There are reports of widespread fighting between the Mujahideen (Islamic guerrillas) and the security forces in vast areas stretching from Kandahar in the south to Badakhshan on the Soviet border.

General Secretary Karmal gives up the post of prime minister; he is succeeded in that position on June 11 by Sultan Ali Keshtmand,[2] another trusted member of the Parcham faction of the PDPA.

Keshtmand is also put in direct charge of the National Patriotic Front, set up in December 1980 with the intention of rallying the people behind Karmal's Marxist revolutionary government.

Pakistan maintains its earlier stand that any direct negotiation with a representative of the Karmal government would amount to recognition of the regime, contrary to the ruling of the Islamic Conference.

The New York meetings are a consequence of a November 1980 General Assembly resolution that called for withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and appealed to all parties to create conditions for a political solution.