Breakthrough in Afghan peace process

The US and the Taliban overcame a major sticking point in progress of the Afghan peace process when on Friday they agreed on a week-long reduction in violence. Speaking on the sidelines of a security forum in Munich, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo hailed the development as a "pretty important breakthrough." The truce was hammered out during recent days by the US envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad in strenuous negotiations with Taliban representatives in Doha, Qatar. Considering that after 19 years of war that remains stalemated, all sides seem to have come to the realisation that the only way forward is a political settlement of the conflict. Hence, the agreement should hold and lead to the next step, an all-out ceasefire.

President Donald Trump is serious about ending his country's longest war. After several rounds of talks, the Washington has agreed on a phased withdrawal of its forces and in return for the Taliban guaranteeing that Afghan territory would not be allowed to be used by foreign militants posing a security threat to US and other countries. But there are other complicated issues to be resolved. One is the need for Afghans to sort out their internal issues. The Taliban have been refusing to talk to the Kabul government, describing it as an American puppet. However, they have participated in two rounds of intra-Afghan dialogue hosted by Moscow, in which those they engaged with included former Afghan president Hamid Karzai and several women, while the third round in Doha involved several Afghan government officials, though in a "personal capacity." Lately, there has been some softening of the Taliban stance towards President Ashraf Ghani as well. A second and thornier issue that remains to be sorted out is how and on what terms the Taliban are to have a share in power. That could take considerable amount of time and energy, but may be resolvable in a loya jirga - a time-tested way of settling difficult problems in that country.

No one would be happier at the prospects of peace than the long suffering people of Afghanistan, civilians and soldiers alike, who have suffered vastly disproportionate casualties than the US and other members of the International Security Assistance Force. President Ghani said a year ago that 45,000 Afghan army personnel had been killed since he came to office in late 2014 while "the number of international casualties is less than 72." With the fighting intensifying in the last quarter of 2019, many more lives have been lost. Although no one has kept a count of civilian dead, hundreds of thousands are believed to have been killed and maimed. Afghanistan at peace with itself is what Pakistan also earnestly desires for, playing a significant role in bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table for the sake of its own peace and stability. Thankfully, progress in the peace process has already begun to show positive results. In recent months, at least three leaders of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) terrorists who had taken refuge in neighbouring Afghan provinces were killed, and another TTP group faced fatal crackdown by Afghan special forces - something unthinkable until a year ago.