Legitimation Crisis in Afghanistan

NEIL SHAPIRO

In the media celebration of our "victory" over the Taliban in the Helmand Valley, little attention has been given to the nature of insurgency: the proper tactic of guerrillas is to fade away before overwhelming power, leaving behind only enough fighters to force the invaders to harm civilians and damage property. This is exactly what happened in the recent fighting in Marja. Faced with odds of perhaps 20 to 1, helicopters, tanks and bombers, the guerrillas wisely dispersed. Victory may not be quite the right description.

That battle will probably be repeated in Kandahar, which, unlike the agricultural area known as Marja, is a large and densely populated city. Other operations are planned, so the Marja "victory" has set a pattern that accentuates military action. This is not conducive to an exit strategy--it will not lead out of Afghanistan but deeper into the country. Indeed, there is already evidence that this is happening. As the Washington Post reported shortly after the Marja battle ended, not far away "the Marines are constructing a vast base on the outskirts of town that will have two airstrips, an advanced combat hospital, a post office, a large convenience store and rows of housing trailers stretching as far as the eye can see."

Since the Helmand Valley is the focal point of the military strategy, it is important to understand its role in Afghan affairs. The Helmand irrigation project, begun in the Eisenhower administration as a distant echo of the TVA, was supposed to become a prosperous island of democracy and progress. As a member of the Policy Planning Council in the Kennedy administration, I visited it in 1962. What I found was deeply disturbing: no studies had been made of the land to be developed, which proved to have a sheet of impermeable rock just below the surface that caused the soil to turn saline when irrigated; the land was not sufficiently leveled, so irrigation was inefficient; nothing was done to teach the nomad settlers how to farm; plots were too small to foster the social engineering aim of creating a middle class; and since there were no credit facilities to buy seed, settlers were paying 100 percent interest to moneylenders. In short, after the buildup of great expectations, disappointment was palpable.

Was it a portent? It seems likely. At the least, it's striking that precisely where we carried out our first civic action program is where the Taliban became most powerful.

So what should that experience have taught us? That we should learn about the Afghans, their country and their objectives before determining our policy toward them. There is much to be learned, but I will here highlight what I believe are the three crucial issues that will make or break our relationship.

The first issue critical to evaluating US policy is the way the Afghans govern themselves. About four in five Afghans live in the country's 20,000-plus villages. During a 2,000-mile trip around the country by jeep, horseback and plane half a century ago, as well as in later trips, it became clear to me that Afghanistan is really thousands of villages, and each of them, although culturally related to its neighbors, is more or less politically independent and economically autarkic.

This lack of national cohesion thwarted the Russians during their occupation: they won many military victories, and through their civic action programs they actually won over many of the villages, but they could never find or create an organization with which to make peace. Baldly put, no one could surrender the rest. Thus, over the decade of their involvement, the Russians won almost every battle and occupied at one time or another virtually every inch of the country, but they lost about 15,000 soldiers--and the war. When they gave up and left, the Afghans resumed their traditional way of life.

That way of life is embedded in a social code (known in the Pashtun areas as Pashtunwali) that shapes the particular form of Islam they have practiced for centuries and, indeed, that existed long before the coming of Islam. While there are, of course, notable differences in the Pashtun, Hazara, Uzbek and Tajik areas, shared tradition determines how all Afghans govern themselves and react to foreigners.

Among the shared cultural and political forms are town councils (known in the Pashtun areas as jirgas and in the Hazara area as ulus or shuras). The members are not elected but are accorded their status by consensus. These town councils are not, in our sense of the word, institutions; rather, they are "occasions." They come together when pressing issues cannot be resolved by the local headman or respected religious figure. Town councils are the Afghan version of participatory democracy, and when they act they are seen to embody the "way" of their communities.

Pashtunwali demands protection (melmastia) of visitors. Not to protect a guest is so grievous a sin and so blatant a sign of humiliation that a man would rather die than fail. This, of course, has prevented the Afghans from surrendering Osama bin Laden. Inability to reconcile our demands with their customs has been at the heart of our struggle for the past eight years.

As put forth in both the Bush and Obama administrations, our objective is to prevent Al Qaeda from using Afghanistan as a base for attacks on us. We sharpened this objective to the capturing or killing of bin Laden. That is popular with US voters, but even if we could force the Afghans to surrender him, it would alienate the dominant Pashtun community. Thus it would probably increase the danger to us. But it is unnecessary, since a resolution of this dilemma in our favor has been available for years. While Pashtunwali does not permit a protected guest to be surrendered, it allows the host, with honor, to prevent the guest from engaging in actions that endanger the host. In the past, the Taliban virtually imprisoned bin Laden, and they have repeatedly offered--provided we agree to leave their country--to meet our demand that Al Qaeda not be allowed to use Afghanistan as a base. Although setting a withdrawal date would enable us to meet our objective, we have turned down their offers.

The second crucial issue in evaluating our policy is the way the people react to our civic action programs.

Afghanistan is a barren, landlocked country with few resources, and its people have suffered through virtually continuous war for thirty years. Many are wounded or sick, with some even on the brink of starvation. The statistics are appalling: more than one in three subsists on the equivalent of less than 45 cents a day, almost one in two lives below the poverty line and more than one in two preschool children is stunted because of malnutrition. They are the lucky ones; one in five dies before the age of 5. Obviously, the Afghans need help, so we think they should welcome our efforts to aid them. But independent observers have found that they do not. Based on some 400 interviews, a team of Tufts University researchers found that "Afghan perceptions of aid and aid actors are overwhelmingly negative." We must ask why this is.

The reason, I think, is that the Taliban understand from our pronouncements that civic action is a form of warfare. The Russians taught them about civic action long ago, and Gen. David Petraeus specifically proclaimed in his Iraq days, "Money is my most important ammunition in this war." Thus many ordinary citizens see our programs as Petraeus described them--as a method of control or conquest--and so support or at least tolerate the Taliban when they destroy our projects or prevent our aid distribution.

To get perspective on this, it is useful to look at Vietnam. There too we found that the people resented our efforts and often sided with our enemies, the local equivalent of the Taliban: the Vietminh, or, as we called them, the Vietcong. The Vietminh killed officials, teachers and doctors, and destroyed even beneficial works. Foreigners thought their violence was bound to make the people hate them. It didn't. Like the Kabul government, the South Vietnamese regime was so corrupt and predatory that few supported it even to get aid. When we "inherited" the war in Vietnam, we thought we should sideline the corrupt regime, so we used our own officials to deliver aid directly to the villagers. It got through, but our delivering it further weakened the South Vietnamese government's rapport with its people.

Is this relevant to Afghanistan? Reflect on the term used by Gen. Stanley McChrystal when his troops moved into Helmand: he said he was bringing the inhabitants a "government in a box, ready to roll in." That government is a mix of Americans and American-selected Afghans, neither sent by the nominal national government in Kabul nor sanctioned by local authorities.

