VZCZCXRO7337
PP RUEHDBU RUEHIK RUEHYG
DE RUEHBUL #0343/01 0351114
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 041114Z FEB 07
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5851
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE
RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/OSD WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 3599

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 000343 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/FO, SCA/A, S/CT 
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG 
NSC FOR HARRIMAN 
OSD FOR KIMMITT 
CENTCOM FOR CG CFC-A, CG CJTF-76, AND POLAD 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV PTER PK AF
SUBJECT: PRT GARDEZ: REGIONAL MEETING IN SUPPORT OF 
CROSS-BORDER JIRGA 
 
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SUMMARY 
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¶1. (SBU) Representatives from the southeastern provinces of 
Paktia, Khost, Paktika, and Ghazni gathered in Gardez January 
25 to meet with representatives from Kabul to discuss and 
build support for the cross-border Jirgas initiative.  The 
event demonstrated the Government,s efforts to secure 
support from an area critical to the Jirgas' success.  The 
four provincial governors, representatives of the central 
Government, and local tribal and political leaders spoke to 
an audience of traditional and official leaders.  The 
speakers praised the Jirgas as a traditional Afghan/Pashtun 
institution aimed at solving conflict.   They also stressed 
that the Jirgas represented an Afghan attempt to deal with 
war and addressed the need for Afghanistan to become less 
reliant on international assistance in the long term.  Some 
speakers used the event to blame Pakistan for inciting the 
insurgency in order to divide Pashtuns and maintain influence 
in Afghanistan.  The Governor of Pakitika warned that 
Afghanistan could likewise export insurgency to Pakistan if 
Islamabad did not respond to peaceful approaches.  The 
audience responded enthusiastically to the Pakistan-bashing 
and patriotic Afghan/Pashtun themes but appeared to take a 
wait-and-see approach on the effectiveness of the Jirgas. 
The meeting highlights the challenges facing the jirga 
planning commissions. END SUMMARY 
 
¶2. (U) The Paktia provincial government hosted January 25 a 
regional meeting to promote President Karzai,s proposed 
cross-border "Peace Jirga" with Pakistan.  The event 
attracted officials and tribal elders from the greater Paktia 
(Loya Paktia) area that encompasses Paktia, Khost, Ghazni, 
and Paktika provinces.  The governors and members of 
provincial shuras and tribal elders, local delegates to the 
Jirgas, some Presidential advisors, political party 
representatives, regional ANA and ANP leaders, most key 
Paktia officials and representatives of coalition forces, and 
the international aid community attended the function. 
 
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Using A Traditional Way to Resolve Problems 
------------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (U) The 23 speakers at the half-day event focused on 
expressing support for the jirga concept as a way to 
resolving the current war, espousing patriotic themes, and 
making strenuous denunciations of Pakistan for being 
responsible for present difficulties.  Speakers from Kabul, 
including representatives of the President's office and 
ministries, a local member of parliament, and members of the 
recently-established jirga commission, pointed out that 
jirgas, a traditional Afghan/Pashtun institution, had been 
used in the past by Afghan governments to solve disputes. 
They highlighted that the Karzai initiative showed that the 
central Government was interested in a peaceful solution to 
the present conflict with Pakistan.  They claimed tribes on 
both sides of the border would respect decisions by the 
jirga.  The speakers characterized the jirga as being 
essentially apolitical.  The delegates indicted that they 
would open a regional information office in Gardez to answer 
questions and concerns about the jirga. 
 
¶4. (U) Several speakers emphasized that Afghanistan needed to 
develop means to solve its own problems -- that international 
support would not last forever.  They stressed that the 
inhabitants of the greater Paktia (Southeastern) region 
needed to overcome their factional tendencies to bring the 
war to an end.  Only regional and tribal unity in dealing 
with the insurgency could result in an improved security 
situation.  Speakers reminded the audience that suicide is 
not an Islamic practice and that the only real recent Jihad 
in Afghanistan had been against the Russia-backed communist 
regime. 
 
KABUL 00000343  002 OF 002 
 
 
 
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Pakistan as the Root of the Problem 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶5.  (SBU)  The local audience expressed support for the jirga 
proposal, though several provincial and local tribal elders 
focused on the Pakistani government as the root cause for the 
insurgency in Afghanistan.  They drew upon several familiar 
themes, including that Pakistan and its Punjabi leadership 
sought to divide the Pashtuns and maintain a weak Afghanistan 
subject to Pakistani influence.  They noted that no 
insurgency existed during the Taliban period because 
Islamabad controlled that Afghan regime.  Several speakers 
alluded to Pakistan's proposal to place fences and mines 
along the border as a ruse to physically divide the Pashtun 
tribes in both nations, just as the Durand Line had split 
them administratively.  They asserted that the suicide 
bombers and so-called jihadists were all trained in Pakistan 
and noted that the 150 Taliban infiltrators killed recently 
by coalition forces in Paktika all were Pakistanis.  The 
Governor of Paktika, Akram Khpalwak, a young, well-regarded, 
and popular leader, indulged in an 45-minute populist rant. 
Warming to his appreciative local audience, Khpalwak 
described the jirga as possibly Pakistan's last opportunity 
to solve disputes peacefully, adding, in ill-conceived 
remarks, that Afghanistan could respond in kind by exporting 
terrorism to Pakistan. 
 
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Comment 
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¶6. (SBU)  One of a series of events being held across 
Afghanistan to build support for the jirga initiative, the 
well-attended gathering in Gardez highlights the complexities 
involved in the jirga proposal while providing a flavor of 
the themes that have resonance in the border provinces.  The 
audience of influential tribal and provincial representatives 
welcomed the meeting -- some because it addressed a mechanism 
that should be useful for addressing cross-border issues and 
others because it provided another platform for criticizing 
Pakistan.  The question among the predominantly Pashtun 
attendees was not whether to hold the jirga, but how it would 
be structured, whether it could make binding decisions, and 
what its outcomes should be.  Getting past the 
neighbor-bashing to a implement a commitment to cross-border 
cooperation to solve problems is, of course, the challenge 
faced by the Afghan and Pakistani commissions that have 
responsibility for implementing the jirga proposal.  We 
continue to press for constructive engagement by the two 
commissions, underlining U.S. willingness to support a joint 
plan for the jirgas. 
NEUMANN