By Mohammad Haroon Alim
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s recent remarks on Twitter saying “no US servicemen have been killed in Afghanistan” sparked a backlash from politicians in the Afghan government.
As no US servicemen were killed in the last year, thousands of civilians and Afghan security members were killed in the violence during 2020.
Afghan Senate Speaker Fazl Hadi Muslimyar said, “Besides the US, I congratulate the victory of the Taliban as well,” saying that “meanwhile, I tell the Taliban ‘congratulations to you, you have killed the sons of this soil, civil society activists and journalists who are reflecting the pains of the people”, Tolonews quoted.
Presidential Palace said US soldiers were not killed in the previous year is because the Taliban were busy and focused on fighting against Afghans.
“The foreign forces casualties were zero because now the conflicts are led by the security and defense forces and the Taliban is fighting only against the people and the government of Afghanistan,” Dawa Khan Minapal, a presidential spokesman, was quoted by Tolonews.
Taliban in a tweet replied to Pompeo, that no attacks against US forces since the Doha deal show that the Islamic Emirate is fulfilling its obligations as a committed entity, adding that they also hoped for a peace agreement to be implemented in the same way,
“We will fulfill the same obligations when we reach an agreement with the internal” actors, the group stated. A UN report indicated that within the first six months of 2020, Two Thousand One hundred civilians were killed and 3,800 others were wounded.
This comes as Negotiators of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan will be leaving for Doha on Monday, and President Ashraf Ghani in a meeting on Sunday evening assured them of the government’s full support.