How will the Afghans react to McChrystal's government? President Karzai was at least initially opposed, seeing the move as undercutting the authority of his government. We don't yet know what the inhabitants thought. But we do know that when we tried similar counterinsurgency tactics in Vietnam, as the editor of the massive collection of our official reports, the Pentagon Papers, commented, "all failed dismally."

If we aim to create and leave behind a reasonably secure society in Afghanistan, we must abandon this failed policy and set a firm and reasonably prompt date for withdrawal. Only thus can we dissociate humanitarian aid from counterinsurgency warfare. This is because once a timetable is clearly announced, a fundamental transformation will begin in the political psychology of our relationship. The Afghans will have no reason (or progressively less reason, as withdrawal begins to be carried out) to regard our aid as a counterinsurgency tactic. At that point, beneficial projects will become acceptable to the local jirgas, whose members naturally focus on their own and their neighbors' prosperity and health. They will then eagerly seek and protect what they now allow the Taliban to destroy.

If under this different circumstance the Taliban try to destroy what the town councils have come to see as beneficial, the councils will cease to provide the active or passive support, sanctuary and information that make the Taliban effective. Without that cooperation, as Mao Zedong long ago told us, they will be like fish with no water in which to swim. Thus, setting a firm and clear date for withdrawal is essential.

This leaves us with the third issue, the central government. We chose it and we pay for it. But as our ambassador, Gen. Karl Eikenberry, has pointed out in leaked reports, it is so dishonest it cannot be a strategic partner. It is hopelessly corrupt, and its election last year was fraudulent; General Petraeus even told President Obama that it is a "crime syndicate." It is important to understand why it lacks legitimacy in the eyes of its people.

For us, the answer seemed simple: a government must legitimize itself the way we legitimize ours, with a reasonably fair election. But our way is not the Afghan way. Their way is through a process of achieving consensus that ultimately must be approved by the supreme council of state, the loya jirga. The apex of a pyramid of village, tribal and provincial assemblies, the loya jirga, according to the Constitution, is "the highest manifestation of the will of the people of Afghanistan."

Like the Russians, we have opposed moves to allow Afghanistan to bring about a national consensus. In 2002 nearly two-thirds of the delegates to a loya jirga signed a petition to make the exiled king, Zahir Shah, president of an interim government to give time for Afghans to work out their future. But we had already decided that Hamid Karzai was "our man in Kabul." So, as research professor Thomas Johnson and former foreign service officer in Afghanistan Chris Mason wrote last year, "massive US interference behind the scenes in the form of bribes, secret deals, and arm twisting got the US-backed candidate for the job, Hamid Karzai, installed instead.... This was the Afghan equivalent of the 1964 Diem Coup in Vietnam: afterward, there was no possibility of creating a stable secular government." An interim Afghan government certified by the loya jirga would have allowed the traditional way to achieve consensus; but, as Selig Harrison reported, our ambassador at the time, Zalmay Khalilzad, "had a bitter 40-minute showdown with the king, who then withdrew his candidacy." We have suffered with the results ever since.

Could we reverse this downward trend? If we remove our opposition to a loya jirga, will the Kabul government respond? Probably not so long as America is willing to pay its officials and protect them. But if we set a clear timetable for withdrawal, members of the government will have a strong self-interest in espousing what they will see as the national cause, and they will call for a loya jirga. Indeed, President Karzai already has.

Would such a move turn Afghanistan over to the Taliban? Realistically, we must anticipate that many, perhaps even a majority, of the delegates, particularly in the Pashtun area, will be at least passive supporters of the Taliban. I do not see any way this can be avoided. Our attempts to win over the "moderates" while fighting the "hardliners" is an echo of what we tried in Vietnam. It did not work there and did not work for the Russians in Afghanistan. It shows no sign of working for us now. As a 2009 Carnegie Endowment study of our occupation and the Taliban reaction to it laid out, even after their bloody defeat in 2001, "there have been no splinter groups since its emergence, except locally with no strategic consequences."

Nor, as I have shown in my history of two centuries of insurgencies, Violent Politics, are we likely to defeat the insurgents. Natives eventually wear down foreigners. The Obama administration apparently accepts this prediction. As the Washington Post reported this past fall, it admits that "the Taliban cannot be eliminated as a political or military movement, regardless of how many combat forces are sent into battle."

A loya jirga held soon is the best hope to create a reasonably balanced national government. This is partly because in the run-up to the national loya jirga, local groups will struggle to enhance or protect local interests. Their action will constitute a brake on the Taliban, who will be impelled to compromise. Today the Taliban enjoy the aura of national defenders against us; once we are no longer a target, that aura will fade.

If we are smart enough to allow the Afghans to solve their problems in their own way rather than try to force them to adopt ours, we can begin a sustainable move toward peace and security. Withdrawal is the essential first step. Further fighting will only multiply the cost to us and lead to failure.

About William R. Polk

William R. Polk (williampolk.com) is the senior director of the W.P. Carey Foundation. He is the author, most recently, of Understanding Iran, and is working on a new book on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, tentatively titled The Cockpit of Asia

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How to End the War in Afghanistan | The New York Review of Books

Hamid Karzai; drawing by John Springs

Neither the UK nor the US started the war in Afghanistan. In the 1990s that country’s Taliban government provided a safe haven and support for al-Qaeda. In return Osama bin Laden provided the Taliban with money and fighters. Afghanistan became the incubator for the September 11 attacks. The international intervention in response to those attacks had widespread support around the world. But we never meant for our militaries to be there forever. Eight years later, with al-Qaeda pushed into Pakistan, it is not enough to explain to people why the war started. We need to set out how it will be ended—how to preserve what has been achieved and protect South Asia from a contagion that would affect us all.

The route to progress depends on recognizing the centrality of politics to issues of war and peace. Violence of the most murderous, indiscriminate, and terrible kind started this Afghan war; politics will bring it to an end. A political settlement for Afghanistan must have two dimensions. First, a new and more inclusive internal political arrangement in which enough Afghan citizens have a stake, and the central government has enough power and legitimacy to protect the country from threats within and without. And second, on which the first depends, a new external settlement that commits Afghanistan’s neighbors to respect its sovereign integrity and that carries enough force and support to ensure that they abide by that commitment.

Britain fought three wars in Afghanistan between 1839 and 1919. Each time it was defending its power base—and economic stake—in British India. And each time it suffered military reverses as it sought to establish order. Yet on every occasion, once that lesson had been learned the hard and bloody way, Britain’s imperial strategists sought—and secured—a saner and more sustainable objective: a self-governing, self-policing, but heavily subsidized Afghanistan, whose tribes balanced each other and that posed no threat to the safety of British India.

