Baradar released, Nato facilitating Peace talks in Kabul

[Fighter488]

AN ATOL EXCLUSIVE

Pakistan frees Taliban commander ​

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan has freed the supreme commander of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, so that he can play a pivotal role in backchannel talks through the Pakistani army with Washington, Asia Times Online has learned.

The release of Baradar, who was arrested in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi in February, was confirmed by a senior Pakistani counter-terrorism official. He added that the United States was fully aware of the development although he gave no indication of the Americans' reaction.

A senior Taliban leader, speaking to Asia Times Online on Thursday from the southern AfPak region, also confirmed that Baradar "had reached the safely of his people". The implication is that he is back with Taliban leader Mullah Omar. Baradar has represented Mullah Omar in previous peace talks with Washington, mediated by Saudi Arabia.

When news broke of Baradar's arrest in a raid by Pakistani and US intelligence officials, it was widely touted as a major victory in the war in Afghanistan, given his top position.

Talking to Asia Times Online at the time, a senior US official confided that Baradar had been picked up in a stroke of luck as intelligence operatives were not aware that he was in the vicinity when they went after other suspects. (See Pakistan, US undeterred by Afghan setback Asia Times Online, April 23, 2010.)

"The Pakistan army's mental block about the Afghan Taliban is still there. They still believe them as their connection in Afghanistan. Mullah Baradar's arrest was not deliberate, it was a mistake," the US official told Asia Times Online.

Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was aware of the presence of Baradar and other Taliban figures in Karachi but never intercepted them because they were not considered a threat to the internal security of the country. The military did not want to mess with them as it was convinced that once foreign forces finally withdrew from Afghanistan, these Taliban would in one way or another be a part of the political set-up.

"At the time of Baradar's arrest, all the [Pakistani] bosses [chief of army staff and director general of the ISI] were in Brussels. We got a hint that somebody very important was lurking in Karachi. We informed them [Pakistanis] and jointly we went there. At the time of the arrest, neither we nor the Pakistanis were aware that they had rounded up Baradar," the official told Asia Times Online after the arrest.

Following Baradar's seizure, the US tried its level-best to get its hands on him through the Afghan government, which pressed Pakistan to deport its citizen so that he could be tried in an Afghan court.

But squadron leader Khalid Khawaja, a former ISI official killed this year by militants in Pakistan, successfully petitioned for a stay in the Lahore High Court against Baradar's extradition. Baradar was confined in a very comfortable safe house in the capital, Islamabad.

Several days after his arrest, the Americans were given access to him, and according to a US official he shared some valuable information. However, because of the delay in access, the situation had already changed on the ground.

Baradar's release coincides with an announcement by the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, that Pakistan had promised to launch military operations in the North Waziristan tribal area to dislodge al-Qaeda and the powerful Haqqani network, which is active in Afghanistan. Pakistan has for months dragged its feet on going into this volatile area.

Mullen reiterated that war and reconciliation with the Taliban would continue side-by-side. Before this statement, Pakistan's army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani toured North Waziristan and met members of the military stationed there.

As a compromise, Pakistan might carry out limited surgical strikes in the town of Mir Ali and in the Datta Khel area, home to al-Qaeda, and spare the Miranshah and Dand-e-Darpa Khel areas that form the base of the Haqqani network and his ally, Hafiz Gul Bahadur.

Pakistan adopted this approach in South Waziristan when it spared Moulvi Nazeer, who runs the biggest Taliban network in the Paktika region across the border. The military did target Makeen and Ladha, home to the Mehsud tribe that was hostile to Pakistan and which had little role in the Taliban's struggle in Afghanistan.

It appears, therefore, that a military operation is inevitable, even at this critical juncture of embryonic backchannel talks with the Taliban. These currently involve confidence-building measures on the part of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates that are aimed at eventually bringing the Taliban and the US to the negotiating table.

Baradar's chance arrest, his comfortable confinement, the refusal to hand him over to Afghanistan, and now his secretive release once again show that the real cards are in the hands of the Pakistan military and that it has the ability to play an ace whenever it chooses.

Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)

Asia Times Online :: South Asia news, business and economy from India and Pakistan

 

[Abu Zolfiqar]

some suggest he may be a new darling for the soon-to-depart ISAF.......

the Baradar episode is quite humourous and intriguing at the same time.

