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16-09-2021
By SJA Jafri + Bureau Report + Agencies
NEW YORK/ KABUL/ ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s national security adviser has called on the world to “engage” with the Taliban’s caretaker government in Afghanistan or risk a return to the instability that characterized the group’s last era in power three decades ago.
In an address to foreign media in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, on Wednesday Moeed Yusuf urged the international community not to repeat past mistakes.
“We are trying to make sure that the world understands the importance of not making the mistakes of the past again,” he said.
“For us, it is an imperative to seek peace and stability in Afghanistan, that is what we are focused on.”
Yusuf’s comments come as world powers debate whether and under what conditions to recognise the new government in Kabul dominated by the Taliban, which swept across Afghanistan in a lightning offensive last month. The group seized control of the capital, Kabul, on August 15 as former President Ashraf Ghani fled the country.
Pakistan, Afghanistan’s southeastern neighbour, has repeatedly called for world powers to engage with the new government and to provide immediate humanitarian and other aid to stave off an imminent economic collapse.
On Monday, several countries pledged more than $1.1bn in food aid at a United Nations conference to address immediate poverty and hunger concerns in Afghanistan. Roughly $10bn in Afghan central bank reserves, however, remain frozen at banks abroad, notably with the US Federal Reserve.
Remain engaged
Yusuf called for world powers to engage with the Taliban rather than to freeze ties with the government led by the armed group, which waged a bloody 20-year battle against occupying US and NATO forces that killed tens of thousands of Afghan civilians and security forces.
“By engaging, you essentially are saying we are constructively going to try and look at how to help Afghanistan for the sake of the average Afghan,” said Yusuf.
Asked if there were human rights concerns under a Taliban government, the Pakistani national security adviser said international powers could only exercise leverage on those issues if it engaged with the country.
“If the Taliban have signaled clearly, which they have, that they want to remain engaged with the world … and if they have said clearly that engagement would bring legitimacy and assistance, it’s not Pakistan that would provide that,” he said.
“We can’t provide that legitimacy, that’s the West. And that’s the leverage. But if you engage constructively then that conversation can happen.”
Moreover, the US officials are concerned about the banned outfit Al Qaeda rebuilding and regrouping in Afghanistan, as per a report in The New York Times.
Top US intelligence officials noted that some members of the Al Qaeda had returned to Afghanistan as the Taliban consolidated their hold over the country.
The assessment from the US officials came amid concerns over the Taliban’s capacity to ensure that militants do not take advantage of the vacuum in the war-ravaged country and use Afghanistan’s soil as a launching pad against other countries.
Top intelligence officials met at the annual Intelligence and National Security Summit where they noted that it would take Al Qaeda at least one to two years before it can strike the US again.
“The current assessment probably conservatively is one to two years for Al Qaeda to build some capability to at least threaten the homeland,” Lt. Gen. Scott D. Berrier, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said.
David S Cohen, the deputy director of the CIA, said it was hard to detect when the Al Qaeda or Daesh’s local affiliate would have the capability to threaten the US, adding that the CIA is keeping a close watch on “some potential movement of Al Qaeda to Afghanistan.”
“We’re thinking about ways to gain access back into Afghanistan with all kinds of source,” said General Berrier.
Won’t allow Afghan soil to be used for terrorism, say Taliban
The Taliban’s spokesman in Doha Suhail Shaheen had said a couple of days ago that the Taliban had condemned the 9/11 attacks 20 years ago and told the US that “no Afghans were involved” in them.
Shaheen’s remarks came during an interview with Geo News on program “Jirga”, aired last week.
“I recall that we condemned the incident. (Abdul Salam) Zaeef was the ambassador (to Pakistan) and I was an aide. We called a press conference and we condemned the incident. We said we will cooperate to unearth the real behind the scenes culprits”, “we asked that the matter be resolved through dialogue, do not invade Afghanistan. And the result of an invasion is before you now,” Shaheen had said.
“It won’t be a good result for you, so it is better for you and for us also, having fought against an invasion (for so long) and many people being martyred, so we do not want this,” he had recalled the Taliban saying to the US “but they did not listen to us and came to Afghanistan and occupied it through sophisticated weapons. At a time there were more than 150,000 soldiers here of theirs and of the alliances. But the result was what we had warned against 20 years ago,” the spokesman said.
He went on to state that “with the support of the people, we won back our freedom”.
To a question, Shaheen had said that Al Qaeda at the time had not taken into confidence Afghanistan or Mullah Muhammad Omar over such a move, and that the Taliban, who were in power at the time, were “caught off-guard”.
He added that the Taliban have now, since taking control of Afghanistan, made a policy to never allow the use of Afghan soil against any other country.
Meanwhile, a month after seizing Kabul, the Taliban is facing daunting problems as it seeks to convert its lightning military victory into a durable peacetime government.
