Background

"Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the U.S. is holding peace talks with Taliban guerrillas who accept Afghanistan’s constitution. “Peace talks with the Taliban and other countrymen who accept the Afghan constitution, Afghanistan’s development, democracy and freedom have started this year, and God willing they are going well,” Karzai told a national youth conference in the capital, Kabul, yesterday. “International forces, especially America, are carrying out these talks.” [...] About 100,000 U.S. soldiers are in Afghanistan, according to the Pentagon and Obama has pledged to fully transfer security duties to the Afghan government by 2014." http://bloom.bg/m6QEmf

"American decision-makers have still not grasped that the Taliban's main motivation – as revealed in several surveys of insurgents – is a desire to end foreign occupation of their country. US officials, political as well as military, produce endless briefings that claim people join the Taliban because of money, unemployment, or local disputes over land and family honour. [...]
Support for a long-term US military presence in Afghanistan flies in the face of serious negotiations to end the war. It will also undermine the prospects for any regional agreement between Afghanistan and its neighbours. [...]
No peace deal in Afghanistan will stick unless the era of outside interference by its neighbours comes to an end, so the concept of "neutrality" must be upheld. Having US forces in Afghanistan "to protect Afghan neutrality" is dangerous nonsense." http://bit.ly/lbHQ43

Obama: "Our position on these talks is clear: they must be led by the Afghan government, and those who want to be a part of a peaceful Afghanistan must break from al-Qaeda, abandon violence, and abide by the Afghan constitution." http://bit.ly/iAzOZX