick Trump Plows On, Says Willing to Meet Taliban Demand to Withdraw From Afghanistan If Peace Reached

In comments at the White House on Thursday, President Trump finally addressed weeks of reports of peace negotiation in Afghanistan, saying that if a peace deal is reached, he is willing to withdraw all American troops from Afghanistan.  That’s a huge deal, and not just because the US has been occupying Afghanistan since 2001. These comments came the same day that the Senate passed a non-binding resolution expressing opposition to leaving Afghanistan.  Indications are that a peace deal with the Taliban to cap off over 17 years of war is a very real possibility. The Taliban’s main demand is for all foreign troops to leave Afghanistan, and would guarantee no ISIS or al-Qaeda bases are allowed in Afghanistan.  While other officials have said a lot of other issues need to be sorted out for a final deal to be reached, those are already the broad strokes of a pact, and a reason to be optimistic that a negotiated settlement could happen.  Indeed. This is the only way peace happens. The Taliban have been offering to come out of the bush forever now but their key demand has always been that foreigners agree to a withdrawal timetable -- and since Trump and Americans want the very same thing, why not?  That Trump has finally confirmed this publicly confirms the current peace talks in Qatar are serious and have a real chance of producing a settlement. Best not to get one's hopes up, but after 18 years America's longest war and occupation of another sovereign nation could actually soon finally be over.  Moreover it shows Trump won't bent to the blob on this one easily. The Senate republicans are voting against him and for permanent war. He doesn't care. He schooled the Republican Party mainstream three years ago and should stick to his guns.  Hate him for Venezuela, Yemen, Iran, Khan Shaykhun strikes...(indeed the list is long), but is he an unqualified evil on everything? No, not by comparison to anyone else that was likely to win the White House in 2016. It's been one step forward, two steps back, but on Syria, Afghanistan and Korea he is the unlikely, the best, the only, chance for peace those places and the Americans have.


sottnet--2019-08-13--Taliban Afghan-US peace talks were long and useful sides to consult with leaders for next steps

Taliban: Afghan-US peace talks were 'long and useful; sides to consult with leaders for next steps

U.S. and Taliban negotiators will consult their leaders following an eighth round of peace talks to end the nearly 18-year war in Afghanistan, the Taliban says. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the negotiations in the Qatari capital, Doha, ended early on August 12, adding: "It was long and useful. Both sides decided to consult with their leaders/seniors for the next steps."U.S. officials didn't immediately comment. But on August 11, as Afghans were marking the Muslim festival of Eid Al-Adha, U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad expressed hope that "this is the last Eid where Afghanistan is at war." Khalilzad tweeted: Few details have emerged, butSuch an accord would be followed by intra-Afghan peace negotiations on a political settlement and a permanent cease-fire.The Taliban has so far refused to negotiate with the Western-backed government in Kabul, calling it a "puppet regime."As U.S. and Taliban negotiators appeared to be closing in on an accord,Ghani insisted that peace was only possible "between the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the Taliban movement."and some U.S. officials have hinted at the possibility that thein the event of a peace settlement and the formation of an interim government that the Taliban would join.Ghani called for the vote to be held as planned, saying:Earlier this month, the militants denounced the election as a "sham, " and warned fellow Afghans to stay away from campaign rallies and the polls, saying such gatherings could be targeted.On August 12, Afghanistan's National Directorate For Security intelligence service announced in a statement that 35 Taliban prisoners will be released as "a clear sign" of the government's "strong will" for peace.


sottnet--2019-09-02--US-Taliban peace talks fail in Doha Afghan presidential election up ahead

US-Taliban peace talks fail in Doha, Afghan presidential election up ahead

did not offer a timeline for the withdrawal, which is what the Taliban demands.  The United States and Taliban have concluded the ninth day of the ninth round of peace negotiations in Qatar with no final agreement in sight, a Sputnik correspondent reported on Saturday.The issues discussed during the Qatar talks include pulling out foreign armed forces from Afghanistan, a comprehensive ceasefire, prisoner release and future intra-Afghan negotiations.While some, like Wahidullah Ghazi Khel, the spokesman for the new National Front have hope that the technical teams working on both sides will reach an agreement shortly , the correspondent reported.The Taliban insist that the Afghan authorities should participate in the talks not as a government but as a political movement.The peace talks, meanwhile, were overshadowed by overnight clashes between the Taliban and the Afghan government forces in Kunduz.While the Afghan government has claimed that the attack had been successfully repelled, the Sputnik correspondent has reported that there were fears that, while the government has vowed to safeguard the democratic process.Conflict-struck Afghanistan has been long torn by fighting between government troops and the Taliban, who are currently negotiating a peace deal with the United States.


sputnik--2019-02-06--Taliban Shifts to Talks With Moscow Despite Possible US Peace Deal

However, no Afghan government officials were present at the meeting, and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani strongly criticized the talks as undermining his government.  Dr. Marvin Weinbaum, the scholar-in-residence and director of the Middle East Institute's Center for Pakistan and Afghanistan Studies, joined Radio Sputnik's Loud & Clear Tuesday to discuss the Taliban talks.  "I think that unless, and until, they're [the Taliban] willing to talk directly with the Afghan government, it's going to be very difficult for the US, as much as it is angling to get out of Afghanistan as soon as possible. But if it does so without a ceasefire and some kind of discussions between the Taliban and the government in Kabul, it's going to look too much like we [the US] sold them out," Weinbaum told hosts John Kiriakou and Brian Becker.  The US invaded Afghanistan in 2001 as a reaction to the 9/11 terror attacks, with the mission lasting until December 28, 2014. Since then, Afghanistan has been in a state of political turmoil, with the government unable to establish full control over the country's territory due to various terrorist factions, in particular the Taliban and Daesh.  The US has long insisted that the Afghan government take part in the peace negotiations; however, the Taliban has said it is the only stakeholder in Afghanistan that will deal with the US, rejecting the Kabul government as a US puppet.  In January, US President Donald Trump announced that the US and the Taliban had reportedly finalized a deal to end the war in Afghanistan. The deal will ensure that terrorist groups are not allowed to use the country as a base of operations and that the US and other foreign countries will withdraw their troops, Sputnik previously reported.  "As far as the Moscow discussions, they are significant," Weinbaum told Sputnik.  "Part of the Taliban's approach here is, ‘We are not against talking to Afghans… we don't want to talk to the Kabul government because they aren't in a position to negotiate. They are just puppets to the US," Weinbaum added.  "What is interesting about the meeting in Moscow is that opposition politicians in the country representing all of the major opposition parties are in Moscow today talking. But they're all trying to diminish the Kabul government in the lead-up to the elections, which will take place this summer. So, what they want to show is that this government has no credibility, and that there should be an interim government and then elections to hopefully oust the government," Weinbaum continued.  In addition, the meeting in the Russian capital is a victory for the Kremlin, according to Weinbaum.  "[The meeting is Moscow] sidelines the American negotiations and means that there is an alternative. Russia would like to say that ‘whatever goes on in Afghanistan, we would very much like to be part of it.' This is a bit of a struggle between the US and Russia, because we are in a position where both parties are trying to say they can do what has to be done in terms of ending the conflict, but theirs is the way to do it," Weinbaum noted.


sputnik--2019-03-13--In Interests of Israel and Syria to Negotiate Peace Professor

