http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/GE12Ag02.html May 12, 2005
The 'Talibanization' of Central Asia By M K Bhadrakumar Three successive waves of political Islam have swept over Central Asia during the 15-year period since the disintegration of the Soviet Union. They might seem dissimilar. But they have common elements - the most important being that they all had extra-regional profiles, even as they sought a habitation and name in the region. To the naked eye, they appear as interpolators on a civilization that was historically eclectic. They are the monstrous progenies of "foreign devils on the Silk Road" - of Central Asia's globalization. The first wave of political Islam appeared in Tajikistan in 1992, seeking to make the country an Islamic state. The Islamic rebels were initially concentrated in the southern provinces of Kulyab and Kurgan Tyube, but incrementally linked up with elements in neighboring Afghanistan. By 1996 they were operating from within Afghanistan. Their leaders were domiciled in Iran and Pakistan. The Tajik civil war involved factions, but they were ideological overlaps of secular democracy, nationalist reformism and Islamization. A listing of the parties involved in the protracted Tajik peace process under United Nations auspices (1994-96) is revealing - Russia, the United States, Iran, Pakistan, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Organization of the Islamic Conference. The American perspective on the Tajik civil war (1992-96) was that it was a power struggle involving clans or regional cliques, and was engineered by Russia with a view to justifying its military presence in Central Asia. But, its reasoning was seriously flawed - that there were no Islamist elements in Afghanistan interested in a spillover into Central Asia; the Taliban was an indigenous Afghan phenomenon who did not have any regional agenda; Afghan fratricidal strife was purely about capturing power in Kabul; and that the Taliban would be ultimately a factor of regional stability. (Americans were not alone living in a different intellectual universe. As late as June 1995, at a conference convened by the US Institute of Peace, French scholar Olivier Roy laughed off the very thought that there could be "revolution-exporting Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan".) At any rate, alarmed by the ascendancy of the Taliban (leading to the capture of Kabul in 1996) and signs that the Tajik Islamists were increasingly coming under the influence of rival benefactors, Russia and Iran swiftly closed ranks to bring about a Tajik settlement, giving Tajik Islamists a role in the government in Dushanbe. Ironically, the regional rivalries hastened the Tajik settlement. The US, predictably, debunked the settlement and continued to move on the old track, encouraging Central Asian states to forge cooperative links with the Taliban regime in Kabul. This line continued almost right up to the bombing of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August 1998. No sooner than the Tajik settlement came about, the Uzbek militants who fought alongside the Tajik Islamists broke away and linked up with the Taliban. The period from 1996-2001 saw the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) operating from Taliban-ruled areas within Afghanistan and stepping up violent activities inside Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in particular. The IMU was the second wave of political Islam to appear in Central Asia. Unlike the Tajik Islamists, the IMU assumed distinct Wahhabi trappings, and called for jihad against the established secular regimes. The US approach was once again imbued with regional rivalry with Russia - that Russia was "exploiting" a non-existent threat of militant Islam for the sake of dominating Central Asia. Washington proceeded to adopt an ambivalent attitude toward the regional initiative involving Russia and Central Asian states (and subsequently including Iran and India) for the strengthening of anti-Taliban resistance in Afghanistan. The American stance finally took a u-turn only with the September 11, 2001, attacks. The US went on to secure military bases in Central Asia on the new imperative to forge a common front against "Islamic terror". The collaboration with al-Qaeda was certainly the IMU's (and Taliban leadership's) fatal mistake. In the American military intervention in Afghanistan in October 2001, the IMU's cadres retreated to Pakistan's tribal agencies - along with the Taliban. No one knows what happened thereafter. According to some Western media reports, the IMU leaders are in American custody. At any rate, in the void left by the IMU, a third wave of political Islam has appeared in Central Asia - Hizbut Tehrir (HT - Party of Islamic Liberation). Unlike the earlier manifestations of political