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'In every society state breakdown always allows the most extreme people to emerge'

Who are the Taliban? How did they come into being? Who are their leaders and founding members? What is the present situation in Afghanistan? These are many questions on Afghanistan that have been answered thoroughly and with remarkable precision in TALIBAN: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia.

Ahmed Rashid begins the well-researched book by tracing the origins of the Taliban in Kandahar in 1994. 'Afghanistan was in a state of virtual disintegration just before the Taliban emerged at the end of 1994," he writes. "The country was divided into warlord fiefdoms and all the warlords had fought, switched sides and fought again in a bewildering array of alliances, betrayals and bloodshed.'

The brutal killing of President Najibullah, who ruled the country from 1986 to 1992, is described in gory detail. 'The Taliban walked up to Najibullah's room, beat him and his brother senseless, then bundled them into a pick-up and drove them to the darkened Presidential Palace. There they castrated Najibullah, dragged his body behind a jeep for several rounds of the palace, then shot him dead. His brother was similarly tortured and then throttled to death. The Taliban hanged the two dead men from a concrete traffic control post just outside the palace, only a few blocks from the UN compound.'

A Pakistani journalist who covers Central Asia for The Far Eastern Review and The Daily Telegraph, Rashid lays some of the blame for the present chaotic situation in Afghanistan on the United States. He believes that the Afghans are deeply bitter about their abandonment by the US for whom they fought the Cold War.

Pakistan, on the other hand, is facing increased fundamentalism, bloody ethnic division and economic devastation for its ties with the Taliban.

Rashid explains how the growth of Taliban power has already created severe instability in Russia, Iran, Pakistan and five Central Asian republics. He describes the Taliban as a major player in a new Great Game -- competition among the Western countries and companies to build oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia to Western and Asian markets.

But the author hasn't given up yet. He offers quite a few suggestions to bring Afghanistan back into the world of nations. Nitish S Rele contacted Rashid for an exclusive interview. Excerpts:

How has your book been received in South Asia, especially India and Pakistan, and the US? Are you happy with the response?

The book has done extraordinarily well, considering the limited audience for this kind of book. My publishers in London (I B Tauris) and New York (Yale University Press) have had to reprint the book within the first six weeks of it appearing. The second edition is already out in both countries. Translation rights have been sold in four languages, German, Japanese, Dutch and Spanish, with more in the works. It has been widely reviewed in the mainstream British and US press. In both India and Pakistan, it is selling extremely well, especially amongst diplomats, journalists and academics. Local reviews have emphasised that it is very readable, so it is also attracting a wider middle-class audience who may not know much about the Taliban but would like to learn who they are.

You seem to lay quite a bit of blame on the United States for the turmoil in Afghanistan today. Is that justified?

I think it is because the US was the main provider of arms to the mujahideen in the 1980s and then just walked away from the situation once the Soviets had completed their exit from Afghanistan in 1989. The whole issue of terrorism with the presence of foreign mercenaries in Afghanistan now is a result of the US encouragement in the 1980s for radical Muslims to come to Afghanistan from all over the world and fight jehad. After the war against the Soviets ended and peace did not come, these militants had nowhere else to go and just stayed on.

Today, the US has a 'get bin Laden policy', but no effective Afghan policy -- which could help to end the civil war.

You have several suggestions to make to improve the situation in Afghanistan. But do you think any of them are going to work in reality because of the several groups/countries involved?

The main cause of the continuing war is the continued supply of arms, ammunition and fuel by neighbouring countries to their various proxies inside Afghanistan. The international community needs to exert pressure on all these external players to end this support, which in turn will dry out the Afghan factions and force them to the negotiating table.

The neighbouring countries, especially Iran and Pakistan, also need to work out a strategic consensus on accommodating each other's strategic interests in Afghanistan and a peaceful settlement. The present competition between them has to be turned into co-existence.

What changes have occurred in Afghanistan since the book was written/published? Anything major that you would have liked to put in your book?

Well, there has been a major escalation in the international community's attempts to contain the Taliban. Last November, there were UN Security Council sanctions imposed on the Taliban. Since then Russia and the Central Asian states are pushing for more sanctions and Russia has threatened to bomb camps in northern Afghanistan where Uzbeks and Tajiks opposing their regimes in Central Asia are based. There is growing international pressure from the Americans on Pakistan to help it resolve the bin Laden issue. The military coup in Pakistan has created hopes that Pakistan may now put pressure on the Taliban to accommodate the interests of the anti-Taliban alliance and the international community. There is a lot going on behind the scenes and many peace initiatives are active.

What are you working on next? Bookwise?

For the moment I have gone back to full-time journalism. I have written two books now on Central Asia and the second one on the Taliban. I would like to take a break before I start something new. There is a lot going on in the South Asia-Central Asia region, which I would like to tackle in the future in another book. But at the moment I have no plan to work on one. Writing a book while trying to be a full-time journalist at the same time takes a lot out of you.

Is a Taliban-style Islamic revolution in Pakistan a given? Is it just a matter of time?

No, it's not a given. Much depends on how the military government tackles the issue of the growing fundamentalism, sectarianism and breakdown in law and order as well as the issue of weaponisation of civil society. It's estimated that there are more than one million weapons in the hands of civilians in Sind province alone.

I am still optimistic that these issues can be tackled as long as they are complemented by a revival of the economy and job creation for disaffected youth. The military regime has chalked out such an agenda and we are still waiting to see if they can implement it. The army is the only state institution that can carry out such far-reaching reforms.

What do you think of the entire hijacking drama of the Indian Airlines plane in Kandahar? Do you believe the Taliban were in some way behind the ordeal?

I thought the hijacking drama was handled extremely well by the Taliban, considering their lack of experience in such matters and their obvious sympathy for the hijackers. They were in a Catch-22-type situation, but they managed to resolve it without loss of life, though the hijackers got away scot-free.

One can see today from the complex and long-running hostage-kidnapping drama going on in the Philippines how difficult these things are to resolve. Unless there are concerted international efforts to end the civil war in Afghanistan, that country is going to remain a haven for extremist groups who have their own agendas in their home countries. It would help if India began a dialogue with Pakistan on not just Kashmir, but also such issues as Afghanistan.

Any last thoughts?

I am hopeful that my book will educate people in India that the Taliban are not some great mystery or the creation of Pakistan, but have emerged as a result of the devastation of 20 years of war in Afghanistan and the destruction of the country. Historically, we have seen in every society that state breakdown always allows the most extreme people to emerge. That is what has happened in Afghanistan. There is a whole array of very complex issues that led to the emergence of the Taliban and their success and these have to be understood to enhance dialogue between the neighbouring states in order to bring the war to an end.

TALIBAN: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia. By Ahmed Rashid. 274 pages. Yale University Press. $27.50

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