After four decades of war and the deaths of tens of thousands of people, security has largely improved but Afghanistan’s economy is in ruins despite hundreds of billions of dollars in development spending over the past 20 years.
Drought and famine are driving thousands from the country to the cities, and the World Food Program fears its food supplies could start running out by the end of the month, pushing the 14 million food-insecure Afghans to the brink of starvation.
While much attention in the West has focused on whether the new Taliban government will keep its promises to protect women’s rights and to reject groups like al-Qaeda, for many Afghans the main priority is simple survival.
“Every Afghan, kids, they are hungry, they don’t have a single bag of flour or cooking oil,” said Kabul resident Abdullah.
‘Food emergency’
On Tuesday, Rein Paulsen, director of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s Office of Emergencies and Resilience, told reporters at the UN headquarters in a video briefing from Kabul that four million Afghans are facing “a food emergency”.
Paulsen said 70 percent of Afghans live in rural areas and there is a severe drought affecting 7.3 million Afghans in 25 of the country’s 34 provinces.
These vulnerable rural communities have also been hit by the pandemic, he said.
Paulsen said the winter wheat planting season, the most important in Afghanistan – is threatened by “challenges of the cash and banking system” as well as challenges to markets and agricultural items.
“More than half of Afghans’ daily calorific intake comes from wheat,” he said.
If agriculture collapses further, Paulson warned, it will drive up malnutrition, increase displacement and worsen the humanitarian situation.
Long lines still form outside banks, where weekly withdrawal limits of about 20,000 Afghanis ($200) have been imposed to protect the country’s dwindling reserves.
Impromptu markets where people are selling their possessions have sprung up across Kabul, although buyers are in short supply.
International donors have pledged more than $1bn to prevent what UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned could be “the collapse of an entire country”.
Even with billions of dollars in foreign aid, Afghanistan’s economy had been struggling, with growth failing to keep pace with the steady increase in population. Jobs are scarce and many government workers have been unpaid since at least July.
‘Every day, things get worse’
While most people appear to have welcomed the end of fighting, any relief has been tempered by the near-shutdown of the economy.
“Security is quite good at the moment but we aren’t earning anything,” said a butcher from the Bibi Mahro area of Kabul, who declined to give his name.
“Every day, things get worse for us, more bitterly. It’s a really bad situation.”
Following the chaotic foreign evacuation of Kabul last month, the first aid flights have started to arrive as the airport reopens but world reaction to the government of Taliban veterans and hardliners announced last week has been cool, and there has been no sign of international recognition or moves to unblock more than $9bn in foreign reserves held outside Afghanistan.
Although Taliban officials have said they do not intend a repeat of the harsh rule of the previous government, toppled by a US-led campaign following the September 11, 2001, attacks, they have struggled to convince the outside world that they have really changed.
Widespread reports of civilians being killed and journalists and others being beaten, and doubts about whether the rights of women really will be respected under the Taliban’s hard-line interpretation of Islamic law, have undermined confidence.
In addition, there has been deep mistrust of senior government figures, such as the new interior minister, Sirajuddin Haqqani, designated by the US as a global terrorist with a $10m bounty on his head.
To make matters worse for the Taliban, the movement has had to fight speculation over deep internal splits in its own ranks, denying rumours that Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Ghani Baradar had been killed in a shootout with Haqqani supporters.
Officials say the government is working to get services up and running again and that the streets are now safe but, as the war recedes, resolving the economic crisis is looming as a bigger problem.
“Thefts have disappeared but bread has also disappeared,” said one shopkeeper.
Moreover, two weeks after the announcement of members of a Taliban caretaker government, the Taliban government’s acting army chief of staff, Qari Fasihuddin, on Wednesday said they are working to form a “regular” and “strong” army.
Fasihuddin said the plan to form the army will be finalized soon.
“Our dear country should have a regular and strong army to easily defend and protect our country,” he said.
Talking to TOLOnews, Fasihuddin said the soldiers and officers of the former government will also be recruited for the new army.
He said the Taliban will stand against any internal or external security threats.
“Those who have received training and are professional should be used in our new army. We hope this army should be formed in the near future,” he added.
The Taliban has repeatedly said that former government army personnel will be called back to their duties. In a recent move, the Taliban said they will call back the former government police to maintain Kabul security along with Taliban forces.
The former government security personnel, however, say they have yet to be asked to resume their duties.
A number of former military officers expressed appreciation for the Taliban’s intention to use former government army personnel and said the Taliban should use the skills and capabilities of those personnel.
“They (the Taliban) should make a decision about the fate of the 300,000 army personnel,” said Shakorullah Sultani, a former military officer.
“It is obvious that without consulting with the former army personnel and without using them, it is not possible,” said Wasiqullah Azim, a Kabul resident.
The new remarks of the Taliban government army chief of staff come as residents have repeatedly raised concerns over the fate of the former government’s security, defense and intelligence personnel.
