The deal that set the stage for a Taliban victory
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 23 August 2021
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Every Monday this August, we're looking back at some of the stories from the past year that have stuck with us.
With the Taliban now in control of Afghanistan, we return to the agreement between the US and the Taliban last February that sowed the seeds for what followed. Today we revisit a prescient May 2020 conversation with Times foreign correspondent Anthony Loyd, and our August 2020 interview with Afghanistan's recently deposed president.
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Guests:
- Anthony Loyd, foreign correspondent, The Times.
- Ashraf Ghani, former president of Afghanistan, 2014-2021.
Host: Manveen Rana.
Clips: Channel 4 News, BBC, CNN.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Every Monday, this August, we're looking back at some of the stories from the past year |
| 0:09.5 | that stuck with us. Not least, because to understand the world now, it often helps to |
| 0:15.4 | look back to see how we got here. Today's look back couldn't be more timely. As the Taliban |
| 0:23.1 | take control of Afghanistan again, we return to the early signs that the withdrawal was |
| 0:29.2 | about to go badly wrong. It's time, after all these years, to go and to bring our people |
| 0:40.7 | back home. We want to bring our people back home. Over the past week, we've heard politicians |
| 0:47.1 | express their shock, saying no one saw this coming. But we're looking back at the agreement |
| 0:54.0 | last February that soared the seeds for the disaster that's followed. Everyone's eyes |
| 0:59.7 | been sort of taken off what's been going on in the world's longest war, but in fact, |
| 1:04.6 | in Doha, the war is escalating again. We're revisiting my conversations from last |
| 1:09.6 | year with the Times Foreign Correspondent Anthony Lloyd and with Afghanistan's recently |
| 1:14.8 | deposed President Ashraf Khani. You're listening to stories of our times from the times |
| 1:20.8 | in the Sunday Times. I'm Manvin Rana. Today, the deal that handed Afghanistan to the Taliban. |
| 1:34.0 | Anthony Lloyd has been reporting from Afghanistan for the Times for 25 years, long before the recent |
| 1:41.3 | war started. Some of the main protagonists of people I knew back then as well. We've all got |
| 1:47.4 | older in the war together. 18 months ago, the United States and the Taliban reached a |
| 1:53.6 | fateful agreement. People talk about it as a piece of agreement, but it was more of a withdrawal |
| 1:57.9 | agreement. It was a bilateral agreement signed between the Americans and the Taliban in Doha. |
| 2:03.8 | Basically, it outlined a schedule for the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, and it |
| 2:11.4 | conceded most of the Taliban's major demands. For a start, that was a timetable for an American |
| 2:18.2 | withdrawal, providing the Taliban were in negotiations with the Afghan government. It wasn't even |
| 2:24.8 | that there had to be a piece agreement, a piece deal, or the implementation of a piece deal |
... |
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