Soviet strategists reached strikingly similar conclusions. When the Soviet forces in Afghanistan withdrew in 1989, they left behind a government, led by the Afghan Communist Mohammad Najibullah, that survived for three years. It did so—in the words of advice from the Kremlin—by “forgetting communism, abandoning socialism, embracing Islam, and working with the tribes.” As with every other regime in modern Afghan history, the Najibullah government could not have existed without external subsidy. And so it fell when Boris Yeltsin’s newly independent Russia cut all aid to Kabul.

Britain’s experience in the nineteenth century, and the Soviet Union’s in the twentieth, showed that the best way, perhaps the only way, to stabilize Afghanistan in the long term is to empower the Afghans themselves in charge so that they can secure and govern their own villages and valleys. To achieve this, the Afghans need full political and military support, and generous economic subsidy, from outside. But the Afghan people neither need nor welcome our combat troops on their soil any longer than is necessary to guarantee security and set them on a course to regulating their own affairs.

A recent study of Britain’s bloody withdrawal from Kabul in 1842 concluded that the first cause of that disaster was the reluctance of junior officers to tell their superiors the truth about the dire situation the British forces found themselves in. I know from my own discussions with diplomats and commanders in the field that such “happy talk” is no longer the order of the day. Getting Afghanistan right means getting down to ground truth. These are the facts as I see them:

• The Afghan people are tired of thirty years of war. They have been traumatized by the fighting and the denial of basic rights and opportunities. The majority of them hate, for good reason, the brutality of the Taliban. But sometimes they see them as their only protection from other brutal powerbrokers or warlords.

• The Afghan government led by Hamid Karzai faces competing demands from its own people, from powerful criminal and commercial interests, and from the international community. But it lacks the capacity to govern. The concerns about its credibility run deeper than last fall’s elections, which were marred by widespread corruption and fraud. They also relate to the very structure of the political system.

• The Afghan insurgency is a broad but shallow coalition, with shifting relationships, geographical bases, and tactics. The Taliban is led by members of the former Talib regime under Mullah Omar, who has been based in Pakistan’s border areas. A variety of other factions are also operating, including the Haqqani network, Hizb-e-Islami, and a range of smaller groups. These groups all trade on the uncertainties of the people and the weaknesses of the state.

• The Taliban are still despised—one recent poll suggests that only 6 percent of Afghans want them back in power. But they do now have organized cadres that enjoy some limited support—in the south, east, and north—and are able to mount operations in Kabul and elsewhere.

• Having fled Afghanistan, al- Qaeda’s senior leadership is now also hiding in Pakistan’s tribal areas. A significant number of its leaders have been killed or arrested. Despite the historical ties between al-Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban, their relationship is predominantly tactical and local. Yet al-Qaeda retains the capacity—including through its affiliates in other countries, such as Yemen—to plan and carry out deadly attacks around the world.

• There has been a significant change in Pakistan in the last eighteen months under President Asif Ali Zardari’s democratic government. The reality and threat of domestic terrorism has brought new purpose to civilian and military leadership, and new consensus between leaders and the Pakistani electorate. It is now realistic to talk about complementary pressure on the insurgencies on both sides of the border.

The Afghan and international strategy over the last eight years has been to focus on building up the key functions of the state and delivering better lives for the Afghan people. Despite many setbacks, there is a real record of achievement here, continuing today. The return of five million refugees in recent years is perhaps the greatest sign of the growing confidence of Afghans in their safety and security, and an important indicator of our own progress in protecting them. Still, polling shows that Afghans regard the lack of security as one of the biggest problems; last year more Afghan civilians were killed in insurgent attacks than ever.

In 2003 the Afghan National Army numbered fewer than two thousand. Today it is over 100,000 strong, though the ethnic balance within it—and particularly the proportion of Pashtuns—is weak. The total will grow by a third by the end of the year, and further in the years to come. Afghan soldiers are gaining frontline combat experience, including in the current Moshtarak operation in Helmand province. Plans are now being developed for the transfer of “lead security responsibility” to the Afghans—district by district and province by province—once the Afghan National Security Forces, local government, and other institutions are able to meet key conditions of effectiveness. As the Afghan National Army gets stronger, international forces will be able to withdraw from combat operations—although their training and mentoring of their Afghan counterparts will need to continue for a number of years.

Concerning education and health, in 2001 only one million Afghan children attended school, all of them boys. This year we expect to see seven million Afghan children enrolled in school—a third of them girls. Eight out of ten Afghans now have access to health care.

Poppy growing and the drug trade are major problems for Afghanistan; but during the past two years there have been successive reductions in poppy cultivation: 19 percent in 2008, 22 percent in 2009. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that cultivation will not increase in 2010. Improvements in governance and security, along with high wheat prices, have supported these results.

The achievements of the National Solidarity Programme—which aims to improve local and regional government—would be a remarkable story in any country. Over 22,000 village councils have been elected by their peers since 2003. They have not just designed but implemented almost 40,000 development projects, and are now forming, from the bottom up, district councils.

There are also areas where progress has not been so impressive. We are now stepping up our efforts to address these concerns, and the Afghan government needs to do much more:

• Justice and law and order are a critical battleground. The Afghan National Police number almost 100,000, but the biggest problem is now quality, not quantity. Part of the force is involved in the drug trade. It also suffers from illiteracy, patronage by criminals and insurgents, and corruption. The Afghan government is launching a robust and far-reaching program of reform. But the government needs, with our help, to build up the informal judicial structures for resolution of criminal and civil disputes. That is, after all, what Afghans often mean by the rule of law.

• Despite the success of the National Solidarity Programme, civil administration remains an extremely difficult and uphill struggle. In large parts of the country, district governance is almost nonexistent; half the governors do not have an office, fewer than a quarter have electricity, and some receive only six dollars a month in expenses. Over the next two years the international community has promised to help train 12,000 civil servants to serve on the district level.

• Last, there is the problem of corruption. According to January’s BBC/ABC/ARD poll, 95 percent of Afghans see corruption as a problem in their local area. In some regions Afghans are paying an average of $100 in bribes to officials every year. Such widespread abuse has deep roots. President Karzai has promised to tackle corruption and build independent institutions to monitor and drive progress. The international community will judge him by his actions, not his words. Donors are trying to provide him with incentives by promising to channel more aid through the government as certain tests are met, for example the verification and publication of the assets of senior officials and ministers; the adoption of new procedures for senior appointments; and a clear timeline for the enactment of comprehensive anti-corruption legislation.

The achievements of the last eight years would not have been possible were it not for the tireless efforts and unstinting bravery of our troops. Without them, the insurgency would have overwhelmed the Afghan government and probably overrun Kabul. Our development work would have ground to a halt. And al-Qaeda would have seized more space to plan its terrorist atrocities.

The work ahead—on each of these fronts—is both clear and pressing. The additional troops that the United States, Britain, and others are deploying are vital if progress is to be made. Britain’s commitment and determination will endure until we have achieved our shared objective—an Afghanistan that must not again be used as a basis for international terrorism.

