The offer made by Taliban’s political spokesman Suhail Shaheen in a tweet follows one of the most significant shake-ups in the Taliban in years.
The group appointed the son of the movement’s fearsome founder to head its military wing and powerful leadership council members to its negotiation team.
In Kabul on Friday, the High Council for National Reconciliation, which was created in May to manage peace efforts with the Taliban, said it was still working through the Taliban’s prisoner list.
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The Islamic Emirate is ready to release all remaining prisoners of the other side before the eve of Eid al-Adha provided they release our prisoners as per our list already delivered to them. Likely, IEA is ready to begin intra-Afghan negotiations immediately after Eid— Suhail Shaheen. محمد سهیل شاهین (@suhailshaheen1) July 23, 2020
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in case the process of the release of the prisoners is completed.Advertisement— Suhail Shaheen. محمد سهیل شاهین (@suhailshaheen1) July 23, 2020
Javed Faisal, spokesman for the Afghan national security adviser’s office, previously said nearly 600 Taliban prisoners whose release is being sought have been convicted of serious crimes.
The government is reluctant to set them free, he said.
It seemed unlikely the government would free the remaining Taliban prisoners before the Muslim holiday.
The release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by the government and 1,000 government personnel and security officials in Taliban custody is laid out in a US deal with the Taliban aimed at ending Afghanistan’s relentless wars.
According to the deal, the prisoner exchange is to take place ahead of talks between Kabul and the Taliban, seen as perhaps the most critical part of the deal.
Mr Shaheen’s tweet was the first offer at a timeline for the negotiations, however he demanded the prisoner release be completed first and refused any substitutes to the list of prisoners submitted by the Taliban.
Kabul has offered to free alternative Taliban members they have in custody and who they say have not been convicted of serious crimes.
The Taliban have refused.
The government’s national reconciliation council membership has yet to be decided.
It is being led by Abdullah Abdullah, a candidate in last year’s presidential election who disputed the results and had for a time declared himself president.
He was appointed to head the reconciliation efforts to break the political deadlock over the election, which had frustrated Washington’s efforts to get intra-Afghan negotiations off the ground.
Meanwhile, in the Qatar capital of Doha, where the Taliban maintain a political office, the religious movement has finalised its 20-member negotiating team, which includes 13 members of the Taliban’s leadership council.
Taliban officials who spoke previously said the strength of the team means it can make decisions on behalf of the movement.
The Taliban team is also led by one of the founders of the movement, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who spent eight years in a jail in Pakistan after he attempted to open peace talks in 2010 with then president Hamid Karzai.
Mr Baradar’s independent peace overtures were apparently made without either Pakistan’s or the United States’ prior approval, according to Mr Karzai.
Mr Karzai has said he twice asked Islamabad and Washington to free Mr Baradar.
He was rejected both times, he said.
Now, however, Mr Baradar speaks on the phone with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and was the leading negotiator in talks with US peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, which resulted in a peace deal between the Taliban and the US.
It was touted as Afghanistan’s best chance at peace in decades when it was signed on February 29.
However, it has been bogged down over the release of prisoners.
