U.N. Seeks to Drop Some Taliban From Terror List

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

By DEXTER FILKINS

KABUL, Afghanistan — The leader of the United Nations mission here called on Afghan officials to seek the removal of at least some senior Taliban leaders from the United Nations’ list of terrorists, as a first step toward opening direct negotiations with the insurgent group.

In an interview, Kai Eide, the United Nations special representative, also implored the American military to speed its review of the roughly 750 detainees held in its military prisons here — another principal grievance of Taliban leaders. Until late last year, the Americans were holding those prisoners at a makeshift detention center at Bagram Air Base and refusing to release their names.

Together, Mr. Eide said he hoped that the two steps would eventually open the way to face-to-face talks between Afghan officials and Taliban leaders, many of whom are hiding in Pakistan. The two sides have been at an impasse for years over almost every fundamental issue, including the issue of talking itself.

“If you want relevant results, then you have to talk to the relevant person in authority,” Mr. Eide said. “I think the time has come to do it.”

In recent days, Afghan and American officials have signaled their willingness to take some steps that might ultimately lead to direct negotiations, including striking the names of some Taliban leaders from the terrorist list, as Mr. Eide is suggesting.

The remarks by Mr. Eide, who will leave his post here in March, were the latest in a series of Afghan and Western efforts to engage the Taliban movement with diplomatic and political means, even as a new American-led military effort was under way here.

American, Afghan and NATO leaders are also preparing to start an ambitious program to convince rank-and-file Taliban fighters to give up in exchange for schooling and jobs. That plan, expected to cost hundreds of millions of dollars, will be the focus of an international conference later this week in London.

The plan aims at the bottom of the Taliban hierarchy — the foot soldiers who are widely perceived as mostly poor, illiterate, and susceptible to promises of money and jobs. In 2007 and 2008, a similar effort unfolded in Iraq, where some 30,000 members of the country’s Sunni minority — many of them former insurgents — were put on the American payroll. Partly as a result, violence there plummeted.

Mr. Eide said that in Afghanistan, such efforts at reintegration, while useful, would not be enough. While some rank-and-file Taliban soldiers might be fighting for economic reasons, he said, the motives of most were more complex. The Taliban’s leaders exert more control over the foot soldiers than they are given credit for, he said.

“I don’t believe it’s as simple as saying that these are people who are unemployed, and if we find them employment they will go our way,” Mr. Eide said. “Reintegration by itself is not enough.”

In the past, talks between the Afghan government and the insurgents have foundered on a few core issues. Afghan leaders have demanded that the Taliban forswear violence and their association with Al Qaeda before talks can begin. For their part, the Taliban have demanded that the Americans and other foreign forces leave the country first.

But some Taliban leaders have indicated that they might be willing to engage in some sort of discussions if their names were stricken from the United Nations’ so-called “black list.” The list contains the names of 144 Taliban leaders, including Mullah Mohammed Omar, the movement’s leader, as well as 257 from Al Qaeda. Under United Nations Resolution 1267, governments are obliged to freeze the bank accounts of those on the list and to prevent them from traveling.

Some Taliban leaders say the black list prevents them from entering into negotiations — if they show their face, they say, they would be arrested.

“This would allow the Taliban to appear in public,” said Arsalan Rahmani, a former deputy minister with the Taliban who now lives in the Afghan capital, Kabul. “It would allow the possibility of starting negotiations in a third country.”

Mr. Eide said he does not believe that senior Taliban leaders like Mullah Omar should be removed from the list. It was Mr. Omar, after all, who provided sanctuary to Osama bin Laden and thousands of fighters from Al Qaeda, which launched the Sept. 11 attacks.

But some second-tier Taliban should be taken from the list, he said. Those leaders are not necessarily associated with terrorist acts but might be able to speak for the movement, he said, and might be willing to reciprocate a good-will gesture.

The request to strike any Taliban names from the United Nations list would have to made by Afghan government. In the past, Afghan officials have indicated that they might be willing to take some names off — even that of Mr. Omar. But they have kept details and their ultimate intentions under wraps.

Last week, the American envoy to the region signaled some willingness to allow some Taliban names to be taken off the list as long as they are not senior commanders responsible for atrocities or associated with Al Qaeda.

“A lot of the names don’t mean much to me,” Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, said last week in Kabul. “Some of the people on the list are dead, some shouldn’t be on the list and some are among the most dangerous people in the world.

“I would be all in favor of looking at the list on a case-by-case basis to see if there are people on the list who are on the list by mistake and should be removed, or in fact are dead,” he said.

Mr. Holbrooke showed no willingness to ease up on the leaders of the insurgency, including Mr. Omar and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the leader of the Islamic Party, an insurgent group fighting the government and the Americans here. “I can’t imagine what would justify such an action at this time,” he said, “and I don’t know anyone who is suggesting that.”

As for the Taliban prisoners, American officials say they imposed a more rigorous review process several months ago, and that they are examining the cases of each detainee. This month, after years of keeping the names of detainees secret, the American military released the names of 645 detainees being held in the main detention center outside of Kabul.

Since September, when the new review process was imposed, the Americans have reviewed the cases of 576 detainees, and 66 of those have been released, Col. Stephen Clutter said. A review of all 645 detainees will be completed by the end of March, he added. Mr. Eide said he hoped it would go further.

“There needs to be a more comprehensive review of the list that has now been published,” Mr. Eide said.

Still, for all of that, it wasn’t clear Sunday just how the Taliban would respond — or if it would at all.

“I don’t know what they will do,” Mr. Rahmani said.

Sangar Rahmi contributed reporting.