Brennan Linsley/AP Images

A girl watching an Afghan National Army soldier searching an area thought to have been used as a Taliban firing position, Pech Valley, Kunar province, January 24, 2010

However, even on the most optimistic reading of present plans, the Afghan authorities will not be able to govern their land in sustainable or acceptable ways unless the scale of the insurgency itself is reduced. And only then will we be able to withdraw our forces confident that we will not have to return. The strengthened efforts of our military forces are an important part of this. As General McChrystal said recently, the role of the military is to “try to shape conditions which allow people to come to a truly equitable solution to how the Afghan people are governed.” This raises the core political challenge for Afghanistan, one that has been neglected for far too long.

The Bonn Agreement of 2001 and the process that followed it fell short of a truly balanced political settlement. The Northern Alliance came to Bonn as the new masters of Afghanistan. But they were not representative of the broader Afghan population, including the Pashtun majority in the south. It was right that the Taliban leaders were excluded from Bonn. But other more significant and legitimate groups were seriously underrepresented, most notably the various Pashtun confederations from which the Taliban draws its strength.

The two jirgas that followed Bonn led to a top-down, highly centralized political structure for a country whose people have always had a strong predilection for managing their own affairs at the local level. Furthermore, new arrangements in Kabul did not do justice to tribal and other informal, traditional, and community-based structures. Corruption has exacerbated these problems. The unconstrained accumulation of financial resources by malign power brokers has eroded tribal balance. Finally, from Iran in the west to Pakistan in the east, from the Central Asian Republics in the north to the regional powers of India, China, Saudi Arabia, Russia, and Turkey, the Bonn Agreement failed to bind Afghanistan’s neighbors into the long-term project of building a new, more peaceful country.

The lesson I draw from history is that Afghanistan will never achieve a sustainable peace unless many more Afghans are inside the political system, and its neighbors are in agreement with a political settlement.

Political Outreach

There is now an international consensus behind a program to reintegrate Taliban fighters, which the UN defines as “the process by which ex-combatants acquire civilian status and gain sustainable employment and income.” The logic behind this program is simple. As military pressure on the insurgency increases—as the dangers of continuing the fight grow and the prospects of success look more remote—those on the periphery of the insurgency will start to review their allegiances. We have seen this happening in fits and starts in recent years.

For such realignments to be sustained there needs to be not just employment but protection from retaliation by former allies. That is the significance of President Karzai’s proposed National Council for Peace, Reconciliation, and Reintegration, and of the $150 million the international community has already pledged to fund it.

But I would emphasize that a re-integration program will have a major impact only if it is coupled with a serious effort to address the grievances of those whom President Karzai describes as his “disaffected compatriots”—i.e., the Taliban and other insurgents. Without a genuine effort to understand and ultimately address the wider concerns that fuel the insurgency, it will be hard to convince significant numbers of combatants that their interests will be better served by working with the government than by fighting against it.

Some insurgents are committed to al-Qaeda’s violent extremist agenda. There will never be reconciliation with them—they must be beaten back. But the majority are not. They share conservative Islamic beliefs and, linked to that, strong views about what is a just social order. Their rallying cry is the expulsion of international forces. But they are also motivated by their intense dissatisfaction with the Afghan government and Afghan politics—which they see as corrupt and incompetent.

The idea of anyone reaching out to political engagement with those who would directly or indirectly attack our troops is difficult. We have no more right to betray our own values than those of the Afghan people who pray that the Taliban never come back. But dialogue is not appeasement; nor is allowing political space for discussion with opposing forces and politicians.

The Afghans must own, lead, and drive such political engagement. It will be a slow, gradual process. But the insurgents will want to see international support for it; and international mediation—for example under the auspices of the UN—may ultimately be required. So there needs to be clarity about the preconditions for any agreement: those who want a political say in their country’s future must permanently sever ties with al-Qaeda, give up their armed struggle, and accept the Afghan constitutional framework. In doing so their interests would be recognized and given a political voice but would be constrained by the nation’s laws and balanced by the interests and views of others.

In his repeated offers to talk directly to insurgents, President Karzai has made clear that while such preconditions should set the terms of any eventual agreement, they should not prevent a dialogue from developing. The build-up of international and Afghan military forces should concentrate everyone’s mind. Dialogue provides an alternative to fight or flight. Any such process of political outreach will take time and effort to prepare, let alone conclude. But the time to start laying the foundations for dialogue is now, so as to take advantage of the growing Afghan and international military presence.

President Karzai has proposed for April 29 a great consultation—a grand peace jirga—involving around 1,400 members and guests. They are to include parliamentarians, provincial councils and governors, religious and tribal leaders, and representatives from civil society organizations and women’s groups. This should be the start of a process of building a new national political settlement. He has said:

The objective will be to get guidance from the Afghan people on how to move forward towards reintegration and reconciliation —where reconciliation may be possible—and chart out an action plan in consultation with the Afghan people.

What might such a political settlement look like? An outsider can only offer suggestions.

First, there should be arrangements, whether formal or informal, to ensure that the legitimate tribal, ethnic, and other groups that feel excluded from the post-Bonn political settlement are given a real stake in the political process and are able to compete for political representation. A peace settlement must include the vanquished as well as the victors. To do this, the new arrangements should give voice to the different blocs of opinion and influence. Access to political office and government jobs should be opened up. And efforts should be made to broaden the ethnic base of the Afghan National Army. All of this would encourage Afghans to address their grievances, and those of their broader community, from within the system. And it would offer them a part in building stability and security in Afghanistan so that—and this is a key objective of many of the insurgents—the international forces will be able to withdraw from combat, initially into a training and support role, and then altogether.

Second, the provincial and district governors and their associated assemblies of elders should be given new governing powers, so that the walis (or provincial governors) and the uluswals (district governors) have the confidence, competence, and capacity to govern in the best interests of those they represent. Recruiting the right people for these jobs is essential—and in view of the challenges of upholding justice and the rule of law, the police chief and local magistrates are equally important. Local governors and local assemblies also need to be given more direct responsibility for overseeing development, adjudicating disputes, providing local security, and reintegrating local insurgents and their sympathizers.

Third, a new legislative process should be established—not necessarily involving constitutional change—between president and parliament, in order to give parliamentarians a real stake in the success of the political settlement. Such a stake would encourage them to participate as well as to criticize, and would ultimately lead to the development of something completely alien in Afghanistan today, but critical to democracy—a constructive or loyal opposition.

Fourth, underpinning all this must be a more concerted effort to prevent and eradicate corruption. President Karzai’s promises to tackle the culture of impunity and to establish a new anti-corruption unit are important. Emphasis must also be put on how the Afghan government—with international help —can counter the extensive drug trade. This goes to the heart of ordinary people’s concerns about corruption and lack of the rule of law. Part of this is about ensuring that the new political settlement includes many more checks and balances—such as independent courts—and much greater emphasis on transparency and accountability to ensure that government at all levels and in all guises is the servant, not the master, of the Afghan people.

