April 9 (The Killid Group) — The Afghan government released a hundred of Taliban prisoners on Wednesday, read a statement issued by the Afghan National Directorate of Security, a day after the group announced it was pulling the its negotiators out of the talks over prisoner release.
According to the press release by the National Directorate of Security (NDS), a day after the Taliban said they would not participate in “fruitless” prisoner release talks, the Afghan government made a decision to release 100 of Taliban prisoners “based on their health condition, age and length of remaining sentence as part of our efforts for peace and containment of COVID-19.”
Since last week the two relevant technical sides for prisoner swap talks have been negotiating in Kabul try to finalize the process that was originally supposed to have taken place by March 10 and pave the path for intra-Afghan peace talks between Kabul and the Taliban.
But the swap process were suspended, with Kabul claiming the Taliban wants the release of its 15 top commanders who were involved in massive attacks, while the insurgents accused Afghan authorities of intentionally postponing the talks and wasting time.
Javid Faisal the NDS spokesperson, however, said that the 15 commanders were not among those being released, adding that additional prisoners would be freed depending on what the Taliban do.
The United States and the Taliban singed a peace pact in February 29 under which the Afghan government was required to free 5,000 Taliban prisoners and for the insurgents to release 1,000 pro-government captives in return.
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