By the CNN Wire Staff
October 7, 2010 -- Updated 1026 GMT (1826 HKT)
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Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Troops have killed a few top Taliban leaders in northern Afghanistan, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said on Thursday.
Security forces killed Maulawi Jawadullah, the Taliban district leader for Yangi Qalah of Takhar, and seven of his associates in northeastern Afghanistan's Takhar province on Wednesday. They were killed in a coalition airstrike and ground operation, authorities said.
ISAF said Jawadullah was directly responsible for organizing and holding kidnapped Afghan security forces, and he is linked to the recent deaths of at least 10 police officers during an attack on a police station in Kunduz province.
In northwestern Afghanistan, troops killed Mullah Ismail, the Taliban shadow governor of Badghis province, and Abdul Hakim, a Taliban senior leader in Badghis, on Wednesday. Ismail directed a range of attacks, including IED strikes and ambushes on coalition forces, according to ISAF.
On Tuesday, the Faryab shadow governor was killed, and an ISAF spokesman called the actions a "huge blow to the Taliban" in northwestern Afghanistan.
"These were two of the few remaining shadow governors not hiding in Pakistan and their removal will significantly reduce Taliban influence throughout the region," U.S. Army Col. Rafael Torres, ISAF spokesman.
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The White House repeated U.S. support for Afghan peace talks with the Taliban as an aide to President Hamid Karzai met former leaders of the guerrilla movement.
Education Minister Ghulam Farooq Wardak, a member of a peacemaking council appointed by Karzai, conferred in Kabul this week with ex-officials of the former Taliban regime, Afghanistan’s Pajhwok news agency reported. Pakistani politicians and Arab delegates joined the meeting in the capital, which focused on how best to build a settlement with the insurgency, said a former Taliban official who attended, and who asked not to be named.
Karzai’s deputy spokesman, Siamak Herawy, confirmed the meeting, which took place at Kabul’s Serena Hotel, and declined to give details. The Afghan president today summoned his peace council for an inaugural formal meeting on the ninth anniversary of the start of a U.S. bombing campaign that helped force the Taliban from power and install Karzai’s government.
The Washington Post reported yesterday that the Taliban have begun secret “high-level talks” with Karzai’s government. Those talks are at a preliminary stage and follow meetings held in Saudi Arabia more than a year ago, the newspaper cited unnamed Afghan and Arab sources as saying.
The Taliban representatives in those talks are believed to have been “fully authorized” by the Quetta Shura, the Taliban’s top council, and its leader, Mohammad Omar, the Post said.
Renounce Violence
For the U.S. to accept peace talks, the Taliban must renounce violence, said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. The U.S. will not meet directly with Taliban leaders, he told reporters yesterday.
“This is not something that we do with the Taliban,” Gibbs said. “This is something that Afghans -- the Afghan government -- has to do with people in Afghanistan. And we have always been supportive of that reconciliation.”
Gibbs declined to confirm details of the newspaper’s report and would only outline the U.S. policy on such talks. State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley declined to confirm knowledge of the talks. Any such discussions would “not contradict U.S. policy,” he said, and “there has to be a political solution to the current challenge.”
Crowley said the U.S. believes some branches of the Taliban “may well be willing to seek a political solution. We recognize that other groups will be holdouts and that’s why we are intensively bringing the fight to them.”
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To contact the reporters on this story: Roger Runningen in Washington at rrunningen@blooomberg.net; Eltaf Najafizada in Kabul, Afghanistan atenajafizada1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Bill Austin at billaustin@bloomberg.net.
Education Minister Ghulam Farooq Wardak, a member of a peacemaking council appointed by Karzai, conferred in Kabul this week with ex-officials of the former Taliban regime, Afghanistan’s Pajhwok news agency reported. Pakistani politicians and Arab delegates joined the meeting in the capital, which focused on how best to build a settlement with the insurgency, said a former Taliban official who attended, and who asked not to be named.
Karzai’s deputy spokesman, Siamak Herawy, confirmed the meeting, which took place at Kabul’s Serena Hotel, and declined to give details. The Afghan president today summoned his peace council for an inaugural formal meeting on the ninth anniversary of the start of a U.S. bombing campaign that helped force the Taliban from power and install Karzai’s government.
The Washington Post reported yesterday that the Taliban have begun secret “high-level talks” with Karzai’s government. Those talks are at a preliminary stage and follow meetings held in Saudi Arabia more than a year ago, the newspaper cited unnamed Afghan and Arab sources as saying.
The Taliban representatives in those talks are believed to have been “fully authorized” by the Quetta Shura, the Taliban’s top council, and its leader, Mohammad Omar, the Post said.
Renounce Violence
For the U.S. to accept peace talks, the Taliban must renounce violence, said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. The U.S. will not meet directly with Taliban leaders, he told reporters yesterday.
“This is not something that we do with the Taliban,” Gibbs said. “This is something that Afghans -- the Afghan government -- has to do with people in Afghanistan. And we have always been supportive of that reconciliation.”
Gibbs declined to confirm details of the newspaper’s report and would only outline the U.S. policy on such talks. State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley declined to confirm knowledge of the talks. Any such discussions would “not contradict U.S. policy,” he said, and “there has to be a political solution to the current challenge.”
Crowley said the U.S. believes some branches of the Taliban “may well be willing to seek a political solution. We recognize that other groups will be holdouts and that’s why we are intensively bringing the fight to them.”
======================================================
To contact the reporters on this story: Roger Runningen in Washington at rrunningen@blooomberg.net; Eltaf Najafizada in Kabul, Afghanistan atenajafizada1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Bill Austin at billaustin@bloomberg.net.
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