Quetta Shura can’t enter Afghanistan: US

US Major General John Toolan on Friday said the Quetta Shura would not dare enter Afghanistan for fear of being killed or arrested. He said a Taliban commander suspected of being involved in the deaths of British and American troops in Afghanistan’s Helmand province is to be offered immunity from prosecution after giving himself up. The commander and 30 of his fighters surrendered in Sangin yesterday to an American general and the governor of the province, where 99 British soldiers and Marines were killed by the insurgents between 2006 and 2010.
The Taliban commander, who has not yet been identified because of fears for his safety, promised to bring in another 300 of his fighters by the end of the month. US Marine Major General John Toolan said the commander had also offered to kill a senior Taliban figure linked to the insurgents’ senior leadership in Quetta. General Toolan said the individual was on the coalition’s “target list” and would probably now flee the area, knowing that the local people would be after him. Speaking to Pentagon reporters on a video link from his headquarters at Camp Leatherhead in Helmand, General Toolan said the man had come “of his own volition”. Under the rules of the reintegration programme, once an individual had satisfied officials that he is genuinely changing sides, he is normally granted immunity. Defectors also receive cash rewards for two or three months, the general said.
“In Helmand, we don t have too many, so today was a big success story [because] we’ve got a Taliban commander who is willing to come in from the cold,” General Toolan said. Asked if he had evidence that the Taliban commander had killed and wounded coalition troops in Sangin, he said: “I wouldn’t doubt that at all.”