West's game plan in Afghanistan hits a stumbling block

The western game plan of involving Afghanistan's neighbours in tackling the post-2014 situation, by which time the bulk of its troops would be back home, seems to have struck a stumbling block with Russia expressing its reluctance, said diplomats focussed on the Af-Pak region. “Russia was the most difficult,'' they said of last-November's Bonn conference, which was the last of the mega meets that began with the same location in 2001 and travelled through London, Kabul and Lisbon.

Now, with the West pinning hopes on specialised meets such as the ones in Chicago, Tokyo and Ashgabad to bring focus on Afghanistan's immediate needs, western Af-Pak envoys who have visited India recently realised the need to quickly bring around most of the neighbours who were generally kept on the sidelines while the 10-year-war in the country raged, first with the al-Qaeda and then with the Taliban.

Despite the U.S. and European Union's attempts to bring Iran to its knees by hitting at its mainstay of oil exports, diplomats described Tehran as “not a bad partner” in stabilising Afghanistan due to its shared concerns of narco-trafficking, Taliban's viciousness in the social sphere and anti-Shia orientation.

But it was Russia which was a cause for concern because its “proxies,” as a western Af-Pak envoy who visited India recently described Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyztstan and Kazakhstan, are also likely to align with Moscow because of the closely guarded NATO plans of leaving behind a military presence. Only Turkmenistan, which styles itself as the “Switzerland of Central Asia” (because of its ‘neutral' position), seems enthusiastic. “Russia is the most difficult partner, even more than Pakistan. Even China did not support the Russian position at the Bonn conference,'' they said.

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