'In Interests of Israel and Syria to Negotiate Peace' – Professor

Last month, Senators Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton, together with Representative Mike Gallagher, introduced a resolution to ensure that Israel retains control of the Golan Heights.  On Thursday, Syria reportedly warned the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation that Damascus will attack Israel if it does not leave the Golan Heights. The region was taken by Israel from Syria during the Six-Day War of 1967. Neither the UN nor the US recognises the territory as belonging to Israel.  Sputnik: What do you think about the announcement by Lindsey Graham that he will push for US recognition of the Golan Heights? Do you think it's just part of a campaign effort?  Eyal Zisser: You know, in Israel itself we are approaching elections, this is one thing. And in the United States, there is the tension between the Democrats and the Republicans; and the Republican Party is becoming a little bit much to the right, sometimes it's more to the right than many Israelis themselves. So, I don't think that it shows that there is any change in the policy of the United States; I doubt it very much whether the US administration will change its position, but with President Trump, you never know.  Sputnik: Do you think that if Trump does make that move, it will be upheld by US lawmakers?  Eyal Zisser: It's hard to say. We have to mention that many Israeli prime ministers in the past, including Benjamin Netanyahu himself, the current prime minister, were ready to give the Golan Heights entirely or part of it as Israel's part of the peace process. I think the issue is that there is no peace process on the horizon, it's not on the agenda, that's why there're those who say that Israel should retain it.  I doubt very much whether or not there will be any change in the position of all actors; and I also think that in the coming future, maybe it can take several years, negotiations with Syria will be resumed, because it is in the interest of the two countries — Israel and Syria — to negotiate for peace; and once again we'll hear other voices from Israel.  Sputnik: How much support is there in Israel itself to recognise the Golan Heights as part of the country? Or is there, as you've mentioned, more support to actually return to talks with Syria and, perhaps, return part, or all, of that area to Syria as part of a peace deal?  Eyal Zisser: You know, when there were peace talks some years ago, in 2000 and before and after, there was readiness; according to the polls, more than half of the Israelis were ready to give it back. When there is no peace when Iran is playing a role in Syria when the situation is not stable in Syria and with the emergence of ISIS in Syria, I think it is not on the agenda, so there is not much support.  In this sense, people change their mind according to the situation; so I don't think that if there is a peace process, even a peace agreement, there will be a withdrawal from the Golan Heights.  READ MORE: 'Conflict Can't Be Ruled Out': Iran Warns Israel Against 'Adventurism' in Syria  Sputnik: Can you talk about how this is going to affect Washington's role in the region? Is there any incentive for Washington to push for US recognition of the Golan Heights? Other than the personal political ambitions of some politicians, is there strategic importance for Washington?  Eyal Zisser: You're absolutely right. There was a time when the United States wanted to play a role in the region, the region was important for it; and it had to take into consideration all of the interests of all of the parties, it sought good relations with Arab countries, it wanted some role in Syria and Iraq, good relations with Iran, so, when the US had a real interest in the region, we never heard such talks; nowadays, the United States [has] lost any interest in the region and it looks at the region through the prism of domestic American politics, and you can clearly understand why you hear such voices from some lawmakers in the United States.  READ MORE: Possible US Recognition of Golan Linked to Assad Remaining Syrian Leader — PhD  Sputnik: What can we expect to hear from the UN on this matter?  Eyal Zisser: All the UN institutions voted over and over again to confirm that the future of the Golan Heights should be dictated as part of peace negotiations.  If Syria decides to give it up to Israel, that's okay, but it should be part of peace negotiations. This situation cannot be changed as a result of a war; the presence of Israel there can be legitimate in the sense that as long as there is no war it's important for Israel to be there. But the permanent future should be dictated in peace negotiations and in an agreement recognised internationally. This was always the position of the UN and, by the way, also of the USA.  Views and opinions, expressed in the article are those of Eyal Zisser and do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.


sputnik--2019-08-02--Taliban Indicate Readiness to Strike Peace Deal - US Afghan Envoy

"The Taliban are signaling they would like to conclude an agreement. We are ready for a good agreement", Khalilzad said in a statement posted on Twitter.  Khalilzad arrived in the Qatari capital of Doha on Friday to resume peace talks with the Taliban.  He said in an earlier statement on Twitter that the United States is pursuing a peace agreement and not a withdrawal agreement of American troops.  "Our presence in Afghanistan is conditions-based, and any withdrawal will be conditions-based", he said.  Khalilzad said on Sunday that once the United States and the Taliban concluded an agreement, intra-Afghan negotiations between the movement and Afghanistan's national negotiating team would take place.  On Saturday, the Taliban movement also confirmed that the peace negotiations with Washington will be resumed later in the day.  "At Doha time today at 10:00 [07:00 GMT], the negotiations between delegation of Islamic Emirate and US will be resumed", the Taliban main spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahed, wrote on Twitter.  The peace talks come amid reports that the United States is preparing to withdraw almost 6,000 troops from Afghanistan to support the peace deal with the Taliban.  The United States and the Taliban have already held seven rounds of peace talks, which have so far excluded the Afghanistan government.  But the Afghan government has recently said that it has agreed on a 15-member delegation, including politicians as well as social and tribal representatives, for peace talks with Taliban.  Afghanistan is suffering from an unstable political, social and security situation due to the activity of the Taliban and the Daesh terrorist group.  The Afghan National Defence and Security Forces are currently conducting joint offensive operations to combat terrorism across the country with support from the international coalition.  *Taliban, Daesh (Islamic State, ISIS, ISIL, IS) are terrorist organizations banned in Russia and many other countries.


theepochtimes--2019-09-08--Trump Cancels Afghan Peace Negotiations After Taliban Admits to Kabul Attack

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media as he meets with President of Romania Klaus Iohannis in the Oval Office of the White House on Aug. 20, 2019. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)  President Donald Trump announced on Twitter Saturday, Sept. 7 that he was canceling U.S.-Afghan peace negotiations after learning that the Taliban had launched a murderous terror attack in Kabul thinking it would “strengthen their bargaining position.”  “I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations,” Trump wrote Saturday night.  Trump said that there had been secret arrangements made for two private meetings on Sept. 8; one with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and another with major Taliban leaders.  “They were coming to the United States tonight,” the president wrote.  Trump said in his tweets that the Taliban had admitted to using deadly attacks as a means to give them a stronger negotiating position in the peace talks with the Afghan government and the United States.  “Unfortunately, in order to build false leverage, they admitted to an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great great soldiers, and 11 other people.  “What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?”  On Sept. 5, an explosion from a Taliban car bomb killed an American soldier, a Romanian service member, and 10 civilians in a busy diplomatic area in Kabul near the U.S. Embassy.  The Defense Department identified the American as Sgt. 1st Class Elis A. Barreto Ortiz, 34, from Morovis, Puerto Rico.  Ortiz was the fourth U.S. service member killed in the past two weeks in Afghanistan, amid numerous other attacks by the Taliban and other extremist groups in Afghanistan despite the peace negotiations.  The Trump administration had been hopeful for a peace agreement that could bring an end to the almost 18-year war in Afghanistan that started when the Bush administration invaded the country in October 2001 following the Sept. 11 attacks.  Since then, the United States has lost more than 2,400 soldiers and spent more than $800 billion on the war. The United States and NATO formally concluded their combat mission in 2014, but U.S. and allied troops remain, conducting strikes on the ISIS terrorist group and the Taliban, and working to train and build the Afghan military.  Taliban insurgents, however, control nearly half of Afghanistan. They carry out near-daily attacks, mainly targeting security forces and government officials.  Zalmay Khalilzad, Washington’s peace envoy, has been leading the U.S. peace effort, with a strategy focused on four interconnected issues: counterterrorism, NATO and U.S. troop presence, inter-Afghan dialogue, and a permanent cease-fire.  The Taliban have so far refused direct talks with the internationally-recognised Western-backed government in Kabul, which it says is an illegitimate “puppet” regime of the United States. This line of reasoning also appears to be applied to Afghani civilians, as seen in Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid’s referring to civilian casualties as “invaders.”  Khalilzad has said 5,000 U.S. troops would withdraw from five bases in Afghanistan within 135 days of a final deal. Between 14,000 and 13,000 troops are currently in the country.  However, the Taliban want all of the approximately 20,000 U.S. and NATO troops out of Afghanistan immediately, while the United States seeks withdrawal in phases that would depend on the Taliban meeting certain conditions, such as a reduction in violence.  “We’ve been there for 18 years. It’s ridiculous,” Trump said last month. “We’re not really fighting; we’re almost more of a police force over there.” But Afghanistan remains dangerous and some U.S. presence is needed, he said.  The talks have also sought guarantees from the Taliban that Afghanistan would not again become a safe haven for extremist groups such as al-Qaida and the local affiliate of the ISIS terrorist group.  The Afghan government on Sept. 4 said it remains concerned that a full U.S. troop withdrawal that moves too quickly and without the Taliban meeting conditions, such as reducing violence, could lead to “total civil war” such as the one that engulfed the country in the 1990s after a coup by Afghanistan’s Soviet-backed communist party, the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA).  Trump said on Twitter: “If they cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway. How many more decades are they willing to fight?”  Khalilzad has not commented publicly on this week’s attacks.  With reporting by The Associated Press.


thehuffingtonpost--2019-11-28--Trump Makes Surprise Afghanistan Visit, Says U.S. And Taliban Peace Talks Restarted

Trump met Thursday with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and announced that the U.S. and the Taliban had restarted peace negotiations, according to a White House press pool report. Trump said he believed the Taliban wanted a cease-fire.  “The Taliban wants to make a deal ― we’ll see if they make a deal,” Trump told reporters following his meeting with Ghani. “If they do they do, and if they don’t they don’t. And that’s fine.”  In September, Trump declared peace talks between the U.S. and Taliban leaders were “dead” after an American soldier was killed by a suicide bomber in the capital city of Kabul.  “We’ve made tremendous progress and at the same time we’ve been drawing down our troops,” Trump said Thursday.  He said he hopes to decrease the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan to 8,600. Last month, the top American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Austin Miller, said the size of the U.S. forces in the country was between 12,000 and 13,000 troops.  Before his meeting with Ghani, Trump served turkey to troops at Bagram Airfield. He later addressed the crowd of roughly 500 troops, which erupted in applause when he finished speaking, according to the White House press pool report.  “It’s a dangerous area, and he wants to support the troops,” White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said of the president’s trip. “He and Mrs. Trump recognize that there’s a lot of people far away from their families during the holidays, and we thought it’d be a nice surprise.”  Grisham said the trip had been planned weeks in advance, according to the White House press pool report.  The first lady did not accompany the president on the trip. Last week, Vice President Mike Pence and his wife, Karen, surprised U.S. troops in Iraq for a pre-Thanksgiving celebration.


