In the 1970s, when the oldest generation of Afghans experienced the last leg of peace, Stanekzai and two others would become central figures in the history of the troubled nation – ousted President Ashraf Ghani and the Afghan-American peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad – they were all busy meeting while studying for scholarships abroad.
Stanekzai, now the Taliban’s chief negotiator, spent those years in military fatigue in the foothills of the Himalayas, training at India’s prestigious military school. During the breaks, their group of young Afghans were in the hills of Kashmir or on the sets of Bollywood movies waiting for a photo with the stars.
Like the other two, his journey from being an IMA cadet to the deputy director of the Taliban’s political office captures an arc of the long Afghan conflict. By then, the ideological lines of returning home were already consolidating: on the one hand, a communist approach that looked to the Soviet Union; on the other, a wave of conservatism from the Muslim Brotherhood.
Some of Stanekzai’s former classmates in India say he largely fled politics. But remember that he leaned toward personal conservatism, including avoiding non-halal meat. “He was the most disciplined of his group, very focused and organized,” recalled Abdul Razique Samadi, who was Stanekzai’s senior at IMA. “Even if he smoked a cigarette, he would get it out of our attention.”
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There were few things to suggest that one day Stanekzai would become the top aide to one of the Taliban’s top guerrilla commanders, Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf. His role was to link with Pakistani military intelligence, a relationship that, according to those who have known him, has shaped his political career.
While ideologically Stanekzai was with the anti-Soviet mujahideen, as an urbanite he didn’t quite fit socially, said a friend who knew him well in the 1980s. In Quetta, Pakistan, where his group operated, he often went to restaurants with his wife, a reason for gossip among fighters. The friend recalled that Stanekzai rebuked his fellow Mujahideen for outdated notions about how to keep women hidden at home.
When the Taliban, backed by Pakistan, seized Kabul after the anarchist civil war that followed the Soviet withdrawal, Stanekzai became deputy foreign minister. Her English skills again made her a focal point for international media and diplomats, a voice for a government that banned women’s public roles.
He traveled to the United States to seek, unsuccessfully, diplomatic recognition from the then Bill Clinton administration. His name appeared regularly in the Taliban newspaper Shariat. In 1998, Shariat saw a change in Stanekzai’s fortune: he was replaced as deputy foreign minister, and then completely stopped appearing in news reports for a long time.
According to several Kabul officials at the time, Stanekzai clashed with the Taliban leadership, possibly for reasons such as abuse of power and a lax attitude toward alcohol. He was detained at home and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar said it was a source of personal anger at the time.
According to his friends, what saved Stanekzai was the continuity of his connection with the Pakistani military intelligence agency, which exerted the influence of the Taliban leadership. A few months later, he reappeared as a deputy health minister as a degraded. Stanekzai, however, denied the allegations of misconduct and said his move from the foreign ministry to the health ministry was a routine reshuffle of the government.
Today, his is the face of television, talking about how the Taliban want ties to India as before, with a special focus on trade and other economic activities. In a recent televised speech, he even talked about the possibilities of trade with India through Pakistan, while at the same time calling for air routes to remain open.
(NYT and TNN)