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Taliban Say Talks With Afghan President ‘Waste of Time’

The Afghan Taliban rejected an offer by President Ashraf Ghani to hold peace talks.

Taliban Say Talks With Afghan President ‘Waste of Time’
Residents pass an Afghan flag flying on a hill top in Kabul, Afghanistan (Photographer: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg)  

(Bloomberg) -- The Afghan Taliban rejected an offer by President Ashraf Ghani to hold peace talks in a blow to efforts by the U.S. administration to end the 17-year old war.

The Taliban reiterated that “talking to powerless and foreign imposed entities is a waste of time because impotent sides do not possess the capacity for making decisions,” the militant group’s spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed said in a statement on Thursday, a day after Ghani formed a 12-member team to negotiate with them.

The group is fighting and negotiating with the U.S. administration, he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Eltaf Najafizada in Kabul at enajafizada1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Chris Kay at ckay5@bloomberg.net, Khalid Qayum

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