Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia, Second Edition

by Ahmed Rashid

  Kaplan, Robert, The Ends of the Earth, a Journey to the Frontiers of Anarchy, Vintage Books 1997.

  Khan, Riaz, Untying the Afghan Knot, Negotiating Soviet Withdrawal,Duke University Press 1991.

  Khilji, Jalaluddin, Muslim Celebrities of Central Asia,University of Peshawar 1989.

  Magnus, Ralph and Naby, Eden, Afghanistan, Mullah, Marx and Mujahid, Harper Collins, India 1998.

  Maley, William (ed.), Fundamentalism Reborn? Afghanistan and the Taliban C. Hurst, London 1998.

  Marsden, Peter, The Taliban: War, Religion and the New Order in Afghanistan, ZedBooks, London 1998.

  McCoy, Alfred and Block, Alan, War on Drugs, Studies in the Failure of US Narcotics Policy,Westview Press 1992.

  Metcalf, Barbara, Islamic Revival in British India 1860-1900,Royal Book Company, Islamabad 1982.

  Mousavi, Sayed Askar, The Hazaras of Afghanistan, an Historical, Cultural, Economic and Political Study,Curzon Press, London 1998.

  Naumkin, Vitaly, State, Religion and Society in Central Asia,Ithaca Press, Reading 1993.

  Newby, Eric, A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush,Picador 1974.

  Noelle, Christine, State and Tribe in Nineteenth-Century Afghanistan,Curzon Press, London 1997.

  Olcott, Martha Brill, Central Asia's New States,US Institute of Peace 1996.

  Olsen, Asta, Islam and Politics in Afghanistan,Curzon Press, London 1995.

  Pettifer, James, The Turkish Labyrinth – Ataturk and the New Islam,Penguin Books, London 1997.

  Polo, Marco, The Travels of Marco Polo,Dell Publishing, New York 1961.

  Rawlinson, Henry, England and Russia in the East,1875, Reprinted by Indus Publications, Karachi 1989.

  Roy, Olivier, Afghanistan, from Holy War to Civil War,Princeton University 1995.

  Roy, Olivier, The Failure of Political Islam, I.B.Tauris, Cambridge, London 1994.

  Roy, Olivier, Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan,Cambridge University Press 1986.

  Royal Geographical Society, The Country of the Turkomans,Royal Geographical Society, London 1977.

  Rubin, Barnett, The Fragmentation of Afghanistan, State Formation and Collapse in the International System,Yale University Press, New Haven 1995.

  Rubin, Barnett, The Search for Peace in Afghanistan, From Buffer State to Failed State,Yale University Press, New Haven 1995.

  Rubin, Barnett and Synder, Jack, Post-Soviet Political Order, Conflict and State Building,Routledge, London 1998.

  Seward, Desmond, The Monks of War, the Military Religious Orders,Penguin, London 1972.

  Shafqat, Saeed, Civil Military Relations in Pakistan. From Z.A. Bhutto to Benazir Bhutto, Westview Press 1998.

  Sikorski, Radek, Dust of the Saints,Chatto and Windus, London 1989.

  Tapper, Richard, The Conflict of Tribe and State in Afghanistan,Croom Helm, London 1983.

  Verrier, Anthony, Francis Younghusband and the Great Game,Jonathan Cape, London 1991.

  Media sources

  Pakistan: Dawn, Frontier Post,the Nation,the News, Herald.

  USA: International Herald Tribune, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times.

  Other: Agence France Press (AFP), Associated Press (AP), Reuters, Interfax, Far Eastern Economic Review,the Economist,the Guardian,the Independent, Le Monde.

  Notes

  Introduction

  1. Huntington, Samuel P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the New World Order, Simon and Shuster, New York 1966.

  2. Verrier, Anthony, Francis Younghusband and the Great Game, Jonathan Cape, London 1991.

  3. Polo, Marco, The Travels of Marco Polo, Dell Publishing, New York 1961.

  4. Babur-Nama, translated by Nette Beveridge, Sang-e-Meel Publications, Lahore 1979.

  5. Noelle, Christine, State and Tribe in Nineteenth Century Afghanistan, Curzon Press, London 1997.

  6. Rubin, Barnett, Afghanistan the forgotten crisis, Refugee Survey Quarterly, Vol 15 No.2, UNHCR 1996.

  Chapter 1

  1. US aid began with US$30 million in 1980, rising to US$80 million in 1983, to US$250 million in 1985, to US$470 million in 1986, to US$630 million in 1987 until 1989. US aid continued until Kabul fell to the Mujaheddin in 1992. Between 198689 total aid to the Mujaheddin exceeded US$1 billion dollars a year. Rubin, Barnett, Afghanistan the forgotten crisis, Refugee Survey QuarterlyVol 15 No.2. UNHCR 1996.

