Qudsia cries as she describes how the Taliban shot her husband in the head and stomach 13 years ago. Like a growing number of Afghans, however, she says talking peace to the insurgents may be an idea whose time has come.
“If peace can be made, then it’s a good thing,” the 51-year-old mother of six said. “But if it does not, it is meaningless.”
After a nine-year US-led war with no clear victory in sight, there are signs many Afghans, including victims of the Taliban’s rule, are increasingly tempted by the idea of talking peace with the Islamists.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai is organizing a national peace council, or Jirga, from May 29 to bring together tribal elders, officials and local powerbrokers from around the country to discuss peace, despite the Taliban rejecting any overtures.
Reconciliation will also be high on the agenda when Karzai meets US President Barack Obama in Washington this week.
Sayed Arabshah Arabshahi is a Kabul university professor whose 26-year-old brother was lashed to death with a wire cable by the Taliban.
“Essentially I’m not against talking with the Taliban if it will mean peace,” Arabshahi said on the sidelines of a “Victim’s Jirga” organized by civil society groups in Afghanistan, as an alternative to the one planned by the government.
It is a course that is already underscoring differences between Kabul and Washington. The US has been cautious about any peace overtures as it prepares an offensive against the Taliban stronghold in Kandahar. The White House opposes efforts to contact Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
However, many Afghans feel the US may already be preparing to leave after Obama announced a July next year start for a troop withdrawal.
“The US has said it will withdraw, and the Afghans have realized that if we have to deal with each other, we might as well as start talking about it now,” said Hashmat Ghani Ahmadzai, an Afghan analyst and politician.
Other Jirga attendees favored talking with insurgent groups, but were adamant that justice had to be served first to civilians for a political process to gain traction.
It is a difference of opinion that will likely be thrashed out at the Jirga.
One person who is resolute in her belief that no insurgent faction should be engaged is 18-year-old Sediqa from Kabul.
When she was a little girl, shrapnel from a Hizb-e-Islami rocket that hit her home entered her back. After surgery in Germany she returned to Kabul only for her home to be destroyed in another rocket attack.
In the second attack her mother, two brothers and her great aunt were killed.
“I don’t want them to anytime talk with [insurgents],” said Sediqa, who walks with a limp, said. “I used to have hopes and wishes, to help my country and work for my country, but those hopes have turned to dust.”
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