There should be less violence in Afghanistan for a week so that peace can be thought of at all. The course of the first weekend after the official start of a restricted ceasefire gives reason for hope.
Kabul / Washington (dpa) - US President Donald Trump has so far seen no violations of an agreement with the Taliban to reduce violence in Afghanistan.
If this continues in the coming days, he wants to sign an agreement with the militant Islamist group, Trump said in the garden of the White House. "I think it will work." After the official start of a seven-day phase of reduced violence after midnight on Saturday (local time in Afghanistan), the country in crisis experienced a comparatively quiet weekend.
The US sees "reducing violence" as a test of whether the Taliban can control its fighters. If there is really less violence for a week, the US and Taliban want to sign the broader agreement. It is said to include a U.S. troop withdrawal schedule and Taliban guarantees that Afghanistan will not become a retreat for terrorists.
Washington is preparing to sign on February 29. The agreement is also intended to initiate negotiations within Afghanistan - the actual peace talks. This would involve a redistribution of power in the country in crisis. A comprehensive ceasefire could be one of the first points in negotiations.
In the southern province of Kandahar, two attacks on Afghan security forces occurred on Sunday, as the governor's spokesman for the German Press Agency said. There were no victims. Local officials said that small attacks on checkpoints attributed to the Taliban were carried out in at least three provinces of the country on Saturday. Five security forces were killed in the province of Balkh in the north of the country. Two police officers were reportedly injured in Urusgan province.
At the end of the test phase it will be decisive how incidents are assessed. In a statement released on Friday evening, the Taliban had urged its fighters to strictly adhere to a "program" imposed on them over the seven days. In addition, they should only prepare for "self-defense against violations" on the other side. It is also strictly forbidden to go to the areas controlled by the government.
In return, the US is likely to reduce or even stop its operations and air strikes against the Taliban. President Aschraf Ghani said the Afghan police and army would only attack the Islamic State (IS) terrorist militia, al Qaeda extremists and other terrorist groups a week, but not the Taliban. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper warned on Friday: "If the Taliban reject the peace path, we will be prepared to defend ourselves and our Afghan partners."
The USA and the Taliban have been negotiating a political solution to the Afghanistan conflict since July 2018. The United States originally started negotiations with the call for a comprehensive ceasefire. However, the Taliban, who saw violence as their most important lever and acted more and more militarily, could not convince them.
In the fourth quarter of 2019, NATO reported that the Taliban and other armed groups averaged 90 attacks a day. More than a third of them were injured or killed. Over the course of the year, more than 10,000 civilians were victims of the ongoing conflicts and attacks: more than 3,400 citizens died and almost 7,000 others were injured, according to a report released on Saturday by the UN mission in Afghanistan (Unama).