Taliban sends delegation to Russia after talks with Washington collapse

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The Taliban have sent a delegation to Russia to discuss the possibilities of withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan after talks with the United States collapsed this month, Taliban officials said.

This came days after US President Donald Trump canceled a planned meeting with Taliban leaders at the presidential retreat at Camp David.

The news agency "RIA Novosti" a spokesman for the ministry as saying that "the Russian President's Special Representative for Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov hosted a delegation of Taliban in Moscow," without disclosing the date on which the talks were held.

"The Russian side stressed the need to re-launch negotiations between the United States and the Taliban," the spokesman said.

He added that the delegates "the Taliban for their part confirmed their desire to continue dialogue with Washington."

The Taliban are looking to boost regional support through overseas visits, which are also scheduled to include China, Iran and Central Asian countries.

A senior Taliban official said in Qatar that "the purpose of these visits is to inform the leaders of these countries on peace talks and President Trump's decision to cancel the peace process at a time when the two sides resolved all outstanding issues and were about to sign a peace agreement."

Russia said last week it hoped the peace process would be back on track, urged both sides to resume talks, and hosted meetings between representatives of the Taliban and Afghan civil and political society.

Conditions of peace
"We are convinced that the end of a full foreign military presence is a prerequisite for a viable peace in Afghanistan," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday.

The Taliban official, who asked not to be named, said the aim of the visits was not to try to revive negotiations with the United States, but to assess regional support for the issue of being forced to leave Afghanistan.

US officials held months of talks with Taliban officials in the Qatari capital Doha, where they agreed on a draft deal that would have led to the withdrawal of about 5,000 US troops from Afghanistan in exchange for security guarantees from the Taliban.

But the deal - which was just a step toward a peace deal - has drawn strong criticism from the Afghan government, which has not been allowed to take part in the talks.

The draft did not include a ceasefire agreement, and with violence continuing and after a suicide attack in Kabul that killed at least 12 people - including a US soldier - Trump announced on Twitter that the Camp David meeting was canceled.

Trump then said the talks were deadlocked and that US forces would step up operations against the Taliban, who now control the largest territory since they were ousted from power in a US-led campaign in 2001.