KABUL: A major progress has been achieved in Afghan government’s reconciliation efforts with Taliban and serious negotiations between the two sides are likely to commence soon.

“The three-phased reconciliation process has reached the final stage—the negotiations part,” a senior official, who has been following the process, said in a background interview on Friday.

The other two phases, setting up of a peace council and establishing contacts with the Taliban, have already been completed.

“Contacts have been made with all shades of Taliban,” the official said when asked if such contacts were limited to moderate elements.

In January this year, President Hamid Karzai unveiled a two-track ambitious plan to encourage foot soldiers of Afghan militancy to give up arms–broadly known as reintegration and wooing back the movement’s leaders through a reconciliationpolicy.

The peace council was set up to implement reintegration and reconciliation strategies after tribal leaders endorsed plans for engaging militants.

Contacts with Taliban, the official said, were made with the help of Pakistan even though Pakistanis officially said the roadmap for reconciliation had not been shared by Kabul with them.

Cables revealed by WikiLeaks also indicated that Taliban had largely moderated their hardline views and were ready for unconditional talks with the Afghan government and coalition forces before any reconciliation, even though the Americans had reservations about engaging Taliban and had set conditions and they should renounce violence, sever ties with Al Qaeda and abide by the Afghan constitution.

It was obvious from the background briefing and WikiLeaks that the Taliban and the Afghan government were ready to abandon from their maximalist positions and engage in meaningful negotiations.

The official quoted Afghan Peace Council Chief Burhanuddin Rabbani as having said that he was ready to talk to Taliban even if they did not accept the Afghan constitution.Former Taliban Ambassador to Pakistan Mullah Zaeef was quoted in a US diplomatic communiqué of February 2010 as having told an American diplomat that the peace process must first start with negotiations among all involved parties, including armed and disarmed Taliban, and that hurdles must be removed before entering the talks.

He had identified the hurdles as removing Taliban leaders from the UN(1267) list and US blacklists and cessation of foreign hostilities against the group during the negotiations.