Ties with Israel: Afghan opposition rejects Taliban accusations

ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan's opposition Sunday dismissed as false and part of Taliban propaganda that the alliance held high-level contacts with Israel.

"The Afghan United Front neither has contacts with Israel nor received any aid from Zionists," the Islamabad-based spokesman for the opposition Junbish-e-Milli Islami Sibghatullah Zaki said.

Zaki told NNI here that Taliban are indulged in leveling baseless allegations against the alliance for political motives. Taliban, he said, are losing support in their controlled areas and that is why the student militia is trying in a desperate move to win the people's support through such malicious campaign.

Taliban's Foreign Ministry on Saturday renewed its blame on the opposition for "having ties with Israel". Taliban Foreign Ministry statement claimed that representatives of the former President Burhanuddin Rabbani had visited Israel and talks between the two sides had also taken place in New Delhi and New York.

"We cannot even think to have ties with Zionists, who have occupied Arab territories, including Bait-ul-Muqadis, and are indulged in the killings of Palestinian Muslims," the Junbish spokesman said.

Israel dispatched relief goods to Tajikistan for distribution among the survivors of the last month's devastating earthquake which killed around 5,000 and left 50,000 homeless. But Red Cross sources say the supplies have so far been left untouched and are still in Dushanbe, with the opposition alliance refusing to allow the donation on Afghan soil.--NNI