US strategy for Afghanistan: Trump breaks off negotiations with Taliban

The US peace negotiations with the radical Islamic Taliban have apparently failed on the home straight: US President Donald Trump has surprisingly declared talks with the Islamist group to be over.

Trump wrote on Twitter that he had planned secret meetings with the Taliban and - apart from that - with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani for this Sunday in Camp David.

But because of a deadly attack in the Afghan capital Kabul, in which a US soldier was killed, he had canceled the meetings - and also the other peace talks with the Taliban. Whether this is the final outcome for the negotiations of both sides or the discussions are only exposed remained unclear at first.

The US and the Taliban have spoken since July 2018 about a political solution to the 18-year conflict in Afghanistan. The US chief negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad had said on Monday that they had agreed "in principle" on an agreement. The "fundamental" agreement is only definitive if Trump agrees. If Trump agrees, the agreement could be announced in the coming days.

The talks focused on troop withdrawals and Taliban guarantees that Afghanistan will not be a safe haven for terrorists. As a result, intra-Afghan peace talks should be held. So far, the Taliban refused to speak with the government in Kabul, which they regard as a "puppet" of the West. A truce was also an issue.

Trump wrote on Twitter that leading Taliban officials and Ghani should have arrived in the US on Saturday night to meet him on Sunday in Camp David. Almost nobody knew about it. Unfortunately, "in order to strengthen their bargaining position," the Taliban committed an attack in Kabul killing one US soldier and eleven others. He had therefore canceled the meeting immediately - and also canceled the peace negotiations. "If they can not arrange a truce during these very important peace talks, they probably will not have the power to negotiate a meaningful deal anyway."

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The radical Islamic Taliban continued their wave of attacks in Afghanistan over the past few days: two car bomb attacks in the capital Kabul and in the eastern province of Logar, at least 16 people were killed on Thursday, including two Nato soldiers. One of the soldiers was American. The US Department of Defense said Friday that a US soldier was killed by a Kabul bomb attack on Thursday. With the two car attacks, the Taliban had carried out five large-scale attacks within five days.

The United States, which entered Afghanistan in 2001 after the September 11 attacks, has been negotiating with the radical Islamic Taliban for a year and has already reached a settlement. Accordingly, the US wanted to deduct around 5000 of the total of 13,000 soldiers from five bases in Afghanistan.

In return, the Taliban were to renounce the al Qaeda terrorist network, fight the Islamic State jihadist militia and initiate direct negotiations with the government in Kabul.