My special thanks and gratitude to Tufts University, Global leadership Institute; Harvard Kennedy School, Belfer Center for Since and International Affairs; and other co-sponsors for convening this significant workshop on a topic that is so crucial for the future of security and peace in Afghanistan.

I strongly believe that such activities by well recognized and prestigious world academic institutions will have a great positive impact on the US and its international ally’s policies on Afghanistan.  

On behalf of the Afghn people, I sincerely thank you and appreciate your efforts on rasing this critical topic at this extremly important time.

I also want to thank all of the particpants in this workshop for taking the time to  gather here and sahre their valueble knowledge and experince with us on the prospects of security and political settlement in Afghanistan.

I am hnored to be part of this valuble gatehring!

The situation in Afghanistan is complex and volatile; both internal and external dynamics of its current war are multiple, complex and intertwined. Internally, various conflicting armed and unarmed groups and elements – with a long history of war – are competing for political and economic power with serious ethnic, tribal and religious divisions and considerations.

The Afghan government has seriously failed to bring a constructive structure and order to the political area in the country. Serious lack of institutional capacity to effectively introduce and mange political and economic liberties in the country has made democracy to backfire in Afghanistan. Political and economic liberalization has been hijacked by a number of powerful warlords and corrupt government officials. This is one critical factor why some insurgents use force and violence against the state and the international community for acquiring political recognition.    

Taliban are the main armed opposition group against the Afghan government and its international allies. Their goal is a radical Islamic state system and the withdrawal of all foreign troops in Afghanistan.

However, most of them could have been integrated into the political process, if the international community and the Afghan government effectively dealt with them from the beginning. Unfortunately, instead they were forced into hostility by calling them terrorists. Nevertheless, it is important to note that there are indeed some elements in the Taliban that are strongly connected to al-Qaeda who would hardly accept being part of any political process with the international community’s help. But, again we want to reiterate that a large portion of the Taliban have local political motivations that could have been integrated into a peaceful process.

The failure of the Afghan government and the international community to take in the Taliban for a peaceful political recognition, is the main reason why they are today a tool for some regional states and al-Qaeda to use them for their political agendas; in other words, we failed to effectively engage them and now we are facing the challenge of others using them against us.  

Understanding the external complication of the current Afghan turmoil requires the right knowledge of all the external players, their motivations and links with the various actors of the Afghan political arena. A simple explanation would be that, today, the main external actor in Afghanistan is the international community whose concern is to help Afghans defeat al-Qaeda and radical Taliban cells; and their purpose is enhanced homeland security. The second main external player is regional state powers; they too share the international community’s objective of fighting international terrorism.

However, the reality of external state motivations and interests in Afghanistan is extremely complex in nature. Individual state actors within both the international and regional communities have specific other political and economic agendas in Afghanistan. In short, due to its sensitive geographic location in the region, Afghanistan is increasingly becoming an area of geo-political and geo-strategic calculations for many states in the international system. It is no longer only a frontline in the war against al-Qaeda; but is also an area of great power competition for various regional and international players.        

The main characteristic of this geo-political and geo-strategic competition is similar to that of the early nineteenth century Great Game; many are already calling it the “New Great Game”. A number of regional powers are highly concerned about the political and military presence of the United States and its international allies in Afghanistan and the region as a whole.

It is almost evident that regional powers perceive the United State’s presence in Afghanistan as a political and military maneuver to strategically manage key powerful states in the region in order to counter act their world and regional power aspirations.

In the current international order, the only states that can pose serious threats to United State’s status as the world super power are located in some how close vicinity of Afghanistan who may never accept the US influence in the region.

This geo-strategic power competition is not only between the international alliances led by the United States on one side and regional states on the other side; regional powers too are engaged in a serious regional power struggle over Afghanistan and the region.

In the heart of this inert-state political conflict and its linkages to the Afghan internal matters, there is a third external element which is al-Qaeda, with a goal of a radical religious agenda for the world. Al-Qaeda benefits from both the internal and external disputes over the Afghan politics and power. Afghanistan is a great proxy battle field for al-Qaeda to engage in an open fight with those nations that it can’t reach for such a fight in their own soils.

Afghanistan brings many state armies into a geographic setting conducive for al-Qaeda type militant operations; thus, Afghanistan can be titled as an alternative battle field for international terrorist organizations.

There is a strong lack of unity and cohesion among regional and international actors on truly supporting each other in the fight against al-Qaeda and religious extremism simply because they have strong geo-strategic and geo-political disputes over the region.  

Now the question is; are there states that may be using religious extremism as a tool for their political agendas in the region? Is al-Qaeda a kind of state sponsored terrorism?

