Hekmatyar's comments in a ceremony at the presidential palace highlighted the complications likely to face President Ashraf Ghani, who signed a peace deal with Hekmatyar last year that brought his Hizb-i-Islami party into the government fold. Calling his former allies in the Afghan Taliban "brothers", Hekmatyar, a charismatic speaker whose address was frequently interrupted by shouts of acclamation, portrayed himself as a mediator able to bring peace. The national unity government led by Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, painstakingly brokered by Washington after the disputed election of 2014, was "not working", he said, and either Ghani or Abdullah should resign. The Taliban has shown no sign of accepting any arrangement with Hekmatyar, but Ghani thanked him for accepting the deal and said the Afghan people wanted peace and prosperity. But in Kabul, where he is widely known as "Rocketyar" after the thousands of bombs his forces fired into the city, Hekmatyar has been awaited with a mixture of anticipation and mistrust.

Source: bd News24 May 04, 2017 14:15 UTC