Trump envoy is selling out Afghanistan in Taliban peace talks: senior Afghan official

By Dan De Luce

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A top Afghan government official on Thursday blasted the Trump administration's peace talks with the Taliban, accusing a U.S. presidential envoy of shutting out the Kabul government and betraying the trust of a close ally.

"We don't know what's going on. We don't have the kind of transparency that we should have," Hamdullah Mohib, Afghan national security adviser, told reporters during a visit to Washington.

Asked if President Donald Trump's envoy for reconciliation in Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, was consulting the Afghan government on his talks with the Taliban insurgents, Mohib said: "No. We get bits and pieces of information."

He added: "The last people to find out are us."

The commanders of Afghan security forces were deeply concerned about the situation, Mohib said.

"How am I supposed to convince them that they are not being sold out?"

The Afghan government was asked to send a negotiating team to recent talks in the United Arab Emirates to take part in possible three-way proximity talks among the Taliban, the United States and Kabul representatives, he said. But the Afghan representatives were reduced to waiting in hotel lobbies and were not properly briefed by the U.S. delegation, according to Mohib, who served as Afghan ambassador to the United States until he returned to Kabul last year.

"It was a humiliation for the Afghan government," he said.

His extraordinary criticism revealed a bitter divide between the two countries at a moment when the Trump administration is pushing hard to broker an end to the 17-year-old war and allow for the withdrawal of American troops. U.S. lawmakers from both parties and some former U.S. diplomats have warned against a hasty negotiation with the Taliban that could amount to an American capitulation.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani previously has spoken of the risks of moving too hastily to cut a deal with the Taliban and warned Washington not to sideline his government in the talks. But his national security adviser's broadside went a step further, accusing Washington of selling out Afghanistan and questioning the motives of Trump's Afghan-born envoy.

"We think there may be personal ambitions, because there is a lack of information," Mohib said.

Khalilzad has been considered a possible presidential candidate in Afghanistan in the past, and has held discussions with opposition Afghan political figures in Kabul, he said.

"The perception in Afghanistan, people in the government think that perhaps, perhaps all this talk is to create a caretaker government of which he will then become the viceroy," Mohib said.Qatari officials participate in peace talks in an undisclosed location in Doha, Qatar, on Feb. 25, 2019. U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan, Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, is seen, second left, and the Deputy Commander of the Taliban Movement for Political Affairs, Abdul Ghani Baradar, right.Qatar Foreign Ministry / AP

A State Department official, who was not authorized to speak on the record, dismissed the allegations.

"Mr. Mohib's comments are inaccurate and unhelpful, and we will be responding to them privately today," the official said. His comments do not in any way reflect the high level of U.S.-Afghan coordination on all matters involving peace in Afghanistan. "It is vital that the Afghans take this opportunity for peace."

At a State Department press briefing, spokesman Robert Palladino said that Mohib's comments did not warrant a public response.

But he said the U.S. remains in close consultation with President Ashraf Ghani and other senior officials, that Khalilzad has paid frequent visits to Kabul to hold discussions with Afghan leaders and that the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and his team are in contact with Ghani on "a near daily basis."

"There is no lack of coordination," Palladino said.

He later offered an account of a meeting on Thursday afternoon between David Hale, undersecretary of state for political affairs, and Mohib.

Hale reminded Mohib that Khalilzad represents the secretary of state, and “that attacks on Ambassador Khalilzad are attacks on the Department and only serve to hinder the bilateral relationship and the peace process,” Palladino said in a statement.

A White House National Security Council official rejected Mohib's comments and said the United States values its longstanding relationship with Afghanistan.