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Mulla Umar refused Karzai's 35,000-govt jobs offer for Taliban fighters | | Taliban Supreme leader Mulla Umar has turned down the Afghan government's offer of 35,000 jobs for his fighters, putting an end to all hopes of a breakthrough between them for possible reconciliation. Top level US, Afghan, Saudi and Pakistani
officials have claimed that all efforts to organise the first-ever direct talks
between Taliban and the Karzai administration in Saudi Arabia after Hajj have
failed and the Taliban have refused to send any delegation to Jeddah, The News
reported. Two months back, Afghan President Hamid Karzai had established a 70-member
peace council, which had at least twelve people who were part of the Taliban government
from 1996 to 2001. However, Mulla Umar refused to listen to his former associates,
who offered 35,000 government jobs to the Taliban fighters on behalf of the Afghan
President. A close associate of Karzai said on the telephone from Kabul: "We are
not disappointed, we will try again to establish direct contact with Mulla Umar
because we need to sit together to ensure lasting peace in Afghanistan". Meanwhile,
Mulla Omar said in a statement on Monday that reports of peace talks between militants
and the Afghan government were "misleading rumours", and dismissed the coalition
surge as ineffective. Omar, who rarely issues public statements, said that the
Taliban maintained its aim was solely to drive out foreign forces from Afghanistan
. "Claims of negotiation, flexibility in the stance of the Islamic Emirate (of
Afghanistan - the Taliban) are mere baseless propaganda" and a "hollow" smokescreen
to mask the US and Nato-led coalition's failures, he said. "The troops surge made
no change in the status quo and never will they be able to turn the tide. The
more the war prolongs, the more casualties of your troops increase and the more
its economic burden become heavier," Umar added.
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