The Taliban on Tuesday announced that they had come to an “initial agreement” to open their first political overseas office, possibly in Qatar, in the first public gesture towards peace talks with the US. It is the first time the insurgent group has publicly raised the prospect of a negotiated peace after more than 10 years of fighting the Kabul government, after previously stating they would not talk until all foreign troops had left Afghan soil. In a statement on their purported website “Voice of Jihad”, the Taliban said they had held “preliminary talks with relevant sides including Qatar” to open an office outside Afghanistan, without confirming where it would be. One of their demands would be for a prisoner exchange to include the release of Taliban inmates from the US-run detention facility Guantanamo Bay, they said. “We’re now prepared, while having a strong presence inside (Afghanistan), to have a political office outside (Afghanistan) for negotiations,” the statement said. “And as part of this we have reached initial agreement with relevant sides including Qatar.” The Taliban, now into an 11th year of fighting President Hamid Karzai’s Western-backed government, called again for international troops to leave. “The occupation of the country must be ended and Afghans must be allowed to create an Islamic government of their choice that be no harm to any one.” The statement rejected some media reports that negotiations with the US had begun, but according to a source in Pakistan early discussions had been held last autumn in Doha, Qatar, between US diplomats and a small Taliban delegation led by Tayyeb Agha, the former secretary of Taliban leader Mullah Omar. The source said Agha was the only Taliban official in direct contact with Mullah Omar, saying the Taliban’s founder was based in Pakistan.
