Pressure Builds on Anti-Terrorism Alliance

Two prominent Pashtun commanders, Abdul Haq and Hamid Karzai, who are both loyal to Afghanistan's former King Mohammed Zahir Shah, have entered southern Afghanistan from Pakistan to raise a rebellion against the Taliban. Their attempt to open a "southern front" against the Taliban ultimately aims to strengthen the Pashtun component of any future government. Their action coincided with an October 24 meeting of 800 Afghan Pashtun exiles in Peshawar that seeks to establish a political counterweight to the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, which is made up of mainly Tajiks and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan.

The two developments underscore the growing centrifugal pressure building on the anti-terrorism alliance. The diverging interests of key players in the anti-terrorism campaign are hampering efforts to forge a broad political coalition that could govern Afghanistan after the ouster of the Taliban.

Factionalism and deep mistrust among Afghan Pashtun leaders continues to prevent the formation of a common Afghan front against the Taliban. The failure of Pashtun tribes to unite in opposition to the Taliban, which also draw support from Pashtuns, could hinder the US-led offensive against the Taliban leadership and Osama bin Laden. In 17 days of intense US bombing not a single Afghan city has fallen to the anti-Taliban alliance, nor has there been a single defection of a prominent Taliban leader.

The meeting of more than 800 Afghan exiles in Peshawar took place under the auspices of moderate spiritual leader Pir Sayed Ahmad Gailani. He called for the cessation of US bombing of Afghanistan, and the establishment of a transitional government of technocrats under the guidance of the country's former monarch, Mohammed Zahir Shah. Senior aides to Zahir Shah, who lives in exile in Rome, said the meeting was not part of the king's own efforts to establish a broad governing coalition. The aides added that Pakistan financed and organized the meeting.

"Afghanistan dangles between life and death, efforts should be made to stop the military operations and start work on the reconstruction of the country as soon as possible," Gailani told the assembled "white beards," or tribal elders. The gathering represented tribal and clan leaders from the Pashtun ethnic group, but had no representation from Zahir Shah's recently formed 120-man Supreme Council for the Unity of Afghanistan. There were no Northern Alliance representatives at the Peshawar gathering either.

Gailani told the gathering that during his mid-October talks with Zahir Shah in Rome he emphasized the need for "the formation of a leadership council comprising those personalities who enjoy the support of the majority of Afghans