theindependent--2019-05-04--Female delegate told she aposshould be in the kitchenapos at Afghan peace talks with Taliban

Female delegate told she 'should be in the kitchen' at Afghan peace talks with Taliban

An Afghan assembly to discuss peace with the Taliban has been criticised for making female delegates feel unwelcome, with one woman told she “should be in the kitchen”.  The assembly, known as a loyal jirga, was convened by President Ashraf Ghani to debate Afghanistan’s path to peace. Organisers said that around 30 per cent of the 3,200 delegates were women.  But several female delegates said they felt ignored, marginalised or patronised. They were told that men should lead the jirga’s 51 committees and women should serve as secretaries.  Some women complained that they were groped and fondled – not by men, but by women who patted them down during security checks.  On the second day of the assembly, a female delegate who rose to speak was ordered to be quiet by a male delegate.  “He told her: ‘Peace has nothing to do with you. Sit down, you should be in the kitchen cooking!’” said Behnoh Benod, 31, a male delegate who witnessed the put-down.  Other women said they had been confronted by male delegates who claimed to support women’s rights, but only under sharia, or Islamic law – a view shared by the Taliban.  “I asked them which sharia law, the Taliban sharia law or Isis sharia law,” said a delegate, Sakina Hussaini, referring to the Islamic State.  “Some men didn’t accept women as human beings and I had to scream at them,” she said.  Male delegate Behnoh Benod said just 16 of the delegates on his 108-member committee were women. A male delegate was selected as committee chair. Of the 51 committees, 13 were headed by women, and 28 elected women as committee secretaries.  For many women, the jirga got off to a bad start when Ms Ghani appointed as chairman Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf, a combative former warlord known for his harsh views on women’s rights.  When a female delegate complained directly to Mr Sayyaf , she was hustled out by security guards. Other delegates hooted and clapped to drown out her protest.  State-run television RTA, which broadcast the proceedings, posted a banner on Twitter showing images of Mr Ghani and Sher Mohammed Abas Stanekzai, the chief Taliban peace negotiator.  Beside them were photos of two women with their faces covered – one by a niqab, a veil that leaves the eyes visible, and the other by a burqa, the garment forced upon women under the Taliban regime that was toppled in 2001.  After a torrent of complaints on social media, a new banner appeared. Ghani and Stanekzai were still depicted, but four smiling women wearing head scarves that left their faces uncovered were added to the two with their faces concealed.  On Monday, as the jirga opened, some female delegates arrived dressed in burqas.  “Most of these women have come from provinces and they have no idea why they are here,” said delegate Taiyaba Khavari.  Ms Khavari and other women said they grew disillusioned as they were insulted or interrupted by male delegates.  Torpekai, 45, a delegate who goes by one name, said she had been pleased to be among war victims invited to Kabul. She said her 18-year-old son, a police officer, had been killed by the Taliban.  Torpekai said she had planned to tell delegates that she wanted the Taliban punished if a peace deal gave them a role in a postwar government. But the men who dominated the jirga did not bother to listen.  “No one would hear me out,” Torpekai said. “They said women shouldn’t be here – this isn’t a discussion for women.”  It was not just women who felt disillusioned by the jirga. Social media lit up with comments from Afghans who dismissed the assembly as a patronage tool for Mr Ghani. Some critics said the jirga usurped Afghanistan’s parliament.  The government shut down the capital for five days, giving government workers the week off.  The jirga was caught up in a bruising presidential election campaign, in which Mr Ghani is struggling to stay relevant while his government is excluded from peace talks in Doha, Qatar, between the Taliban and the United States. The militants refuse to meet with the government, calling it illegitimate.  Jirga organisers said it was an effective exercise in grassroots democracy that incorporated a wide range of Afghan society. Among the delegates were urban and rural residents, victims of war and terrorism, young people, traditional elders, and ulema, or Islamic religious scholars.  Organisers said that with the government sidelined at the peace talks, the jirga produced a national consensus on conditions for peace with the Taliban. The assembly’s recommendations are not legally binding.  “It’s our sacred tradition,” said Mohammed Umer Daudzai, who organised the gathering. “I doubt that anybody will say consensus building or dialogue is a bad idea.”  At the close of the jirga on Friday, Mr Ghani accepted its recommendation to seek a ceasefire, a goal of the Doha peace negotiations. He urged the Taliban to negotiate within Afghanistan and said he would release 175 Taliban prisoners.  Among other recommendations accepted by Mr Ghani was a demand that any postwar government honour the Afghan constitution and protect the rights of women and children. He thanked the delegates, “especially the women”.  One delegate, Wazhma Tukhi, 25, said she was satisfied. “The constitution protects our rights, and that’s all Afghan women want,” she said.  But another, Masuma Bahar, 24, said the jirga should have made a stronger case for preserving women’s gains over the past 18 years. “There were women on the board and they should have raised their voices, but they haven’t done anything,” she said.


theindependent--2019-09-07--Trump calls off Afghanistan peace talks after claiming he was due to meet Taliban at Camp David

Donald Trump has publicly called off US peace talks with Afghanistan after claiming he was due to hold a “secret” meeting with Taliban leaders at Camp David.  Writing on Twitter, Mr Trump said he had been due to meet both members of the militant Islamist group and the president of Afghanistan at the presidential retreat in Maryland on Sunday.  However, he announced he had decided to call off the negotiations after the Taliban claimed credit for a car bomb in Kabul earlier this week, which left 12 dead, including one US soldier.  “Unbeknownst to almost everyone, the major Taliban leaders and, separately, the President of Afghanistan, were going to secretly meet with me at Camp David on Sunday,” Mr Trump wrote.  “They were coming to the United States tonight. Unfortunately, in order to build false leverage, they admitted to an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great great soldiers, and 11 other people.  “I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations. What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?”  The president added: “If they cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway. How many more decades are they willing to fight?”  Mr Trump’s decision to pull out of talks came just days after the US’s top negotiator for peace in Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, said the two sides were close to a deal to end America’s longest war..  A draft framework agreement had been drawn up under which US troops would leave five military bases in Afghanistan within 135 days of the signing of the pact.  In return, the Taliban would be expected to guarantee the country will not be used as a launchpad for global terrorist operations.  However, the Taliban has carried out several deadly attacks across Afghanistan in recent weeks while talks with US envoys have been ongoing.  The attacks are seen as strengthening the negotiating position of the Taliban, who control or hold sway over roughly half of Afghanistan and are at their strongest since their 2001 defeat by a US-led invasion.  But some critics have warned the Taliban was merely waiting out the US and that another American goal in the talks, a ceasefire, will probably not happen as foreign troops leave.


theindependent--2019-09-08--Taliban say peace deal breakdown with Donald Trump aposwill harm America more than anyone elseapo

Taliban say peace deal breakdown with Donald Trump 'will harm America more than anyone else'

The Taliban has warned Donald Trump’s decision to cancel peace negotiations with the militant group after a car bomb claimed the life of a US soldier would increase America’s “human losses”.  Mr Trump confirmed he would not attend a planned meeting with Taliban leaders and the president of Afghanistan in a tweet on Sunday after the militant group took credit for a car bomb in Kabul that claimed the lives of 12 people including a US soldier.  The president tweeted: “I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations. What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?”  The Taliban have warned that Mr Trump’s decision to cancel their agreement would “harm America more than anyone else”.  A spokesman for the militant group said talks, which had been ongoing for a year, had been completed “in a favourable atmosphere”, adding that the scrapping of the deal “will damage [America’s] status, will make it clear to the world its most hostile stance for peace, will increase its material and human losses, and its role will be known as shaky and fragile in political dealings”.  Before the president’s announcement the meeting between members of the Afghan government, the Taliban and US officials, scheduled to take place in his Camp David residence, had been a closely guarded secret.  But critics in the US denounced Mr Trump’s decision to hold the talks on the week of the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks. The Taliban harboured al-Qaeda members before the attack, providing a safe base of operations for the group making up a key reason for the US war in Afghanistan of 2001.  Since the invasion, and with US military involvement dramatically reduced in the country from a height of 100,000 in 2010 to 14,000 in 2019, the Taliban has been able to regain a significant foothold across the country.  Around 14.5 per cent of Afghanistan is considered to be under the militant group’s control, compared to the 56.3 per cent of the country overseen by the Afghan government.  While growing in stature, the Taliban has continued to campaign for a complete withdrawal of US troops in Afghanistan, where there has been a US military presence for 18 years.  A draft framework agreement drawn up by the three parties had paved the way for US troops to leave five military bases in Afghanistan within 135 days, with the Taliban guaranteeing in return that the country would not be used as a launch pad for global terror.  Afghanistan’s government has remained sceptical of the talks, while the possibility of an accord has placed pressure on the election campaign of President Ashraf Ghani, which is due to take place next month.


