Introduction
How should mediators deal with groups that use terror? Should a mediator (or the policymakers he or she represents) resolutely exclude them from any form of participation in the peace process, on the grounds that to do otherwise is to reward their violence and to give them a legitimacy they would not otherwise possess? Or should the mediator acknowledge groups that use terror as influential actors in the ongoing conflict but seek to confine them to the sidelines of the peace process, hoping thereby to diminish their incentives for further violence1 while not alienating the other, non-terrorist actors in the peace process? Or should the mediator reach out to such groups—even though they are, by definition, “terrorists”—and seek to engage them in negotiations, calculating that by doing so they can be persuaded to turn away from violence and toward peaceful political processes—to become “ex-terrorists” and “legitimate” political actors?
These questions are not new, but since 9/11 they have provoked sharper debate, especial y in the United States and in cases in which the mediator represents the U.S. government. The debate is itself controversial, often becoming an exchange of political y and moral y charged accusations and counteraccusations that generate more heat than light about the best way for a mediator to deal with groups that use terror. Understandably, governments—not just in Washington but in capitals throughout the world—seek to shield themselves from such heat by categorical assertions that they have not talked and will not talk to terrorists.2
Despite such claims, however, more than a few governments have talked and do talk with groups and individuals they regard as “terrorists” (or what are sometimes termed “proscribed groups” or “proscribed armed groups”). Such interactions are not routine, but nor are they rare: one study found that 18 percent of terrorist groups have participated in talks.3 From Western Europe to the Middle East, Southeast Asia to South
America, mediators, negotiators, and other government officials have sought to push forward a peace process by engaging in some fashion with a movement or organization that they regard as a terrorist outfit. Even in the recent past, the U.S. government and its allies have talked with the leaders of terrorist organizations in detail and at length about their political goals and the make-up of their organizations. These talks have sometimes expanded into negotiations intended to find a political accommodation.
Four well-known examples involving U.S. officials il ustrate some of the different forms such talks can take:
➤ Bilateral negotiation: In December 1988, the United States sought to advance the Middle East peace process by initiating a dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), then a proscribed organization. The PLO had a clear history of terrorism: from the hijacking of international airline flights to the murder of Israeli athletes during the 1974 Munich Olympic Games. Nonetheless, a quiet meeting between the U.S. ambassador to Tunisia and a special emissary of PLO head Yasser Arafat took place in Tunis, and was followed by a series of discussions about U.S.-PLO relations. These Tunis discussions were the first in a series of contacts that led to the convening of the Madrid Peace Conference in October 1991.
➤ Multiparty negotiation/mediation: In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan mandated his secretary of state for African affairs, Chester Crocker, to engage in a quiet dialogue with officials of the African National Congress (ANC) as a part of a wider effort to bring peace to Namibia. Like the PLO, the ANC had a history of targeting civilians for its own political purposes. The Crocker talks were secret, but substantive. At much the same time, U.S. emissaries had a series of exchanges with the leaders of the proscribed Southwest Africa Peoples Organization, then at war with South African troops deployed in Southwest Africa. These quiet exchanges, when coupled with a regional peace initiative begun by Crocker, led to the adoption of a regional diplomatic framework that brought an end to the conflict in Southwest Africa.
➤ Mediation: In the 1990s, the Provisional IRA was included in talks on the status of Northern Ireland. The Irish Republican Army had a long history of terrorism, which included the murder of British citizens in a series of 6 ongoing bombing incidents in Great Britain and in Northern Ireland. Even so, the talks with the IRA went forward, in the hopes that they might lead to a resolution of the troubles in Northern Ireland. While the dialogue with the IRA was fraught with difficulties, after a delicate diplomatic exchange the movement was successful y brought into the Northern Ireland peace process. Senator George Mitchel , tasked by President Bill Clinton with conducting these talks, had a series of substantive exchanges with IRA leaders as a part of meeting his mandate. The Good Friday Agreement that brought an end to the conflict in Northern Ireland resulted, in part, from Senator Mitchel ’s discussions.
➤ Quasi-official negotiation: In July 2004, a group of senior U.S. Marine Corps officers met with leaders of the primary Iraqi National Resistance movements in Amman, Jordan. The Iraqi resistance had a history of targeting civilians, and the talks proved controversial, particularly inside the U.S. government, which had not mandated them. The series of exchanges, which became known to the public by the end of 2005, were substantive and were continued into 2006 and 2007. Eventually, they led to the creation of a Sunni political network allied with the United States and opposed to al-Qaeda.
