Afghan Ceasefire, US Pullout Prolonging Peace Talks

Specific details are still lacking despite deal being nearly finished

The peace deal in Afghanistan is, by some accounts, all but reached. Yet two major issues surrounding the pact, the ceasefire in Afghanistan and the US pullout from the country, remain unresolved.

It’s more than that the specifics are not public, but US and Taliban statements on them have been very contradictory, suggesting they haven’t really worked out those aspects of the deal at all.

Some media were quoting unnamed Taliban figures as saying there was to be no ceasefire and they’d just keep attacking what’s left of the Afghan government. The US withdrawal is even more problematic, because President Trump publicly declared that the US would “always” retain a presence in Afghanistan no matter what.

These need to be worked out, and adding to the issues, there are three distinct versions of the deal, in Dari, Pashto, and English, and all apparently say different things, and officials can’t seem to agree which is going to be the official version.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.