KABUL - The Taliban has provided with the Afghan government a revised list of several hundred of their prisoners, according to Afghan officials.
This comes after the government said last week that it would not release 600 prisoners from a total of 5,000 the Taliban want released, as they were involved in major attacks and had committed criminal offenses.
“They have given us another list, the release process will continue but direct talks should also start immediately,” Javid Faisal, spokesman for the National Security Council, said as quoted by Reuters.
The Afghan government has released about 4,000 Taliban prisoners so far following the group’s agreement with the United States, which expects such releases to happen as confidence building measure ahead of intra-Afghan talks.
Reuters citing an unidentified senior government official said there was still no agreement on starting the talks.
“The government will start the process of release in the coming few days and will complete the release whether the Taliban agree or not,” he said.
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Daily Times reported on Thursday that the Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada has inducted four more senior members of their leadership council into the negotiating team.
The 20-member negotiation team has now 13 members from the leadership council, it reported.
The negotiation team members will not seek approval either from the chief or the leadership council for the decisions in the intra-Afghan dialogue, the report said citing an unidentified Taliban leader. (1TV NEWS)