thenewyorktimes--2019-02-28--Under Peace Plan US Military Would Exit Afghanistan Within Five Years

Under Peace Plan, U.S. Military Would Exit Afghanistan Within Five Years

WASHINGTON — All American troops would withdraw from Afghanistan over the next three to five years under a new Pentagon plan being offered in peace negotiations that could lead to a government in Kabul that shares power with the Taliban.  The rest of the international force in Afghanistan would leave at the same time, after having mixed success in stabilizing the country since 2001. The plan is being discussed with European allies and was devised, in part, to appeal to President Trump, who has long expressed skepticism of enduring American roles in wars overseas.  The plan calls for cutting by half, in coming months, the 14,000 American troops currently in Afghanistan. It would task the 8,600 European and other international troops with training the Afghan military — a focus of the NATO mission for more than a decade — and largely shift American operations to counterterrorism strikes.  [For more stories about the experiences and costs of war, sign up for the weekly At War newsletter.]  Various elements of the plan were shared with The New York Times by more than a half-dozen current and former American and European officials. It intends to help talks with the Taliban that are being led by Zalmay Khalilzad, the American special envoy.

THOMAS GIBBONS-NEFF and JULIAN E. BARNES


therightscoop--2019-12-29--Taliban agrees to ceasefire with U.S., will begin peace negotiations

The Taliban has agreed to a temporary ceasefire to make room for peace negotiations with the U.S.  Here’s more from the AP:  The Taliban’s ruling council agreed Sunday to a temporary cease-fire in Afghanistan, providing a window in which a peace agreement with the United States can be signed, officials from the insurgent group said. They didn’t say when it would begin. A cease-fire had been demanded by Washington before any peace agreement could be signed. A peace deal would allow the U.S. to bring home its troops from Afghanistan and end its 18-year military engagement there, America’s longest. There was no immediate response from Washington. The U.S. wants any deal to include a promise from the Taliban that Afghanistan would not be used as a base by terrorist groups. The U.S. currently has an estimated 12,000 troops in Afghanistan.  I could see Trump going for a ceasefire. He is definitely down on the Afghanistan War, and has signaled this many times. Including this report:  Months after becoming president in 2017, Donald Trump began taking meetings with enlisted U.S. service members who deployed to Afghanistan in order to get a better understanding of America’s longest war. “I want to sit down with some enlisted guys that have been there,” Trump told advisers, according to the national-security journalist Peter Bergen’s latest book, Trump and His Generals: The Cost of Chaos. “I don’t want any generals in here. I don’t want any officers,” Trump added, according to Bergen’s book, which is sourced from dozens of interviews with current and former White House officials and military officers. “I just want enlisted guys.”  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this account was leaked right ahead of the peace negotiations with the Taliban….


unian--2019-12-05--U.S. stands with Ukraine as country moves forward with peace talks – State Department

Washington is committed to keep pressuring Russia to live up to its commitments under the Minsk Agreements.  In the lead-up to the Normandy Format meeting, Acting Assistant Secretary Reeker emphasized that the United States stands with Ukraine as it moves forward with peace negotiations, the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv reports.  "Secretary of State [Mike] Pompeo asked me to travel to Ukraine to assure you, the people of Ukraine, that the United States steadfastly supports Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity in the leadup to the December 9th Normandy Format Summit," U.S. Acting Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Philip T. Reeker said in a video address the U.S. Embassy published on Twitter, showing him laying flowers at the memorial of the Heavenly Hundred Heroes at the Maidan in Kyiv.  "Ukraine's success in the face of Russia's unacceptable and illegal aggression, and a challenging agenda of crucial reforms matters deeply to the United States and to all those around the world who stand for democratic values," the acting assistant secretary emphasized.  He reiterated the U.S. commitment, along with allies and partners, to "keep pressuring Russia to live up to its commitments under the Minsk Agreements."


usatoday--2019-09-08--Trump suspends Afghanistan peace talks after attack cancels secret Camp David meeting

Trump suspends Afghanistan peace talks after attack, cancels secret Camp David meeting

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said Saturday he canceled a secret Camp David meeting with Taliban leaders and is suspending Afghanistan peace negotiations after the group claimed responsibility for a car bomb this week that killed an American and 11 others.  The president said that Taliban leaders and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani were preparing to travel to the United States this weekend, presumably to finalize an agreement that has been in the works for months to reduce U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Instead, Trump said he abruptly canceled the meeting following the Taliban attack.  "I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations," Trump wrote in a tweet Saturday.“What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?”  Trump disclosed that he had planned to meet with Taliban and Afghan officials on Sunday at Camp David, near the 18-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.  Trump instead accused Taliban officials of trying to "build false leverage" ahead of those talks with the bombing.  Trump has said he wants to pull thousands of U.S. troops out of Afghanistan. His administration has been negotiating with the Taliban to reduce the roughly 14,000 troops now in Afghanistan. A U.S. envoy said on Monday that an initial agreement had been reached  to achieve that goal, but Trump remained noncommittal about his support.  More than 2,400 American soldiers have been killed in the war, according to the most recent figures from the Pentagon.  As recently as Thursday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the U.S. had “delivered” on its promises in Afghanistan and seemed to defend the emerging agreement.  “If you go back and look at the days following 9/11, the objectives set out were pretty clear: to go defeat al-Qaida, the group that had launched the attack on the United States of America from Afghanistan,” Pompeo said in an interview with a conservative website. “And today, al-Qaida … doesn’t even amount to a shadow of its former self in Afghanistan … We have delivered.”  The State Department referred questions about Trump's announcement to the White House.  Trump's desire to reduce America's military presence in Afghanistan has been fraught with political and military peril. Critics – including some of Trump's strongest supporters – fear a U.S. withdrawal will open the door for a resurgence of al-Qaida, as well as other terrorist groups operating in Afghanistan, such as the Islamic State.  The president is also under pressure to avoid a hasty agreement in order to achieve his campaign promise to reduce troop levels. That pressure has come from Afghan leaders, some Republican members of Congress and also hawks within his White House.  "This will make President Ghani happy but will slow down hopes for an early September deal," said Aaron David Miller, a diplomat who has worked for administrations of both parties. "Bottom line – there are no good withdrawal deals. If Trump wants out, (it's) likely a choice between bad and worse.”  Two NATO services members, including an American, were among a dozen people killed in the attack in Kabul on Thursday.  Brett Bruen, a former foreign service officer and global engagement director for President Barack Obama, expressed shock that any American president would invite the Taliban, a militant Islamic group that has targeted American soldiers throughout the war, to the U.S.  "Coming to the United States, let alone to a presidential retreat, is a prize saved for when real concessions have been made," Bruen told USA TODAY. "As we have seen in North Korea, Trump’s negotiations with our adversaries are marked by their preference for style over strategy. Ultimately it is a recipe for damaging our influence and the prospects for peace."  Trump's assertion that the car bombing prompted him to cut off talks seemed odd, given that the Taliban have been engaging in such violent attacks all through the current negotiations. Miller suggested there may have been more at play than Thursday's attack.  “It’s clear he’s coming under pressure from Pompeo and (National Security Adviser John) Bolton to avoid a hasty agreement that has U.S. making most of the concessions and the Taliban very few," he said.  Ned Price, a National Security Council spokesman for Obama, said Trump's actions are likely to undercut the negotiating process.  “What we heard from Trump today was his attempt to subvert and sensationalize the process, taking over for political gain a true diplomatic process that, by all accounts, had made genuine progress,” Price said.  “All of those diplomatic gains may now be in jeopardy,” he added.  Military leaders have resisted Trump's push for a full, speedy withdrawal. When asked about the potential peace deal last week, Marine Gen. Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters that he’s "not using the withdrawal word."  There are about 22,000 coalition troops in Afghanistan now, 14,000 of them Americans.  Dunford stressed that an agreement with the Taliban would be "conditions based," a term favored by commanders who oppose deadlines for the drawdown of troops.  The emerging peace agreement also leaves major questions unresolved, most notably what role the Afghan government, which is backed by the U.S., will play in the future of the country. The Taliban had so far refused to negotiate with Ghani, demanding the complete withdrawal of all foreign military forces first.  It's not clear if those two parties could come to any power-sharing agreement. The Taliban already controls a large swath of the country, and the Afghan government remains heavily dependent on the U.S. military for its security, according to a recent analysis by Robert Pape, director of the Chicago Project on Security and Threats.  Asked about the emerging agreement on Wednesday, Trump declined to commit.  "We’re talking to the Taliban. We’re talking to the government. We’ll see if we can do something," Trump told reporters at the White House. "We have great soldiers. But they’re not acting as soldiers. They’re acting as policemen and that’s not their job."

