Four-way Afghanistan peace talks begin
Key Afghan, Pakistani, Chinese and US officials are meeting for talks aimed at establishing a road map for peace between Afghanistan and the Taliban.
The Afghan government has been locked in a bloody conflict with Taliban militants for more than a decade.
Delegates hope the talks, hosted by Pakistan, will help pave the way for negotiations with the Afghan Taliban.
However, the Taliban, who are divided by factional infighting, are not attending Monday's talks.
Peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban last year collapsed, after news emerged that Taliban leader Mullah Omar had in fact died in 2013.
His deputy Mullah Mansour was declared leader in July - but a number of senior Taliban commanders refused to pledge allegiance to him and a faction opposed to him was set up under Mullah Mohammad Rasool.
Perhaps the most significant aspect of these talks is the participation of the US and China, which can to an extent dilute Kabul's scepticism about Pakistani motives.
But the complexity of links between Pakistan and the Taliban are likely to make the reconciliation process trickier, and protracted.
The question of whether the Taliban could end up being happy with what Kabul can offer may be closely linked to the extent to which Pakistan is satisfied with the direction of the talks. This is because Pakistan is widely understood to be housing the Taliban leadership on its soil and has influence over them, though it denies this.
