[Quqnoos] French troops are attempting to bribe Taliban fighters not to attack them in Afghanistan, a local Taliban leader has told Al Jazeera| A confirmation of reports seen here before. |
The Nato-led International Security Assistance Force [ISAF] has denied Jalili's claims, saying they are Taliban propaganda.
In his interview, Jalili also claimed that local groups being armed by Western forces to confront his fighters were in fact handing over their weapons to the Taliban. "There are many groups that work for the Taliban and also receive weapons from the foreign troops through the government," he said. "They are supposed to fight us, but these groups fulfil their promise of loyalty by bringing the weapons to the Taliban," he said.
The Taliban claim comes only a month after Italian troops in the same area were accused of paying off Taliban fighters to keep the area calm. Despite Italian denials, there were suggestions that French troops deployed in the region had no knowledge of the secret arrangement and an attack last year on them that resulted in the deaths of 10 French soldiers was directly because the payments had been discontinued, the report says.