GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: 'New Yorker': US in Direct Talks with Taliban

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: VOA News

19February2011 10:36amEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: A prominent U.S. magazine reported Friday the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama has entered into "direct, secret talks with senior Afghan Taliban leaders."

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Steve Coll, writing in The  New Yorker, described the continuing talks as of "an exploratory nature" that do not yet amount to a "peace negotiation."

Coll says several people briefed about the talks told him about them last week.  

The New Yorker article say the talks are the "final diplomatic achievement" of the late Richard Holbrooke, the special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.  The story says Holbrooke, who died suddenly in December, lived long enough to see his advice to talk to the Taliban accepted.

Earlier Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the Taliban cannot defeat or outlast U.S. military pressure and must break with al-Qaida and reconcile with the Afghan government.  (read full report)

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