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Islamabad, July 2
A surprise announcement by President Donald Trump seemed to accelerate the expected time frame for US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan ahead of an all-Afghan peace summit planned for July 7-8 in Qatar. The gathering apparently will be held on Taliban terms as there will be no official Afghan government representation.
Trump told Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight on Monday that nearly half of all American troops have already been pulled out.
That pullout was expected to be announced as part of a time frame being negotiated by Washington’s peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, who is in the middle of talks with the Taliban in Qatar.
“I’ve wanted to pull them out. And you know, I have pulled a lot out. We were at 16,000. We’re down to about 9,000, which a lot of people don’t know,” Trump said, according to the transcript of the interview shared with The Associated Press.
“So we’ve reduced the force very substantially in Afghanistan, which I don’t talk about very much, and that’s okay,” Trump added.
The Taliban’s spokesman in Doha, Suhail Shaheen, has said that talks with Khalilzad are focused on a timetable for withdrawal of US and NATO troops from Afghanistan.
In a tweet on Monday, Shaheen had said talks would come with an announcement of a timetable for withdrawal of the estimated 20,000 service personnel, nearly 14,000 of whom are Americans.
Trump’s comments on Monday would seem to contradict a statement made by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a visit to Kabul on June 25. Pompeo said then that Washington had made no decision on a timeframe for withdrawal.
Trump also said in the Monday TV interview that he wanted to leave a strong intelligence gathering force behind in Afghanistan. “I’ll tell you the problem is, look, I would like to just get out,” he said. — AP
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