19 years into war, after having
lost 2400 American lives and spending $ 1 trillion, the US which is keen on
withdrawal of forces has sealed a peace pact with the Afghan Taliban at Doha on
Feb 29th. On the same day, the US made a joint declaration with the
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (IRA) and Indian Foreign secretary, Harsh
Shringla made a brief sprint to Kabul to attend the event. Keen on fulfilling the
electoral promise, Trump administration has pulled all stops to reach an
agreement in the election year. US envoy, Zalimay Khalilzad negotiated for one
and half years with Taliban to bring them to the table. In September 2018,
President Trump even invited Taliban representatives to Camp David for peace
negotiations. Cognizant of the
implications of the event scheduled days head of the anniversary of 9/11, the
President called off the event at the eleventh hour after the death of American
soldier in a Taliban attack. But within weeks, the US again resumed
conversations and prepared ground for withdrawal of troops.
The deal is an outcome of growing
realisation that neither sides-America nor Taliban sure of an outright victory.
The losses in terms of men and material is mounting and the public outcry
against American involvement is palpable. Unlike previous leaderships,
advocating America’s global retrenchment, Trump has committed to bring back the
forces. Taliban welcomed Trump’s initiative which is in congruence with its
plans of donning a political role.
As a confidence building measure, a
week preceding the proposed signing of agreement, Taliban refrained from
violent attacks. The pact titled as “Agreement for Bringing Peace to
Afghanistan between the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) which is not
recognised by the United States as a state and known as the Taliban and the
United States of America” 1 has four important parts- guarantees
on preventing the use of Afghanistan soil by any group against the US;
announcement of timeline for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from
Afghanistan; Taliban to begin intra-Afghan negotiations with Afghan side on
March 10th at Oslo; negotiations and dialogue for “comprehensive
and permanent ceasefire” for evolving a future political roadmap for
Afghanistan. The time-bound implementation of first two parts of the agreement
would pave way for the execution of next two parts. By and large, all the four
aspects are interconnected and interrelated.
Setting the ball rolling, within
135 days of agreement, the US and its allies agreed to reduce the forces to
8600 from the existing 13000 troops and withdrawal all troops from the five
military bases. Subsequently, the US will pull out troops from the remaining
bases in the next 9.5 months. Also, the US has committed to ensure prisoner
swap of 5000 Taliban prisoners held by Afghan Taliban in exchange of 1000 Afghan
security forces held in captive by Taliban. After the start of intra-Afghan
talks, US is expected to initiate the review of sanctions on Taliban, appeal
UNSC to remove the Taliban from the terror list, refrain from interfering in
the domestic affairs of Afghanistan and seek economic cooperation for the
reconstruction of Afghanistan.
While the US is ordained to deliver
on various fronts, Taliban in return is expected to deny shelter, asylum,
support to any agencies or individuals in Afghan territory to plot attacks on
the US or its allies. In its overdrive to extricate troops from Afghanistan,
America has alluded to the IEA as an entity along the lines of a nation,(with
an authority to issue visas) saying- “IEA (Taliban) will not provide visas,
passports, travel permits or other legal documents to those who pose a threat
to the security of the US and its allies to enter Afghanistan”
The half-baked deal, lacking any
provisions for enforcement mechanisms appear to have at best achieved a safe
passage for the exit of the American and its allied troops from Afghanistan. While
Trump is revelling in the glory of pulling out American troops from the war
zone, Taliban triumphantly termed the deal as “termination of occupation
agreement with the United States”. In his message, Hibatullah Akhundzada,
proclaiming the Taliban as the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan”, a new
nation, underscored it as an Islamic polity replete of true Islamic governance 4.
While there is no overt mention of sharia, in all likelihood it is going to
make a return and undo the rights enjoyed by Afghan women since 2001. By way of
directly engaging with the Taliban, America has indirectly elevated its
stature.
After signing the peace agreement
with Taliban at Doha, adroitly balancing its relations with Afghanistan regime,
Defence Secretary Mark Esper and Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani made a
Joint Declaration for bringing peace to Afghanistan3. Afghan regime
reaffirmed to contain the efforts of terror outfits like al-Qaeda and ISIS -K
from using its territory against the US. America reiterated its commitment to
conduct military operations, extend support to Afghan forces to defeat
terrorist organisation and offered to “facilitate discussions” between
Afghanistan and Pakistan to ensure that neither country’s territories are used
by terror outfits which threaten each other’s security. Also, the US along with
IRA will seek the removal of Taliban members removal from UN sanctions list by
May 29th and subsequently, the US will consider withdrawal of
sanctions against Taliban by August 27th.
