Afghan President Ashraf Ghani announced on Thursday that the first round of Afghan peace process talks will be held in Pakistan's capital city of Islamabad in January.
"The first round of a quadrilateral meeting between senior officials from Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the US that will lay a roadmap for peace negotiations, is set to be held on January 11 in Islamabad. The second round of the meeting will be convened in Kabul afterwards," Ghani said.
The first round of face-to-face talks between Taliban and the Afghan government was held in Pakistan in July but the second round was cancelled after news of the death of the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, was revealed, Xinhua news agency reported.
The announcement came four days after President Ghani met with Pakistan's Army Chief General Raheel Sharif in Kabul and the two countries agreed to take action against those armed groups refusing to join the peace process.
