AFGHAN HOUNDED

October 2001 – 7’11’’

(ABC Australia, Reporter Geoff Thompson)

With each crossing, these Afghan drivers briefly leave their homeland behind but never its problems.

KHALIK DJAN, TRANSLATION: The Taliban are our brothers and the Northern Alliance are also our brothers and if the United States helps the Northern Alliance to fight the Taliban, once again, Afghanistan and its people will face destruction.

GEOFF THOMPSON: It's hardly the first conundrum need a solution along the way of Afghanistan's bitter journey through wars.

The driver is one who believes the answer lies with his country's long-exiled king.

KHALIK DJAN, TRANSLATION: We all want Zahir Shah.

He is one of us.

He should come into power.

Whether the Taliban or the Northern Alliance want to be with him, we will accept.

The people are too tired and fed up.

GEOFF THOMPSON: Fed up and still divided.

But, if recent history has proven the Afghans inability to agree, it has also proven their ability to unite against a common foe.

At Peshawar's Afghan fruit market, another truck driver's been an eyewitness to such fresh sentiments in Kabul.

TRUCK DRIVER, TRANSLATION: People are shouting, "Death to America, death to America," and the people were totally against America.

GEOFF THOMPSON: For 22 years, Afghans have squabbled over solutions to their history of invasion, civil war and displacement.

Now, America and the war community thinks they can help them to agree.

FRANCESC VENDRELL, UN SPECIAL ENVOY TO AFGHANISTAN: The UN's answer is to enable the Afghan people to determine their form of government in the future.

Mr Vendrell was the UN's Special Envoy to East Timor.

Now he's the same to Afghanistan.

FRANCESC VENDRELL: That was the answer in East Timor.

It is the answer in Afghanistan.

The Afghans have not had the opportunity to decide their future since the Soviet invasion.

It's time they had this possibility.

GEOFF THOMPSON: It's a possibility even supported by the Taliban's last standing friend, Pakistan's military government.

RIAZ MOHAMMAD KHAN, PAKISTAN FOREIGN MINISTRY SPOKESMAN: Everybody seems to be groping for ideas because there are many ideas.

You can talk about referendums, you can talk about elections, you can talk about - but whether that fits the situation that Afghanistan is - Afghanistan is caught in a time warp but one parameter remains paramount and that is that the solution will have to come from the Afghan people.

GEOFF THOMPSON: Working out what or too the ethnically diverse Afghanistan will support is another matter altogether.

Retired General Hamid Gul should know.

He's the former head of Pakistan's Intelligence Service.

GENERAL HAMID GUL, FORMER INTER SERVICES INTELLIGENCE DIRECTOR: One people cannot be controlled and stilled by anyone.

It would be against their psyche and they will not bend or bow because they have an honour core which is stronger than their faith in Islam.

They are Muslims later and they are Afghans first.

GEOFF THOMPSON: The United Nations is hoping that Zahir Shah, Afghanistan's 83-year-old former king, can garner the support of all Afghans.

Deposed in 1973, Zahir Shah has signalled a willingness to return from exile in Rome to symbolically head an interim Afghan government, including Taliban representation, an offer the Taliban have point-blank refused.

FRANCESC VENDRELL: He's not the only person.

He's not the only force.

But he has, in our estimation, a great deal of support.

If you like, he's a rallying point for a lot of Afghans who remember his days in power as golden days.

GEOFF THOMPSON: But those days are long gone.

An entire generation of Afghans has now grown up in Pakistan's refugee camps.

Kids are allowed to fly their kites here.

Under the Taliban, it was once forbidden.

Driven here by war, drought and starvation, it's in camps like this that the Taliban grew up too.

Here you can still find their supporters which credit the Taliban with at least bringing law and order to a divided Afghanistan.

Even among those who dislike the Taliban, few desire a return to the lawlessness typical under the Mujaheddin-based Northern Alliance, which now controls only 5 per cent of the country.

The Taliban may also be favourites for Pakistan's holy warriors but, as long as they protect Osama bin Laden, the Taliban are in danger of being directly targeted by the American led anti-terrorism alliance.

Indeed, without the Taliban's removal, it's hard to imagine the UN realising its dream of an Afghan solution.

FRANCESC VENDRELL: That presupposes the Taliban at least becoming more flexible than they've been hitherto in the negotiations.

GEOFF THOMPSON: They are not known for their flexibility?

FRANCESC VENDRELL: They are not but a reason for lack of flexibility is they felt they could win militarily.

Maybe, after this experience, they may go down a notch or two.

GEOFF THOMPSON: If that military experience has begun, little is yet known about it.

But, despite reports of some defections, there is no suggestion yet the Taliban is about to give in.

DR RIFAAT HUSSAIN, QUAID-I-AZAM UNIVERSITY: That really creates a problem, how do you really engage with them, because they are not willing to deviate?

GEOFF THOMPSON: It's also increasingly clear that Pakistan is unwilling to expand its military commitment to the US beyond intelligence sharing and logistic support.

RIAZ MOHAMMED KHAN: Certainly, we are not talking about an attack against Afghanistan or an attack against the Afghan people. That is quite clear.

We are talking about hunting down those people who may be responsible for the attacks on the 11th of September, or terrorists, or - those are the kind of objectives on which we remain part of the coalition.

GEOFF THOMPSON: America's answer to that reality and its answer to the Taliban's intransigence may yet trigger some answers for the people of Afghanistan too.