Peace Negotiator Fawzia Koofi on the War in Afghanistan

FAWZIA KOOFI, AFGHAN PEACE NEGOTIATOR: Well, Christiane, we started the negotiation with Taliban six months ago with a good faith and with the hope that this more than four decades of war will come to a dignified end, and a cease-fire leading to a political settlement that will set an inclusive government, including Taliban, will be set up that will avoid a collapse of institutions when the foreign troops withdraw. We are now in the midst of talks, and, as you know, further initiatives have been planned in Turkey to boost the talks and hopefully agree on a political settlement. The — President Biden’s announcement of withdrawal, to be honest, puts the negotiation in a — jeopardized, because, already, after the U.S.-Taliban agreement that was signed last year in February, Taliban, from my personal experience, feel victorious, after the agreement that they will win anyways, politically or militarily. Our hope was that the announcement of withdrawal of U.S. troops will be when a political settlement is agreed upon, because, before that, not only women — I mean, women of Afghanistan have been part of the transformation in the past 20 years, part of the progress of the nation. And if women are excluded, and if women are not safe, in general, the country will not be stable, and it can be threat to the security of the world, but let alone women. I mean, the whole country, our hope was to avoid the collapse of everything and move forward in a peaceful transition.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: OK. So, let me ask you, do you think that your government and the Afghan National Forces, who have been financed and trained by the United States and other NATO forces, can they hold the line? Do you think that, as you just said, everything is going to collapse once the foreign forces leave?

KOOFI: The expectation was and our faith in this process was that we need to do everything to avoid the war, the continuation of the war, to avoid more bloodshed, because of — only in the past year, since the signing of the Doha agreement between United States and Taliban, 400 — based on a U.N. report, 400 woman activists, journalists and prominent women politicians have been targeted and assassinated.