Posted on 05/10/2005 1:42:59 AM PDT by Eurotwit
BBC - The only major Taleban figure to have been arrested by the Americans and then released, the former foreign minister, Wakil Ahmad Mutawakil, has given his first interview to a western news organisation since his release.
Mr Mutawakil has emerged from three years in American detention and then house arrest in Kabul as a key figure in the moves by the government to forge peace with the Taleban.
Speaking in Kabul, Mr Mutawakil said he was unapologetic about many aspects of Taleban rule, although he did admit that their foreign guests, Osama Bin Laden and his men, had brought suffering to the country.
The former Taleban minister also said he now approved of girls' education, so long as it was in keeping with Afghan culture.
Renewed fighting
The Afghan government and the American forces here have offered an amnesty to any members of the Taleban who have not been involved in what are described as serious abuses.
However, as Mr Mutawakil acknowledged, the fighting actually appears to be picking up again.
Some 70 people were reported to have been killed in the last week alone.
Mr Mutawakil said the talks were crucial to ending the war.
To succeed, members of the Taleban, he said, had to feel confident that they would be treated with dignity if they came over to the government side.
'Too strong'
The former Taleban minister said that al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and his men had abused Afghan hospitality for their own ends and brought suffering on Afghanistan.
"Our guests are always too rich or too strong. That's been Afghanistan's historical problem," he said.
"The Russians, the Arabs and now today, well it's not just the Americans, it's the international coalition and Nato. There's no doubt that today's guests are very strong compared to our own forces, our own army at least. They're strong technically."
But the former Taleban minister said that this time the guests might be allowed to stay in Afghanistan if, he said, a continuing American presence was considered to be in the national interests by the representatives of the Afghan people.
'Little corruption'
Mr Mutawakil also said the current government could learn from the Taleban on some issues.
He cited security, eradication of opium poppies and low rates of government corruption.
But as to banning girls' schools, a Taleban policy which he used to justify to the world's press, Mr Mutawakil now says education is positive and knowledge, he says, marks out both men and women as human.
"he did admit that their foreign guests, Osama Bin Laden and his men, had brought suffering to the country."
And anyplace that OBL and his thugs go on the planet can expect the same treatment, thanks to one man... George W Bush.
:-)
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