Taliban has to break all bonds with al Qaeda and other terrorist organisations, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday.
In reply to a question by 1TV following the meetings of NATO defense ministers, Stoltenberg said that the issue of breaking bonds with al Qaeda and other terrorist groups is a very “explicit condition” in the US agreement with the Taliban.
“One of the reasons why we will measure developments, the main reason why we also have made clear that we will only leave Afghanistan when the time is right, is that we have to make sure that Afghanistan doesn’t once again become a country where Al-Qaeda, other terrorist organisations, can operate freely,” Stoltenberg said.
He called on the Taliban to reduce violence and engage in intra-Afghan negotiations in a constructive way.
“We have not seen the reduction in violence that we expect and that we think is necessary to really underpin the peace efforts.”
Stoltenberg said NATO is in the process of actually adjusting its presence in Afghanistan from roughly 16,000 troops in the NATO mission down to roughly 12,000 troops.
“We are prepared to further reduce that presence in a coordinated, planned and orderly way,” he said.
On corruption, Stoltenberg said that it is a problem in Afghanistan and “has to be fought with strength and conviction and with joint efforts.”
“It’s really really undermining the strength of any society. And therefore also NATO, when we, NATO Allies, when they provide support to the security forces or NATO Allies also provide all kinds of development aid, of course, they focus extremely much on how can we make sure that the NATO support is not destroyed by corruption but it actually gets to where it’s meant to go,” Stoltenberg said.
