US,Mullah Omar aide meet thrice

Among the many reasons: It is not clear that the Taliban want to negotiate,or who even represents the organisation. The Afghan president has also distanced himself from the talks. And Pakistan,the vital third leg of negotiations because of its ties to the Taliban,is increasingly a wild card because of recent strains with the US over the drone assaults inside Pakistan.

According to officials and diplomats,the US has participated in three meetings this year with an English-speaking Afghan who was once a personal assistant to the renegade Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar. Those meetings,in Germany and Qatar,appear to have accomplished little more than confirming the mans identity,and perhaps not even that,according to officials familiar with the talks,all of whom requested anonymity.

Adding another layer of complexity to the murky effort,the English-speaking Afghan,Tayeb Agha,who was an aide to Mullah Omar during the Talibans rise to power,was arrested by Pakistani authorities last year and then released,leading US officials to assume he is negotiating on behalf of the Taliban with the blessings of the Pakistani authorities.

Were at that stage where its very confusing, one senior administration official said,adding that the meetings could not even be called talks at this stage,let alone peace talks. The wariness in part reflects the fact that the administration has been badly embarrassed by previous diplomatic efforts. An Afghan was given large sums of cash last year and was flown in a NATO aircraft in the belief that he was a Taliban envoy,but he turned out to be an impostor.

Even so,the renewed diplomatic push signals a significant shift in Obamas strategy since he came to office in 2009 and increased US forces in Afghanistan to nearly 1,00,000 troops,from 34,000,in an effort to crush a resurgent Taliban insurgency. While the military has secured parts of the country and bolstered the Afghan governments security forces,the administration now recognises that a final US withdrawal depends on a political settlement with the Taliban,a fundamentalist Islamic movement equated closely with the murderous ideology of al-Qaeda. The attacks of September 11,2001,were orchestrated by al-Qaeda under the Talibans protection.

The administration has imposed significant conditions for any reconciliation with the Taliban. The movements leaders must disarm,sever ties with al-Qaedas remaining leadership,recognise the government in Afghanistan and accept the countrys Constitution,including basic rights for women,who were severely repressed when the Taliban governed the country in the 1990s.

It is uncertain whether the Taliban or even parts of its leadership are willing to accept such conditions,and many experts are deeply skeptical. The diplomatic effort is being led by Marc Grossman,who is the special envoy to the Af-Pak region. Grossman has not been directly involved in the initial contacts with the Taliban envoy. That work has been handled by Frank Ruggiero,a Grossman deputy,and Jeff W Hayes,an official of the Defence Intelligence Agency,one official said.