Taliban Close to Formation of Cabinet, Announcement of New Government    

KABUL/ISLAMABAD - A senior Taliban leader confirmed to VOA on condition of anonymity that the group is in the final stages of announcing a new Cabinet that was expected to include all members of its current Rahbari Shura, or leadership council.   

Taliban supreme commander Hibatullah Akhundzada is holding the consultations in Kandahar, the city known as the birthplace of the Taliban, along with his deputies Sirajuddin Haqqani, the head of Haqqani network, and Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, son of Taliban founder Mullah Omar and the head of Taliban military commission.    “Currently, the Taliban leadership is consulting with different ethnic groups, political parties and within the Islamic Emirate about forming a government that has to be accepted both inside and outside Afghanistan and to be recognized,” Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai, another senior Taliban leader said in a televised address Saturday.    Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid told VOA the process was “near completion.”