REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, KABUL -- The Taliban said on Saturday it would not take part in peace talks brokered by a four-way group including representatives of Afghanistan, Pakistan, China, and the United States.

The Taliban, ousted from power in a U.S.-led military intervention in 2001, has been waging a violent insurgency to try to topple the Western-backed Afghan government and reestablish a fundamentalist Islamic regime.

Following a meeting of the so-called Quadrilateral Coordination Group made up of representatives of the four countries in Kabul in February, officials said they expected direct peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban to begin in early March.

But the Taliban, which calls itself the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, publicly denied they would be participating in any