062 afghanistan the problem of pashtun alienation

8/8/2019 062 Afghanistan the Problem of Pashtun Alienation

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AFGHANISTAN:

THE PROBLEM OF PASHTUN ALIENATION

5 August 2003

ICG Asia Report N62Kabul/Brussels


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS.................................................i

I. INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................1II. BACKGROUND .............................................................................................................3

A. STATE FORMATION AND PASHTUN DOMINANCE (1747-1973)...............................................3

B. DECLINE OF DURRANI HEGEMONY (1973-1979)...................................................................4

C. PDPARULE AND RESISTANCE (1979-1992).........................................................................5

D. CIVIL WAR AND TALIBAN RULE (1992-2001) ......................................................................6

III. THE BONN PROCESS ..................................................................................................8

A. THE BONN AGREEMENT........................................................................................................8

B. THE EMERGENCY LOYA JIRGA..............................................................................................8

IV. REPRESENTATION AT THE CENTRE..................................................................10A. PRESIDENCY AND CABINET.................................................................................................10

B. LEADERSHIP ALTERNATIVES...............................................................................................11

C. INSECURITY AND RESPONSE................................................................................................12

V. WARLORDISM, TRADE AND GOVERNANCE .................................................... 14

A. THE WAR ECONOMY ..........................................................................................................15

B. IMPACT ON TRADE ..............................................................................................................15

C. TRIBALISATION OF GOVERNANCE .......................................................................................17

VI. EXTERNAL ACTORS.................................................................................................19

A. UN .....................................................................................................................................19B. U.S.....................................................................................................................................20

VII. REGIONAL ACTORS .................................................................................................22

A. PAKISTAN ...........................................................................................................................22

B. IRAN ...................................................................................................................................24

C. RUSSIA ...............................................................................................................................24

VIII.CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................26

APPENDICES

A. MAP OF AFGHANISTAN ......................................................................................................27B. ABOUT THE INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP.......................................................................28C. ICGREPORTS AND BRIEFING PAPERS ................................................................................29D. ICGBOARD MEMBERS .......................................................................................................35


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ICG Asia Report N62 5 August 2003

AFGHANISTAN: THE PROBLEM OF PASHTUN ALIENATION

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Prospects for an enduring peace in Afghanistan arestill fragile despite progress since the ouster of theTaliban in December 2001. A key obstacle is the

perception of many ethnic Pashtuns that they lackmeaningful representation in the central government,particularly in its security institutions. Other factorscontributing to growing alienation from the Bonnpolitical process include continued violence againstPashtuns in parts of the north and west, heavy-handedsearch operations and collaboration with abusivecommanders by the U.S.-led Coalition, andimpediments to trade in the southern and easternprovinces. Unless measures are taken to address thesegrievances and ensure that a more representative

government emerges from the forthcoming election,there will be a greater likelihood of the politicalprocess ending in failure.

Although headed by a Pashtun, Hamid Karzai, theInterim Administration created in Bonn in December2001 was dominated by a mainly Panjshiri Tajikarmed faction, the Shura-yi Nazar-i Shamali(Supervisory Council of the North). The powerministries of defence, interior and foreign affairswere held respectively by Mohammad Qasim Fahim,

Younus Qanuni, and Abdullah Abdullah, all membersofShura-yi Nazar. The Emergency Loya Jirga in June2002, which was expected to install a more broadlyrepresentative and hence more legitimate government,ended up reinforcing the Panjshiri monopoly over thecentral governments security institutions, though itincluded Pashtuns in key positions in financialinstitutions.

President Karzai is widely seen as having beenunable to limit either the power of the Shura-yi

Nazarat the centre or of commanders, irrespective

of ethnicity, who wield power in other parts of thecountry. Unless the national security institutions areperceived as representing the population as a

whole, their efforts at disarmament anddemobilisation are unlikely to find popular support.At the same time, the authority of local

commanders will be legitimated as a vehicle forresisting ethnic domination.

Alienation from the centre is compounded by thedisplacement of large numbers of Pashtuns in thenorth, amid a wave of ethnically targeted violencefollowing the collapse of Taliban rule by factionsof the United Front that helped the U.S.-ledCoalition. UNHCR, the Karzai administration, andsome regional authorities have taken steps tofacilitate the return of displaced northern Pashtuns.

The critical issue will be ensuring security andaccess to land for those communities that weredisplaced. The international community should alsosupport continued monitoring of violence againstPashtuns in the north and west by non-Pashtunmilitias, which remains acute in the provinces ofHerat and Badghis, and call on regional authoritiesto remove and hold accountable commandersresponsible for these abuses.

To date, the south and east have had only a modeststake in the political and economic reconstructionprocesses outlined in the Bonn agreement.International assistance has been slow tomaterialise in areas outside of Kandahar and othermajor towns, while poppy cultivation has boomed.Commanders with little or no popular legitimacyremain the principle military partners of theCoalition, and have used their power to consolidatecontrol over regional administrations andeconomies. In Pashtun areas, this has led to thegrowth of patronage systems along sub-ethnic linesand fuelled tensions within communities; those

Pashtun tribes that lack kinship ties to localauthorities are marginalised politically andeconomically.


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Afghanistan: The Problem of Pashtun Alienation

ICG Asia Report N62, 5 August 2003 Page ii

The Coalition, whose entry into the Pashtunprovinces was welcomed by a population that hadgrown disenchanted with the Talibans increasinglyarbitrary and autocratic rule, has failed to capitaliseon this reservoir of goodwill. Collaboration withlocal commanders has drawn the Coalition intotheir factional and personal rivalries, compromisingits non-partisanship in disputes unrelated to the waron terrorism. Heavy-handed tactics in searchoperations and inadequate responses to reports ofcivilian deaths from air strikes have also fuelleddiscontent with the Coalition presence.

The risks posed by the growing disaffection amongPashtuns in Afghanistan should be self-evident.The Taliban came to power not only because of themilitary assistance provided by Pakistan, but also

because local commanders had become notoriousfor their abusive conduct toward civilians andextortion of traders. The Talibans initial success indisarming the south and restoring a modicum ofsecurity was welcomed as a respite by largesegments of the local population. Today, insecurityin the south and east, impediments to trade, andcontinued competition for influence by theneighbouring states present a set of conditionsdangerously close to those prevailing at the time ofthe Talibans emergence. The risk of destabilisation

has been given added weight by the re-emergenceof senior Taliban commanders who are ready tocapitalise on popular discontent and whose long-time allies now govern the Pakistani provincesbordering Afghanistan.

The elections scheduled for June 2004 will be acritical barometer of the credibility of the Bonnprocess among Afghanistans Pashtuns. Reform ofthe central governments security institutionsshould be prioritised in advance of the elections.The removal of abusive regional authorities, andtheir replacement by educated professionals whoare perceived as neutral actors will go a long waytoward reclaiming support for the centralgovernment. Suitable individuals are not hard tofind: there are a large number of Pashtunprofessionals with management and technicalexpertise gained through work with internationalagencies and NGOs in Afghanistan and amongrefugee communities in the neighbouring states.The international community should also work toensure that non-militarised political parties have the

necessary security space and legal authorisation tocampaign freely in advance of the election.

RECOMMENDATIONS

To the Transitional Administration:

1. Ensure that cabinet level appointments andmilitary command assignments are made with

a view to reflecting Afghanistans ethnicdiversity and are linked to the development ofprofessional criteria.

2. Revise the draft political parties law nowbefore the cabinet so that it does not providepretexts for the dissolution of parties or limitson political expression, in particular byremoving Articles 3 and 9 and minimummembership thresholds for registration.

3. Continue to monitor the treatment of ethnicPashtuns in northern and western Afghanistan,and especially:

(a) broaden the mandate of the ReturnCommission for the North to includethe provinces of Herat, Badghis,Baghlan, Takhar, and Badakhshan; and

(b) direct regional authorities to ensurethat commanders whose forces areidentified as having been responsiblefor violence against Pashtun

communities, including illegal seizureand occupation of land, are removedfrom their posts and held accountableunder international standards of dueprocess and fair trials.

4. Appoint a non-partisan panel with powers toreceive complaints and investigate allegationsto carry out, in cooperation with the AfghanIndependent Human Rights Commission, acomprehensive and time-bound review of the

performance of provincial administrations,with a view to identifying cases of gross abuseof power including, inter alia, illegal taxationand mistreatment of ethnic, tribal, or sectarianminorities, and then remove from officegovernors whose administrations are found tohave systematically abused their authority.

To the International Community:

5. Extend ISAF or an equivalent mission toadditional areas of the country, beyond Kabul,

including the major regional centres.6. Ensure that regional minorities, including

Pashtuns in the north and west, receive


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ICG Asia Report N62, 5 August 2003 Page iii

humanitarian assistance and that reconstructionaid is promptly directed to areas whereCoalition military operations continue.

7. Provide increased support for thereconstruction of judicial institutions in the

provinces, with particular attention todeveloping their capacity to impartially reviewand resolve competing claims to land.

8. Initiate a dialogue with civil society andlegitimate community leaders in Pashtun areasas part of the broader consultative processes onthe constitution, preparations for the election,and other elements of the Bonn process anddevelop parallel mechanisms, where necessary,to ensure that women are included in all ofthese consultative processes.

