The United States cancelled peace talks with Taliban at the last minute. US President Donald Trump fired off a series of tweets on Saturday night, calling off the US-Taliban peace negotiations in Doha, as well as secret meetings he had arranged with senior Taliban leaders and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at Camp David, for continued Taliban attacks. Trump specifically put the blame for the cancellation of talks on Taliban’s suicide car bombing in Kabul that killed 12 people, including an American soldier. He later said the talks with Taliban were dead because they were killing people to strengthen their bargaining position.
The abortion of peace talks after almost a year of political efforts is a bad tiding for war-weary Afghan people. Although Afghans were left out of the US-Taliban negotiations, and Afghan government and some political groups and leaders had serious concerns about them, their success was a necessary step towards the political settlement of the conflict, especially when both sides had reached an agreement, and were discussing arrangements for an official signing ceremony.
Despite the fact that Trump called the talks dead, Americans may soon return to the negotiating table, as the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan was Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign promise which can also boost his chances of re-election in the upcoming US presidential polls in 2020 if honored. Pulling out of talks with Taliban is apparently an attempt by Trump to pressure the Taliban to show flexibility in their demands. Unfortunately, it is the Afghan people who are paying the price of Trump’s pressure similar to that of the Taliban. Concurrent with military pressure on the Taliban is always a surge in civilian casualties.
Now that the Taliban and Americans have negotiated a peace deal for about a year, and both sides have also agreed to it in principle, a single attack or incident should not be used as a pretext to call off the talks. Both sides have to avoid disruptive actions so that trust is restored. Additionally, Afghan sides must prepare for intra-Afghan negotiations, and stop banging the drum of the foreign war. Peace is a blessing, and serves everyone’s interest, so no one should deprive the conflict-battered Afghan nation of the precious divine gift.