  2. I conducted several interviews with Mullah Hassan in Kandahar in 1995, 1996 and 1997.

  3. Dupree, Nancy Hatch, A Historical Guide to Afghanistan, Afghan Tourist Organization, Kabul 1970.

  4. I conducted several interviews with Mullah Ghaus in 1996 and 1997.

  5. Yousufzai, Rahimullah. Taliban head says Rabbani sabotaging UN peace efforts, the News, 2 February 1995.

  6. This profile of Mullah Omar has been built up over five years after interviews with dozens of Taliban leaders. I am grateful to Rahimullah Yousufzai's articles as he is the only journalist to have interviewed Omar.

  7. Goldenberg, Suzanne, Place where the Taliban began and certainty ends, the Guardian,13 October 1998.

  8. Burns, John and Levine, Steve, How Afghans stern rulers took hold, New York Times,11 December 1996.

  9. Dawn,4 November 1994.

  10. The Ambassadors were from the USA, UK, Spain, Italy, China, and South Korea. The delegation included officials from the United Nations.

  11. Interviews with senior Pakistan government officials and transporters in Quetta, March 1995.

  12. Davis, Anthony, How the Taliban became a military force, in Maley, William (ed.), Fundamentalism Reborn? Afghanistan and the Taliban,C. Hurst, London 1998. Davis's military account is the most detailed to date on the capture of Spin Baldak and Kandahar by the Taliban.

  13. Interviews with Pakistani intelligence officers, Kandahar, April 1995.

  14. Muslim,17 November 1994.

  15. The Nation,18 February 1995.

  16. Dawn,18 March 1995.

  Chapter 2

  1. Seward, Desmond, The Monks of War, the Military Religious Orders, Penguin, London 1972. The great military orders, the Templars, the Hospitallers and the Teutonic Knights, were founded in the twelfth century.

  2. Interviews with Taliban soldiers, Kandahar, March 1995.

  3. Sikorski, Radek, Dust of the Saints, Chatto and Windus, London 1989.

  4. Byron, Robert, The Road to Oxiana, Macmillan, London 1937.

  5. Byron wrote on his first sight of the minarets, No photograph, no description, can convey their colour of grape-blue with an azure bloom, or the intricate convolutions that make it so deep and luminous. On the bases, whose eight sides are supported by white marble panels carved with baroque Kufic, yellow, white, olive green and rusty red mingle, with the two blues in a maze of flowers, arabesques and texts as fine as the pattern on a tea-cup. (Byron: The Road to Oxiana)

  6. Dupree, Nancy Hatch, A Historical Guide to Afghanistan, Afghan Tourist Organization, Kabul 1970.

  7. Interview with Ismael Khan, September 1993.

  8. Interview with Mullah Wakil Ahmad, Kandahar, May 1995.

  9. Dupree: A Historical Guide to Afghanistan.

  Chapter 3

  1. Interview with Mehmoud Mestiri in Islamabad, 2 February 1996. See also Rashid, Ahmed, Masud ready to launch offensive says Mestiri, the Nation, 4 February 1996.

  2. AFP, Ullema declare Jehad against Rabbani, the Nation, 4 April 1996.

  3. Interview with Wakil in Kandahar, March 1996.

  4. Interviews with Pakistani diplomats and intelligence officials, Islamabad, February 1996.

  5. AFP, Taliban ready to negotiate, the Nation,3 April 1996.

  6. Interviews with US and Pakistan diplomats, Islamabad, February 1995. See also Rashid, Ahmed. Afghanistan: Proxy War is back, the World Today,The Royal Institute of International Affairs, March 1996.

  7. AFP, Kabul, Senator Hank Brown meets Masud in Kabul, the Nation, 8 April 1996. For a fuller discussion of the US role in the rise of the Taliban, see Chapter 13.

  8. AFP
, Bagram, Raphael says US interest in Afghanistan increasing, the Nation,20 April 1996.

  9. Interview with Robin Raphel, Islamabad, 18 April 1996.

  10. APP, Washington, US wants peace, stable Afghanistan, the Nation, 11 May 1996. Raphel spelled out US policy in a Testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in Washington.

  11. Interview with Rabbani, Kabul, August 1996.

  12. AFP, Kabul, Holl flays Taliban for rocket attacks, the Nation,31 July 1996.

  13. Interviews with several Pakistani and Afghan sources. See also: Rubin, Barnett, Afghanistan the forgotten crisis, Refugee Survey QuarterlyVol 15 No.2, UNHCR 1996.

