KABUL, July 18: The Taliban office in Doha was a plot to break up Afghanistan orchestrated by either Pakistan or the United States, a top aide to the Afghan president has said.

Hamid Karzai’s chief of staff said Kabul was concerned about growing closeness between Pakistan and the United States, and that there was still a huge rift with Washington despite top-level efforts to patch up the disastrous fall-out over the office.

“The opening of the Qatar office, the way it happened was a plot and Afghanistan foiled that plot and this plot was aimed at splitting or breaking up Afghanistan,” Karim Khorram told local 1TV in an interview.

When the Taliban opened their office on June 18, it was hailed as a first step towards a potential peace deal, but a furious Karzai slammed it as an unofficial embassy for a government-in-exile.

He reacted by breaking off security talks with Washington and threatening to boycott any peace process altogether.

“We have concerns and those concerns have increased since January, and that is over US closeness with Pakistan, specially over issues linked to Afghanistan,” Mr Khorram said.

“I can’t say 100 per cent for sure, but you, yourself, can understand that one of these two countries is behind this (Doha office) plot,” Mr Khorram said.

Referring to media reports of an Afghan peace plan that would effectively cede control of parts of the south and east to the Taliban, Mr Khorram said any such move would unleash rebellion elsewhere in the country.

“If the Afghan government had not reacted as it did, Afghanistan could have gradually become like a place you would have had the Islamic Republic in Kabul and the Islamic Emirate in another place.

“And in other parts of Afghanistan others would have risen against this. If this would not have divided Afghanistan, it would have turned it into a country with a weak central (government) and each part controlled by different powers,” he said.—AFP