Taliban and the Pashtun politics by Imtiaz Gul and Nabila Jaffar

Pashtuns - the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan and the second largest in Pakistan - have recently been stereotyped as socially ultra-conservative, religiously radical, and politically allied with Al Qaeda and the likes for support inside Afghanistan, and globally irreconcilable with the ideals of modern democratic principles. And Taliban are projected as vengeful, fierce warriors, the illiterate flag-bearers of the Pashtoon tribal society still mired in some medieval dogmas and practices.

The region where the Taliban movement took birth is a Pashtun area, inhabited by scores of tribes for thousands of years, mostly independent of foreign influences. As it turned out, the Soviet withdrawal in February 1989, the collapse of communism and the loss of American interests gave way to the civil war in Afghanistan, followed in mid-1990s by the emergence of Taliban, especially in Pashtun areas. Of the erstwhile mujahideen, most were coincidentally Pashtuns - Hekmetyar, Sayyaf, Yunus Khalis, Haqqani, Peer Gilani et el.

But it is indeed unfair to trace the Afghan Taliban down to a single ethnicity. It is true that some primitive Pashtun tribes with strict tribal rules absorbed the conservative narrative of religion propagated and practiced by Mullah Umar and his disciples.Does the geographical location lend a primarily religious entity a national character? Not necessarily. Do the Taliban represent Pashtun nationalism? Perhaps partially yes for the simple reason that the anti-thesis of the Taliban - former socialists and liberals like President Karzai and several of his ministers are also Pashtun.

They enjoy the best of relations with Pakistani Pashtuns ie leading lights of the Awami National Party in KPK and of Pashtun parties in Balochistan like the one headed by Mehmood Khan Achakzai. It therefore represents a tricky turf as to who is the legitimate claimant to Pashtun nationalism at all. The Afghan Taliban led by Haqqani, Mullah Umar and Hekmetyar, or those by Afrasiab Khattak, Asfandyar Wali in Pakistan, and by Karzai, Gilani, Sayyaf and several Pashtun governors.

If judged on their religious outlook, it becomes easier to delineate the Taliban and nationalism; while they stand for "national liberation from foreign occupation forces", they remain indebted to, and draw inspiration from, radical Islamist outfits such as Al Qaeda, and this way they continue to attract people of all ethnic denominations from Pakistan as well; Pashtuns, Punjabis, some Baloch, and Kashmiris. It is the trans-border Islamist Al Qaeda ideology that serves as the bonding gel for all of them, and this of course transcends Pashtun nationalism.

That is why Taliban (in Afghanistan) can rightly be called as mix of different ethnicities who have the same religious ideology and political interests. This group comprises of Pashtun, Punjabi, Uzbek, Tajik, Chechens, and Arabs. Together, they act as squads of death and destruction on Afghanistan. They do the same on the Pakistani, especially in the Pashtun areas, in deference to, and collaboration with Al Qaeda.

That is why attempts by many contemporary writers and even politicians such as Imran Khan, who emphasise the Pashtun provenance of the Taliban movement to justify their claim of Taliban militancy as a nationalist movement are out of synch with the ground realities of the AfPak region. Such efforts largely ignore the role played by the afghan minorities, the military alliance and the resistance movements from within the Pashtun tribes against Taliban. So this kind of blindness and stereotyping of Pashtuns is obfuscating the reality, at least partially.

Some reports suggest that Taliban have influence and supporters among the Tajiks and Uzbeks commanders of north, especially from Jamiat and Hizb-i-Islami commanders who were assimilated into their ranks long ago. That is why, a good number of Taliban commanders, particularly in the western and some northern provinces are reportedly non-Pashtun. The Taliban themselves also never categorized themselves as a Pashtun movement but often stressed their readiness to accept anybody who shared their views and accepted their rules, regardless of ethnicity and tribe. There were a number of Tajiks and Uzbeks involved with Taliban because they were present in the Taliban areas for a long time.

By dint of bad luck, the Pashtun-dominated Taliban movement surfaced in areas where secular Pashtun nationalists including socialists like Noor Mohammad Tarakai, Hafeezullah Amin, and Dr Najibullah - all good friends of their Pakistani brethren like Ajmal Khattak, Achakzais, Asfandyar Wali and Wali Khan - espoused a greater Pashtunistan (including areas that today constitute part of Pakistan right of the Indus River). That is why there is a Pashtunistan Square in the heart of Kabul - next to the Presidential Palace and the Central Bank behind the Serena Hotel.

Afghan Taliban, on the contrary, never looked beyond the eastern border ie Pakistan, and primarily parroted their medieval version of Islam as the guiding principle for a united Afghanistan.

Comment: Taliban and the Pashtun politics by Imtiaz Gul and Nabila Jaffar