Alwaght- Afghanistan’s National Security Advisor Mohammad Hanif Atmar visited Saudi Arabia last week. After returning home on February 27, in a comment on his Twitter account Atmar said that he discussed with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Saudi regime’s role in the Afghan peace process as well as other regional issues. The afghan official added that during the talks, they highlighted the need for the Saudi-led Arab alliance to support the fight against terrorism in Afghanistan.
Saudi Arabia has recently stepped up its Afghanistan-related moves, receiving former rebel figures as well as government officials from the war-devastated country. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the leader of the Hizb-e-Islami, and Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, the head of Islamic Dawah Organization of Afghanistan in the past few weeks also traveled to the Arab kingdom to meet with Riyadh leaders.
The Afghan figures’ trips to Riyadh and bringing in spotlight the terrorism in Afghanistan have raised many questions about Saudi Arabia’s plans and policies towards Afghanistan under Prince Mohammed. Alwaght has conducted an interview with Abbas Fayyaz, Afghanistan affairs’ expert, to shed light on the movement.
Mr Fayyaz first commented on the recent Afghan visits, saying that Saudi Arabia’s terrorism-related policies in the region focus on backing the terrorist groups and factions and gradually getting a sway over them instead of directly fighting against them. The ISIS terrorist group has a different function in Afghanistan, and a set of parties use the takfiri group in various ways. Even Mr Atmar and the government’s agencies are charged with instrumentally using ISIS in the north of the country against northern factions such as the Uzbeks, Tajiks, and Hazaras. Even Hekmatyar’s trip to Saudi Arabia and his discussions with the Saudi crown prince served this purpose. Hekmatyar is under charges of contributing to some ISIS activities in the capital Kabul. His supports include backing the takfiris of the group by the Islamists and harboring them in safe houses that open the door for their activities in Kabul.
The Afghanistan expert continued by having his say on the various functions ISIS could fulfill for Saudi Arabia in Afghanistan, maintaining that ISIS is relocating to Afghanistan to be utilized for destabilizing the country’s neighboring states. Saudi Arabia and the US intend to take revenge on Russia for losses in the Syrian conflict by destabilizing the nations of Central Asia, which are Russia’s neighbors. They also aim to spread insecurity in Afghanistan’s border regions to perpetuate the proxy wars and so put strains on Iran.
“According to these ISIS functions for them in Afghanistan,” Mr Fayyaz noted, “we should translate Mr Atmar’s comment on the Saudi Arabian help to the war against terrorism in Afghanistan this way: Saudi Arabia and the US support ISIS with the aim to serve their interests and also interests of parts of the government that oppose other cults and ethnic groups in the country.”
He continued that parts of ISIS in southern Afghanistan are from the Pashtuns and others are Uzbeks who are remnants of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan at the time of Al-Qaeda dominance who are unrelated to the peoples of the north. The government is now accused of links and supports to ISIS to press the northerners for the final aim of confronting former Balkh province’s governor Atta Muhammad Nur and General Abdul Rashid Dostum.
Mr Fayyaz maintained that it is clear that ISIS has transformed into an element required for abuses and pursuing interests by many sides. The US government believes that over 50 percent of Afghanistan’s soil is practically held by Taliban or is the sphere of Taliban’s influence, whereas the government’s share is smaller. According to a model designed for Afghanistan, Americans are reluctant to see Afghanistan stabilized because in a state of insecurity and active hot spots the conditions are ripe to drag the instability into such targets as Iran and Central Asia.
The expert also commented on the overlap of the US and Saudi Arabia’s plans for and interests in supporting ISIS, pointing that Saudi Arabia is struggling to propagate Wahhabism and takfiri ideology in the shape of ISIS. And the US is striving to dominate the region and so realize its regional goals. The US and Saudi Arabia re-boosted their alliance after Donald Trump came to the power. During Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia last year, they assertively announced the official alliance of Washington and Riyadh. Therefore, in Yemen and elsewhere like Afghanistan Saudi Arabia is a pursuer and implementer of the US policies and interests. So, the two countries have managed to synchronize their objectives in Afghanistan and so have each other’s back in this case.
He also pointed to the reason behind passiveness of Afghanistan’s government in dealing with Saudi Arabia’s destructive actions in the country, saying that the government of Afghanistan is living on the foreign money. Of the $7 billion of the annual budget, nearly $6 billion is provided by the foreign countries. So, a country that 80 percent of its budget is provided by the foreign governments certainly cannot be independent of opinion.
Therefore, Afghanistan’s financial need and President’s Ashraf Ghani’s dependence on the US cause Kabul to move closer to Riyadh. Afghanistan’s public and elites and experts all blame Saudi Arabia as a key backer of terrorism and find Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS as its products, and no free and independent elite supports Saudi Arabia and its plans in Afghanistan. Still, financial hardships, aids, and relations with the West motivate the government’s interest in Saudi Arabia.
