Trump Isn't Telling Us Everything About His Deal With the Taliban
Trump Isn’t Telling Us Everything About His Deal With the Taliban
The administration is keeping two written annexes a secret from the American public.
By The Editorial Board
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
March 10, 2020, 6:42 p.m. ET
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/opinion/afghanistan-taliban-peace-deal.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
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Why is the Trump administration keeping parts of its deal with the Taliban secret from the public? There’s no point in hiding them from the Taliban, because they have the annexes. The State Department says the reason is to conceal details of military movements from, “for example, ISIS.” But skeptical members of Congress who have seen the documents believe the real reason is that the agreement is so vague on how to ensure that the Taliban are living up to their end of the bargain.
Under the accord signed with the Taliban on Feb. 29, the United States agreed to withdraw all American and allied forces from Afghanistan within 14 months. In return, Taliban leaders pledged not to cooperate with terrorist organizations that target the United States or to let them use Afghan territory, and to open talks with the government (which was not party to the agreement) and other Afghans on a permanent cease-fire and how to share power.
The two annexes that remain classified are said to deal with the criteria by which the United States will determine whether the Taliban are keeping their promises. And it’s hard to escape the suspicion that they are being kept secret from the American public because, as The Times reported on Sunday,the annexes give President Trump “enormous latitude to simply declare that the war is over and leave.”
That has been the sense of several members of Congress, including Republicans normally in Mr. Trump’s camp, who have viewed the classified sections in a secure facility underneath the Capitol. Liz Cheney, the hawkish Republican congresswoman from Wyoming, for one, said after seeing the documents that she remains unsure the deal has sufficient mechanisms to verify that the Taliban are abiding by the terms.
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