By Abdul Ahad Bahrami

Afghan peace activists and Taliban representatives have gathered in Qatar for a two-day unofficial peace talks. According to the reports, Pakistani officials have also urged the Taliban to cease its spring offensive and start negotiations with the government of Afghanistan. The two-day ‘open discussions’ on peace in Qatar is coming as the first tangible sign of the Taliban preparing for engaging in a formal peace negotiations with the government of Afghanistan. The gathering held after months of diplomatic efforts from the new unity government of Afghanistan and a new approach towards the key regional powers who are believed to have high influence on the Taliban.

In recent weeks, the Taliban have been launching a deadly spring offensive against Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) in many provinces. Seemingly, the recent Taliban offensive is a last-ditch battle as the group seems to be preparing for peace talks with the government of Afghanistan. By launching a widespread campaign, the militants aim to show that they have supremacy on the ground and still are able to launch deadly attacks. The Taliban leaders hope that a bloody fight on the ground will give them leverage in future peace talks with the government of Afghanistan. However, the ANSF reaction to the recent offensive by the militants has been decisive and the group has suffered heavy casualties and considerably failed to gain grounds. If the ANSF manage to inflict a heavy blow to the Taliban offensive across the country, it would also be a blow to the group’s intention of taking advantage from the offensive in peace negotiations.

The previous peace initiatives have been failures not only for the government of Afghanistan but also for the United States who had been engaging with preliminary talks with the Taliban. The major reason for the failure of the peace efforts was that its failure to include major players to the initiative and attract their support. The government of Afghanistan under President Hamid Karzai failed to reach out to the Taliban and convincing Pakistan to help the Afghan government in its efforts for peace. The Karzai administration failed to seek a solution through regional cooperation that includes major players such as Pakistan, China, Saudi Arabia as well as the United States. President Karzai’s lacked a cohesive strategic approach towards the talks with the Taliban as well as relations with Pakistan, who has a high level of influence over the militant group.

Since coming to power, the new unity government quickly moved to prepare the ground in order to kick-start the peace process. President Ashraf Ghani made the talks with the Taliban his top priority. Along with rebalancing of Afghanistan’s foreign policy aimed at benefiting peace efforts, the government of Afghanistan also sought national consensus over the new government’s approach towards Pakistan and negotiations with the Taliban. The government of Afghanistan needs to keep the momentum of its heightened regional diplomacy aimed at engaging major players such as China, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. There have been shifts in Pakistan approach towards the Taliban; however, it will take time for Islamabad to put real pressures on the militant groups to start peace negotiations with the Afghan government.

However, recently there have visible signs that it may be still early to rely in the previous optimisms and the flurry of diplomatic efforts. In recent weeks the government has been less talking of the resumption of talks while it had previously suggested that the talks would begin soon. The recent decline of government officials’ talks about the peace process suggests the difficulties of the process. For sure, the process would see ups and downs and it may have considerable failures when it resumes officially. The most daunting challenge for the peace process would be the terms that will be laid by two sides as both the government and the Taliban do not seem to have any common ground for ending the violence and making a peace deal.

However, the government needs to not consider the process as a short-term objective. The Afghan government should go through the process of negotiations with the Taliban as a long-term strategy that may be derailed to some extent at some points. Keeping this in mind, the government needs to maintain military pressure over the militants’ insurgency for the coming years. In fact, the Taliban should be defeated to a large extent on the ground so to be forced to come to table of negotiations. This two-track strategy would ensure that the Taliban would not gain supremacy on the battleground and, in the meantime, would gradually be convinced that there would not be military solution to the conflict.