In each of these cases, talking to groups designated as “terrorist” had a significant impact on fostering stability and peace. A successful outcome is by no means guaranteed, however. Talks with proscribed armed groups (PAGs) often fail, can easily backfire, and are almost always political y costly—for instance, as just noted, the exchange between U.S. Marines and the anti-U.S. insurgency helped stabilize western Iraq but it had not been mandated by the U.S. government and subsequently met with strong disapproval from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Policymakers and the mediators and negotiators they appoint must recognize that the conditions for success are elusive. This should make them cautious about initiating contacts in general but also eager to seize on potential opportunities should the stars align and the proscribed group be ready to make a fundamental change and move away from violence. Pouncing on such an opportunity requires both political dexterity to do what was once unthinkable and a long-term view that accepts both the possibility of real change as well as the risks of failure.
This handbook is designed to help peacemakers recognize such opportunities and exploit them effectively. This handbook is not, however, an argument in favor of talking to groups that have been designated as “terrorists”—or, for that matter, of not talking to them. Rather, it offers advice on how to assess the advantages and dangers of talking to such groups, describes the range of options for doing so, and discusses how to craft and implement strategies to facilitate a productive exchange and to minimize the associated risks.
Each of the following six chapters covers a different step in the process of talking to groups that use terror: assess the potential for talks, design a strategy for engagement, open channels of communication, foster commitment to the process, facilitate negotiations, and protect the process from the effects of violence. These steps are numbered and reflect the order in which a mediator who sees some potential for useful talks might begin different tasks. However, it is important to note that a mediator may opt not to move beyond the first step, or may skip a step, or may (indeed, almost certainly will) undertake several steps simultaneously. And the steps themselves are overlapping and iterative. In short, these steps are a helpful way for the mediator to assess options and anticipate obstacles and opportunities, but the steps certainly do not constitute an inflexible road map or a precise recipe.
This handbook poses and attempts to answer a series of basic, but complex, questions: Is there any advantage to the peace process in inviting or permitting the participation of PAGs? What kinds of PAGs are worth talking to and which are not? What form should the talks take and whom should they involve? Under what conditions should engagement be initiated—and, if need be, suspended or terminated? How can the mediator persuade a PAG and its constituency that the peace process is working? What can a mediator do to enable the government and the PAG to climb out of entrenched positions and engage in serious negotiations? How can the mediator constrain violence during the exchanges and encourage the PAG to commit itself to the peace process and political process? What are the most effective ways to deal with spoilers?
Some of these questions are pertinent to talks involving almost any kind of armed actor. After al , most violent conflicts are characterized by atrocities and violations of human rights and an unwillingness to recognize the legitimacy of the other side or their demands. But other questions have a special relevance for a mediator or negotiator who is dealing with those who use terror. Terrorists have a particular kind of illegitimacy, one that stems from their use of violence against civilians as a standard tactic, their reliance on that tactic because of their inability to access other forms of leverage, the sheer scale of the difference in status between terrorist groups and governments and the associated problems of recognition, and the difficulty of maintaining accountability of a group that is already considered illegitimate. Thus, for instance, while every peace process must contend with the dangers posed by spoilers, a peace process that involves those who use terror is likely to have potential spoilers at its very heart.
In answering such questions, this handbook draws on the experiences and expertise of both mediators and negotiators. However, mediation and negotiation are not the same thing—the former intended to resolve a conflict, the latter often seen as another means of waging that conflict— and some of the advice in the following chapters is more applicable to one endeavor than to the other. General y speaking, mediation receives the lion’s share of attention.
The applicability of advice also has much to do with who or what is mediating or negotiating. A government may have less freedom of maneuver in dealing with terrorist organizations than an inter- governmental organization (IGO), and an IGO may be less flexible than a nongovernmental organization (NGO) or an individual.
The decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2010 to uphold a law that makes it illegal for any American to offer a terrorist entity “material support” of any kind, including training and advice—even advice intended to direct it toward peaceful and legal activities—further complicates the picture.5 A U.S. negotiator can negotiate and a U.S. mediator can mediate with a group designated as terrorist on the State Department’s and Treasury Department’s lists, but the negotiator or mediator cannot offer advice—which offers some but limited room for diplomatic maneuver! Exactly how this judicial reaffirmation of these legal restrictions will play out in practice is uncertain. Chester Crocker, who orchestrated the negotiations with the ANC over Namibia, anticipates that these laws will 11 deter external mediation efforts by individuals and organizations based in or supported by the United States and the twenty-seven members of the European Union (which also has a list of proscribed organizations), and he noted that there are forty-seven terrorist groups on the State Department’s List of Foreign Terrorists and hundreds more on the Treasury Department’s lists.6 Certainly, one can expect those countries— such as Switzerland and Norway—that do not have to navigate such bans to play more prominent roles in trying to bring PAGs into peace processes.7 As the reader will discover, this handbook provides not only options for talking to terrorists but also, at least in some instances, guidance on which actors can even consider such a course of action.
