ISE SHIMA (Japan): The Taliban are unlikely to come to the table for peace talks with the government of Afghanistan “anytime soon”, US President Barack Obama said on Thursday.
Mr Obama told reporters in Japan, where he was meeting other leaders of the Group of Seven nations, that he expected the group to continue killing people in Afghanistan.
“We anticipate (that) the Taliban will continue an agenda of violence,” he said.
Mr Obama was speaking a day after the Afghan Taliban named Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada as their new leader, elevating a low-profile religious figure in a swift power transition after the death of Mullah Mansour in a US drone strike.
Some analysts said it was not clear if Mullah Akhundzada, formerly one of Mansour’s deputies, would emulate his former boss in shunning peace talks with the Afghan government.
He was also expected to face the enormous challenge of unifying an increasingly fragmented militant movement.
The killing of Mullah Mansour, meanwhile, showed that Washington had for now abandoned hopes of reviving the direct peace talks between Kabul and the Taliban, which broke down last summer.
President Obama acknowledged that he was never going to find a willing negotiating partner at the helm of the Afghan group.
“I was not expecting a liberal democrat to be appointed (as Taliban chief),” he told reporters. “My hope, although not my expectation, is that there comes a point where the Taliban realise what they need to be doing” and start getting into a dialogue with the government, he said.
“I am doubtful that it will be happening anytime soon.”
Before his killing, Mansour had written a will handpicking Mullah Akhundzada to be his successor, Taliban sources said.
The killing marked a significant shift for Washington, highlighting a new willingness to target Taliban leaders in Pakistan and risk retaliatory attacks against struggling Afghan security forces.
Saturday’s drone attack, the first known American assault on a top Afghan Taliban leader on Pakistani soil, sent shockwaves through the insurgent movement which had seen a resurgence under Mansour.
Published in Dawn, May 27th, 2016
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