John Fritze, Deirdre Shesgreen and David Jackson, USA TODAY


usatoday--2019-11-28--Trump announces resuming peace talks with Taliban during surprise visit to troops in Afghanistan

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump announced he restarted peace talks with the Taliban during a surprise visit to soldiers Thursday at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, his first visit to the country since becoming president.  Trump spent about 2 1/2 hours at the military base, where he served turkey to soldiers in a dining hall, posed for photos, delivered brief remarks and met with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, according to press pool reports. The president arrived at Bagram Airfield, the largest U.S. base in Afghanistan, around 8:30 p.m. local time.  The trip, Trump's second visit to a combat zone, comes as he faces threats to his presidency back home. A fast-moving impeachment inquiry yielded testimony about the Trump administration's efforts to push Ukraine to announce investigations that could have been politically beneficial to Trump in 2020.  Trump announced the restart of peace negotiations with the Taliban during a bilateral meeting with Ghani. The two presidents sat at one end of the room at the military headquarters, where four alternating U.S. and Afghan flags were erected behind the two leaders, according to pool reports.  "The Taliban wants to make a deal – we’ll see if they make a deal. If they do, they do, and if they don’t, they don’t. That's fine," Trump told reporters.  The president reiterated his desire to reduce the number of American troops in Afghanistan to 8,600, a figure he cited in announcing a major withdrawal in August. The United States has less than 14,000 troops in Afghanistan; military officials would not confirm the exact number.  The move would reduce troop levels to one of the lowest points in the history of the war. U.S. troops swelled to nearly 100,000 at the highest mark in 2011 and dipped to 8,300 in 2017.  Peace talks were upended in September, when Trump canceled a secret summit with the Taliban, Ghani and other Afghan officials after the militant group killed a U.S. soldier. The meeting was to finalize an agreement that had been in the works for months to reduce U.S. forces in Afghanistan and would have taken place at Camp David two days before the 18th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.  Trump said "it was not a good thing" that the group killed the soldier, who was from Puerto Rico.  During a speech greeted with cheers and chants of "USA! USA!" Trump told soldiers that his administration had eradicated the Islamic State's territorial caliphate despite warnings of the terrorist group's resurgence.  A report released by the Pentagon on October found that the Islamic State is rebuilding itself in Syria, where Trump ordered the withdrawal of U.S. troops in October. The decision allowed Turkey's incursion into the region and left vulnerable Kurdish forces that had worked with the United States to roll back gains made by terrorists.  Before the meeting with Ghani, Trump served turkey to about two dozen troops in a dining hall decorated with red, orange and yellow banners, according to pool reports.  "I’ll be talking to you later, but right now I want to have some turkey," Trump told soldiers as he joined a table of service members at the hall, where 500 troops ate their Thanksgiving meal. Trump sat down to eat a plate of turkey, mashed potatoes and cornbread, according to pool reports.  White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham, who accompanied Trump on the trip, said the visit had been planned for months. Reporters traveling with the president were not told of the destination until two hours before landing. They were barred from reporting on the trip until the visit was nearly over.  "It’s a dangerous area and he wants to support the troops," Grisham told reporters. "He and Mrs. Trump recognize that there’s a lot of people far away from their families during the holidays and we thought it’d be a nice surprise."  Trump had initially flown to his Mar-a-Lago resort, but he flew out of an undisclosed airport in Florida on Wednesday evening and landed at Joint Andrews Base, where he boarded Air Force One, according to pool reports. First lady Melania Trump stayed behind in Florida.  Vice President Mike Pence made a surprise visit to Al Asad Air Base in Iraq last week to serve a Thanksgiving dinner to troops.  Last year, Trump made a surprise visit to troops in Iraq, where he defended his decision to withdraw troops from Syria. The trip last December was Trump's first encounter with soldiers serving under his command in a combat zone.

Kristine Phillips and Courtney Subramanian, USA TODAY


rferl--2019-02-13--UN Official Says Peace Negotiations For Ukraine Have Lost Momentum

UN Official Says Peace Negotiations For Ukraine Have 'Lost Momentum'

A top UN official said the negotiations aimed at implementing the 2015 Minsk accords and ending the conflict in eastern Ukraine have lost momentum.      Assistant Secretary-General Miroslav Jenca made the comment in a speech before the UN Security Council on February 12, at an event marking the fourth anniversary of the accords.      Jenca said negotiations "appear to have lost momentum" and that neither Russia nor Ukraine appear to be willing to agree on key steps forward.      The conflict, which erupted in 2014 at around the same time that Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula, has killed more than 10,000 people and displaced more than 1 million.      The fighting pits Ukrainian government troops and allied militias against fighters that Western officials say have been funded and equipped by Russian military units.  Signed roughly a year after full-scale fighting erupted, the Minsk accords laid out a blueprint of political steps, including elections, that would end the conflict.      Both Russia and Ukraine have blamed each other for the failure to implement the agreement.      The United States was not directly involved in the Minsk negotiations but has had a special envoy dedicated to resolving the fighting. That envoy, Kurt Volker, said in a post on Twitter that Russia continued to violate the agreement.      "In the four years since [Minsk], Russia has continued to violate the Minsk agreements every day. It's time for Peace for Ukraine," he wrote.      Russia's UN envoy, meanwhile, accused the West of using Ukraine as a pawn in a geopolitical chess game.      "Unfortunately, it is obvious to us that the West is not interested in Ukraine itself, in its fate and well-being of its citizens," Vasily Nebenzya was quoted by the state news agency TASS as saying. "For them, this country is a mere pawn in the geopolitical confrontation with Russia."      The five current European Union members on the Security Council issued a joint statement accusing Russia of continuing to fuel the conflict.      "We call on Russia to immediately stop fueling the conflict by providing financial and military support to armed foundations," the statement said.


thetelegraph--2019-10-07--Taliban commanders released as hopes rise for resumption of US peace negotiations

Hopes are rising for the resumption of the abandoned Taliban and US peace talks after eleven senior Taliban members were freed from prison in an exchange with three kidnapped Indian engineers.  Among those freed are two former provincial governors of the Taliban and Abdul Rashid Baluch, a notorious regional leader sentenced to 18 years imprisonment for trafficking opium.  The men were being held near Bagram air base outside Kabul.  It is believed American authorities must have given permission for the swap as Baluch was previously on their ‘Specially Designated Global Terrorist’ list.  Last month, Donald Trump cancelled over a year’s worth of on-going peace negotiations with the Taliban after the group claimed a Kabul bomb attack that killed 11 people, including an American soldier.  However, relations appear to be thawing again after Zalmay Khalilzad, the Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation at the State Department, met senior Taliban leaders on Friday for clandestine talks in Islamabad.  It is unclear whether the exchange of the Taliban leaders was discussed during the meeting.  While the Afghan authorities do intermittently release prisoners early as gestures of goodwill it is rare to see such high-profile members of the Taliban freed.  Abdul Rashid Baluch was a regional official for the group in the southwestern province of Nimroz when he was apprehended while personally escorting an almost one-tonne consignment of opium in 2014.


rferl--2019-06-19--Khalilzad US Seeking Peace Agreement With Taliban Not Withdrawal Deal

Khalilzad: U.S. Seeking 'Peace Agreement' With Taliban, Not 'Withdrawal' Deal

KABUL -- The U.S. envoy seeking a peace deal with the Afghan Taliban has said Washington is seeking a “comprehensive peace agreement, not a withdrawal agreement” in its talks with the Taliban.      Zalmay Khalilzad tweeted the comments late on June 18 after a spokesman for the Taliban's political office in Qatar, Suhail Shaheen, wrote in a tweet that the United States had agreed to withdraw all its troops from Afghanistan.      Khalilzad has held six rounds of talks with the militant group in Qatar to end the nearly 18-year war in Afghanistan.      The sides have made progress, but the Taliban has so far rejected direct negotiations with the Western-backed government in Kabul.      “As we prepare for the next round of talks with the Taliban, important to remember we seek a comprehensive peace agreement, NOT a withdrawal agreement,” Khalilzad tweeted.  The U.S. envoy wrote in a separate tweet that such an agreement would include “counter-terrorism assurances, troop withdrawal, intra-Afghan negotiations that lead to a political settlement; and a comprehensive & permanent ceasefire."  “This is a framework which the Taliban accept,” he added.      Khalilzad also reiterated that “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.”


skynewsus--2019-01-28--US and Taliban reach agreement in principle on Afghan peace deal

