Sputnik TJ says the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, led by Ahmad Massoud, plans to hold a conference with Taliban representatives in Dushanbe.
The date of the conference is still unknown but it is planned to invite representatives of political parties, in intelligentsia, public figures and some others, totaling 50 people, to participate in the event.
Citing its source within the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, Sputnik TJ says the purpose of the conference is to find a political solution to the current crisis and create inclusive government with participation of all political forces of Afghanistan.
For the reliability of this information, Asia-Plus has turned to the Afghan Embassy (the embassy of the former government of Afghanistan) in Dushanbe. They told us that they do not have such information, because “neither official bodies nor representatives of the National Resistance Front informed them of that.”
The Foreign Ministry of Tajikistan neither confirmed nor denied this information. Tajik MFA officials said that “they can neither confirm nor deny this information, because it would be wrong both in the first and the second case.” They refrained from giving further comments.
By the way, the information about a meeting of Ahmad Massoud with Taliban representatives in Tajikistan has appeared after visit of Russian president Vladimir Putin to Tajikistan on June 28. According to some sources, Putin met with Ahmad Massoud here and was interested in his vision of the situation in Afghanistan.
The National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), also known as the Second Resistance, is a military alliance of former Northern Alliance members and other anti-Taliban fighters loyal to the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. When the Taliban captured the country on August 15, 2021, former first vice president Amrullah Saleh, citing provisions of the Constitution, declared himself the caretaker president of Afghanistan and announced the republican resistance against the Taliban. Saleh's claim to the presidency was endorsed by Ahmad Massoud, the founder and president of NRF.
The alliance constitutes the only organized resistance to the Taliban in the country, and is possibly planning an anti-Taliban guerilla struggle. The resistance has called for an "inclusive government" of Afghanistan; one of their objectives is speculated to be a stake in the new Afghan government.
Ahmad Massoud (born in 1989) is an Afghan politician who is the founder and President of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan. He is the eldest son of anti-Soviet military leader Ahmad Shah Massoud. In 2012, Ahmad Massoud commenced an undergraduate degree in war studies at King's College London, where he obtained his bachelor's degree in 2015. He obtained his master's degree in international politics from City, University of London in 2016. Ahmad Massoud was appointed as the CEO of Massoud Foundation in November 2016. On September 5, 2019, he was declared his father's successor at his mausoleum in the Panjshir Valley.
