Afghan conflict: Taliban to resume attacking local forces after deal with US

[brooklynite]

Source: BBC

The Taliban are to resume attacks against government forces, just days after signing a deal with the US aimed at bringing peace to Afghanistan.

The hard-line Islamist group had observed a "reduction in violence" in the week leading up to the agreement.

The deal included a commitment to hold peace talks with the Afghan government.

But the group's spokesman said on Monday the talks would not go ahead if 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by the government were not released.

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-51706126

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America's big deal-maker strikes again...

[Polly Hennessey]

1. The clown and his deals. What a laugh.

When I first heard of this fiasco, I started laughing. I will give him his due on his success in conning people. Not sure too many took this one seriously. What I find side splitting is how effectively the Taliban played the Idiot and Pompass. Have we really survived three years of him?

[Massacure]

15. It's not the Taliban that are playing Trump

A part of the peace deal that the United States and the Taliban signed was that 5,000 captured Taliban fighters would be released. Those fighters are actually being held by the Afghan government though, and the Afghan government says that it has no intention of releasing them. Either the Trump administration is getting played by the Afghan government, or the administration was so incompetent as to not actually make sure the Afghan government was okay with the deal before we actually signed it. It's understandable why the Taliban are pissed.

[IronLionZion]

2. Art of the deal

[jayfish]

3. Gosh, Obama Let Five Members Of The Taliban Go...

to get an American soldier back and it almost led to armed insurrection on the Right. What are they going to do about 5,000?

[SWBTATTReg]

4. Wow. The ink hasn't even dried yet, and this admin. already crowing about this accomplishment(?)...

is seeing it get trashed promptly by the Taliban. I alone, can do it. rump certainly is proving it!

[rockfordfile]

5. This is trump's fault

[packman]

6. The "art" of the deal - What a joke

Release those 5,000 prisoners and watch the country explode.

[keithbvadu2]

7. Master negotiator!

Master negotiator!

[Eugene]

8. Afghanistan: bomb attack kills three as Taliban ends partial truce

Source: The Guardian

Afghanistan: bomb attack kills three as Taliban ends partial truce

• Motorcycle with bomb explodes during football match
• Taliban’s week-long ‘reduction of violence’ expired on Saturday

Julian Borger in Washington
Mon 2 Mar 2020 16.45 GMT
Last modified on Mon 2 Mar 2020 18.35 GMT

Three people have been killed and 11 injured in a motorcycle bomb attack at a football match in eastern Afghanistan, as the Taliban announced an end to a partial truce two days after signing a deal with the US.

The Taliban had agreed to a week-long “reduction of violence” as a confidence-building measure ahead of the agreement signed on Saturday, in which the US pledged that all foreign forces would leave Afghanistan within 14 months, if the Taliban sat down for talks on Afghanistan’s future with government representatives.

The agreed “reduction in violence” expired on Saturday, but US officials had expressed hope it would be prolonged. The Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, committed to extending it at least until the scheduled start date for intra-Afghan talks, 10 March.

Those talks appeared to be in jeopardy on Monday, as the Kabul government said it had not agreed to the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners before the negotiations started, an offer made by the US as part of its agreement with the insurgent.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/02/afghanistasn-bomb-attack-taliban-us-deal

[Devil Child]

9. Not our fight anymore. Bring the troops home ASAP!

[maxsolomon]

11. Pottery Barn Rule. You break it; you bought it.

So when did it stop being our fight?

[Devil Child]

13. We haven't "fixed" it with 18 years and 4 months, we never will

To give it more time, blood, and money is a fool's errand. It is time to withdraw all deployed combat assets from Afghanistan.

[maxsolomon]

14. I agree and I don't agree.

Throwing every non-Pashtun to the tender mercies of the Taliban's medieval rule is a bad choice, too.

It's inevitable, I suppose. It will be a bloodbath and Trumpublicans won't give a flying fuck. They'll just pretend it never happened and they didn't have a part in it. Spin spin spin.

Curse GWB forever.

[sandensea]

10. The Fat Bastard's always hoping these "deals" will give him a few extra moderate votes.

But you can only cry wolf so many times/

[captain queeg]

12. Donnie will be mad it fell apart so quickly

As we all knew it would. I’m sure he was planning on getting some mileage out of his great deal. First he’ll blame the afghan government ( who weren’t even involved in the talk...how stupid can you get?). But soon it’ll be the democrats trying to make him look bad or something

All the repukes that have lined up behind him are fully culpable for every aspect of this failed presidency.

[ck4829]

16. Hurt of the deal