Views on a new Afghan government

With the recent arrival of the UN special envoy for Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, in Pakistan in search of views on the formation of a new government in Afghanistan, a senior Tajik official said he would favour a broad-based authority, representing all ethnic backgrounds. Abdunabi Sattorzoda, Tajikistan's deputy foreign minister, told IRIN that the future government in Afghanistan had to represent those legitimate political forces which had fought to keep Afghanistan a single nation. "It is only the Northern Alliance which expresses the interests of the Afghan people, because almost all ethnic groups living in Afghanistan are represented in this anti-Taliban coalition," he said. According to estimated population statistics, ethnic-Tajik Afghans make up the second largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, and Dushanbe is keen to see their involvement in the new authority. Experts say Afghanistan's main ethnic group, the Pashtuns, represent about 40 percent of the population, followed by the Tajiks, who constitute 30 percent. There are an estimated nine percent of people from the Hazara ethnic group, and the same percentage of Uzbeks. The remaining 21 percent are from other smaller minorities. Accurate statistics on the ethnic breakdown of the population in Afghanistan are not available, due to the fact that there has not been a census in over 20 years. Sattorzoda said that the ex-king, Mohammad Zahir Shah, and other well-known Afghan statesmen and political figures currently living outside Afghanistan must also be represented in the new Afghan government. "Zahir Shah has become a symbol of the national unity of Afghanistan. He is from the majority Afghan Pashtun ethnic grouping, and he will represent interests of the Pashtun population of the country," Sattorzoda added. The deputy minister added that it was necessary to distribute seats in the future Afghan government in proportion to the ethnic composition of the population. He believes that the Taliban should not participate in the future government. "Their regime has turned Afghanistan into the centre of international terrorism. To give them power would mean to close down the regime temporarily only, which could revive at any time," Sattorzoda said. He added that it was "absurd" to seek out a moderate Taliban group. "They are not ordinary Muslims. They submit to a certain ideology of the radical Islamic persuasion. Therefore there are no moderate Taliban as there are no moderate radicals," he said. The Russian ambassador to Tajikistan, Maksim Peshkov, told IRIN that his government shared this view. "There are no moderate Taliban," he said. He stressed that the Taliban's presence as a political force in a new power structure of post-war Afghanistan was impossible, because the world community had a series of serious grudges against them. He also noted that all Pashtuns should not be linked to the Taliban, whose members are from that particular ethnic background. Peshkov said Russia was interested in the formation of a broad-based government in Afghanistan with the participation of all ethnic groups living in the country. "If this balance is broken, the government would not be capable of carrying out the tasks on post-conflict rehabilitation of the country." However, there are some who believe that Taliban representation is necessary if a new government in Afghanistan is to succeed. A Tajik independent expert, Rashid Ghani, told IRIN that the interim government in Afghanistan could not be formed according to standards imposed by other countries. "It is not the business of other countries to determine what type of government should follow in Afghanistan. Its composition must be determined by those forces which are fighting each other in Afghanistan." Rashid Ghani agreed that a widely-based composition of the new government was the most acceptable, but did not rule out participation of the Taliban. "The Taliban are a real political force, and this fact must be reckoned with. It is impossible to deny that a certain part of the Afghan people supports them. If it were not so, the Taliban could not have retained power for even a day," he added. He stressed that the new government would have to meet the interests and needs of the people, and should be able to provide the country with sustainable development.