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Afghanistan

President Ghani and Hekmatyar Sign Peace Deal

2016-10-01

[Asharq al-Aswat] The President of Afghanistan Ashraf Ghani

...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. ..
signed a peace deal with one of the country’s most notorious warlords

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar
... who used to be known in intelligence circles as The Most Evil Man in the World but who now seems merely run-of-the-mill evil...
yesterday. This is considered the final step before the implementation of an immediate cease-fire.

Ghani, surrounded by hundreds of Afghan officials and former warlords, signed an agreement paving the way for the Hezb-e-Islami, a faction led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, to take an active role in political life.

Despite his reverberating speeches about unity, Hekmatyar did not attend the signing but rather signed the agreement on Thursday via a video link into Kabul
...the capital of Afghanistan. Home to continuous fighting from 1992 to 1996 between the forces of would-be strongman and Pak ISI/Jamaat-e-Islami sock puppet Gulbuddin Hekmayar and the Northern Alliance, a period which won Hek the title Most Evil Man in the World and didn't do much for the reputations of the Northern Alliance guys either....
’s presidential palace. The ceremony was broadcast live on television and was attended by high ranking representatives of the government and members of the Hezb-e-Islami group that Hekmatyar belongs to. The rebel group, which is the largest in the country, opposes international military intervention in Afghanistan and has fought international forces and the Afghan government since the US-led invasion in 2001.

One of the Hezb-e-Islami’s conditions for signing the peace agreement was that all foreign forces leave the country. The agreement stipulates that foreign forces must leave the country according to a "reasonable schedule". According to the agreement, which the German Press Agency (DPA) obtained a copy of, the Hezb-e-Islami’s agreement with the Afghan government provides immunity from prosecution for all members of the group, and the Afghan government must release imprisoned members of the Hezb-e-Islami within two months.

Posted by:Fred

#5 The peace deal depends on how much boodle and influence Hek can get with and from Kabul.

Posted by: Pappy 2016-10-01 17:22

#4 A useful summation, Shick de Medici6262. Thank you.

What's the over / under on the peace deal being violated by the Hekster, one week?

Oughtn't fighting season be winding down soon, as winter approaches? I believe the post-Taliban tradition is to take the demobilization payments all winter, then rejoin the bad guys preparatory to fighting season in the spring. So that's where I'd place my bet.

Posted by: trailing wife 2016-10-01 16:24

#3 What's the over / under on the peace deal being violated by the Hekster, one week?

Posted by: Raj 2016-10-01 13:05

#2 Thanks for that, will try to assimilate.

Posted by: Shipman 2016-10-01 10:48

#1 The history of the Afghan resistance can be dated from the nineteen sixties and the intersection of three Muslim Brothers: Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf (1946-) and Burhanuddin Rabbani (1940-) both studied at Al Azhar University, Egypt, in the nineteen sixties, and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar (1947-), a Muslim Brother who graduated in engineering from the University of Kabul. All three were acquainted with and were greatly influenced by the writings of Egyptian Muslim Brother and salafist intellectual, Sayyid Qutb. The three would become the leaders of the mujahideen forces to emerge following the Soviet Invasion.

Well before the Soviet invasion of December 1979 the Jamiat e-Islami movement had been founded by Rabbani. Called Afghanistan's oldest mujahideen movement, it was from its inception associated with the international Muslim Brotherhood. While Rabbani was the brains behind the movement, the field leadership was assumed by the ruthless Pushtun commander and Muslim Brother Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

It was at the University that Rabbani, the Al Azhar-trained Tajik and member of the salafist Naqshabandi (Sufi) sect emerged as a student leader in the nineteen sixties. Rabbani, born in Afghanistan's remote Badakhshan province had been influenced by both the Pakistani Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi and Hassan al-Banna the Muslim Brotherhood founder. In addition, Rabbani would translate Qutb into Dari, Afghanistan's official language, and tranfuse that salafist influence to his own followers. Rabbani would later serve as President of Afghanistan from 1992-1996. Rabbani was a Tajik, a minority in a nation that counted some seven million Pushtun and five million Tajik at the time of the Soviet invasion. It was Rabbani's task (and misfortune) to try and meld the interests of two ethnic groups who had often been antagonistic. Following the end of the war with the Soviets Hekmatyar sought to seize control of Afghanistan in what was called the war of the warlords. A war eventually won by the Pakistan-backed taliban. Hekmatyar licked his wounds, kept his band of cutthroats together and maintains to this day the control of Afghanistan opium trade. In sum, he is, as he always has been, a miserable sonofabitch.

Blank lines added between paragraphs for ease of reading.

-- tw at 4:10 p.m. ET

Posted by: Shick de Medici6262 2016-10-01 08:45

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