Former EastEnder and current investigative TV presenter Ross Kemp has revealed that he isn’t entirely unsympathetic to some of the points members of the Taliban have made to him during the course of his research for his new show, Ross Kemp Back on the Frontline.

The new series, which debuts on Sky1 on Monday, November 14th, will see Ross back in Afghanistan, where he’s previously cheated death, including one incident in which a bomb went off near Ross, killing a British soldier.

Back on the Frontline documents Ross’s third visit to the war torn county for Sky, and once again, he joins British and American soldiers in the thick of the fighting, as well as talking to representatives of the Taliban.

Speaking to What’s On TV, Ross said, “I’ve spent lots of my life there [in Afghanistan] now and I’ve seen young men lose their lives there.

“I’m very passionate about the place.”

And on the subject of his meeting with Taliban troops, Ross said, “We talk to them on several occasions, both to the man who is their official spokesman and some of those serving long sentences at Pul-e-Charki prison for their involvement with the Taliban.

“Three of the Taliban people we interview had seen our previous programmes.

“They said to me I looked scared in the previous programmes. I told them I was.”

It was when he was asked what his overall impression of the Taliban is that Ross said, “People are going to find this shocking, but some of the things the Taliban say I find myself agreeing with.

“They say the Afghan ruling regime is corrupt and I say: ‘Yes, it is.’

“They say: ‘We want you out of our country, you shouldn’t be here’, and I think: ‘No, we shouldn’t really, it’s their country…’”

While discussing the withdrawal of coalition troops from the country, Ross said, “The major question that we ask in this series is: Is it practical to believe that by the end of 2014 that Afghanistan will be able to stand up on its own two feet to counter the Taliban?”

However, Ross didn’t pretend to know the answer, saying, “At the moment, the jury is out.

“There’s three years to go yet and an awful lot can happen in that time.”

Click here to visit Sky1’s Ross Kemp micro-site. In the meantime, here’s a trailer for the new series…

What do you think of Ross’s comments about agreeing with some of the points made by the Taliban?