KABUL: Taliban and Afghan government forces clashed across Afghanistan hours after the start of long-awaited peace talks in Doha on Saturday, officials said, underscoring the uphill challenge of settling a 19-year insurgency. Talks between the two sides were to begin shortly after a US-Taliban agreement in February, but began only over the weekend after months of delays, caused in part by continuing Taliban offensives in the war-torn country.
“With the start of intra-Afghan talks we were expecting the Taliban to reduce the number of their attacks, but unfortunately their attacks are still going in high numbers,” Fawad Aman, a spokesman for the Afghan defense ministry, said.
Representatives from a number of countries who spoke at the inauguration of the peace talks called on the Taliban to announce an immediate cease-fire before negotiators sat down to find a way to end decades of war in Afghanistan.
The Taliban did not say anything about a possible cease-fire at the ceremony.
Achieving a significant reduction in violence and how to get to a permanent cease-fire would be among the first issues the sides would discuss when they meet on Sunday, the head of Afghanistan’s peace council, Abdullah Abdullah, told Reuters on Saturday.
No meeting between the two has been reported by either side in Doha on Sunday, but Qatar’s state news agency reported teams led by Taliban’s political chief Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and Abdullah had met the Qatari Emir.
Aman said that, on Friday, the eve of the inauguration of the talks, the Taliban had carried out 18 attacks against government forces and installations across the country, inflicting heavy casualties.
“We don’t have exact information about Taliban attacks on Saturday, but I can say the number of attacks has increased instead of decreased.”
Taliban attacks on Saturday night were confirmed by officials in the provinces of Kapsia and Kunduz.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement that the insurgent group attacked a convoy of Afghan forces that had arrived to launch an operation along a key highway in Kunduz.
He added that security forces carried out air and artillery strikes on Saturday night in the provinces of Baghlan and Jowzjan.
Afghan forces, Taliban continue to clash even as peace talks start
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Afghan forces, Taliban continue to clash even as peace talks start
- ‘With the start of intra-Afghan talks we were expecting the Taliban to reduce the number of their attacks, but unfortunately their attacks are still going in high numbers’
Czech Prime Minister Babiš faces confidence vote as government shifts Ukraine policy
- “I’d like to make it clear that the Czech Republic and Czech citizens will be first for our government,” Babiš said
- Babiš has rejected any financial aid for Ukraine and guarantees for EU loans
PRAGUE: The Czech Republic’s new government led by populist Prime Minister Andrej Babiš was set to face a mandatory confidence vote in Parliament over its agenda aimed at steering the country away from supporting Ukraine and rejecting some key European Union policies.
The debate in the 200-seat lower house of Parliament, where the coalition has a majority of 108 seats, began Tuesday. Every new administration must win the vote to govern.
Babiš, previously prime minister in two governments from 2017-2021, and his ANO, or YES, movement, won big in the country’s October election and formed a majority coalition with two small political groups, the Freedom and Direct Democracy anti-migrant party and the right-wing Motorists for Themselves.
The parties, which share admiration for US President Donald Trump, created a 16-member Cabinet.
“I’d like to make it clear that the Czech Republic and Czech citizens will be first for our government,” Babiš said in his speech in the lower house.
The political comeback by Babiš and his new alliance with two small government newcomers are expected to significantly redefine the nation’s foreign and domestic policies.
Unlike the previous pro-Western government, Babiš has rejected any financial aid for Ukraine and guarantees for EU loans to the country fighting the Russian invasion, joining the ranks of Viktor Orbán of Hungary and Robert Fico of Slovakia.
But his government would not abandon a Czech initiative that managed to acquire some 1.8 million much-needed artillery shells for Ukraine only last year on markets outside the EU on condition the Czechs would only administer it but would not contribute money.
The Freedom party sees no future for the Czechs in the EU and NATO, and wants to expel most of 380,000 Ukrainian refugees in the country.
The Motorists, who are in charge of the environment and foreign ministries, rejected the EU Green Deal and proposed revivals of the coal industry.
