- Dawn in Jalalabad and in scores of dirty rooms and courtyards
across the city the Mujahideen are getting ready for the weekend. A dull
murmur of conversation, the crackle of the cooking fires and the clink
and rattle of weaponry - Kalashnikovs, rocket-propelled grenades and heavy
machine guns - fills the air. The guns are slung over the men's shoulders
with a mixture of bravado and boredom.
-
- Soon they will fan out across the city. Some will career
through the narrow, dusty roads in souped-up pick-up trucks; others will
throng the bazaars or squat in groups at street corners, each band eyeing
the others like wary dogs over the grey muzzles of their weapons.
-
- Others are watching Jalalabad closely too. The city was
given up by the Taliban early last week. With the last of their troops
- and their Arab extremist allies - leaving on Wednesday night, by Thursday
groups of armed men, led by the commanders who had run the region before
the coming of the hardline Islamic militia, had taken their place.
-
- Analysts in London, Washington and Islamabad know that,
if a post-Taliban set-up is to work anywhere, it must work here. But, despite
the good intentions of the United Nations and the US-led coalition, there
is little sign that the return of the Mujahideen will bring freedom and
prosperity to the people of this city. Five years ago, these same men brought
chaos and violence. Now the fear is they are bringing it again.
-
- The locals are watching developments with fear and resignation.
'I am sick when I see what is happening. There is no discipline here. There
is no police, no army, no government. Everyone has a Kalashnikov,' said
Rehmat Ali Khan, a spice trader in Jalalabad's once busy bazaar.
-
- One sign of the deteriorating situation is that the infamous
partaks or checkpoints, that made travel so difficult in the years between
the collapse of the Soviet-backed regime in 1992 and the coming of the
Taliban to eastern Afghanistan in 1996, are returning.
-
- Out on the roads - to Pakistan 50 miles away to the east,
to Kabul 90 miles to the west - sharp-eyed and sharp-fingered gunmen man
chains stretched across the potholed tarmac. A week ago such posts did
not exist. There are already reports of looting and passing journalists'
vehicles have been fired on.
-
- The Mujahideen are determined to make the most of their
opportunity. 'When there is a big victory it is right that everybody should
share in it,' said Haziullah, a 28-year-old manning one of the roadblocks
on the outskirts of the city. 'We have been waiting a long time for this.'
-
- But distributing the spoils is a vexed business. Within
24 hours of the Taliban retreating, six different commanders had led their
fighters into the city. On Friday, in the palatial high-ceilinged rooms
of the governor's house, they sat down to talk, but with little result.
Yesterday, after 36 hours of volatile discussions, a jirga or traditional
council, including 100 different groups had reached a fragile agreement.
This came after a night so tense that a curfew had been imposed and armed
guards with rocket launchers had been posted outside hotels. As expected,
the man heading the new administration is Haji Abdul Qadir. He is the brother
of Abdul Haq - the opposition leader killed in a disastrous bid to spark
a revolt within Taliban territory three weeks ago.
-
- Qadir, who arrived in Jalalabad in a helicopter on Thursday,
was governor of the rich Nangarhar province, which lies around the city,
until he was ousted by the Taliban on 10 September 1996.
-
- But there is no shortage of contenders hungry for power,
including Qazi Amin Wiqad, a hardline Islamist with close ties to the Taliban.
Another of the commanders vying for power was actually fighting for the
Taliban until last week. Though none is strong enough to unseat Qadir alone,
they could probably defeat him if they joined forces. For the moment, an
uneasy calm has descended on the city, but few expect it to last.
-
- Almost all these men are remembered for the chaotic anarchy
of the 1992-96 period.
-
- 'Thank you Britain and America for allowing these men
to come back and rob and beat us again,' one refugee shouted at The Observer
as he drove slowly back into Jalalabad on Friday.
-
- Others openly confess their Taliban sympathies.
-
- 'They followed Islamic law and that is the only way to
resist America's tyranny,' said Waly Yad, 24, a doctor at Jalalabad's filthy
and battered hospital where more than 300 civilian victims of the US-led
bombing raids have been treated in the last two months. 'Osama is a very
good Muslim. This is all wrong now.'
-
- Even those who might rejoice at the ending of Taliban
rule are worried. Fatima, a 36-year-old teacher, said she was 'too scared'
to celebrate. 'How can we be happy when things are so uncertain. Does this
look like peace? We have not seen so many soldiers in Jalalabad for five
years.'
-
- The only signs of change are the overt playing of music
and the return of televisions to restaurants. There is no sign of women
forsaking the burqa - the traditional all-encompassing veil that the Taliban
imposed.
-
- 'I am not going to walk unveiled through a city full
of soldiers where there is no police force,' Fatima said.
-
- All the fighters in Jalalabad are from the Pashtun tribes
who are the majority in this part of Afghanistan. While the Tajik, Uzbek
and Shia Muslim Hazara fighters can easily hold on to the more ethnically
mixed parts of the country, it would be impossible for them to capture
Jalalabad and the surrounding provinces. So it is up to Abdul Qadir and
the others - all ethnic Pashtuns - to create a stable administration.
-
- Once they have done that, they will look for a national
role. Yesterday, Mohamed Zarman, from the jirga, said they would not tolerate
Northern Alliance rule in Kabul and called for a broad-based government
that would include all ethnic groups. For almost all of Afghanistan's recent
political history a Pashtun has ruled the nation from Kabul. Now the Pashtun
tribes - who comprise almost half the population - have no representation
in the capital at all.
-
- At present however all anyone is thinking about is getting
through the next 48 hours without a major outbreak of violence between
the factions in the city.
-
- 'We have suffered so much in recent years we cannot suffer
any more,' said Amin Gul, the father of a teenager being treated for blast
wounds in Jalalabad hospital. 'Afghanistan has run out of everything except
suffering.'
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- http://www.observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,596788,00.html
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