US special envoy in Pakistan to discuss Afghan endgame
Kamran Yousaf
Press TV, Islamabad
Zalmay Khalilzad, the US special envoy for Afghanistan, flew from Doha to Islamabad.
In Doha, he held talks with the Afghan Taliban, the first direct contact between the US and the militant group since the Biden administration took charge.
In Islamabad, Khalilzad, accompanied by a top US general, held talks with Pakistani Army and intelligence chiefs.
The focus was on how to break the deadlock in the slow moving peace process.
The top US diplomat has shared a new Afghan peace plan with Pakistan. The Biden administration is seeking national elections under the interim government in Afghanistan.
The US is seeking Pakistan’s help to persuade the Taliban to accept the proposal.
Both Taliban and Kabul are reluctant to accept the new plan.
The US secretary of state also recently wrote a letter to the Afghan president, outlining the four-point plan for the Afghan endgame. The plan includes a UN sponsored meeting of foreign ministers of Pakistan, US, Iran, China, Russia, and India to adopt a unified approach on Afghanistan.
The Biden administration is facing a dilemma whether to pull out troops from Afghanistan this summer as part of a deal the Trump administration had signed with the Taliban.
The Doha deal provides a road map for the US troops' withdrawal in return for the Taliban agreeing not to allow Afghan soil to be used again by terrorist groups.
As the peace process hangs in the balance, Secretary Blinken sent a message to President Ghani that in the absence of a peace deal, Taliban may make rapid territorial gains.
The situation in Afghanistan is precarious and the US, observers believe, has little options to work with.
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