In late June, anonymous intelligence sources told The New York Times that Russia had been offering Taliban fighters cash rewards for killing US and coalition troops in Afghanistan, and alleged that President Trump was informed about it but did nothing. Trump, Moscow, and the Taliban itself have all dismissed the allegations.
The Trump administration has narrowed down its search for the NYT ‘Taliban bounties' story's intelligence sources to fewer than 10 people, Politico has reported.
Multiple senior officials including Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany criticized the leakers last week, with Ratcliffe calling their actions “simply put, a crime.”
CIA Director Gina Haspel offered a more muted criticism, saying only that “leaks compromise and disrupt the critical interagency work to collect, assess, and ascribe culpability,” and promising to “continue to pursue every lead” regarding “hostile states' use of proxies in war zones” against US forces.
Taliban Dismisses Allegations
On Monday, the Taliban reiterated that the claims made in the NYT report were “false,” with Suhail Shaheen, peace process negotiator for the group in Qatar, saying the group considers the claims of collusion with Russia a deliberate invention by Afghanistan's intelligence services to derail the Afghan peace process.
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