 

[BATMAN]

Aide: Karzai Angry at Taliban Boss' Arrest

AP) The Afghan government was holding secret talks with the Taliban's No. 2 when he was captured in Pakistan, and the arrest infuriated President Hamid Karzai, according to one of Karzai's advisers.

The detention of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar - second in the Taliban only to one-eyed Mullah Mohammed Omar - has raised new questions about whether the U.S. is willing to back peace discussions with leaders who harbored the terrorists behind the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

Karzai "was very angry" when he heard that the Pakistanis had picked up Baradar with an assist from U.S. intelligence, the adviser said. Besides the ongoing talks, he said Baradar had "given a green light" to participating in a three-day peace jirga that Karzai is hosting next month.

The adviser, who had knowledge of the peace talks, spoke on condition of anonymity because of their sensitivity. Other Afghan officials, including Abdul Ali Shamsi, security adviser to the governor of Helmand province, also confirmed talks between Baradar and the Afghan government. Several media reports have suggested that Baradar had been in touch with Karzai representatives, but these are the first details to emerge from the discussions.

Talking with the Taliban is gaining traction in Afghanistan as thousands of U.S. and NATO reinforcements are streaming in to reverse the Taliban's momentum. That has prompted Pakistan and others to stake out their positions on possible reconciliation negotiations that could mean an endgame to the eight-year war.

Officials have disclosed little about how Baradar was nabbed last month in the port city of Karachi. The Pakistanis were said to be upset that the Americans were the source of news reports about his arrest.

The capture was part of a U.S.-backed crackdown in which the Pakistanis also arrested several other Afghan Taliban figures along the porous border between the two countries, after years of being accused by Washington of doing little to stop them ar from expressing gratitude, members of Karzai's administration were quick to accuse Pakistan of picking up Baradar either to sabotage or gain control of talks with the Taliban leaders.

Whatever the reason, the delicate dance among Karzai, his neighbors and international partners put the debate over reconciliation on fast forward.

Top United Nations and British officials emphasized last week that the time to talk to the Taliban is now. The Afghan government, for its part, has plans to offer economic incentives to coax low- and mid-level fighters off the battlefield. Another driving force is President Barack Obama's goal of starting to withdraw U.S. troops in July 2011.

The United States, with nearly 950 lives lost and billions of dollars spent in the war, is moving with caution on reconciliation.

At a breakfast meeting in Islamabad last week, Karzai said he and his Western allies were at odds over who should be at the negotiating table. Karzai said the United States was expressing reservations about talks with the top echelon of the Taliban while the British were "pushing for an acceleration" in the negotiation process.

"Our allies are not always talking the same language," he said.

Karzai said overtures to the Taliban stood little chance of success without the support of the United States and its international partners. He says his previous attempts to negotiate with insurgents were not fruitful because "sections of the international community undermined - not backed - our efforts."

The U.S. has said generally that it supports efforts to welcome back any militants who renounce violence, cut ties with al Qaeda and recognize and respect the Afghan constitution, but it is keeping details of its position closely held.

Daniel Markey with the Council on Foreign Relations said that while Karzai is having discussions with senior people on the Taliban side, "it's not clear that Washington or other members of the international community have weighed in as to what they believe are the red lines or proper boundaries with respect to negotiations with the Taliban."

During his trip to Afghanistan last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said it was premature to expect senior members of the Taliban to reconcile with the government. He said until the insurgents believe they can't win the war, they won't come to the table. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said she's highly skeptical that Taliban leaders will be willing to renounce violence.

A U.S. military official in Kabul, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss reconciliation, said the top commander in Afghanistan, U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has not yet solidified his opinion on this issue.

He said the U.S. is still debating the timing of the Afghan government's outreach to senior leaders of three main Afghan insurgent groups - Omar; Jalaluddin Haqqani, who runs an al Qaeda-linked organization; and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the boss of the powerful Hezb-e-Islami.
The official added that the international military coalition had no problem with the Afghan government's reaching out to anyone, at any time, but is concerned that a deal to end the violence not come at too high a price.

Deep differences remain within the Obama administration on reconciliation, said Lisa Curtis, a research fellow on South Asia for the Heritage Institute, a right-leaning think tank in Washington. "This disagreement is contributing to a lack of clarity in U.S. official statements on the issue and leading to confusion among our allies," she said.

"The military surge should be given time to bear fruit," Curtis argued. "Insurgents are more likely to negotiate if they fear defeat on the battlefield."

