Iran denounces US talks with Taliban

Iran has criticized US talks with the Taliban on ending the Afghanistan war, saying Washington was elevating the role of the militants.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarifacknowledged that Iranhad also opened dialogue with the Taliban but said that the US push for a dealwith the extremists was “seriously wrong”.

   

“An attempt to exclude everybody and just talk totheTaliban has alienated the government, has alienated the region, hasalienated everybody else and it achieved nothing, as you’ve seen from thestatement that came from the Taliban,” Zarif said, apparently referring tothe militants’ announcement of a new spring offensive.

“I was the first to say that in any peace inAfghanistan, the Taliban cannot be set aside or isolated,” Zarif said atthe Asia Society in New York, which he was visiting to take part in a UNsession.

“But you cannot negotiate the future of Afghanistanwiththe Taliban. The Taliban only represent a segment of Afghan society, not all ofit,” he said.

President Donald Trump has voiced impatience at ending thelongest-ever US war, launched after the September 11, 2001 attacks on theUnited States.

US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad is set shortly to hold a freshround of talks in Qatar with the Taliban, with early indications sayingWashington will agree to pull troops and that the militants will promise not toallow foreign extremists on their soil.

But the Taliban have refused to negotiate with PresidentAshraf Ghani’s internationally recognized government, with a would-bebreakthrough meeting recently collapsing in a dispute over the delegation list.

Despite its tense relations with the United States, Iran hadquietly backed the initial US invasion that ousted the Taliban.

Iran nearly went to war with the Taliban in 1998 after anattack on its consulate in the Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif killed nineIranian diplomats and a journalist.But Iran has more recently sought to buildrelations with the Taliban, mindful of preserving interests in the neighbouringcountry.

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