Cablegate: Prt Gardez: Regional Meeting in Support Of

VZCZCXRO7337
PP RUEHDBU RUEHIK RUEHYG
DE RUEHBUL #0343/01 0351114
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 041114Z FEB 07
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5851
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE
RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/OSD WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 3599

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 000343

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CT
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG
NSC FOR HARRIMAN
OSD FOR KIMMITT
CENTCOM FOR CG CFC-A, CG CJTF-76, AND POLAD

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PREL PGOV PTER PK AF
SUBJECT: PRT GARDEZ: REGIONAL MEETING IN SUPPORT OF
CROSS-BORDER JIRGA

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SUMMARY
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1. (SBU) Representatives from the southeastern provinces of
Paktia, Khost, Paktika, and Ghazni gathered in Gardez January
25 to meet with representatives from Kabul to discuss and
build support for the cross-border Jirgas initiative. The
event demonstrated the Government,s efforts to secure
support from an area critical to the Jirgas' success. The
four provincial governors, representatives of the central
Government, and local tribal and political leaders spoke to
an audience of traditional and official leaders. The
speakers praised the Jirgas as a traditional Afghan/Pashtun
institution aimed at solving conflict. They also stressed
that the Jirgas represented an Afghan attempt to deal with
war and addressed the need for Afghanistan to become less
reliant on international assistance in the long term. Some
speakers used the event to blame Pakistan for inciting the
insurgency in order to divide Pashtuns and maintain influence
in Afghanistan. The Governor of Pakitika warned that
Afghanistan could likewise export insurgency to Pakistan if
Islamabad did not respond to peaceful approaches. The
audience responded enthusiastically to the Pakistan-bashing
and patriotic Afghan/Pashtun themes but appeared to take a
wait-and-see approach on the effectiveness of the Jirgas.
The meeting highlights the challenges facing the jirga
planning commissions. END SUMMARY

2. (U) The Paktia provincial government hosted January 25 a
regional meeting to promote President Karzai,s proposed
cross-border "Peace Jirga" with Pakistan. The event
attracted officials and tribal elders from the greater Paktia
(Loya Paktia) area that encompasses Paktia, Khost, Ghazni,
and Paktika provinces. The governors and members of
provincial shuras and tribal elders, local delegates to the
Jirgas, some Presidential advisors, political party
representatives, regional ANA and ANP leaders, most key
Paktia officials and representatives of coalition forces, and
the international aid community attended the function.

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Using A Traditional Way to Resolve Problems
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3. (U) The 23 speakers at the half-day event focused on
expressing support for the jirga concept as a way to
resolving the current war, espousing patriotic themes, and
making strenuous denunciations of Pakistan for being
responsible for present difficulties. Speakers from Kabul,
including representatives of the President's office and
ministries, a local member of parliament, and members of the
recently-established jirga commission, pointed out that
jirgas, a traditional Afghan/Pashtun institution, had been
used in the past by Afghan governments to solve disputes.
They highlighted that the Karzai initiative showed that the
central Government was interested in a peaceful solution to
the present conflict with Pakistan. They claimed tribes on
both sides of the border would respect decisions by the
jirga. The speakers characterized the jirga as being
essentially apolitical. The delegates indicted that they
would open a regional information office in Gardez to answer
questions and concerns about the jirga.

4. (U) Several speakers emphasized that Afghanistan needed to
develop means to solve its own problems -- that international
support would not last forever. They stressed that the
inhabitants of the greater Paktia (Southeastern) region
needed to overcome their factional tendencies to bring the
war to an end. Only regional and tribal unity in dealing
with the insurgency could result in an improved security
situation. Speakers reminded the audience that suicide is
not an Islamic practice and that the only real recent Jihad
in Afghanistan had been against the Russia-backed communist
regime.

KABUL 00000343 002 OF 002

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Pakistan as the Root of the Problem
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5. (SBU) The local audience expressed support for the jirga
proposal, though several provincial and local tribal elders
focused on the Pakistani government as the root cause for the
insurgency in Afghanistan. They drew upon several familiar
themes, including that Pakistan and its Punjabi leadership
sought to divide the Pashtuns and maintain a weak Afghanistan
subject to Pakistani influence. They noted that no
insurgency existed during the Taliban period because
Islamabad controlled that Afghan regime. Several speakers
alluded to Pakistan's proposal to place fences and mines
along the border as a ruse to physically divide the Pashtun
tribes in both nations, just as the Durand Line had split
them administratively. They asserted that the suicide
bombers and so-called jihadists were all trained in Pakistan
and noted that the 150 Taliban infiltrators killed recently
by coalition forces in Paktika all were Pakistanis. The
Governor of Paktika, Akram Khpalwak, a young, well-regarded,
and popular leader, indulged in an 45-minute populist rant.
Warming to his appreciative local audience, Khpalwak
described the jirga as possibly Pakistan's last opportunity
to solve disputes peacefully, adding, in ill-conceived
remarks, that Afghanistan could respond in kind by exporting
terrorism to Pakistan.

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Comment
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6. (SBU) One of a series of events being held across
Afghanistan to build support for the jirga initiative, the
well-attended gathering in Gardez highlights the complexities
involved in the jirga proposal while providing a flavor of
the themes that have resonance in the border provinces. The
audience of influential tribal and provincial representatives
welcomed the meeting -- some because it addressed a mechanism
that should be useful for addressing cross-border issues and
others because it provided another platform for criticizing
Pakistan. The question among the predominantly Pashtun
attendees was not whether to hold the jirga, but how it would
be structured, whether it could make binding decisions, and
what its outcomes should be. Getting past the
neighbor-bashing to a implement a commitment to cross-border
cooperation to solve problems is, of course, the challenge
faced by the Afghan and Pakistani commissions that have
responsibility for implementing the jirga proposal. We
continue to press for constructive engagement by the two
commissions, underlining U.S. willingness to support a joint
plan for the jirgas.
NEUMANN

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