Karzai won't discuss his administration's talks with Taliban members or their representatives, but several Afghan officials confirmed that his government was in discussions with Baradar, who hails from Karzai's Popalzai tribe of the Durrani Pashtuns in Kandahar.

"The government has been negotiating with Mullah Baradar, who took an offer to the Taliban shura," Shamsi said, using the word for the group's governing board.

Shamsi said he'd seen intelligence reports indicating that Omar resisted the offer and that Baradar's rivals within the Taliban leadership were fiercely opposed to any negotiations with the Afghan government.

An intelligence official in southern Afghanistan, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk with journalists, said there were reports that Omar was angry about Baradar's negotiations with the government and asked Pakistani intelligence officials to arrest him.

Nevertheless, Hakim Mujahed, a former Taliban ambassador to the United Nations, said many Taliban leaders are willing to talk.

"The problem is not from the Taliban side," he said. "There is no interest of negotiations from the side of the foreign forces."

Hamid Gul, a former director of the Pakistani intelligence service who has criticized the U.S. role in Afghanistan, said the insurgents want three things from the U.S. before talks could begin

a clearer timetable on the withdrawal of troops, to stop labeling them terrorists, and the release of all Taliban militants imprisoned in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

What actually precipitated Baradar's arrest remains a mystery.

Some analysts claim Pakistan wanted to interrupt Karzai's reconciliation efforts or force Karzai to give Islamabad a seat at a future negotiating table.

"I see no evidence to support that theory," Richard Holbrooke, U.S. envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, told reporters this month. "I know somewhat more than I'm at liberty to disclose about the circumstances under which these events took place and every detail tends to work against that thesis."

Another theory is that Baradar, deemed more pragmatic than other top Taliban leaders, was detained to split him from fellow insurgents. McChrystal said recently that it was plausible that Baradar's arrest followed an internal feud and purge among Taliban leaders.
There's also speculation that Baradar's arrest was just lucky - even unintentional.

If Karzai was still angry about Baradar's arrest, he didn't show it publicly last week on a two-day visit to Islamabad. His message was twofold - that Pakistan had a significant role to play in reconciliation and that its cooperation would be welcomed. He called Pakistan a "twin" and said Afghans know that without cooperation, neither would find peace.

 

[Omar1984]

US Allowed Taliban From Pakistan to Attend Kabul Peace Talks in Recent Weeks


Secretary of Defense Confirms U.S. Facilitated Talks in Effort to End to 9-Year War


U.S. forces in Afghanistan have allowed a Taliban member to travel to Kabul from Pakistan to attend peace talks with the Afghan government within the past two weeks, a senior U.S. official told ABC News.

The Taliban representative is believed to have driven into Afghanistan from the Pakistani city of Quetta, where the Taliban and its leader, Mullah Omar, have been based since their ouster by U.S. forces in 2001, the official said.

The official spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to provide greater detail about the U.S.-facilitated talks than had previously been disclosed.

"We are dealing with one main person," the official said.

The official declined to reveal the Taliban representative's identity, but said he "speaks for people in a big Taliban network."

On Thursday, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates confirmed for the first time that the United States had facilitated peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban in an effort to bring an end to the nine-year war in Afghanistan. He added, however, that the U.S. was not yet prepared to take part in the talks itself.

"Whenever opportunities arise that are worth exploring, we ought to take advantage of that," Gates said.

Today, the official said the U.S. military does not provide transportation, but rather guarantees the Taliban representative will not be targeted on his way into Kabul.

The official said this particular Taliban representative has not been in meetings in Kabul before, but there have been meetings in the past that "broke down over stupid stuff."

The official seemed slightly more optimistic about the new meeting but "suspects they will squabble over all kinds of things" before the parties even really talk.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has sought for months to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table.

Afghans in Charge of Reconciliation
The United States has insisted this is an Afghan-led reconciliation process, though it has set some standards for what Taliban members must do in order to be accepted back, including renouncing ties to al Qaeda.

The State Department said today that some of the Taliban's top leadership may not qualify.

"There are particular red lines, if you want to call it that, that we have agreed with the international community and Afghanistan. There is no indication that we have that Mullah Omar has any intention of meeting the standards that we've laid out," spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters.


US Allowed Taliban From Pakistan to Attend Kabul Peace Talks in Recent Weeks - ABC News

 

[mjnaushad]

And who here believes it happend without American and Afghan consent. ???

