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KABUL—Deadly violence in Afghanistan has marred the first-ever direct talks between Kabul and the Taliban, underscoring the excessive stakes that face the warring sides as they wrestle to get negotiations off the bottom to finish almost 20 years of combating.
Representatives of the Afghan authorities and the Taliban kicked off a historic first spherical of U.S.-brokered talks in Qatar’s capital almost two weeks backago. But as the 2 groups wrangle over the agenda and framework for talks which are possible to drag out for months, if not longer, each factions have accused the opposite of ramping up assaults in opposition to their folks in latest days.
The Afghan authorities has known as for an instantaneous cease-fire as a primary precedence of the talks. The Taliban, whose biggest leverage is the power to inflict violence, has to date refused.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani repeated that decision Wednesday in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly, saying the U.N. had an important position to play in serving to the Kabul authorities uphold their shared values on the Doha peace talks with the Islamist group.
“At those talks, the Afghan people have a clear and urgent priority: a cease-fire,” Mr. Ghani stated. “An urgent end to the violence will more than anything else give us a chance to progress.”
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