Afghan officials, Taliban held talks in Male last month

Taliban representatives and Afghan government envoys held three-days of face-to-face talks on one of the resort islands of Maldives to attempt a breakthrough to involve moderate elements of the guerrilla outfit in governance in war-ravaged Afghanistan.

The talks were held late last month between medium-level representatives of Taliban, including its key faction led by Pashtun warlord Gulbuddin Hekmateyar and an Afghan delegation which included lawmakers and a close relative of legendary Afghan war hero late Ahmed Shah Massoud.

"The talks were aimed at finding a way out of the problem confronting Afghanistan, but the Maldivian government was not directly involved with them," an official source told PTI from Male, the capital of the Indian Ocean archipelago.

The US special envoy for Af-Pak region, now on a tour of Afghanistan, said that the US was monitoring the indirect contacts between Taliban and Afghan government but ruled out participation until the insurgents renounced al Qaeda.

Richard Holbrooke said a lot of indirect contacts had taken place between the two sides but did not make any direct reference to talks in Maldives, and only to contacts made by former UN envoy Kai Eide with Taliban.

The source said Karzai's men met with at least half a dozen members of the Taliban to discuss peace ahead of the January 28 meeting of world powers in London that was held to discuss the vexed Afghan issue.

"Yes it was a secret meeting held in the Bandos resort Island prior to an international conference on Afghanistan in London on January 28," Maldivian sources said. The talks were held between the Afghan president's representatives and the "moderate" Taliban leaders, they said, adding the meeting lasted three days.

The source said the talks apparently took place with the knowledge of the Maldivian government and that Male supported any peace initiatives.

British Newspaper The Times reported that among the Taliban representatives was the son of former prime minister Hekmatyar, the founder and leader of the Hizb-e-Islami political party and paramilitary group.

The group is opposed to NATO forces in Afghanistan though not against discussions with Karzai to end the conflict. The Taliban representatives were apparently permitted to travel to Maldives having been removed from a UN blacklist that froze their assets and imposed a ban on their movements.

The newspaper quoted an Maldivian official as saying that the government delegation included four Afghan lawmakers and a relative of Ahmad Shah Massoud, the late leader of the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance.

Massoud, an ethnic Tajik, was killed by al-Qaeda two days before the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. It was not immediately clear as to  who organised or sponsored the meeting on Bandos, which is close to Male.