The External Political Settlement

No country’s politics can exist in a vacuum, least of all Afghanistan’s. For too long it has been the victim of external meddling and interference. Today competing regional interests are being pursued in Afghanistan, and the country’s tribal and ethnic groups—in the south, the east, and the north—still roam freely and find refuge across its borders. Those who oppose the government still draw on funding, support, and shelter from abroad. If Afghanistan is to have a more peaceful and prosperous future, it needs not just a new internal political settlement but also a new external political settlement.

Given the scale of the geopolitical challenges in this region—including the long-running tensions between India and Pakistan and the presence of Iran—it can seem that Afghanistan is fated to remain the victim of a zero-sum scramble for power among hostile neighbors. The logic of this position is that Afghanistan will never achieve peace until the region’s most intractable problems are solved. But there is an alternative and ultimately more promising possibility, by which Afghanistan poses so many dangers that it becomes the place where more cooperative regional relations are forged.

The first step is a greater recognition by all of Afghanistan’s neighbors and the key regional powers of two simple facts. Fact one: no country in the region, let alone the international community, will again allow Afghanistan to be dominated, or used as a strategic asset, by a neighboring state. Fact two: the status quo in Afghanistan is damaging to all. Crime, drugs, terrorism, and refugees spill across its borders when Afghanistan’s great mineral wealth and agricultural land should instead be of benefit to the region. These two facts can and must provide the basis of a shared interest around which the countries of the region can coalesce.

Second—and this point is more complex—there needs to be a more honest acknowledgment of the different interests and concerns of Afghanistan’s neighbors, so that efforts can be made to provide reassurances. Pakistan is essential here. It holds many of the keys to security and dialogue. It clearly has to be a partner in finding solutions in Afghanistan.

Pakistan is a country of 170 million people. It is a nuclear power. Pakistan will act only according to its own sense of its national interest. That is natural. Its relationship with Afghanistan is close to the core of its national security interests. Pakistan fears the build-up of a non-Pashtun Afghan National Army on its doorstep, and it is perpetually worried about India’s relationship with Afghanistan.

It has also had a difficult relationship with the US for a generation. That is the significance of the Obama administration’s determination to pursue a new security, economic, and political relationship with Pakistan. This policy opens up a vital opportunity to address Pakistan’s concerns—and ours. The Kerry-Lugar Act—which provides for over $7 billion in nonmilitary aid over the next five years, but makes the support conditional on the Pakistani government taking effective action against militants in its territory—is an important down payment in this regard.

But progress cannot be achieved simply by a more serious, more equal US–Pakistan strategic security understanding, crucial though that is. Alongside Pakistan’s fears about its western border, fears about Pakistan’s own involvement in Afghanistan need to be addressed. Every country needs to accept that, just as there will be no settlement in Afghanistan without Pakistan’s involvement, so there will be no settlement in Afghanistan unless India, Russia, Turkey, and China are also involved in the search for solutions. China is Afghanistan’s largest foreign investor. India has already pledged $1.2 billion for reconstruction in Afghanistan. It has a big part to play. Moreover, the Iranian regime—whose nuclear policies have flouted the UN and that has a record of attempting to destabilize its neighbors—must acknowledge that the best way to protect its investments or promote the interests of Afghans that share its Shia faith is to work to promote peace, not undermine it. The Iranian government’s refusal to take part in the recent London Conference on Afghanistan was completely shortsighted.

Third—and this is where the external settlement connects most clearly to the internal political settlement—there needs to be greater transparency with respect to the future direction of Afghan foreign policy. It is for the Afghans to decide how to do this, but their involvement is critical in building confidence and reducing miscalculation. Linked to this, there will need to be consistency and clarity about the presence, activities, and future plans of the international forces in Afghanistan.

Fourth, economics should be the great lubricant for better regional relations. Afghanistan can benefit all its neighbors if it becomes the land bridge of Central Asia, South Asia, and the Gulf. After all, the Silk Road was the passage for trade for many centuries. There are common interests not just in trade and transport, but in managing and sharing water and electricity and harnessing economic growth for the benefit of Afghanistan and the neighboring countries.

Fifth is the question of the forum in which this work should move forward. The process must be led by the countries in the region. Only these governments can decide whether the multitude of existing bodies such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference can provide the basis for the serious and sustained regional engagement that is now needed. The Afghans should take the lead, in partnership with the UN. In time perhaps this could lead to a standing Conference on Stability, Security, and Cooperation in South Asia. Above all, Afghan citizens must decide the future political process in their country. Important as the neighbors’ legitimate interests are, they cannot supplant, nor will we allow them to supplant, the Afghan government and the Afghan people. The days are long gone when powerful countries would dispose of a smaller, vulnerable neighbor to suit their own ends.

Conclusion

If we successfully implement the strategy I have outlined, a better future for Afghanistan is not a utopian goal. Within two to five years it is realistic to aspire to see the country still on an upward trajectory, still poor but stable, with a just peace, with democracy and inclusive politics taking hold at all levels, and with incomes growing. The urban population should have access to electricity. More shops will be open in the local bazaars and more children—in particular more girls—will be going to schools. Most grassroots insurgents —the so-called ten-dollar-a-day Taliban—should be resettled in their villages with at least some of the insurgent leaders taking part in the legitimate political process. Communities will be increasingly able to rely on the Afghan National Security Forces for protection—or to protect themselves. International troops will have stepped back from the front line—though they will still have a role, and sometimes a dangerous role, in training and mentoring their Afghan counterparts. The neighbors will be working together, preventing trouble, not fueling it. And above all, al-Qaeda will be kept out.

I have been to Afghanistan six times as British foreign secretary. On my first visit in July 2007 I attended the funeral of its last king, Mohammed Zahir Shah. The grief I witnessed was palpable and deep, but so too was the sense of national unity. Ethnic allegiances and historic feuds were put aside to mourn the passing of the “father of the nation.”

This unity is not expressed today through allegiance to a monarch. Instead it is founded on a deep desire among the people to live life as they see fit. The military surge is vital to success; so is investment in the civilian economy; but now is the time for Afghans to pursue a political settlement with as much vigor and energy as we are pursuing the military and civilian effort. That is how to end the war in Afghanistan.

—April 1, 2010

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Human rights report threatens aid to Pakistan - washingtonpost.com

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By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, April 6, 2010; A06

ISLAMABAD -- The Pakistani army has allegedly committed hundreds of retaliatory killings and other ongoing human rights abuses in the Swat Valley since the end of its successful anti-Taliban offensive there in September, threatening billions of dollars in U.S. military and economic aid to a crucial ally in the fight against al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said it had documented the extrajudicial execution of as many as 300 alleged Taliban supporters and sympathizers in the area around Mingora, the Swat capital, in interviews with more than 100 Swat families in February and March. A report on the alleged abuses, including torture, home demolitions, illegal detentions and disappearances, is scheduled for release this month.

