Mad Mullah On A Leash

AS the Taliban prepares for an assault to gain control over all of Afghanistan, of which they now already command 95 per cent, there are indications that the six adjoining countries (China, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Iran and, ironically, Pakistan; see infographic) as also the US and Russia are increasingly coordinating their approaches towards the common problem of terrorism in the region. Indeed, Afghanistan is the swamp from which terrorists and secessionists of various hues fan into these countries, threatening the very survival of the regimes there. Similarly, Russia is exercised over Afghanistan's support to the Chechen separatists.

The desire to have stability in the region has a strong economic underpinning-the shortest route to vast gas reserves in Central Asia lies through a stable Afghanistan. The current international manoeuverings in relation to Afghanistan seeks to address both these concerns.

Some figures in relation to India will highlight the importance of the energy angle: India's requirement of gas is expected to reach 2.3 trillion cubic feet (TCF) by 2005. Its natural gas consumption rate has doubled in the past five years, from 0.6 TCF in 1995 to 1.2 TCF. The growing requirements, therefore, make a pipeline more economically viable than, say, shipping it. India is now the world's seventh-largest energy consumer, but without regional stability the gas pipeline could well be a non-starter.

The stakes are even higher for countries like the US. For instance, the US is reported to have already invested $8 billion in energy-related projects in Central Asia. China is also a major energy consumer. This is the site where terrorism, energy and radical Islamic politics converge.

Nothing made the new intent to come to grips with the situation clearer than when Russian President Vladimir Putin declared in New Delhi: "We believe that international terrorism has shifted to this part of the world. We have to coordinate all services of specialised agencies and coordinate military and political activities."

National security advisor Brajesh Mishra, however, denies that the Indo-Russian joint working group on Afghanistan has any military dimension. Mishra's response, in a way, manifests the limited options that India has. India's accent is more on Pakistan than on Afghanistan, which means different things for different countries. When the US talks about Afghanistan, its primary concern is Osama bin Laden. In fact, American coordinator for counter-terrorism Michael Sheehan has been quoted by the Pakistani newspaper Dawn as saying: "I don't believe that the Taliban is hostile to the US. In fact, they repeatedly tell me that they want good relations with the US, and I believe that to be a sincere desire."

Again, the US has not declared the Taliban a terrorist organisation. Neither has Delhi expressed any wish to see Afghanistan branded as such. India can scarcely take direct measures against terrorist camps in Afghanistan; for, it hasn't taken any step even against those in Occupied Kashmir and Pakistan. Options on Afghanistan are even more limited and consist mainly of information sharing and coordinating political stance through other countries and the usual formulation on "humanitarian supplies", whatever that means.

All this, though, did not prevent foreign minister Jaswant Singh from declaring, bravely and famously, towards September last year that days of "supine acceptance" of developments in Afghanistan are over. Ironically, as it turned out, a few months later IC 814 was hijacked. His visit to Kandahar can be termed proactive only in a very narrow sense, his gracious remarks on the "Taliban authorities" notwithstanding.

Yet, the Indo-Russian joint working group and the Indo-US joint working group on terrorism (as well as the reported decision on June 9, 2000, to establish a working group between Russia and the US) suggest a new convergence on Afghanistan. This can be viewed against the current moribund processes over Afghanistan (6+2 process: Afghanistan's neighbours and Russia and the US) as well as the intention to tighten the UN sanctions announced last November against the Taliban following its failure to hand over Bin Laden.

The tightening of sanctions will attempt to isolate Taliban leaders by seeking to prevent arms supplies (Afghanistan's largest imports) reaching the country and drugs (which, along with terrorism, constitute its largest exports) from going out. But then the existing UN sanctions haven't worked. As the ambassador of the Islamic State of Afghanistan (Ahmed Shah Masood's Northern Alliance), Masood Khalili, told Outlook: "The challenge is to convert this paper convergence to reality."

Challenges remain. Kremlin spokesman Sergei Yastrazhembsky has been quoted expressing concern over an anti-Russian conclave in Mazar-e-Sharif involving the Taliban, Chechen rebel Ashlan Mashkadov, Osama bin Laden and Uzbek militant Juma Namangani. During his May visit to Uzbekistan, Putin stated: "We are ready to take preventive measures, if necessary."

This might be mere sabre-rattling. Considering that robust and sustained military methods have failed to diminish Putin's problem in Chechnya, it is questionable how much strikes in Afghanistan can achieve, or even how much acceptance there will be for this kind of escalation in tension. Will India, for instance, support air-strikes? Diplomats in Delhi tend to see such periodic Russian outbursts as manifestations of frustration.

BUT Russia and the countries abutting Afghanistan have a lot to complain about. Tahir Yuldashev, leader of the radical Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) wanted in the attempted assassination of that country's president, was given refuge in Afghanistan and allowed later to set up camp. In May last year, another IMU leader Namangani entered southern Kyrgystan with some 800 militants and seized villages and threatened to invade Uzbekistan. In late 1998, the Taliban executed 11 Iranian diplomats in Mazar-e-Sharif after which Iran threatened to invade Afghanistan. This is also a training ground for militants from Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgystan, separatist Uighurs from the Chinese province of Xinkiang, militants headed for Kashmir and leaders of insurrection against Russia in Dagestan. According to Khalili, there are 35 terrorist training camps in Taliban-held regions.

The new military realities underscore the scare scenarios that Afghanistan embodies. The Taliban is now virtually at Tajikistan's border, after over-running Northern Alliance strongholds in Kunduz and Takhar. With Ahmed Shah Masood's stronghold Taloqan under its control, the Taliban is focused on Badakhsan province, which is warlord Burhanuddin Rabbani's turf. If it falls, it would seriously disrupt supply lines from Tajikistan and increase the possibility of strangling Panjshir and other Masood possessions like Charikar and Jabal-us-Shiraj, north of Kabul. It would bring the Taliban into an eyeball-to-eyeball situation with Russian troops deployed a few years ago to quell the Tajik civil war. If all this happens, the resulting influx of refugees as well as militants would be destabilising.

But Masood can't be written off yet. He had lost Taloqan and much of Takhar in 1998 as well and was able to strike back and regain territory. On five occasions in recent years he has lost all of Shamoli area and each time regrouped and forced the opposition out. Recently, those opposed to the Taliban, like Masood, Abdul Rashid Dostum and Maulvi Atta Mohammed held a meeting on October 4 in Mashad, Iran. It is also believed that Russia has begun re-supplying arms to Masood.

It is also not certain that there would be light at the end of the tunnel if the Taliban begins controlling an additional five per cent territory. Khalili emphatically says: "No one has so far gained in Afghanistan. From Alexander the Great down to the former Soviet Union and everyone in between-all failed. Pakistan and the Taliban are dreaming if they think they will succeed."

Moreover, exactly six years of Taliban-style governance has given rise to a situation where Afghanistan now produces three times as much opium as the rest of the world put together. This cannot provide the necessary underpinning for politically rehabilitating the Taliban. But yes, the Taliban craves for international recognition and that could provide some leverage in any future bargain with it.