Female member of government team involved in inter-Afghan talks injured in assassination attempt.

Fauzia Kofi, a member of the government team set up to negotiate with the Taliban in the Afghan capital Kabul, was wounded in an attack by gunmen.

Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Aryan said 45-year-old Fauzia Kofi and her sister were returning from a meeting in Parwan Province when they were targeted by gunmen near Kabul, AFP reported.

He said Kofi had been shot in the right arm and was out of danger.

The former lawmaker, who was a fierce critic of the Taliban, is now part of the Afghan government's negotiating team.

The Taliban has denied any involvement in the attack.

Afghan presidential spokesman Sediq Sadiq said President Ashraf Ghani had strongly condemned the attack, calling it a cowardly move.

Abdullah Abdullah, head of the National Reconciliation Committee, called on Afghan authorities to bring the attackers to justice.

Shahrzad Akbar, head of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, said in a statement on Twitter that there was concern over the targeted attack, which could have a negative impact on confidence in the peace process.

Human rights activists and leaders have been attacked in Kabul in recent months, and Fauzia Kofi herself survived a 2010 assassination attempt.

Fauzia Kofi was returning from a ceremony in Kabul on International Women's Day in 2010 when she was attacked by gunmen.

Fauzia Kofi is one of the few women in the government team formed to negotiate with the Taliban, which held several rounds of talks in 2019.

The talks were separate from an agreement reached between the United States and the Taliban in Qatar in February this year, when Fauzia Kofi said she had received threats from terrorists over the use of nail polish.

It should be noted that the team formed by the government for inter-Afghan talks includes 4 women including Fauzia Kofi.

"I think we're having serious negotiations now. It's a sense of pride, but there's a lot of pressure," he said this week.

Fauzia Kofi had said that you have to prove that you are complete in every way.

It should be noted that the Taliban regime was overthrown after the US intervention in Afghanistan in 2001 and Fauzia Kofi was elected Afghanistan's first female deputy speaker in the parliament formed in 2005.

Talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government are expected soon to end a two-decade-long civil war.

The release of nearly 400 Taliban prisoners by the Afghan government has opened the door to lasting peace talks in the country.

"We are hopeful that some concrete steps will be taken in the next 10 days," a diplomat was quoted as saying by the Dawn newspaper.

Under the Doha agreement between the United States and the Taliban, the Afghan government was to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners in exchange for the release of 1,000 security personnel by the Taliban.

About 4,600 of them have already been released, but Kabul was reluctant to release the remaining 400, which were declared dangerous.

The matter was later taken up with the Loya Jirga, which confirmed his release, after which Afghan President Ashraf Ghani issued a presidential decree to release him.

When the United States signed an agreement with the Taliban on February 29 after more than a year and a half of negotiations, it was hailed as the best opportunity for peace in Afghanistan in four decades of war. It was also seen as a roadmap for the withdrawal of the Taliban, which would end America's longest war.

Four-and-a-half months after the agreement was signed, Zalmai Khalilzad, head of negotiations and peace envoy from the United States, tweeted that the United States had reached a "significant milestone" in implementing the Taliban agreement as the number of US troops dropped to less than 12,000. 8,600 and 5 bases have been closed in Afghanistan.

Khalilzad even condemned the insurgents' growing attacks on Afghan security forces, saying the Taliban were true to their word not to attack US and NATO troops.

He said in his tweet that no American had lost his life in Afghanistan due to Taliban violence and regional relations had improved.