Since the outcome of this arrangement would be conditional to the role and conduct of Afghanistan’s contiguous neighbours, namely: Pakistan, Iran and China, they will have to agree to a policy of non-intervention. United Kingdom, Germany, Israel and India will also have to cease their covert operations and leave Afghanistan alone.
For the US it will be prudent to gradually withdraw from this imbroglio leaving it to the UN Security Council to negotiate and implement such an arrangement. Under a mandate of the UN SC an ‘Afghanistan Group of 7′, comprising five permanent members plus Pakistan and Iran should be created and tasked to oversee the gradual withdrawal of foreign troops to be replaced by a UN peacekeeping force. It should also supervise political reintegration and reform and the reconstruction effort.
The Group should also lay down and implement the principles of Afghanistan’s neutrality and international obligations to eliminate terrorism and deal and diffuse any situations that may arise from time to time. The Belgian neutrality model created in the 19th century could perhaps be followed.
While this option is worked out, some important regional issues will need attention.
Pakistan being central to any solution of the Afghanistan issue, its geopolitical sensitivities cannot be ignored. Increasing Indian engagement in Afghanistan that Pakistan deems hostile to its security will force Pakistan to rely on Taliban support to neutralise Indian threat. This necessitates international pressure to be brought upon India to accept the peace accord that Pakistan is agreeable to and that would resolve contentious issues like Kashmir, moving them both towards peaceful coexistence.
Iran must also be brought into the mix. Although Iran has been helpful in Afghanistan in the past, current tensions between the US and Iran will likely cause it to refrain from throwing its weight behind a multilateral arrangement. Engagement of Iran will have to be given serious attention and Israel will have to be kept on a tight leash.
Similarly, Russian apprehensions about American intentions to marginalise it by gaining control over energy resources of Central Asia using Afghanistan as a conduit will have to be allayed too.
Russia, India and Iran will also have to be brought on board to accept US-Pakistan-Saudi Arabia supported Taliban dominated government, owing to their past association with the Northern Alliance.
And above all, American support to the biggest perpetrator of state terrorism – Israel, which in turn has fuelled terrorism around the world, will have to be rationalised.
If indeed Al Qaeda did cause 9/11 to happen, it is time for Obama to acknowledge its causes and address them.
This article was first published in the Pakistan daily Dawn on April 25, 2009.
Mr. Shachid Siddiqi, your analysis is full of lies. Bomb-bomb-and bomb again, until all these shachids will be cry for American mercy.
Pakistan coniders India’s involvement in Afghanistan as a cause of insecurity. But, it is only a subset of a larger argument that its neighbourhood with India itself is a cause of its insecurity, for the following reasons:
1. Democracy,
2. Secular polity
3. Liberal society
4. Economic strength
5. Local governance
6. Law redressal
7. More participation of women in society
8. alienation of feudal forces
9. social and equity based devlopement programmes
All these are the areas where actually India wants to help Afghanistan and India helps itself. This is the sole cause of unease.
They fail to given reason why they have not looked into their social construction from these perspective. And, it is only a sorry state when one sees a girl being flogged in Swat that the kind of neighbourhood we have to live with. I believe that Pakistani intelligensia does have much time and space to recover from this downspiral. And, unless they confront these forces right at their bases then it would not be Afghanistan that Talibans would be ruling, but it would be Paksitan.
I would like to thank Shahid R. Siddiqi for such an accurate analyses of the situation in Afghanistan and its effects on Pakistan. As for Udo and Ambrish Dhaka posts only God knows which dream world they are still living in. I would advise them to read ‘Engaging the Muslim World’ by Juan Cole who is the professor of history at the University of Michigan.
Let me tell you the truth about India:
1. Democracy? when the minorities have no voice, probably they mean Idian style democracy.
2. Secular polity? This is the country where Hidutva Party is on the rise promoting radical Hindu militancy to its constituency.
3. Liberal society? In the name of liberal society India is one of the countries with highest HIV cases in the world.
4. Economic strength? All you have to see is the Slum Dog Millionaire movie to see the slums of India for sure. 80% of the population is illiterate and 85 % of the people are living under powerty level.
5. Local governance? The local governance of Gujrat committed murders of thousands of innocent Muslims in that state because of which the Minister Narendra Modi’s visa for US was canceled. A murderer is a politician.
6. Law redressal? Unless you pay bribe to the law enforcement your case cannot be registered.
7. More participation of women in society? Just recently NY Times reported the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent young girls because parents felt they were burden on them. Rape of innocent girls is common. Today only LINK TV showed the traficking of young Hindu girls being married then sold by their husbands to brothels. Pakistan has 33% seats reserved for women in the parliment. How many seats are reserved for women in India?
8. alienation of feudal forces? “Today too the exploitation and plunder of India by the alliance of imperialism – comprador bureaucrat capitalism and feudalism is continuing. The people of India are writhing under the loot of imperialist exploitation and feudal loot. The natural resources and labour of India are being exploited for the benefit of multinational companies of imperialist countries and comprador big corporates. The major part of the people of the country are victims of extreme poverty, impoverishment and backwardness” this is from ‘War of Independence of 1857 and Democratic Revolution in India’ by cpimlnd Tuesday, 24 April 2007.
9. social and equity based devlopement programmes? What development programs when 85% of the country are illiterate are living under powerty level.
All this bubble of misinformation and lies to the world to show that India is heading to be the new super power of the world is nothing else but hoaks.
The fact of the matter is Inda and Indians never want to see Pakistan prosper from its inception. They bomb their own country and blame Pakistan for it. No other country in the world has as many militant factions of its own as India has.
India constantly interfears in Pakistans affairs. India is an occupier of Kashmir and is guilty of mass murder of innocent Kashmiris for the past 62 years. India is the country with second larges UN resolutions against it in the whole world and it never complies. Human rights record of India is one of the lowest in the world as well.
Mr. Ambrish Dhaka has a gall to paint India in such rosy colors when the facts are just the oposit. I know it because I am from India too. Lets face the facts Ambrish Dhaka.
Sami is a paranoid freak. Congress Party leader Sonia Gandhi is a Catholic, and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is a Sikh. Also, a dalit, Mayawati, is Chief Minister of India’s largest state (Uttar Pradesh). By the way, India’s literacy is 65% – not as high as the West, but certainly higher than the 15% that Sami is shouting and yelling about. How many Bangalores does Pakistan have?
Hey Sami, since you hate India so much, why don’t you move to Pakistan? Preferably to the Pashtun areas. But don’t wear shorts, as that may excite the Taliban men, and then they’ll flog you. Or ass rape you. But judging from your seething hatred, it looks like you’ve already been ass raped a few times. How tragic. Would you like a hug?
When there is mental bias then one produces such argument as this “9. social and equity based devlopement programmes? What development programs when 85% of the country are illiterate are living under powerty level.”
And it is hearty to learn that one so much about India than the Indians would. I feel sorry for the pathetic state that they have to defend like Pakistan. They are ready to kill their own men for the sake of $1-2 billion dollars per year of aid.
The points that I listed did not say anything more than the areas where Pakistan cannot contest the claims of India’s betterment when compared in the last 60 years of history.
But, Sami in eagerness of spitting venom belched out his own jealousy towards these points. That is the attitude what the present Pakistani state demands from its protagonists. I congratulate him for such bellowing patriotism.
Thanks!
Ambrish Dhaka
What I wouldnt give to have a debate with you about this. You just say so many things that come from nowhere that Im pretty certain Id have a fair shot. Your weblog is wonderful visually, I mean people wont be bored. But others who can see past the videos and the layout wont be so impressed together with your generic understanding of this subject.