Afghanistan: FO's unshared optimism

Brigadier (Retd) A.R. Siddiqi The Nation: Opinion/Views

Our Foreign Office faces the UN (Kofi Annan, Norbert Holl), Gulbadin Hikmatyar (for whatever he is worth) and Iran (for its declared support of the Northern Alliance) in what may conveniently be described as unshared optimism for a shared intra-Afghan compact emerging in the foreseeable future. This is in spite of the lack of any direct contact reported yet between Kabul and the Northern Alliance even on the modalities of the new Taliban proposal for a meeting of Afghan Ulema (MOAU) from both sides.

In appearance and reality, the proposal would be an uneven line-up weighted against any chances of an early resolution of the crisis. First and foremost, the Taliban would have the Northern Alliance submit a list of qualified ulema for their prior approval. This one precondition alone would be enough to preempt the conference even before the preliminaries about its date, timing and venue are tied up.

Unlike the Taliban, almost ninety per cent of whom are Pushtoons and Sunnis, the Northern Alliance is a conglomerate of at least four major parties viz. Jamiat-i-Islami (Rabbani), Hizb-i-Wahdat (Hazara-Shiite), Jumbish-i-Milli (Dostum) and Shoora-e-Nazaar (Ahmad Shah Masood), each with its own politics and theology. A round-table conference of such widely disparate and divergent groups would be welcome only if it would also be workable.

A Taliban spokesman, Mullah Wakil Ahmad, after the recent talks in Kandahar between Mullah Mohammad Omar and Foreign Secretary Shamshad Ahmad confirmed their offer for the formation of 'an all-powerful' joint commission of the 'recognised' ulema representing the two sides.

"For us only the Quran is the supreme law," Wakil stated. In their words, only a solution based on Shariat would be acceptable to the ulema. Whether the resolution of an essentially politico-military crisis be found at all via Shariat remains a moot point. While one can hope for the best, it would be nothing short of a miracle to find two ulema agreeing on a single interpretation of the Shariat Law.

Foreign Office spokesman Tariq Altaf would call it a 'positive development'. He 'presumes' that the leader of the Northern Alliance and deposed President, Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani (hopefully along with other factions) had agreed to 'this format' despite 'an element of uncertainty attached to such matters'.

So much for the hard-boiled optimism of the Foreign Office. It would be relevant here briefly to recall the views of others concerned with the issue on prospects of its early resolution.

Head of the United Nations Special Mission for Afghanistan, Norbert Holl on Sunday (December 28) formally announced his resignation from the job after his failure to convince the warring Afghan factions to stop the 'long-standing hostilities'. The United Nations, he said, had realised that the Afghans 'alone for whatever reason are not capable of finding true reconciliation. And, therefore, we have to open a second track. What is outside the track....'

He would say nothing about the 'outside track', whether still within the UN or outside and leave it to the Afghans (and their respective supporters) to define and lay down.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan plainly admitted the UN's inability to 'impose peace on Afghanistan'. Of the 'lessons' UN learnt from its 'involvement' in Afghanistan, Mr Annan said: "In the conflict situations, whether in Afghanistan or Tajikistan, the inspiration for viable peace has to spring from the leaders and people in the region. UN can help and sometimes even encourage them by providing the basis for a settlement, but we can never impose peace."

Quite a bit of plain-speaking! Whether it would, in the ultimate analysis, mean the UN quitting the Afghan peace process, must be left to the world body to answer. It does nonetheless, in no small way, show the amount of frustration and ennui that has already overtaken the UN at the highest level.

As for Hikmatyar, though a spent force in the intra-Afghan milieu, he could not be simply dismissed - if only for his destabilising potential. He was, more than others, responsible for destroying the Peshawar Accord (April 1992) and subsequently the Islamabad Declaration (March 1993) on the formation of a broad-based government. His Hizb-i-Islami must accept the blame for subjecting Kabul to the worst and the longest artillery barrage, razing much of the city to the ground.

Until the Taliban's advance eastward, Gulbadin had his guns spitting fire day and night. It was the Taliban who forced him to a humiliating withdrawal lock, stock and barrel.

That Hikmatyar is a shrewd player of the power game goes without saying. A radical Sunni of the Wahabi persuasion (recognised for his opposition to Shiite Iran), Hikmatyar, along with his men, enjoys the hospitality of the Iranian government as their honoured guest. That by itself proves the ability to switch sides to suit his purpose and gain sympathy from the most unlikely quarters. Nothing would substantiate the point better than his continuing stay in Tehran, ever since he left his country after his defeat at the Taliban hands in 1996.

Hikmatyar took strong exception to Prof Rabbani's recent visit to Pakistan. He was bitterly critical of Pakistan's 'partiality' and continuous support to Taliban. He said Pakistan 'backed' Taliban when they were engaged in fighting his party - the Hizb-i-Islami.

Iran had been and remains openly opposed to Pakistan's 'active' support of the Taliban faction. Regardless of the fact that Taliban control two-thirds of the Afghan territory, they can hardly claim yet to have succeeded in establishing a stable and UN-recognised government. They stay in a state of perpetual armed conflict with the Northern Alliance and other Afghan factions to belie their claim to legitimacy.

Their attitude towards Tehran had been one of open hostility. In the one-to-one meetings with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, President Ali Khatami urged Nawaz Sharif to keep the Taliban under control and restrain them from their anti-Iran posture.

To cap it all, there does not exist even the basic understanding between the Northern Alliance and the Taliban concerning each other's legitimacy. Rabbani vehemently denounces the Taliban-led Kabul government as illegal and unconstitutional. They are 'illegitimate rulers and only mine is the legal government', he swears.

The Taliban for their part remain at war with the Northern Alliance of which Rabbani is the recognised leader. The unofficial Afghan delegation (with observer status) to the OIC Conference was led by Rabbani to the exclusion of other Afghan factions. Not to speak of Mulla Omar, Taliban's supreme leader, even Hikmatyar who was in Tehran as a government guest together with his supporters remained conspicuous by his absence throughout the conference. They were not even invited.

The issue now is between the Taliban in de facto control of the bulk of Afghan territory and the not-quite-unrecognised de jure status of Rabbani as the president-in-exile. Even in Pakistan, Rabbani's Afghan delegation was accorded full protocol. That was in spite of the uneasy relationship until lately between Rabbani and our Foreign Office.

It is to be noted that while in Tehran, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif personally invited Rabbani to visit Pakistan. Taliban's Kabul government was simply furious over the Pakistani initiative. They refused Pakistan permission to use their air space for flying Rabbani and his men across from Northern Afghanistan to Peshawar/Islamabad in a special PAF plane. Consequently, the Pakistani plane had to take the longer route, avoiding Kabul and other Taliban-held areas. Such is the state of Taliban hostility towards the leader of the Northern Alliance and lack of respect for Pakistan, their putative sponsor and supporter.

What hope there could be for establishing a meaningful dialogue between them and the Northern Alliance? To make things worse, hostilities are still raging between the two sides without a significant let-up. Taliban would not even allow the UN planes and personnel to rush food supplies to the stranded people of Western Afghanistan. A UN aircraft narrowly escaped Taliban's artillery fire. While one can always hope for the best, there is little room for the kind of optimism our Foreign Office has been in the habit of showing for an intra-Afghan rapprochement and a peaceful way out of the crisis in the near future.