Taliban’s hijack parking fee — $100,000

The latest bill seems to indicate that the Taliban regime is obviously aiming at extracting its pound of flesh from New Delhi.

At the time the plane carrying the Indian negotiators landed in Kandahar, three days after IC-814 reached there, the air traffic controller (ATC) at Kandahar had said that handling charges would approximate $15,000.

Later, though, External Affairs minister Jaswant Singh told journalists that the Taliban would not be charging any fees for IC-814 because the Indian passengers were their “guests.”

But with the Taliban “hand” in the subsequent drama that was played out at Kandahar increasingly clear to New Delhi, Singh told a news conference in Delhi on January 1 that India’s policy towards the Taliban remained “unchanged.”

That is, India would continue to recognise the Northern Alliance of Burhanuddin Rabbani, with whom the Taliban is fighting a civil war for the complete control of Afghanistan.

In the subsequent days and weeks, the Taliban’s position towards the hijacking as well as India, has grown increasingly stronger, with Kabul warning India some days ago not to interfere in the affairs of Pakistan.

Some political observers here feel that with India taking a much more public profile on terrorism in the last month, and in fact giving evidence of the Taliban’s “complicity” in the hijacking, it became clear that New Delhi was not about to adopt a softer line towards Kabul.

Besides IC-814, which was parked on the tarmac of the Kandahar airport for seven days, the second plane with Indian negotiators on board was there for four days. Finally, Jaswant Singh took another aircraft to Kandahar on December 31, to escort the passengers back home.

Part of the Taliban bill is said to be for the food consumed by the hijacked passengers. In the initial days after the hijacking, the Taliban authorities had fed the passengers on board, but the food ran out soon after.

Arrangements were then made with a catering service from Islamabad to feed all the passengers as well as the Indian officials in Kandahar.