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After the revelation that the Taliban commander, who remained engaged in talks with the Afghan government recently, was an imposter, the peace process between the insurgents and authorities in Kabul has fallen through with little prospects of revival. Consequently, the hope of bringing political stability to the war-ravaged country would also become a pipedream. The Taliban negotiator who was ‘mistakenly’ believed to be Taliban No 2, Mullah Muhammad Akhtar Mansur, turned out to be an ordinary person who was especially flown from Pakistan by NATO to hold talks with Afghan authorities. It means that Afghan Taliban conceived a strategy to hoodwink Karzai and his team.
However, it is quite important to ask that why the Taliban sent a pseudo-representative for negotiations with Afghan government? One explanation could be that Taliban wanted to expose NATO and American officials and tell the world that how shallow their claims have been of making dents in the ranks of Afghan Taliban and bringing some of them to the negotiating table. Taliban felt it necessary as for the last one and a half years there have been various disclosures and claims of the militia’s representatives meeting Afghan and even NATO authorities to reach a peace agreement. We have been hearing of such meetings taking place in Makkah, Maldives and even such an unlikely place as Malta. Each time Afghan Taliban spokesmen announced that no such talks have ever taken place with Afghan or NATO officials and termed it propaganda of their enemies to create schisms within their ranks.
Against this backdrop it is quite understandable that the Taliban came up with the idea of sending in an imposter so as to tell the world the kind of ‘Taliban’ commanders or renegades NATO and Afghan officials have been talking. The imposter acting as Mullah Akhtar Mansur also reportedly got millions of dollars from the NATO authorities as token money to distribute it among Taliban ‘renegades’ or even high-ups. Most likely he must have asked for the money. This was also a trick to show how easily NATO officials could be led by the nose by the generally naïve Taliban. In this regard Taliban strategy remained quite successful. At the same time on part of NATO it was a clear indication that they were not up to the task of negotiating with the Taliban.
The second explanation of the Taliban imposter episode could be that Taliban wanted to test the waters so that to ascertain to what extent NATO officials and Afghan authorities could go to get Taliban on board. As there was also a fear of arrest of an important Taliban commander, therefore, Taliban may have thought to send an imposter instead of the real commander. For Taliban it was important as only after knowing the real political advantage they could expect to get, could they make adjustments in their strategy. At least Taliban must now be convinced that if they agree to negotiations with Afghan government and sharing power they could expect substantial concessions from the NATO and Americans. However, knowing that the U.S. and NATO have never offered anything in concrete terms to them, Taliban also remained stick to their main demand - not to negotiate with Karzai administration until foreign forces are in Afghanistan. As Afghan government and U.S.-NATO officials again failed to offer something tangible to Taliban, the latter have declared that they were not going to budge a single inch from their well-known stance. Instead of making some concessions and showing any flexibility, U.S. President Barrack Hussein Obama on the occasion of recent Lisbon meeting of NATO declared there would be a delay in the complete troops withdrawal from Afghanistan. Although this may be more practical and realistic on part of the Americans as pulling all the troops from Afghanistan within a year after starting the process at an earlier declared date of July 2011 was almost impossible. But the problem is that such a declaration is in complete conflict with the stand of Taliban. Therefore, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid in a reaction maintained that NATO would be unable to establish a stable government in Afghanistan by that date. He described NATO’s plan to withdraw combat troops by the end of 2014 as “irrational” and would only lead to more “tragic events and battles”. It means that Afghan Taliban would not only step up their militant campaign but also do their utmost to further weaken the fledgling Karzai government.
Here it is important to assess that to what an extent Karzai has been sincere in peace talks with Taliban. Although he has been showing his complete readiness to talk to any representatives of Taliban and even shed tears on the Taliban recalcitrance to bring ‘peace’ to Afghanistan by not agreeing to negotiations and power-sharing. However, his actions have so far belied his words. This could be gauged from the composition of the High Peace Commission to negotiate with Taliban and making the former Afghan president Ustad Rabbani as its head. Since the very day of formation of the commission it was conspicuous that Karzai has something else on his mind than making Taliban reconcile. Because Rabbani has been one of the critical foe of Taliban who remained an important component of anti-Taliban Afghan Northern Alliance of non-Pakhtoon militias, which helped U.S.-NATO oust Taliban regime in November 2001.
Keen observers anticipated quite early that the Afghan High Peace Commission would be a failure due to its very composition and this has been proven quite evidently by now. There is further evidence of Karzai’s insincerity to the peace process with Taliban. Recently, one of the cables unearth by WikiLeaks revealed that ex Afghan Taliban regime foreign minister, Wakil Ahmed Mutawakil, told American diplomats that Karzai had been playing foul with all the sides by telling one thing to one side and completely other thing to the other side. Elaborating Wakil, according to the leak, told that Kazai always told U.S. and NATO officials not to withdraw from Afghanistan as it was important for the future of Afghanistan. On the other hand Karzai had been telling Taliban that he also wanted U.S.-NATO troops withdraw as quickly as possible but he had been powerless in this regard. By doing so Karzai only prolonged his stay in power. Otherwise, Taliban could have shown some flexibility but when they have been constantly told by officials of Karzai administration that they also share their agenda they had an impression that they had been on a winning track. This writer through his well-placed sources in Afghanistan and Peshawar could say with certain amount of confidence that this time round Taliban were quite eager to negotiate provided they get some concrete guarantees in return. One reason which Afghan Taliban commanders have recently privately mentioned for their readiness to negotiate is their war-weariness.
Keeping in view Taliban intransigence, Karzai’s insincerity, NATO’s incapability and divisions and Americans strategic agenda in the region and Pakistan’s continued enamoring with the idea of ‘strategic depth’ in Afghanistan, there are so many conflicting interest that it would be very difficult to reconcile them. 
Raza Khan is a political analyst and researcher on the political economy and the AF-PAK region. He has served in several senior positions in the Pakistan government and is currently writing his doctoral thesis on religious extremism-terrorism in Pakistan.
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