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{Update: See my new diary – Despite Peace Talks, US Drone Strikes Unrelentless.}
Original title: Speaking of Surprise Pardons
In the aftermath of murderous spree by the Taliban in recent days, the Pakistan government has decided to release top Taliban prisoners including close allies of OBL such as Mullah Nooruddin Turabi.
- At least 20 Shias pulled off bus, shot dead in northern Pakistan
- Taliban execute 21 captured policemen in NW Frontier
Pakistan ‘frees Afghan Taliban ex-minister Mullah Turabi’
(BBC News) – Pakistan has freed the Afghan Taliban’s ex-justice minister, Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, and three other Taliban prisoners, officials say. Afghan officials have been in talks with Pakistani counterparts to try to free certain Taliban prisoners in order to push forward a peace process.
Pakistan released 13 Afghan Taliban members in November. However, the former Afghan Taliban number two, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, remains in Pakistani custody.
Update [2013-01-01 03:32:46 EST by Oui]:
Taliban, Karzai allies to attend Afghanistan meeting in France
PARIS, France (RFI) Dec. 18, 2012 – The Taliban are to attend a conference near Paris along with supporters of President Hamid Karzai and peaceful opposition parties this week. The meeting comes after the Afghan government published a peace roadmap, which invites the rebels to take official positions if they give up violence.
The Foundation for Strategic Research, the thinktank that is hosting the meeting, had no statement about it on its website and the conference will be at a secret location to the north of Paris and will not to be open to the press.
Karzai gave his green linght for the meeting, French Foreign Affairs Minister Laurent Fabius told RFI on Sunday, and Afghan presidential adviser Haji Din Mohammad and Masoom Stanekzai of the Afghan High Peace Council will be present, according to The News, as will opposition leaders Abdullah Abdullah and Yunus Qanooni and members of the second most important armed opposition group, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s Hizb-e-Islami.
The Afghan government published a “Peace Process Roadmap”, which invited the armed opposition to take part in the country’s institutions.It outlines a four-point programme:
1. Secure the collaboration of Pakistan, whose intelligence agencies have longstanding links to the Taliban, Hizb-e-Islami and other jihadi groups;
2. Negotiations with the Taliban in Saudi Arabia next year with the support of Pakistan and the US;
3. Ceasefire and transformation of the Taliban and other armed groups into political parties with possible participation in the “power structures of the state”, possibly including the cabinet and regional governorships;
4. A peaceful end to the conflict in 2014.The plan calls on the US and the UN to drop sanctions against some Taliban and other armd group leaders to help negotiations.
On Monday the UN Security Council renewed its sanctions but adapted it to allow those on the blacklist to travel outside Afghanistan for peace talks.
Although the roadmap says that the peace process “must respect the Afghan constitution and must not jeopardise the rights and freedoms [of] the citizens of Afghanistan, both men and women”, rights groups and non-Pashtun parties are likely to be worried by the prospect of Taliban members holding high office.
The document also requires the rebels to break all links with Al Qaeda.