Taliban delegation reaches Russia to gain regional support

A team of negotiating members of Taliban reached out to Russia Friday to bolster regional support following collapse of talks with United States President Donald Trump.

The Afghan Taliban also has plans to visit Iran, China and Central Asian states for the same reason.

A senior Taliban leader said, “The purpose of these visits is to inform leaders of these countries about the peace talks and President Trump’s decision to call off the peace process at a time when both sides had resolved all outstanding issues and were about to sign a peace agreement.”

The delegation discussed prospects for a withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. Trump baruptly cancelled the secret meeting with the Taliban and Afghan leaders at his Camp David retreat.

Russia had earlier hosted meetings between the political and civil society representatives of Afghan and Taliban. It lately urged both sides to resume talks.

The Taliban and US officials had months of talks and agreed a draft accord that included withdrawing of 5,000 US troops from Afghanistan in exchange of security guarantees in the region. However, the accord excluded a ceasefire agreement.

Trump announced cancelation of the meeting via Twitter citing a suicide bomb attack in Kabul that killed one US soldier and 11 others.

He added the US forces would step up operations in Afghanistan describing the talks as dead.