US and Taliban reach 'agreement in principle' on Afghan peace deal

US and Taliban reach 'agreement in principle' on Afghanistan peace deal  US and Taliban reach 'agreement in principle' on Afghanistan peace deal  More than 2,400 American soldiers have died in the war in Afghanistan  The US and the Taliban have reached "agreements in principle" on a peace deal - igniting hopes of ending more than 17 years of war in Afghanistan.  Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has assured his people that their rights will not be compromised in the name of peace with the Taliban, which has been staging near-daily attacks against Afghan forces.  Six days of talks between the US and the Taliban were held last week in Qatar, where the Islamic insurgent group was urged to enter into direct negotiations with Mr Ghani's government.  Senior US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad said the framework of a peace deal - "which still has to be fleshed out" - would see Taliban insurgents commit to guaranteeing that Afghan territory is not used as a "platform for international terrorist groups or individuals".  He added that the deal could lead to a full pullout of US troops in return for a ceasefire and Taliban talks with the Afghan government.  Striking a note of caution, Mr Khalilzad added: "There is a lot more work to be done before we can say we have succeeded in our efforts but I believe for the first time I can say that we have made significant progress."  Mr Ghani has urged the Taliban - which until now has refused to deal with him and described him as a US "puppet" - to "accept the call of the people" and commence "serious talks" with his government.  Acting US defence secretary Patrick Shanahan described the talks as "encouraging", while NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said any discussion about the withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan would be premature.  Mr Stoltenberg added: "We are in Afghanistan to create the conditions for a peaceful negotiated solution.  "We will not stay longer than necessary, but we will not leave before we have a situation that enables us to leave or reduce the number of troops without jeopardising the main goal of our presence and that is to prevent Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for international terrorists once again."  More than 3,400 allied military personnel (more than 2,400 of them Americans) have died in the war since 2001, when a US-led international force invaded to pursue al Qaeda, the terror group behind the 9/11 attacks.  An estimated 45,000 Afghan security personnel have lost their lives over the same period.  The US has about 14,000 troops in the country, most of which are present as part of a larger NATO-led mission to train, advise and assist Afghan forces.  The Taliban ran Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, and currently controls nearly half of the country.


sottnet--2019-01-28--More on the US-Taliban peace agreement framework

U.S. and Taliban officials have agreed in principle to the "framework" of a peace deal, The New York Times quotes U.S. special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad as saying after five days of talks between the militant group and the United States in Qatar.Both sides have said "progress" had been made in the talks aimed at ending the 17-year conflict in Afghanistan.The New York Times quoted Khalilzad as saying on January 28 in an interview in Kabul.In the framework,That could lead to a full pullout of U.S. combat troops,The Taliban "committed, to our satisfaction, to do what is necessary that would prevent Afghanistan from ever becoming a platform for international terrorist groups or individuals," Khalilzad was quoted as saying."We felt enough confidence that we said we need to get this fleshed out, and details need to be worked out," he added, according to The New York Times.The Western-backed government in Kabul has struggled to fend off a resurgent Taliban and other militant groups.In a televised address on January 28, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani called on the Taliban to enter "serious" negotiations with the government in Kabul and "accept Afghans' demand for peace.""Either they join the great nation of Afghanistan with a united voice, or be the tool of foreign objectives," he told the militant group.Ghani spoke after Khalilzad briefed him and other Afghan officials in Kabul on the six-day talks he held with Taliban representatives in the Qatari capital, Doha, last week.The president's office quoted Khalilzad as saying"The U.S. insisted in their talks with the Taliban that the only solution for lasting peace in Afghanistan is intra-Afghan talks," Khalilzad said, according to a statement. "My role is to facilitate" such talks between the insurgents and Kabul, Khalilzad was quoted as saying.The U.S. envoy said on January 26 that the United States and the Taliban had made "significant progress," adding that the Doha talks were "more productive than they have been in the past."He also emphasized that the sides "have a number of issues left to work out," and that "nothing is agreed until everything is agreed."Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said that while there was "progress" at the meetings, reports of an agreement on a cease-fire were "not true."Mujahid also said in a statement that talks about "unresolved matters" will continue.Until the withdrawal of international troops was hammered out, "progress in other issues is impossible," he insisted.Another round of peace talks between the Taliban and the United States was tentatively set for February 25, the Reuters news agency quoted a Qatari Foreign Ministry official as saying on January 28.


theguardianuk--2019-08-19--Donald Trumps peace agreement is a betrayal of Afghanistan and its people Simon Tisdall

Donald Trump’s ‘peace agreement’ is a betrayal of Afghanistan and its people | Simon Tisdall

If Donald Trump has his way a [“peace agreement”](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/17/trump-hints-america- close-to-deal-with-taliban-others-question-peace) in Afghanistan will be finalised in the coming days. It’s a sure bet the US president will claim noisy, personal credit for ending one of America’s longest wars. Knowing him, he may even hail it as the “deal of the century” – despite having already accorded that boastful accolade to his failed [North Korea summitry](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jun/30/trump-north- korea-kim-jong-un). But the world, as always, should beware a Trump bearing gifts.  What is in prospect, after months of US-Taliban talks, is more accurately termed a troop withdrawal than a peace deal. It will deliver what candidate Trump most wants – a path home for [14,000 American troops](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/05/taliban-talks-peace- afghanistan-190510062940394.html) before next year’s US election. It will not serve the interests of the Afghan people. More likely, this shoddy stitch-up will leave them trapped inside a pitiless conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of [civilian lives](https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/afghan) since 2001.  Right now, it’s as bad as ever. July was the most lethal month for years, with about [1,500 people killed or wounded](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world- asia-49165676). And a chilling glimpse of worse to come emerged at the weekend when more than [60 wedding guests](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/17/dozens-feared-dead-or- wounded-after-afghan-wedding-hall-blast) were killed by a suicide bomber in Kabul. A series of [attacks in Jalalabad](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/19/bombs-hit- restaurants-and-public-squares-in-eastern-afghanistan-jalalabad) followed on Monday.  It’s well known that Trump never supported the US’s Afghan involvement, criticising its cost (financial, not human) and characterising it, unfairly, as another Obama bungle. For him, nation-building, like altruism in any form, is a foreign concept. Yet his reckless push to leave, without adequate security guarantees and a credible plan, is betrayal on many fronts.  First and foremost it betrays the painful, patient efforts of ordinary Afghans to build a more inclusive, tolerant society after decades of civil war and external meddling. It betrays a fragile democratic process, whose next stage – presidential elections next month – is jeopardised by uncertainty over US intentions. And Trump’s unprincipled cut-and-run [betrays Afghan women](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/16/world/middleeast/afghanistan-peace- womens-rights-.html)’s groups and civil society activists whose precious gains, in terms of personal freedoms, education, healthcare and travel, may be trampled in the rush for the exit. If the Taliban regain the upper hand religious and ethnic minorities, such as the Shia Hazaras, will suffer badly.  The abandoning of Afghanistan is a gross betrayal, too, of the sacrifices made by American and Nato military personnel, who were told that they were fighting the good fight. [More than 2,300](https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/2018/Human%20Costs%2C%20Nov%208%202018%20CoW.pdf) US military personnel have died in Afghanistan. More than 20,000 have been wounded.  And what of the terrible price paid by the UK’s troops? [At least 450 died](https://www.gov.uk/government/fields-of-operation/afghanistan) in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. Many more were maimed for life. Yet this operation has neither endured nor secured freedom – and Helmand, scene of bitter fighting involving British forces, is back [in insurgent hands](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/30/it-feels-like-groundhog- day-us-marines-return-to-helmand-province-afghanistan). Gallingly, the Taliban now control, or contest, more territory than at any point since 2001 when George W Bush and Tony Blair went after Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida following the 9/11 attacks. And yet here is Trump, the well-heeled [Vietnam draft- dodger](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/may/23/pete-buttigieg-trump- vietnam-war-disability-accusation), walking away on two good legs and looking to cash in electorally. Where is the anger, where is the fury, at this cruellest, most cynical of betrayals?  The outlines of the deal being discussed in Qatar are fairly clear. In return for safe passage for departing forces and a Taliban pledge not to provide safe haven to jihadist groups such as Isis, [Trump will end the US’s campaign](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/13/world/asia/us-taliban-peace-deal- details.html) and bring its troops home. But crucial questions are up in the air. The Afghan government in Kabul, excluded from the Doha process, is expected, somehow, to reach a power-sharing arrangement with the Taliban. So far, neither side shows any sign it is able or willing to do so, not least because of intra-Afghan political splits and mutual, deeply ingrained enmity.  For this reconciliation process even to begin, there must first be a nationwide ceasefire between the Afghan army and the insurgents. But the Taliban expressly reject any truce until all foreign forces have left – their fundamental demand. Meanwhile, al-Qaida and a strengthening Isis can be expected to [do their brutal best](https://www.apnews.com/add4a393afed4ca798401c5a0958f2c2) to disrupt any progress.  The US military and intelligence agencies are by no means united in their view of Trump’s bid to portray retreat as victory, either. Experienced commanders such as the former US general David Petraeus doubt a divided Taliban leadership will keep its word. Hard-line elements may reject a [deal of any kind](https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/aug/13/afghanistan-no-deal- better-bad-deal/). So it makes sense that the US keep a residual force, primarily tasked with counter-terrorism but also with supporting the Afghan government and army. “A complete military exit would be even more ill-advised and risky than Obama’s disengagement from Iraq in 2011 [which opened the way for Isis],” [Petraeus warned](https://www.tolonews.com/afghanistan/petraeus- cautions-trump-over-troop-withdrawal-afghanistan) this month.  A gradualist approach also reduces the risk that Iran, Russia, Pakistan and India – traditional players in the [“Great Game”](https://indianexpress.com/article/india/afghanistan-taliban-india- kashmir-us-zalmay-khalilzad-5895132/) – will exploit the vacuum caused by a precipitous US exit, thereby once more turning Afghanistan into a regional battleground and transforming a historic defeat for the west into an ongoing strategic disaster. Wars in Afghanistan do not end well. When a British army retreated from Kabul in 1842, during the [first Anglo-Afghan war](https://www.britannica.com/event/Anglo-Afghan-Wars), it was ruthlessly annihilated at Gandamak on the road to Jalalabad.  No right thinking person would wish [Gen William Elphinstone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_George_Keith_Elphinstone)’s sorry fate on the departing Americans. But Trump must understand that if the US is to leave peacefully, it must do so responsibly and by stages, and in a way that ensures the hard-won political and social gains of recent years are not wantonly squandered. Afghanistan was broken. We in the west promised to fix it. Like it or not, that promise must be honoured.  • Simon Tisdall is a foreign affairs commentator


