US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad arrived in Kabul, where he plans to hold meetings with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and Chairman of the Supreme Council for National Reconciliation Abdullah Abdullah, a source in the presidential palace told RIA Novosti.
Earlier, the US State Department announced Khalilzad’s plans to visit Afghanistan.
“Zalmay Khalilzad has arrived in Kabul and is due to meet with President Ghani and Chairman of the Council for National Reconciliation Abdullah Abdullah”, – the source said.
Earlier, the representative of the political office of the radical Taliban movement in Qatar, Suheil Shahin, said that the Taliban were ready to release all the remaining Afghan prisoners before the evening of Eid al-Adha and, at the end of the holiday, begin inter-Afghan negotiations if the exchange of prisoners is completed. The holiday of the sacrifice of Eid al-Adha this year comes to Muslims on July 31.
For his part, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has ordered the army and law enforcement to observe the three-day truce and avoid any operations against the Taliban.
In late February, at a ceremony in Qatar, the United States and the Taliban signed the first peace agreement in more than 18 years of war, which provides for the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan in 14 months and the beginning of an inter-Afghan dialogue in March following a prisoner exchange deal.