Zalmay Khalilzad, the United States’ special envoy for Afghanistan reconciliation, stepped in this week to end the deadlock in Doha and said the US “will not walk away” from the war-torn country should the intra-Afghan negotiations fail.

A car bomb explosion rocked Ghanikhail district of Nangarhar province earlier today after insurgents attacked the district government compound.

Pakistan’s ailing former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday accused the country’s powerful military of political interference, saying in a televised speech from exile in London that the military had rigged the 2018 vote that brought the country’s current prime minister Imran Khan to power.

Iran says that the Khaf-Herat railway border stations will be completed in less than three months.

US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad met with the Taliban deputy leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and their chief negotiator Mawlawi Abdul Hakim in Doha on Thursday night.

Resolute Support Commander General Scott Miller said that the level of violence in Afghanistan is too high, urging the Taliban “to lower their violence.”

An Afghan official says at least nine people were killed when a suicide car bomber attacked a military checkpoint in the southern province of Helmand.

The Afghan government and the Taliban will need to find compromises on a plethora of contentious issues to reach a peace settlement — from civil liberties and women’s rights to the country’s name and flag.

Chairman of the High Council for National Reconciliation Abdullah Abdullah says Iran did not attend the opening ceremony of the historic peace talks between Afghanistan and the Taliban in Doha last month due to tensions with the United States.

At least 16 people died in two separate road accidents on Thursday in western Herat province.