October 6, 2010

WASHINGTON (AFP) –

Taliban supreme leader, Mullah Omar, has, for the first time, backed secret high-level talks with the Afghan government to negotiate an end to the nine-year war, the Washington Post said Wednesday.

"They are very, very serious about finding a way out," a source close to the talks told the Post, referring to the Taliban.

The Post cited unnamed Afghan and Arab sources as saying the talks were believed to involve representatives authorized by the Quetta Shura, the Afghan Taliban group based in Pakistan, and Omar.

Omar, the Afghan Taliban leader who is believed to be hiding in Pakistan, and other top Taliban figures have insisted for years that foreign fighters must first leave Afghanistan before peace talks can begin.

But a source close to the talks told the Post that the leadership knows "that they are going to be sidelined," and was negotiating with the government of President Hamid Karzai to ensure their positions are protected.

"They know that more radical elements are being promoted within their rank and file outside their control," the source said.

"All these things are making them absolutely sure that, regardless of (their success in) the war, they are not in a winning position."

The report comes after meetings hosted by Saudi Arabia ended without success last year.

The new negotiations involve agreements to allow Taliban leaders positions in the Afghan government and the withdrawal of US and NATO forces according to an agreed timetable, the newspaper said.

The White House on Wednesday backed the idea of Afghan government reconciliation talks with the Taliban, but said the United States was not a party to the reported contacts between Kabul and militia leaders.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the Obama administration had "long supported" an "Afghan-led reconciliation effort," though did not specifically confirm the Post report.

"We and the Afghans have said that ... requires a renunciation of Al-Qaeda, following Afghan law and a renunciation of violence," he said, adding that such talks had to be conducted by Afghans.

"This is not something that we do with the Taliban. This is something that the Afghan government has to do with people in Afghanistan."

The talks are believed however to exclude representatives of the Haqqani group, which the Post said was the target of recently escalated US drone attacks, and is seen by US intelligence as being "particularly brutal."

The United States and NATO have 150,000 troops in Afghanistan aiming to quell the insurgency that began soon after the Taliban regime was overthrown in a US-led invasion in late 2001.

US General David Petraeus, the commander of NATO troops in Afghanistan, said last week that the Taliban was approaching the Afghan government and foreign forces with "overtures" about quitting the fight.

A Taliban spokesman dismissed Petraeus's comments as "completely baseless," however, saying the insurgents would not "negotiate with foreign invaders or their puppet government."

European officials told the Post that US representatives had been lukewarm to the idea of negotiations until this summer, fearing the US domestic repercussions of talking to the Taliban.

That changed, the sources said, when escalated combat in Afghanistan produced disappointing results and US public opposition to the war ramped up.