KABUL, Nov 10: Kabul residents are watching the opposition takeover of Mazar-i-Sharif with hopes that it heralds relief for themselves, but also fearing it would signal fresh bloodletting and misery.

Residents of the beleaguered capital said the fate of civilians under Gen Dostum’s forces would be a portent of how they themselves would fare should the capital fall.

“Mazar’s capture by the opposition and their treatment of people there will be an example of their policy. Any wrongdoing, looting, killing and destruction will have a long-term negative impact on the future unity of Afghans,” a shopkeeper said.

“If it leads to stability and ends bloodshed, then it is a good move. The US and the opposition must guarantee the lives and property of Mazar’s people.

They must make sure that there is no harm and revenge against the various tribes living there.”

Many in Kabul have little enthusiasm for the regime imposed by the Taliban, but the Northern Alliance is also widely despised for the misery its leaders inflicted on the Afghan capital in the 1990s during an internecine power struggle that killed about 50,000 Kabul residents in five years.

Kabul has seen governments come and go — usually in bitter fighting — but one thing that has not changed is the misery its residents endure.

“People are largely fed up, but that does not mean they prefer the opposition,” one resident said. “But if (the opposition) can bring some relative cohesion among the various tribes, and security, then they are good people.”

Rival Mujahideen, including Dostum and former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, subjected Kabul to ruinous rocket attacks in the early 1990s in their struggle for power.

But in his fiefdom in Mazar-i-Sharif, Dostum gave the city a measure of security and relatively efficient education and healthcare.

Kabul residents are waiting to see who does that for them.

“Improvement of the economy and stability in Mazar and other opposition-held areas will boost their image. Otherwise if they resort to revenge, looting and killing, then no civilian would welcome it,” said a Kabul taxi driver.

However, some, noting US backing for the Northern Alliance, are opposed to any foreign intervention in Afghanistan, whatever the privations under the Taliban.

“I personally see the fall of Mazar to the opposition with the involvement and help of foreigners as direct intervention in our country.

They are puppets and Afghans must fight against them,” one resident said.

Mazar-i-Sharif was convulsed by bloody massacres after the Taliban seized it in 1997. Residents rose and butchered the Taliban, who unleashed murderous revenge in 1998 when they retook the city.

Reprisals now by the Northern Alliance would send shivers through Kabul.

Knowing the unease with which many Kabul residents view the Northern Alliance, Washington says it does not want Alliance forces to enter the city until some agreement is reached on the structure of any post-Taliban government.

Many Kabul residents feel the United States abandoned them to squabbling warlords after backing resistance to the Soviet forces that withdrew in 1989. If the Taliban fall, locals fear the world will turn its back again.

“The world must make sure that it does not desert the Afghans again,” one resident said.—Reuters