NATO key alley Canada supports talks with Taliban

[HAIDER]

OTTAWA (AFP) — Canada supports talks with Taliban insurgents to try to quell unrest in Afghanistan, but only if they renounce violence and Kabul leads the negotiations, Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon said Monday.

"If the Afghan government at the end of the day desires to go out there and have discussions with people who fundamentally will renounce any forms of violence, we're quite comfortable with that," Cannon told public broadcaster CBC.

"We're not going to go out there and say we're going to go and deal and negotiate with people would have arms and are trying to kill our people," he said.

"What we're saying fundamentally here is, 'Renounce all forms of violence and we'll sit down and we'll discuss with you'."

Cannon's comments follow US President Barack Obama's hints in an interview on Sunday at possible talks with moderate Taliban.

Highlighting the US success of bringing Sunni Iraqi insurgents to the negotiating table and away from Al-Qaeda, Obama told the New York Times "there may be some comparable opportunities in Afghanistan and the Pakistani region."
AFP: Canada supports talks with Taliban

[S-2]

"If the Afghan government at the end of the day desires to go out there and have discussions with people who fundamentally will renounce any forms of violence, we're quite comfortable with that..."

So is America. Here's the problem. Disarm. It's the only way to gain access to the political system.

Second problem-It doesn't matter if the Afghani government, Canada, or America wish to negotiate-at least with Omar. He's made clear that he'll not negotiate so long as NATO is in Afghanistan. We won't leave to allow his idea of negotiations which would follow at the point of a gun.

He won't talk so long as he believes that he's winning. For an insurgent, "winning" is anything other than "losing". Omar believes that the taliban hold the upper hand just now and he'll not settle for half-measures when he thinks that the whole pie can be his.

Talking isn't the issue. There's plenty of room in the afghani political discourse for those renouncing violence and willing to disarm. Who wouldn't be willing to negotiate under those terms?

[luftwaffe]

Duh Americans will now define the term and form of violence.

[fatman17]

NATO must deepen engagement with Pakistan: Scheffer

Thu Mar 12, 2009

BUDAPEST (Reuters) - NATO must deepen its engagement with Pakistan, ensure it has sufficient troops in Afghanistan and keep up a dialogue with Russia, NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said on Thursday.

"Of course we need to look beyond Afghanistan... and especially Pakistan, with which we must deepen our engagement," Scheffer told a conference in Budapest on the 10th anniversary of the accession of Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic to NATO.

He also said NATO must ensure it has enough troops in Afghanistan as that country prepares for elections.

"We must ensure that we have sufficient troops on the ground to enforce security both during and after the coming election period," Scheffer said.

He said NATO had considerable success in training and equipping the Afghan national army.

"But there's a lot we and the international community as a whole can do on the civilian side as well in helping the Afghans to build functioning institutions, to fight crime and corruption and get a better grip on the narcotics problem," he said.

U.S. President Barack Obama last month approved the deployment of 17,000 more troops to Afghanistan as Washington and other NATO nations try to stabilize the country, where insurgent violence is at its highest since U.S-led forces toppled the Taliban in late 2001.

Other NATO countries are under pressure to boost troop commitments to the international operation in Afghanistan, though some are reluctant to do so.

Scheffer also said NATO disagreed with Russia on several issues, including Georgia or the recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, but its relationship with Russia was too important to get stuck over those differences.

"It is clear that the NATO-Russia relationship is too valuable to be stuck in debates over enlargement, or for that matter missile defense, or for that matter Kosovo," Scheffer said.

"Afghanistan is one key area where we have obvious common interests but there are other areas as well, such as the fight against terrorism (and) piracy," he added.

NATO agreed on March 5 to resume formal ties with Russia, suspended after Moscow's war with Georgia, in the hope of winning greater Russian support for its struggle to stabilize Afghanistan.

(Reporting by Krisztina Than and Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Dominic Evans)