Afghanistan Rebels with Too Many Causes

By William R. Doerner

Neither side in Afghanistan's nine-year-old civil war wasted much time last week in attempting to fill the country's power vacuum. Just three days after the departure of the last Soviet troops based in Afghanistan, as major cities became the target of sporadic but deadly rebel rocket attacks, the government of President Najibullah abruptly slapped a state-of-emergency decree on the country. The mujahedin, meanwhile, after two weeks of paralyzing delays, managed to reach at least tentative agreement on the leadership of a rival government-in-exile.

Meeting in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi, Muslim delegates to a shura, or consultative assembly, appeared set to nominate as Prime Minister of their "interim" government Ahmat Shah, 44, a U.S.-trained engineer and hard- line fundamentalist. Muhammad Nabi Muhammadi, 68, a former member of Afghanistan's parliament, was named to fill the largely ceremonial office of President. The shura thus managed to bridge, for the moment, the principal issue dividing the rebel side: whether post-Soviet Afghanistan should be governed as an Islamic revolutionary state, on the Iranian model, or as one that is moderate and secular. Shah strongly advocates the fundamentalist approach, and Muhammadi heads one of the moderate factions.

While choosing one exemplar of each approach for the interim government's two top posts would be an obvious attempt at compromise, it would not guarantee that Shah and Muhammadi will be able to work together smoothly. Shah, moreover, owes his position at least in part to strong backing from the Pakistani intelligence service, a source of support that is resented by many Afghans, who view it as meddling.

Still another weakness of the team is that it was being advanced without the agreement of Afghanistan's Shi'ite Muslims, who are boycotting the shura.

Despite the fractious relations among the rebel leaders, most observers still look to them to make the next move in the Afghan showdown. There are seven factions altogether, all rooted in Islam, Afghanistan's universal faith. The four fundamentalist leaders:

-- Burhanuddin Rabbani, 48, heads the Jamiat-i-Islami (Islamic League), militarily the strongest Afghan party. A former theology professor at Kabul University, Rabbani has fought against Afghan governments since 1970. Rabbani's main weakness: his political strength lies with the Tajik and Uzbek ethnic groups in a country that has traditionally been ruled by Pashtuns.

-- Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, 41, best-organized and most ruthless of the rebel leaders, heads a faction of the Hezb-e-Islami (Islamic Party). Despite his outspokenly anti-Western views, he is reportedly allotted 25% of the total U.S. weapon supply by the Pakistanis, more even than Rabbani. An engineer by training, Hekmatyar is a religious extremist who would keep Afghan women in purdah.

-- Maulvi Younus Khalis, 70, the only political leader who also regularly serves as a military field commander, leads an independent faction of the Islamic Party. A former village mullah dismissed as something of a bumpkin by his rivals, Khalis sports a henna-dyed beard and in 1987 took a 16-year-old bride. He vehemently opposes elections; in his view, the only constitution needed for post-Soviet Afghanistan is the Koran.

-- Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, 48, the least-known but perhaps most fanatical of the fundamentalists, runs the Islamic Union for the Liberation of Afghanistan. A member of Islam's Wahhabi sect, which is prevalent in Saudi Arabia, he , operates primarily with Saudi funds.

The three nationalists:

-- Pir Sayed Ahmad Gailani, 56, is the most pro-Western and secular of the mujahedin leaders, despite his claim of direct descent from the Prophet Muhammad. Gailani's National Islamic Front is nicknamed the "Gucci Muj" for its leader's taste in well-tailored camouflage uniforms. Though he favors the return of exiled King Zahir Shah, Gailani is also a fervent believer in Western-style elections.

-- Muhammadi, the President-designate, heads the Harakat-i-Inqilab-i-Islami (Islamic Revolutionary Movement). He is a former Muslim educator and is known as a vociferous anti-Communist.

-- Sibghatullah Mojaddedi, 63, presides over the Afghan National Liberation Front, the smallest and weakest militarily of the resistance parties. Mojaddedi, who speaks five languages, is currently chairman of the rebel alliance, but he wields limited power.

There was a growing consensus in Washington that whatever the short-term twists, the country's eventual government would be Islamic in character, though not as radical as Iran's. According to this view, the new regime would not only be sufficiently decentralized to keep power outside Kabul largely in tribal hands but nonthreatening to the Soviets as well. Even the most anti- Soviet mujahedin, says a State Department official, realize that "the Afghans sleep next to the bear, and so they must act accordingly."

With reporting by Christina Lamb/Islamabad