In absence of any direct costs on
Taliban in case it reneges the terms of the agreement, Taliban eventually
emerged as the major benefactor of the agreement. With Trump administration
keen on pulling itself from the “endless wars”, the field is virtually
open for Taliban to wreak havoc.
America’s agreement with Taliban
and Joint Declaration with Afghanistan is expected to bring a modicum of peace
to the region. It is anticipated that violence would also come down. A day
after the deal, exposing fissures, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani contradicted “prisoner
swap” as a precondition for direct talks and refused to release Taliban
prisoners 2. Ghani even questioned America’s authority on committing
a prisoner swap as Afghan government alone is entitled to make such a call.
Ashraf’s objections posed fresh hurdles to scheduled intra-Afghan talks and
highlighted the intractable differences. Losing no time, Taliban negotiator
announced delaying of intra-Afghan talks if prisoners are not released.
Additionally, ending the truce, Taliban resumed operations in Afghanistan saying,
“that as per the US-Taliban agreement, our mujahideen will not attack
foreign forces but our operations will continue against the Kabul
administration forces” 5. While US secretary, Mike Pompeo, advised not
to get carried away by Taliban’s statements in an interview, explosion of bomb
laden motor vehicle during a football match on Monday killing three people
reignited worse fears capitulating the return
of unabated violence in Afghanistan.
In wake of the prisoner swap
dispute, to ensure progress of scheduled Afghan talks President Trump spoke to
Taliban negotiator Mullah Baradar Akhund assuring him of removing all obstacles
6. American desperation to pull out the troops from Afghanistan is
bound to leave the country in a lurch. By directly conversing with Taliban
leader, Trump has eventually mainstreamed the terror outfit. Definitely Taliban
couldn’t have asked more. In its hurry to leave Afghanistan, besides investing
heavily in negotiating Taliban, America conceded lot of ground, inadvertently
made one-sided concessions and turned Taliban into a pivotal player and reduced
the sovereign nation (Afghanistan) a secondary entity.
Hours after Trump’s telephonic conversation,
America launched first air strike since the peace deal in response to Taliban’s
reported 43 attacks on Afghan National Defense Forces (ANDF) in Helmand
province which killed 25 soldiers and 13 personnel injured 7. By
defending Afghan forces, America reaffirmed that it wouldn’t abandon its
allies. While Taliban’s terror attacks days after proclaiming to bring peace in
Afghanistan exposed its hypocrisy. A spree of violent attacks elicited numerous
doubts about the plausibility of a prospective intra-Afghan dialogue.
Withdrawal of US forces is bound to
create power vacuum in the region and India is closely monitoring the
developments in the neigbourbood. Responding to the US-Taliban deal, Foreign
Minister Jaishankar, said, “To the US and the West-our message has been
though the achievement of 18 years, is in global interest, those achievements
are to be protected, not jeopardised”. Speaking at the inauguration of the
Centre for Policy Research Dialogues, two days after the deal, he said, “To
my mind, the real negotiations will start now.” And prophetically added, “we
have to see that many of the assumptions that we had-how cohesive are various
players, what do they do, what are their demands, and finally do the Taliban
join a democratic setup or does a democratic set up adjust to the Taliban. I
think those are issues for which right now there are no clear answers”8.
Interestingly, Taliban’s reluctance to give up terror and the relentless
attacks despite the deal has reaffirmed India’s worse concerns about the
Taliban. India has always firmly supported all opportunities and mechanisms
that bring peace, stability and development to Afghanistan. In the Joint
Statement during the Trump’s recent visit, both India and the US advocated, “Afghan-led,
Afghan-driven, Afghan-owned peace and reconciliation process” for sustainable
peace, cessation of violence and preservation of gains made in 18 years.
America’s objective of bringing
together contrasting stakeholders- Afghan regime and Taliban to charter a
roadmap for peaceful and stable Afghanistan has hit a major roadblock. While
American is exuberant over its planned withdrawal from the region, a surge in
Taliban attacks is an ominous sign of the deal falling apart even before it
could take off.
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