Taliban calls on Biden to stick to US forces withdrawal from Afghanistan
Afghanistan's Taliban militants have urged the US President-elect Joe Biden to uphold the deal by administration of the outgoing US President Donald Trump over withdrawal of the American forces from Afghanistan.
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“The implementation of the agreement is the most reasonable and effective tool for ending the conflict between both our countries,” the Taliban said in a statement on Tuesday.
The US reached the deal with the Taliban in February.
Trump had made the end of the American war in Afghanistan a major campaign pledge. He declared in a Twitter post last month that US troops could be out of Afghanistan by Christmas, contradicting his national security advisor, who had spoken of a May 2021 deadline for the troop pullout.
The Tuesday statement by the Taliban marked the group’s second announcement on the need for Washington to stick to its agreement with the militants since press reports started projecting Biden as the winner of the US presidential election last week.
A Taliban spokesman said on Sunday that the militants expected Biden to abide by Trump’s deal with the group and withdraw the remaining US troops from Afghanistan.
The US military has been pulling out its troops from Afghanistan under the deal, which envisages the withdrawal to be complete by May — subject to certain security guarantees — while the Taliban hold talks with the Afghan government, which was not involved in the US deal.
Violence has, nevertheless, surged in Afghanistan. The Taliban have stepped up their attacks on Afghan security forces and civilians, and US forces have conducted some airstrikes against the militants.
Afghan people have called on the government to end the ongoing talks with the Taliban, particularly following recent attacks on education centers in Kabul. While the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group has claimed responsibility for those attacks, some Afghan officials have blamed the Taliban.
Hundreds of tribal leaders from eastern Nangarhar Province took part in a protest rally outside the US Embassy in Kabul to demand that Washington end its occupation of the country, blaming the upsurge of violence on the Trump administration’s accord with the Taliban.
The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) admitted in its quarterly report to the Congress on Thursday that attacks against Afghan forces and civilians had risen by 50 percent in the three months to the end of September compared to the previous quarter.
