Piece by piece, talking peace
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - A two-day jirgagai, or mini-jirga (council) , involving
politicians and tribal leaders from Afghanistan and Pakistan ended in Islamabad
on Tuesday with the participants offering an olive branch to militants willing
to lay down their arms, but the initiative does not extend to al-Qaeda.
This leaves open how the real players, the two foreign forces in the South
Asian war theater - the United States and al-Qaeda - fit into this game of
reconciliation.
Commenting on the key recommendations adopted at the talks, Owais Ahmed Ghani,
who led the Pakistani delegation and who is also the governor of North-West
Frontier Province (NWFP), said that he and former Afghan foreign minister
Abdullah Abdullah, who
headed his county's delegation, had been tasked with contacting the Taliban.
"Our responsibility is to set up a committee formed by jirgagai members.
In addition, we will form contact groups of influential people to contact those
groups involved in fighting and who are referred to as 'opposition'. That way
we can talk to them about peace and reconciliation," Ghani said.
Abdullah added that contact would only be established with groups which
recognized the Afghan and Pakistani constitutions.
"This committee will also make recommendations to the governments with a view
to denying sanctuaries to terrorists and subversive elements in both
countries," the declaration said.
Another jirgagai has been scheduled for Kabul within a few months to
assess the progress of the recommendations.
This week's gathering was a follow-up to the larger joint peace jirga held
last year in the Afghan capital of Kabul at which delegates from Pakistan and
Afghanistan called for negotiations with Taliban militants to discuss ways of
ending the insurgencies in both countries.
This ongoing jirga process, including the recent Saudi Arabia initiative
for peace in Afghanistan, is part of a broader shift in US policy towards the
Taliban under which at least some of them will be accepted as "good sons of the
soil".
The Wall Street Journal, citing senior US administration officials, wrote this
week, "Senior White House and military officials believe that engaging some
levels of the Taliban - while excluding top leaders - could help reverse a
pronounced downward spiral in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan."
The report said the new approach was contained in a draft recommendation in a
classified White House assessment of US strategy in Afghanistan. Talks would be
led by the Afghan government, "but with the active participation of the US".
It is noteworthy that a string of United Nations resolutions has labeled the
Taliban as terrorists. A sticking point in the dialogue process could be the
requirement that the participants lay down their arms.
Senator Allyas Bilour, a prominent leader of the Pakistani secular Pashtun
nationalist Awami National Party, which governs the restive NWFP, expressed
serious reservations. "Pashtuns never lay down their weapons. There is no
precedence in history for such a demand to any Pashtun that he lay down his
weapon," he said in a statement.
"During conflicts within Pashtun societies, the antagonized segment is part of
the dialogue process and once all parties become part of the process, conflict
automatically halts until the jirga reaches any consensus and the agreed
upon consensus is binding for all. No Pashtun can deviate from the jirga's
decision."
Similarly, a senior Taliban source told Asia Times Online that the move to
initiate dialogue only with some militants was a problem. "Dozens of small and
big Taliban have already joined the government. What was the result? Even a big
commander like Mullah Abdul Salaam Rocketti joined the government, but what
difference does it make? He cannot even go to Zabul, his native place [in
Afghanistan] and he lives in Kabul under heavy security."
The Taliban source also commented that he was pleasantly surprised that the
Western media, which have always downplayed Taliban activity, have suddenly
started highlighting Taliban attacks in Afghanistan. "The media flash our point
of view. This has never happened before," he said.
The peace initiative in Afghanistan is clearly in its beginning phase, at which
point strict protocols are set, such as the demand to surrender weapons and to
uphold the constitution. However, once the process proceeds and contacts are
established with the militants and dialogue is initiated on a regular basis,
backchannel discussions can remove such barriers.
A far bigger obstacle in the process of peace jirgas is to overcome the
barrier that currently prevents the United States from sitting across the table
from al-Qaeda.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He can
be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
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