Taliban to decide soon about joining Afghan talks

KABUL: The Taliban’s leaders will decide soon about joining talks with the Afghan government, a spokesman said on Friday, after President Hamid Karzai invited them to a peace council as part of efforts to end years of fighting.

“I cannot say a word regarding these peace talks. The Taliban leadership will soon decide whether to take part in these peace talks,” Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said.

UN lifts sanctions on five former Taliban officials

KABUL: Five former Taliban officials have been removed from the UN sanctions list ahead of Thursday’s key international conference in London that is expected to focus on a government plan to persuade militants to switch sides.

President Hamid Karzai has been pressing for the removal of certain Taliban figures from the list, which imposes punitive measures such as a travel ban and an assets freeze, as part of reconciliation efforts.

The United Nations said Tuesday that the sanctions committee approved the removal of Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, a former foreign minister and confidant of Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and four others.

The UN did not mention the reconciliation plan but said the decision was made Monday after a review of the list. Sanctions had been imposed on the five men in 2001.

Karzai has said Taliban who are not part of al-Qaida or other terrorist groups ”are welcome to come back to their country, lay down arms and resume life.”

He plans to seek international support for a new government reintegration plan at the London conference.

The other four removed from the list were the Taliban’s deputy commerce minister, Faizl Mohammed Faizan; Abdul Hakim Monib, the deputy minister of frontier affairs who later renounced the Taliban and became a provincial governor; Mohammad Musa Hottak, the deputy planning minister who was later elected to parliament; and a former press officer, Shams-ul Safa Aminzai.

The effort to remove some Taliban figures from the list is one of the incentives being discussed as part of the plan, along with jobs and vocational training. Officials hope the multimillion-dollar initiative will succeed where past programs have failed.

Skeptics, though, wonder whether significant numbers of militants will stop fighting when they believe they’re winning.

Wahid Muzhda, a Kabul-based security analyst, said the removal of the men from the list was not likely to persuade other Taliban militants to leave the fight. He said all five were relatively low-level or already had turned on the militant group.

”These people are not fighters now and they weren’t powerful commanders then,” he said. ”This won’t have any effect on peace or stability. It won’t give confidence to the Taliban.”

Afghan soil being used against Pakistan: DG ISI

KARACHI: Director General ISI Ahmad Shuja Pasha said on Tuesday that Afghan soil is being used for terrorist activities in Pakistan, adding that peace cannot be established in Pakistan unless infiltration from Afghan border is stopped.

Pasha’s statement came in the backdrop of increased US pressure to launch a parallel operation in North Waziristan.

Briefing the parliamentary committee on national security, the DG said that the drug mafia in Afghanistan is supporting terrorists who are creating unrest within Pakistan.

According to reports, the committee members believe that the Pak-Afghan border should be fenced and movement across the border should be strictly monitored.

The members also called for the need to enhance security along the Pak-Afghan border.

After the meeting, Senator Raza Rabbani the chairman of the Parliamentary committee on national security briefed the media during which he informed that the committee members condemned the screening of Pakistani citizens at US airports, terming it a ‘violation of international Human Rights Declarations.’ –DawnNews