Afghan officials said Friday they will meet Taliban insurgents next week for a second round of talks aimed at ending 13 years of war, pledging to press for a ceasefire in negotiations likely to be held in China. The Afghan government conducted its first face-to-face talks with Taliban cadres on July 7 in Murree which were supervised by American and Chinese representatives.
They agreed to meet again in the coming weeks but the venue remains unconfirmed and it was unclear whether the nascent dialogue was widely endorsed within the ranks of the Taliban, riven by internal divisions. "The second round of talks... is set for July 30 or 31," said Mohammad Ismail Qasimyar, a member of the Afghan High Peace Council (HPC), the government's top peace negotiating body. "This meeting will most probably be held in China... and will be supervised by the US and China. We will insist and put pressure in the meeting for a temporary ceasefire."
But another HPC official said discussions over a possible venue were still ongoing. "The talks... are set for July 30 but discussions and consultation are ongoing between Afghanistan, Pakistan, the United States and China on where to host the meeting," said HPC deputy chairman Abdul Hakim Mujahid.
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