A world of difference in Kabul

Yet — and this is unlike Sarajevo — there is no hostility towards internationals in Kabul, or at any rate no palpable hostility. This could be partly because we South Asians are inured to the existence of classes apart, in a way that the Europeanised Bosnians are not. But there is another reason too. In Afghanistan, the internationals had learned their lesson from Bosnia. They were not going to be vice-regal (which makes the US-UK proposal that Lord Ashdown, the former High Representative in Bosnia, take over as UN head in Afghanistan, all the more puzzling). And they were going to support state-building.

As a result, Afghanistan has a government. It is poor, faction-ridden and weak, but it is a government — and more importantly, unlike Bosnia, it is (in name at least) a unitary government. So Afghans have someone of their own to blame, and to hold accountable, which is an invaluable foundation for state-building, though often underestimated.

It is no surprise, then, that we hear plenty of blame on the streets. What is surprising is that we also hear an equal measure of understanding. By and large the Kabul intelligentsia support what the Karzai government stands for, while unhappy with its track record. “But Kabul is not Afghanistan,” they say. Unsure of who is going to win — Taliban or the internationally-backed Karzai government — provincial warlords prefer to wait, and consolidate their local authority. This means that state-building ends up entrenching local powers instead of sharing power between the centre and the region, and increases institutional and territorial fragmentation rather than unification.

We know from experience that this situation will change only when the country is secured, as happened in Bosnia under international peace enforcers. But the NATO-led force is numerically too small to secure the country, and there is as yet no prospect of a significantly larger international peacekeeping mission, bolstered by, for example, South Asian troops.

From the days of Bonn, it has been recognised that the Taliban and their sympathisers have to be brought into a peace process. The Afghan government appeared to have evolved a two-pronged approach to the task. The first prong was to drive a wedge between Afghan and Pakistani Taliban through encouraging disarmament and reintegration for the former, but fighting the latter. The strategy has not worked, partly because the NATO-led troops in Afghanistan cannot distinguish between Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, partly because the Pakistani government has not contained its Taliban, and mostly because the Taliban do not wish to be separated.

This puts the spotlight on the second prong, which is primarily political and partly cultural. Two years ago, the Afghanistan government and the Awami National Party launched a quiet initiative to revive pluralist and non-violent Pashtun identities through the symbol of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and his Khudai Khitmadgars. They began cautiously by opening a centre in his name in Jalalabad. The conference on Ghaffar Khan in Kabul that I was at was another step in this direction — and it was attended by a large delegation of Pakistani Pashtuns, led by the Awami National Party, who are today the governing party in the NWFP.

It was, for me, enormously humbling to be in a hall packed with Afghans who discussed, along with their Pakistani counterparts, a non-violent political process to isolate hardliners, under photographs of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. Sentimental as this may sound, it has a hard and practical political edge to it. A joint Afghan-ANP strategy will be the first time that there is potential for complementary action on both sides of the Durand Line (though to work fully, it will require Pakistani army backing). This is also the first time that I have felt Afghans, Indians and Pakistanis can work together in an Afghanistan peace process, which if true could be another important turning point.

Sadly, there was one point that the Afghans I met made over and over, so clearly they felt outsiders had missed it — the fact that they are all Afghans first. They are right that this is a point of strength for Afghan nation-building (as distinct from state-building). We have forgotten the enormous role that the 1940s-60s Bollywood played in forging an Indian identity that coexisted quite comfortably with regional, linguistic and religious nationalisms, and has allowed us to establish our democracy. Where is the funding for Afghan films?

Finally, there was one question that I asked both the Afghans and Pakistanis I met: What would be the opportunity for SAARC to play a helpful role? “Ah” each said ruefully, “We had forgotten SAARC. Yes that could indeed be a useful forum.” Is this a wake-up call?

Radha Kumar is Professor and Director of the Nelson Mandela Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution at Jamia Millia Islamia, and trustee of the Delhi Policy Group