Towards a terror-free zone?

THE UNITED STATES is beginning to exude confidence that its military campaign against the Taliban-Osama axis in Afghanistan is producing the desired results. On the diplomatic front, the U.S. Secretary of State, Gen. Colin Powell, has indicated that the anti-Taliban factions might meet soon at a neutral venue, possibly in Europe, to try and form an interim government as the first step in the wake of the Taliban's collapse in Kabul, the Afghan capital. The idea, as being canvassed by the U.S. and its allies, is that the proposed post-Taliban arrangement, a transitional set-up at best, would in due course pave the way for a government with the traditional Afghan characteristics of multi-ethnicity and multi-culturalism. While the West is keen to appear entirely neutral as regards this process, the fact remains that the U.S. cannot but seek to dictate the course of events, either gently if possible or indeed bluntly if necessary. It is, therefore, quite immaterial at this stage whether the anti- Taliban Northern Alliance had in fact made an autonomous move to take control of Kabul from the fleeing Taliban without an explicit American nod for the purpose. Washington's active interest in promoting a post-Taliban succession at this moment is the clearest sign yet that the U.S. is willing to let the internal dynamics of Afghanistan play out in a manner not detrimental to Washington's fundamental stakes in that hapless geopolitical arena. In a sense, the expanding boundaries of the territories under the writ of the motley anti-Taliban forces will narrow the terrain for the fugitive cover that might still be available to Osama bin Laden, the terrorist czar in the eyes of Washington and most of the world.

No tears need be shed for the plight of either Osama or the Taliban. However, the persistent doubts about the actual whereabouts of both Osama and the Taliban's Mullah Omar should caution the U.S. against any hasty moves in regard to Afghanistan at this time. There is no point in hastening to conceptualise Afghanistan as a possible terror-free zone in the absence of actual or credible evidence that the Taliban-Osama axis has been broken to the point of both being neutralised as diabolical purveyors of terror. The latest word from the U.S. is that Osama is still suspected to be in hiding inside Afghanistan itself, given his status as persona non grata in any of the neighbouring countries. Acquiring unusual importance in this context are the somewhat coordinated efforts of the U.S. Air Force and the anti- Taliban Afghan fighters on the ground to try and oust the Taliban from its remaining hold-outs such as Kunduz town. The battle for Kandahar, the Taliban's seat of receding power, has not yet been decisively joined.

On the whole, however, it is right that the United Nations has lost no time to turn the spotlight on the political future of Afghanistan even before the Taliban's death knell has been fully sounded. The concerns of Pakistan, for long the Taliban's guide and benefactor, will clearly need to be addressed in the context of Islamabad's recent disavowal of that group as also the overall Pakistani clamour for stability in Afghanistan. The U.S. National Security Adviser, Dr. Condoleezza Rice, has now indicated a policy compulsion that Afghanistan's ``neighbours and near neighbours'' should in some way or other be associated with the delineation of a post-Taliban dispensation. This makes sense and should please India which wants a new and friendly Afghan order.

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