9. Ensure the early dissemination of informationin the provinces, and in refugee communitiesin Iran and Pakistan, about the 2004 electionsthrough support for voter education,registration, and mobilisation, and supportefforts in these areas by Afghan NGOs,independent media and womens associations.

10. Support the development of civil societyinstitutions initiated by local actors in southernand eastern Afghanistan and take steps in so

doing to ensure the independence of theseinstitutions from influence by military andgovernmental institutions.

To the United States and its Coalition partners:

11.

Progressively direct military and financialsupport away from regional and localcommanders, as part of the broader nationalframework for disarmament, demobilisation,and reintegration.

12. Consult with provincial authorities andlegitimate community leaders prior to carryingout military operations and ensure thatintelligence reports have been independentlyverified to the fullest extent possible beforeconducting searches of private homes or other

military operations.13. Promptly investigate, in consultation with

provincial authorities and local communityleaders, all reports of civilian deaths in thecourse of military operations.

14. Sensitise Coalition forces to respect, as far aspossible, local norms of conduct whilecarrying out search operations.

Kabul/Brussels, 5 August 2003


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ICG Asia Report N62 5 August 2003

AFGHANISTAN: THE PROBLEM OF PASHTUN ALIENATION

I. INTRODUCTIONAfghanistans population is composed of some 55distinct ethnic groups,1 of whom four account for alarge majority: the Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, andUzbeks.2 Precise population ratios are difficult to

determine, in part due to the absence of a censusbut also because refugee flows during 23 years ofwarfare impacted disproportionately on differentethnic groups. While the last census, in 1976, wasnever completed, estimates used by the UnitedNations put Pashtuns at 38 per cent of thepopulation, making them the largest single ethnicgroup.3 Pashtuns controlled political power formost of Afghanistans history as a state, with theresult that their traditions and cultural norms wereprojected as being synonymous with the national

identity of Afghanistan.

Pashtuns in Afghanistan are divided into some 30tribes, each of which is subdivided into clans and,in turn, lineages. About half of these tribes belongto one of two major confederations: the Durraniand the Ghilzai (also transliterated as Ghalji). TheDurrani are predominant in the southwest, in theplains extending from Farah to Kandahar. TheGhilzai are concentrated in the southeast, betweenKandahar and Kabul, but also have large

communities in the centre and north as a result ofboth forcible and encouraged resettlement underDurrani rule. An estimated ten million Pashtunslive across the border in Pakistan, where they form

1 Nigel J. R. Allan, Defining Place and People inAfghanistan, Post-Soviet Geography and Economics,2001, Vol. 42, No. 8, p. 545.2 Within each of the four major groups, sub-ethnic categories such as Panjshiris and Badakhshis among Tajiks are oftenmore politically significant forms of self-identification.3 Afghanistan Information Management Service (AIMS),Country Profile, http://www.aims.org.pk/. The AIMSproject is part of the UNs Afghanistan Mission(UNAMA), and is administered by UNDP.

a majority of the population in the North-WestFrontier Province and the northern part ofBaluchistan Province. Despite these divisions,Pashtuns have a strong sense of ethnic identity,shaped by a tradition of common descent; adistinctive Indo-Iranian language, Pashto; and asocial code known as Pashtunwali (the way of the

Pashtuns).

The Dari (Persian)-speaking, Sunni Tajiks are thesecond largest ethnic group, accounting for roughly25 per cent of the population. They areconcentrated in Kabul, the northeast and HeratProvince, but also account for a large share of theurban population elsewhere in the country. Literacyin Dari (the language of administration) andproximity to administrative centres allowed urbanTajiks to serve as junior partners of the Pashtuns in

governance, under Durrani rulers as well as latercommunist administrations.

The central highlands are home to the Dari-speaking, predominantly Shia Hazaras, who makeup roughly 19 per cent of the population and havetraditionally been the most politically andeconomically disadvantaged group. The Turkic-speaking Uzbeks live in the northern plains andfoothills, and constitute some 6 per cent of thepopulation; their presence in government betweenthe late nineteenth and middle of the twentiethcenturies was also negligible.4 In contrast to thePashtuns, the three other major ethnic groups inAfghanistan were either non-tribal or largelydetribalised by the late twentieth century. A varietyof social processes, including labour migration toKabul in the case of the Hazaras and the Tajiks of

4 ...[U]ntil the early 1950s, all military and political officials(plus their entourage) in the northern provinces wereexclusively from among Pashtun or Tajik from the south of

the Hindu Kush, Nazif Shahrani, Ethnic Relations underClosed Frontier Conditions: Northeast Badakhshan, inWilliam O. McCagg, Jr. and Brian D. Silvers (eds.), Soviet

Asian Ethnic Frontiers (New York, 1979), p. 181.


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the Panjshir Valley, had the effect of breakingdown local identities and creating larger solidaritygroups.5

The emergence of the Afghan state in the mid-eighteenth century coincided with the rise ofDurrani tribal power at the national level. Fromthen, Pashtuns belonging to Durrani tribesconsolidated their hold over state and society, oftenat the expense of other tribal and ethnic groups.The resistance that followed the Soviet invasion of1979 as well as the subsequent civil war allowednon-Pashtun ethnic groups to assert political andeconomic autonomy both from the state and fromPashtun dominance. From 1992 to 1996, the mainlyTajik Jamiat-i Islami party under PresidentBurhanuddin Rabbani controlled the central

government. Pashtun opposition to a Tajik-dominated political order, and support fromPakistan and Saudi Arabia, paved the way for theTaliban, a largely Pashtun fundamentalistmovement that ruled most of the country from 1996to 2001.

In December 2001, U.S.-led forces ousted theTaliban, and an Interim Administration wasinstalled by the UN-brokered Bonn Agreement.Though headed by an ethnic Pashtun, Hamid

Karzai, leaders of the Shura-yi Nazar-i Shamali(Supervisory Council of the North),6 mainly Tajiksfrom the Panjshir Valley, dominated the cabinet.7The Emergency Loya Jirga (11-19 June 2002),which was expected to install a more balanced andhence more legitimate government, reinforced themonopoly of the Shura-yi Nazar over the centralgovernments security organs (army, intelligenceand police).8

5 Olivier Roy, Afghanistan: From Holy War to Civil War(Princeton, 1995), pp. 72-73, 93-95.6 The Shura-yi Nazar-i Shamali was a regional military andpolitical structure founded by Ahmad Shah Massoud. Itscore leaders were Panjshiris associated with the Jamiat-i

Islami party of former President Burhanuddin Rabbani.Many key figures in the Shura-yi Nazar now support apolitical party known as Nizhat-i Milli that is distinct from,but maintains links with,Jamiat-i Islami.7 The so-called power ministries of interior, defence andforeign affairs were held by Younus Qanuni, MohammadQasim Fahim and Abdullah Abdullah.8 For more details on the Loya Jirga, see ICG AfghanistanBriefings: The Loya Jirga: One Small Step Forward?, 16May 2002 and The Afghan Transitional Administration:Prospects and Perils, 30 July 2002.

Though some effort was made to counterbalancethis control of the security organs by establishingPashtun dominance of financial institutions, theconcentration of political power in Panjshiri handshas led to resentment among Pashtuns. Accordingto Ahmed Rashid, a noted analyst:

The central political issue is Pashtunrepresentation at the centre. There has to beroom for them in the political process orAfghanistan is likely to remain precariouslyunstable.9

Although Pashtuns lack national leaders apartfrom the former king, Zahir Shah, who retains theallegiance of most Pashtuns their numbers andstrategic location within the country represent

important political facts. To convert peace intolasting political stability requires addressinglegitimate ethnic grievances and promotingrepresentative governance both in the centre and inthe provinces. Loss of power at the centrefollowing the collapse of Taliban rule, and thefragmentation of the Pashtun south and east amongcommanders with very narrow support bases, haveleft most Pashtuns without a stake in the politicalprocess set forth in Bonn.

Analysing the ethnic fissures permeating state andsociety in Afghanistan remains crucial to anassessment of the prospects for reconstruction andpolitical stabilisation, though sectarian, linguisticand religious identities are also important. ManyAfghans feel that regional countries, the Westernmedia and international human rights organisationsemphasise ethnicity too much in their politicalcalculus. Influential Pashtuns in Pakistan also warnagainst a concentration on ethnic ties that ignoresthe complex and overlapping territorial, economic,and factional relationships among Afghanistans

ethnic groups.10 Indeed, Afghans tend to deny thatethnicity plays a major role in their political efforts,though they are quick to point to their grievancesagainst other ethnic groups.

Political leaders typically use group identity in theircompetition for power and resources byreconstructing history around symbols of ethnic orreligious differences, especially during civil wars.As one close observer of Afghanistan, Barnett

9 ICG interview with Ahmed Rashid, July 2002.10 ICG interviews, Peshawar and Quetta, May 2002.


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Rubin, notes, the sub-ethnic homogeneity of theTaliban and Massouds forces helped themcoordinate and prolong civil wars.11 NorthernAlliance commanders often exploited thehistorically rooted anti-Pashtun sentiments amongHazaras, Uzbeks and Tajiks to forge unity amongtheir forces, a tactic that backfired as it alienatedPashtuns.12 Similarly, Pashtun reluctance to accepta Tajik-dominated central government was put togood use by the Taliban.

