The Afghan government and Taliban representatives are set to meet again for the second round of peace talks in Murree on Friday.
Media reported a Pakistani official as saying that the second round of talks would be more substantive and detailed. “The fact that the two sides are re-convening in less than a month is encouraging. It is a big success,” the official said, according to a Dawn report.
“We expect both sides to discuss confidence-building measures, including steps to bring down the level of violence before they move on to discuss the more complex issues to end the conflict in Afghanistan.”
The first round of what Islamabad described as the 2+2+1 or the Murree Peace Process was held on July 7. Pakistan’s foreign office in a statement said participants recognised the need to undertake confidence-building measures in order to engender trust among all stakeholders.
There was some confusion over the venue of the second round of talks with Afghan government officials saying the meeting could take place in the north-western Chinese city of Urumqi, while some within the Taliban wanted the meeting to take place in Doha.
The official said that the level of delegation was expected to remain the same, though efforts were being made to persuade Taliban to send more senior representatives to the talks. “If this happens, the Afghan government would also raise the level of their delegation to the second round.”
In the first round, the Afghan government side was led by its deputy foreign minister, Hekmat Khalil Karzai, while the Taliban delegation was led by Mulla Abbas Durrani.
