Amrullah Saleh, former Acting Interior Minister and President Ghani’s running mate as his first vice president for the upcoming presidential elections, has said that any decision about the future of Afghanistan and any peace talks without the engagement of the Afghan government will have no results and will be counted as “intellectual exercise”.

Talking to Turkey’s TRT TV, Saleh said Afghanistan has changed and that Afghanistan has moved on and that movement has to be realized and appreciated.

In response to a question about the Moscow talks, which was held in absence of the Afghan government, Saleh said “if they don’t go through Kabul, they are always going to be intellectual exercise”.

“We are in control. We are in control of our country, we are in control of our cities. Our legitimacy stems from the will of our people. We had election, we are going to have election. So, fundamentally, we are the factor. If you bypass the factor, it becomes an intellectual exercise.” 

Saleh said that Taliban are “afraid of a pluralistic society” and that they think that they will die in today’s Afghan society.  

“That future can be tomorrow, but they think [Taliban] they will die in that type of future. That is why they are trying to maintain their habitat away from civilization, away from integration, away from new Afghanistan. Because they are afraid that in a pluralistic society, which Afghanistan today is, Taliban will become another loud cleric, Mullah preaching after death,” said Saleh. 

This comes after a number of Afghan politicians, representing mainstream political parties in the country, attended a meeting with Taliban representatives in Moscow.