LONDON: Members of the Taliban who give up their fight are being paid £100 a month and will be allowed to keep their guns in a new initiative to end the insurgency.
The “reintegration” programme, which has the full support of Nato, is intended to keep them from attacking troops from the International Stabilisation and Assistance Force (ISAF).
Those who have attacked and killed British forces are also effectively given an amnesty, which means they will never be put on trial.
The amnesty extends to all Taliban fighters, including those who have taken part in atrocities, such as murdering children, beheadings and hanging women.
The agreement is part of a policy signed by the British Government in which insurgents are being allowed to “walk off the battlefield” and enter a “reintegration” scheme.
Taliban joining the programme not interrogated but instead are asked to complete a questionnaire explaining their reasons for joining the insurgency. The strategy has been designed to encourage rank and file Taliban to stop fighting and instead return to their communities with “dignity and honour”.
More than 2,700 insurgents have been reintegrated into mainstream Afghan society since October 2010, with 800 now described as “showing interest in leaving the Taliban”.
Of those, about 90 are from Helmand, where nearly 400 British troops have been killed and more than 5,000 injured.
The reintegration policy has already produced some startling results. In northern Afghanistan, about 900 former Taliban have left the insurgency and violence has decreased by 30 per cent.
But it is not without risk. Maj Gen David Hook, the director of the Joint Force Integration Cell in Kabul, admitted in an interview with The Sunday Telegraph that the programme would be difficult for many British families to accept but insisted that reintegration was vital if peace was to be achieved.
The British general, who previously served as a commander in southern Afghanistan, said he saw some horrendous examples of Taliban brutality, which he said he would have “personally found difficult to forgive”.
The general confirmed that even if the insurgent who murdered five members of the Grenadier Guards battlegroup at a check point in Nad e’Ali in November 2009 entered the scheme, he would not be prosecuted. “This is an Afghan process which the international community signed up to,” said Maj Gen Hook.
Islamic scholars also provide lessons explaining that the true path of Islam is non-violent. During this period volunteers are paid a stipend of about £100 a month.
“We’ve had more than 2,700 Taliban come across and only five have returned to the insurgency,” said Maj Gen Hook.
However, critics of the scheme have warned that too few of those defecting are actual insurgents, and that it is failing to undermine the rebels in their southern heartlands.
Hanif Atmar, a former interior minister, said last week: “Of around 30,000 insurgents, only eight per cent have reconciled so far — and 99 per cent of them are not from the south.
“Frankly speaking, it does not work. The eight per cent that are reconciled, most of them are not genuine insurgents, particularly not from the regions that matter.”
The “reintegration” programme, which has the full support of Nato, is intended to keep them from attacking troops from the International Stabilisation and Assistance Force (ISAF).
Those who have attacked and killed British forces are also effectively given an amnesty, which means they will never be put on trial.
The amnesty extends to all Taliban fighters, including those who have taken part in atrocities, such as murdering children, beheadings and hanging women.
The agreement is part of a policy signed by the British Government in which insurgents are being allowed to “walk off the battlefield” and enter a “reintegration” scheme.
Taliban joining the programme not interrogated but instead are asked to complete a questionnaire explaining their reasons for joining the insurgency. The strategy has been designed to encourage rank and file Taliban to stop fighting and instead return to their communities with “dignity and honour”.
More than 2,700 insurgents have been reintegrated into mainstream Afghan society since October 2010, with 800 now described as “showing interest in leaving the Taliban”.
Of those, about 90 are from Helmand, where nearly 400 British troops have been killed and more than 5,000 injured.
The reintegration policy has already produced some startling results. In northern Afghanistan, about 900 former Taliban have left the insurgency and violence has decreased by 30 per cent.
But it is not without risk. Maj Gen David Hook, the director of the Joint Force Integration Cell in Kabul, admitted in an interview with The Sunday Telegraph that the programme would be difficult for many British families to accept but insisted that reintegration was vital if peace was to be achieved.
The British general, who previously served as a commander in southern Afghanistan, said he saw some horrendous examples of Taliban brutality, which he said he would have “personally found difficult to forgive”.
The general confirmed that even if the insurgent who murdered five members of the Grenadier Guards battlegroup at a check point in Nad e’Ali in November 2009 entered the scheme, he would not be prosecuted. “This is an Afghan process which the international community signed up to,” said Maj Gen Hook.
Islamic scholars also provide lessons explaining that the true path of Islam is non-violent. During this period volunteers are paid a stipend of about £100 a month.
“We’ve had more than 2,700 Taliban come across and only five have returned to the insurgency,” said Maj Gen Hook.
However, critics of the scheme have warned that too few of those defecting are actual insurgents, and that it is failing to undermine the rebels in their southern heartlands.
Hanif Atmar, a former interior minister, said last week: “Of around 30,000 insurgents, only eight per cent have reconciled so far — and 99 per cent of them are not from the south.
“Frankly speaking, it does not work. The eight per cent that are reconciled, most of them are not genuine insurgents, particularly not from the regions that matter.”