Islamabad, Feb 17 (DPA) The capture of Taliban’s second-in-command Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar represents a rising level of cooperation between Pakistani and US intelligence agencies, but it remains far from clear if Pakistan’s 15-year Taliban romance is over.
Afghan Taliban can hardly survive without hiding places inside Pakistan, and the country has yet to find an alternative for the militia that has served as its proxy in Afghanistan since 1994 when the Taliban movement was founded.
This marriage of convenience might linger on, at least for now.
“Mullah Baradar’s arrest may be a significant development but it does not show that Pakistan has taken a U-turn on its policy towards Taliban,” said Saleem Safi, an analyst covering the conflict on Pakistan-Afghan border for the last two decades.
“His arrest fits a pattern of Pakistan surrendering one or two Taliban leaders to its Western allies whenever pressure mounts on it to do more in the fight against terrorism, and at the same its overall relations with Taliban remain good,” Safi added.
He cited the examples of the capture of former Taliban foreign minister Abdul Salam Zaeef in early 2000 and militant commanders Mansur Dadullah and Ustad Yasir recently.
Baradar, the operational head of Afghan Taliban who was one of its four founders in 1994, seems to be the latest victim of Pakistan’s game of running with the hare and hunting with the hounds.
As a symbolic gain, his arrest is set to please the US government at a time when its chances of a real success in Afghanistan remain scanty despite a recent troop surge, and the success of its latest assault in the south-eastern province of Helmand is in doubt.
The White House welcomed the increased cooperation with Pakistan against the “extremists” after the joint raid by the intelligence agents of both countries in the southern port city of Karachi.
“We’ve seen an increase in Pakistani push-back on extremists in their own country,” US presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs said Tuesday.
“The Pakistanis realised that extremist threats within (their) own borders were threats to their own country.”
Gibbs might be only partly correct. Pakistan has mainly acted against groups of local Taliban who have challenged its own writ and targeted its officials and civilians.
Among them were the followers of hard-headed cleric Maulana Fazlullah in Malakand region, and fighters associated with the Tehrik-Taliban Pakistan in South Waziristan. Both groups have been disrupted, if not completely defeated.
At the same time, local Taliban like Mullah Nazir in South Waziristan and Hafiz Gul Bahadur in the North Waziristan, who mainly focus on cross-border attacks on international forces in Afghanistan, remain unscathed.
And the Haqqani network led by Sirajuddin Haqqani, described by US officials as the “most lethal group”, still operates from North Waziristan.
The outfit of veteran jihadi leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Hizb-e-Islami, is believed to have its offices in and around Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province.
Most of all, one-eyed Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Muhammad Omar is alleged to be hiding in Pakistan, with the support of the Inter Services Intelligence agency, although Islamabad denies that.
The US might have genuine reason to rejoice over Pakistan’s increasing cooperation, and netting a big fish like Baradar is the sort of action against the Taliban which suits Islamabad and Washington equally.
A senior Pakistani diplomat told DPA earlier this month that the US had given Islamabad a lead role in arranging peace talks between Taliban and the government in Kabul, on the condition that Mullah Omar and his most senior lieutenants be excluded from the process.
“We have been asked to concentrate on second-tier leadership and peel away a huge chunk of them, leaving the top guys vulnerable,” said the diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Seducing the young Taliban commanders away from the experienced and charismatic Mullah Omar, and his cunning deputies like Baradar, is no easy job even for the ISI that created and nurtured the movement over the years.
But losing an opportunity to revive its fading influence in Kabul – where its arch-rival India has made inroads – could be a fatal mistake, especially when the US is not ready to accept less than a respectable withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Pakistan might have gone other way round, trying to gradually round up notorious senior Taliban leaders and replace them with militants over which it has more control, and whom would be acceptable for the US as negotiation partners.
“Whatever the reasons for Mullah Baradar’s arrest, Pakistan and Taliban will continue to work together even if there is a trust deficit on the part of Taliban towards Pakistan,” said Safi.
