[The Taliban offer,
which was made at the same time they were opening a long-delayed office in
Doha, Qatar, breathed new life into a proposal floated in late 2011 that
collapsed amid Congressional skepticism and the strict security conditions the
Obama administration sought as part of any exchange. They included the
stipulation that the Taliban prisoners be sent to Qatar and forbidden to leave
there.]
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| The New York Times Image |
WASHINGTON —
Two were senior Taliban commanders said to be
implicated in murdering thousands of Shiites in Afghanistan. When asked about
the alleged war crimes by an interrogator, they “did not express any regret and
stated they did what they needed to do in their struggle to establish their
ideal state,” according to their interrogators.
There is also a former
deputy director of Taliban intelligence, a former senior Taliban official said
to have “strong operational ties” to various extremist militias, and a former
Taliban minister accused of having sought help from Iran in attacking American
forces.
These five prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba,
could be the key to whether the negotiations the United States has long sought
with the Taliban are a success, or even take place. A Taliban spokesman in
Qatar said Thursday that exchanging them for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, an American
prisoner of war who has been held by militants since 2009, would be a way to
“build bridges of confidence” to start broader peace talks.
Less than a month ago,
President Obama gave a speech reiterating his desire to close Guantánamo. But
one official familiar with internal deliberations emphasized that any exchange
involving the Afghan prisoners should not be seen as part of efforts the
president has ordered to winnow the prison of low-level detainees.
The five Taliban members
are considered to be among the most senior militants at Guantánamo and would
otherwise be among the last in line to leave.
The Taliban offer, which
was made at the same time they were opening a long-delayed office in Doha,
Qatar, breathed new life into a proposal floated in late 2011 that collapsed
amid Congressional skepticism and the strict security conditions the Obama
administration sought as part of any exchange. They included the stipulation
that the Taliban prisoners be sent to Qatar and forbidden to leave there.
Those conditions,
created by the Obama administration to comply with legal restrictions imposed
by Congress to prevent any detainees from returning to the battlefield in
Afghanistan, led the Taliban to walk away from the negotiations. It is not
clear whether the Taliban position on transfers to Qatar, as opposed to
outright release and repatriation, has softened.
Any prisoner release,
according to officials familiar with the deliberations, is not imminent. The
transfer restrictions require 30 days’ notice to lawmakers before any detainee
leaves, and the administration has not yet given any notification. The
officials would not comment on the record because of the diplomatic and
political delicacy of the issue.
One of the leading
skeptics of such a deal has been Representative Howard P. McKeon, a California
Republican who is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. On Thursday,
Claude Chafin, a spokesman for Mr. McKeon, said the congressman would want to
know what plans the administration had to ensure that the five would remain
under watch.
“Absent any actual
details, the chairman remains very concerned that these five individuals should
never be allowed to re-engage,” Mr. Chafin said.
The details of what the
government believes about what the five former Taliban leaders have done were
made public in classified military files given to WikiLeaks by Pfc. Bradley
Manning, who is now being court-martialed and faces a possible life sentence if
convicted of the most serious charges against him. Because the five men have
never been given a trial, the quality of the evidence and the credibility of the
claims against them in the files — some of which they deny — have not been
tested.
Mohammad Nabi
Omari is described in the files as “one of the most significant
former Taliban leaders detained” at Guantánamo. He is said to have strong
operational ties to anti-coalition militia groups, including Al Qaeda, the
Taliban and the Haqqani network. He is also accused of participating in a cell
in Khost that was “involved in attacks against U.S. and coalition forces,”
maintaining weapons caches and smuggling fighters and weapons.
A former Taliban
provincial governor, Mullah Norullah
Noori, is also “considered one of the most significant former
Taliban officials” at the prison, according to the documents. He was a senior
military commander against United States forces and their allies in late 2001.
Both Mr. Noori and a
third detainee being considered in an exchange, Mullah Mohammad
Fazl, a former Taliban deputy defense minister, are accused of
having commanded forces that killed thousands of Shiite Muslims, a minority in
Afghanistan, before the Taliban were toppled in the aftermath of the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks.
The fourth is Abdul Haq Wasiq,
a former top Taliban intelligence official described as “central to the
Taliban’s efforts to form alliances with other Islamic fundamentalist groups to
fight alongside the Taliban against U.S. and coalition forces after the 11
September 2001 attacks.” He also helped fighters with Al Qaeda and the Taliban
evade capture and arranged for Al Qaeda to train Taliban members in
intelligence methods, according to his military file.
The fifth prisoner, Khirullah Said
Wali Khairkhwa, a former minister of the interior and provincial
governor, has contended that he had direct ties to Osama bin Laden and
represented the Taliban in talks with Iranian officials seeking their support
after Sept. 11, according to the documents.
He is also accused of
using his position to “become one of the major opium drug lords in Western
Afghanistan.” Described as “extremely intelligent,” Mr. Khairkhwa is said to
have claimed to be motivated by public service rather than ideology and pledged
to support President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, who has called for his
release.
The five Taliban leaders
are just a subset of 18 Afghans remaining at Guantánamo — out of the 220 taken
there by the Bush administration. But the other 13 are accused of far less
serious and specific actions, meaning that they are not important
enough to be bargaining chips.
With American troops
still on the ground in Afghanistan, both Obama administration and Congressional
officials say there is genuine concern about releasing high-level leaders if
there is any prospect that they could return to rally new attacks.
But the prospect of
winning freedom for Sergeant Bergdahl, who is believed to be the only living
American prisoner of war, has complicated the calculation, and the politics, of
releasing the five — at least if the Taliban ultimately agree to a condition
that they stay in Qatar until the end of the war.
One Republican staff
member on the House Armed Services Committee said that the administration had
yet to present any concrete, detailed plan for how such an exchange would work.
An administration official said that kind of consultation with lawmakers would
be a prerequisite to a deal, if any ultimately emerges.
“If we were going to
make this decision, which we have not yet decided to do, we would consult with Congress,
as we always do on these issues,” the administration official said. “We are not
looking to quickly do something that they wouldn’t be aware of, and for which
there wouldn’t be proper oversight.”
