Afghan leader meets Taliban-linked cleric

19 Feb 2012, 3:40 pm   -   Source: AAP

The Afghan president met with a Pakistani cleric linked to Taliban insurgents, a meeting that marks the first public contact between an Afghan official and members of the Afghan Taliban's support network in Pakistan.

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The Afghan president met on Saturday with a Pakistani cleric linked to Taliban insurgents, a meeting that marked the first public contact between an Afghan official and members of the Afghan Taliban's support network in Pakistan.
  
The meeting between President Hamid Karzai and the cleric was held in Islamabad said the cleric and Afghan officials, and shows how far the Afghan president is willing to go to open contact with the insurgent leaders.
  
The Taliban leaders are widely believed to be based in Pakistan with some level of protection by the country's security forces.
 
The US and Afghanistan increasingly see negotiating with the Taliban as the only way to end the more than 10 years of warfare in Afghanistan and allow American troops to leave the country without it falling further into chaos.
  
Speaking to The Associated Press, the cleric, Maulana Samiul Haq, said Karzai asked for his help in bringing the militant movement's leadership into peace negotiations and to help establish contacts with the Taliban leadership.
 
Haq said he told Karzai that he would help in the "noble cause" as long as it was clear what was wanted from the Taliban. Karzai was in Pakistan on a trip to gain the country's cooperation in the nascent peace process.
  
"I told him to take steps to gain some confidence of the Taliban. 'They do not trust you,"' Haq said he told Karzai. "I told him that if you take a clear position on what you can offer the Taliban, and what you want from the Taliban, God willing, I will contribute in this noble cause."
  
Hamed Elmi, deputy spokesman for Karzai's office, confirmed the meeting took place.
  
Haq runs a large seminary where many of the insurgent leaders once studied and reportedly still provides recruits for the Taliban fighting in Afghanistan. He is known in some circles as the Father
of the Taliban, but it's unclear how much sway he has currently with the movement.
  
Karzai met Haq in an Islamabad hotel, not his seminary closer to the Afghan border where he regularly preaches the virtues of jihad in Afghanistan to thousands of students.
  
Karzai's trip reinforces the centrality of Pakistan to the peace process.
  
Pakistan is seen as crucial because much of the Taliban leadership is believed to be based in the country, and the government has historical ties with the group.
 
But Islamabad has always denied Taliban leaders are using its territory and rejected allegations that the Pakistani government has maintained its links to the group, frustrating Afghan and American officials who say Pakistan is not aggressively going after the terror group.

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