The US government has acknowledged its involvement in conducting direct secret negotiations with Taliban militants

The US government has acknowledged its involvement in conducting direct secret negotiations with Taliban militants, following the disclosure of the clandestine talks by Afghan officials.

The talks had mostly revolved around the whereabouts and release of US Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, who was seized by Taliban forces in eastern Afghanistan over two years ago, AP reported Monday, citing statements by Afghan and American officials.

According to reports leaked by officials of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government, the Taliban negotiator, Tayyab Aga, had in return demanded the release of their comrades incarcerated at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba and the Bagram Air Field prison, north of Kabul, where an estimated 600 Afghans are being held by US military forces.

Washington has reportedly pledged concessions to the Taliban as a “confidence-building measure,” including an offer to develope close relations with the militant group and allowing it to open an office in a third country.

Reports indicate that the US government has even held clandestine talks with the Haqqani network, which is widely viewed by American and NATO forces as their biggest security challenge in Afghanistan.

Western and Afghan officials familiar with the development have stated that an insider within Afghanistan's presidential palace leaked the surreptitious negotiations due to Karzai's emerging hostility toward the US and out of fears that any potential Washington-brokered deal with the anti-government militant group would weaken his authority.

The American and British officials have on several occasions floated the idea of negotiating and making peace with the Taliban, despite their vows to eradicate the militant group as part of their so-called 'war on terror' campaign that gave them the pretext to invade Afghanistan in 2001 with a substantial military force.

Meanwhile, senior Afghan and Pakistani officials have often stated that efforts by Washington to make peace with the militant group are bound to fail without the involvement of Kabul and Islamabad.