 

[Awesome]

What's to keep him from doing a complete 180 now? Or that he won't be killed by his own people since he helped arrest quite a few of them.

 

[Awesome]

Lots of Taliban facilitation going on...

The Associated Press: Petraeus: NATO has facilitated Taliban movement

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Commanding Gen. David Petraeus confirmed Friday that coalition forces have allowed Taliban representatives to travel to Kabul for peace discussions with the Afghan government, but a Taliban spokesman said all such talk is only propaganda, designed to lower the morale of the movement's fighters.

U.S., Afghan and Taliban sources all declined to give details of the contacts, if they are taking place at all.

"There have been several very senior Taliban leaders who have reached out to the Afghan government at the highest levels, and also in some cases have reached out to other countries involved in Afghanistan," Petraeus told reporters at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

"These discussions can only be characterized as preliminary in nature," Petraeus said. "They certainly would not rise to the level of being called negotiations."
In Afghanistan, Taliban leaders have told followers that there are no official peace talks with the U.S.-backed Afghan government, an apparent move to persuade their rank-and-file to stay in the fight.

U.S. officials speaking anonymously say there have been preliminary discussions that date back a couple of months and involve mid- to senior-level Taliban but not top-level decision-makers.

Petraeus indicated that Taliban representatives had been given safe passage by coalition forces. It was not known if that included providing transport or other NATO facilities to support the talks.

One Taliban representative involved could be Mullah Abdul Kabir, the former Taliban governor of Nangarhar province in eastern Afghanistan. According to two Afghan sources with knowledge of the contacts, Kabir has reached out to Karzai through an intermediary. Both sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they said they did not want to compromise their relations with the Taliban or international community.

The Taliban deny that any official representatives are engaged in such discussions and vow to fight until the Americans leave.

"Believe me, no official envoy came," said Abdul Salam Zaeef, the Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan. Zaeef was imprisoned at Guantanamo but has resumed his contacts with the movement since his release in 2005.
The Taliban accused the U.S.-led NATO coalition of trying to weaken the spirit of insurgents, especially in the south where they are engaged in fierce fights against tens of thousands of NATO troops pushing deeper into areas long held by militants.

"We are fighting against Americans and we will continue it until the time the Americans leave this country," said Qari Yousef, the Taliban spokesman in southern Afghanistan. "The so-called Taliban who are talking to the government are not related to us. This is propaganda to lower the morale of the Taliban, but it will not work."

Amanullah Mujahid, a 31-year-old Taliban fighter who was reached by the AP in the Afghan province of Zabul, said that when he heard that the U.S. said Taliban leaders had been talking to the Karzai government, he and his fellow fighters were disheartened. "We didn't expect it and it hurt our morale," said Mujahid.
He said their spirits were lifted when the Taliban leadership sent a message to his commanders denying involvement in any talks.

"Now we know that NATO is just using such propaganda to divide us," he said.
A Taliban fighter in Ghazni province said that after news of the talks broke, the Taliban leadership council, the Quetta Shura, sent out a radio message saying "It is wrong. Nobody from the Taliban side is going to talks." The insurgent fighter spoke on condition of anonymity out of fears of retaliation.

But this is not the first time that Taliban militants may have been in touch with the Afghan government.

Meanwhile, Pakistani sources denied a report Friday in the Asia Times that Pakistan had released Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Afghan Taliban's No. 2 leader. Baradar was arrested in February in a joint raid with the CIA — a move some analysts believe was driven by Pakistan's desire to guarantee itself a seat at the negotiating table.
Afghan officials say Baradar had been in contact with Karzai. The Afghans believed the Pakistanis agreed to the arrest to sever those contacts until they received assurances they would get what they wanted out of a peace deal.
Senior U.S. officials have long said they didn't expect the Taliban to talk peace as long as the militants believed they were winning, and at least some administration officials had been cool to peace feelers put forth by Karzai.

That changed publicly on Thursday, when U.S. Secretary Robert Gates and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton backed exploratory talks between the Afghan government and the militants.

Richard Holbrooke, U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, on Friday attributed an increase in contacts with individuals linked to the Taliban to the "tremendously increased military pressure" NATO and its Afghan allies were placing on the insurgents.

