Karzai wants to pay Taliban to lay down their arms

Afghan President Hamid Karzai unveiled an ambitious Western-funded plan Friday to offer money and jobs to tempt Taliban fighters to lay down their arms in an effort to quell a crippling insurgency. His comments to the BBC came as US Defense Secretary Robert Gates described the Taliban as part of Afghanistan's "political fabric", but said any future role would depend on insurgents laying down their weapons. Karzai's plan echoed similar proposals by Washington to try and bring low and mid-level extremists back into mainstream society, but the leadership of the insurgent groups remain hostile to negotiations. Militants led by the Taliban movement have been waging an increasingly deadly rebellion against the Afghan government and foreign troops since a US-led invasion ousted the Taliban regime from power in late 2001. "We know as the Afghan people we must have peace at any cost," Karzai said in the television interview aired Friday ahead of an international conference on Afghanistan in London next week, where he will present the plan.