Islam, HT claims to be a pan-Islamic movement. HT subscribes to the goal of establishing a Sharia-based caliphate in Central Asia and "dividing Russia along the line of the Volga" so as to liberate the "originally Muslim lands". HT remains in many ways an enigma wrapped in mystery - much like the Taliban. American media organs periodically interview HT spokesmen, but no one says where its leadership is based. HT is believed to be getting its financing from "Arab charities" and its "branches" in some Western countries. HT resembles a hierarchical pyramid consisting of five-member cells at its base, each with a leader. No two cells interact directly. Leaders of every four cells are grouped as a local body under a naquib who, in turn, belongs to a regional council headed by a muta'amad (head of a region). The muta'amads work independently under the amir's (supreme leader's) supervision. The entire arrangement is on a "need-to-know" basis. The recruits are not required to have any detailed knowledge of Islam but must be committed to the jihad and the Sharia-based goals of the party. They attend clandestine "study classes" stretched over months that can extend up to 18 months. The curricula ranges from religion to world politics. Without doubt, the great social and economic upheavals in the Central Asian region provide a fertile ground to HT. To quote the well-known scholar, Anatol Lieven, "In depressing circumstances, adherence to a radical Islamic network provides a sense of cultural security, a new community and some degree of social support - modest, but still better than anything the state can provide." Thus, American specialists on Central Asia have begun describing HT as the region's "most popular radical Islamic group". The HT spokesmen openly acknowledge that the present "revolutionary climate" in Central Asia works to their advantage. Associated Press news agency reported on May 1 that, "according to Dr Imran Waheed, HT's London-based spokesman, the region remains a fertile recruiting ground, with local membership soaring". Western think-tanks estimate HT's hard core to be in the region of 20,000 cadres. Central Asian security agencies put the figure as 60,000. By any reckoning, HT would be the single-biggest cadre-based political movement today in the region. HT professes non-violent methods. But it is believed that HT has a parallel military structure. It is an intriguing thought how exactly HT co-relates with the dormant IMU cadres in Central Asia, estimated by Western intelligence agencies to be in the region of 3,000-5,000 militants. Central Asian countries and Russia have proscribed HT as a terrorist organization. Uzbekistan has blamed HT and/or IMU for several incidents of violence. But the US refuses (unlike Germany) to list HT as a militant organization, apparently for want of evidence. Conceivably, the US's regional policy considerations would explain this differentiated approach. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization's lead role in combating religious extremism in the region after all makes this Russia and China's "crusade" against militant Islam. Indeed, the leader of the Islamic Party of Tajikistan, Deputy Prime Minister Hoji Akbar Turajonzoda, has alleged that HT is a Western-sponsored bogeyman for "remaking Central Asia". He said, "A more detailed analysis of HT's programmatic and ideological views and concrete examples of its activities suggests that it was created by anti-Islamic forces. One proof of this is the comfortable existence this organization enjoys in a number of Western countries, where it has large centers and offices that develop its concept of an "Islamic caliphate". Osh and Jalalabad, the cities which spearheaded the regime change in Kyrgyzstan, happen to be HT strongholds. HT will hugely gain in an entire belt stretching from the Fergana provinces of Namangan, Andizhan and Kokand (contiguous to Osh and Jalalabad) to the adjacent Penjekent Valley (Uzbekistan) and Khojent (Tajikistan). Similar to the early 1990s when the Taliban seemed an alternative to mujahideen misrule, it is tempting to view HT as a counterpoint to Central Asia's political elites. But can that be the whole picture? The Afghan experience should offer sobering thoughts. Afghanistan too, like Central Asia, had its history - into which Islamists were introduced as agents of change. Many thought that these Islamists would be birds of passage for a time of transition. Instead they settled in. So much so that Afghan President Hamid Karzai faces an existential dilemma distinguishing the good, bad and the ugly among them. M K Bhadrakumar is a former Indian career diplomat who has served in Islamabad, Kabul, Tashkent and Moscow. (Copyright 2005 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. 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