(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) Taliban chief Mullah Omar has apparently lent his backing to peace talks recently started with the Afghan government, in an Eid message released on Wednesday.
The message came after confusion about whether Omar supported the opening peace talks held in neighboring Pakistan last week, with rumors suggesting they were only attended by certain factions of the group. His spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid had previously rejected peace talks with the government.
Mullah Omar has long been in hiding and his lack of public appearances or statements had stoked rumors that he was dead, creating confusion within the Taliban about whether their "Supreme Commander" supported the peace process.
But the statement attributed to Omar, published on the Taliban website, dismissed the notion of disunity within the militant group.
"All mujahedeen and countrymen should be confident that in this process, I will unwaveringly defend our legal rights and viewpoint everywhere," he said, adding that the purpose of talks was to "bring an end to the occupation" of Afghanistan.
"Concurrently with armed Jihad, political endeavors and peaceful pathways for achieving these sacred goals is a legitimate Islamic principle and an integral part of Prophetic politics," said the statement, highlighting that Islam's Prophet Muhammad regularly relied on diplomacy over military strategy.
"If we look into our religious regulations, we can find that meetings and even peaceful interactions with the enemies is not prohibited," the statement said.
Though the message was released on the official Taliban website, some Afghans were suspicious about its authenticity.
"Odd or not? With few exceptions, most tweets by Afghans cast doubts about Mullah Omar [statement], while media has different take," tweeted Omar Samad, a government advisor and former diplomat.
Several Afghan social media users claimed that the version of the statement released in Pashto, a language used in the Pashtun border region heavily effected by the Taliban insurgency, had bad grammar, indicating that it was written by Pakistani intelligence agencies, who many Afghans accuse of controlling the Taliban.
Zabihullah, an Afghan lawyer, noted that even Taliban fighters did not know whether their leader was alive. "I am sure this message is written by [Pakistani intelligence] ISI agents as they did with peace talks held in Islamabad," he said.
In the past year, several high-profile Taliban commanders have defected and pledged loyalty to the Syria-based group Daesh, with more claiming they will follow unless they are given proof that their leader Mullah Omar is alive.
The statement attributed to Omar appeared to address the issue of Daesh, calling for "the unity of Jihadi front" and claiming that religious scholars had recognized him as a legitimate leader of Muslims, rather than Daesh's leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
"The fruits of successful Jihad against the former Soviet Union were lost as an inevitable consequence of the multiplicity of factions," the statement said.
The statement backing the peace talks came despite the Taliban earlier rejecting a request from Afghan clerics and the government for a ceasefire during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
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