Talks with Taliban

It remained unclear how an explosion Wednesday that reportedly claimed the lives of three Germans would influence the current dialog debate.

According to news reports, deputy government spokesman Thomas Steg on Monday suggested that "moderate, reasonable" Taliban representatives should be included in the reconstruction and reconciliation process in Afghanistan.

The suggestion has been criticized by Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, a parliamentarian and foreign policy expert for Bavaria's conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), the sister party of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

"The Taliban were and are supporters of an inhuman terror regime," Guttenberg said in a press statement. "They have knowingly supported international terrorism and al Qaeda. These connections still exist today."

More civic participation

Guttenberg added that Taliban fighters should be reintegrated into Afghan society, but he said that there were no signs that moderate, let alone reasonable, Taliban existed.

"That's why it's so important to continue the work against the Taliban by the Afghan government and the international community," he said. "To involve the Taliban in the stabilization and reconstruction of the country would be a preposterous turn away from reality."

The chairman of the parliament's foreign affairs committee, Ruprecht Polenz (CDU), also warned against undermining the moral basis for the German and international mission in Afghanistan.

In an interview with the daily Frankfurter Rundschau, he said that including certain insurgent groups in talks would have to lead to rule of law and more civic participation for Afghans -- "ergo the opposite of the Taliban's terror regime until 2001."

Mutually exclusive?

Berlin's Der Tagesspiegel in an editorial also said Steg's comments seemed strange.

"If there are [moderate, reasonable Taliban] -- sure, talking can't hurt," the daily wrote. "But so far, it seemed that the two things were mutually exclusive: Someone is either a Taliban -- or reasonable."

In April, a similar controversy arose when Kurt Beck, the leader of Germany's Social Democratic Party, which forms a coalition with the CDU/CSU, suggested that Taliban representatives should be invited to peace talks. At the time, Afghan President Hamid Karzai had confirmed that he was doing just that.