#6
strana.ru
October 22, 2001
Russia to Play Key Role in Forming Afghanistan's Post-Taliban
Government
President Putin Loses No Time in Increasing Russia's Influence in the Region
By Patricia Heffernan
Hot on the heels of his successful turn at the APEC Summit in Shanghai, Russian President Putin made a critical pit stop in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, on his way back to Moscow, to meet with Tajikistan President Emomali Rakhmonov and Burkhanuddin Rabbani, president of the legally recognized Islamic Government of Afghanistan.
The meeting was organized on Mr. Putin's initiative, who has continued to operate in breakneck "carpe diem" mode since September 11, supporting the U.S. military operation in Afghanistan on the one hand, without missing a single opportunity to advance Russian geopolitical interests on the other.
With the United States effectively looking the other way as it conducts its Afghan campaign, soon to be bogged down even further by the introduction of ground forces into the theater of operations, Russia has picked up the proverbial ball - and continues to run with it - in terms of what is to be done to fill the power vacuum in Afghanistan after the Taliban regime is eventually flushed out.
Although, at first glance, these maneuverings may smack of Russia taking advantage of the U.S. preoccupation with doing the dirty work of routing out Taliban terrorist remnants while Russia takes the high road - and high politics - in positioning itself to its own best advantage in post-Taliban Afghanistan; on closer consideration, this activity is certainly justified.
Firstly, Russia never promised the United States anything more than its whole-hearted moral and political support in the latter's military campaign against the Taliban. The fact that it has since offered military, technical and financial assistance to the Northern Alliance, in fact, poses somewhat of a double-edged sword for the United States. On the one hand, Northern Alliance assistance in crippling the Taliban's military capabilities can only serve to make the American task in Afghanistan that much easier. On the other, however, the U.S. is looking with skepticism at increasingly close ties between Russia and the Northern Alliance, as the latter is likely to play a key role in Afghanistan's next government.
Secondly, the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan - and its possible consequences - poses an undeniable direct threat to the Central Asian Republics of the CIS, namely Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, and thereby indirectly to Russia.
Russia, therefore, can make a convincing argument as it sits at the conference table with the Tajik and Afghan presidents, discussing the future of post-Taliban Afghanistan, that it is protecting its own geopolitical interests in its natural sphere of influence.
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