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PAKISTAN-TALIBAN NEGOTIATIONS

Talks falter as they open

AFP, Islamabad
Pakistan's planned peace talks with Taliban insurgents stumbled as they began yesterday, with government negotiators missing a preliminary meeting citing doubts over the militants' team.
The faltering start will fuel scepticism about whether negotiations with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) can achieve a meaningful and lasting peace accord.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif caused surprise last week by announcing a team to begin dialogue with the TTP, which has been waging a violent insurgency since 2007.
Many observers had been anticipating a military offensive against TTP strongholds in Pakistan's tribal areas, following a bloody start to the year. More than 110 people were killed in militant attacks in January, many of them military personnel.
Tentative efforts towards peace talks last year came to an abrupt halt in November when the TTP leader Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in a US drone strike.
Teams representing the Taliban and government had been due to gather in Islamabad at 2:00pm to chart a "roadmap" fortalks.
But the government delegation did not show up. One of its members, senior journalist Rahimullah Yusufzai, said they wanted to clarify who was on the Taliban team and what powers they had.
The TI P initially named five negotiators but cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan declined to take part and another was pulled out by his political party.
The head of the Taliban team, hardline cleric Maulana Sami-ul-Haq, accused the government of not taking the talks seriously.
"Today it has been exposed how serious the government is about talks," Haq told AFP. The prospect of talks will be keenly watched in the West. Stability in Pakistan is seen as important to neighbouring Afghanistan, where US-led Nato troops are pulling out after more than a decade of war.
Washington has long pressured Pakistan to take action against militants using tribal areas as a base to attack Nato forces across the border.
Even before yesterday's abortive start, media held out scant hope for the talks, with the two sides appearing to have virtually no common ground.
The TTP has said in the past that it opposes democracy and wants Islamic sharia law imposed throughout Pakistan, while the government has stressed the country's constitution must remain paramount.
English-language daily The Nation predicted the "peace talks balloon will burst soon enough".
"The ambiguity and confusion still exists because the political leadership has been extremely hesitant towards taking a clear stand and calling a spade a spade for a change," it said in an editorial on Tuesday.
In the past, localised peace deals between the authorities and the TTP