U.S.-Afghan tensions erupt over Kabul's exclusion from peace talks

[TomSea]

U.S.-Afghan tensions erupt over Kabul's exclusion from peace talks
Jonathan Landay

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States and Afghanistan clashed publicly on Thursday over U.S. peace talks with the Taliban, with a visiting Afghan official accusing the chief U.S. negotiator of “delegitimizing” the Kabul government by excluding it from the deliberations.

The remarks by Hamdullah Mohib, a former ambassador to Washington who serves as Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s national security adviser, drew a blistering rebuke from the State Department, which said they impeded U.S.-Afghan ties and the peace process.

The feud thrust into the open tensions that have been building between the allies over U.S. efforts to forge a peace pact with the Taliban paving the way for a U.S. troop withdrawal that Kabul fears could weaken its own negotiating position.

Read more at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-afghanistan-mohib-idUSKCN1QV2XU

Trump envoy is selling out Afghanistan in Taliban peace talks: senior Afghan official
"We don't know what's going on. We don't have the kind of transparency that we should have," said Afghan national security adviser Hamdullah Mohib.


Afghanistans National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib during a meeting of national security secretaries of Afghanistan, China, Iran, India and Russia, in the Iranian capital Tehran on Sept. 26, 2018.Atta Kenare / AFP - Getty Images file

March 14, 2019, 12:41 PM CDT
By Dan De Luce

A top Afghan government official on Thursday blasted the Trump administration's peace talks with the Taliban, accusing a U.S. presidential envoy of shutting out the Kabul government and betraying the trust of a close ally.

"We don't know what's going on. We don't have the kind of transparency that we should have," Hamdullah Mohib, Afghan national security adviser, told reporters during a visit to Washington.

Asked if President Donald Trump's envoy for reconciliation in Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, was consulting the Afghan government on his talks with the Taliban insurgents, Mohib said: "No. We get bits and pieces of information."

Read more at: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-envoy-selling-out-afghanistan-taliban-peace-talks-senior-afghan-n983326