
Taliban foreign minister meets U.S. special envoy for hostage affairs
"During this meeting, discussions were held on Afghanistan-U.S. bilateral relations, the release of prisoners, and the provision of consular services to Afghans in the United States," the statement said, adding the meeting was also attended by former U.S. special representative to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad.

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
40 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump Performs Major U-Turn As He Urges Zelenskyy To Do A 'Deal' With Putin To End The War
Donald Trump has performed a major U-turn as it emerged Vladimir Putin wants Ukraine to give up a huge part of its land in exchange for peace. The US president has ditched his demands for a Russian ceasefire as an essential precursor to ending the three-and-a-half years-long war. Trump revealed the climbdown as he claimed his summit with Putin had been 'great and very successful', despite it breaking up without any agreement on ending the war. It has now been revealed that the Russian president wants Ukrainian troops to withdraw from the Donbas region before he will agree to end the war. According to the Reuters news agency, the proposed deal would see Kyiv fully withdraw from the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions in return for a Russian pledge to freeze the front lines in the southern regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. However, Ukraine has already rejected any retreat from Ukrainian land such as the Donetsk region, where its troops are dug in and which Kyiv says serves as a crucial defensive structure to prevent Russian attacks deeper into its territory. Trump, who will meet with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the White House on Monday, said after the summit that he and Putin 'has largely agreed' on land transfers and security guarantees for Ukraine. He told Fox News: 'I think we're pretty close to a deal,' he said, adding: 'Ukraine has to agree to it. Maybe they'll say 'no'.' Trump had previously said he wanted Russia to agree to a ceasefire before the terms of a full-blown peace deal could be signed off. But in a post on his Truth Social account following his talks with Putin, the US president said: 'The meeting with President Vladimir Putin of Russia went very well, as did a late night phone call with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and various European Leaders, including the highly respected Secretary General of NATO. 'It was determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up.' His climbdown will be seen as a huge win for Putin, who has shown now willingness to end Russia's bombardment of Ukraine in recent months. Related... Sean Hannity Asked Trump To Rate Putin Meeting 'On A Scale Of 1 To 10.' This Was His Answer. 'Child Like Behaviour': Trump Mocked As He Falls For Putin's Flattery Trump Treats War Criminal Dictator Putin Like Royalty – And Still Fails To Get Ceasefire
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Israel in talks to resettle Gaza Palestinians in South Sudan, sources say
NAIROBI (Reuters) -South Sudan and Israel are discussing a deal to resettle Palestinians from war-torn Gaza in the troubled African nation, three sources told Reuters - a plan quickly dismissed as unacceptable by Palestinian leaders. The sources, who have knowledge of the matter but spoke on condition of anonymity, said no agreement had been reached but talks between South Sudan and Israel were ongoing. The plan, if carried further, would envisage people moving from an enclave shattered by almost two years of war with Israel to a nation in the heart of Africa riven by years of political and ethnically-driven violence. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office and Israel's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the information from the three sources. A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department said, "we do not speak to private diplomatic conversations," when asked about the plan and if the United States supported the idea. Netanyahu said this month he intends to extend military control in Gaza, and this week repeated suggestions that Palestinians should leave the territory voluntarily. Arab and world leaders have rejected the idea of moving Gaza's population to any country. Palestinians say that would be like another "Nakba" (catastrophe) when hundreds of thousands fled or were forced out during the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. The three sources said the prospect of resettling Palestinians in South Sudan was raised during meetings between Israeli officials and South Sudanese Foreign Minister Monday Semaya Kumba when he visited the country last month. Their account appeared to contradict South Sudan's foreign ministry which on Wednesday dismissed earlier reports on the plan as "baseless". The ministry was not immediately available to respond to the sources' assertions on Friday. News of the discussions was first reported by the Associated Press on Tuesday, citing six people with knowledge of the matter. Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said the Palestinian leadership and people "reject any plan or idea to displace any of our people to South Sudan or to any other place". His statement echoed a statement from the office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday. Hamas, which is fighting Israel in Gaza, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel, who visited the South Sudanese capital Juba this week, told reporters that those discussions had not focussed on relocation. "This is not what the discussions were about," she said when asked if any such plan had been discussed. "The discussions were about foreign policy, about multilateral organisations, about the humanitarian crisis, the real humanitarian crisis happening in South Sudan, and about the war," she said, referring to her talks with Juba officials. Netanyahu, who met Kumba last month, has said Israel is in touch with a few countries to find a destination for Palestinians who want to leave Gaza. He has consistently declined to provide further details. Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Drought, dams and diplomacy: Afghanistan's water crisis goes regional