thetorontostar--2019-10-31--India, Naga rebels hold peace talks, but no agreement signed

NEW DELHI - India’s government and Naga rebel groups have held talks in New Delhi on ending 70 years of armed insurrection in the northeast, but did not sign a widely expected peace agreement.  Nagaland state’s top elected official, Neiphiu Rio, said in a tweet that a breakthrough had been achieved in Thursday’s talks, but gave no details.  A home ministry statement referred to anxiety among some groups about a possible agreement and said all stakeholders would be consulted and their concerns taken into consideration before any settlement is reached.  It did not elaborate or say whether the government had accepted a contentious demand by one Naga faction for a separate flag and constitution.  Separatist groups have been fighting the Indian government, accusing it of exploiting the region’s rich natural resources.  Get more of the Star in your inbox Never miss the latest news from the Star. Sign up for our newsletters to get today's top stories, your favourite columnists and lots more in your inbox Sign Up Now


breitbart--2019-11-30--Colombia: Leftists Riot to Demand 'Peace Deal' with Marxist Terror Group

Leftist rioters in Colombia set out a range of demands in a letter to President Iván Duque on Thursday, including a renewed peace deal with the Marxist terror organization National Liberation Army (ELN).  In the letter to Duque, elected last year on a platform of taking a harder stance against the Marxist terror organizations that have destabilized Colombia for decades, the “National Strike Committee” warned that his promise of a “grand national dialogue” was not sufficient to end the riots that have rocked the country over the past eight days.  In the letter, also signed by 56 members of Congress and the pro-guerrilla Movement to Defend Peace, the signatories propose three demands to begin a dialogue with the government. One of these demands involves the demilitarization of Colombian cities following violent clashes between rioters and security forces.  Another demand is to hold a “national table of dialogue that is both plural and diverse,” featuring representatives from various social sectors involved in the recent protests, including the National Committee of Unemployment, the Movement to Defend Peace, the Peace Bank, local assemblies and town councils, cultural expressions, and other sectors of the population.  Once having initiated a dialogue, the committee is demanding that the government engage and make concessions on five different issues, which include: • Negotiations on the government’s social and economic policy, with specific regard to minority movements such as students, peasantry, and indigenous communities. • Full implementation of the Final Peace Agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) forced through by former President Juan Manuel Santos, with a view to re-opening talks with the People’s Liberation Army (ELN), who have carried out a number of deadly terrorist attacks across the country in recent years. • Discussions surrounding the government’s national security policy, human rights and military campaign against guerrilla forces. • Political and electoral reform, as well as a detailed plan of how they plan to fight corruption. • Measures to guarantee the rights of nature and the protection of the environment.  It remains highly unlikely that the Duque administration would cede to such extensive demands, although the severity of the demonstrations has placed him under increased pressure to return stability to the South American country.  The demands also make clear that the riots are being coordinated by groups with ties to Marxist terrorist organizations. The FARC, which the rioters seek to legitimize, declared war on the state this fall despite the Santos government issuing them multiple uncontested seats in the Colombian Congress.  On Friday, it was reported that the government is seeking around $1 billion in dividends from state company Ecopetrol S.A. to help fund a public spending spree that would help reduce tensions, especially among Colombia’s most impoverished communities.  Follow Ben Kew on Facebook, on Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at bkew@breitbart.com.


chicagosuntimes--2019-01-30--Peace with the Taliban Trump warned of Afghan pullout risks

Peace with the Taliban? Trump warned of Afghan pullout risks

WASHINGTON — Trump administration claims of progress in talks with the Taliban have sparked fears even among the president’s allies that his impatience with the war in Afghanistan will lead him to withdraw troops too soon, leaving the country at risk of returning to the same volatile condition that prompted the invasion in the first place.  Discussions between a U.S. envoy and the Taliban are advancing weeks after the administration said it wanted to begin drawing down troops in Afghanistan. That has prompted some critics to note that President Donald Trump is telegraphing a withdrawal — the same thing he accused President Barack Obama of doing by saying he wanted to end the American combat mission in 2014.  “It’s an effort to put lipstick on what will be a U.S. withdrawal,” said Ryan Crocker, a former U.S. ambassador to Kabul under Obama.  A negotiated settlement to America’s longest war poses a dilemma for Trump. He has often declared he wants to end lengthy overseas military entanglements, something he made clear in December by declaring the Islamic State group defeated in Syria and announcing he was pulling 2,000 American troops from that country over the objections of his top foreign policy advisers.  The stakes are higher in Afghanistan, a conflict that has cost 2,400 American lives and hundreds of billions in taxpayer dollars. The U.S. invaded the country to oust the Taliban and al-Qaida in October 2001 in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and the CIA director warned as recently as Tuesday that Afghanistan could once again become a terrorist haven.  But now even fellow Republicans worry that reports of progress will embolden Trump to withdraw troops from Afghanistan before the region is stable and will reintroduce the conditions that first ensnared America in the conflict. The Taliban now control nearly half the country and carry out near-daily attacks, and foreign-policy experts fear that any progress on protecting women and minorities in the country could be lost if the militant group is once again part of the government.  The top Republican in Congress, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, cautioned the president against a hasty exit from the war.  “While it is tempting to retreat to the comfort and security of our own shores, there is still a great deal of work to be done,” McConnell said Tuesday. “And we know that left untended, these conflicts will reverberate in our own cities.”  James Dobbins, special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan during the Obama administration, said Trump “seems to have abandoned” the conditions-based strategy he espoused in 2017. The future of troops in Afghanistan is anybody’s guess, he said.  “I don’t think anybody, including probably him, can predict his behavior,” Dobbins said.  White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Tuesday that the administration’s priority is to “end the war in Afghanistan, and to ensure that there is never a base for terrorism in Afghanistan again.” Afghan officials hope Trump will explain his intentions in further detail during his State of the Union address next week.  Taliban officials, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said that the two sides had reached an understanding about the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops and that the militant group had made assurances that Afghan soil would not be used again for attacks against the United States or others.  On the U.S. side, Trump’s Afghanistan envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, said, “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed, and ‘everything’ must include an intra-Afghan dialogue and comprehensive cease-fire.”  That’s something the Taliban have refused to do, though they said Wednesday that they aren’t seeking a monopoly on power in a future Afghan administration but are instead looking for ways to co-exist with Afghan institutions —”tolerate one another and start life like brothers.”  If the Taliban agree to talk to the Afghan government and stop fighting while they do so, the negotiations could be a “significant step,” Dobbins said. If they don’t agree, “then the whole thing is null and void.”  Moreover, he said, the U.S. should stay until a peace deal between the Taliban and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s government is implemented.  “If the U.S. leaves once the Afghans begin talking to each other, those talks will end and the war will resume,” Dobbins said. “If the U.S. leaves after they’ve come to an agreement but before it’s implemented, that agreement will never be implemented and the war will resume.”  Nicholas Burns, a career foreign service officer and former undersecretary of state during George W. Bush’s administration, said he thinks Trump is right to find a way to bring U.S. troops home from Afghanistan. But he, too, thinks that the president’s impatience is the driving force behind current talks with the Taliban.  “I think there’s an advantage to going slowly here,” said Burns, who is now at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. “Go quickly and we risk giving away too much to the Taliban.”  The Pentagon has been developing plans to withdraw as many as half of the 14,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan.  Acting Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan told reporters Tuesday that there has been no change in the U.S. military strategy in Afghanistan, which is to force the Taliban to the peace table by realigning troops to train and advise Afghans and by getting greater support from the region.  Talks led by Khalilzad must be given time to work, Shanahan said. Yet nobody knows how long Trump is willing to wait.  In November, Khalilzad told Afghan journalists that he wanted to see concrete results by spring. Trump gave Khalilzad six months to show results, according to a former Afghan official, who is privy to details about the negotiations and spoke on condition of anonymity to protect his sources of information about the talks.  The official said the militant group refuses to negotiate with the current Afghan government and insists on the creation of an interim government. Once that happens, the group wants to convene a grand national assembly to change the Afghan constitution to make it more to their liking, the former Afghan official said.  The official said the Taliban don’t see that a U.S. pledge to withdrawal is contingent on a cease-fire and a requirement to negotiate with the Afghan government. Moreover, the official said, Ghani remains upset that the U.S. is talking to the Taliban without representatives from his government present.  It also remains unclear how the U.S. could verify Taliban pledges that terrorist groups won’t use Afghanistan as a staging area for attacks.  “If there were an eventual peace agreement,” CIA Director Gina Haspel told a Senate panel on Tuesday, “a very robust monitoring regime would be critical and we would still need to retain the capability to act in our national interest if we needed to.”


