Time is running out for Afghan peace negotiations and more needs to be done to boost the negotiations, Tomas Niklasson, the European Union special envoy for Afghanistan, said as international forces withdraw from the war-torn country.

“Time is getting shorter as we speak...There has been no or very little progress on substance, so from that perspective more has to be done,” Tomas, who was on a visit to Pakistan, was quoted as saying on Wednesday by Reuters. He also added that Pakistan should use all leverage it had to encourage the Taliban to deliver a written peace proposal.

“I see so far little progress in terms of (the Taliban) putting a proposal on the table but whether that is because insufficient leverage is there or because the leverage that is there hasn’t been used … fully I don’t really know,” Niklasson said.

He added, “But I have confidence that Pakistan realizes the importance and the urgency of the situation and that it is in its own interest to use the leverage it has.”

The remark came at a time when the fighting has intensified in the country despite the negotiation teams of the Afghanistan government and the Taliban are still holding discussions in Doha, Qatar. 

Talks between the warring Afghan parties that begun in September last year broke off in April when the United States announced it would withdraw its forces by 11 September--much after the 1st May 1 deadline the Trump administration had agreed upon with the Taliban. Although the insurgent group, thereafter, refused to participate in the Turkey conference, they resumed negotiation in Doha a few weeks ago.  

Both negotiation teams last met on Tuesday and “recalibrated order and sequences of sessions,” Suhail Shaheen, the Taliban’s Doha office spokesperson, said on Twitter.  

Stressing on fast-tracking talks, Niklasson said that to show true progress, substantive proposals needed to be put on the table on each side’s plans for the country and the outcome of the talks, which the Taliban had not yet provided.

“It’s quite possible that a proposal from the Taliban might be maximalist; maybe they would just put an Islamic Emirate on the table, which is perfectly fine for negotiations, and then you can see where you can make compromises and compromises will have to be made by both sides,” he said.

On the other hand, Zabihullah Mujahid, the group’s spokesperson claimed that they did have a written plan but would not share it publicly or with foreigners and would save it for substantive negotiations.

Earlier, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had said they should not be held responsible if the peace process fails.