Many Afghanistan experts believe that this use ofethnic and sub-ethnic solidarity to mobilise militaryand political action has increased the ethnicpolarisation of Afghan society.13 Ethnic and triballoyalties are not fixed, however, and remain subjectto political negotiations. Fundamentalist leaders

like Gulbuddin Hikmatyar, for example, haveplayed both pan-Islamic and ethnic cards, as andwhen needed. In sum, ethnicity is one of theprimary fault lines around which politicians wagetheir battles for power in Afghanistan but it is notthe only one.

11 ICG interview with Barnett Rubin, New York, April2002.12 See Bernt Glatzer, Is Afghanistan on the Brink of

Ethnic and Tribal Disintegration, in William Maley, ed.,Fundamentalism Reborn: Afghanistan and the Taliban

(Lahore, 2002), pp.167-181.13 ICG interviews, June and July 2002.

BACKGROUND

STATE FORMATION AND PASHTUN

DOMINANCE (1747-1973)

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,Afghanistan was at the centre of imperialcompetition between the Safavid Persian andMoghul empires.14 The critical feature of thisperiod of competition was the transformation ofsouthern Pashtun tribalism into a vehicle forSafavid political domination. To consolidate theircontrol over western Afghanistan, the Safavidsappointed specific Pashtun tribes or clans to headtribal confederations and conferred special

privileges upon them. As a result, the Durrani tribesof Popalzai and Barakzai and the Ghilzai tribes ofHotaki and Tokhi rose to prominence.15

After the death of the Persian emperor Nadir Shah,Ahmed Shah Durrani, a Saddozai commander inhis army,16 established an independent governmentin Kandahar in 1747. In the absence of alternativesocial bases, Ahmed Shah relied on Durrani tribalsupport. The Saddozai emperor was forced torecognise the political and economic autonomy ofthe Durrani tribes, thus retarding the growth of

centralised economic and political power.17 Statepatronage (land grants, tax concessions) helped theDurrani tribal chiefs (khans) consolidate theirpolitical and economic influence, largely at theexpense of non-Pashtun ethnic groups such as theHazaras, Tajiks, and Uzbeks, as well as their rivals,the Ghilzai Pashtuns. Durrani tribes were alsoexempted from providing levies, a task that wasentrusted to the Ghizai tribes.

In the later part of the nineteenth century,

incursions from Russia and Britain resulted in thecreation of Afghanistan as a buffer state betweenthe imperial rivals.18 Amir Abdur Rahman Khan

14 The Safavids controlled the western regions of present-day Afghanistan, while the Moghuls ruled over Kabul andthe East. Control of Kandahar alternated between the twoimperial powers.15 See Vartan Gregorian, The Emergence of Modern

Afghanistan: Politics of Reform and Modernisation, 1880-

1946(Stanford, 1969).16 The Saddazoi are a clan within the Popalzai tribe.17 Gregorian, op cit., pp. 39-40.18 The Russians pushed toward Afghanistan from CentralAsia, the British from India.


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(1880-1901)19 agreed to the demarcation of theDurand Line between Afghanistan and the BritishEmpire in 1893 a border that divided the Pashtunsroughly in half. While Britain controlledAfghanistans foreign relations, internal autonomy,aided by British subsidies, gave the Amir theopportunity to create the institutional vestiges of acentral state (army, civil administration, schoolsand universities) less reliant on tribal support.Rebellious tribes were crushed, many Ghilzai wereforcibly resettled in the north, and supportivePashtun khans were generously rewarded with land.

In 1919, Amir Amanullah Khan declaredindependence from Britain and embarked on aradical project of modern statehood. He gave thecountry its first constitution, which established

formal equality among his subjects and abolishedthe special privileges previously enjoyed by thePashtuns. Not unexpectedly, his attempts atmodernisation were seen by the Pashtun and non-Pashtun tribal and religious elites alike asinfringements on their traditional authority. By1928, appeals presenting Islam as being underthreat galvanised revolts in both Pashtun and Tajikareas. In 1929, Baccha-e Saqqao, a Tajik fromKohistan, captured power with a narrow supportbase in the religious establishment. Nadir Khan, a

general in Amanullahs army, rallied Pashtun tribesto oust Saqqao.20 After Nadirs assassination in1933, his son, Zahir Shah, ruled until 1973.

In 1947, when the British ceded independence toIndia and Pakistan, the shifting regional balance ofpower gave Afghanistan the opportunity to exploitPashtun nationalist sentiments on both sides of theDurand Line. It argued that the Pashtun-populatedareas of the North-West Frontier Province andBaluchistan should have had the option of mergingwith Afghanistan at the time of Indias partition.Afghanistans refusal to recognise the Durand Lineas the international border created lasting tensionswith Pakistan and was to have a deep impact on thecourse of politics in both countries.

To compensate for state weakness, both NadirKhan and Zahir Shah continued to rely on Pashtuntribal and landed power. The states failure to forgeorganic links with civil society groups and its

19 The Musahiban are a lineage within the Muhammadzaiclan of the Barakzai tribe.20 Nadir Khan crowned himself King.

inability to create a reliable economic base left thecountry heavily dependent on external aid. In the1960s for example, foreign aid accounted for 40 percent or more of the budget, including virtually alldevelopment projects.21

Various sections of both the urban and ruralintelligentsia began to organise politically alongnationalist, communist, and Islamic lines. For the left-leaning urban intellectuals and Soviet-trainedmilitary officers, socialism emerged as a powerfulrallying cry. Responding to growing demands forpolitical participation, the King enacted a constitutionin 1964 with an elected parliament. But politicalparties were disallowed, and the elections returnedtribal and landed elites to the parliament. Dissatisfiedwith this faade of representation, leftist parties like

the Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan(PDPA) and Islamic movements22 began to challengethe authority of the Durrani monarchy.

DECLINE OF DURRANI HEGEMONY (1973-

1979)

By 1973, tenuous state-society links maintained byan ethnically stratified state structure wereunravelling. Rising unemployment, reduced aid,

regional disparities and growing non-Pashtunresentment provided Mohammad Daud, the Kingscousin, grounds to abolish the monarchy anddeclare Afghanistan a republic. Dauds coup wasostensibly aimed at democratising the state andtherefore had the backing of the left-leaning urbanelite as well as the Soviet-trained army. However,he brutally suppressed leftist dissent, purged leftistarmy officers and repressed the Islamic opposition.While he relied on a fragmented Pashtun tribalstructure to preserve the economic, social andpolitical order, Daud adopted a pro-active policy ofexploiting the Pashtunistan issue.

21 Rubin, Fragmentation, op cit., p. 65.22 By the late 1960s, an Islamic movement had begun toemerge in the Sharia faculty of Kabul University. It latertook the shape of the Jamiat-i Islami, headed byBurhanuddin Rabbani, the Ittihad-i Islami, headed by Abdal-Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf and the Hizb-i Islami, headed byGulbuddin Hikmatyar. Dauds repression of the Islamic

extremists forced them to flee to Pakistan, which was atloggerheads with Afghanistan over the Pashtunistan issueand provided them with sanctuary from which to launch aninsurgency against the Daud regime.


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The threat of dissent from restive leftist elements aswell as the Islamic opposition weakened Daud, andthe left-leaning military, wary of his repression ofits PDPA comrades, deposed him in a bloody coupin April 1978. The Saur (April) Revolutioneffectively ended Durrani dynastic rule and markedthe ascendance of non-Durrani Pashtun politicalpower. The ruling Khalq (masses) faction of thePDPA was mainly Ghilzai and eastern Pashtun.23

Under Nur Mohammad Taraki, a Ghilzai Pashtun,the Khalqis implemented a radical Marxist reformagenda. The consequences were disastrous. Policiesaimed at destroying the power of the tribal, landedand religious elite fragmented Afghanistan furtherby alienating most political and social groups.Despite its pluralist rhetoric, the northern ethnic

groups perceived the regimes policies, especiallythe purges of the non-Pashtun Parcham members ofthe PDPA, as yet another form of Pashtundomination. The non-Pashtun resistance took thecharacter of a territorial and ethnic conflict with thecentre. Pashtuns, too, were averse to the purportedpluralism of the Khalqis. The resistance also forgedlinks with Pakistan-based Islamic parties, such asGulbuddin Hikmatyars Hizb-i Islami andBurhanuddin RabbanisJamiat-i Islami.

Marred by intra-party factionalism, the leftist eliteof the PDPA had little support from within societywith which to challenge the traditional powerholders. The feudal and tribal elites, as well as theclergy, were able to mobilise their ethnic,linguistic, religious and territorial constituencies inopposition to a weak state. The regimes violentcounter response aggravated divisions within thePDPA,24 alienated its urban support base, andsowed seeds of dissension in the army andbureaucracy along ethnic and ideological lines.

PDPARULE AND RESISTANCE (1979-1992)

The virtual disintegration of the Khalqi state led theSoviet Union to intervene militarily, replacing theKhalqis with the Parcham faction led by BabrakKarmal, a Dari-speaker from Kabul. The statesdepleted authority outside cities sustained by the

23 The PDPA was divided into the Khalq (masses) faction

and the Parcham (flag) faction, whose membership basewas among urban Pashtuns and Tajiks.24 Taraki was replaced by his deputy, Hafizullah Amin, inSeptember 1979.