cnbc--2019-12-09--'It's now or never': Russia and Ukraine hold peace talks in Paris

There is cautious optimism that talks between the leaders of Russia and Ukraine on Monday could end the stalemate over a long-running conflict in the Donbass region. Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky will be joined at the talks in Paris by France's President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel; the group is known as the "Normandy Four." Macron and Merkel have previously tried to broker several peace agreements, known as the "Minsk agreements," but these have yet to be fully implemented. It will be the first time that Putin and Zelensky have met face to face and the first time that the Normandy Four group has met since October 2016. Relations between Russia and Ukraine nose-dived after Moscow annexed Crimea from Ukraine in early 2014 and then supported a pro-Russian uprising in the Donbass region in the east of the country where two republics (of Donetsk and Luhansk) were declared by pro-Russian separatists. The conflict is now in its fifth year and has been largely characterized by clashes and skirmishes between separatists and the Ukrainian army. Nevertheless, 13,000 people (including civilians and combatants from both sides) have died in the conflict since 2014, according to the United Nations, and hostilities have affected 3.9 million civilians living in the region. The summit comes amid a tentative rapprochement between Russia and Ukraine that has taken place since Zelenksy came to power in May.  He had made achieving a peace deal with Russia, and ending what he's called "this horrible war," a key part of his election manifesto. The 41-year-old president is inexperienced, however, having a background in comedy and TV production rather than politics, leading some experts to worry he could be outmaneuvered by a veteran Russian president. For Russia too, though, the stakes are high, with the country still subject to international sanctions for its interventions in Ukraine. The lifting of EU sanctions has been tied to the successful implementation of a peace agreement with Ukraine. There is a fragile cease-fire in the Donbass region right now but the Minsk agreements are widely seen to have failed because both sides accused the other of not abiding with the deal, and of misinterpretation of the conditions of the deal. In 2016, Germany's then-Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier came up with a plan (now known as the "Steinmeier formula") to solve the deadlock. The plan is like a road map to peace setting out a sequence of events that both sides need to enact — including the holding of free and fair elections in the Donbass region and for self-governing status to be granted if these are deemed to have taken place. This has proved a very hot potato for Zelensky who signed up to the formula in early October. He has been accused of capitulating to Russia and there were protests at the decision.  Signing up to the Steinmeier formula has appeared to bear some fruit with Ukraine and pro-Russian separatists disengaging forces in three areas along the front line in recent weeks. For its part, Ukraine has said that no elections will take place in the region unless they are in accordance with Ukrainian law and until it regains control over its border with Russia in that area. Zelensky has said "there won't be any elections under the barrel of a gun," and that no elections would take place "if the troops are still there." Last week, an aide to the Ukrainian president said that Ukraine will attend the meeting in Paris with goodwill and hopes for a deal. But he added that it would not wait "years" for Russia to implement its part of the Minsk deal. Presidential aide Andriy Yermak also said that if peace talks with Russia fail, Ukraine will consider "building a wall" along its borders with Russia.  Ahead of the summit, the Elysee Palace released a statement in November saying that it would "be held following major progress since the summer in negotiations for a settlement in the east Ukraine conflict, progress which in particular allowed the removal of troops from several areas on the frontline." There might be progress, but experts say the meeting might be a last opportunity for the countries to normalize relations. Christopher Granville, managing director of EMEA and Global Political Research at TS Lombard, told CNBC that the meeting was a "now or never" opportunity. "There seems a reasonable chance of some progress (at the meeting), but that's the boring answer, the more interesting answer is that I do think it's now or never. In politics there's always a window, there's a moment of political capital, a honeymoon when something can be done, and Zelenksy's honeymoon is probably past its zenith, so either something is done now or the window will close, so that's what makes it particularly interesting." Daragh McDowell, head of Europe and principal Russia analyst at Verisk Maplecroft, told CNBC ahead of the summit that principles of territorial sovereignty and integrity were at stake, however. "France has made it clear that it wants to normalize relations with Russia somehow, but at the same time we're in a position where Russia has changed its borders through military force, invaded a European country — there are very important principles at stake here and you can't just draw a line under it and say, 'all is done, all is forgotten'," he said.  Russia also has a commercial interest in improving relations with its neighbor, not least on the energy front as it looks to maintain its dominant position in terms of energy provision to Europe. Russia was the largest supplier of natural gas to the EU, both in 2018 and 2019, according to data from Eurostat, although it is facing a competitive threat from the U.S. on that front. France and Germany's leaders want to see relations normalized between Ukraine and Russia due to the heightened geopolitical threat posed by Moscow on its border, as well as realpolitik and the desire to keep Russia on side and engaged to a large extent. Although new gas pipelines are under construction to transport Russian gas to Europe via alternative routes (such as the Nord Stream 2 pipeline which will supply gas from Russia to Germany, and the TurkStream pipeline from Russia to Turkey) much of the EU's gas currently comes via Ukraine.


cnn--2019-06-03--Washington Post Pompeo tries to manage expectations on Middle East peace plan

Washington Post: Pompeo tries to manage expectations on Middle East peace plan

Washington (CNN) Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently acknowledged widespread skepticism of the Trump administration's Middle East peace plan, but said he hoped people would give it a chance.  Pompeo described the plan as "very detailed, one might argue unexecutable," and said it "may be rejected," according to an audio recording obtained by CNN of a private meeting of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations on Tuesday.  "It may be rejected," Pompeo said. "It could be in the end, folks will say, 'it's not particularly original, it doesn't particularly work for me, that is, it's got two good things and nine bad things, I'm out.'"  Pompeo said the State Department has given "quite a bit of consideration" to what it would do if the plan "doesn't gain traction," and said there are "no guarantees that we're the ones that unlock it."  "We hope that there's enough vision here, enough space, that lots of countries will see this as an opportunity to really engage in this process," Pompeo said.  President Donald Trump, when asked Sunday about the Post's reporting on Pompeo's comments, said, "Well, let's see what happens."  "We're doing our best to help the Middle East to get a peace plan, and (Pompeo) may be right, I think most people would say that. I think we have a good chance, but we'll see what happens."  "Most people think it can't be done, I think it probably can," Trump said. "But as I say often, we'll see what happens."  Trump administration officials have offered few details about the political portion of the long-awaited Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. The effort is being led by the President's son-in-law and White House senior adviser, Jared Kushner.  The plan discusses four major components: infrastructure, industry, empowering and investing in people, and governance reforms to help make the area as appealing as possible to investors.  Pompeo said, "I get why people think this is going to be a deal that only the Israelis could love. I understand the perception of that. I hope everyone will just give the space to listen and let it settle in a little bit."  Pompeo noted the unveiling of the long-awaited plan has been delayed and said, "This has taken us longer to roll out our plan than I had originally thought it might -- to put it lightly."  "Everyone will find something to hate about the proposal, everything will find something I think, including the Palestinians, will find something that they say that's something to build upon," Pompeo said.  "Then the big question is can we get enough space that we can have a real conversation about how to build this out," Pompeo said.  Malcolm Hoenlein, CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, which hosted the event, told CNN he and other participants did not take Pompeo's remarks as critical of the prospects of the Trump administration's peace plan.  "He was citing what people had raised," Hoenlein told CNN, and that people should give the proposal due consideration once it is unveiled.  Hoenlein characterized Pompeo's message as: "People should cool it and give it a chance," and "don't fall" for arguments already being made.  He praised the speech, given to 50 heads of various Jewish organizations encompassing various political viewpoints, as thoughtful.  The State Department's special envoy to combat anti-Semitism, Elan Carr, who also attended the meeting, said he thought Pompeo "provided a hopeful assessment over the prospect of a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians," according to the Post.  "It was an excellent briefing that was very well received by the conference," he said in a statement from the State Department to the Post.  The State Department had no immediate comment to CNN.