Talking to the Taliban: Progress or Propaganda?

Today on the BBC, Ros Atkins presented a taped interview between BBC Security Correspondent Frank Gardner and Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid on his program World: Have Your Say. The interview followed an online discussion regarding whether anyone should be banned from the show. Most listeners felt that invitations should not be exclusive, citing freedom of speech, etc., but some thought that presenting the Taliban with an open mic was giving in to propaganda. One listener said that Western politicians were treated far less politely than Mujahid was and that the terms of the interview should have been disclosed.

Regardless of how one feels about granting the interview which, incidentally, included listeners' direct questions to the Mujahid, the program was both groundbreaking and fascinating. Furthermore, Gardner said that "it is in the world's public interest to understand more about the Taliban."

Mujahid received special permission from the Mullah Mohammed Omar to talk to the BBC, which he did from an undisclosed location, and was asked some of the questions that BBC listeners had previously emailed to WHYS in addition to several of Gardner's.

Recurrent themes shared by Mujahid included the "foreign invasion" of Afghanistan and the control previously maintained by the Taliban when they were in power, even though he repeated "it's not about power" throughout the interview:

"The Taliban is not interested in having a parcel...we are not trying to show off power... It's about the whole country. We want to have a Muslim country that's not invaded by foreigners. The Taliban wants full control of the country, but not to show off...we want to bring civility and stop the killing of people and fighting in our country. Fifty-five percent of the country is under our control...Shari'a law solves peoples' problems. We want a free nation of invaders."

When asked whether the Taliban would consider sharing power in Afghanistan, Mujahid said,

"We are fighting for freedom of our country from invaders. When we free it, we'll talk about power sharing."

The discussion hit on the treatment of women in Afghanistan more than once. Mujahid said that keeping women at home helped control the prescence of AIDS and prevented the rape of young girls, but that they are trying to work on making things available to women:

"We were planning to given women rights, but our government collapsed and they invaded us...we are trying to work on making things available for women."

But when pressed on the issue of allowing women to obtain a full education, he said,

"Now we are not in power in most areas...[have] no power in central areas. It's about when we are in power, we will decide. Again, we will look at conditions and environment. How is it? Then we will decide."

Gardner brought up the fact that with regard to aid workers, Afghanistan had experienced serious problems even before the recent conflict. He asked Mujahid if he thought Christian aid workers should be working in Afghanistan. Again, the Taliban spokesman invoked the issue of control:

"These questions are about if we're in power. When we get in power we'll see how it goes. We never forced anyone to change their religion prior to this. But now I can't talk about it...until we're in power."

Mujahid distinctly differentiated the Taliban from al qaeda and other groups who had blamed terrorist acts on them:

"Things happened in the country that the Taliban has been blamed for, of course we believe they were not right. This is a propaganda war against the Taliban which we say shouldn't have happened. We shouldn't be blamed. On the other hand, we brought security and peace to whole region...[and are] proud of those moments of Arab power. We did good stuff in Afghanistan...stand by them. Things the Taliban were blamed for and didn't do - of course we're not happy about it."

Recently, Mujahid sent a message to President-Elect Obama indicating that if Obama were to alter the Bush strategy of decreasing troops in Iraq and increasing troops in Afghanistan, the war could be stopped. However, he told Gardner that he was not optimistic that this would happen.

Post-interview reaction indicated that most listeners found Mujahid "hedgy." Gardner said that critics would say there was a lot of denial on the spokesman's part, and that the Taliban seems to have no clear agenda other than "wanting to kick out the invaders." Even so, Mujahid gave a surprisingly lengthy interview, and conveyed a lot of confidence. Perhaps his claims that there exists an unfair propaganda war against the Taliban contain some truth, but did Mujahid, sanctioned by Mullah Omar, just employ the BBC for its own propagandist purposes?

Listen to the full interview here.

-------------------------------------------------------
Retired from a career in law and banking, Diana Raabe is a freelance writer/editor whose work has been featured on Gather.com for over three years. A member of The Loft Literary Center and the National Book Critics Circle, she blogs at The Raabe Review and, occasionally, Minnesota Campaign Report.