Issued on: 19/10/2021
Zalmay Khalilzad spent years as Washington's point man for talks with the Taliban.
© Alex Wong, Getty Images North America/AFP/File
Text by: NEWS WIRES
The U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan is stepping down following the chaotic American withdrawal from the country, the State Department said Monday.
Zalmay Khalilzad will leave the post this week after more than three years on the job under both the Trump and Biden administrations. He had been criticized for not pressing the Taliban hard enough in peace talks begun while Trump was president but Secretary of State Antony Blinken thanked him for his work.
“I extend my gratitude for his decades of service to the American people,” Blinken said of Khalilzad, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and Afghanistan.
Khalilzad had initially planned to leave the job in May after Biden’s announcement that the U.S. withdrawal would be completed before the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in September. However, he was asked to stay on and did so.
Khalilzad had served as the special envoy for Afghan reconciliation under both the Trump and Biden administrations since September 2018, when the-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo brought him on board to lead negotiations with the Taliban and the Afghan government.
An Afghan native, Khalilzad was unsuccessful in getting the two sides together to forge a power-sharing deal but he did negotiate a U.S. agreement with the Taliban in February 2020 that ultimately led to the end of America’s longest-running war.
The agreement with the Taliban served as the template for the Biden administration’s withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan, which many believe was conducted too hastily and without enough planning. Thousands of Afghan citizens who worked for U.S. forces there over the past two decades were left behind in the rush to leave as were hundred of American citizens and legal residents.
President Joe Biden and his aides frequently said the agreement that Khalilzad negotiated tied their hands when it came to the pullout and led to the sudden takeover of the country by the Taliban, although administration critics noted that Biden had abandoned the “conditions-based” requirements for a complete U.S. withdrawal.
In interviews and in his resignation letter described to The AP, Khalilzad noted that the agreement he negotiated had conditioned the final withdrawal of US forces to the Taliban entering serious peace talks with the Afghan government. He also lamented that those negotiations and consequently the withdrawal had not gone as planned.
Despite the criticism, Khalilzad remained on the job, although he skipped the first high-level post-withdrawal U.S.-Taliban meeting in Doha, Qatar earlier this month, prompting speculation he was on his way out. Khalilzad will be replaced by his deputy Thomas West, who led the U.S. delegation to that last round of talks in Doha.
However, the U.S. will not be sending a representative to a Russia-hosted conference on Afghanistan this week, the State Department said. Speaking before Blinken’s announcement of Khalilzad’s departure, department spokesman Ned Price cited “logistics” as the reason the U.S. would not participate in the Moscow talks.
Khalilzad said in his resignation letter that after leaving government service he would continue to work on behalf of the Afghan people and would offer his thoughts and advice on what went wrong in Afghanistan and the path forward.
(AP)
State Department watchdog launches reviews of Afghanistan withdrawal
United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks during a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on September 23 during the 76th Session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. File Photo by John Minchillo/UPI/Pool | License Photo
Oct. 18 (UPI) -- The State Department's inspector general has opened multiple reviews of the United States' withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to reports Monday.
Diana Shaw, the State Department's acting inspector general, notified top lawmakers that her office is conducting "oversight projects related to the suspension of operations at the U.S. Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan," according to letters obtained by Politico and CNN.
According to the letter, the reviews will focus on the State Department's Special Immigrant Visa program, Afghans processed for refugee admission into the United States, resettlement of refugees and visa recipients and the emergency evacuation of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.
"Given the elevated interest in this work by Congress and the unique circumstances requiring coordination across the Inspector General community, I wanted to notify our committees of jurisdiction of this important work," Shaw wrote in the letter addressed to leaders of the Senate foreign relations committee, House foreign affairs committee and the intelligence committees of both chambers.
Ryan Holden, a spokesman for the office of the inspector general, confirmed it had notified lawmakers of its plans but said the probe did not meet the watchdog's definition of an "investigation."
"State OIG notified its committees of jurisdiction today of planned projects in the areas you mention," Holden told Politico. "This work will be conducted in coordination with other members of the IG community. However, it is inaccurate to say that these projects are investigations. We indicated to Congress that these projects will be reviews."
The reviews will add to existing scrutiny of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, including a review into a drone strike on Aug. 29 that killed 10 civilians, including seven children in Kabul, which was announced by the Air Force inspector general last month.
Criticism of the withdrawal has largely centered around the special immigrant visa program, as the State Department said there were 17,000 applicants stuck in the program's pipeline before the August evacuation.
United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks during a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on September 23 during the 76th Session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. File Photo by John Minchillo/UPI/Pool | License Photo
Oct. 18 (UPI) -- The State Department's inspector general has opened multiple reviews of the United States' withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to reports Monday.
Diana Shaw, the State Department's acting inspector general, notified top lawmakers that her office is conducting "oversight projects related to the suspension of operations at the U.S. Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan," according to letters obtained by Politico and CNN.
According to the letter, the reviews will focus on the State Department's Special Immigrant Visa program, Afghans processed for refugee admission into the United States, resettlement of refugees and visa recipients and the emergency evacuation of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.
"Given the elevated interest in this work by Congress and the unique circumstances requiring coordination across the Inspector General community, I wanted to notify our committees of jurisdiction of this important work," Shaw wrote in the letter addressed to leaders of the Senate foreign relations committee, House foreign affairs committee and the intelligence committees of both chambers.
Ryan Holden, a spokesman for the office of the inspector general, confirmed it had notified lawmakers of its plans but said the probe did not meet the watchdog's definition of an "investigation."
"State OIG notified its committees of jurisdiction today of planned projects in the areas you mention," Holden told Politico. "This work will be conducted in coordination with other members of the IG community. However, it is inaccurate to say that these projects are investigations. We indicated to Congress that these projects will be reviews."
The reviews will add to existing scrutiny of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, including a review into a drone strike on Aug. 29 that killed 10 civilians, including seven children in Kabul, which was announced by the Air Force inspector general last month.
Criticism of the withdrawal has largely centered around the special immigrant visa program, as the State Department said there were 17,000 applicants stuck in the program's pipeline before the August evacuation.
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