The new acceptance of reconciliation could be seen as an admission that the war is going badly. Or it may reflect the view of U.S. military commanders that NATO troops have damaged the insurgency following the surge of more than 30,000 U.S. forces ordered by President Barack Obama.

Lt. Col. John Dorrian, a coalition spokesman, denied that NATO's decision to speak openly about the talks was part of a communications strategy to break the will of the insurgent fighters. "They are trying to mitigate the fact that some of their leaders are indeed talking with the Afghans," he said.

Nader Nadery, an Afghan analyst who has traveled extensively in Taliban-controlled territory, said indications that high-level insurgents are engaged in negotiations could prompt junior commanders to join the peace process to reap the benefits of any concessions offered to the leadership.

"Certainly the talks would have a huge effect on the battlefield — not right away, but if the leadership decides to come and join, channeling of resources will stop," Nadery said. The effect would be gradual as word of peace talks involving senior Taliban seeps down to the village level where the bullets are flying, Nadery said.

Stephen Biddle, a defense analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations, said even if Petraeus thought that raising the prospect of peace negotiations could help him on the battlefield, it was not likely his sole reason for doing so.

"I think the primary reason he's doing it is that he recognizes that insurgencies almost always end in negotiated settlements," Biddle said. "And that's almost certainly the way this thing will come to an end."

Matt Waldman, a fellow at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government who does research on negotiations with the Taliban, said he did not think that insurgents would automatically oppose high-level talks with the government.

"The commanders that I've spoken to did not object to it in principle," he said. "Rather there was a skepticism — a real mistrust about Western intentions — and that view was that the West is not serious about genuine negotiations.
"From their perspective what they have seen is a military surge, increasing military pressure, attacks and raids and there is no doubt that they have been feeling that pressure."

 

[Abu Zolfiqar]

well it certainly negates the views of ''some'' who claim there is no "good vs. bad" taleban or who claim they are one single non-factionalized entity, that's for sure!

the double-standards are so clearly written on the wall; soon it will be "my taleban" vs. "your taleban" and which one is better.


in the end, we all pray for stability and sanity; and at the same time, and it obviously goes without saying, we cannot allow Afghanistan to be used for waging covert or overt ''ops'' or vicious conspiracies against Pakistan Nation --be it by hindustan or others.

The civilian govt. may be unable or unwilling to disallow it, but others ARE willing and that should be well established by now

 

[Awesome]

Taliban Provided U.S. Escort for Peace Talks | Indie Pro Publishing

A U.S. and NATO forces commander is providing a senior leader of the Taliban with safe passage to Kabul to participate in peace talks the Royal United Services Institute in London, England was told Friday.

General David Petraeus made the announcement shortly after it was revealed that the Taliban would be involved in peace talks with Afghanistan regarding the nine-year-war, and would be closely monitored by the U.S.

The two sides have been reaching out to discuss potential peace agreements, but have only been able to do so through long-distance messages provided by mediators. N.A.T.O. has been assisting in these reconciliation talks, but a decided a more formal meeting is a mandatory component of a successful pact.
Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Friday, “thanks to tremendously increased military pressure on the insurgents, there have been an increasing number of people associated with the Taliban who’ve reached out and said: ‘We want to talk about an alternative to the war.’
However, conflicting remarks from the Taliban, who insist there will be no talks unless all foreign troops leave first, indicate there has been no contact with Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government.

“This does not constitute a formal negotiation, but it falls in the category of reintegration,” he told the media. He added that he had no further comments as idle speculation furthers nobody’s best interests.

The Taliban has been feeling the pressure recently as international troops and Afghan security forces have been putting pressure on the movement’s heartland. Record casualties have been reported on NATO troops as a result.

 

[Awesome]

Taliban Provided U.S. Escort for Peace Talks | Indie Pro Publishing

A U.S. and NATO forces commander is providing a senior leader of the Taliban with safe passage to Kabul to participate in peace talks the Royal United Services Institute in London, England was told Friday.

General David Petraeus made the announcement shortly after it was revealed that the Taliban would be involved in peace talks with Afghanistan regarding the nine-year-war, and would be closely monitored by the U.S.

The two sides have been reaching out to discuss potential peace agreements, but have only been able to do so through long-distance messages provided by mediators. N.A.T.O. has been assisting in these reconciliation talks, but a decided a more formal meeting is a mandatory component of a successful pact.
Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Friday, “thanks to tremendously increased military pressure on the insurgents, there have been an increasing number of people associated with the Taliban who’ve reached out and said: ‘We want to talk about an alternative to the war.’
However, conflicting remarks from the Taliban, who insist there will be no talks unless all foreign troops leave first, indicate there has been no contact with Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government.

