UN: Talibanization poses threat to Pakistan

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
The top UN diplomat in Afghanistan said Monday that Talibanization posed a threat to the region, particularly neighboring Pakistan, and warned that the hardline group's rule was not an experience worth repeating. Tom Koenigs, the UN special representative to Afghanistan, also criticized a senior Pakistani official who last week likened the Taliban resistance to a nationalist struggle against foreign forces. There is "a danger of Talibanization of the region ... particularly of Pakistan," Koenigs told reporters. "Other states should look at this experience (of Afghanistan) and make it very clear that they don't want to repeat this experience." Koenigs said that some Pakistani politicians and officials were underestimating the Taliban's threat to international peace and security, just as the international community did when the Taliban first rose to power in the 1990s.