Excitement coupled with fear dominated the ambience of a small cave in Miranshah. Apparently, Maulana Fazlur Rehman was continuously repeating some mantras on his worry beads, Maulana Samiul Haq was exploring his beard, Munawar Hasan and Imran Khan were conversing with each other in murmurs but inside their hearts the only wish, prayer and craving was the timely arrival of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) chief, Mullah Fazlullah as the drones were also hovering. They were preparing some kind of joint presentation, separately. On a piece of paper were written some demands and statistics: more than 50,000 Pakistani citizens have died, including 5,000 soldiers, 500 schools have been blown up in the tribal belt and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, dozens of polio workers have died in attacks reportedly carried out by the Taliban. All this was shuttled among them in three rounds. Some intellectual rubbish was communicated to Imran Khan on his Thuraya satellite phone. The voices on the other side closely resembled Orya Maqbool Jan and Ansar Abbasi. Munawar Hassan sounded confident and was convinced that his favour of calling Hakeemullah Mehsud a ‘shaheed’ (martyr) would earn him special treatment from the emir (chief). Imran Khan had his own reasons for being very confident. He was sure that the emir had been informed of his bold decision of blocking NATO weaponry from leaving Afghanistan. Since the Taliban movement originated from the madrassa (seminary) of Maulana Samiul Haq, he kept running his fingers through his freshly coloured beard, wearing a cheeky smile. Maulana Fazlur Rehman looked apprehensive. Deep in his heart he knew that the emir did not approve of his double dealing and was not happy with his meagre donations to the Islamic Emirates. The emir believed that Fazl made handsome amounts from his diesel permits and other business transactions. The ‘four’ kept on deliberating the counter-arguments for the expected statements from the emir: “If the emir says he has no regard for the constitution of Pakistan as it is not Islamic, we will nod in the positive and update him on the latest research by Orya Maqbool Jan that the August 11 speech by Jinnah was a myth, so the first step to Islamise the constitution has already been taken,” they unanimously agreed. The 12 by 12 cave, designated for high level talks between the parties, was guarded by veiled armed men from the Khurasan group. Some of them were togged up in quite heavy jackets while others were dictating instructions through their satellite phones to different television anchors and commentators in Pakistan. Some others were video-graphing the entire set up. All of a sudden there came a sudden halt to each and every activity. Strange Arabic music infiltrated the air and, as it faded, the flag hoisting the Islamic Emirates of Waziristan could be seen. Imran Khan remained standing during the entire ceremony while the other three men managed to do the same. A smokescreen blurred the cave. As it disappeared, the emir of the TTP emerged in the middle of the cave along with four exceptionally tall and very young suicide bombers (fidayeen). The unilateral exchange of pleasantries was touching as Imran Khan not only went almost down on his knees but also kissed Mullah Fazlullah’s hands. The latter, however, remained unmoved. The silence was deepening as no one from the char ka tola (gang of four) was ready to begin any conversation though all of them cleared their throats more than twice in less than 30 seconds. They knew that they had only 30 seconds left as the brokers had scheduled only one minute with the emir for their pitch. Suddenly, some more coughing broke the silence but it did not lead to any words. By the time the coughing had settled, more smoke camouflaged the cave — a clear sign that the emir had left. The talks ended before they had begun. “They have wasted our precious time and other resources. Our emir came along all the way from Kunar to Waziristan with his entourage. This char ka tola has to pay for our diesel, our food and other arrangements. One thing is clear: they are clearly confused. They are not only totally incompetent for complex negotiations but they do not have basic manners as indicated by their complete unawareness of our culture. As far as Imran Khan is concerned, it looked like he knew what he was doing but then the talks went away from his mind. None of them were able to utter a single word,” says Taliban spokesman Shahidullah Shahid in his statement after the failed talks. When I opened my eyes, I saw breaking news on my television screen about an improvised explosive device hitting a military convoy. The Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility. The char ka tola blamed the bairooni haat (foreign hand) for the attack and stressed holding talks with the Taliban. The writer is a freelance journalist and can be reached at kaharzalmay@yahoo.com