KABUL, June 3 (Reuters) - Afghan tribal elders discussed ways to reach out to the Taliban on Thursday, despite a rocket and gunfire attack by the insurgents aimed at disrupting a national conference seeking an end to nearly nine years of war.
President Hamid Karzai, who launched the traditional "peace jirga" of tribal elders on Wednesday amid the gunfire is hoping to get national support for his plans to reach out to the the Taliban ahead of a gradual U.S. military withdrawal from 2011.
Nearly 1,600 delegates, many wearing turbans and long beards, were huddled in a giant tent in the west of the capital to finalise a resolution on a peace plan to end the deadly insurgency.
It consists of luring Taliban foot soldiers back to the mainstream with cash and job incentives while seeking reconciliation with senior figures by offering them asylum in a Muslim country and striking their names off a UN blacklist.
"The main deliberations have begun on how we can come up with a peace formula for talks with the Taliban," Mohammad Shah Hemad, head of one of 28 groups, set up to discuss the proposals. The delegates will report back to former president Burhanuddin Rabani who was named the jirga chairman on the opening day.
But even if Karzai does win the backing of the delegates drawn from around the battle-scarred nation, it would amount to little more than symbolic support, since the Taliban have vowed to press on with their campaign — at its most intense since 2001 — until all foreign troops leave.
"The jirga is itself mostly for show. They have these things every few years, and they don’t change anything," said Joshua Foust, a U.S.-based independent analyst focused on Afghanistan and Central Asia.
Critics have also said that the jirga is packed with delegates loyal to Karzai and hence its decisions did not reflect the full spectrum of Afghan politics, tribes and geography.
About a 100 people staged a demonstration in Asadabad, the provincial capital of eastern Kunar province, saying three delegates they had chosen to represent them at the meeting were not invited.
MOUNTAIN OF FOOD
A fifth of those assembled in the big tent are women, reflecting the progress they have made since the Taliban’s ouster in 2001. Karzai’s administration is keen that the gains made in developing democracy and civil rights are not compromised in any opening to the hardline Taliban, delegates said.
The women, most them in flowing shalwar kameez, were seated separately from the men in the big tent, but came together in the meeting rooms to discuss the peace proposals.
The Afghan government is spending an estimated $3 million on food, shelter, and transport of the delegates not counting the security costs. Over the three days of the jirga, mountains of food, endless cups of the weak Afghan tea and tonnes of water will be consumed. The jirgas, a centuries-old institution, have in the past run way beyond schedule.
Hundreds of police and security forces have been deployed on the streets surrounding the campus and in the hillsides overlooking the tent where the conference is taking place.
"It is the begining of the process, not the end of the process. This is a process where all Afghans should be involved because they have suffered for a long time … because of the cycle of violence," said Masoon Stanakzai, a top adviser to Karzai.
On Wednesday, three insurgents breached a security cordon by disguising themselves with the all-enveloping burqa worn by women. Rockets fell near the tent and gunfire erupted. Two gunmen were killed and a third captured.
The Taliban insurgency is at its most intense since their overthrow in 2001 by U.S.-led coalition forces and analysts say the militants may want to wait out a U.S. military withdrawal planned to begin from July 2011.
U.S-led NATO forces are expected to launch an operation against the Taliban in their southern stronghold of Kandahar in the next few weeks that some believe may force them to reconsider their opposition to talks.
