Taliban 'open to ceasefire'

10 Sep 2012, 9:44 am   -   Source: AAP
Share This
0 
+ Comment
1
The paper claims to reveal an emerging, pragmatic consensus among the Taliban leadership, who are willing to take part in peace negotiations in exchange for political leverage after 2014. (File: AAP)

The paper claims to reveal an emerging, pragmatic consensus among the Taliban leadership, who are willing to take part in peace negotiations in exchange for political leverage after 2014. (File: AAP)

The Taliban are open to a ceasefire as well as a political agreement which could lead to a US military presence in Afghanistan up until 2024, a new report says.

RELATED

The Taliban are open to a general ceasefire as well as a political agreement which could lead to a US military presence in Afghanistan up until 2024, a new report by a British think-tank says.

But the insurgent group, led by Mullah Omar, will not negotiate with President Hamid Karzai or his administration, which it sees as corrupt and weak, the briefing paper by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) says.

The report, entitled "Taliban Perspectives on Reconciliation", presents interviews with four senior Taliban representatives about their approach to reconciliation.

The paper claims to reveal an emerging, pragmatic consensus among the Taliban leadership, who are willing to take part in peace negotiations in exchange for political leverage after 2014.

NATO has about 130,000 soldiers fighting a decade-long insurgency by the Taliban, but they are due to pull out in 2014 and now work increasingly with the Afghans they are training to take over.

The report says the Quetta Shura Taliban, a council of Taliban leaders headed by Omar, will not accept the interpretation of the Afghan constitution in its current form since this would be akin to surrender.

But Taliban representatives did welcome the prospect of a US military stabilisation force operating in Afghanistan up to 2024 out of the five primary military bases -- Kandahar, Herat, Jalalabad, Mazar-e-Sharif and Kabul.

However, this was only as long as the US presence contributed to Afghan security and did not constrain Afghan independence and Islamic jurisprudence, the report said.

The paper also warned any American attacks against neighbours -- such as Iran and Pakistan -- launched from Afghan bases would not be tolerated since it would impact on national security and invite "trouble".

The report's authors met in July with one former Taliban minister, one ex-Taliban deputy minister and founding member of the Taliban, one senior ex-mujahideen commander and lead negotiator and one Afghan mediator who had negotiated with the Taliban.

The paper was written by Anatol Lieven, Theo Farrell and Rudra Chaudhuri from the Department of War Studies at King's College London, together with Michael Semple from Harvard University's Carr Centre on Human Rights.

So far no Taliban leader has publicly endorsed the idea of a ceasefire, the report said.

The paper also found that the Taliban leadership and 'base' deeply regretted their past association with al-Qaeda, so much that once a ceasefire or political agreement were decided they would obey a command to completely renounce al-Qaeda, as long as this call came from Omar.

  • Follow us: 
  • Follow us on Facebook
  • Follow us on Twitter
  • Follow us on Youtube

Your Comments

No Taliban leader has publicly endorsed the idea of a ceasefire, the report said

Mona - from Australia, 9 months ago

and that's about where it will stay, no need for this intellectual think tank because we are winning the war, absolutely! (except for that green on blue thing )

Join the Discussion

Name
City / Suburb E.g. Artarmon, Sydney
Title
Comment
You have characters remaining.
Validation
What's this?
This is a captcha-picture. It is used to prevent mass-access by robots.
All submitted comments become the property of SBS. They are moderated, so we reserve the right to edit comments and remove HTML tags. Not all submitted comments will be published. Publication does not mean we endorse the opinions expressed. Please read our terms and conditions for more information.