The Taliban government on Sunday rejected U.S. President Donald Trump's call to retake Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, four years after the U.S. withdrawal left the facility in Taliban hands. Trump had renewed his call the day before and said the United States was talking with Afghanistan about the matter, though he gave no details.
The response from Kabul was direct. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Afghanistan sought constructive relations with all states based on mutual and shared interests, but that the country's independence and territorial integrity were of the utmost importance. He also pointed to the Doha Agreement, saying the United States had pledged not to use or threaten force against Afghanistan's territorial integrity or political independence.
A senior defense official went even further, saying ceding even an inch of Afghan soil was out of the question and impossible. Those statements matter because they leave little room for ambiguity: the Taliban are not signaling a negotiation over the base, but a categorical refusal to discuss sovereignty on U.S. terms.
Trump's comments fit a broader effort to portray the 2021 withdrawal as a strategic failure. He has repeatedly criticized former President Joe Biden over the exit from the country's longest war and hinted during a state visit to the United Kingdom that the Taliban might be willing to let the U.S. military return because they need things from Washington. The AP excerpt does not verify any such talks, and it is careful to note that Mujahid did not answer questions about them.
The story also leaves open the question of what, if anything, has happened behind the scenes. The excerpt says the U.S. and the Taliban have no formal diplomatic ties but have had hostage conversations, including the release of an American man in March and an agreement on a prisoner exchange. For now, though, the public position is simple: the Taliban say Bagram is not for sale and not up for discussion.
The verified facts are that Trump renewed his push, the Taliban rejected it, and both sides framed the issue in terms of sovereignty, commitments and leverage rather than practical military logistics.
The public standoff leaves the U.S. and the Taliban with little room for a symbolic compromise. The AP report suggests their relationship is already limited to prisoner and hostage talks, and those contacts do not amount to a diplomatic reset. Bagram remains a potent symbol of the U.S. presence in Afghanistan and of the war's end, which is why neither side can treat the air base as a simple asset transfer. For now, the base stands as a line the Taliban say will not be crossed.
The Bagram dispute is also another reminder that the Taliban want their foreign policy to be read through sovereignty rather than dependency. Mujahid's comments and the defense ministry's answer both push back against the idea that Afghanistan can be pressured into returning a symbol of the U.S. war. The AP report says Washington and Kabul still talk over hostages and prisoners, but those talks are narrow and transactional. On the broader question of Bagram, both sides appear to have reached a hard limit rather than a negotiating starting point.
