Page 1 of
2 A stumble over the 'W' word in
Afghanistan By Tarique Niazi
A group of tribal leaders from Afghanistan
and Pakistan have called for talks with the
Taliban. These leaders convened in Kabul from
August 9-12 in a US-brokered peace jirga, a
traditional council akin to a parliament of
elders. At the Kabul meeting, the jirga
formed a 50-member tribal council, made up of 25
members each from Afghanistan and Pakistan, to
begin the dialogue.
The call does not
spell out the talks' schedule, scope, substance
or
venue. Meanwhile, the Taliban have rejected the
jirga as a "US-sponsored farce". They are
opposed to the US-backed Northern Alliance
government in Kabul and want troops led by the
United States and the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO) to leave Afghanistan.
This issue of foreign troop withdrawal was
controversial at the jirga. Although
carefully screened by their respective
governments, a smattering of jirga members
did manage to articulate their support for the
Taliban's call for foreign troops to leave, which
they wished to replace with those of Islamic
countries.
Many obstacles remain in the
path of opening talks with the Taliban. The peace
jirga in Kabul is subject to conflicts
between the leaders of Afghanistan and Pakistan as
well as pressures from the great powers. For all
its shortcomings, though, the jirga's call
for greater dialogue and its wide representation
from both sides of the border suggest that it
could serve as a key mechanism for resolving the
swath of conflicts across Southwest Asia.
Call to replace foreign troops The key conflict at the peace jirga was
the issue of foreign troops and Pakistan's
behind-the-scenes support for withdrawal. On April
8, London's Daily Telegraph reported that Pakistan
had urged the United Kingdom and the United States
to pull out of Afghanistan. The suggestion,
according to the newspaper, "reflects the growing
belief in Islamabad that NATO is as much to blame
for the endurance of the Islamic rebel army as
Pakistan".
In public, however, Pakistan is
more circumspect. A day before the Telegraph's
report, Khurshid Kasuri, Pakistan's foreign
minister, said: "NATO should consider holding
talks with Taliban leaders." He added, "Britain in
particular should know the limitations of a purely
military approach in Afghanistan." This nuanced
caution refers to Britain's three failed military
campaigns in Afghanistan since the beginning of
the 20th century.
Britain, however, taps
into a different history of its conflicts to
determine the length of its stay in Afghanistan.
Drawing on his country's military campaign against
the Irish Republican Army, a senior British
commander estimates that the UK will need "38
years" to pacify the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Minority ethnic communities in Afghanistan,
especially Tajiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras, would
welcome Britain's long-term commitment. The
Taliban, who are predominantly drawn from the
majority ethnic group the Pashtuns, oppose such
resolve. Also, neighboring countries would likely
resist British intent.
Pakistan wants to
see foreign troops leave, as their presence has
increased its arch-rival India's influence with
Kabul while diminishing its own. If foreign troops
depart from Afghanistan, the 35,000-strong Afghan
National Army will be hard put to hold back the
Taliban. Absent external forces, they are bound to
reclaim Kabul, and with it restore Islamabad's
traditional strategic advantage.
At a
still larger scale, China and Russia are also
getting impatient with the foreign presence in
Afghanistan. In 2005, the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization, which includes China and Russia as
members, asked that the United States and NATO
give a timetable for withdrawal of their forces.
The jirga's call for replacing NATO-US
troops with Islamic forces resonates in these
larger circles.
Karzai-Musharraf
bickering Kabul has long accused President
General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military
ruler, of harboring Taliban leadership in
southwestern Pakistan, which borders southern
Afghanistan. In a Newsweek interview last
September, Afghan President Hamid Karzai faulted
Musharraf for failing to act against senior
Taliban leaders. "Mullah Omar is, for sure, in
Quetta, Pakistan, and he [Musharraf] knows that.
We have given him the GPS [Global Positioning
System] numbers of his house and the telephone
number."
Musharraf dismissed the charge as
"baseless". In a CNN interview, he retaliated by
saying that Karzai "is behaving like an ostrich".
Later, he sardonically counseled the Afghan leader
to "put your own house in order", a veiled
reference to Kabul's and NATO-US troops' failure
to end violence in the country.
This
bickering between the two persuaded US President
George W Bush to move quickly to calm passions on
both sides. Last September, he hosted an
Iftar dinner breaking the fast of Ramadan
at the White House for Karzai and Musharraf. By
then both had grown so far apart that they had
stopped speaking to each other, except for trading
barbs of criticism. At the dinner, Bush pleaded
with both to end their acrimony and join forces in
the common cause of fighting terrorism.
For a time, his persuasion seemed to work.
A hopeful signal came from Karzai, who proposed
that Afghanistan and Pakistan convene a joint
jirga of the tribal leaders who live on
both sides of the Durand Line that divides his
country from Pakistan, to enlist their support
against terrorism. The proposal froze Musharraf in
his tracks. Yet Bush warmed to the idea, which
eventually pushed Musharraf also to tag along.
Musharraf's indifference
Musharraf's reluctance to the call for a
jirga sprang from his non-existent
influence with this institution. In contrast,
Karzai, who commands immense popularity with the
tribal leaders of both
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