Over four decades of war, Afghanistan wielded limited control over five major river basins that flow across its borders into downstream neighbouring nations. But as Taliban authorities swept to power and tightened their grip on the country, they have pushed for Afghanistan's water sovereignty, launching infrastructure projects to harness precious resources in the arid territory. Dams and canals have sparked tensions with neighbouring states, testing the Taliban authorities' efforts to build strong regional ties, as they remain largely isolated on the global stage since their 2021 takeover. At the same time, the region is facing the shared impacts of climate change intensifying water scarcity, as temperatures rise and precipitation patterns shift, threatening glaciers and snowpack that feed the country's rivers. Here are key points about Afghanistan's transboundary water challenges: - Central Asian states to the north - Afghanistan is emerging as a new player in often fraught negotiations on the use of the Amu Darya, one of two key rivers crucial for crops in water-stressed Central Asia, where water sharing relies on fragile accords since Soviet times. Central Asian states have expressed concern over the Qosh Tepa mega canal project that could divert up to 21 percent of the Amu Darya's total flow to irrigate 560,000 hectares of land across Afghanistan's arid north, and further deplete the Aral Sea. Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are likely to face the biggest impact, both joined by Kazakhstan in voicing alarm, even as they deepen diplomatic ties with the Taliban authorities -- officially recognised so far by only Russia. "No matter how friendly the tone is now," water governance expert Mohd Faizee warned, "at some point there will be consequences for Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan when the canal starts operating". Taliban officials have denied that the project will have a major impact on the Amu Darya's water levels and pledged it will improve food security in a country heavily dependent on climate-vulnerable agriculture and facing one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. "There is an abundance of water, especially when the Amu Darya floods and glacial meltwater flows into it" in the warmer months, said project manager Sayed Zabihullah Miri, during a visit to the canal works in Faryab province, where diggers carved into a drought-ridden plain dotted with camels and locusts. - Iran to the west - Iran is the only country with which Afghanistan has a formal water sharing treaty, agreed in 1973 over the Helmand river, which traverses Taliban heartland territory, but the accord was never fully implemented. Longstanding tensions over the river's resources have spiked over dams in southern Afghanistan, particularly in periods of drought, which are likely to increase as climate shocks hit the region's water cycle. Iran, facing pressure in its parched southeastern region, has repeatedly demanded that Afghanistan respect its rights, charging that upstream dams restrict the Helmand's flow into a border lake. The Taliban authorities insist there is not enough water to release more to Iran, blaming the impact of climate pressures on the whole region. They also argue long-term poor water management has meant Afghanistan has not gotten its full share, according to an Afghanistan Analysts Network report by water resources management expert Assem Mayar. Iran and Afghanistan have no formal agreement over their other shared river basin, the Harirud, which also flows into Turkmenistan and is often combined into a single basin with the Morghab river. While infrastructure exists on the Afghan portions of the basin, some has not been fully utilised, Faizee said. But that could change, he added, as the end of conflict in Afghanistan means infrastructure works don't incur vast security costs on top of construction budgets, lifting a barrier to development of projects such as the Pashdan dam inaugurated in August on the Harirud. - Pakistan to the east - Water resources have not topped the agenda in consistently fraught relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Afghanistan's Kabul river basin, which encompasses tributaries to the greater Indus basin and feeds the capital and largest city, is shared with Pakistan. The countries, however, have no formal cooperation mechanism. With the Afghan capital wracked by a severe water crisis, the Taliban authorities have sought to revitalise old projects and start new ones to tackle the problem, risking fresh tensions with Pakistan. But the lack of funds and technical capacity means the Taliban authorities' large water infrastructure projects across the country could take many years to come to fruition -- time that could be good for diplomacy, but bad for ordinary Afghans. sw/ecl/rsc/cwl