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Struggle for recognition

Janes Defence Weekly
4 Oct 00

Anthony Davis 

Afghanistan's Taliban may be winning battles on the  ground, but their policies and human rights record  mean they are failing to win international  recognition and acceptance. 

Anthony Davis reports   Sweeping successes on the battlefield have brought Afghanistan's Taliban closer than ever to their objective of complete domination of the country. 

However, with the West and Russia still deeply sceptical over the extremist militia's policies and intentions, recent military advances are unlikely to help the Taliban achieve their other major goal: international recognition and acceptance.  

The past three months have seen the heaviest summer fighting since the Taliban emerged on the border of Pakistan in September 1994. 

Analysts estimate that up to 1,500 ethnic Pushtun Taliban and allies have died as well as several hundred from the mainly Tajik opposition.

 Ahmadshah Massoud, former defence minister of the ousted government of Burhannuddin Rabbani that still holds Afghanistan's UN seat, leads the opposition. 

 Unlike last year, when the Taliban suffered a military debacle north of Kabul, the current campaign, involving up to 20,000 troops including several thousand foreigners, has scored major gains culminating in the seizure of the opposition's de facto capital, Taloqan. 

"This is the most significant offensive mounted in the last five years," said one Western analyst. "It's a do-or-die campaign."  

After initial setbacks in July on the plains north of Kabul, the Taliban switched their focus in August to the war's central front in Baghlan Province on the northern flanks of the Hindu Kush range. 

There they succeeded in seizing the towns of Nahrin and Ishkamish, severing a key opposition supply line between the Tajikistan border and Taloqan to the north and the Panjshir Valley to the south. 

Wedged in the heart of the Hindu Kush range, the 100km-long Panjshir is the main base area and strategic pivot around which Massoud's defence of the northeast hinges.  

These gains were followed in early August by an offensive on the northern front from Taliban-held Kunduz province towards Taloqan. 

On 9 August an advance that reached to within 2km of the city centre was beaten back with an estimated 150 Taliban and allied foreign volunteers killed. 

A second major offensive launched on 4 September succeeded in breaking defence lines and, despite further high casualties, overran the city on 6 September.

 By that time most of its civilian population of some 80,000-100,000 had already fled eastwards.  

Apparently timed to coincide with the UN's Millennium Summit, attended by ousted President Rabbani, this victory marked the second time the Taliban had captured Taloqan. 

They first seized the city in August 1998 at the end of a rapid campaign across most of the north. 

However, a failure to consolidate gains with reliable troops resulted in the loss of the city two months later. 

This year, however, Taliban commanders are evidently determined not to repeat the same mistakes. 

In the days following the city's fall, reinforcements were brought in to undertake a measured campaign to secure surrounding districts.

In late September the district centres along the Tajikistan border, Emam Saheb, Dasht i Archi, Hazarbagh and Khwaja Ghar, were captured. 

 Despite some continuing resistance, the Taliban have now secured a wide arc around Taloqan bordered by the natural barriers of the Amu Darya river to the north, the Kokcha river to the northeast and the mountains of Badakhshan to the east.

Badakhshan is the last province held in entirety by the opposition.  Foreign backing for the Taliban has played a crucial role. 

Western military sources estimate up to one-third of Taliban forces in the campaign are non-Afghan, mostly Pakistani religious volunteers as well as 1,000-1,500 Arab fighters.  

In addition, informed sources told Jane's Defence Weekly that Pakistani military involvement appears to have gone beyond logistic support and the presence of military advisers to include the covert deployment of special forces. 

One western military analyst noted the presence of an estimated 300-400 Punjabi-speaking infantry displaying "extraordinary collective skills". 

He added: "The Afghan Taliban have never been trained collectively to this level before. This is new."  

Whether the Taliban and their Pakistani allies have the reserves to continue their push into Badakhshan before the onset of winter is unclear. 

A brief attempt to seize the Tupkhana pass on the border of southern Badakhshan and Pakistan, thus opening a second front in Massoud's rear, was repulsed in late September. 

Some analysts believe they may prefer to rely on an indirect strategy of subversion in a conservative and now isolated province that has never been solidly behind Massoud. 

"They may wait for Badakhshan to resolve itself, extending the cheque-book where they need to and sowing the seeds of dissent," said one analyst.  

Predictably, Taliban successes on the ground have been paralleled by a renewed push to secure Afghanistan's UN seat. 

Within hours of Taloqan's fall Kabul's foreign minister Wakil Ahmad Mutawakil attacked the UN for inviting Rabbani to address the Millennium Summit and demanded that it "should not ignore realities".

 The Taliban ambassador to Pakistan reiterated the message, noting that 95% of the country is under the movement's control and that the rest would be "freed" in the "near future".  

The campaign for recognition is being reinforced diplomatically by Pakistan, one of only three countries (with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates) to recognise the Taliban. 

For the foreseeable future there is minimal prospect of a regime sullied by a poor human rights record, association with suspected terrorists and contempt for negotiations gaining the recognition it seeks. 

Washington has made it clear that until Osama bin Laden, accused by the Clinton administration of sponsoring the bombing of two US embassies in Africa in 1998, is handed over relations will remain frozen.

Moscow, which along with Tehran has supported the northern opposition, has meanwhile expressed concern over the stability of neighbouring Tajikistan and Central Asia beyond.

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