Under a revised UN plan, the transfer of power in Kabul is now scheduled for March 21st. If it takes place on time, it will be a coup by Mr Mahmoud Mistiri, the chief UN negotiator.
The UN’s interests, which largely coincide with those of Pakistan these days, are to pry apart the warring factions and restore peace in Afghanistan. Beyond that, of course, Western sympathies are clearly lined up behind moderate supporters of ex-King Zahir Shah and the incumbent President of Afghanistan, Mr Burhanuddin Rabbani. Mr Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s extremist Hizbe Islami party and the pro-Iran Shi’ite Hizbe Wahdat party are to have their wings clipped.
In the emerging scenario, the role of the Taliban has evoked much interest and comment. Sardar Assef Ali, the Pakistani foreign minister, and General Naseerullah Babar, the interior minister, have swept aside suggestions that the Taliban are secretively being backed by Pakistan. This is a popular, indigenous movement, they insist. Mr Mistiri, concurs.
The evidence, however, would seem to suggest a more complex situation. The Taliban were nudged into action by General Babar last year when a Pakistani convoy to Turkmenistan was waylaid by rogue Mujahideen commanders in Kandahar. Since then, hundreds of “taliban” from north western Pakistan have made their way to Maulvi Mohammad Umar’s camps in Kandahar and beyond. How many among these tribals are actual Afghan “taliban” and how many are operating under their cover, we don’t know. But it would be naive to think that General Babar has withdrawn his “hand” from Taliban affairs. Nor can Maulana Fazlur Rahman’s “interest” in Taliban matters be fortuitous. Indeed, the maulana’s determination to play a role in the forthcoming Kabul negotiations would suggest that he has the blessings of Islamabad.
Mr Mistiri’s plans, too, have benefitted from the Taliban’s northward march to Kabul. By sending Mr Hekmatyar packing from Charasiab, the Taliban have given the UN leverage to enter into more “realistic” power-sharing negotiations with the stubborn Hizbe Islami. The same sort of fate awaits the Hizbe Wahdat, which finds itself squeezed between the forces of the Taliban and President Rabbani in south-west Kabul. It is therefore no coincidence that Mr Rabbani’s forces have opened their heavy guns on the Hizbe Wahdat on the eve of the transfer of power on March 21st in order to make the Shias more responsive to “reason”.
President Rabbani has also benefited from the rise of the Taliban. He was able to seek a postponement of the transfer of power last month by arguing that the Taliban should also participate in power-sharing. This way Mr Rabbani hopes to ensure that the share of the Royalists and the extremists in any future government will be diluted in his favour. That the Taliban are no longer insisting upon Mr Rabbani’s withdrawal from Kabul as a precondition to the transfer of power implies some sort of implicit “understanding” between these two forces.
That said, it is clear that the Taliban are increasingly beginning to acquire independence from outside forces and are in the process of formulating a political agenda of their own. Whether this eventually meets with the approval of President Rabbani, the UN and Pakistan remains to be seen. If it doesn’t, then we may expect more trouble ahead.
The Taliban are a Pushtun force largely derived from southern Afghanistan. The Taliban leaders also share the same Islamic philosophy as the Sunni Deobandis. In a multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian country like Afghanistan, this doesn’t auger well. The predominant Tajiks and Uzbeks of northern Afghanistan are unlikely to allow the Taliban to impose their hegemony on Afghanistan. There are thus bound to be conflicting passions ahead.
More ominously, we need to pause and consider the potential “demonstration” effect of the Taliban on Pakistan. Many of the Deobandi madrassas which have supplied a chunk of the Taliban force are based in Pakistan’s Balochistan province where their students have been ideologically “trained” by Maulana Fazlur Rahman’s JUI which still doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the birth of Pakistan. The JUI, in turn, is the party which gave birth to the extremist Deobandi organisation, the Sipah i Sahaba, which has wrought sectarian havoc in the Punjab. The “success” of the Taliban in Afghanistan, therefore, may lead to the dominance of the Deobandi militant school of thought in Pakistan. This development is likely to be more virulent for Pakistan’s body politic than an earlier aberration: Pakistan’s previous support of Mr Hekmatyar during the Zia ul Haq and Nawaz Sharif years has led to the strengthening of the Jamaat i Islami in the country.
If the Afghan jihad has already brought guns, drugs and militant Islam to Pakistan, the rise of the Taliban in Kabul could fuel sectarian fury and religious intolerance in this country. If it leads to the ethnic partition of Afghanistan, it could also amplify the demand for greater Pushtunistan. Thus when General Babar says that “the Taliban are like school-children and there is no danger from them”, he probably doesn’t know what he is talking about. Certainly, the Afghan situation has the potential to explode in Pakistan’s face at any time in the future.