Under fire, Taliban hardens line

A Taliban official yesterday ruled out pardons for the aid workers. And Mawlavi Mohammad Wali, Taliban Minister for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the religious police) said that all aid groups would face "severe surveillance by the intelligence, security, and religious organs" to ensure that they do not promote religions other than Islam.

Mr. Haider says the West has missed numerous opportunities to reward the small successes of the moderate wing, such as a ban on the cultivation of opium poppies and greater freedom of movement for Afghan women. "The moderates are on their back foot, because they really don't have much to show for what the outside world would offer them," he says.

Western diplomats, for their part, say international sanctions against the Taliban are in place for a range of issues and cannot simply be lifted because of sporadic "improvements" in Taliban policy. The success in banning opium-poppy cultivation, while impressive, is thus regarded as simply the duty of a responsible government.

What this means for the 24 arrested aid workers, including 16 Afghan nationals, remains to be seen. At present, no foreign diplomats or international agencies have been allowed to visit the detainees. The Taliban yesterday issued visas to US, German, and Australian diplomats, but a Taliban official repeated that they would not be given consular access.

United Nations special envoy Francesc Vendrell, on a long-planned trip to Kabul Saturday, urged the Taliban to show mercy to the detainees, who are entering their second week in custody. "I just hope that they deal with [this issue] with the international principles of fair treatment. And I hope they will give access to the diplomatic representatives of the foreigners."

While much of the attention has focused on the eight foreign aid workers, the position of Afghan detainees may be more precarious.

Those who have experienced Taliban interrogation methods, including Pakistani journalist Salim Safi and other Pakistani journalists working for Associated Press and Reuters, report severe beatings to extract confessions. Most interrogation units are made up of former agents of Khad, the brutal Communist-era secret police agency.

Taliban officials say the arrested foreigners are in good health, but there have been no such assurances for the 16 Afghan nationals employed by Shelter Now - or the parents of 59 boys who attended its classes.

"As they were careless and ignorant toward their children, and in order to be a lesson for others, the elders of these boys have been taken into custody for a few days," said the state-run Radio Shariat, quoting Mohammad Salim Haqqani, deputy minister of the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.

The 59 children also were taken into custody to "remove from their hearts and minds the Christian teachings," but have since been released.

For their part, Shelter Now officials deny that any conversion was going on at their Kabul aid center. All classes were conducted in front of Muslim elders, and the classes mostly comprised teaching children handicrafts, such as making paper flowers.

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