Afghanistan releases 100 more Taliban prisoners

Afghanistan government on Thursday released another 100 Taliban prisoners in a bid to encourage the Taliban to comeback to the negotiation table, taking the total number to 200 of the freed prisoners in two days, however; the armed group is yet to respond to the latest move.

On Wednesday, President Ashraf Ghani's administration freed 100 Taliban prisoners; a day after the Taliban broke off the talks with the Afghan government on prisoners' swap.

On Thursday, a spokesperson for the Office of the National Security Council (NSC) of Afghanistan Javid Faisal said that another batch of 100 Taliban prisoners would be released based on their health condition, age and length of remaining sentence as part of "our efforts for peace and containment of COVID-19".

"Pursuant to President Ghani's decree of March 11, the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan will release 100 Taliban prisoners today based on their health condition, age and length of remaining sentence as part of our efforts for peace and containment of COVID-19," Fasial said in tweet on Thursday.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Afghan NSC spokesperson said that the freed 100 prisoners were on the broader list that the Taliban technical team shared and discussed during meetings with the technical team of the Afghan government.

He said that the Afghan National Directorate of Security (NDS) and the Attorney General's Office thoroughly vetted the prisoners, who had taken an oath never to return to the battlefield.

"The Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan has received the same assurance from the group's leadership in Doha," Faisal said, adding that the releases took place according to routine procedure after the prisoners enrolled biometrically.

"The Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan remains open continuing joint technical work with the Taliban in order to advance the peace process," he added.

The Taliban, which on April 7, broke off talks with Ghani administration, is yet to respond to the latest move by Kabul. Suhail Shaheen, the spokesman for Taliban's Doha political office, had announced the Taliban's decision that its technical team would no longer hold meeting with the Afghan government's team due to the constant delay in release of the prisoners.

"We sent a technical team of the 'Prisoners' Commission' to Kabul for verification and identification of our prisoners as release of prisoners was to start as per the signed agreement and the promise made to us...But, unfortunately, their release has been delayed under one pretext or another till now. Therefore, our technical team will not participate in fruitless meetings with relevant sides starting from tomorrow," Shaheen stated in a tweet on April 7.

He insisted that Taliban's prisoners should have been released long before as per the signed agreement and to pave the way for intra-Afghan negotiations.

"But, the relevant sides are deliberately delaying our prisoners' release and thus violating the peace Agreement," he said, adding that the Taliban's technical team was being recalled from Kabul with immediate effect.

As per the February 29, 2020 peace deal between the US and the Taliban, the Afghanistan government is required to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners and in return the Taliban will free 1,000 prisoners of the government as a confidence building measure to initiate the intra-Afghan dialogue.