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SOUTHWEST ASIA: Muslim Ministers Blast the U.S.

5 minute read
TIME

And softly ask the Soviets to leave Afghanistan

It says something about the conference of Islamic Foreign Ministers in Islamabad last week that one of the more moderate voices heard there was that of Iran’s Sadegh Ghotbzadeh. “When we condemn the U.S. for supporting Israel in Palestine and for intervening in Viet Nam,” said Ghotbzadeh, who was clearly the star of the six-day meeting, “we should not hesitate for one minute to condemn the Soviet Union for intervening in Afghanistan.” Trailed by reporters wherever he went, the tall, dark-haired Iranian Foreign Minister went well beyond rhetorical denunciation of Moscow’s “adventurism” in Afghanistan; he also included leaders of five Afghan rebel groups in his country’s official delegation and warned that Iran might begin to arm and train the rebels unless the Soviets withdraw their troops. At the same time, Ghotbzadeh predictably denounced the abortive U.S. attempt to rescue 53 American hostages in Tehran last month as “another manifestation of American imperialism in the form of armed aggression.”

The mood of the Islamic ministers, who represented 39 nations and the Palestine Liberation Organization, has changed considerably since they met in the Pakistani capital last January. The final resolution of that conference attacked the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan as a “flagrant violation” of international law. The muted resolution adopted by last week’s conference called for a Soviet troop withdrawal, but it also kowtowed to the Kremlin by urging a reasoned “political” approach to the problem.

Even as Soviet troops were crushing the Muslim rebellion in Afghanistan, the ministers in Islamabad set up a committee —made up of the organization’s Tunisian secretary-general Habib Chatti, Iran’s Ghotbzadeh and Pakistan’s foreign affairs adviser Agha Shahi—to seek a “comprehensive solution” to the crisis through consultations with the concerned parties. The initiative, whose success seems problematical, reflected the delegates’ desire for concrete action after the tough language of the earlier conference had failed to produce any results.

For all their lip service to international law and justice, the ministers virtually ignored Iran’s illegal and inhumane detention of 53 U.S. citizens. Only through the efforts of Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Prince Saud al Faisal was a phrase inserted urging Tehran to solve the hostage question “in the spirit of Islam.” The delegates denounced Washington for the hostage rescue attempt, which the resolution describes as “the recent American military aggression in Iran.”

Less ambiguous than the Muslim ministers, the International Court of Justice at The Hague declared Iran guilty of “continuing breaches” of international law and ordered the immediate release of the hostages and payment of damages to the U.S. Tehran, which does not recognize the court’s jurisdiction, is expected to defy the order. But some hopes for a break in the crisis were raised at week’s end when three prominent Socialist party leaders—Sweden’s Olof Palme, Spain’s Felipe Gonzalez and Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky—met in Vienna and discussed the possibility of flying together to Tehran to probe the chances for the hostages’ liberation.

Moving beyond the hostage crisis and Afghanistan, the Islamabad conference blasted the U.S., Egypt and Israel for their role in the Camp David accords and other “subversive measures engineered by the imperialist and Zionist aggressors” against the Palestinians. Muslim states were urged to sever all ties with Cairo, while Israel was denounced for the Knesset’s preliminary approval two weeks ago of a bill declaring Jerusalem the country’s perpetual and indivisible capital.

Not surprisingly, the anti-American forces in Islamabad were led by a group of pro-Moscow hard-liners such as Syria, Libya and the P.L.O. Declared P.L.O. Delegate Abdel Mohsen Abu Maizer: “Why do you want to compare the Soviet Union, which is offering help and support to the Palestinian people and the Arab cause, to America, which is feeding Israel with weapons in order to kill the Palestinian people?” Among the leading opponents of this pro-Soviet faction was Ghotbzadeh, who asserted that “the liberation of Afghanistan is not less important than the liberation of Palestine.” But the U.S. found no outspoken defenders, although certain delegates quietly expressed sympathy for the hostages.

In Afghanistan, meanwhile, the bloody war continued.

Armed with tanks, armored personnel carriers and helicopter gunships, Soviet forces launched major attacks last month in four areas: Ghazni, southwest of Kabul; Parwan to the north; Ghorband, 30 miles south of the capital; and the Kunar Valley to the northeast. Nonetheless, the Soviets have not yet pacified the forbidding, mountainous country. Even with an estimated 85,000 troops in Afghanistan, plus 30,000 in reserve near by, they are unable to control the countryside or protect their lines of communication from guerrilla ambushes. Says Naji Bullah, an official of one of the Afghan rebel groups based in Peshawar:

“The Russians are in the cities and they have the highways, but elsewhere they have no control.”

Even in the capital, the Soviets must contend with the smoldering hostility of the local population. Civil riots in Kabul last February reportedly resulted in 500 to 2,000 civilian deaths, while another 60 to 100 people were killed during two weeks of anti-Soviet demonstrations last month. At least seven people died last week in clashes between police and armed students.

There are other problems. The fighting has left the country almost totally dependent on Kremlin aid and grain shipments. Desertions have cut the Afghan army from 80,000 before the revolution to 25,000. Up to 1 million civilian refugees have fled to Pakistan and Iran.

Despite their tenacity as fighters, the rebels are handicapped by primitive tactics, poor weapons and the inability of rival guerrilla factions to form a common front. In the analysis of one U.S. official, the biggest danger facing Moscow in Afghanistan may be political rather than military: “The Communist regime they installed is weaker, less popular, more in disarray [than ever]. Its original slim support is eroding. The Soviets are in danger of losing their puppet regime.” ∎

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