This is a highly controversial question; al-Qaeda is an independent terrorist organization with a clear radical religious agenda for the world; thus, apparently, it can’t be affiliated with any state in the international system. But in the Afghanistan case, Taliban are increasingly showing signs of being affiliated with a number of states in the region that are seriously against the international community’s intervention and any progress in Afghanistan.

This is a unique opportunity for al-Qaeda to use the Afghan Taliban and their links with regional powers as a great tool for achieving their interests. Therefore, for a lasting stability in Afghanistan, the international community must clearly make a distinction between Taliban and al-Qaeda and should deal with the two differently.     

This is not to say that Taliban are entirely separate from al-Qaeda; there are certain elements within the Taliban structure that do follow al-Qaeda’s international radical religious agendas. Hence, there is also a need to differentiate between those Taliban that have international security implications and those that only have internal political motivations and are operating only within the internal framework of the Afghan conflict.   

It is significantly important to note that Pakistan is a key factor for fighting religious extremism; Pakistan has a long history of using religious militants to expand its regional power. Since its inception as an independent state, religious militants have been at the fore front of its military and political strategy on the Kashmiri conflict with India.  

Pakistan has always strictly regarded Afghanistan as a critical area within the sphere of its influence; and thus sees the international community in Afghanistan against its regional power interests.

We strongly believes that Pakistan’s lack of interest in honestly fighting the Taliban is due to their belief of the international community not being able to remain in Afghanistan for long.

Pakistan deeply believes that Taliban can still be brought back to power to rule Afghanistan the way it wants. Afghanistan is in the depth of Pakistan’s strategy for regional politics/ power and will always remain there.   

The question whether al-Qaeda is really present in Afghanistan or not? They are not on the Afghan soil; they are in Pakistan with an open border with Afghanistan which means they can come in attack and go back to their safe havens on the other side of the border. This is even worse than having them in Afghanistan.         

Any solution for the Taliban problem in Afghanistan, be it military or political settlement, is subject to failure, should it fall short to effectively address the Pakistani affiliation with the Taliban.    

We do believe that a political settlement is possible in Afghanistan, if based on:

1.     the right understanding of the Afghan war, its actors and their motivations; both internal and external and what links them;

2.     addressing both regional and international security implications and political dynamics;

3.     the right political will and commitment for a true Afghan reconciliation among key internal and external players; 

4.     a clear strategy and criteria to distinguish between reconcilable and irreconcilable elements of the insurgency; otherwise, reconciliation will risk being lost for larger scale considerations of international security concerns and regional politics;

5.     a systematic economic reintegration of the reconciled; reconciliation without reintegration and reintegration without reconciliation is meaningless;

6.     people’s support and trust in the process; and

7.     an honest, dedicated and capable Afghan government with the right commitment for a national reconciliation  without any agenda for keeping certain individuals or groups in power.       

The terms and conditions of the strategy for a national reconciliation in Afghanistan must be based on a common definition and understanding of the ‘Afghan political settlement’ among all the national, regional and international stakeholders of the Afghan conflict.

The strategy should make a clear distinction between reconcilable and irreconcilable elements of the insurgency and must present different approaches to deal with the two differently. The methods and means of dealing with the two with an objective of reaching a sustainable political settlement in Afghanistan should be agreed up on by all the relevant stakeholders who undertake the reconciliation process.

A comprehensive and strategic criterion for selected the reconcilable and irreconcilable elements must be agreed up on between the Afghan government and the international community; this agreement should also have regional endorsement/ backing.

These criteria should allow for reconciliation with all those insurgency elements that have internal political, social and economic motivations for the Afghan conflict; and should clearly identify the characteristics of those elements that are irreconcilable.

The irreconcilable must only be those groups and individuals, in the insurgency, that have international radical religious agendas and are closely linked with al-Qaeda. There should be distinct and strategically selected methods and tools to deal with the two effectively and in parallel.

For the irreconcilable elements of the insurgency, it is important to understand that no matter wither the international community and the Afghan government is ready to negotiate with them or not, they will not talk and it is the same for the international community as well. So now what is needed to counter act their audacious activities? The answer is straight forward; they have to be fought until they are defeated.

The question that follows is how to fight them effectively? And most importantly based on the Afghan context, how to differentiate between the reconcilable and the irreconcilable and how to fight the radical without causing damage to the non-radical, given the fact of them being so closely intertwined?    

There is no military tactic or equipment that can draw this fine distinction in the battle field; however, this distinction can be made with a set of careful and systematic joint political, military and intelligence initiatives.

Military operations and political reconciliation efforts must complement each other in order to defeat the radical and reconcile with the non-radical. In other words, political reconciliation must work on identifying the linkages between the two and try to weaken them in order to undermine cooperation between the two sides.

