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Afghan President Hamid Karzai is reaching out to the Taliban — as a way to decrease tensions inside Afghanistan. That’s welcome news to many in the spiritual home of the Taliban…Kandahar. The CBC’s Derek Stoffel reports.

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MARCO WERMAN:  I’m Marco Werman and this is The World.  Afghanistan’s President reached out to the Taliban today.  Harmid Karzai is in London at an international conference aimed at finding a way to end the fighting in Afghanistan.  Today Karzai invited the Taliban to a Peace Council of Elders and he urged Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to help with the negotiations.  We’ll hear more from the conference in London, but first, Karzai is also seeking international funding to help persuade Taliban fighters to give up violence.  As Derek Stoffel reports that’s welcome news to many in Qandahar.

DEREK STOFFEL:  Qandahar is the spiritual home of the Taliban and threat of the insurgents is never far away.  A shop keeper tends to his stall at Qandahar city market.  The Taliban have attacked this bazaar before.  The shop keeper Habi Bulah listens closely to the news on the radio.  He says it’s time to make peace at any cost.  The foreigners have been fighting the Taliban for too long, the shop keeper says. We should be working with them instead.  That’s exactly what Harmid Karzai wants.  The Afghan President is proposing a plan known as the Taliban Trust Fund.  Under it, Taliban fighters would be paid to lay down their weapons in exchange for security and jobs.  In Qandahar some reconciliation has already started on a smaller scale.  Haji Aga Lalai is a local politician.  For the past three years he headed efforts in Qandahar to reintegrate Taliban fighters into Afghan society.  He gave jobs to 606 of them.  We can reconcile with most of the Taliban, Lalai says.  Many of them fight simply for money.  They should be welcomed back.  But there are those who fight because of ideology.  They shouldn’t be welcomed back.  Canadian Brigadier General Dan Menard commands the U.S. and Canadian troops in Qandahar Province.  He says his soldiers have seen a handful of Taliban fighters who want to switch sides.

BRIGADIER GENERAL DAN MENARD:  The reality is it’s happening.  It doesn’t matter if we think it’s a good thing or not, it’s happening and we have to deal with it.  And at the low level, it’s actually working quite well.

DEREK STOFFEL:  But the Taliban are rejecting any chance of reconciliation.  Kari Yusef Ahmadi is a Taliban spokesman.  He says the Talibs fighting against international forces will never join the current Afghan government.  That rejection, though, comes from senior levels of the Taliban.  Karzai’s plan calls for reintegrating the lower ranked fighters, young men who often side with the Taliban because it pays better than farming, for example.  Karzai wants the international community to establish a fund and offer these men more to switch sides.  So far, there have been pledges of up to $140,000,000.00 for a Taliban fund.  While similar proposal aimed at reconciliation have gone nowhere in the past, there are many in Qandahar Province who hope that with the support of the international community this latest plan will bring some sort of peace to their troubled country.  For The World, I’m Derek Stoffel in Qandahar.

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