Soviet military and the divided nature of anti-Soviet resistance led to further socialfragmentation. The Karmal regime moved awayfrom Khalqi policies aimed at radically altering thepower of the religious, tribal and landed elite. Theregime created a Ministry of Nationalities, givingofficial status to previously unrecognised languagesand enlisting Uzbeks, Turkmen, and members ofother historically marginalised groups to teachthose languages in schools.

By the time the Soviet Union intervened militarily,the country was already engulfed in civil war.Resistance to the Soviet invasion was largely local(organised around ethnic, tribal, sub-tribal, clan orsectarian identities), and loosely affiliated with theIslamic parties supported by regional patrons to

leverage foreign aid for the anti-Soviet Jihad. TheSunni Islamic parties backed by the United States,Saudi Arabia and Pakistan became the bulwark ofopposition to the Soviet-backed Parcham regime.25Though these parties were Islamic, their supportwas more or less along ethnic lines.

By the mid-1980s, changes in the Kremlin as wellas dtente with the U.S. led to a reappraisal ofSoviet policy in Afghanistan. Moscow replacedKarmal with Dr. Mohammad Najibullah, an

Ahmadzai Ghilzai Pashtun, in 1986.

26

With Sovieteconomic and military aid, Najibullah resorted tothe time tested tools of manipulation to exploittribal rivalries. In addition, the state supported thecreation and expansion of semi-autonomous non-Pashtun militias to balance the Khalqi-dominatedmainly Pashtun army. These militias, whichincluded the Jowzjan militia of Uzbek commanderAbdul Rashid Dostum, evolved into powerfulregional and ethnic forces. Due to the flow of aidfrom Moscow, the Najibullah government was ableto endure the factional and ethnic conflict thatpermeated state institutions.27

25 The seven recognised Sunni Mujahidin parties wereBurhannudin Rabbanis Jamiat-i Islami, Hizb-i Islami (thefaction led by Gulbuddin Hikmatyar), Hizb-i Islami (thefaction led by Younis Khalis), Pir Sayyid Ahmad GailanisNational Islamic Front for Afghanistan (NIFA), Abd al-Rabb al-Rasul Sayyafs Ittihad-i Islami, SibghatullahMujaddidis Afghan National Liberation Front (ANLF),

and Maulvi Nabi MohammadisHarkat-i Inqilab-i Islami.26 Najibullah had been chief of KhaD, the KGB-organisedintelligence agency, Rubin, op.cit., pp.122-124.27 Ibid., p. 150.


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During the war, politics was sharply polarisedalong ethnic lines but this was more the effect ofthe crisis than its cause. Non-Pashtuns, benefitingfrom the Soviet-backed states more balancedethnic policies as well as external support, wereable to assert political and economic autonomyboth from the state and from Pashtun dominance.The Hazarajat gained autonomy for the first time ina century, as the Afghan government concentratedits forces on more strategic fronts. Tajiks wonmilitary ascendancy in the northeastern PanjshirValley, with mainly Western assistance. Uzbeks,long resentful of Pashtun landlords in provincessuch as Faryab and Balkh, reaped economicdividends from the Soviets for their support of theKabul government. After the Soviet withdrawal,Tajiks and Uzbeks also increased their share in the

states administrative and military apparatus,gradually eroding traditional Pashtun dominance.

CIVIL WAR AND TALIBAN RULE (1992-2001)

President Najibullah, grappling with factionalismwithin the PDPA, weakened by the withdrawal ofSoviet aid, and hoping for a peaceful transition,resigned in 1992 in favour of a neutral administration.With the Peshawar-based and mainly Pashtun

opposition parties failing to agree on a transitionaladministration, the Tajik troops of Ahmed ShahMassoud took over the capital with Dostumsassistance, after the pro-Najibullah Uzbekcommander joined the Mujahidin in 1992. TheNorthern Alliance, formed by the largely Tajik

Jamiat-i Islami, the Uzbek Junbish-i Milli and theHazara Hizb-i Wahdat, represented non-Pashtunelements brought together by opposition to thePeshawar-based Sunni Pashtun parties.

But internal rivalries and divergent regionalinterests continued to hamper creation of a viablecentral authority. President Rabbani had littleinfluence outside of Kabul, the northeast, andHerat, which were largely controlled by Jamiat-i

Islami commanders. Anarchy reigned in much ofthe country, with local commanders ruling over apatchwork of fiefdoms independent of the nominalcentral government.28

28 The eastern Pashtun provinces, for instance, werecontrolled by the Eastern (Nangarhar) Shura, comprising acoalition of former anti-Soviet mujahidin commanders.

The anti-Soviet jihad and the spread of radicalpolitical Islam during that time deeply transformedPashtun societies otherwise insulated from theintrusions of a weak and distant state. The dynamicthat had kept the clergy politically subordinate tothe tribal leadership collapsed during the jihad. Inthe absence of tribal authority, madrassa-basedulema (clergy), aided by Pakistan, Saudi Arabiaand the U.S., had gradually filled the social andpolitical vacuum during the anti-Soviet jihad.29

After the mujahidin takeover of Kabul, the absenceof central government authority and the control ofstrategic trade routes by rival warlords imposedenormous costs on commerce for Afghan andPakistani traders involved in the multi-milliondollar transit and drug trade. They also blocked

Pakistans access to Central Asia. Hence, acoalition of traders, Pakistani authorities andreligious parties facilitated the rise of the Taliban.30The continued domination of non-Pashtuns inKabul and the widespread anarchy in the countryhad galvanised ethnic Pashtun resentment againstthe Tajik-dominated political order at the centre, asentiment the Taliban used to their advantage.

Against this background of civil strife, the Taliban,initially mostly Durrani (and later also Ghilzai)

Pashtuns, emerged in 1994 in Kandahar.

31

Exploiting their ethnic ties with other Pashtuns,they moved quickly to establish control over thePashtun southern and eastern provinces by co-opting local warlords and disarming militias. Theycaptured Herat in 1995 and dislodged Massoudsforces from Kabul in 1996, restricting them to thenortheast. With extensive Pakistani tactical andfinancial support, the Taliban had gained control ofroughly 90 per cent of Afghanistan by the end of2000.

The Taliban were able to build their military forceby using their links with Islamic parties in Pakistan,financial support from Pakistan and Saudi Arabiaand technical assistance from the Pakistani military.Meanwhile, the ties forged between Arab andAfghan mujahidin during the anti-Soviet resistance

29 These included members of the seven Peshawar-basedmujahidin parties.30 Taliban is the plural for talib or student. Ahmed Rashid,

Taliban: The Story of the Afghan Warlords (London,2001), pp. 26-30.31 Ibid, pp. 17-30, for an account of the immediatecircumstances surrounding the emergence of the Taliban.


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facilitated the return to Afghanistan of Islamicextremists such as Osama bin Laden. The Talibanleadership developed close links with bin Laden,who furnished both money and his largely Arab al-Qaeda cadres to fight alongside them. Afghanistanbecame a terrorist safe haven as militants fromKashmir, Central Asia, the Philippines and severalArab countries moved in.

The Taliban gradually began to lose support inPashtun areas once their consensual decision-making processes gave way to a much narrowerpower structure, in which their non-Afghan alliesplayed a critical role. By 2001, moderatinginfluences within the Taliban had been sidelined,and the Taliban shuras (councils) in Kandahar andKabul had ceased to function. Forcible conscription

and mounting casualties, including the loss of anestimated 2,000 fighters who were summarilyexecuted after the Talibans first defeat in Mazar in1997,32 also contributed to disaffection in the southand east.

Renewed Western, Russian and Indian assistance tothe United Front during 2001 and the Talibansown dwindling support base allowed Massoud toclose in on his former capital of Taloqan and alliedanti-Taliban forces to reclaim much of the large

western province of Ghor. Yet the United Frontsprospects of ousting the Taliban remained slightuntil the U.S.-led Coalition intervened militarily inAfghanistan on 6 October 2001, in response to the11 September terrorist attacks on New York andWashington.33 As a result of that intervention, theTaliban were swiftly removed from Kabul and theprovincial capitals, with their last stronghold,Kandahar, falling on 6 December. At the sametime, taking advantage of their collaboration withthe U.S.-led Coalition, United Front troops tookover Kabul, and former resistance commanders andlocal shuras quickly reasserted control over areasthey ruled between 1992 and 1996.

In the wake of the U.S. intervention, Pashtunleaders failed to exhibit cohesiveness either in thefield against the Taliban or in negotiations with theNorthern Alliance. The Eastern Shura, representing

32 See Human Rights Watch, The Massacre in Mazar-i Sharif,November 1998, Chapter Two, at

http://www.hrw.org/reports98/afghan/.33 Massoud was assassinated by suspected Al-Qaedamilitants on 9 September 2001, just two days before theterrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre.

the key eastern provinces of Nangarhar, Laghmanand Kunar, initially launched a campaign to enlistformer mujahidin commanders and other anti-Taliban groups behind the return of former kingZahir Shah. Its members also hoped to open amilitary front against the Taliban in the east buttheir efforts to forge a southern Pashtun coalitionbogged down quickly due to internal differences.The Talibans capture and execution in late October2001 of Abdul Haq, a celebrated resistancecommander during the Soviet occupation,eliminated the Pashtun leader with perhaps the bestprospects for creating an effective military front inthe east while maintaining a bridge to the northernmujahidin.34 Amid the entry into Kabul of themainly Tajik United Front forces, the Pashtuncoalition in the making fell by the wayside as

commanders raced to establish their own authorityover parts of the south and east.

