Ghani’s outburst

When under pressure, the Afghan government blames Pakistan. The story is an old one – with some degree of truth to it – but at a time when Pakistan is leading an all-out assault on the Taliban, it makes little diplomatic sense to raise the Pakistan card once again. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, who made overtures to Pakistan in his early days in power and remains on close talking terms with both the civilian and military leadership of Pakistan, decided to react to the terrorist attack in Kabul last week which killed 64 people with another verbal assault on Pakistan. Speaking on Monday in a rare joint session of both houses of the Afghan parliament, Ghani warned that he would lodge a complaint in the UN Security Council against Pakistan if the country did not take action against the Taliban leaders based on in its soil. More importantly, perhaps, Ghani has stated that the Afghan government does not expect Pakistan to bring the Taliban to the talks table. This sounds more like criticism of the four-country talks between Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the US which have been going on for the last four months without any presence of the Afghan Taliban.

Just one day after Ghani’s speech to the Afghan parliament, Pakistan’s foreign secretary was in New Delhi for the Heart of Asia conference to discuss reconciliation with the Taliban. Afghanistan has been reluctant so far to commit to negotiations with the Taliban but it also recognises that it cannot militarily defeat the insurgency. This is why Ghani’s rhetoric against Pakistan could be seen as the lament of a frustrated leader who realises he has no good options. But flared tempers and public blame game are still not justified. Ghani’s statement to the Afghan parliament could have easily been delivered in any other way to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who had called Ghani last week to express condemnation of the Kabul attack. With the Afghan Taliban having started another insurgency against Kabul this spring, Ghani has continued to change his position on what to do with the Afghan Taliban. Once again, he told the Afghan parliament that there would be no ‘amnesty without cause’ for members of the group who come to the talks table. This attitude is not going to do much to encourage Afghan Taliban groups to actually engage in constructive dialogue if that is indeed what the Afghan government wants. Sometimes it seems that the aim instead is to stir up anger and push the blame elsewhere. If the Afghan president wants to take Pakistan to the UN over support of the Taliban, more buried ghosts will be brought to the table. Pakistan has also blamed Afghanistan for hosting anti-Pakistan Taliban groups. There is nothing to be achieved by blaming each other. We hope President Ghani understands that soon.