The Taliban won’t return any of the military equipment left behind by the U.S. troops while exiting Afghanistan in 2021, a person familiar with the matter said, as relations between Kabul and the Donald Trump administration start on a wobbly note.

Instead of taking back the weapons, the U.S. should provide Taliban with more advanced weapons to fight the Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K, an offshoot of the broader Islamic State organization, said the person, who did not want to be identified as he is not authorized to speak to the media.

The response comes after Trump’s remarks at a Sunday rally, in which the U.S. President threatened to cut any financial assistance to Afghanistan if the South Asian nation does not return U.S. aircraft, air-to-ground munitions, vehicles and communications equipment.

“If we’re going to pay billions of dollars a year, tell them we’re not going to give them the money unless they give back our military equipment,” Trump said.

“We don’t intend to make a comment for now,” a Taliban deputy spokesman, Hamdullah Fetrat, said in a text message.

Military equipment, reportedly worth more than $7 billion, were taken over by the Taliban when U.S. troops made a rushed withdrawal from Afghanistan after more than 20 years in the country.

The Taliban each year parade the captured U.S. military equipment at a former American military base next to the capital Kabul to mark their return to power. Last year, Chinese and Iranian diplomats also attended the ceremony.

Despite rejecting Trump’s demand, the Taliban-led government wants a fresh start with the U.S. under the new president, and gain access to over $9 billion in frozen foreign exchange reserves.

Establishing normal relations with the U.S. would help the Taliban’s efforts to get international recognition for its pariah government, and the funds would provide relief for the cash-strapped Taliban, which has been battling to rebuild an economy devastated by sanctions and the loss of international aid.

Meanwhile, the Taliban government on Tuesday said it released American citizens in a prisoner exchange for an Afghan jailed in a U.S. prison.

While a handful of countries, including China, Pakistan and Russia, have accepted Taliban diplomats, they don’t formally recognize the government, which has been condemned internationally for repeated human rights violations. China was the first nation to grant diplomatic credentials to the Taliban last year.

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