ianstone
08-08-2010, 04:48 PM
We will talk to Mullah Omar, and maybe to Bin Laden too
When I first met Martin McGuinness I refused to shake his hand. Now I know that negotiation is the key to lasting peace
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/3/9/1236627374609/jonathanpowell.jpg (http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/jonathan-powell)
Jonathan Powell (http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/jonathan-powell)
guardian.co.uk (http://www.guardian.co.uk/), Sunday 8 August 2010 20.00 BST
Article history (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/08/talking-to-the-taliban-negotiations-end-war#history-link-box)
It has become fashionable for western leaders, including generals, to talk about talking to the Taliban. But no one seems to be able to quite bring themselves to actually do it. That is understandable. It is almost impossible for a democratic government to fight an insurgency, losing lives in the process, and at the same time meet their representatives and negotiate.
If it had been known that John Major's government was sending messages to the army council of the IRA in 1993, at the very same time that the IRA were blowing up children in Warrington, there would have been outrage. And yet those secret contacts took place and led, in time, to the Northern Ireland peace process.
There seems to be a pattern to the west's behaviour when we face terrorist campaigns. First we fight them militarily, then we talk to them, and eventually we treat them as statesmen. That is what Britain did with Menachem Begin (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/events/israel_at_50/profiles/81305.stm) and the Irgun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irgun) in Israel, with Jomo Kenyatta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jomo_Kenyatta) and the Mau Mau (http://africanhistory.about.com/od/kenya/a/MauMauTimeline.htm) in Kenya and with Archbishop Makarios (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/9/newsid_3745000/3745505.stm) in Cyprus.
I participated in one of these transformations of British policy. When, as Tony Blair's chief of staff, I first met Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness in Belfast in 1997, I was not well disposed to the IRA. They had shot my father during the second world war, and my brother, who had worked for Margaret Thatcher, had been on an IRA death list for eight years. I refused to shake their hands; a gesture I regret. Now McGuinness is deputy first minister of Northern Ireland and in the forefront of facing down those dissident republicans who are still committed to the terrorist campaign there.
The process of reconciliation with terrorist groups is not unique to Britain. For a forthcoming documentary, I have talked to, among others, Yair Hirschfeld (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yair_Hirschfeld), who negotiated with the PLO at Oslo, James Lemoyne, who was the UN special representative in the talks with the Farc guerrillas in Colombia, and Martin Griffiths, who helped set up talks with the redshirts in Thailand. Of course every conflict is different, but there seem to be some common themes on how to make contact with terrorists, how to open up a channel, how to turn that channel into a negotiation and, finally, how to secure lasting peace.
Do any of these lessons apply to our new enemies, the Taliban and al-Qaida? Are there good terrorists and bad terrorists, or is it just a matter of time before we talk to them too?
Experience in Northern Ireland suggests that both sides have to have reached the conclusion that they cannot win militarily before meaningful talks are possible. But communication can begin before that point. In Northern Ireland, Michael Oatley (http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/mar/18/northernireland.northernireland), an SIS officer codenamed Mountain Climber, opened up a channel to the IRA in 1974, which he described to me as a "bamboo pipe". It was this same bamboo pipe that was used to carry the messages between Major and McGuinness in 1993.
The first stage in such a process is usually listening to insurgents' grievances and winning their trust. The negotiator needs to understand the currents within the terrorist movement and the pressures the leadership face.
This can take time. Hirschfeld started his contacts with the PLO a decade before the Oslo talks and Lemoyne's meetings in the jungle lasted years before a negotiation could begin. The early meetings serve an educative purpose. It is easy for terrorist groups to remain united while they are just talking to themselves and their demands are purely negative.
For the IRA, as long as the objective was "troops out", little discussion was needed. The same is true in Afghanistan. The Taliban will need to move beyond the single demand that foreign forces must leave first, and consider what they really want to achieve. What changes do they want in the Afghan constitution? What sort of power sharing should there be between the Pushtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks and other minorities? How would they demonstrate that they had separated themselves from al-Qaida? What attitude would they take to women's rights and girls' education? They probably haven't thought these questions through themselves, but opening a channel would help them to start elaborating answers. And experience from other conflicts suggests this can take a long time.
Experience also suggests such conversations cannot be conducted in public. Hirschfeld believes that the secrecy of the Oslo talks was indispensable to their success, and the same was true for the initial contacts with the IRA. Neither side will be prepared to reveal the concessions they can make in public but will only begin to explore them behind closed doors. It is only when you get to the stage of a negotiation proper that the process should become public, when there is a ceasefire in place and the killing on both sides has stopped. And it is the government of Afghanistan that should be conducting the negotiations with the Taliban, not Nato forces.
Some commentators still think there is an alternative. They point to the success of the Sri Lankan government in destroying the Tamil Tigers as proof that it is possible to defeat terrorists with a purely military strategy. But as Erik Solheim (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Solheim), the Norwegian negotiator with the Tigers, told me, winning in the field is not the end of the story. Unless the political grievances that underlie the conflict are addressed, the terrorist campaign is likely to start again in a new form.
In the end there always has to be a political solution. Tough military pressure to convince insurgents that they cannot win, coupled with offering them a political way out, seems to be the only way to resolve such conflict. If history is any guide we will in the next few years be repeating the pattern we went through with Begin, Kenyatta and Makarios, and will be speaking to Mullah Omar, and even perhaps to Osama bin Laden
Sorry Guys, I can't bring myself to comment on this one,
its up to you ?
