KABUL, Afghanistan — Members of the Taliban leadership in Pakistanwere directly meeting with at least one senior Afghan official in the Pakistani capital on Tuesday, in what the Afghan government hoped could be a step toward beginning negotiations to end the Afghan war, according to the government and a senior Western diplomat.
For years, it has been the Taliban’s position to refuse face-to-face meetings with the Afghan government, and the fact that representatives of both sides were meeting appeared to reflect a softening of that position.
The meeting follows a series of encounters this year between current or former Taliban figures and Afghan officials in Qatar, Norway and China, which the insurgents later played down or disavowed. But the meeting in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, has an aura of greater significance because of its location, as well as the role Pakistani officials were expected to have as
