#10
Los Angeles Times
October 22, 2001
Russia Fears U.S. Has Hidden Afghan Agenda, Fighter Says
Asia: Top Moscow leaders meet with anti-Taliban commander to discuss concerns that America is trying to expand its influence in the region.
By PAUL WATSON, Times Staff Writer

ASHKARGA, Afghanistan -- Russia summoned the commander of Afghan anti-Taliban forces to a meeting in neighboring Tajikistan over the weekend as escalating U.S.-led attacks fueled a new competition for foreign influence over this country.

Gen. Mohammed Fahim, who leads the Northern Alliance troops battling the Taliban regime, met with Russian Defense Minister Sergei B. Ivanov at his "invitation" Sunday, Gen. Abdul Basir, one of Fahim's top associates, said in an interview.

"They were discussing Afghanistan's borders to reassure the Russian government that the capture and defeat of the Taliban are not dangerous for them, and that America will not control Afghanistan," Basir said through an interpreter.

Nikolai P. Patrushev, the head of Russia's Federal Security Service, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, arrived with Ivanov in Dushanbe, the Tajik capital, early Sunday. Russian President Vladimir V. Putin arrived about 3 a.m. today to join them during a stopover on his way home from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shanghai.

The unprecedented series of meetings, which included the Northern Alliance's aging figurehead president, Burhanuddin Rabbani, came as U.S. fighter-bombers for the first time struck Taliban troops near the front line closest to Kabul, the Afghan capital.

Putin officially supports what Washington insists is a war against terrorism in Afghanistan and not an attempt to expand U.S. influence into Russia's backyard.

But Basir said there is increasing concern in Russia, Iran and other front-line states that the U.S. has a hidden agenda: to be the dominant power in Afghanistan, a strategic crossroads and a gateway to vast Central Asian oil fields.

That raises prospects of a 21st century version of the struggle among foreign powers that Rudyard Kipling immortalized as the "Great Game."

The U.S. and Russia already disagree on what form any post-Taliban government should take. Washington and its closest ally in the region, Pakistan, want "moderate" Taliban leaders to be included in the government they hope will replace the hard-line Taliban regime.

But Russia, Iran and other longtime allies of the Northern Alliance such as Tajikistan and India have rejected any role for the Taliban in ruling Afghanistan.

"The Taliban are the killers of the Afghan people," Basir said at his headquarters in the Salang Pass, which linked Kabul with northern Afghanistan until retreating Northern Alliance troops blew up a Soviet-built mountain tunnel in 1997.

"It is impossible for them to participate in a new government. Only their soldiers can serve under the new government," he said.

Putin was officially in Dushanbe to meet with Tajik President Emamali Rakhmonov. But Tajik Foreign Ministry officials told Associated Press that a meeting involving Putin, Rakhmonov and Rabbani would be followed by bilateral sessions.

Yet the simple fact that three of Russia's most powerful men were in Dushanbe together, combined with the high-level meetings between the anti-Taliban forces and their closest allies, underscored deepening concerns in Moscow, which has competed with foreign powers over Afghanistan for centuries.

"Russia realizes the threat to its national security more than Washington," Northern Alliance Foreign Minister Abdullah, who was in Dushanbe with Fahim, said in Afghanistan last week.

Iran, which has refused to back the U.S.-led attacks on Afghanistan, is also worried that a new U.S. base for support troops in Uzbekistan, and an agreement to put additional troops in Tajikistan, will lead to a permanent American presence in the region.

Iran, Russia and other front-line states are even more worried about the prospect of the U.S. putting a long-term military base in Afghanistan, Basir said, as it did in Bosnia-Herzegovina and in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo after winning air wars in those regions.

Basir is one of about 10 top commanders who sit on the Northern Alliance's war council, which has held almost daily meetings recently to plan its next moves on the battle and political fronts.

He said the alliance is working closely with the U.S. military in the escalating Afghan war, but he insisted that doesn't mean Washington will be able to dictate terms for a postwar government or its future role here.

"It doesn't mean we are under the control of anyone, just that we are friends and we want to fight the Taliban and terrorism together," Basir said.

The Northern Alliance says it plans to advance on Kabul, surround it and then send in police units to maintain security to prevent a power vacuum arising between the fall of the Taliban and the swearing-in of a new government.

The alliance says it will wait for negotiations to produce a political settlement that would allow deposed King Mohammad Zaher Shah to oversee a traditional loya jirga, or grand council, of tribal and other leaders.

Basir said formal agreement is close on a list of 120 people who would form an interim assembly to consult with the former monarch about convening a grand council. U.S. officials have played a key role in negotiations between the alliance and supporters in Italy of Zaher Shah, who has lived in exile outside Rome since 1973.

"We are still discussing it, and we will announce the results in the next few days," Basir said.

A political deal on a transitional government would open the way for the alliance to launch an assault on Taliban front lines about 20 miles north of Kabul, Basir said.

Outside observers have suggested that time is running out for an offensive because the Muslim holy month of Ramadan begins in mid-November and winter will set in soon after that.

But neither winter nor Ramadan would stop the Northern Alliance from making its long-awaited move on Kabul, Basir said.

Like other opposition commanders, Basir complained that the U.S.-led strikes against Taliban positions have been neither heavy nor frequent enough, and he asked why Washington isn't willing to give the Northern Alliance stronger support.

"The Americans come and bomb in unnecessary places, like in the mountains or other places where it doesn't have any effect on the Taliban," he said.

Basir said he had ordered his men to begin clearing the rubble from the Salang's mountain tunnel, which leads north to the strategic city of Mazar-i-Sharif, where alliance forces are battling the Taliban.

The Taliban has repulsed several attacks on the city, but the alliance claims that it is regrouping for another thrust. Yet there wasn't a soul in the ruins of the Salang tunnel Sunday--not even a soldier or military vehicle on guard.

"When I saw the attacks of the Americans were so weak, we stopped work clearing the tunnel," Basir said. "It wasn't clear whether America really wants to get rid of the Taliban or not."