Deadly message of the Taliban

Recently Afghans mourned the death of the chief negotiator with the Talibs, the former president of Afghanistan Burhanuddin Rabbani. By coincidence the ceremony of commemorating Rabbani, Chief of Afghan High Council for Peace, took place on the International Day of Peace. But it seems that this day will cause more fear among Afghans, because Rabbani’s death – he was a Tadjik – may compound interethnic relations and push the country toward civil war. Such concerns are not accidental, because, when the High Council for Peace was founded, the current president of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai called Rabbani the largest hope of the Afghan people and urged the Taliban to seize the opportunity to establish peace. The High Council for Peace conducts negotiations with the Taliban. Rabbani himself was the head of the main opposition party in Afghanistan.

It looks like the Taliban doesn’t seek to establish peace. After all, as it became known, the aim of this extremist movement was to block the peace negotiations and the establishment of peace in the country. In an interview with Reuters a member of terrorist organization the Taliban Zabihullah Mujahid told in detail how talibs managed to trap Rabbani and kill him.

According to the extremist, there was created a group whose purpose was to organize negotiations with Rabbani to end the war in Afghanistan, although, the real goal was to destroy the former president.

“When Rabbani came up to our representative to hug him, the man activated the explosives attached to his body and killed the ex-president and four guards,” said Zabihullah to Reuters. According to what he said, both of the negotiation members often met with the ex-president and that is why he trusted them. By the way, this was the reason why the kamikaze killer wasn’t checked for presence of explosives. The agency reported that the killer said he had the message from the Taliban leaders.

The talibs said they will continue to kill their political opponents. Previously they managed to eliminate the brother of the current president Karzai and also the influential general Mohammed Daud Daud, who supported Kabul power.

Meanwhile, the head of the Afghan foreign ministry Janan Mosazail said that the killing would not stop the peace process. He also said: “Rabbani is not the first and he will not be the last prominent Afghan leader who has been killed by terrorists trying to derail the peace process. But we will continue with our efforts.”

Rabbani was the president of Afghanistan from 1992 through 2001. But after 1996 the Taliban captured Kabul in 1996, he was actually removed from power. In the 1980s Rabbani was one of the militants’ leaders who fought against the Soviet army. In 1985 he led the suppression of the uprising of Soviet captives in Badaber camp near the Pa-kistani city Peshawar.

The Day asked the expert to comment on how Rabbani’s assassination will influence the further reconciliation in Afghanistan and the development of this country in general.

COMMENTARY

Viacheslav SHVED, Ph.D. in History, assistant professor, chief research fellow at the Institute for World Economy and International Relations (National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine), vice president of All-Ukrainian non-governmental organization Ukrainian Center of Islam Studies:

“First, there is a very difficult situation now in Afghanistan around the discussion of the principles of the future peace format, peace agreement between the government and the talibs, which should, in fact, provide for the return of the talibs, I can’t say yet to what extent, into active political life in Afghanistan. This discussion involves many annual movements, factions, from moderate to most radical and extremist, who don’t want to hear about any reconciliation in Afghanistan on the principle that is offered by Karzai’s government, the US, NATO and the West.

“Second, external forces with their tasks have always been active in Afghanistan. We also need to carefully consider who benefits from the constant instability in Afghanistan, how did this situation fail to give the Afghan people the chance for quiet peaceful life? Speaking about this I would like to mention one important thing. What is actually happening in the area of Middle East? What is the essence and content of the deep transformations? In fact, there is an ongoing large-scale process of restoration of civilizational and cultural identity of the Arab world, including Afghanistan. In fact, the mainstream of political life is that moderate Islamist forces take the active leading position in this process.

“In case with Afghanistan there is an attempt to involve the moderate wing of the talibs in governing the country. It is almost the best variant of the peace process development for Afghanistan. But, of course, there is a very fierce struggle around all this.”

Which of the external factors benefit from the situation destabilization in Afghanistan?

“Honestly, I can not say now who might be directly interested in undermining the stabilization process in Afghanistan. Of course, it is work of intelligence, intelligence analysts, who have serious documentary base at their disposal. They could reach quite paradoxical conclusions. Afghanistan today is the fight field between several major regional and global centers of politics and in each of these centers some political forces play their own political game. There is such a great tangle of contradictions and conflicts of interests in Afghanistan that it is very difficult to unravel it.

“Rabbani’s murder is a serious blow to the peace process in Afghanistan. However, in my opinion, the Afghan people have no other way. They have to come to realize that there has to be a compromise between the current government and the Taliban’s moderate wing.”

What then should be the role of one of the main centers of politics – the US who are interested in stabilizing the si-tuation in Afghanistan? Should they continue to maintain military presence in the country?

“The US must remain in this country for some time, but in a totally new role. There won’t be combat units. There will basically be advisers and specialists in training the Afghan forces. Maybe SWAT units and air forces will stay in some key cities. But combat units will be withdrawn. I think, in Afghanistan there will be a process similar to what is now happening in Iraq.”

What can be the role of Ukraine in Afghanistan, considering the fact that our country is gradually, one can say in microscopic shares, increasing its presence in this country?

“Ukraine is very careful in this respect and, perhaps, it is justified because we still have rather hurtful memories of the bitter fate of several thousands of Ukrainians who died during the Afghan war. Any losses will have negative impact on the political situation in Ukraine. That is why we only sent medical staff and several instructors there. It is possible that such form of cooperation will develop. But I think that Ukraine could find an opportunity to participate in training military personnel for Afghanistan as it was done in times of Soviet Union. In particular, we could offer training of interior specialist. We have an extensive network of educational establishments of the Interior Ministry. We could provide great help for the Afghan people by training qualified specialist and police officers for law enforcement agencies.”