Based on a continuing pattern, "we can only assume it is part of the counterterrorism effort by the security forces to shoot people in the back of the head," said Ali Dayan Hasan, the organization's senior South Asia analyst.

The Obama administration has been aware of reports of abuse since last summer, U.S. officials in Washington said, even as it has strengthened its relationship with Pakistan. Last month, the administration held a "strategic dialogue" with top Pakistani military and government officials.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Monday that "we take allegations of human rights abuses seriously" and that the U.S. military was "working with the Pakistanis" to address the situation and that progress was being made.

A senior U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the administration has provided Congress with regular updates on the allegations since last summer as well as on steps taken to address them. "We are mindful of the legislative requirements," the official said.

Most U.S. aid to Pakistan falls under congressional restrictions requiring the administration to certify the country's adherence to human rights laws and norms. Since 2002, the United States has provided $11.6 billion in military aid and $6 billion in development assistance, according to Congressional Research Service figures. The administration has requested an additional $3 billion in combined aid for 2011.

Pakistani army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas denied allegations of abuse, saying that the military had invited human rights groups to investigate earlier charges during the June-to-September offensive in the former Taliban stronghold. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, he said, issued written directives ordering troops operating in Swat and other regions to respect the rule of law.

"If we are seen as becoming terrorists against the terrorists," Abbas said, "all we have gained will go up in the air." He suggested that reported killings or other abuses were the result of "scores being settled between the people and the Taliban," many of whom remain in the mountains surrounding settled areas in Swat.

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The army is holding about 2,500 detainees from counterinsurgency operations in Swat and elsewhere in the north and west, about 1,000 of them in Swat. The military has no judicial arm to prosecute them and has complained that Pakistan's slow-moving civilian judiciary was unable to handle them.

Hasan, of Human Rights Watch, said the military has not released the names of those being held or allowed outside access to them.

Despite the abuse allegations, the army presence appears to have the support of many Swat residents. In Mingora, members of the military could be seen rebuilding roads, schools and libraries, buying computers for women's vocational institutes and providing solar-powered streetlights to villages, in the absence of government reconstruction efforts.

The Swat offensive marked the start of several major Pakistani military operations against strongholds of the Pakistani Taliban, which the Obama administration says is tied to al-Qaeda and to Taliban forces fighting in Afghanistan. About 150,000 Pakistani army troops have been involved in operations in Swat and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Afghanistan border, including Bajur and South Waziristan.

The administration has urged Pakistan to extend full offensive operations into North Waziristan, Orakzai and Khyber regions of the FATA, which it has described as havens for al-Qaeda leaders and the Taliban-allied insurgent network of Afghan commander Jalaluddin Haqqani.

U.S. officials have also worked to develop close ties with the Pakistani military, which has ruled the country for nearly half of Pakistan's 63-year existence and has an uneasy relationship with the civilian government. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, visits Pakistan regularly, as does Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan.

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Under a $7.5 billion, five-year economic and development aid package signed by President Obama in October, the secretary of state must certify that the military is "not materially and substantially subverting the political or judicial processes of Pakistan" -- a provision that drew sharp protests from the Pakistani military, which charged that it interferes in the country's internal affairs.

Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and national security adviser James L. Jones have met with the army chief, Kiyani, as well as civilian leaders, during recent visits to Pakistan, as has Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who co-sponsored the new developmental aid package. An aide said Kerry had raised the human rights allegations "with senior Pakistani officials" during a trip in February.

Hasan said Human Rights Watch had investigated about a third of the abuse reports the group had received from the Mingora area and found most of them substantiated. "Certainly, some of these people are Taliban supporters and sympathizers," he said of Swat, but many are "caught in the middle."

The group has been unable to verify the military units involved in alleged abuses, as required by U.S. law before a cutoff of aid.

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Violence Helps Taliban Undo Afghan Gains - NYTimes.com

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By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.

MARJA, Afghanistan — Since their offensive here in February, the Marines have flooded Marja with hundreds of thousands of dollars a week. The tactic aims to win over wary residents by paying them compensation for property damage or putting to work men who would otherwise look to the Taliban for support.

The approach helped turn the tide of insurgency in Iraq. But in Marja, where the Taliban seem to know everything — and most of the time it is impossible to even tell who they are — they have already found ways to thwart the strategy in many places, including killing or beating some who take the Marines’ money, or pocketing it themselves.

Just a few weeks since the start of the operation here, the Taliban have “reseized control and the momentum in a lot of ways” in northern Marja, Maj. James Coffman, civil affairs leader for the Third Battalion, Sixth Marines, said in an interview in late March. “We have to change tactics to get the locals back on our side.”

Col. Ghulam Sakhi, an Afghan National Police commander here, says his informants have told him that at least 30 Taliban have come to one Marine outpost here to take money from the Marines as compensation for property damage or family members killed during the operation in February.

“You shake hands with them, but you don’t know they are Taliban,” Colonel Sakhi said. “They have the same clothes, and the same style. And they are using the money against the Marines. They are buying I.E.D.’s and buying ammunition, everything.”

One tribal elder from northern Marja, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of being killed, said in an interview on Saturday that the killing and intimidation continued to worsen. “Every day we are hearing that they kill people, and we are finding their dead bodies,” he said. “The Taliban are everywhere.”

Image by Helmandblog via Flickr

The local problem points to the larger challenges ahead as American forces expand operations in the predominantly Pashtun south, where the Taliban draw most of their support and the government is deeply unpopular.

In Marja, the Taliban are hardly a distinct militant group, and the Marines have collided with a Taliban identity so dominant that the movement appears more akin to the only political organization in a one-party town, with an influence that touches everyone. Even the Marines admit to being somewhat flummoxed.

“We’ve got to re-evaluate our definition of the word ‘enemy,’ ” said Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, commander of the Marine expeditionary brigade in Helmand Province. “Most people here identify themselves as Taliban.”

“We have to readjust our thinking so we’re not trying to chase the Taliban out of Marja, we’re trying to chase the enemy out,” he said. “We have to deal with these people.”

The Marines hoped the work programs would be a quick way to put to work hundreds of “military-aged males,” as they call them. In some places, that has worked. But the programs have run into jeopardy in other parts of Marja, an area of about 80 square miles that is a patchwork of lush farmland and small bazaars and villages.

In northern Marja, the biggest blow came when the local man hired to supervise the work programs was beaten by the Taliban and refused to help the Marines any more. The programs are “completely dead in the water” there, Major Coffman said.

In addition to work programs, the Marines are using compensation payments to build support for the newly appointed district governor of Marja, Hajji Abdul Zahir, telling people that to receive money they must get his approval. That effort has proved equally vulnerable.

In late March, an Afghan man was beaten by the Taliban hours after he had gone to the Marine outpost that houses Mr. Zahir’s office to collect his compensation. The Taliban took the money and stole a similar amount as punishment, said Colonel Sakhi, the police commander.

