Talks in Qatar

The reported resumption of peace talks between the Afghanistan government and the Taliban in Qatar for the first time since 2013 was long overdue. The war in Afghanistan is at a stalemate. The government and its Nato allies know that they cannot militarily defeat the Taliban. The Taliban know that they cannot hold major cities for too long and certainly cannot take over the entire country. A negotiated settlement is the only possible solution and the arduous task of figuring out the details of that settlement needs to begin in earnest. Media reports indicate that the Taliban are demanding the release of their cadres, the removal of their leaders from a UN blacklist and formal recognition by the Afghan government as a precondition of their participation in further talks. While the release of a few symbolic prisoners as a good-faith gesture may be possible, the other conditions are what the Taliban are likely to receive in return for laying down arms and not as a reward for just agreeing to hold talks. One demand of the Taliban’s – that all foreign troops withdraw from the country – should be enthusiastically taken up by the Afghan government since a decade-and-a-half of foreign occupation has shown that it only acts as an accelerant to a country already on fire.

The question of foreign actors has been at the centre of speculation about the Qatar meetings. The Taliban claimed that the US had an official present at the meeting, although that has not been confirmed by anyone else. Pakistan, which was the original go-between for the Taliban and Afghanistan, seems to have been shut out of the process altogether, with the Taliban saying we no longer have much influence over them. If that is true, it does mean Pakistan will have less say in the reconciliation process but it also puts the lie to Afghanistan’s tiresome assertions that Pakistan is behind every militant attack in the country. The only reason we could lose influence with the Afghan Taliban is if we actually are going after them as part of Operation Zarb-e-Azb. The Pakistani state has always claimed that it was doing so and our absence from Qatar would give some credence to that. Whoever else is involved in the talks, ultimately it will be up to the Afghan government and the Taliban to reach an understanding that they are mired in an unwinnable war and a peace agreement is the only way to end it.