Afghan politician: Taliban must participate, not overrun the country

Afghanistan’s Vice President Amrullah Saleh has urged the militant Taliban to stop its violent acts against the country’s leadership and institutions and participate in government instead.

Saleh was speaking at the second meeting of the leadership assembly of the Afghan National Reconciliation Council on Saturday.

Saleh added that Afghanistan is a complicated country, where the dominance of one group was impossible and would only lead to its isolation.

The Taliban has always said that the ongoing government in Afghanistan was not Islamic, vowed to establish what the militants call a “pure Islamic government.”

Saleh added that the Taliban cannot win the ongoing war by killing tribal leaders, journalists or members of Afghan civil society, as this would further complicate the ongoing conflicts.

The country has seen ongoing violence. Last week alone, a journalist, four health workers, the head of an election monitoring organization and his driver, and a women’s rights activist and her brother were assassinated in separate Taliban attacks.

Meanwhile, prominent warlord Marshal Abdul Rashid Dostum said in a statement that the Afghan negotiating team should tell the Taliban team in Doha to accept a democratic government and test its popularity among the people by nominating their candidates for government positions.

A former vice president, Younus Qanoni, criticized the government for its failure to ensure security and argued that something needed to be done about the high level of violence.
Four explosions were reported Saturday in various parts of Kabul.

As usual, no group claimed responsibility for the incidents as of yet, but the government always blames the Taliban for the incidents.