Taliban Appears Divided on How to Play Endgame

After nearly a week of wholesale retreat across Afghanistan, Taliban leaders and their hard-core supporters holed up in the southern city of Kandahar appear divided over whether to negotiate a surrender or fight to the end.

The Taliban and southern tribal leaders reportedly are in tense negotiations over terms of a Taliban hand-over of power.

The outcome could determine whether the U.S.-led military campaign ends in a straightforward transition to post-Taliban rule or in jockeying for power among tribal groups.

Reports just 24 hours ago that the Taliban had handed over power in Kandahar to tribal leaders were premature, and the reality on the ground is far less clear.

In the last few days, many Taliban soldiers have fled to Kandahar from elsewhere in Afghanistan, raising the tough question of where they will go if forced to leave the city.

Some Afghan Taliban could return to their homes, but areas controlled by the Northern Alliance may bar others. And fighters from Arab countries have nowhere to go if the Taliban gives up Kandahar--they would be targets for both the Americans and anti-Taliban Pushtuns who have long wanted Arab fighters to leave the country.

And that means there are splits over strategy in the Taliban ranks.

Further complicating matters is that the proposed hand-over could give power to commanders with strong Taliban ties and questionable records.

Among the names that surfaced, Haji Basher is described as one of the biggest opium smugglers in Afghanistan and a financier of the Taliban regime; another figure, Hafiz Majid, was a former chief of security for the Taliban. A third proposed leader, Mullah Naquibullah, is a popular commander from the period when the Afghans were fighting the Soviets and is reported to be the most popular of the three.

It is far from clear that a broad base of Pushtuns, the dominant ethnic group in Afghanistan and a large majority of the people in southern Afghanistan, support these leaders as anything more than an interim group. That raises questions about whether there would be skirmishing among the factions as soon as the Taliban leaves.

A senior United Nations official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a struggle for power over all the Pushtun areas will cause trouble for a long time.

In the short term, however, Pushtuns agree on one point: They want to free the country of the Taliban.

“I think this will settle quickly,” said Rasul Bakhsh Rais, a regional specialist at the Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital. “These tribal leaders understand each other and the importance of staying together at this time.”

Abdul Malik, a top lieutenant to Hamid Karzai, an anti-Taliban Pushtun leader who now controls a province north of Kandahar, agreed that at least the tribal leaders share the short-term goal of getting rid of the Taliban, and that is hard enough to achieve.

“The country is going through a really critical time, and the first thing is the survival of the people and ending the Taliban government, and this is one objective that we all have,” he said.

“Later we can solve some of the other things, after a loya jirga,” he added, referring to the traditional tribal council that chooses new leaders.

Taliban efforts to broker a deal with local Pushtun elders and tribal leaders about the turnover of Kandahar reportedly started five to six days ago as their forces began to retreat throughout much of northern Afghanistan.

The Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, is said to have played an important role as an emissary in the negotiations.

“Zaeef went to Kandahar but stopped in Quetta and has met with these tribal leaders and [former moujahedeen] commanders,” said Mohammed Tahir Khan, a senior Pakistani journalist who knows Zaeef well. “They all discussed the same thing: handing over power.”

Others privy to the talks described them as “very tense.”

The Taliban reportedly is ready to turn over the city if its many fighters now in Kandahar are spared.

Discussions about handing over Kandahar are especially difficult for the Taliban. At an emotional level, the city has served as a spiritual home for the movement since it first became a political force seven years ago. It is the home of Mullah Mohammed Omar, the religious leader of the Taliban and one of the figures who has rallied the movement’s supporters to embrace the strictest form of Islam. He has also been the most vocal Afghan protector of Saudi militant Osama bin Laden.

People in touch with those in Kandahar say the Taliban has split into three factions: the Arabs, who oppose surrender because it means they would have nowhere to go; the Taliban members who are willing to raise the white flag; and a third group in the middle that is unenthusiastic about the prospect of withdrawal but not terribly eager about provoking a battle.

According to tribal sources, the negotiator for the Taliban is Osmani, a Taliban commander close to Omar. Like many Afghans, he uses just one name.

On the other side are a small group of tribal elders and the commanders who appear to be jockeying for the job of leader of Kandahar. It has not been easy to find people whom the Taliban will trust to uphold a deal.

One of those who seems to be a key player, Hafiz Majid, has worked as chief of security for the Taliban in Kandahar and therefore enjoys its trust. Another important figure, Haji Basher, also has the advantage of a long relationship with the Taliban, several people said, but a worrisome reputation.

He is known as the biggest smuggler in Afghanistan, he is wealthy and he has a lot of weapons, said Mohammed Atif, 26, who described himself as a small opium smuggler.

Although Basher is a businessman, he travels like a military commander, with 25 bodyguards in four or five pickup trucks, said Atif.

A spokesman for another commander, Gul Agha Shirzai, a former governor of Kandahar, was more tactful in describing Basher:

“He’s been working with the Taliban and he’s a big businessman; I leave it at that,” said the spokesman, Mohammed Yusef Pushtoon.

Even with familiar faces on the other side of the bargaining table, the Taliban is clearly nervous about the outcome.

Rais, the regional specialist, believes that the tribal leaders are willing to let the Taliban slip out of Kandahar, but they are unlikely to provide any guarantees or amnesty for any Taliban who decide to stay.

Pushtoon, who said he was in touch with tribal elders negotiating with the Taliban, said he expected that the Taliban leadership will go into hiding but that the majority of the fighters will go to their villages.

There are reports that members of the Taliban militia are already leaving Kandahar, hoping either to return to their homes, hide in the rugged southern mountains or take shelter in the teeming Pushtun neighborhoods of Quetta.

They are said to be leaving the city in small groups to avoid drawing American airstrikes, although there are reports of larger contingents on the move as well. One group of 83 Pakistani Taliban volunteer fighters was detained by Pakistani authorities as the fighters crossed into Pakistan near the frontier town of Miram Shah.

Pakistani officials are also vigilant when it comes to Arab fighters who might slip into their country. Unlike the Afghan Taliban, most of whom are members of the same Pushtun ethnic group as many people in southwestern Pakistan, the Arabs are viewed as potentially dangerous foreign interlopers. Two Arab men fleeing Afghanistan were arrested late Saturday near Quetta, and authorities in the tribal border areas of Pakistan have agreed to turn over to the Pakistan government any Arabs who cross into their land.

Prominent individuals from the Taliban government are also showing up in Pakistan, including the deputy chief of its Bakhtar News Agency, Qari Fasil Rabi.