DOHA (MEMO) – A delegation from the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has met with Afghanistan’s Taliban movement in the Qatari capital, Doha, for the first time since U.S. forces killed Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in July, according to a CNN report.
The network said David Cohen, CIA deputy director, headed the U.S. delegation and Abdul Haq al-Wasa, the head of Taliban intelligence, headed the Afghan delegation.
The agency quoted U.S. sources as saying that Cohen was accompanied by the special representative of the State Department in Afghanistan, Tom West, who had been in contact with the Taliban since the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Kabul last year.
According to the sources, the two sides discussed the United States’ release of Afghan frozen funds and the release of an American prisoner detained by the movement.
The Taliban announced the arrest of American film director Ivor Shearer, while he was filming in the area where al-Zawahiri was killed.
The U.S. killing of al-Zawahiri angered the Taliban, who described the attack as a violation of Afghan sovereignty and the Doha agreement that ended the 19- year war in the country in 2021.
However, Washington warned the Afghan movement at the time that the Doha agreement stipulates that the Taliban will not harbor terrorists after U.S. forces withdraw from Afghanistan, stressing the need for “the Taliban’s commitment to this” condition.