Donald Trump ended a year of US talks with Afghanistan’s Taliban on Sunday in typical style—on Twitter. The US president said he was scheduled to hold an unprecedented “secret meeting” with the militant outfit in Camp David near Washington on Sunday, but cancelled it citing the death of a US army man and 11 others in a Taliban attack in Kabul on Thursday.
Authoritarian states such as China usually resort to such measures to improve their negotiating position ahead of talks, but Trump called the Taliban’s bluff and said attempts to “build false leverage” would not work. His Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told CNN that the US did not rule out reopening talks but said the Taliban should “behave” and make a “significant commitment”.
Some analysts called Trump’s move a face-saving measure after difficulties in the negotiations and noted that talks had gone on for two days after the Taliban attack. A report in the New York Times quoting American officials suggested the Taliban might not have agreed to the meeting as Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, whose government they deride as a US puppet, would have been present there.
Setback for Pakistan
Trump’s decision is a blow for Pakistan that tried to use Taliban to build leverage with US. In fact, the America-Taliban talks had begun last year after Islamabad released Abdul Ghani Baradar, one of the group’s founders, from prison at the request of the US.