Qatari-mediated, deal to exchange detainees with Taliban

Nahla Abdel Moneim

US President Donald Trump on Thursday welcomed the swap of detainees between the Taliban and the Afghan government.

“Now, we can celebrate with the family of American Kevin King and Australian Timothy Weeks,” the US president said on his Twitter page. Trump said he was proud of his country’s team to resolve the Afghan issue.

For his part, Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, expressed his happiness for the release of the hostages, pointing out that their family has long demanded the state to make all possible efforts to restore them and end this ordeal, which has dragged on for years.

The Pakistani Prime Minister, Imran Khan, also welcomed the release of the detainees, thanking all those concerned that helped to this eventual release.

On November 19, 2019, the Taliban released two professors at the American University of Kabul, Kevin King and Timothy Weeks, after capturing them since August 2016, in exchange for the release of Anas Haqqani, the younger brother of the leader of the Haqqani extremist network, Sirajuddin Haqqani, Haji Mali Khan, and Hafiz.

Abdel-Rashid also expressed in an official statement that this would be the basis for building confidence and showing goodwill towards the progress of the peace process.

Suspicious Qatari mediation

At the end of the statement, the movement did not forget to thank the Qatari government and its emir, who mediated the release of terrorists held by the Afghan authorities, and flew them to Doha, where the movement’s political bureau was founded for years.

It is likely that the release was based on Doha’s proposal that they would remain in the Gulf emirate and would not return to the internal fighting in Kabul.

Here the foreign press expressed concern about it. The New York Times reported on November 19, 2019 that 2014 witnessed Qatar’s acceptance to host five Taliban militants accused of attacks that killed thousands in exchange for their release from Guantanamo Bay.

This situation raises a lot of fears within the American media, for them did not comply with Qatar in its previous pledge, what are the guarantees provided enough to repeat the matter again.

Return of negotiations

The release is accompanied by assurances of confidence-building and peace from all concerned, and follows the announcement by the Afghan government on November 6, 2019, of the final touches to the list of attendees scheduled to meet in Beijing to discuss negotiations between the Taliban and the government.

On November 13, 2019, the government announced a prisoner exchange deal with Taliban prisoners, but a few days later reported that the deal was postponed because the Taliban did not comply with pre-agreed terms.

On November 16, 2019, the Ministry of Defense stated that it had surrounded Nangarhar for weeks in a row, forcing at least 615 ISIS terrorists to surrender. The disinfection is still incomplete.

Then, on November 19, the government announced the completion of the delayed prisoner exchange deal, suggesting that there was a secret deal in light of the government’s weak security forces and in the past unable to defeat ISIS or even Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, but within weeks only cleared the large province of violent organization.

Thus, it is likely that this time the peace process will take a serious curve that is difficult or easy to predict its conclusion, but the facts of reality show that there is a real desire on the part of all parties to complete the process of the agreement.