34 Similar efforts by Pashtun leaders (Karzai and Sherzai) werecoordinated from the southern Pakistani city of Quetta.


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THE BONN PROCESS

The jihad against the Soviets and the civil war thatfollowed disrupted traditional state-society linkagesand sharpened religious, ethnic and sectarian faultlines. While the U.S. intervention has abruptly endedthe civil war, the forced redistribution of politicalpower at the centre has created new tensions andpressures, threatening a return to the chaos of the1990s. Hence the central task for the internationalcommunity overseeing Afghanistans post-conflicttransition is to ensure that a legitimate state authoritywith a monopoly of force is reconstituted, therebypreventing Afghanistan from falling back into yetanother cycle of factional violence.

Equally important for a durable political transition,however, is achieving an approximate balancebetween the competing ethno-regional interests.Restoration of the traditional Pashtun dominance islikely to be resisted by other ethnic groups. Yet, thecurrent dispensation favouring Panjshiri Tajiksremains equally illegitimate in the eyes of mostPashtuns and other Afghan ethnic groups.

THE BONN AGREEMENT

A UN-brokered conference in Bonn in earlyDecember 2001 resulted in an InterimAdministration that was to govern for six months.Installed on 22 December 2001, it was headed byHamid Karzai, a Popalzai Pashtun tribal leader andformer deputy foreign minister from Kandahar.However, the new political dispensation wasdominated by Tajiks from the Panjshir Valley, thelate Massouds native region and power base.

The Bonn Accords provided for the holding of anEmergency Loya Jirga (Grand National Assembly)before the end of the Interim Authoritys six-monthtenure. It was to elect the head and key personnel ofa two-year transitional government to prepare thecountry for a new constitution and generalelections. The Emergency Loya Jirga, inauguratedby the former King Zahir Shah in June 2002, pavedthe way for the creation of Hamid Karzaistransitional government that will rule Afghanistanuntil 2004, when general elections are scheduled.

THE EMERGENCY LOYA JIRGA

The Transitional Administration formed after theEmergency Loya Jirga in June 2002 largelymaintained the dominance of ministers associated

with the Shura-yi Nazar. In addition to retaining thedefence ministry, Marshal Mohammad QasimFahim gained the portfolio of vice president.Abdullah Abdullah remained the countrys foreignminister. After threatening to refuse the new post,Younus Qanuni was compensated for hisreassignment from the interior to the educationministry with his appointment as the Presidentsinternal security advisor.35 Haji Abdul Qadir, thebrother of Abdul Haq and leader of the EasternShura, gained the post of vice president, but wasgunned down in Kabul on 6 July 2002. While thecircumstances surrounding his assassination remainsubject to speculation (both political and economicmotives have been cited), his death left the cabinetwithout an influential Pashtun leader.

According to Pir Ishaq Gailani, leader of theNational Solidarity Movement of Afghanistan anda member of an earlier peace process known as theCyprus process:36

Bonn had created the false hope that some

form of political power will be transferred tothe majority Pashtuns. That didnt happen,guns still rule Afghanistan. Those hopes andtrust were trampled in the Loya Jirga.37

35 For an analysis of the Bonn process and the AfghanInterim Authority, see ICG Briefing,Loya Jirga, op. cit.36 Before the fall of the Taliban, there were two rival effortsamong Afghans to find a solution to the conflict. The RomeProcess, started in the early 1990s and led by the former

king, Zahir Shah, brought together technocrats, academics,tribal elders, former civil servants and politicians whosupported the re-establishment of a constitutionalmonarchy in Afghanistan. The Rome group long advocatedthe convening of a Loya Jirga to elect a broadly basedgovernment. One of four groups participating in the UN-sponsored talks on Afghanistan in Bonn, members of thegroup were given several cabinet posts in the AfghanInterim Authority. The Cyprus Process, created in 1999,was Iran-backed and intended to counter the Rome process.Influenced by fundamentalist groups like theHizb-i-Islami(Hikmatyar), it included mostly Afghan expatriates. It alsocalled for a Loya Jirga to elect a broadly representative

national government. A three-member delegationrepresented the group in the UN talks held in Bonn inDecember 2001.37 ICG interview, Peshawar, July 2002.


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Even before the Loya Jirga, there were widespreadgrievances among Pashtuns about the conduct ofthe Bonn political process, fuelled by theexpanding influence of non-Pashtun armed factionsduring the Interim Administration. But given theopportunities created by the fall of the Taliban andgeneral war weariness, Pashtuns continued toexpress at least verbal support for the InterimAuthority, the Loya Jirga and the peace process.38

Pashtun delegates had pinned their hopes forreclaiming lost ground in Kabul on the formerKings candidacy to head the TransitionalAdministration.39 As one delegate noted, theunceremonious manner in which he (Zahir Shah)was shown the exit under the auspices of the U.S.special envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, and the UN

created the impression that the Loya Jirga was arubber-stamp for the Panjshiri-dominated InterimAuthority.40 The intimidating presence inside thetent of the Shura-yi Nazar-controlled NationalSecurity Directorate, the countrys internal securityagency, undermined the confidence of delegates ofall ethnic backgrounds in the neutrality of theprocess.

Many Pashtun delegates interviewed by ICG claimthey voted for Karzai in the hope that he would

consult them over his cabinet. Under pressure fromthe Shura-yi Nazar, however, Karzai used thelegitimacy accorded him by the landslide vote toimpose his cabinet. The composition of thecabinet has widened the ethnic rift between thePanjshiri Tajiks and Pashtuns, says Rasul Amin,an ethnic Pashtun and education minister in theInterim Administration, and the perception thatKarzai had betrayed his ethnic Pashtuns is nowfirmly embedded in the minds of the Pashtuns.41

Most observers, including Amin, agree that Pashtuns

left the Loya Jirga disappointed and frustrated.Resentful yet still optimistic, however, severalPashtun delegates claimed that their conduct duringthe protracted proceedings had proved that Pashtuns

38 These conclusions are based on ICG interviews withPashtun commanders as well as UN officials involved inthe Loya Jirga process.39 Support for Zahir Shah seemed to cut across ethnic lines.Many Uzbeks and non-Panjshiri Tajiks, resentful of the

disproportionate influence of the Shura-yi Nazar, alsobacked the King.40 ICG interview, Kabul, June 2002.41 ICG interview, Kabul, July 2002.

were not mere terrorists, Taliban or al-Qaedasupporters. According to a Pashtun delegate fromKandahar, we know how to use our guns but we canalso engage in a democratic dialogue.42 Thesedelegates believe the Loya Jirga gave Pashtuns fromall over the country their first chance in 24 years toform networks and assert a political voice, albeit withlittle success and only for a short period.

While resistance may not be in the cards for now,the growing sense of Pashtun alienation should notbe dismissed as mere angst. Pashtun clerics andtribal elites have, in the past, exploited populardiscontent to foment revolt. A UN officialconcludes that there is a sense of alienationamongst the Pashtuns but not a complete loss ofhope as yet.43 According to Ahmed Rashid, the

threat of instability is most likely to arise whenPashtuns feel utterly helpless in the face ofunfavourable political developments, though thereaction is likely to be localised, as the Pashtuns arefragmented and leaderless.44

42 ICG interview, Kabul, June 2002.43 ICG interview, Kabul, June 2002.44 ICG interview, Islamabad, July 2002.


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REPRESENTATION AT THE CENTRE

PRESIDENCY AND CABINET

Although President Karzai assumed office withreasonably strong support across the south and east,many Pashtuns harbour deepening worries about hisability to lead the country. Karzais inability to limitthe Shura-yi Nazars power at the centre, or tosuccessfully challenge local warlords elsewhere inthe country, has produced increasingly profounddisillusionment. The gunmen came and stole theirpositions within the government after the fall of theTaliban, a tribal leader from the southeast told ICG.The government never appointed them, but the

government also cannot get rid of them. Thegovernment is not the government until it can dothis.45

Southern Pashtuns say the Presidents popularitysoared when in October 2002 he announced thedismissal of 30 middle-level commandersthroughout the country, who were often the worstof the warlords. Compliance with the order wasinconsistent, however, and largely dependent onU.S. pressure. It was disregarded in thesouthwestern province of Nimruz,46 while in

Jalalabad, Governor Haji Din Mohammad promptlyremoved the four named officials, and in KandaharIntelligence Chief Gulalai yielded his post afterreportedly being threatened with arrest by U.S.Special Forces.47 Karzais announcement,moreover, conspicuously avoided Shura-yi Nazarallies who were responsible for some of the sameabuses that had been cited as reasons for thedismissal of other officials. For example, HazratAli, the Eastern Corps Commander, retained hispost even though his officers were illegally levying

tolls at a check-post on the PeshawarKabul road.48

The U.S. and other members of the internationalcommunity sought, at Bonn and during theEmergency Loya Jirga, to balance Panjshiri controlof the central governments security organs withPashtun control of the key financial institutions.

