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KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN — In the spring of 2007, a Taliban commander brought a small delegation of insurgents to Kabul for a secret meeting with Sibghatullah Mojaddedi, the former Afghan president who leads a reconciliation program for insurgents who want to stop fighting.
But the talks quickly turned sour. Mr. Mojaddedi gave the Taliban delegation $10 to cover the expenses of the dangerous journey and waved them away, telling them to come back later.
“It was an insult,” said the Taliban leader, his skin darkened by years on sun-baked battlefields. “They're not serious.”
Nothing in the recent months of war has changed that impression. The government and its backers have failed to persuade insurgents that they're taking the idea of negotiations seriously, and the Taliban themselves haven't shown any real enthusiasm for talks.
Pakistani Taliban militants visit the mosque where a suicide attack wounded 30, in Bara, a troubled town in the Khyber tribal region about 15 kilometers from Peshawar, Pakistan on May 1, 2008. (Mohammad Zubair/Associated Press)
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Despite a much-publicized meeting in Saudi Arabia last month that included representatives from all sides, negotiators have hardly started to bridge the chasm between the players in the conflict.
The subject of negotiations has come up more than once recently in comments from high-ranking officials – from Britain's top commander in Afghanistan to the senior United Nations official in the country – who have argued that a military solution is not feasible and that a negotiated settlement will be necessary.
A spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai has previously admitted that his government's calls for negotiations in recent years have been in part an effort to split the already fractious insurgency into camps that support or oppose a mediated settlement.
Sections of the Taliban movement and their allied groups hold different views about their political aims in the war: While agreeing on expelling foreign troops, they have contrasting visions about what might happen next.
Insurgents in southern Afghanistan have burned schools and executed teachers in front of their students, for example, while a researcher for The Globe and Mail recently recorded video of armed Taliban touring a school in the central province of Wardak, where insurgents claimed to be protecting, funding, and even supplying books for schools. Those disagreements between insurgent factions have occasionally turned bloody, with three sources reporting a gunfight last month between Taliban and their local allies from Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-i-Islami network.
In that context, observers say, it's not surprising that hints of progress on negotiations frequently emerge from authorities in Kabul. As the war grows, and the government's position looks increasingly weak, raising the idea of negotiations brings a rare piece of hopeful news to the capital.
For similar reasons, the Taliban have vehemently denied they're engaged in any kind of discussions, as the insurgents try to keep their fighters united and motivated. Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi announced yesterday that peace talks have not happened.
The Taliban's website, Voice of Jehad, also carried a statement this week from Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, the former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, clarifying his previously reported comments that the Taliban had made contact with their opponents. A meeting did occur during a meal to celebrate the Eid holiday, Mr. Zaeef said, but the participants were visiting Saudi Arabia only for the sake of a pilgrimage, or umrah, to the holy land and did not discuss the situation in Afghanistan.
It does not appear that the insurgents completely reject the idea of talks, but their framework for negotiations is unacceptable to the government and its foreign supporters.
In his comments on the Taliban site, Mr. Zaeef said: “I believe talks should be held without putting any condition by either side. … The government's condition means to recognize the government, which Taliban will not accept.”
He continued: “The talks should be unconditional and the U.S. should also present its stance, while the withdrawal of foreign troops, the future of Afghanistan and several other issues should be discussed.”
Mr. Ahmadi, the Taliban spokesman, made similar comments, repeating the insurgents' long-standing refusal to talk while foreign troops remain in Afghanistan.
For his part, Mr. Karzai has always said that any talks must respect the new constitution of Afghanistan. The Afghan President also cannot satisfy the Taliban's demands for a troop withdrawal before talks happen, observers say.
Even Waheed Muzhta, a former Taliban foreign ministry official who lives in Kabul and wrote a nostalgic book about the previous Taliban government, says he does not favour an immediate pullout of foreign troops. Although he would like to see them leave eventually, and perhaps take a less aggressive role as they try to find a political solution to the conflict, Mr. Muzhta conceded in a recent interview that a quick withdrawal of international forces would spark a vastly bloodier civil war.
But the former Taliban official emphasized that the burden now falls on Mr. Karzai and his foreign supporters to show greater flexibility about their terms for peace. Like his U.S. counterparts, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has often said negotiations must be handled by the Afghan government, despite calls from some Taliban or ex-Taliban figures, such as Mullah Zaeef, for direct involvement by the international military forces. Speaking with reporters this week, Mr. Harper also repeated a caveat he has used in the past, saying talks can happen “provided these people are willing to participate in the democratic and constitutional process.”
U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates used a similar phrase this week, endorsing a reconciliation process with “people who are willing to work with the Afghan government.”
Such people are difficult to find in Afghanistan these days, and the short-term prospects for peace are slim.
