Conflict with Pakistan Tests National Understanding in Afghanistan
According to the principle of conscience, attachment, and national sentiment, any violation of a person’s land and country wounds their spirit and unsettles their mind. From this perspective, any country—regardless of its intention or motivation—that attacks Afghanistan commits a repugnant and condemnable act.
However, if we set aside this general rule and examine the ongoing conflict between the Taliban and Pakistan, at times, there are murmurs tinged with nationalist sentiments. Occasionally, harsh slogans also appear. To clarify the dimensions of this issue, one must focus on the core subject of the dispute. If this conflict were about a national matter, then discussions of mobilization and national alignment would be meaningful; for example, if the disagreement concerned territorial integrity, water resources, or other vital national interests, national unity could be legitimately invoked.
Yet, the main issue, as claimed, is the Taliban in Afghanistan supporting the Pakistani Taliban and allowing their presence on Afghan soil. Pakistan has always been a problematic actor in Afghanistan’s affairs; regardless of the validity of its claims, one fact is clear: the Pakistani Taliban issue has never been a national matter for Afghanistan but rather an ethnic one. Therefore, it is unwise to crudely engineer public opinion to portray the extremism in the relationship between the Pakistani Taliban and Kabul as a national Afghan concern. Consequently, investing national capital in such a matter is a grave mistake.
Moreover, the Taliban have exclusively seized all power and excluded others from participating in governance and benefiting from national resources; thus, they cannot burden the people with their self-made ethnic problems and exploit national concepts. The current crisis between the Taliban and Pakistan is the result of the Taliban’s own policies, and the responsibility to resolve it lies with them.
In conclusion, until national participation and equitable distribution of power and wealth are achieved, invoking national concepts and titles is baseless and meaningless, let alone presenting purely ethnic issues as national ones.
Dr. Seyed Javad Sajjadi