45 ICG interview with an Ahmadzai tribal leader, Kabul, 25March 2003.46 ICG interview, Kandahar, December 2002.47 ICG correspondence with Western diplomats, Kabul,October-November 2002.48 Ibid.

Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a distinguished WorldBank anthropologist, was appointed as financeminister, while Anwar ul-Haq Ahadi was namedgovernor of the Afghan Central Bank. There wasone major flaw in this strategy: the independentresource base and military force of most regionalauthorities and some central government ministersgives the financial institutions only limited leverageover them, and in turn, leaves the latter reliant oninternational assistance. (Ghani has managed tocajole some regional authorities, such as Heratgovernor Ismail Khan, into transferring a portion oftheir revenue to the centre, symbolically animportant step, but of limited value unless suchtransfers become regular and systematic.)

Under international pressure, Defence Minister

Fahim has responded, but only half-heartedly, tocriticisms that Panjshiris are disproportionatelyrepresented in the central governments securityorgans. On 20 February 2003, he announced areshuffling within the defence ministry, withUzbeks, Pashtuns, and Hazaras assuming posts thatwere, in most cases, previously held by Panjshiris.The changes involved eleven department heads andincluded the appointment of a Pashtun general, GulZarak Zadran, as an additional deputy minister ofdefence. Zadrans appointment, however, does little

to alter the balance of power in the ministry andarguably even reinforces it. A supporter ofIttihad-i

Islami leader Abd al-Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf (who isin turn a key Pashtun ally of former PresidentRabbani), Zadran has expressed a firm belief thatmujahidin should form the basis of the new AfghanNational Army.49

Earlier, on 28 January, Karzai named Ali AhmadJalali as interior minister, replacing Taj MohammadWardak. Wardak had been appointed by theEmergency Loya Jirga in June in an attempt to dispelimpressions of a Panjshiri monopoly of state security,but proved entirely ineffectual in restructuring andprofessionalising his ministry. Jalali, a Pashtun likeWardak, assumed office with an ambitious andpublicly stated goal of carrying out a completeoverhaul of the police forces.50 But like other

49 ICG interview with an Afghanistan scholar, Kabul,March 2003.50 A former lecturer at Afghanistans Military College,

secretary to the defence minister, and military planner forAfghan resistance factions after the Soviet invasion, Jalalireturned to Afghanistan in January 2003 after 21 years ofexile in the U.S., where he served as the head of the Voice


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members of the Afghan diaspora who occupy highoffice in the central government, his lack of apowerful domestic support base has made it hard forhim to break up the combination of military andeconomic power enjoyed by individual commandersand the factions with which they are linked.

LEADERSHIP ALTERNATIVES

When questioned about the 2004 elections,Pashtuns in the south almost universally seemed tofeel that if they were fair and democratic, theywould break the perceived domination of Panjshirisin the central government. Few appeared willing toaccept an election victory by an ethnically Tajikparty, though there was strong support for Karzai

maintaining a close working relationship with Tajikleaders.

Opportunities for Pashtuns to mobilise around non-militarised parties whether or not ethnically based are constrained by a lack of security conditionsthat would allow those parties to campaign openlyas well as by an ambiguous legal status. Unlessthose needs are addressed, political space in theelections is likely to be monopolised by themilitarised parties that are now represented in the

central government.

Led by Central Bank Governor Ahadi, the Pashtunnationalist Afghan Millat party enjoys substantialsupport among educated Pashtuns in easternAfghanistan. Afghan Millat activists report that inJalalabad, the main city in the east, fear of localgunmen prevents them from operating openly.51Since the assassination of Haji Qadir, power inJalalabad has shifted toward Eastern CorpsCommander Hazrat Ali. A member of the Pashaiminority from the north of Nangarhar Province, he

has used the backing of Defence Minister Fahim toconcentrate military and police powers in hislargely Pashai forces.

In Kabul, three non-ethnic, pro-democracy partieswith Pashtun leadership or substantial Pashtunmembership the Council for Peace and

of Americas Dari, Pashto and Persian services. AbdulWaly, New Interior minister prepares overhaul of police

services, Kabul Weekly, 30 January 2003, p. 1. BehrozKhan, Major Shuffle in Karzai Government Likely, The

News, 20 January 2003.51 ICG interview, Kabul, May 2003.

Democracy in Afghanistan, the NationalProgressives Council, and the Movement forDemocracy in Afghanistan formed theDemocratic Coalition at the beginning of 2003.According to Fazal ur-Rahman Orya, a Pashtunwho heads the coalition, its objectives aredemocracy, political pluralism, free marketeconomics, a resolution to the nationality crisis inAfghanistan, and [maintaining] the integrity of thecountry.52 The coalition has opened a provincialoffice in Jalalabad, and says it has representativesin Mazar, Kunduz, Baghlan, and other provinces.The main vehicle for disseminating its views is itsnewspaper, Mashal-e Democracy (Torch ofDemocracy), which is edited by Orya andpublished every fifteen days.

The Democratic Coalitions experience ofaddressing the issue of war crimes in Afghanistangraphically illustrates the informal limits onpolitical speech. After publishing an article in

Mashal-e Democracy calling for accountability forfaction leaders who were implicated in war crimesand naming several key figures associated with theUnited Front, Orya says he received a succession ofthreatening calls and visits from officials of theNational Security Directorate (Amaniyat). Duringone visit, he said, an Amaniyat representative

warned him:

Look, in Afghanistan, all your efforts arefruitless. Democracy is not implementable.The U.S. and the Coalition forces willeventually be defeated in Afghanistan, andtherefore we and the fundamentalist partieswill remain in power for a long time. I adviseyou to cease your activities.53

Sebghatullah Sanjar, a Tajik former member of theLoya Jirga commission and leader of the

Republican Party of Afghanistan, said that his partymembers cannot operate freely outside of Kabul.Even here, we cant display our board, he

52 ICG interview with Fazal ur-Rahman Orya, Kabul,February 2003.53 Ibid.Orya says he also received a phone call fromIttihad-i

Islami leader Sayyaf, about ten days before the Islamicholiday ofEid-i Qurbani (11-13 February 2003). Allegedly,Sayyaf requested a meeting at his residence, claiming Orya

had insulted him and questioned his dignity. Orya told ICGthat he said to Sayyaf, There are thousands of witnesses whocan say that your men have done these things. Sayyaf replied,We will see each other.


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asserted. Sanjar cited an article in the Ministry ofDefence publication Dafa that captured theatmosphere in which pro-democracy partiesoperate. The article, he said, stated that elementsespousing democracy were a threat to theachievements of the jihad and to the morality ofAfghan youth.54

Apart from shared security concerns, past rivalriesand ideological differences impede effectivecoordination among parties that share similarviews. Leaders of pro-democracy parties includeformer members of Hizb-i Islami (Hikmatyarfaction) as well as bureaucrats in the Najibullahgovernment. Although they now espouse similarobjectives, fundamental trust between their leadershas yet to be achieved.

The absence of a regulatory framework withinwhich parties can operate has also impededpolitical mobilisation. A draft Political Parties Lawnow before the Cabinet would create significantbarriers to registration and the formation of partiesin provincial centres. The draft states that a partymust have at least 10,000 members, and that itscentral office must be located in the capital.55 It alsoincludes several requirements that militate againstparty leadership by Afghans who have lived abroad

for long periods.

56

The draft vests powers ofregistration in its author, the Ministry of Justice,and gives the Ministry broad grounds upon whichto seek the dissolution of a party.57 It would requirethat the constitution of each party not be in conflictwith the fundamentals of Islam or the nationalinterests of the country,58 and obligate parties tofollow and respect Islam and the historical andnational customs of Afghanistan.59

54 Interview with Sebghatullah Sanjar, Kabul, February 2003.55 Law on Political Parties (draft), Articles 11 and 12.56 The draft requires that the parents of both the leader ofthe party and his spouse must have been Afghans, that theleader should have lived at least ten years continuously inAfghanistan, except for the times in exile, and should nothave two nationalities. Ibid., Article 6.57 The Ministry of Justice, headed by Abdul Rahim Karimi,a former professor of Sharia, has also drafted laws onsocial organisations and the press that may adversely affectdemocratic development. See ICG Asia Report No. 45,

Afghanistan: Judicial Reform and Transitional Justice, 28January 2003, pp.10-11.58 Law on Political Parties (draft), Article 3.59 Ibid., Article 9.

One potential source of leadership, as yetunorganised politically and with limitedrepresentation in the cabinet, consists of the manyPashtun professionals with experience of workingin NGOs and development agencies in Afghanistanand the neighbouring countries.60 Most retain closeties to their communities of origin and could helpgive those communities an effective voice in thecentral government.

