Faculty Fellow Mahan Mirza (Islamic studies) has written an opinion piece in The Hill titled, “To Engage the Taliban, the US Needs an Honest Debate on Sharia Law.” Rather than sending US troops back into Afghanistan, Mirza offers an intervention option in response to the Taliban regaining control. Strategic peace-building, he writes, “involves establishing sustained relationships across all levels of society to build trust, the primary ingredient for good-faith negotiations leading to enduring peace.”
One such way to build peace in Afghanistan is to engage scholars from various disciplines to dig into the interpretation of the Sharia and “invite the Taliban to rethink their tradition.”