KABUL, Nov 14: Afghanistan’s position at the crossroads of ancient trading and invading routes has turned it into a kaleidoscope of rival cultures and races whose only unifying factor is Islam.
The country’s 26 million people are split into 19 ethnic groups, who do not all see eye to eye or even understand each other’s languages. Their ancestors hail variously from the oil-rich steppes of Central Asia to the north, Iran to the west and the plains of the subcontinent to the south and east.
The dominant Pakhtoons make up over 40 percent of the population and fill most of the Taliban’s ranks.
Split into a large number of tribes and sub-tribes, they occupy the southern desert regions stretching from the border with Pakistan to the frontier with Iran.
Tajiks account for 25 per cent of the population, while Uzbeks, Turks and Hazaras together make up about another quarter.
These four groups populate the rugged northern and central provinces and are the mainstay of the Northern Alliance.
There are also a string of small ethnic groups, who include the Balochs, Nuristani, Aimak, Brashui, Turkmens, Kyrghyz and Kazakhs.
The Pakhtoons have ruled Afghanistan for much of the last three centuries and enjoy strong support from the Pushto-speaking tribes in Pakistan.
Afghanistan’s first national dynasty was founded by a Pakhtoon, Ahmed Shah Durrani, in 1747 after the country was divided between Mughals and Persians.
Generations of Afghan kings originated from Kandahar, including the aging Mohammed Zahir Shah, who was toppled in 1973 and now lives in exile in Rome.
The four presidents who succeeded Zahir Shah between 1973 and 1992 were also Pakhtoons.
The ancestors of Afghanistan’s Persian-speaking Tajiks were probably the first peoples to occupy the country. Their Central Asian homeland Tajikistan was invaded in succession by Alexander the Great, the Arabs, Genghis Khan, the Turks, the British and the Russian empire.
The Tajiks share a region that stretches between Kabul and the borders with Tajikistan and Uzbekistan with the country’s one million Uzbeks, Sunnis of Turkic origin.
The Persian-speaking Hazaras, who claim to descend from Genghis Khan and whose Asiatic features belie their Mongol origin, make up about eight per cent of the population. They live in the centre of the country, in a strategic zone to the west of Kabul.
They have allied with the Pakhtoons at various points over the last century.—AFP