“This does not constitute a formal negotiation, but it falls in the category of reintegration,” he told the media. He added that he had no further comments as idle speculation furthers nobody’s best interests.

The Taliban has been feeling the pressure recently as international troops and Afghan security forces have been putting pressure on the movement’s heartland. Record casualties have been reported on NATO troops as a result.

 

[Awesome]

Head of Afghan peace council says Taliban is ready to talk

KABUL - The head of Afghanistan's new peace council said Thursday that he believes that some members of the Taliban are ready to negotiate, while still describing contacts as in their early stages.

"We are taking our first steps," Burhanuddin Rabbani, a former Afghan president, said in a news conference in Kabul.

"I believe there are people among the Taliban that have a message that they want to talk," he said. "They are ready."

Rabbani's comments echoed those of other Afghan and U.S. officials in Kabul who have said that members of the Taliban, including senior leaders or those purporting to represent them, have met with the Afghan government to discuss potential negotiations, despite the insurgent group's public denials of such meetings.

Some officials in Kabul have described the contacts, which stretch back years but appear to have intensified recently, as remaining scattered and sporadic. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told journalists in Brussels on Thursday that it was too early to tell whether the Afghan reconciliation process would work.

"We're not yet ready to make any judgments about whether or not any of this will bear fruit on the reconciliation front," said Clinton, who was attending a NATO meeting of foreign and defense ministers.

The substance of contacts with the Taliban so far remains largely shrouded in secrecy, even to members of the new peace council, which is eventually supposed to make policy on how to move forward. Recently, U.S. officials have appeared more enthusiastic about high-level talks with insurgents, to the point of facilitating the movement of Taliban leaders to Kabul for discussions, a senior NATO official said this week.

Skepticism persists among Afghan officials that Pakistan, which many view as exerting significant control over the Taliban leadership, will help further peace negotiations.

"I think any high-level [insurgents] will not be able to come here unless they have the full agreement of their supporters," Afghan Defense Minister Rahim Wardak said in an interview this week.

In Brussels, Clinton appealed to NATO countries to send more personnel to train Afghan forces.

"If we want to be credible when we announce at the Lisbon summit [in November] that a transition process in Afghanistan will begin next year, we need to show that we have eliminated the shortfall in the NATO training mission resources, so that Afghan national security forces can take the lead in providing for Afghanistan's own security," she said.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told journalists that he is "optimistic" about getting enough trainers. "I have received quite a number of positive and encouraging announcements" from countries offering additional personnel, he said, without providing specifics.

 

[Awesome]

Afghans, Taliban look toward talks

KABUL - Recent meetings between Taliban representatives and the Afghan government have focused on establishing a site for more formal negotiations on the war, as well as guarantees of safe passage for participants, according to the head of Afghanistan's new peace council.

In an interview Friday evening, Burhanuddin Rabbani, the former Afghan president chosen to chair the committee to foster peace talks, said a government official had told him the Taliban representatives offered to provide security if the talks were to be on their turf - presumably Pakistan - and asked for security if meetings were in Kabul or a third country.

"I think this is one of the best opportunities we have had for talks," Rabbani said.

Although there has been some contact between Afghan officials and the Taliban for years, persistent reports of recent behind-the-scenes meetings suggest that the prospect for more-serious negotiations is growing.

The details of the Afghan government's communications with the Taliban remain largely secret. But senior NATO officials have said this week that the U.S.-led alliance has helped Taliban leaders travel to Kabul to meet with the Afghan government. On Friday, NATO's top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, confirmed that assistance, according to wire service reports.

"In certain respects we do facilitate that," he said, speaking in London. He added, "It would not be the easiest of tasks for a senior Taliban commander to enter Afghanistan and make his way to Kabul if [the coalition] were not willing and aware of it and therefore allowing it to take place."

Rabbani, who would not identify which insurgents are taking part in the meetings, described the discussions as being in their earliest stages, as have other U.S. and Afghan officials. But he said some insurgents appear willing to try to find a political settlement to the war and that greater international support for negotiations has hastened the process.

"The international community now are showing more willingness, and they're more interested, and the countries in the region are more interested. These kinds of things will help the process," he said. "What I think is most important is building trust among each other."

