Afghan peace process

Former Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic, who is now the president of the Serbian parliament, said on Tuesday that negotiations between the Afghan authorities and the Taliban were held in secret in Serbia a few years ago.

Turkey is continuing its dialogue with all the sides in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, the Turkish foreign minister has said, vowing that Ankara's efforts for peace, stability and prosperity of the war-torn country will endure.

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The Taliban were in control of Afghanistan on Aug. 16 after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country and conceded the insurgents had won the 20-year war.

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The astonishingly quick collapse of the government, with militants taking over the presidential palace on Sunday night, triggered fear and panic in the capital.

With the last U.S. forces on the way out of Afghanistan, U.S. President Joe Biden assured President Ashraf Ghani of U.S. diplomatic and humanitarian support on July 23 as Taliban advances piled pressure on the U.S.-backed government in Kabul.

The latest round of intra-Afghan negotiations failed to deliver a breakthrough, with the Afghan government and the Taliban vowing in a joint statement on July 19 to meet again and expedite high-level peace talks in Doha, Qatar.

The Turkish foreign minister said on July 15 that he discussed Afghan peace with U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan reconstruction.

Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu met Zalmay Khalilzad during his visit to Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.

Çavuşoğlu tweeted that he "exchanged views on the Afghan peace process and regional developments."

President Joe Biden on June 25 promised Afghanistan's top leaders a "sustained" partnership even as he moves to accelerate winding down the United States' longest war amid escalating Taliban violence.

Ambassador Hakan Tekin, director general for South Asia at the Turkish Foreign Ministry, met Massoum Stanekzai, the Afghan government's top peace broker, in the Qatari capital Doha on June 8. 

According to a statement by the negotiating team in Kabul, Stanekzai and Tekin discussed ways and means to expedite the stalled peace drive.

Afghanistan's Taliban on May 10 announced a three-day cease-fire for the Eid-al-Fitr holiday this week marking the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The cease-fire would begin on either May 12 or May 13. The Muslim calendar follows lunar cycles and the Eid holiday depends on the sighting of the new moon.

The US and Nato allies has started formally withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, beginning the end of what President Joe Biden called "the forever war".

The US and Nato have had a presence in Afghanistan for almost 20 years.

But the withdrawal, which runs until 11 September, comes amid escalating violence, with Afghan security forces on high alert for reprisal attacks.