The Taliban have given a US envoy a document outlining their offer for a temporary ceasefire in Afghanistan that would last between seven and 10 days, AP reported on Thursday, citing the movement’s officials familiar with the negotiations.
The offer is seen as an opportunity to open a window to a peace deal for Afghanistan that would allow the US to bring home its troops and end the 18-year war, America’s longest conflict.
The ceasefire offer was reportedly handed to Zalmay Khalilzad, Washington’s envoy for talks with the insurgents, late on Wednesday in Qatar, a Gulf Arab country where the Taliban maintain a political office.
Khalilzad has been pressing for a ceasefire. However, it wasn’t immediately clear whether the Taliban proposal would be enough to allow for the talks between the Taliban and the US to restart, with the aim of eventually signing a peace deal. The US envoy said earlier that the deal would also include the start of talks among Afghans to hammer out a road map to a post-war Afghanistan.