Rabbani, who was ousted as president in the 1996 Taliban takeover, said President Hamid Karzai has told him he is committed to pushing for peace talks.

"He said: 'I'm ready for negotiations. I'm ready to find a political solution to the problem, not a military one,' " Rabbani said. In the past, Afghan officials "were not interested in the political solution."

The peace council, made up of about 70 prominent Afghans, was formed this month to draft policy on how to proceed with negotiations. The group has met just a few times and is still hashing out its management structure. If Taliban leaders gave a signal that they were serious about talks, a small team from the peace council would be delegated to meet with them, Rabbani said, adding that the insurgent representatives involved should be protected.

"They should feel that when they are negotiating, it doesn't mean that they are going to be destroyed. And the government should also not assume the negotiations won't achieve anything," he said.

Rabbani said Karzai's government has already met with members of the Pakistan-based Haqqani network, an insurgent faction that Afghan officials say is heavily influenced by Pakistani intelligence agencies and the least likely to reconcile with the Afghan government.

Publicly, the Taliban has rejected the prospect of negotiations and described the reports of secret meetings as propaganda. Its long-standing condition for peace talks is that all foreign troops leave Afghanistan.

---------- Post added at 12:06 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:06 PM ----------

washingtonpost.com

KABUL - Recent meetings between Taliban representatives and the Afghan government have focused on establishing a site for more formal negotiations on the war, as well as guarantees of safe passage for participants, according to the head of Afghanistan's new peace council.

In an interview Friday evening, Burhanuddin Rabbani, the former Afghan president chosen to chair the committee to foster peace talks, said a government official had told him the Taliban representatives offered to provide security if the talks were to be on their turf - presumably Pakistan - and asked for security if meetings were in Kabul or a third country.

"I think this is one of the best opportunities we have had for talks," Rabbani said.

Although there has been some contact between Afghan officials and the Taliban for years, persistent reports of recent behind-the-scenes meetings suggest that the prospect for more-serious negotiations is growing.

The details of the Afghan government's communications with the Taliban remain largely secret. But senior NATO officials have said this week that the U.S.-led alliance has helped Taliban leaders travel to Kabul to meet with the Afghan government. On Friday, NATO's top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, confirmed that assistance, according to wire service reports.

"In certain respects we do facilitate that," he said, speaking in London. He added, "It would not be the easiest of tasks for a senior Taliban commander to enter Afghanistan and make his way to Kabul if [the coalition] were not willing and aware of it and therefore allowing it to take place."

Rabbani, who would not identify which insurgents are taking part in the meetings, described the discussions as being in their earliest stages, as have other U.S. and Afghan officials. But he said some insurgents appear willing to try to find a political settlement to the war and that greater international support for negotiations has hastened the process.

"The international community now are showing more willingness, and they're more interested, and the countries in the region are more interested. These kinds of things will help the process," he said. "What I think is most important is building trust among each other."

Rabbani, who was ousted as president in the 1996 Taliban takeover, said President Hamid Karzai has told him he is committed to pushing for peace talks.

"He said: 'I'm ready for negotiations. I'm ready to find a political solution to the problem, not a military one,' " Rabbani said. In the past, Afghan officials "were not interested in the political solution."

The peace council, made up of about 70 prominent Afghans, was formed this month to draft policy on how to proceed with negotiations. The group has met just a few times and is still hashing out its management structure. If Taliban leaders gave a signal that they were serious about talks, a small team from the peace council would be delegated to meet with them, Rabbani said, adding that the insurgent representatives involved should be protected.

"They should feel that when they are negotiating, it doesn't mean that they are going to be destroyed. And the government should also not assume the negotiations won't achieve anything," he said.

Rabbani said Karzai's government has already met with members of the Pakistan-based Haqqani network, an insurgent faction that Afghan officials say is heavily influenced by Pakistani intelligence agencies and the least likely to reconcile with the Afghan government.

Publicly, the Taliban has rejected the prospect of negotiations and described the reports of secret meetings as propaganda. Its long-standing condition for peace talks is that all foreign troops leave Afghanistan.

 

[ajtr]

Pakistan frees Taliban commander ​

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan has freed the supreme commander of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, so that he can play a pivotal role in backchannel talks through the Pakistani army with Washington, Asia Times Online has learned.