  14. Davis, Anthony, How the Taliban became a military force, in Maley, William (ed.) Fundamentalism Reborn? Afghanistan and the Taliban,C. Hurst, London 1998.

  15. This account is based on several interviews with UN officials and Masud himself in 1996 and 1997. There are also reports that Najibullah was hoping to do a deal with the Taliban because of their common ethnic origins and that he left the compound voluntarily.

  16. Khan, Behroz, Taliban commander admits ordering Najib's killing, the News, 16 February 1998. Mullah Razaq admitted ordering Najibullah's execution in an interview. We had asked our soldiers to kill Najib then and there. It was necessary because he was responsible for the massacre of thousands of Afghans, Razaq said. Mullah Omar appointed Razaq commander of the Taliban forces that captured Kabul in 1996. He was captured by Dostum's troops in Mazar in May, 1997 and later freed.

  17. Burns, John, With sugared tea and caustic rules, an Afghan leader explains himself, the New York Times,24 November 1996.

  18. Yousufzai, Rahimullah, The leader nobody knows, the News, 30 March 1997.

  Chapter 4

  1. Pakistani diplomatic sources told me that Pakistan had provided Dostum with US$10 million dollars in a bid to persuade him to ally with the Taliban. Iran paid him similar sums to keep him opposed to the Taliban.

  2. Levine, Steve, Enemies of Enemies, Newsweek,21 October 1996.

  3. Dostum had summoned Malik to Mazar from the Baghdis front but he refused to go saying that Dostum would kill him. That was the trigger for the coup against Dostum, a senior Pakistani General told me in Islamabad on 19 May 1997.

  4. Pakistan's Foreign Minister Gohar Ayub issued a statement on 25 May 1997 extending recognition and stating that the crisis in Afghanistan was now solved as the Taliban had formed a broad-based government. We feel that the new government fulfils all criteria for de jurerecognition. It is now in effective control of most of the territory of Afghanistan and is representative of all ethnic groups in that country, said Ayub. Within hours of the statement the Taliban were forced out of Mazar.

  5. The Taliban captured Ismael Khan and some 700 of his fighters after Khan had been invited to a dinner by Malik who then allowed the Taliban to arrest him. Betraying a guest in your home is anathema for Afghans. See Rashid, Ahmed, 550 Pakistani students captured by Afghan opposition, the Nation,14 July 1997.

  6. According to interviews with officials from the UN and the ICRC in Kabul, July 1997, Malik held 1,000 Taliban in Maimana, 1,000 in Sheberghan and 800 in Mazar. Masud held between 600 and 700 prisoners in the Panjshir. General Naderi's Ismaeli forces north of the Salang tunnel held 100 Taliban and Hizb-e-Wahadat held around 100 Taliban. According to the UN, Malik held 200 Pakistanis in Mazar, another 225 in Maimana while Masud held 100 Pakistanis in the Panjshir valley and Khalili held nearly 50.

  7. Interview with Haqqani, Kabul, 12 July 1997.

  8. Interview with Abbas, Kabul, 15 July 1997.

  9. Interview with Uzbek diplomat, Islamabad, 5 July 1997. See also Rashid, Ahmed, Highly explosive. Renewed fighting alarms Central Asian neighbours, Far Eastern Economic Review,12 June 1997.

  10. Interview with Haqqani, Kabul 12 July 1997. See also Rashid, Ahmed, Afghan factions face serious internal divisions, the Nation,16 July 1997.

  11. Peters, Gretchen, Massacres prompt fears of ethnic escalation, AP, 15 February 1998.

  12. Yousufzai, Rahimullah, Dostum unearths mass graves, the News,16 November 1997.

  13. AFP, Taliban massacre site discovered in Afghanistan, 16 December 1997.

  14. Peters, Gretchen, Massacres prompt fears of ethnic escalation, AP, 15 February 1997.

  15. Press conference by Norbert Holl, Islamabad, 18 October 1997.

  16. Reported by news agencies. See also Rashid, Ahmed, Taliban hold Bonino in hospital ward, Daily Telegraph,30 September 1997. Those held included Chris-tiane Amanpour of CNN.

  17. Taliban leaders alluded to these feelings as early as July in conversations with me in Kabul. In Pakistan, Maulanas Fazlur Rehman and Samiul Haq, leaders of separate factions of the Jamiat-e-UlemaIslam which backed the Taliban, said that the UN was a nest of spies and anti-Islam and that they had asked Mullah Omar to kick out the UN agencies.

