Even by Afghanistan’s standards of often-shifting alliances, a recent meeting between ethnic Hazara elders and local commanders of the Taliban insurgents who have persecuted them for years was extraordinary.
In a sign of changing times, the Taliban commanders agreed to help, said Abdul Khaliq Yaqubi, one of the elders at the meeting held in the eastern province of Ghazni.
The unusual pact is a window into deepening anxiety in Afghanistan over reports of Islamic State (IS) radicals gaining a foothold in a country already weary of more than a decade of war with the Taliban.
Back-to-back kidnappings within a month of two groups of Hazara travellers – by men widely rumoured, though far from proven, to claim fealty to IS – have many spooked.
The current threat IS poses in Afghanistan, observers say, is less about real military might than the opportunity for disparate insurgent groups, including defectors from an increasingly fractured Taliban, to band together under this global “brand” that controls swathes of Iraq and Syria.
The fear is especially keen among religious minorities like the Hazaras, who worry the influence of the fiercely anti-Shia IS could introduce a new dimension of sectarian strife to the war.
“Whether Daesh exists or not, the psychological impact of it is very dangerous in Ghazni, which is home to all ethnicities,” Ghazni’s deputy governor Mohammad Ali Ahmadi told Reuters.
“This could easily stir up tensions.”
‘MOVING TARGET’
Unlike in Iraq or Syria, IS controls no Afghan territory and operational links between local fighters and the group’s leadership are murky.
But reports of self-proclaimed IS fighters have been growing since last summer.
In Kandahar, the Taliban’s birthplace, armed clashes between alleged IS fighters and local Taliban have been reported.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s latest report on Afghanistan said a handful of Taliban commanders had declared allegiance to IS and were increasingly seeking funding or cooperation from the group.
But it added there was “no indication of widespread or systematic support” for Afghan fighters from IS leaders in the Middle East.