While, military operations must strategically pin point and target key radical elements that are trying to sabotage the reconciliation process for their agendas.

Achieving this objective is simply not possible with the current large scale and uncoordinated military operations that are taking place in Afghanistan.

With the present political and military capacity of the Afghan government and the complexity of international assistance due to multiplicity of actors, it is nearly impossible for the current Afghan administration, fraught with corruption, to achieve this level of precise military and political coordination among all the actors.

Widespread corruption of the Afghan government is a serious obstacle for any positive progress in the country. It has robustly hindered development and civilian efforts of the international community in Afghanistan. Thus, it is significantly important to counteract this phenomenon; and understand how much it endangers political settlement and revives insurgency.

Here, we reiterate the significance of an effective, capable and honest national government in any political settlement. The success of the international community in Afghanistan is subject to a dedicated national Afghan government.        

Good governance is key to success of the international community in Afghanistan and is also key for public support which is of a high significance for the success of the international community’s efforts in Afghanistan.

For the international community, gaining the trust of the Afghan people is subject to an effective and honest Afghan administration. The Afghan government is the face of the international community for Afghans. The main problem of the Afghan people is corruption and lack of effective governance.

The growing Taliban insurgency is not due to their increased power, it is due to the Afghan administration’s increased deficiency.

The international community spends billions of dollars in Afghanistan and sacrifices its soldiers to defeat al-Qaeda; but serious corruption and ineffective Afghan governance strongly undermine what the international community achieves in the country.

For instance, coalition troops conduct numerous military operations to remove Taliban forces from areas across the country but just within weeks the Taliban are back.

Why is this? It is simply because the international community wins the fight but the Afghan government fails to effectively administer these areas after military operations.

In other words, the international community brings the initial security by fighting the Taliban but the Afghan government is unable to maintain it.   

Sustained security will not be achieved, no matter how hard the international community fights the Taliban, if there is not an effective Afghan administration to provide the necessary administrative services that can maintain and build on it.

With current Afghan administration, this cycle of internationals troop bringing security and the Afghan government ruining it will continue taking billions of dollars and lives of many for no solid outcome at the end.

It is a vicious cycle that needs to stop evolving immediately in order to save lives and resources. The Afghan government must understand the sacrifices of the international community and must soon improve to be an effective national partner to sustain and maintain what the international community brings to this country with their lives and money.    

Without security it is nearly impossible to achieve progress and development on any front, be it political, economic or social. Thus, any political settlement with the Taliban and other insurgents will be subject to failure, should the Afghan government remain ineffective in maintaining security as it is now. This inability of the Afghan government has already reinforced the Taliban’s moral; they now know that foreign troops will win the military operations but the Afghan government will not be able to maintain that success.

With this mentality, it will be very hard to reach to a political settlement with the Taliban. It is the Afghan weak governance that is, indeed, pushing the Taliban into the hands of radical external religious groups such as al-Qaeda and other in the region who further supports them for revived insurgency. 

While effective governance is fundamental in resolving the Afghan internal problem; to address the external dimensions, we propose the following preconditions for an internal settlement: 

1.     An international and regional political commitment and will for a true peace and stability in Afghanistan;

In the absence of regional commitment and political will for a settlement in Afghanistan, the following is what we propose: 

2.     A true Afghan partnership with key international actors to strengthen the Afghan internal political and military capacity in order to firmly observe and secure its borders to prevent any regional manipulation in the national reconciliation process.

And a precondition for both of the above is:

3.     An honest, capable and effective Afghan government with the right dedication and commitment for a settlement irrespective of any political agenda for keeping certain groups or individuals in power and that is able to gain the required population support through providing adequate security and economic services to a good number of the general population; 

The first precondition is unlikely to be achieved simply because of the political dispute among some key regional and international powers over the Afghan matter for geo-strategic and geo-political reasons.

The second is feasible to an extent; but is highly dependent on the Afghan internal dedication and commitment for peace and ability to achieve the required international commitment and backing for such a strategy and approach.

It is important to note that both are nearly impossible for Afghans to achieve without a strong long term commitment of key international actors. International actors should provide the necessary initial conditions for Afghans to build on in order to gain an effective national government which is what the current government failed to achieve so far.   

A political settlement without either both regional and international cooperation or international backing alone with a strong internal commitment and dedication is unlikely to be achieved.

We strongly believe that a committed national Afghan government with the right political will and capacity can indeed acquire the necessary political and economic backing of key international actors for an integrated reconciliation. Achieving this goal is possible with an effective political diplomacy that can create and advocate for critical long term common political, economic and social cooperation of Afghanistan with key international players.