Blinken nudges Afghan peace process forward

WASHINGTON－US Secretary of State Antony Blinken proposed a United Nations-led peace conference on Afghanistan in a recent letter to Afghan President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, US media reported on Sunday.

In the Feb 28 letter to Ghani, Blinken proposed that the conference be held in Turkey "to discuss a unified approach to supporting peace in Afghanistan", reported The New York Times, which obtained a copy of the proposals.

Envoys from the United States, China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran and India would attend the proposed UN-led conference, according to the report.

The proposals included a road map for a future Afghan government with Afghan Taliban representation, a revised Afghan constitution, and terms for a permanent and comprehensive cease-fire.

Blinken has also called on special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad to share with both the Afghan government and the Taliban the written proposals to help accelerate discussions, according to a report from Afghanistan's TOLONews.

Blinken noted in the letter that the United States had not decided to pull out the remaining 2,500 troops from Afghanistan by May, but he expressed concern that "the Taliban could make rapid territorial gains "following a US withdrawal.

The report said the existence of the letter, which was first reported by the TOLOnews channel in Afghanistan, was confirmed by a US official in Washington and the Afghan government.

Options remain on table

However, a spokesperson for the US State Department on Sunday declined to comment on the letter. "We have not made any decisions about our force posture in Afghanistan after May 1. All options remain on the table," said the spokesperson.

The US and the Afghan Taliban signed an agreement in late February 2020 that called for a full withdrawal of US military forces by May 2021 if the Taliban meets the conditions of the deal, including severing ties with terrorist groups.

The administration of US President Joe Biden had noted that the Taliban had not met its commitments under the US-Taliban deal.

Blinken urged Ghani to quickly embrace the proposal and underscored his concern that the security situation in the country could quickly deteriorate as the weather warms in Afghanistan.

Xinhua - Agencies