“My greatest fear right now is not knowing if I have put money into the pockets of the Taliban,” Major Coffman said.

Despite those reservations, the Marine strategy depends on sowing this community with buckets of cash. The money is a bridge to a day when, in theory, the new Marja district government will have more credibility than the Taliban.

That would be a difficult goal even if the Americans did not intend to rid the region of its lucrative poppy crop. While the United States has abandoned the policy of widespread eradication of the crop, efforts to discourage planting it will still cost farmers and power brokers huge sums.

“There are lots of people with lots of money invested here, and they are not just going to give that up,“ General Nicholson said. “Now is the heavy lifting. We have to convince a very skeptical population that we are here to help them.”

A steady flow of Taliban attacks have added to the challenge. After the February offensive, the Marines used cash payments to prod more than 20 store owners at one bazaar in northern Marja to open their doors, a key to stabilizing the area and reassuring residents.

By late March, all but five shops had closed, Major Coffman said. A prominent anti-Taliban senior elder was also gunned down in northern Marja, prompting most of the 200 people in his district to flee.

“They have completely paralyzed all the folks here,” Major Coffman said.

In another sign of how little the Marines control outside their own outposts, one week ago masked gunmen killed a 22-year-old man, Hazrat Gul, in broad daylight as he and four other Afghans built a small bridge about a third of a mile from a military base in central Marja.

Mr. Gul’s boss, an Afghan who contracted with the Marines to build the bridge, says he has been warned four times by the Taliban to stop working for the Americans.

And even as the NATO-backed Mr. Zahir struggles to gain credibility as Marja’s leader, the Taliban are working to fortify their own local administration.

According to Colonel Sakhi, the Taliban’s governor for Marja returned to the area on Monday for the first time since the February assault and held a meeting with local elders, many of whom Mr. Zahir is trying to win over. The Taliban governor warned them not to take money from the Marines or cooperate with the Afghan government, Colonel Sakhi said.

In central Marja, where the work projects have had more success, about 2,000 Afghan men are employed by programs financed by the First Battalion, Sixth Marines, said the unit’s civil affairs leader, Maj. David Fennell.

At one of the battalion’s outposts, shipments of cash arrive regularly. The last was 10 million afghanis, or $210,000, stuffed into a rucksack. The battalion doles out $150,000 a week, Major Fennell said.

On one afternoon in late March, 40 Afghans could be seen clearing away several acres of rubble remaining from a bazaar leveled during a NATO bomb strike two years ago. The $190,000 contract is expected to take a month to complete.

But intimidation is still rife — even inside the walls of the Marines’ outpost. One woman who came to the base crouched behind a Humvee and begged for help, saying that her husband had been killed during the February operation.

First Lt. Aran Walsh offered her $1,700 worth of Afghan currency. He asked her why she hid herself.

“If they see me, they’ll inform the Taliban,” she said.

Moises Saman contributed reporting from Marja, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan.

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Afghan women fear loss of hard-won progress

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By Karin Brulliard
Tuesday, March 16, 2010; A01

LAGHMAN, AFGHANISTAN -- The head-to-toe burqas that made women a faceless symbol of the Taliban's violently repressive rule are no longer required here. But many Afghan women say they still feel voiceless eight years into a war-torn democracy, and they point to government plans to forge peace with the Taliban as a prime example.

Gender activists say they have been pressing the administration of President Hamid Karzai for a part in any deal-making with Taliban fighters and leaders, which is scheduled to be finalized at a summit in April. Instead, they said, they have been met with a silence that they see as a dispiriting reminder of the limits of progress Afghan women have made since 2001.

"We have not been approached by the government -- they never do," said Samira Hamidi, country director of the Afghan Women's Network, an umbrella group. "The belief is that women are not important,'' she said, describing a mind-set that she said "has not been changed in the past eight years."

The Taliban's repressive treatment of women helped galvanize international opposition in the 1990s, and by some measures democracy has revolutionized Afghan women's lives. Their worry now is not about a Taliban takeover, Hamidi said, but that male leaders, behind closed doors and desperate for peace, might not force Taliban leaders to accept, however grudgingly, that women's roles have changed.

Those concerns share roots with the misgivings voiced by many observers, including some U.S. officials, about Afghan efforts to forge a settlement with the Taliban, whose leaders promote an Islamist ideology that seems wholly at odds with rights the Afghan constitution guarantees.

The unease about such a settlement stretches from Kabul to the mountain-ringed valleys of Laghman, a scrappy town in a province still stalked at night by Taliban fighters. As a young girl here, Malalay Jan studied in a private home, hidden from the Taliban regime that forbade her education. Four years ago, her girls' school was torched in a rash of suspected Taliban attacks. Now, she said, she is sure of one thing: Afghan women should have a spot at the negotiating table.

"We don't want them to stop us from getting an education or working in an office," said Jan, 18, wearing a rhinestone-studded head scarf at her rebuilt school. Women, she said, should be "the first priority."

Karzai, the Afghan president, has endorsed the idea of talking with all levels of the Taliban, and his aides insist that women need not worry about the equal rights the Afghan constitution guarantees them. But they also say they are performing a difficult balancing act, and suggest that making bold statements about the sanctity of such topics as women's rights might kill talks before they start.

"We will act from a position of principle. And that principle is that half the public wants these rights to be protected," said Mohammad Masoom Stanekzai, who is drafting Karzai's reconciliation plan. "It is not the authority of a group of people in government or a group of people in the insurgency to decide the fate of a whole nation."

In today's Afghanistan, females make up one-quarter of parliament, fill one-third of the nation's classrooms and even compete on "Afghan Idol."

But violence against women remains "endemic," according to the State Department. The percentage of female civil servants is steadily dropping. Just one of 25 cabinet members is a woman, and female lawmakers say their opinions are often ignored.

That point was underscored in January, many observers said, when the women's affairs minister was not invited to an international conference in London on reconciliation and reintegration.

Bringing the Taliban into the government could make things worse, Hamidi said.

"They think women should stay at home," she said. "And all of them have the same perception and same beliefs, from the lowest to the top level."

The Taliban itself, led by Mohammad Omar, has tried to dispute that. As part of what analysts call a public relations campaign to soften the movement's image, Omar, though still in hiding, released a statement last fall that said the Taliban did not oppose women's rights and favored education for all.

Arsala Rahmani, a lawmaker and former Taliban government official, said he thought women's activists were being close-minded, defying what he called "a mother's duty to always try to unite their sons." He said that the Taliban restricted women to protect them from conflict -- not out of ideological misogyny -- and that Omar and his fighters would accept any ideas the Afghan public favors.

To human rights activists, those Taliban messages are ploys to dim support for U.S.-led military efforts in Afghanistan. They point to Taliban-dominated Kandahar province, where militants have closed two-thirds of schools, and Helmand, where tribal leaders say female teachers are threatened with death.

