Taliban era foreign minister Wakil Ahmad Mutawakil has said that flexibility and not rigidity on part of the government and its foreign backers can pave way for negotiations with the dissidents. In an exclusive interview with Pajhwok Afghan News, the former foreign minister said Karzai's talks offer was cutting no ice with the dissidents because the presidents' foreign supporters describing those people as terrorists and ruling out any negotiations with them.
Mutawakil said confidence-building measures, like release of detainees and a joint call for negotiations from the government and its international partners, would help the process push forward. "I don't think any one will like tread a tricky path in presence of an easy one," said Mutawakil, who kept himself aloof from political activities after his defeat in the September 18 parliamentary elections.
Asked about his role as mediator between the government and Taliban for a negotiated settlement of the present imbroglio, Mutawakil said no one, including him, would refuse such a responsibility. However, he added, the most vital step in this direction was the development of trust and confidence-building between the two sides. Mediation could work only when there existed trust between the parties to the conflict. Asked about any possible differences in the ranks of Taliban in case their chief Mullah Mohammad Omar accepts the talks offer and join the government at a stage, Mutawakil said he did not believe any opposition to a respectable settlement.
Referring to the previous five years period since the overthrow of Taliban regime, he said no splinter group or second leader had so far emerged to challenge Omar, which pointed to the fact that they (Taliban) are intact and any respectable settle would be acceptable to all. To a question about direct contacts with Taliban leadership instead of winning over their low ranking officials through the National Reconciliation Commission, Mutawakil again stressed the need for trust and confidence-building in this direction.
He criticized the international partners of the Afghan government for ruling out talks with the senior Taliban leadership and describing them as terrorists. On the other hand, he said, the Taliban were demanding the expulsion of all foreign forces from Afghanistan before any negotiations with the government.
Mutawakil said the stances taken by the two sides (Taliban and foreigners) were poles apart and could not bode well for any negotiated settlement of the dispute. Hence, he said, they needed to create trust and then step forward for negotiations. To a question about talks proposal from the government of Italy and Germany with moderate Taliban elements, Mutawakil said all Taliban were moderates.
Taliban had always said that their movement was an Islamic movement and Islam is a moderate religion. Hence all Taliban are moderate, said Mutawakil. If they (the two governments) dubbed Taliban as extremists on the ground that they were involved in fighting, the same thing was being done by the Afghan government, argued the former foreign minister. However, if by moderate, they meant people who were neither fighting war nor verbally opposing the government, then negotiations with such elements would remain futile, Mutawakil pointed.
About the existing situation in Afghanistan, he said it was far from satisfactory. Unfortunately, nothing has been done to resolve the dilemma, which is the product of both previous and present policies. Asked about measures to drag the country out of the existing complexities, Mutawakil suggested the end of war as the immediate step. To achieve this end, he said, only Afghaniet (being an Afghan) must be kept on top and it should be given priority over any other foreign thinking.
by Zubair Babakarkhail & Daud Khan
Source: theunjustmedia
Our button
print version
