The Haqqani network, seen as the most lethal insurgent faction in Afghanistan, would take part in peace talks with the US, but only under the direction of their Afghan Taliban leaders, a top faction commander said yesterday.
The rare flexibility exhibited by an Afghan militant commander was accompanied by a warning that the Haqqanis would keep up pressure on Western forces with high-profile attacks and would pursue their goal of establishing an Islamic state.
The Haqqanis, who operate out of the unruly border area between Pakistan and Afghanistan, say they are part of the Afghan Taliban and must act in unison in any peace process.
The commander, who declined to be identified, accused the US of being insincere in peace efforts and trying to divide the two organizations.
“However, if the central shura, headed by Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, decided to hold talks with the United States, we would welcome it,” he said by telephone from an undisclosed, referring to the militants’ leadership council.
The Taliban said in March they were suspending nascent peace talks with the US.
A senior Afghan official closely involved with reconciliation efforts said last week the government had failed to secure direct talks with the Taliban and no significant progress was expected before 2014. The US designated the Haqqani network a terrorist organization in September, a move its commanders said proved Washington was not sincere about peace efforts in Afghanistan.
Last week, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on the Haqqanis. Isolating the group, who were blamed for the 18-hour attack on embassies and parliament in Kabul in April, could complicate efforts to secure peace at a time when Afghans fear another civil war could erupt after Western forces withdraw.
The Haqqani network may prove to be US President Barack Obama’s biggest security challenge as he tries to stabilize Afghanistan before most NATO combat troops withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014.
The group’s experience in guerrilla fighting dating back to the anti-Soviet war in the 1980s and its substantial financial network, could make it the ultimate spoiler of peace efforts.
A report in July by the Center for Combating Terrorism said the Haqqanis ran a sophisticated financial network, raising money through kidnapping, extortion and drug trafficking, but also have a legitimate business portfolio that includes import/export, transport, real estate and construction interests in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Gulf.
The commander said the Haqqani network was pleased about Obama’s re-election, predicting he would be demoralized by battlefield losses and pull out US forces earlier than expected.
“From what we see on the ground, Obama would not wait for 2014 to call back his forces,” the commander said.
“They suffered heavy human and financial losses and are not in a position to suffer more,” he said, adding that he and his men were looking ahead to victory.
“We will install a purely a Islamic government, which would be acceptable to all the people,” the commander said.
ROCKY RELATIONS: The figures on residents come as Chinese tourist numbers drop following Beijing’s warnings to avoid traveling to Japan The number of Chinese residents in Japan has continued to rise, even as ties between the two countries have become increasingly fractious, data released on Friday showed. As of the end of December last year, the number of Chinese residents had increased by 6.5 percent from the previous year to 930,428. Chinese people accounted for 22.6 percent of all foreign residents in Japan, making them by far the largest group, Japanese Ministry of Justice data showed. Beijing has criticized Tokyo in increasingly strident terms since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last year suggested that a military conflict around Taiwan could
A retired US colonel behind a privately financed rocket launch site in the Dominican Republic sees the project as a response to China’s dominance of the space race in Latin America. Florida-based Launch on Demand is slated to begin building a US$600 million facility in a remote region near the border with Haiti late this year. The project is designed to meet surging demand for the heavy-lift rockets needed to put clusters of satellites into orbit. It is also an answer to China’s growing presence in the region, said CEO Burton Catledge, a former commander of the US Air Force’s 45th Operations
Germany is considering Australia’s Ghost Bat robot fighter as it looks to select a combat drone to modernize its air force, German Minister of Defense Boris Pistorius said yesterday. Germany has said it wants to field hundreds of uncrewed fighter jets by 2029, and would make a decision soon as it considers a range of German, European and US projects developing so-called “collaborative combat aircraft.” Australia has said it will integrate the Ghost Bat, jointly developed by Boeing Australia and the Royal Australian Air Force, into its military after a successful weapons test last year. After inspecting the Ghost Bat in Queensland yesterday,
A pro-Iran hacking group claimed to breach FBI Director Kash Patel’s personal e-mail inbox and posted some of the contents online. The e-mails provided by the hacking group include travel details, correspondence with leasing agents in Washington and global entry, and loyalty account numbers. The e-mail address the hackers claim to have compromised has been previously tied to Patel’s personal details, and the leaked e-mails contain photos of Patel and others, in addition to correspondence with family members and colleagues. “The FBI is aware of malicious actors targeting Director Patel’s personal email information,” the agency said in a statement on
RSS