I was on WNYC’s The Takeaway this morning talking about the politics of the Taliban opening a political office in Qatar.
On Tuesday, after months of denying it was interested in participating in formal talks to end the war in Afghanistan, the Taliban indicated it would consider opening a political office in Qatar. A political office would give mediators from the U.S. a legitimate contact for Taliban members. No details have been given about when these negotiations would begin, or what would be bargained for. This step also implies that there will continue to be some kind of Taliban presence inside Afghanistan.
Joshua Foust, correspondent for The Atlantic and a fellow at the American Security Project, explains what this could mean for U.S.-Afghan relations.
This post was written by...
Joshua Foust – author of 1849 posts on Registan.net.
Joshua Foust is a Fellow at the American Security Project and the author of Afghanistan Journal: Selections from Registan.net. His research focuses primarily on Central and South Asia. Joshua is a correspondent for The Atlantic and a columnist for PBS Need to Know. Joshua appears regularly on the BBC World News, Aljazeera, and international public radio. Joshua's writing has appeared in the Columbia Journalism Review, Foreign Policy’s AfPak Channel, the New York Times, Reuters, and the Christian Science Monitor. Follow him on twitter: @joshuafoust
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If anything, politicizing can definitely be a good thing…more accountability, more transparency…but how awkward is that going to be for us? Al Udeid is right down the road…
This was inevitable. No suprise. The Soviets also spoke with Afghan groups as and before they withdrew.
fortunately no loss with the money or health talk to taliban its true good results to talking to taliban ..