Self-proclaimed President Saleh alleges Pakistan a Taliban sanctuary

Amrullah Saleh implies that Afghanistan was under pressure from the US and Pakistan to release the Taliban, which led to its eventual downfall, the very US that put his government in power in the first place.

In an interview, former vice president Amrullah Saleh claimed that the Taliban received direct and indirect support from Pakistan and the United States. The US also blackmailed Afghanistan to release prisoners who have now become Taliban leaders.

He said that “Pakistan was not just a sanctuary or safe haven for the Taliban in all these years. The entire country was at the service of the Taliban, who used the neighbouring country as their support base.”

He further explained, “The United States kept on paying money to Pakistan. The more they paid, the more Pakistanis became benevolent to the Taiban, Amrullah said in an exclusive interview to a television channel on Wednesday when he was asked why the Afghan Army crumbled so easily in front of the Taliban offensive.”

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While this does still does not explain how the Afghan Army that vastly outnumbered the Taliban while having superior equipment failed to protect the capital without even putting up a fight.

Now one of the faces of the Panjshir Resistance, the anti-Taliban force of the country along with Ahmad Massoud, said concerning the US, “We said are you sure that these people will not end up at the frontlines? Their answer was no but they all ended up at the frontlines. So it was not prisoners’ release but gifting Taliban a division of highly radicalised fighters.”

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He does, however, fail to mention that the government was losing control of the country even before the deal ever began and how the deal was intended to stop the conflict, which they failed to resolve on their own.

Amrullah Saleh is a strong Pakistan-hater. “Afghanistan is too big to be swallowed by Pakistan,” Saleh recently said. He also tweeted how he will not leave Afghanistan, and nobody except God can evacuate his soul from the country’s soil. “I own Afghanistan & it owns me. We are one. It speaks to me every day.” An opinion his former president failed to share.