INSECURITY AND RESPONSE

For Pashtuns in northern and western Afghanistan,loss of political power since the Taliban collapsehas translated into pervasive insecurity and targetedviolence. Between November 2001 and January

2002, a wave of attacks on Pashtun communitiesacross northern Afghanistan, involving all three ofthe major United Front factions, resulted in massdisplacement and communal impoverishment.Abuses documented by human rights monitorsincluded summary executions, rape, denial ofaccess to agricultural land, and widespread lootingof livestock and movable property. Much of thedisplacement took place internally within the north,with rural Pashtuns fleeing to towns where they hadthe protection of local commanders, such as Balkh

and Baghlan. Others fled to Kandahar city, or tocamps located along the southeastern border.61

Violence against Pashtuns in the north abatedconsiderably by February 2002, partly because thesupport of Pashtun commanders had begun toemerge as an asset in the competition between therival United Front factions Jamiat-i Islami and

Junbish-i Milli, but also because the pillaging ofPashtun villages had been so thorough.Appropriation of farmland by Dostums Junbish-i

Milli commanders in Faryab Province continuedwell into 2002, however,62 and Human RightsWatch researchers in November 2002 reported an

60 Almost half the UN Drug Control Programs 4,000-strong local field staff during the Taliban period, forexample, were Pashtuns. ICG correspondence with AhmedRashid, 22 April 2003.61 See Human Rights Watch, Paying for the TalibansCrimes: Abuses against Ethnic Pashtuns in Afghanistan,April 2002. The report directly implicates the United Frontfactions Junbish-i Milli, Jamiat-i Islami, and Hizb-i

Wahdatin the violence against ethnic Pashtuns.62 Human Rights Watch, On the Precipice: Insecurity inNorthern Afghanistan, a Human Rights Watch BriefingPaper, New York, June 2002, Chapter IV.


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ongoing pattern of arbitrary arrests and beatings ofPashtuns in Herat, often on the pretext of suspectedcollaboration with the Taliban.63

In Bala Murghab, in the northwestern province ofBadghis, fighting on 24 March 2003 between a

commander allied with Ismail Khan and JumaKhan, a local Pashtun commander, resulted in therouting of the latters forces and grave humanrights violations against the Pashtun population inthe village of Akazi. An investigation by UNAMAand the Afghan Independent Human RightsCommission found that 38 civilians died (includingthree women and twelve children who drowned in ariver), 761 homes and 21 shops were looted, andthe bodies of 26 of Juma Khans fighters werefound executed, with their hands tied behind their

backs. Although the investigators declined tocharacterise the attack on Akazi as ethnically-motivated, their description of conditions in BalaMurghab prior to the attacks was consistent withthe pattern of abuses against Pashtuns elsewhere inthe north:

According to interlocutors there was analready established pattern of human rightsviolations in Bala Murghab prior to the recentfighting which may have even triggered the

conflict. Reportedly these included: forcedtaxation of the local population by soldiersand armed individuals not wearing anyrecognisable uniform; extortion of moneyand food; and confiscation of cattle andharvest. Failure to comply with the demandsof the soldiers resulted in ill treatment andtorture and even extra-judiciary executions.Interlocutors also pointed out that personsrefusing to comply with requests by thesoldiers were labelled as Taliban.64

Although the attacks on northern Pashtuns havebeen on one level simply crimes of opportunity,with armed groups targeting the most vulnerablepopulation in their area, they have also been drivenby the dispossession of many Hazara, Tajik, andUzbek farmers under Taliban rule. In many cases,inter-ethnic land disputes date back even further, tothe Durrani states settlement of Pashtuns in the

63 Ibid., p. 44.64 UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, press briefing byDavid Singh, UNAMA Public Information Officer, 27April 2003.

north from the late nineteenth to the mid-twentiethcenturies.

The fact that the latest cycle of dispossession tookplace not under a pariah regime such as the Taliban,but an administration created and supported by the

international community, demanded a response fromthe central government and the United Nations. Twoad hoc delegations appointed by President Karzaigathered extensive testimony about violence againstnorthern Pashtuns in early 2002, but theirrecommendations were never publicly disclosed orimplemented. On 17 October 2002, the TransitionalAdministration and the UN reached an agreement onthe formation of a Return Commission to helpfacilitate the return of northern Pashtuns.65 It was tobe chaired by Enayatullah Nazari, the Minister for

Refugees and Repatriation, and includerepresentatives of UNAMA, UNHCR, and theAfghan Independent Human Rights Commission.

By April 2003, there had been indications ofprogress, as well as some outstanding obstacles, inthe Commissions work. Its working group hadproduced four field mission reports, whoserecommendations, including an end to forciblerecruitment and occupation of land bycommanders, were endorsed during the first

meeting of the full Commission in Mazar (attendedby UNHCR head Ruud Lubbers as well as theleaders of all three major parties in the north). TheWorking Group had also begun informing Pashtuninternally-displaced persons (IDPs) and refugeesabout security conditions in their districts of origin,based on its own field assessments.

Returns, which are being monitored by UNHCRprotection officers, have mixed results on thecritical issue of access to land. In some areas,displaced Pashtuns have successfully recovered

their land, but there were also significant cases inwhich they were unsuccessful. In the absence of animpartial and competent judicial mechanism toadjudicate land disputes, as well as authoritativeland deeds, disputes between communities oftenremain unresolved. As one observer noted, therehave been cases in which members of different

65UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, press briefing byManoel de Almeida e Silva, UNAMA Spokesman, 20October 2002.


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ethnic communities have documents attesting theirtitle to the same tract of land.66

The Shura-yi Nazar-controlled northeasternprovinces of Baghlan and Takhar, from which largenumbers of Pashtuns were also displaced, remain

for now outside the Return Commissions ambit.An inter-agency commission for the return ofGujjar pastoralists a northeastern minority alsosubjected to reprisal attacks after the collapse of theTaliban was established in late 2002 with thecooperation of the Northeastern Corps Commander,Daud Khan. There has, however, been littlesubstantive progress in its work.67

Pashtuns in Kabul have not faced systematicviolence but they recount harassment and

discrimination by local police and intelligenceofficials. After the fall of the Taliban, keeping abeard and speaking Pashto can often turn out to bea nightmare in the capital, says one local Pashtun.There is an instant assumption on the part of theTajik security services that you are afundamentalist Talib. You are guilty withoutproof.68 Afghans investigating the mass arrests andshooting deaths of students during the 11November 2002 demonstration at Kabul Universitynoted that while both Tajik and Pashtun students

were taken into custody, the Pashtun students weregenerally detained longer.69

66 ICG interview with UN official, April 2003.67 ICG interviews with UN officials, Afghanistan,November 2002 and April 2003.68 ICG interview, Kabul, June 2002.69 ICG interview with an Afghan human rights investigator,Kabul, November 2002. Such selective discrimination hadalso been visited on Hazaras and Panjshiris in Kabul under

the Taliban; arbitrary arrests of young men from thesecommunities on the basis of suspected opposition activitywere frequent occurrences, particularly during periods ofintensified armed conflict in Hazarajat and the northeast.

WARLORDISM, TRADE AND

GOVERNANCE

In southern Afghanistan, as in other parts of the

country, Coalition intervention has beenaccompanied by a fragmentation of authority alongmuch the same lines as those that prevailed prior tothe Talibans emergence. Most Afghan provincesare dominated by several powerful local figureswho control militias, some of them in conflict withone another. While in some places there is apretence to rule of law, with official police forcesand a judiciary, in practice there are few exceptionsto the power of local potentates.

In southern Afghanistan, arbitrary arrest, torture,

and extortion are all common. Businesses arefrequently seized by commanders and their ownersthrown in one of many private prisons if theyprotest.70 Shopkeepers and wealthy citizens who arenot linked to commanders are often the targets ofextortion, sometimes being imprisoned and tortureduntil their families pay the required sum. Land isheld as somewhat more sacrosanct, but there areexamples of this kind of theft as well.71

This fragmentation and insecurity has had profound

implications for commerce in the Pashtun-majoritysouthern and eastern provinces, which include traderoutes vital to Pashtun business interests.72 Manytraders are now finding, as they did during the1992-1994 period, that the cost of doing businessunder such conditions is untenably high. The socialconsequences of warlordism in the Pashtun areas aselsewhere in Afghanistan are equally great:patronage along sub-ethnic lines by localauthorities has exacerbated internal divisions anddistorted traditional governance arrangements.

70 The information for this section of the report wasgarnered principally from interviews conducted in Dubai,Peshawar, and Quetta from June to July 2002, and inKabul, Kandahar and Helmand provinces from October toDecember 2002. Residents of Farah, Gardez, Ghazni,Oruzgan, and Zabul were also interviewed, mainly inKandahar and Kabul. ICG notes the great diversity ofviews among the Pashtun residents of those provinces onsome of the topics discussed here, and the impossibility offully capturing that diversity.71 ICG interviewed several victims of torture and extortion

in Kandahar, in December 2002.72 Prior to the U.S. military intervention, there were twoprimary Afghan trading routes: Kandahar-Chaman-Quettaand Jalalabad-Torkham-Peshawar.


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THE WAR ECONOMY

The principal source of political power forcommanders has always been economic. In thedesolation of the drought- and war-stricken south,

few industries survive. There are only threeindustries in the south, said one local NGOdirector, smuggling, opium, and the gun.73Foreign sponsorship is another source of funds, andone that is also monopolised by commanders.