  18. The six neighbours were Pakistan, Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and China.

  19. AFP, UN Chief slams outside forces for fuelling Afghan conflict, 9 November 1997.

  20. Report of the Secretary General, The situation in Afghanistan and its implications for international peace and security, 14 November 1997.

  Chapter 5

  1. Mousavi, Sayed Askar, The Hazaras of Afghanistan, an Historical, Cultural, Economic and Political Study,Curzon Press, London 1998. This is the only recent work on the Hazaras, who remain little known outside Afghanistan.

  2. Dr Rahi gave me a sheaf of her Dari poems when I was in the Hazarajat in December 1997. I am grateful to UN officials for the translation.

  3. Interview with Lakhdar Brahimi, 8 April 1997.

  4. Crossete, Barbara, UN's impatience grows over Afghan restrictions on Aid workers, the New York Times,14 July 1998.

  5. AFP, Taliban reject warnings of aid pull-out, 16 July 1998.

  6. Interviews with Pakistani officials and foreign diplomats in Islamabad, March 1998. See also Rashid, Ahmed Massive arms supplies reach all Afghan factions, the Nation,13 March 1998.

  7. Winchester, Michael, Ethnic cleansing in Afghanistan, Asiaweek,6 November 1998.

  8. Interviews with survivors who eventually escaped to Pakistan, conducted by the UNHCR. Private report by the UNHCR sent to the UN Secretary General.

  9. Halal is the ritual Islamic way of killing an animal for meat by slitting its throat so that it bleeds.

  10. Human Rights Watch Report, Afghanistan, the massacre in Mazar-e-Sharif, November 1998.

  11. Human Rights Watch Report, as above.

  12. Human Rights Watch Report, as above.

  13. Interviews with Pakistani diplomats and intelligence officials, and Iranian and Turkmen diplomats, Ashkhabad and Islamabad, August 1998.

  14. Personal communication by an international official who interviewed inmates of Kandahar jail.

  15. Reuters, Taliban blame Clinton scam for attacks, 21 August 1998.

  16. Personal communication from Bamiyan.

  17. UN Security Council Report, 8 December 1998.

  18. Boustany, Nora, Busy are the peacemakers, the Washington Post, 10 January 1998.

  19. UN Security Council Report, 9 December 1998.

  Chapter 6

  1. The four schools of Islamic law which evolved in the ninth century were Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi and Hanbali. Hanafi was based on customary practices and the easiest to follow.

  2. The syllabi of these madrassasare learning the Koran by heart, interpretating the Koran, Islamic jurisprudence, Islamic law, life and sayings of the Prophet Mohammed, spreading the word of God, Islamic philosophy, Arabic language and mathematics.

  3. Magnus, Ralph and Naby, Eden, Afghanistan, Mullah, Marx and Mujahid, Harper Collins, India 1998. I am grateful to the authors for their perceptive history of Islam in Afghanistan.

  4. Battuta, Ibn, Travel in Asia and Africa 13251354, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London 1984. See also Rashid, Ahmed, The Revival of Sufism, Far Eastern Economic Review, 17 December 1992.

  5. Roy, Olivier, Afghanistan
, from Holy War to Civil War, Princeton University Press, 1995.

  6. Roy, Olivier, The Failure of Political Islam, I.B.Tauris, London 1994.

  7. Roy: The Failure of Political Islam.

  8. Huntingdon, Samuel, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World Order, Simon and Schuster, New York 1996.

  9. Metcalf, Barbara, Islamic Revival in British India 18601900, Royal Book Company, Islamabad 1982.

  10. Metcalf, as above.

  11. Olsen, Asta, Islam and Politics in Afghanistan, Curzon Press, London 1995. This is the best book on the historical relationship between Islam and the Afghan state.

  12. Shafqat, Saeed, Civil Military Relations in Pakistan, from Z.A. Bhutto to Benazir Bhutto, Westview Press, USA 1998.

  13. Intelligence report presented to the cabinet of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 1992.

  14. The JUI have consistently only won a small number of seats in the National Assembly and the Baluchistan Provincial Assembly. The JUI won ten seats in the Baluchistan Provincial Assembly in the 1988 elections, six seats in the 1990 elections, three seats in the 1993 elections and seven seats in the 1997 elections with the help of Taliban votes. In the National Assembly the JUI won four seats from Baluchistan in 1988, two seats each in the elections in 1990, 1993 and 1997.

  15. These included Mullahs Khairkhwa, Minister of Interior, Abbas, Health, Mutaqqqui, Information, Ahmed Jan, Industries, Haqqani, Frontier Affairs, Qalamuddin, Religious Police, Mansur, Agriculture and Arif, Deputy Finance Minister. See Appendix for further details.