Just when the impossible task of finding a solution to the Afghan situation was thought to have been discovered, a tug-of-war has struck upsetting optimism. The Afghan government has given the green signal for the peace talks with the Taliban rebels to go ahead, but it is the Taliban who appear to be backtracking with their string of self-invested demands. The Taliban have demanded the complete withdrawal of all foreign troops from the nation say that only then will they come to the table to discuss any peace deals.

At the centre of tug-of-war is the massive unit of 50,000 foreign troops that is still stationed in the country monitoring the rising tension in Afghanistan, that is gradually clmbing up the economy chart under President Hamid Karzai. Out of those 50,000 foreign troops, 24,000 are Americans and this factor also enrages Taliban who see the Bush administration as its prime enemy.

But the complete pullout of the foreign force deployed in Afghanistan would severely cripple the nation’s security since Afghanistan’s own security forces are not quite capable of standing up on their own feet at the moment. So no surprise then, that Mr. Karzai has refused to concede to the Taliban’s demands of the pullout of troops.

The President has also demonstrated his assertion in declining to meet the Taliban’s demands for a new constitution and the strict imposition of Islamic law in the country. Mr. Karzai knows that imposition of an Islamic Law would mean inclination towards a hard-core Islamic State and that would hamper international relations with the US.

But the Talibanis remain adamant on their demands and the deadlock over the peace deal appears to be without a key. The Taliban insurgency in the nation has increased in the last several months with the spread of the terrorist activities from the south of the country to the previously safer regions. Karzai is already finding it tough to handle the Talibans even with the presence of the international military troops and he knows that without that support, the nation would become a free rule for the insurgents. And that’s why he denies to grant their demands; which implies that the stalemate is not going to end in the immediate future.

Image Source: China Daily

Source: USA Today