KABUL - The Taliban are not involved in peace talks between an insurgent faction and Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and will not agree to talks until Western troops are withdrawn from the country, a spokesman said on Tuesday.

Karzai's office said on Monday he had held his first direct talks in Kabul with a senior delegation from Hezb-i-Islami, one of the three main insurgent groups in the country and rivals to the Taliban.

The meeting was an unprecedented success in Karzai's efforts to reach out to insurgents this year, a crucial time when Washington is sending a "surge" of extra combat troops before planning to start withdrawing next year.

Although the talks appeared to be preliminary, the publicly acknowledged face-to-face meeting was a significant milestone: previous contacts with insurgents have been furtive and conducted through mediators, mostly overseas.

The Hezb-i-Islami team, which included the son-in-law of the group's fugitive leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, brought a 15-point peace plan including a call for all foreign troops to withdraw this year, though a spokesman said the demands were negotiable.

A separate peace with Hezb-i-Islami could markedly change the balance of power on the ground in the east and northeast of the country where the group is mostly active.

But the main prize would be talks with the Taliban themselves, more powerful than at any time since they were driven from Kabul in 2001 by US-backed Afghan militia.

A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said his movement, which refers to itself as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the country's name when it ruled from 1996-2001, had not altered its position: that no talks could be held until troops withdraw.

Deadly avalanche

An avalanche struck a remote mountainous area of northern Afghanistan two weeks ago, killing 35 people and burying homes beneath the snow, a provincial official said Tuesday.

Officials said that the area was covered in about three meters (10 feet) of snow, hampering any rescue efforts and attempts to bury the dead.

Such deadly avalanches are rare in Afghanistan during winter, but are more frequent in the spring when heavy snows melt.

In early February, about 170 people were killed when a blizzard and massive avalanches hit the Salang Pass, a treacherous stretch in the Hindu Kush mountain range connecting the north and south of Afghanistan,

Reuters