The admission by a top Pakistani official that his country sheltered the Afghan Taliban’s leadership is hardly a surprise for the intelligence community, but it does signal an end to Islamabad’s approach to discriminating between “good” and “bad” militants.
At a speaking event organized by the Washington-based Council for Foreign Relations, Pakistan’s de facto foreign minister, Sartaj Aziz, said his country did have some “influence” over the Afghan Taliban because their “leadership” resides in the country.
And, while this acknowledgement may be seen as Pakistan’s first, it is nothing new for those, who exactly knew where they lived – Quetta, a southwestern Pakistani city that shares border with Afghanistan’s Kandahar province – the seat of Taliban. Hence, the name “Quetta Shura”, or council of Taliban which is said to be operating from the city.
Some militant leaders are believed to be veterans of Afghan’s Jihad – the Mujahideen who were coalesced together by Pakistan, the United States and the Arab powers to fight the Russian invasion of Afghanistan through the 1980s.
Washington withdrew from Afghanistan after the Soviet pullout in 1989, leaving the region at the mercy of the Mujahideen and their newfound influence over the landlocked Afghan country. Pakistan was left to fend for itself as a terrible mix of militancy, poppy cultivation, ungoverned spaces, arrival of al-Qaeda on its border meant the region was vulnerable to militancy in the form of insurgencies and influence and the militant narrative. Pakistan and India backed opposite armed proxies on the Afghan battlefield through the 1990s, which plunged the region in a bout of instability.
When the United States invaded Afghanistan in October 2001, in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, many al-Qaeda, Taliban, Arab and Central Asian militants crossed over into Pakistani tribal areas – which were beyond the Pakistani mainstream governance and enjoyed autonomy.
Afghan leaders had some level of freedom of movement in parts of the tribal areas and Quetta. Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai also lived in Quetta for many years. This is precisely the kind of relationship which Mr. Aziz referred to, and which can be leveraged to force the Taliban sit across the table with Afghan officials to end the violence which serves not just the Afghan’s but Pakistan’s interest as well.
“…Their leadership is in Pakistan and they get some medical facilities. Their families are here. We can use those levers to pressurize them to stay, come to the table,” he said but, at the same time, stressed the limit of influence ends there. “We can’t negotiate on behalf of the Afghan government because we cannot offer them what the Afghan government can offer them”.
Aziz’s assertion does make sense as, after the death of their supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, there is a visible fraction in Taliban’s ranks over the leadership. That betrays the Quetta Shura may not have as much influence as it used to have on the Afghan commanders in the battlefield.
So, while Pakistan can use its influence on “reconcilable groups” to join talks, the Afghan government can bring the warring Afghan commanders in the battlefield to the negotiating table by offering some incentives.
Even, if there were any apprehensions about Pakistan’s sincerity, the admission of sheltering these leaders should be viewed as a clear change in the country’s approach to the bloody crisis that has claimed lives of 60,000 of its own people. The Tehreek e Taliban Pakistan- that launched a deadly insurgency in 2007 – has inflicted much human and economic losses on Pakistan, and it is only after the mammoth ongoing Zarb e Azb operation, which Secretary of State John Kerry has applauded, that the TTP has been significantly beaten and weakened.
As indicated by Aziz, the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, which assumed power in 2013, strongly believes that Taliban’s coming back to power in Afghanistan is not in Pakistan’s own interests. The assessment stems from the fear that their return to power will strengthen Pakistani Taliban as, Aziz pointed out, “ideologically, they have a nexus”. So, the question of Pakistan supporting these Taliban does not make any logic.
“After our government came into power in 2013, there has been a significant change in our policy. We are now moving against all terrorists without discrimination,” declared Sartaj Aziz, a former foreign and finance minister. That means action against both the “bad” Taliban – Pakistani militants who targeted the state – and the “good” Taliban who focused their activity only in Afghanistan.
As such, he said, the perceptions that there were still sympathizers of Taliban in Pakistan’s establishment “needs to be corrected”. Even, if there were any, the attack on a Pakistani military school in December, 2014 in which 140 students and teachers were killed, has eroded every bit of. That attack galvanized the entire nation which now fully supports the ongoing military operation in the biggest tribal region of North Waziristan, an area once seen as a global hub of terrorism.
Pakistan says it is targeting all terrorist groups without any discrimination and has forced the Haqqani Network there to flee to Afghanistan. The group is considered the biggest threat to U.S. forces fighting Taliban in Afghanistan.
There is, however, a growing realization that any amount of military action both in Pakistan and in Afghanistan will not end the violence, and that reconciliation is the best and perhaps the only path.
Islamabad is going to host a fresh round of direct talks between the Taliban and the Afghan officials, being held under the auspices of the Quadrilateral Group that includes Pakistan, Afghanistan, China and the United States. The first such effort in July was derailed after the announcement that Mullah’s Omer had died in 2013.
Analysts say new efforts require support and sincerity of all stakeholders to bring to an end the decades of violence in Afghanistan, which is not just a threat to the region but to the entire world. Islamabad has also pledged to not allow anybody to use its soil for actions against neighbors.
Meanwhile, in another example of evolving paradigm shift, Pakistan has started cracking down on anti-India elements. Banned outfit Jaish e Mohammad militants, suspected of being behind the Pathankot airbase attack on Jaunary 2, 2016 – which disrupted resumption of Pakistan-India peace talks – have been detained and a team of Pakistani experts would be traveling to India as part of the investigation.
Will Afghanistan – which has allowed TTP leader Mullah Fazalullah to operate from Kunar province against Pakistan, and in the past also gave refuge to Baloch insurgents – and India – which as attested by former U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and boasted by Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval – has been fomenting trouble in Balochistan and the tribal areas from across the Afghan border – come clean on using proxies to kick up unrest in Pakistan? Such frank admissions will help the region make a fresh start and invigorate quest for peace and stability in South and Central Asia – a key U.S. strategic interest.