Commanders in Herat, Helmand and Kandaharhave exclusive control over the road tolls that areset up on the massive smuggling routes to Iran andPakistan. One commentator, Ahmed Rashid,estimated that the smuggling trade accounts for 30per cent of the imported goods in the Pakistani

economy.74 Some of the tolls are unofficial, othersare semi-official customs charges, but few localsbelieve the funds raised find their way back intogovernment coffers. The opium trade remains moredecentralised, however, with many growers andtraders, and significant differences betweenprovinces. While some commanders are activelydeveloping control over the trade, others arekeeping more of a distance. Even thosecommanders who do not profit directly from thetrade, however, profit indirectly by extorting

money to allow wealthy opium traders to continuetheir business.75

In addition to these big money earners, smallerlocal industries are also monopolised by thecommanders. In anticipation of a U.S.-led roadbuilding project, Governor Sherzai and his familyhave amassed control of the local rock quarryingand cement businesses in Kandahar, a combinationthat gives him an effective personal monopoly overany local reconstruction.76

Southern Pashtuns watch this economic consolidationwith increasing unease. They know that patronage is akey source of any commanders power, and thewealthier the commanders are, the more they will beable to challenge the central government. The longerthese figures have to build up their wealth, the moreentrenched their political power will become. A

73 ICG interview with NGO director, Kandahar, October 2002.74 Rashid, Taliban, op. cit., p. 192.75 ICG interview with opium trader, Kandahar, December 2002.76 ICG interviews with local civil society members andbusinesspersons, Kandahar, November 2002.

clock is ticking, said one man from Farah province,the local commanders are racing the centralgovernment to consolidate their power.77

Commanders from the time of the anti-Sovietstruggle have deeply entrenched interests in a war

economy. As Barnett Rubin puts it, warlordism inAfghanistan is not the result of some ancienttraditions but rather the results of the countrysforced integration into the contemporary statesystem.78 The continuation of semi-conflict helpswarlords deter the stability that could undercut theirpower. Transition to real peace could disrupt thepredatory economy that provides them with theresources to maintain their authority and financetheir militias. In other words, chronic war inAfghanistan can be understood as the continuation

of power politics by economic means.

IMPACT ON TRADE

The war with the Soviets destroyed the ruralsubsistence economy.79 After the Soviet withdrawaland the decline in U.S. and Saudi aid for theresistance groups, the mujahidin elites, who had togenerate their own resources to retain and expandtheir power, grew ever more dependent on opium

production, trans-border trade and smuggling.

80

Throughout the civil war, local commandersextorted money for allowing the passage of goodsthrough their fiefdoms. Pashtun trading andtrucking groups are believed to have supported theTaliban to ensure the security of their businessinterests. The initial public acceptance of Talibanrule was based on their ability to end thelawlessness and restore a measure of stability in thewar-plagued country, said a Pashtun businessmenbased in Dubai.81

Afghan Pashtun traders form part of a transnationaleconomic network supported by ethnic and sub-ethnic ties that extends to the United Arab Emirates

77 ICG interview, Kandahar, December 2002.78 ICG interview with Barnett Rubin, New York, April 2002.79 According to the World Food Programme, 85 per cent ofthe Afghan population is dependent on agriculture. SeeWFP Launches Emergency Appeal For Afghanistan,News Release, 6 September 2000.80 See Barnett Rubin, The Political Economy of War andPeace in Afghanistan, World Development, Vol. 28, No. 9,2000, pp. 1789-1803.81 ICG interview, Dubai, July 2002.


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(which has the largest Afghan Pashtun diasporaafter Karachi). Traders typically purchase duty freeconsumer electronics and reconditioned cars inDubai for smuggling into Iran and Pakistan. Thisdiaspora sits atop a regional transit trade businessworth billions of U.S. dollars. A 1999 World Bankstudy estimated that illicit trade alone betweenAfghanistan and Pakistan was worth U.S.$2.5billion a year.82

The Afghan Pashtun traders based in the Pakistaniborder towns of Peshawar and Chaman, as well asin Dubai, believe they are the biggest losers fromthe fall of the Taliban.83 Businessmen involved intransporting consumer goods from Chaman in thePakistani province of Baluchistan to Kandahar, forinstance, claim trade volume has fallen because of

the uncertainty created by the re-emergence ofwarlords. They recall that the Taliban imposed asingle tax on goods passing through theirterritories. We dont know who is who. Everyonehas their own law now, their own taxes, says onetrader in Dubai.84

Pashtun traders say their participation in theeconomic reconstruction of Afghanistan iscontingent on the restoration of peace and security.A series of incidents of extortion and harassment

has emphasised their deep sense of insecurity. Inearly May 2002, two Afghan businessmen weredeprived of U.S.$100,000 near the southern Afghanborder town of Spin Boldak.85 In early August2002, hundreds of transport workers went on strikein the same area to protest the prohibitively hightaxes imposed on their goods by different localwarlords, as well as provincial authorities inKandahar and Herat.

Afghan Pashtun traders interviewed by ICG inDubai and Quetta say their problems are especially

acute in Herat. Herat is a no-go area for Pashtuntraders, as Ismail Khans forces do not tolerate us,complains the owner of a large general cargobusiness in Dubai.86 Many businessmen have had tohire Tajiks to run their business in Herat. Weremain at their mercy as Heratis know Pashtuns are

82 Afghanistan-Pakistan Trade Relations, World Bank,Islamabad, 1999.83 ICG interviews, June and July 2002.84 ICG interview, Dubai, July 2002.85 ICG interview, Quetta, June 2002.86 ICG interview, Dubai, July 2002.

vulnerable and often simply refuse to honour theirobligations, says a trader in Chaman.87

The strong economic and social linkages of Pashtuntraders across regional borders make them a uniquegroup with a lot of cash. Western diplomats in

Kabul say the potential role the traders can play inthe reconstruction and economic modernisation ofAfghanistan is a largely untapped resource thegovernment in Kabul has yet to recognise.Although their expressions of political partisanshipremain muted by feared association with theTaliban, they say they are traders first, andPashtuns later. We are generally interested inpeace and stability for our business interests and forthe good of Afghanistan, says a major car dealer inDubai. Traders are unlikely to support a particular

group or ethnic faction as long as there is peace andsecurity across Afghanistan.88

These resourceful traders are not likely to stand byas their livelihoods are threatened. We are findingways and means to deal with the kind of economicpredation that led many of us to lend our support tothe Taliban in the first place, says an AfghanPashtun electronics trader in Peshawar.89Nevertheless, traders are unlikely to challenge theprovincial authorities or local commanders in the

foreseeable future, since Pashtun economic power,much like political power, is fragmented andregionalised.

Cross border trade and smuggling exerts a strongcentrifugal force on the Afghan economy. Whileeach trader taps into the central governmentthrough his own kinship ties to individuals inKabul, an east-south division is perceptible amongthe traders. Influential commanders in theTransitional Administration try to promote thetrading community from their own regional

strongholds. This regionalisation means thatbusiness interests are served best in the short run bycourting individual commanders and ministers,rather than waiting for central authority toconsolidate. In that sense, the traders couldreinforce the fragmented distribution of politicaland economic power in Afghanistan.

The central government budget is almost entirelyfinanced by foreign aid since regional warlords

87 ICG interview, July 2002.88 ICG interview, Dubai, July 2002.89 ICG interview, Peshawar, July 2002.


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refuse to transfer customs revenues regularly toKabul. For instance, Ismail Khan has become amajor political and financial power earning anestimated U.S.$60 million to U.S.$80 million ayear by controlling trade to Iran and Central Asiathat passes through Herat.90 Such commanders havelittle incentive to abdicate their authority to thecentre, which is seen as weak and dependent onU.S. military strength for its survival. Notsurprisingly, Karzais efforts to lure them to thecentre have met little success. In late December2002, for example, President Karzai reportedlyasked Sherzai to come to Kabul as interior minister,which effectively would have removed him fromhis powerful post as Governor of Kandahar, butSherzai refused.91

While the perception that the political process inKabul has largely bypassed Pashtuns is widespread,the belief that development and reconstruction ofPashtun areas is a distant priority of the centralgovernment is also becoming commonplace. (Theplanned rehabilitation of the road betweenKandahar and Kabul is a major exception butprogress on the ground is as yet limited.) ThePashtun tribal belt, on both sides of the DurandLine, has a high incidence of poverty that feedscriminal activities as well as religious extremism.

The early promises of aid from the U.S. and itsallies created high expectations among Pashtuns onthe Afghan side of the border. But little of that aidhas materialised in the border provinces, andanticipation is slowly turning into frustration.

TRIBALISATION OF GOVERNANCE

The Taliban represented an unprecedented rise topower of the mullahs, at the expense of both triballeaders and mujahidin commanders (though manyof the latter were also absorbed by the Taliban). Inthe eastern mountains, where tribal institutionswere by far the strongest, the Taliban were seen bylocal tribal leaders as undermining Pashtunwali,and in turn, the basis of their authority. Theauthority of the tribal elders was really damaged bythe jihadi parties during the war, and then by the

90 See Afghan Power Brokers: Toll-taker Kingpin, The

Christian Science Monitor online edition, at http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0610/p01s03b-wosc.html.91 ICG interview with a senior UN Official, Kabul,December 2002.

Taliban who tried to impose a strict Shariaregime, said a Pashtun elder from Gardez.92

With the departure of the Taliban, not only have thecommanders returned but tribal leaders areattempting to reassert their pre-eminence in

Pashtun life.93 Today, warlordism is intertwined inthe complex distribution of regional andsubregional power, and local conditions varysignificantly with the individual commander. Theirgreatest legitimating factor lies in their ethnic andtribal affiliations. Commanders e

062 afghanistan the problem of pashtun alienation

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