Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai said Saturday that Afghanistan and the United States are engaged in peace talks with the Taliban, the first official acknowledgment of negotiations in the decade-long war.
Karzai, a strong proponent of peace discussions, announced in Kabul that the preliminary negotiations with the Taliban are aimed at ending the conflict.
"In the course of this year, there have been peace talks with the Taliban and our own countrymen," Karzai said at a speech at the presidential palace.
"Peace talks have started with them already and it is going well. Foreign militaries, especially the United States of America, are going ahead with these negotiations."
Karzai said some of the Taliban emissaries that have met with members of the peace council were only representing themselves, while others were speaking for the broader movement.
Murray Brewster, reporting from Kandahar for The Canadian Press, told Â鶹´«Ã½ Channel that the talks are something the U.S. has wanted to be involved in.
"They've been looking for someone to negotiate with, but where the Taliban are concerned, just who is in charge has been something that's very hard to find out," he said from Kandahar.
Brewster thinks a number of Taliban fighters are open to some sort of discussion and that roughly 5,000 Taliban have surrendered over the last few months throughout the country.
"I think there's a real desire to put down their weapons, but to reintegrate and get what they want, there's a lot of impatience and frustration," he said.
Karzai's announcement came as suicide bombers stormed a police station in Kabul on Saturday in a gunfight that lasted more than an hour.
The Afghan Interior Ministry said nine people were killed in the attack, including three police officers, one intelligence agent and five civilians.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack in a text message to The Associated Press, saying three suicide bombers attacked the police training centre.
Attacks have increased in Afghanistan since the death of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan last month, and the start of the Taliban's annual spring offensive
With files from The Associated Press
