This is the first in-person meeting between the two sides since the US drawdown from Afghanistan in mid-August….’reports Asian Lite News
Taliban spokesperson, Suhail Shaheen on Saturday said that the group is ready to set up an inclusive but not selective government in Doha amid talks with the United States.
Shaheen said, “We are ready to establish an all-inclusive government but not a selective one,” reported Khaama Press.
The delegations of the Taliban and the United States on Saturday held their first meeting in Qatar’s capital Doha, in a bid to turn the “new page on their relationship”.
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This is the first in-person meeting between the two sides since the US drawdown from Afghanistan in mid-August.
Taliban delegation led by the acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Motaqi met with the US delegation in Doha and will continue talking on Sunday, October 10 as well.
They are discussing ways to evacuate Afghans among other political issues.
In response to the western pressures for an inclusive government in Afghanistan, Shaheen said that they have included ethnic minorities in their caretaker government and will soon add women in, reported Khaama Press.
The Taliban’s interim cabinet is not only criticized by the international community but also by the people in Afghanistan as it does not include women and non-Taliban figures.
Moreover, Shaheen in an exclusive interview with Al-Jazeera said that the west must respect the wishes of the Afghan people.
UN special rapporteur for human rights
Amid reports of escalating violence in Afghanistan post the Taliban takeover, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) on Thursday in Geneva adopted a resolution to install a special rapporteur and a team of experts to monitor human rights.
Nick Cumming-Bruce, writing in The New York Times (NYT) said that the top human rights body voted to appoint human rights watchdog in Afghanistan.
The Human Rights Council in Geneva adopted a European Union-led resolution endorsed by 50 mainly European and Latin American countries that will install, by March of next year, a special rapporteur and a team of technical experts to monitor human rights there.
Targeted killings are “continuously happening,” and in some areas are daily occurrences, Shaharzad Akbar, the head of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, said by phone from a location outside the country ahead of the council’s vote.
Most victims are former army or police officers and their families, she said, but there are also reports of former prosecutors being killed, wrote Bruce.
Moreover, the unlawful killing of 13 members of Afghanistan’s Hazara minority, including a 17-year-old girl, has amplified fears for ethnic and religious minorities amid reports that the Taliban are evicting Hazaras from their homes.
The move to appoint human rights watchdog was condemned by China.
China condemned the initiative for overlooking the abuses by American forces and their allies over the past 20 years.
But the 47-member council, after discarding a series of hostile amendments proposed by China, voted 28 to 5 in favor of the resolution, with 14 members abstaining, reported NYT. (ANI)
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