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Taliban Order U.N. Political Office In Kabul To Close
KABUL, Feb 14 (News Agencies) - The ruling Taliban Wednesday ordered the United Nations Special Mission for Afghanistan (UNSMA) to close its Kabul office in a tit-for-tat rebuke against Washington, Taliban officials said.
The demand came after the U.S. ordered the closure of the militia's office in New York, the loss of a key city in central Afghanistan to opposition forces, and amid an escalating humanitarian crisis.
The Taliban Foreign Ministry said if the ruling militia office in New York is closed then there would be no need for an UNSMA office in Kabul.
"The Foreign Ministry of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan expects that you close your office at the soonest," the ministry said in a letter delivered to UNSMA's office.
The letter, released to the media, did not say whether the order also covered UNSMA offices in other Afghan cities.
Kant Samellson, a UNSMA military advisor in Kabul, said UNSMA was waiting for advice from chiefs in neighboring Pakistan. U.N. Special Envoy for Afghanistan Francesc Vendrell is currently in New York.
"We have informed the UNSMA office in Islamabad and we are trying to inform Mr. Vendrell in New York," he said, adding that he would try talk to the Taliban Foreign Ministry officials on Thursday.
He said he was hopeful the Taliban would reverse the order. However, U.N. sources said UNSMA expatriate staff in Kabul were packing to leave.
Last week, the U.S. ordered Taliban representative Abdul Hakim Mujahid to close his office in New York in compliance with last month's U.N. sanctions which called for the closure of Taliban overseas offices.
Vendrell, who says the closure of the Kabul office would handicap the U.N.'s work, talked with Washington officials Tuesday to persuade them to allow the Taliban office in New York to remain open as a window with the militia.
The Taliban came under U.N. curbs for a second time in two years after they refused to hand over Osama bin Laden wanted by Washington for the 1998 twin American embassy bombings in East Africa.
The U.N. Security Council Tuesday condemned the Taliban refusal to hand over bin Laden with 15 council members condemning "the Taliban's continued support for the export of terrorism."
U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher has said the U.S. was merely complying with U.N. sanctions by closing the office and rejected any comparison between the Taliban office in New York and UNSMA.
"The [Kabul] office provides a lot of important humanitarian support and other contacts with the Taliban ... it should be left open," he said.
The row over the Taliban's New York office comes amid U.N. efforts to garner donor support to deal with a humanitarian crisis.
War, drought and famine have driven more than 600,000 Afghans from their homes over the past eight months, according to U.N. estimates.
Taliban officials also confirmed Afghan opposition forces captured the key central city of Bamiyan overnight Wednesday.
"We have pulled out to the Ghorband T-junction," the official said, while the opposition and observers said the loss would deal a major blow to the militia, which has ruled Kabul since 1996.
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