Afghanistan war: Russia denies having to pay militants to destroy US troops

Russia has denied experiences that it presented Taliban-connected militants bounties to kill US troops in Afghanistan.

Citing US officials, The New York Occasions, Washington Post and Wall Avenue Journal reported that a Russian armed forces intelligence unit offered the alleged bounties very last year.

The same device has been connected to assassination attempts in Europe

The Russian embassy in the US explained the claims had led to threats to diplomats.

The Taliban also denied executing any offer with Russian intelligence.

The stories appear as the US tries to negotiate a peace deal to end the 19-12 months war in Afghanistan.

The unnamed officials cited by the New York Occasions mentioned US intelligence organizations had concluded months back that a device of Russia’s GRU army intelligence company experienced sought to destabilise its adversaries by covertly presenting bounties for prosperous assaults on coalition forces.

Islamist militants, or armed prison components intently linked with them, were being thought to have collected some dollars, the newspaper said.

According to the Instances, President Donald Trump was briefed on the stories in March. Mr Trump denied possessing been briefed, writing on Twitter on Sunday that neither he nor the vice president experienced been informed “about the so-referred to as attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians”.

In a series of Twitter posts, the Russian embassy in the US accused the paper of endorsing bogus news.

20 American troops died in Afghanistan in 2019, but the New York Times claimed it was not very clear which deaths were being below suspicion.

The officers quoted by the New York Moments reported the White House’s National Safety Council had thought of how to answer, including imposing an escalating raft of sanctions from Russia.

The GRU unit allegedly included has also been joined to the tried murder of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with a nerve agent in Salisbury, England, in March 2018.

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A spokesman for the Taliban also termed the accusations baseless.

“Our concentrate on killings and assassinations have been ongoing in decades right before, and we did it on our own resources,” Zabihullah Mujahid explained to the New York Times.

He extra that the Taliban had stopped attacking US and Nato forces right after they agreed in February to a phased troop withdrawal and to raise sanctions. In return, the Taliban mentioned they would not permit extremist teams to work in locations they handle.