Why Pakistan's release of Taliban might help peace

Pakistan agreed today to release some Taliban leaders from prison, saying the decision was taken 'to support the peace and reconciliation process.'

|
Press Information Department/AP
In this photo, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik (r.) meets with Salahuddin Rabbani, head of Afghanistan High Peace Council in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Nov. 14. Pakistan freed at least seven Taliban prisoners on Wednesday at the request of the Afghan government, in a move meant to help jumpstart a shaky peace process with the militant group in neighboring Afghanistan, officials said.

Pakistan agreed today to release some Taliban leaders from prison in an effort to facilitate peace talks in Afghanistan

The announcement came during a two day visit to Islamabad by the Afghanistan High Peace Council, a body authorized by Kabul to hold talks with the Taliban. The Peace Council met with Pakistan's president and prime minister – and, crucially, the country's top general – in the first such high-level meetings since the former head of the council was assassinated last year.  

Regional analysts have long suspected that Pakistan's security establishment scuttled the Afghan peace process when it rounded up a group of Taliban leaders in 2010. The arrested Taliban included spiritual leader Mullah Omar's right-hand man, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who had been in quiet negotiations with the Afghan government, possibly behind Pakistan's back. More hard-line leaders opposed to peace appeared to be spared from the roundup, giving rise to suspicions that elements of the Pakistan's military and intelligence community wanted the Taliban to keep fighting.

Pakistani officials have denied that the arrests were an attempt to target the peace process, pointing out some of the raids were conducted jointly with the US, a key pusher of talks. 

Pakistan's Foreign Office explained the today's decision was taken "to support the peace and reconciliation process and in response to the requests of the Afghan government."

Some observers in Pakistan say the release shows that the Pakistani security establishment has changed course and is now willing to fully endorse a negotiated settlement to the Afghanistan war. If such a key player were indeed on board, odds would improve for a stabilized Afghanistan and a peaceful US exit. 

“We are seeing that finally everyone in Pakistan is on the same page and thinks that a power sharing formula [of which Taliban will be a part of] for the future Kabul government is better," says Fahd Husain, a senior columnist who accompanied the Pakistani prime minister on an earlier visit to Kabul that laid the groundwork for today's announcement.  

The detailed 12-point joint statement, which talks about increasing cooperation between the two countries also urged "Taliban and other armed groups to sever all links with Al Qaeda, and other international terror networks" and emphasized that "Pakistan and Afghanistan will work closely with other international partners to remove the names from the UN sanctions list of the potential negotiators amongst Taliban and other groups to enable them to participate in peace talks."

However, it is still unclear which Taliban leaders will be released, according to a senior Afghan official who is part of the dialogue with Pakistani authorities but not authorized to speak to media.

“This was a demand we had put up to the Pakistani authorities long ago and they finally have agreed to release some Taliban leaders,” the official says.

Some Pakistani analysts urged that the details of who gets released may be disappointing. 

“It is not realistic to expect a major breakthrough through this move since [the] Afghan government was demanding the release of ‘senior’ Taliban leaders who would be able to control the insurgency, but according to my information, Pakistan will not be releasing important Taliban commanders as yet,” says Rahimullah Yousafzai, a security analyst, who is also editor of an English daily newspaper in Peshawar.

Still, Pakistan is not the only obstacle to the peace process, says Mr. Yousafzai. The fact that Mullah Omar, the head of Taliban government before its fall in 2001, is still wanted by the US is a big deterrent in the reconciliation process in Afghanistan.

“There is still lack of clarity from Obama’s administration about what it wants with regards to the peace process. And just like not putting Mullah Omar off that [wanted] list, the Haqqani network, an important ally of the Taliban, was recently put on the US list of designated terrorist organizations. The US should take steps to involve these elements. Without that, there will not be much headway in the peace process,” says Yousufzai.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Why Pakistan's release of Taliban might help peace
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2012/1114/Why-Pakistan-s-release-of-Taliban-might-help-peace
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe