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For the first time, representatives of the Taliban and the Afghan government have come to a table. The Doha negotiations also address the issue of the importance of women’s and human rights. This could be overlooked, says Afghanistan expert Thomas Ruttig.
Thomas ruttig
Afghanistan connoisseur
SRF News: What is the Taliban’s agenda for these talks?
Thomas Ruttig: There is still no official agenda for the Doha talks. At the inauguration in Doha, the deputy chief of the Taliban, Mullah Baradar, again mentioned in a very short speech the only cornerstone that the Taliban usually put in the foreground; fighting for an Islamic order to rule Afghanistan.
In Afghanistan you always look bad when you say, ‘No, we don’t want anything Islamic.’
So the Taliban want to reverse Western influences in the country?
That should become clear in the course of the discussions. It is relatively difficult for the Afghan government to hold back. Because Afghanistan is officially an Islamic republic, and in Afghanistan you always look bad when you say, ‘No, we don’t want anything Islamic.’
So it is mainly a question of who will define later what is really Islamic. The Taliban have indicated that they do not want to accept anything that does not correspond to Islamic values, i.e. international values, human rights, women’s rights, etc. At the same time, they repeatedly stress that these also occur in a certain way within the Islamic framework. It will be a matter of negotiation.
People thought that because of their unpopularity, the Taliban would be an easy match.
The Taliban are known as violent militias. They are now sitting at the negotiating table. Have the Taliban changed?
I think the international community has changed. Under the leadership of the United States, the Taliban regime, which was not very popular with the Afghan people, was overthrown in 2001. The Taliban were thought to be an easy match because they were unpopular. But it turned out to be a false assumption.
You just had to bow to reality. This also has to do with the fact that the Taliban also mainly use terrorist methods to achieve their goals. But they see this as an asymmetric war against a heavily armed superpower and find it legitimate. Nor could they have joined it if there were not certain sectors of the Afghan population that they support or tolerate.
The Taliban still have the support of part of the Afghan population.
Keystone
How great is this support among the Afghan population?
You cannot say that because there are no reliable polls in Afghanistan. But when we see that much of the Afghan territory is under the control of the Taliban, we have to take into account that the influence of this Taliban works both through military pressure and threats, but also through the fact that the conservative population local has become can identify with the values of the Taliban, they have support.
On the government side there are former warlords or Islamist forces who are not that far behind the Taliban in terms of value.
How important are Western values such as democracy and human rights for the government?
When you listen to his speeches, of course, that comes first. But you also have to see the practice in Afghanistan. On the government side, there are a number of former Islamist warlords or forces that are not that far behind the Taliban in terms of value.
This naturally creates the risk that concessions will be made, that women’s and civil rights, at least in part, will be jettisoned.
The interview was conducted by Simone Hulliger
