KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - An influx of foreign fighters seeking to fight alongside the Taliban in southern Afghanistan is backfiring on the insurgents by alienating the region's biggest ethnic group, says the top commander in Kandahar.
Canadian Brig.-Gen. Daniel Menard, who heads coalition forces in the province, said many Pashtuns are growing upset with all the fighters from abroad who are hunkering down in their homeland.
Southern Afghanistan -- including Kandahar province, where the bulk of Canada's troops are deployed -- is the traditional heartland of the Pashtuns.
There's an ancient code of honour among the tribe called pashtunwali that demands unfailing hospitality towards guests.
Most Taliban are also Pashtuns. That tribal bond means many Pashtuns shelter and feed Taliban fighters, to the chagrin of coalition forces.
Menard told The Canadian Press the Pashtuns don't feel the same affinity for foreigners.
"The Talibs were welcome by those people because they were from the area," he said in an interview.
"As a Pashtun, you will always welcome someone to your house, especially another Pashtun. You have to provide them food. You have to provide them shelter. You have to protect them.
"Now that you have foreigners ... that do not have the same support locally, then you're talking about a whole different ball game."
Local Pashtun leaders appeared to support Menard's read of the situation.
Kalimullah Nakibi, one of the leaders of the Alokozais, a branch of the Pashtun tribe, agreed that foreign fighters don't know or care about the local culture or people.
"They create many problems here in Afghanistan," he said. "They don't have any respect for Afghans."
Haji Agha Lalai, a prominent Panjwaii district elder and a member of the provincial council who until recently ran Kandahar's reconciliation program, agreed.
"Foreign Taliban don't care about Afghans," he said. "When they are not in their country, they don't care of any thing or any one."
Foreigners have fought alongside the Taliban before. Osama bin Laden, who was born in Saudi Arabia, was instrumental in fusing his Al-Qaida organization with the Taliban in the late 1990s.
Most foreign fighters come from Pakistan's madrassas, or Islamic religious schools, according to a recent study by the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War.
They also come from refugee camps in the Pakistani border province of Baluchistan and from Pakistan's tribal belt.
These foreign fighters are often better trained to carry out sophisticated attacks, the study said.
Indeed, suicide bombers are more likely to be foreigners, it found, since their deaths are less likely to be mourned by locals, resulting in eroded support for the Taliban,
Menard said Pakistan isn't the only country from which the insurgency is recruiting.
Though he wouldn't name specific source countries, some are surprising, he admitted. "You could find some people that have flags that you'll say, 'Okay, that's interesting."' And they all have their reasons for coming: money and ideology are but two.
"The bottom line is, it's irrelevant, because for the people here, it's all the same. They are foreigners, just like us," Menard said.
"But we are here to achieve something good for them. That they know. Even if they don't respond positively to us, it's only because they feel that they are under pressure, that they are terrorized. It's as simple as this."
The general wouldn't guess as to the number of foreigners in the insurgency. The latest estimate on the insurgency, all told, is 25,000 fighters, up from 600 in 2004.
Nor would Menard say precisely how the foreign fighters' tactics differ from home-grown militants. But he said it's easy to tell the locals from the foreigners.
"It's exactly like you know when someone writes with a pen or a pencil. It's as different as this. It's still writing," he said.
Asked if he thinks recruiting more foreign fighters has backfired on the insurgents, Menard replied: "I think so. But they probably don't have the choice because they probably don't have enough (fighters)."
