By IANS,
New Delhi: India is not rigid in its stance against the Taliban and will not stand in the way of any move by Afghanistan in its reintegration efforts with the Islamist fighters.
This message was conveyed by official sources after Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna said in London that India was not rigid in its position that the Taliban were untouchable when it came to talks.
“They should be given a second chance. A solution through military action is not the only alternative. I think there are other alternatives which also need to be tried,” Krishna had told IANS on the sidelines of the global conference on Afghanistan.
“The only adjective is that it has to be an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned initiative and the international community should support that Afghan-led initiative,” he added.
Officials pointed out that the operative phrase was “Afghan-led” and that India cannot stand in the way of any such initiative if it is launched by Hamid Karzai’s Afghan administration.
India had so far stood by its position that the Taliban should not be touched even by a barge pole, which was in stark contrast to the emerging global consensus that some quarters of the Taliban should be wooed back into the mainstream.
At the same time, sources categorically reiterated that India will not ramp up the military part of its involvement in Afghanistan. “What we want there is stability. The stability will only come if there is development, which we will be increasing,” an official said.
India has a multi-billion dollar development programme in Afghanistan, ranging from education to agriculture.
The Afghan government on Thursday said it has invited the Taliban to a peace council meeting. Meanwhile, UN officials have said that secret talks had been held between the US and Taliban top leaders in Afghanistan.
On Pakistan, the sources said India was not interested in the early resumption of the composition dialogue till Pakistan removes the terror infrastructure from its soil, but at the same time kept some doors open for talks in certain sectors like fishermen straying into each other’s maritime waters and prisoners.
They said that with Pakistan still not doing enough on catching the mastermind of the 26/11 attacks and often speaking in two voices, it was difficult to restart the composite dialogue which had been suspended after the 2008 November carnage.
“We cannot have conflict. At the same time, we cannot go too fast (in talks). But, there has to be certain tempo (for contacts),” said a highly-placed source.
There was concern that there were confusing signs coming from Pakistan, despite Pakistan Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani calling for resumption of dialogue and the strident tone of Pakistan Foreign Minister S.M. Qureshi. “There has been rise in the number of infiltrations despite it being winter. That is the area of concern,” the source said.
Officials pointed out that Pakistan had also to realise the current state of the Indian public opinion. “We do realise that there has to be a measure of communication� not everything is closed off. We are talking on things like release of fishermen, consular access, prisoners�” an official pointed out.
There was also talk of “declogging” the talks process with Pakistan and the “obstacles” that had been put up as a result of the 26/11 attacks.