The Taliban have not softened. So why are they pretending they have?

Since taking power again in Afghanistan, the Taliban have projected the notion that the movement has become more moderate since it imposed repressive theocratic rule in 1996-2001, when medieval social and cultural strictures were imposed and torture and executions were widespread.

According to spokesman Suhail Shaheen, the Taliban promised a countrywide amnesty for Afghans who served in the military, government and western embassies. Ethnic and religious minorities would not suffer discrimination, women's rights to education and employment would be respected "within the framework of Islamic law" and journalists permitted to report, also within that framework and in accordance with national interests.

He denied members of al-Qaeda and other jihadi groups were present in his country. “We will not allow anyone to use the soil of Afghanistan [to attack] any other country,” he said.

The show of moderation could, however, disguise the Taliban’s true intentions. The movement’s ultra-orthodox Sunni leaders seem to have adopted the permissible practice of “takiya”, dissimulation or deceit, sometimes used by Shias when faced with persecution.

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The Taliban’s aim appears to be to secure the UN lifting of its designation as a “terrorist” group, acceptance, recognition and urgently needed central bank funds frozen in the US as well as massive humanitarian aid to care for 18 million Afghans living in dire poverty.

The Taliban's promise that there would be no revenge against opponents has been contradicted by a UN report that fighters have been going from door to door in search of people whose names are on "priority lists" as they worked for US and Nato forces. Their relatives would be punished if individuals failed to surrender, the report said.

Taliban fighters have been deployed near the entrances to Kabul’s airport to prevent Afghans, particularly targeted individuals, from leaving the country on evacuation flights.

Hardened and ruthless

Amnesty International reported that last month the Taliban killed nine members of the Shia Hazara ethnic community in a village in Ghazni province southwest of Kabul.

Women’s rights will be subject to the Taliban’s strict interpretation of Muslim canon law, Sharia, while journalists will be subject to both Sharia and limitations imposed by national interests as defined by the Taliban.

Although the Taliban have declared they will not allow jihadis to mount attacks outside the country, a number of groups, including al-Qaeda, continue to operate in Afghanistan, which could act as a magnet for multiple radical factions seeking indoctrination and training.

A former US ambassador to Kabul, Ryan Crocker, told The World public radio: "This is not a kinder and gentler Taliban. These guys are hardened, tough, ruthless. In other words, they're the guys that brought us 9/11 by sheltering al-Qaeda, and they're back. Al-Qaeda will be back with them."

The Taliban have made it clear they are committed to the rule of Sharia, rather than democracy. The movement's ideology has been drawn from the theology of India's 19th-century revivalist religious-nationalist Sunni Deobandi movement, which adopted hardline Saudi Wahhabism.

Taliban leaders have been formed by studies in Saudi-financed Deobandi religious seminaries in Pakistan, where they were originally groomed to fight the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and continued to battle the US-Nato presence.