The release of Baradar, who was arrested in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi in February, was confirmed by a senior Pakistani counter-terrorism official. He added that the United States was fully aware of the development although he gave no indication of the Americans' reaction.

A senior Taliban leader, speaking to Asia Times Online on Thursday from the southern AfPak region, also confirmed that Baradar "had reached the safely of his people". The implication is that he is back with Taliban leader Mullah Omar. Baradar has represented Mullah Omar in previous peace talks with Washington, mediated by Saudi Arabia.

When news broke of Baradar's arrest in a raid by Pakistani and US intelligence officials, it was widely touted as a major victory in the war in Afghanistan, given his top position.

Talking to Asia Times Online at the time, a senior US official confided that Baradar had been picked up in a stroke of luck as intelligence operatives were not aware that he was in the vicinity when they went after other suspects. (See Pakistan, US undeterred by Afghan setback Asia Times Online, April 23, 2010.)
"The Pakistan army's mental block about the Afghan Taliban is still there. They still believe them as their connection in Afghanistan. Mullah Baradar's arrest was not deliberate, it was a mistake," the US official told Asia Times Online.

Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was aware of the presence of Baradar and other Taliban figures in Karachi but never intercepted them because they were not considered a threat to the internal security of the country. The military did not want to mess with them as it was convinced that once foreign forces finally withdrew from Afghanistan, these Taliban would in one way or another be a part of the political set-up.

"At the time of Baradar's arrest, all the [Pakistani] bosses [chief of army staff and director general of the ISI] were in Brussels. We got a hint that somebody very important was lurking in Karachi. We informed them [Pakistanis] and jointly we went there. At the time of the arrest, neither we nor the Pakistanis were aware that they had rounded up Baradar," the official told Asia Times Online after the arrest.

Following Baradar's seizure, the US tried its level-best to get its hands on him through the Afghan government, which pressed Pakistan to deport its citizen so that he could be tried in an Afghan court.

But squadron leader Khalid Khawaja, a former ISI official killed this year by militants in Pakistan, successfully petitioned for a stay in the Lahore High Court against Baradar's extradition. Baradar was confined in a very comfortable safe house in the capital, Islamabad.

Several days after his arrest, the Americans were given access to him, and according to a US official he shared some valuable information. However, because of the delay in access, the situation had already changed on the ground.

Baradar's release coincides with an announcement by the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, that Pakistan had promised to launch military operations in the North Waziristan tribal area to dislodge al-Qaeda and the powerful Haqqani network, which is active in Afghanistan. Pakistan has for months dragged its feet on going into this volatile area.

Mullen reiterated that war and reconciliation with the Taliban would continue side-by-side. Before this statement, Pakistan's army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani toured North Waziristan and met members of the military stationed there.

As a compromise, Pakistan might carry out limited surgical strikes in the town of Mir Ali and in the Datta Khel area, home to al-Qaeda, and spare the Miranshah and Dand-e-Darpa Khel areas that form the base of the Haqqani network and his ally, Hafiz Gul Bahadur.

Pakistan adopted this approach in South Waziristan when it spared Moulvi Nazeer, who runs the biggest Taliban network in the Paktika region across the border. The military did target Makeen and Ladha, home to the Mehsud tribe that was hostile to Pakistan and which had little role in the Taliban's struggle in Afghanistan.

It appears, therefore, that a military operation is inevitable, even at this critical juncture of embryonic backchannel talks with the Taliban. These currently involve confidence-building measures on the part of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates that are aimed at eventually bringing the Taliban and the US to the negotiating table.

Baradar's chance arrest, his comfortable confinement, the refusal to hand him over to Afghanistan, and now his secretive release once again show that the real cards are in the hands of the Pakistan military and that it has the ability to play an ace whenever it chooses.

 

[Aatishbaz]

Its amazing how the events are twisted and turned to suit ones advantage. If I am not mistaken its the same Mullah Beradar whose arrest was once quoted as Pakistan's attempt to torpedo the talks between Karazai and Taliban. And this was expressed by so many NATO and the US officials apart from Afghan functionaries. Now the same Mullah is being projected as one of Pakistan's strategic assets. And doubts are being cast that Pakistanis never wanted to arrest him. Its a catch 22 situation for Pakistan. You always have to do MORE coz you are always on the weaker wicket!!!!

 

[HAIDER]

Catch and release of Mullah show ISI full control on Afghan politics and decision taking power. But when someone make fire then next door get the smoke too...