The fate of the HI-NUG peace deal

 

Since last week, news are circulating in the media that Russia and French are making obstacles in the way of Afghanistan’s demand to delist the name Gulbadeen Hekmatyar from UNSC blacklist.. One of the three significant provisions in the peace deal between the Afghan government and HI (Hekmatyar) was the removal of Hekmatyar’s name from UN’s sanction list.

Although, after France and Russia’s opposition, HI released a statement, which read that delisting of Hekmatyar’s name from UN’s blacklist is not important and the leader of HI does not intend to have a visa of any country and that this peace deal was an intra-Afghan peace deal; but still this promise is presumed to be from the most important provisions of the deal and would have negative consequences on Afghan government’s prestige and the deal itself.

It is three months since the finalization of the HI-NUG peace deal, but the Afghan government is yet to fulfill its promises it made in this deal. What steps are taken for the implementation of this deal? To which extent is it implemented? What are the obstacles in its way? What will be the fate of this deal? And what will be its impacts on the probable peace talks with the Taliban? These are the questions that are analyzed here.

 

Peace deal between HI and the Afghan government

In 1387 (2008-2009), a significant member of HI’s executive council Dr. Ghairat Baheer was released from the Bagram prison and shortly after that the peace talks between HI and the Afghan government started. At the beginning, releasing statement after statement, HI was putting conditions for the peace talks and mostly it would release these statements on significant occasions. For instance, when in 2010 the US President Barack Obama announced the date of US troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan, HI released a statement, later-on, when tensions were raised on the issue of Taliban’s office in Qatar, once again, HI released a statement and showed willingness to peace talks.

According to a research, from 1389 to 1392, HI has sent its delegation to Kabul for 17 times in order to conduct peace talks. After 1392 until 1393, HI has also sent its delegation for peace talks but these efforts had no clear outcomes. At that time the main reasons behind the failure of the peace deal with HI was HI’s limited role in the battlefield, profound opposition of some parties with HI, HI’s difficult stance in peace talks, HI’s divided stances and the existence of an alternative HI in the government.

After Ghani seized power in Afghanistan and when following the two meetings of the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QCG), the Afghan Taliban did not come to the negotiating table, the peace talks between HI and the Afghan government hastened and finally on 22 September 2016, the two sides signed a peace deal.

 

Implementation of the peace deal with HI

After signing the peace deal, the formation of the joint commission to implement the provisions of this deal faced some delay and finally in November 2016, the Afghan President issued a decree and formed the commission. Dr. Akram Khpalwak was selected as the head and Faizullah Zaki and Muhammad Masood Andarabi as the members of the Afghan government’s representatives in this commission and Qazi Abdul Hakim Hakim was the head and Mohammad Amin Karim and Ghairat Baheer were the members of HI’s representative. Azizullah Din Mohammad, Ataurahman Salim, Habiba Sarabi and Mawlawi Abdulkhabir Ochqon were selected as the representatives of High Peace Council (HPC).

The Executive Commission on Peace Pact Commitments Implementation held its first meeting on November 7, 2016 and the implementation of the following three commitment was included in this commission’s works:

First; removal of Hekmatyar’s name from the UN blacklist;

Second; releasing HI’s prisoners;

Third; distribution of close to 20 thousand numras -a unit of area around 500 square meters-to the migrants affiliated to HI.

In an attempt to implement the first commitment, the Afghan government, in accordance with the UN regulations, wrote its reasons for delisting hikmatyar’s name from UN black list in its demand from the UN and sent it to the UN in December 2016. Head of the UN Security Council sent Afghanistan’s demand to the members of this council in order to be responded within ten days. According to the media, first France and then Russia delayed the ten day timeline and demanded longer time for a decision. Although, according to HI’s spokesperson, in this regard, the Afghan government has sent letters to the French President and Parliament and they have pledged to assist in UN Security Council; but nothing is done to change Russia’s position as yet.

In terms of the second commitment, HI has submitted a list of the names of 500 its prisoners to the Afghan government; but the Afghan government have not yet released any of these prisoners.

The Afghan government is yet to take practical steps in regards to the implementation of the third commitment; but the government has promised to settle HI’s migrants in an already constructed city. On the other hand, in some areas of Kabul province, HI has started its own surveys to set refugee camps.

 

Foreign obstacle in the way of the peace deal’s implementation

There exists some foreign obstacles in the way of the deals implementation. Russia is creating obstacles in the way of removal of Hekmatyar’s name from UN blacklist while in the trilateral meeting of Russia, China and Pakistan, the three countries had reached a consensus to delist some of the Taliban leaders from the UN black list. It is really a surprising move on behalf of Russia. After the Moscow trilateral meeting on Afghanistan, suspicion towards Russians is increasing in Afghanistan, because earlier Russia had backed the Afghan government’s peace deal with HI and now no one expected such a move on behalf of this country.

Although, Russia presents its involvement in the Middle East, Europe and some other international issues as reason for demanding more time to decide about HI’s leader, but still, to some extents, the ongoing cold war between the US and Russia plays a role in it. Doing so, Russia on the one hand wants to increase to the US’s difficulties while it had welcomed this agreement before and on the other hand, given the upcoming threatening months, Russians want to gain time for themselves.

On the other hand, as in the case of France’s opposition, which is due to the assassination of more than 10 French soldier in Tagab by HI in 2013, the Russian’s stance, with a weak probability, might also be influenced by the Afghan-Soviet war. They might not want to delist Hekmatyar, who was known as the killer of Russians, from the UN black list so easily.

 

The fate of the peace deal with HI

Although initial steps are taken in regards to the promises made in the HI-NUG peace deal; but no promise has been delivered yet and now Russia has also demanded more than six months’ time in order to the way to be paved for deliverance of another significant promise.

Even if Russia vetoed the removal of Hekmatyar’s name from UN black list, with the support of the other four members of the UN Security Council, that have the veto right, the Afghan government, to a great extent, can decrease sanctions on HI’ leader and it is what HI’s leader have demanded in its recent statement. But creating obstacles in releasing the prisoners of HI and constructing cities for the migrants of HI and, in a large part, non-implementation of the peace deal would not only increase mistrust between HI and the Afghan government but would also further decreases public confidence in the Afghan government. For instance, due to the pressures of a particular circle, the Afghan government does not want to give a particular city or refugee camp to HI.

Implementation of the peace deal with HI is several times easier than the implementation of the probable peace deal with the Taliban. Therefore, in this regard, the Afghan government’s failure and delay in its implementation would have negative impacts on the perceptions of the Taliban, especially if they (the Taliban) want to reinitiate peace talks with the Afghan government. The Taliban would for sure ask themselves that if the Afghan government cannot remove Hekmatyar’s name from the UN black list, then how it would be able to remove their names? How should they trust the Afghan government? When the Afghan government fails to meet the very easy conditions of HI, then how would it be able to deliver their (the Taliban) demands? These are the points that would have negative effects on the chances of direct talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban and would decrease these chances.

The end