Back to square one?
After President Ghani was sworn into office in September 2014, Pak-Afghan relations started improving despite criticism from quarters loyal to Karzai. The critics in Kabul expressed doubts about the sincerity of Pakistan and accused the new president of sell out when an MoU was signed last month for cooperation between the ISI and NDS, the Afghan intelligence agency. It was widely realised that within a few months the two sides had made unexpected advance in improvement of ties.
Both Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah had campaigned on support for negotiated peace with Taliban. Both looked towards Pakistan, which had hosted the Afghan Taliban for long. In February General Raheel Sharif was reported to have told Ghani that the Taliban would be willing to begin official meetings with the Afghan government as early as the next month and that they were being told by Pakistani officials that it was no longer acceptable to carry on the war. In May Nawaz Sharif declared in Kabul that Afghanistan’s enemies were Pakistan’s enemies.
Pakistan’s establishment, however, failed to bring the key Taliban leaders to the table despite promises. The sudden dissociation of Taliban from attempts to reach a peaceful resolution of conflict is inexplicable keeping in view the announcement of peace time-table by a confident Sartaj Aziz a couple of days earlier. Instead, the Taliban have intensified the summer offensive and attacked the Afghan parliament on Monday, leading NDS to accuse the ISI of being in cahoots with the Taliban. Pakistan’s western allies too are likely to interpret the failure as the victory of those in Pakistan’s establishment who still want to retain the proxies.
Pakistan cannot afford to let relations with Afghanistan deteriorate. Any victory gained by the Taliban in Afghanistan will strengthen the TTP and other terrorist groups who will launch attacks inside Pakistan from safe havens across the border. Empty promises will not help regain Afghan confidence. There is a need to build maximum pressure on Taliban for joining peace talks. Failure to do so will force Afghanistan to seek support elsewhere.