It is a worrisome prospect to women such as Khujesta Elham, an aspiring politician who on a recent day was chatting with friends between classes at Kabul University. She said she thought Taliban fighters should be shunned, though she did not expect that to happen.

"Whatever decision Karzai makes will be his alone," said Elham, 22. "The government does not care about women's rights."

The depth of the Taliban's control varies across Afghanistan, as was the case during its rule, and so do views on the movement. In the 1990s, the Taliban viewed Kabul as a den of depravity, and it was there that its notorious Vice and Virtue police most brutally wielded batons against women who exposed their faces or wore high heels.

In Laghman, a rural Pashtun province in the shadow of snow-capped mountains, patriarchal traditions meant many of those rules were already in force. The area's Taliban officials mostly ignored unauthorized girls' schools, said Qamer Khujazada, who ran one until the Taliban was ousted in 2001. Khujazada became principal of Haider Khani high school, but militants burned down its administrative offices four years ago.

Hanifa Safia, the women's affairs representative for the province, said she thinks a settlement is the only way to peace. The Taliban fighters who throw acid on schoolgirls' faces or threaten professional women do so just to antagonize the government, she said. "I have talked to so many Taliban. They are not against women," Safia said. "Once they have been given positions in government, they will definitely change."

Khujazada, the principal, tentatively agrees. She walks confidently through the halls of her fraying school, overseeing a staff that she boasts is exactly half female.

But many of the girls slip into blue burqas before they leave the concrete-walled schoolyard, and Khujazada acknowledged that most will be married off before they ever set foot in a university. What is important, she said, is that they have the right to continue their schooling.

"Education has a lot of friends," Khujazada said cautiously. "But it has some enemies, too."

Departing U.N. Envoy Urges Political Solution in Afghanistan

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By ABDUL WAHEED WAFA

KABUL, Afghanistan — The departing head of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan, Kai Eide, warned Thursday that if negative trends were not reversed, there would be little that could restore peace in the country, and he called for balancing the military strategy with political efforts.

Speaking at his final news conference as the United Nations special representative in Afghanistan, Mr. Eide also cautioned against excessive militarization of international efforts here, a long-standing concern that has taken on greater significance as the American-led military operation grows and includes more nation-building.

Mr. Eide also warned that military operations against insurgents needed to be waged in a manner that did not impede efforts to negotiate a peaceful solution with them.

Mr. Eide’s comments came as thousands of troops from the United States, Britain and Afghanistan began to work to restore civilian services after finishing the huge combat phase of its effort to retake the Taliban stronghold of Marja, in the southern province of Helmand.

Mr. Eide, a Norwegian diplomat, announced late last year that he would step down from his post in Afghanistan when his contract expired. His one-and-a-half year tenure was marked by rising bloodshed and criticism of his handling of the fraud-plagued presidential elections in August.

His former deputy, the American diplomat Peter W. Galbraith, accused Mr. Eide of covering up fraud that helped President Hamid Karzai. Mr. Eide vehemently denied the allegations and said he had followed Afghan law. Mr. Galbraith was dismissed last autumn.

On Thursday, Mr. Eide said he would spend his few remaining days in Afghanistan pressing Mr. Karzai over recent moves that gave the president more control over the electoral process. Mr. Karzai recently gave himself the authority to name the five members of a purportedly independent electoral monitoring commission that reviews citizen complaints, and he has refused, so far, to make changes in the country’s other major electoral body, the independent election commission. Its members oversee election procedures and many Afghans view them as biased in favor of the president., who appoints them.

Mr. Karzai’s move to appoint the election complaint commission himself, removing the requirement that it have United Nations-appointed members, would reduce international oversight of future elections, and could undermine their credibility in the eyes of Afghans as well as foreign countries.

Mr. Eide said he had made “some progress” with Mr. Karzai in negotiations over the complaint commission’s panel, but offered no details. Previously, the United Nations had included foreigners on three of the seats of the commission, with the other two posts held by Afghans.

Mr. Eide, who is set to leave Afghanistan on Sunday, said 2010 would be the “most challenging” year since the American-led invasion toppled the Taliban in 2001, and it would be a critical period for the international community’s efforts in Afghanistan.

“It is a year where negative trends have to be reversed or they will become irreversible,” he said, but added that the world needed to have realistic expectations: “Decisive success within a year or two in a country marred by conflict is unachievable.”

Last year was the deadliest since 2001 for members of the NATO-led military coalition and Afghan civilians. Saying that “clocks in foreign countries tick faster” than change can occur in Afghanistan, Mr. Eide called for international patience with the slow pace of progress. He said that any resolution to the conflict needed to balance military and political approaches.

“I believe that a political process is indispensable for finding a solution to this conflict,” he said. “I believe the focus is too much on military side and too little on political side and civilian side, and our strategy has unfortunately been too much military-driven.”

In his time in Kabul, Mr. Eide tried to carve out a more important role for the United Nations mission, aiming to coordinate international assistance and act as the main international interlocutor with the Afghan government. He also sought to distance his mission from NATO military operations and to assist the Afghan people more, taking a strong stand on investigating civilian casualties and human rights abuses.

Yet his efforts have not always succeeded, and the agency itself has become a target. Five United Nations staff members were killed when gunmen attacked a guesthouse in central Kabul last year, just days before a second round of elections.

Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Kabul, and Jack Healy from New York.

US 'plans to oust Taliban from Kandahar'

The US has said it is planning a new offensive later this year to drive the Taliban from the southern Afghanistan city of Kandahar.

The current action against the Taliban stronghold of Marjah was a "prelude" to a bigger operation, a US official said.

The US general in charge of Nato forces in Afghanistan has said the local population in Kandahar is at risk.

Kandahar is Afghanistan's second largest city, and was once a Taliban stronghold.

'Reversing momentum'

A major offensive there would follow the current military operation in neighbouring Helmand province.

"If the goal in Afghanistan is to reverse the momentum of the Taliban... then we think we have to get to Kandahar this year," an official in the White House told reporters.

The US goal was to bring "comprehensive population security" to the city.

Suicide attacks are frequently carried out in Kandahar, with one at the beginning on February killing three people.

He described Marjah as "a tactical prelude to a comprehensive operation in Kandahar City."

The Marjah offensive by Nato forces began in mid-February, and has several more weeks to go.

It was "pretty much on track", the official said.

Kabul attack

In Kabul on Friday, explosions and shooting took place in an area of hotels and guesthouses popular with foreigners. Up to nine Indians, a Frenchman and an Italian were killed.

Three gunmen and two policemen died in a gun battle that lasted several hours. Taliban militants said they had carried it out.

President Hamid Karzai condemned the violence. India called it "barbaric".

Kabul has been relatively quiet since 18 January, when Taliban bombers and gunmen attacked government targets and shopping malls, killing 12 people.

Friday's attack is also the Taliban's first major raid since the arrest of key leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar in Pakistan this month.