The Afghan government has made no secret of its disdain for the
US-Taliban peace talks, mostly because of their lack of direct
involvement in a deal that is meant to see the US leave Afghanistan.
Afghan National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib, however, sees the US
negotiator as the real problem.
Mohib accused US Special Envoy Zalmay Khalilzad of having political ambitions in the negotiations, and that he was cutting the Ghani government out because he wants to be installed as America’s “viceroy” for Afghanistan.
Mohib went on to claim Khalilzad was not successfully reconciling
people, but instead was alienating the existing US partners in
Afghanistan by talking with the Taliban. State Department officials
rejected Mohib’s comments as “inaccurate and unhelpful.”
The allegations don’t appear to make a lot of sense, given Khalilzad’s
whole job is to get US forces out of Afghanistan, which presumably would
preclude him from ending up with any sort of job involving ruling
Afghanistan.
This is just a bit of the truth leaking out. The senior US representative has always been the Viceroy. The so-called Afghan government is and always has been a mere puppet, unable to control any of its own territory without the US, and unable to survive the departure of the US. It is even weaker than the puppet that was propped up by the Soviets.