Taliban Won’t Attend Peace Talks Until US Leaves Afghanistan

 

Biden's delay in pullout puts peace process on hold

Jason Ditz 

Posted onApril 13, 2021CategoriesNewsTagsAfghanistan

It is an announcement that’s been coming for awhile, but in pushing back the pullout date in Afghanistan from May 1 to 9/11, the Biden Administration finally clarified its expectations on America’s longest war, but is also throwing another spanner in the works of the peace process which may make future dates tougher to deal with.

The effort to sell everyone on this pullout delay is that the peace process is behind schedule. The Istanbul conference was meant to kickstart that process, but that’s not going to happen now, because the Taliban is boycotting all such conferences until the US makes good on withdrawing.

This puts the whole process into serious doubt, as it’s not clear how an Afghan peace deal can be reached without getting the Taliban to the table, and in delaying the pullout is keeping the Taliban away, a predictable result given how important that May 1 date was to the Taliban.

It’s not impossible that they will be able to engage the Taliban more seriously in the future, but this probably depends on the newly set September 11 date being taken seriously, and not just another step down the road.

That’s a tough sell, because it seems unlikely anything will happen from May to September, and if Biden wanted to lay the groundwork for staying in Afghanistan, it’s hard to see how he could’ve done so more easily

https://news.antiwar.com/2021/04/13/taliban-wont-attend-peace-talks-until-us-leaves-afghanistan/