passages hostile to Rabbani and Massoud were crossed out, but
remained clearly legible, including a recommendation for ‘challen-
ging the legitimacy of those who claim to be in power’. He claimed
the Kabul government had ‘no legal basis’, which was a startling
assertion given that it had been granted Afghanistan’s UN seat by
the Credentials Committee of the General Assembly. And while
offering no criticisms of Dostam and the Taliban, he voiced his dis-
approval of the idea of a settlement between Massoud and Dostam,
on the grounds that it could provoke ‘further ethnic tensions’. The
spectacle of a UN official discouraging parties in conflict from
reaching a compromise was an unusual one even for seasoned diplo-
mats: most participants in the meeting were aghast at his interven-
tion. As Saikal has written: ‘One tragic consequence of these
indiscretions may have been to help divert Rabbani’s opponents
from any thought of compromise, and to encourage further meddling
by external forces, the Pakistan-driven seizure of Herat in September
1995, and the resumption of rocket attacks on Kabul a month later’
(Saikal, 1996: 24).
From this point Mestiri lost all credibility and his mission effect-
ively came to an end, although he continued to talk to the various
parties, and retained his position until May 1996. His mediation
miscarried because he failed properly to grasp three essential fea-
tures of the situation. First, the Rabbani government was confront-
ed not by ‘normal’ politicians, but by a ‘total spoiler’ (Hekmatyar
up to February 1995) and an unpredictable movement with at least
some ‘total spoilers’ at its heart (the Taliban from February 1995).
In such circumstances, it is not sufficient for the UN simply to be
moralguarantor of a transition mechanism; security guarantees are
required from a neutral security force (Walter, 1997: 129; King,
1997: 77–8). This Mestiri never offered, and as far as a ‘national
security force’ was concerned, the Secretary-General stated that
‘the most that the Afghanistan parties can expect is the establish-
ment of a voluntary trust fund for which I would solicit contribu-
tions from Member States interested in supporting the peace
process in Afghanistan’ (United Nations, 1994b: para. 79). Second,
Mestiri took inadequate account of the role played by neighbouring
212 The Afghanistan Wars