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In the immediate
aftermath of this incident, the people of the US looked confused and
helpless. Prior to these events, Americans could afford to have little
concern for the world outside of the US. The reality of terrorism of
this magnitude on their own soil forced Americans to stretch beyond their
previous mental boundaries. Explanations of this event began to appear.
The suicide phenomenon to the people of the developed world seemed to be
attributed mostly to a psychological disorder. Then theories of religious
fanaticism emerged and, subsequently, the U.S and other members of the
world community settled for what many people, communities and nations
consider the brutal and blind response of military force. In the war
on terrorism, the only visible target was Osama Bin Laden, a native Arab
and a one time strong ally of the US secret services, who later turned
against the US government policies. We were told that this person was
residing in Afghanistan. Afghanistan became the first battleground
for this new war on terrorism.
We, the
principal researchers of this work, belong to Peshawar in Pakistan, a
place just a few miles away from the Pak-Afghan border. We speak the
Afghani language as our mother tongue. A few days before September 11,
2001, we landed in the US as Fulbright Fellows to study Conflict
Transformation at Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) in Virginia. As
Pakistanis and Muslims-probably the only two Muslims at a Christian
university-we suddenly found ourselves barraged with questions from common
Americans. Media people rushed to find Muslims in their area. University
colleagues came with bundles of questions and community groups invited us
for talks.
As we tried to
respond to their difficult and often highly technical questions, we
noticed that the questions generally centered on three themes:
-
Who were the suicide bombers?
-
Why they did this to us?
-
What should we do now?
To the first
question, no one had an immediate answer, but it was clear from the
statements of national leadership that the attackers were Muslims and they
were friends of Osama. To the second question, the national leadership
devised a new theory of terrorism, a term previously used to describe acts
of indiscriminate violence within a national or domestic framework. To the
third question, no one had a clue.
With the natural
bias for peace and tolerance, the EMU community prayed for the victims,
gave lots of support to us, and continued to ponder the above questions.
To the Mennonites, violence in the name of peace or security is
unjustifiable-a stance with which many people in government do not agree.
It was under these circumstances that we, as Muslims and Pakistanis of
Afghan origin, were expected to give satisfactory answers to our American
fellows.
Our
understanding of conflict, as students of peacebuilding, is that conflict
is an opportunity to address the long-standing issues between parties. In
conflicts, violence is used either as an act of vengeance or as a source
of communication from one party to the other. Violence to us is a
phenomenon, which will invariably attract further violence at least in the
long run.
To respond to
the above three questions, we started with the basics. The first question,
while a matter of scientific investigation, called us to remain cautious,
as we may never knew the clear identity of the perpetrators. In
addition, we bore in mind that the perpetrators may be perceived as
martyrs by others in the world.
The second
question to us was not a simple one either, but it was clear that the act
was not carried out to just destroy buildings and kill innocent civilians:
the act definitely carried a deeper message and symbolism. This
looked more like a communication of another kind in which parties did not
seek to understand each other. Perhaps the parties in this conflict
did not have any other platform on which to put their issues before the
other for discussion. Or perhaps one party was too strong and arrogant to
pay heed to the concerns of the weaker party.
To the last
question again, our understanding remains that an act of violence will
beget further violence; therefore for a U.S response of military force
against Osama Bin Laden and the Afghani people will not lead to a
cessation of terrorism. The question of what action should be taken in
response to the September 11 hijackings leads us back to the second
question: why did these hijackings occur? What is it that the
U.S needs to understand about Osama's violent form of communication?
Violence is not only a psychological disorder. A party operating
from a place of fear and insecurity may resort to violence when unable to
communicate a message and feel heard through a verbal medium.
As the US-led
attack on Afghanistan to hunt Osama became imminent, we argued that, in
order to achieve strategic objectives, there was a need for peaceful
dialogue with the people of Afghanistan, as opposed to the use of force.
Regular diplomatic norms of the nation state system were not possible,
however, as the US did not formally recognize the Taliban government. Our
suggestion to the US policy makers was to try to utilize the indigenous
Afghan social institution of Jirga as a forum to sort out all outstanding
issues between war trodden people and one of the most powerful governments
of the world. In the US, there was little enthusiasm for this
because of many factors. It appeared that the US government was in a
hurry to launch an offensive on helpless Afghan people because it was the
quickest remedy to the painful experience of September 11. As EMU
professor and conflict transformation practitioner, Ron Kraybill, would
always remind, "If a hammer is the only tool in your box, everything will
look like a nail".
Having lived
under a civil war for three decades, the people of Afghanistan were once
again destined to face effects of collateral damage, a term so easy to
pronounce, but so difficult to afford. Yet, at the end of the day, the US
Government invited a national conference of Afghans, called a Loya Jirga,
at Bonn in the spring of 2002. However, the Bonn Jirga was held without
getting a hold of Osama, the suspected mastermind of September 11 attacks.
Politics and
sociology must go hand in hand, as both affect the destinies of common
people living in the global village. Where politics bring change in the
societies, sociology must enable people to adjust to positive changes.
In the absence of a formal political platform, the Afghan culture allowed
a quick formation of Loya Jirga, a quasi-political and quasi-social
institution, which enabled the war trodden people to get back to a
socio-political order of some kind. What would have happened if the
Pukhtoon culture didn't have this tradition? Does the nation state
system provide for a contingency where a nation can make a peaceful start
without any formal institutions? Why is it necessary to identify and
respect such cultural understandings not included in the systems of
political science? As these questions arose, we felt the need to
describe what Jirga is and how it operates. Is it an outdated and obsolete
institution or it is capable to face challenges of the present day
systems?
We are obliged
to the US Institute of Peace for encouraging us to work more on the
subject and sponsor our two years of research work in the field. We also
thank the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) for adding partial funding for
the project. We went out to talk to over two hundred people who are
associated with Jirga in one way or another. The journey took us across
all the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of NWFP (North West
Frontier Province), settled districts of the province, the Pukhtoon
districts of Balochistan Province, and a few provinces of Afghanistan,
including Kabul and Jalalabad. As this is the very first work to explore
the dynamics of Jirga, an effort is made to touch only the very basics of
Jirga. This work is an overview of the whole system of Jirga, so as to
present a comprehensive and focused work on this long neglected, but well
tested, indigenous institution that has influenced the lives of millions
of Pukhtoons over hundreds of years of its history.
Many people
helped develop this work along the way. The project leader Vernon Jantzi
gave us lots of technical input from time to time, while Janice M. Jenner
helped us work on designing the project proposal and looking after the
budget side. Amy Potter helped us consolidate our work and present it for
publication. Our domestic associates include hundreds of people who agreed
to spare their precious time, some in pre-organized sessions and others at
informal chats, to talk to us on Jirga. Supper talks with elders and peers
vastly enriched our understanding of the processes involved in Jirga. We
duly acknowledge the value of information on Jirga put up on the Internet
by many freelance as well as professionals which has been used to improve
our understanding of Jirga. We remain thankful to the proprietors of all
those web sites we used during the course of our inquiry. Special
contributions of Ikram Hoti, Usman Yaqub, Javed Akhtar, Askar, Nadia
Shams, Kashif Karim, Memoona
and Noor Akbar
Khalil helped with final compilation of work. Kirstin Rothrock's hard and
timely help enabled to give final shape to the document. We sincerely
thank all our associates, colleagues and peers without whose
contributions; this work would not have been possible.
Hassan M
Yousufzai & Ali Gohar
January 2005
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