Weekend leader – Tajiks seek Imran boycott of SCO summit after Panjshir massacre

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PHOTO: IANS

Protesters in Tajikistan, furious with Pakistani intervention in Afghanistan, are seeking a boycott of Imran Khan during the upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in the Tajik capital Dushanbe. The Pakistani prime minister is one of those invited to the SCO summit, which is likely to be overshadowed by the chaos in Afghanistan following the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul on 15 August. Tajiks have become furious after Pakistani ISI chief Faiz Hameed landed in Kabul to steer the air strike against ethnic Tajiks who had mounted an anti-Taliban solution in the famous Panjshir Valley.

Unsurprisingly, as the Tajik capital prepares to host the crucial September 15, 2015, the country’s civil society groups have called on the Emomali Rahmon-led government to stop Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan from attending.

On Friday, Tajik civil society called on the country’s authorities to postpone Khan’s visit to Dushanbe “until Pakistan refuses to interfere in Afghanistan’s internal affairs” and an inclusive government is not set up in Kabul.

The anti-Pakistani sentiment has only grown stronger since the Taliban released a Pakistani-backed military operation to decimate the resistance mounted by Ahmad Masood, former Afghan Vice President Amrullah Saleh and their Tajik fighters in northern Panjshir Valley in northern Afghanistan.

In a statement on Facebook, the civil society group said that the Taliban has proven to be a puppet in Pakistan and needs Islamabad to destroy its opponents.

“We categorically condemn Pakistan’s intervention in Afghanistan’s internal affairs, in particular Pakistan’s military involvement in the bombing of Panjshir residents,” Dushanbe’s Avesta News Agency quoted from the social media post.

“We believe that in these days and nights when millions of Tajikistanis’ hearts are bleeding because of the killings of people in Kabul and Panjshir, the upcoming visit of Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan to Dushanbe, his meeting in Tajikistan is undesirable,” the statement added.

The appeal is signed by the country’s leading human rights activists, lawyers, journalists, philosophers, historians and public activists.

It includes names like Oynihol Bobonazarova – one of Tajikistan’s most famous human rights activists who has also fought against the country’s presidential election – and noted filmmaker Anisa Sabiri.

In its open speech, Tajik civil society called on the Foreign Ministry of Tajikistan to postpone the visit of the Pakistani Prime Minister to Dushanbe until Pakistan rejects political and military support from the Taliban government in Afghanistan, the issue is discussed in the UN and an inclusive government is formed in the neighboring country.

“In our view, Tajikistan and other countries in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are obliged to set up a special commission and send it to Panjshir and other regions of Afghanistan to investigate the facts of Pakistan’s intervention and ethnic cleansing of the local population,” the appeal said.

The group said the collected evidence of the crimes committed by the Taliban and the Pakistani army, particularly in Panjshir, should then be sent to relevant international organizations, notably the UN.

‘ “It indicates the existence of the previously developed Taliban scenario. It has now become an extreme concern for the world community and neighboring countries in Afghanistan,” the activists noted.

Civil society groups, which have played an important role in Tajikistan’s growth and development over the past few decades, now fear that the current situation in Afghanistan could lead to a protracted Afghan civil war and instability in Central Asia.

As reported by India Narrative earlier, Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmon had last month conveyed to visiting Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi Dushanbe’s extreme dissatisfaction with Pakistani – backed Taliban who support other ethnic groups in Afghanistan.

Rahmon had told Qureshi that the Tajiks have “a dignified place” in the future government of Afghanistan, and Dushanbe will not recognize any other regime that will be formed “through oppression” without taking into account the position of the entire Afghan people, especially all its national minority.

This, of course, was long before Bloody Sunday (September 5), when Pakistani drones, helicopters and special forces allegedly launched a joint operation with the Taliban fighters to crush Tajiks in Panjshir.

With not just Tajikistan, but even Russia and Iran smoking in anger after the Panjshir massacre, it’s Imran Khan’s turn to take cover now – IANS

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