One has history.
When I first met Martin McGuinness I refused to shake his hand. Now I know that negotiation is the key to lasting peace
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/3/9/1236627374609/jonathanpowell.jpg (http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/jonathan-powell)
Jonathan Powell (http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/jonathan-powell)
guardian.co.uk (http://www.guardian.co.uk/), Sunday 8 August 2010 20.00 BST
Article history (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/08/talking-to-the-taliban-negotiations-end-war#history-link-box)
It has become fashionable for western leaders, including generals, to talk about talking to the Taliban. But no one seems to be able to quite bring themselves to actually do it. That is understandable. It is almost impossible for a democratic government to fight an insurgency, losing lives in the process, and at the same time meet their representatives and negotiate.
If it had been known that John Major's government was sending messages to the army council of the IRA in 1993, at the very same time that the IRA were blowing up children in Warrington, there would have been outrage. And yet those secret contacts took place and led, in time, to the Northern Ireland peace process.
There seems to be a pattern to the west's behaviour when we face terrorist campaigns. First we fight them militarily, then we talk to them, and eventually we treat them as statesmen. That is what Britain did with Menachem Begin (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/events/israel_at_50/profiles/81305.stm) and the Irgun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irgun) in Israel, with Jomo Kenyatta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jomo_Kenyatta) and the Mau Mau (http://africanhistory.about.com/od/kenya/a/MauMauTimeline.htm) in Kenya and with Archbishop Makarios (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/9/newsid_3745000/3745505.stm) in Cyprus.
I participated in one of these transformations of British policy. When, as Tony Blair's chief of staff, I first met Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness in Belfast in 1997, I was not well disposed to the IRA. They had shot my father during the second world war, and my brother, who had worked for Margaret Thatcher, had been on an IRA death list for eight years. I refused to shake their hands; a gesture I regret. Now McGuinness is deputy first minister of Northern Ireland and in the forefront of facing down those dissident republicans who are still committed to the terrorist campaign there.
The process of reconciliation with terrorist groups is not unique to Britain. For a forthcoming documentary, I have talked to, among others, Yair Hirschfeld (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yair_Hirschfeld), who negotiated with the PLO at Oslo, James Lemoyne, who was the UN special representative in the talks with the Farc guerrillas in Colombia, and Martin Griffiths, who helped set up talks with the redshirts in Thailand. Of course every conflict is different, but there seem to be some common themes on how to make contact with terrorists, how to open up a channel, how to turn that channel into a negotiation and, finally, how to secure lasting peace.
Do any of these lessons apply to our new enemies, the Taliban and al-Qaida? Are there good terrorists and bad terrorists, or is it just a matter of time before we talk to them too?
Experience in Northern Ireland suggests that both sides have to have reached the conclusion that they cannot win militarily before meaningful talks are possible. But communication can begin before that point. In Northern Ireland, Michael Oatley (http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/mar/18/northernireland.northernireland), an SIS officer codenamed Mountain Climber, opened up a channel to the IRA in 1974, which he described to me as a "bamboo pipe". It was this same bamboo pipe that was used to carry the messages between Major and McGuinness in 1993.
The first stage in such a process is usually listening to insurgents' grievances and winning their trust. The negotiator needs to understand the currents within the terrorist movement and the pressures the leadership face.
This can take time. Hirschfeld started his contacts with the PLO a decade before the Oslo talks and Lemoyne's meetings in the jungle lasted years before a negotiation could begin. The early meetings serve an educative purpose. It is easy for terrorist groups to remain united while they are just talking to themselves and their demands are purely negative.
For the IRA, as long as the objective was "troops out", little discussion was needed. The same is true in Afghanistan. The Taliban will need to move beyond the single demand that foreign forces must leave first, and consider what they really want to achieve. What changes do they want in the Afghan constitution? What sort of power sharing should there be between the Pushtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks and other minorities? How would they demonstrate that they had separated themselves from al-Qaida? What attitude would they take to women's rights and girls' education? They probably haven't thought these questions through themselves, but opening a channel would help them to start elaborating answers. And experience from other conflicts suggests this can take a long time.
Experience also suggests such conversations cannot be conducted in public. Hirschfeld believes that the secrecy of the Oslo talks was indispensable to their success, and the same was true for the initial contacts with the IRA. Neither side will be prepared to reveal the concessions they can make in public but will only begin to explore them behind closed doors. It is only when you get to the stage of a negotiation proper that the process should become public, when there is a ceasefire in place and the killing on both sides has stopped. And it is the government of Afghanistan that should be conducting the negotiations with the Taliban, not Nato forces.
Some commentators still think there is an alternative. They point to the success of the Sri Lankan government in destroying the Tamil Tigers as proof that it is possible to defeat terrorists with a purely military strategy. But as Erik Solheim (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Solheim), the Norwegian negotiator with the Tigers, told me, winning in the field is not the end of the story. Unless the political grievances that underlie the conflict are addressed, the terrorist campaign is likely to start again in a new form.
In the end there always has to be a political solution. Tough military pressure to convince insurgents that they cannot win, coupled with offering them a political way out, seems to be the only way to resolve such conflict. If history is any guide we will in the next few years be repeating the pattern we went through with Begin, Kenyatta and Makarios, and will be speaking to Mullah Omar, and even perhaps to Osama bin Laden
Sorry Guys, I can't bring myself to comment on this one,
its up to you ?
One has history.