Ashraf Ghani, one of the main organizers of the conference, told the media he wants Kabul to have more control over aid dollars

Kabul conference: Can Karzai take the reins? [Global Post]

As U.S. President Barack Hussein Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai are said to have been at odds for some time now, and Karzai is rumored to have gotten in a shouting match with U.S. Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke the role of the organizer of today’s Kabul Conference was extremely crucial.

Since the Conference is aimed at giving greater power to Karzai and his government, it was clear that the right organizer was needed to appease the Western leaders who are still not sold on Karzai’s legitimacy and effectiveness of President of Afghanistan.

Karzai’s effectiveness along with his dubious relation to half-brother Ahmad Wali Karzai, have been questioned for some time now by Western leaders skeptical of his ability to curb the massive corruption plaguing his nation.

Unlike Karzai however, Dr. Ashraf Ghani has a long-standing relationship with Western leaders and intellectuals that lead him to be in an ideal position for organizing a conference centered around the idea of giving the government of Afghanistan greater supremacy over its own domestic affairs.

Dr. Ghani, famously left his left post as Finance Minister for the Karzai Administration in 2004 leading many to believe that the man who worked on a pro bono basis for Karzai and disclosed all of his assets to the public, was fed up with the rampant corruption within Karzai’s government.

Having worked with the World Bank, United Nations, and Johns Hopkins University, Dr. Ghani also made a name for himself among influential Western leaders and academics, building a confidence in his abilities that the West has largely still not seen in Karzai.

Also, as the author of Securing Afghanistan‘s Future – the most comprehensive public investment plan ever presented to the developed world by a developing nation – and Fixing Failed States, Dr. Ghani can serve as a symbol for a clearly laid out plan that takes into account the language and methods of top Western decision-makers.

Though his run ill-fated for President against Karzai was criticized for being too focused upon the West, Dr. Ghani, in alliance with Democratic Strategist James Carville ran a campaign that made transparency and economic opportunities for ordinary Afghans two of its corner stones. Both goals Western leaders seem to be unsure of President Karzai’s ability to deliver upon.

It is very interesting (to say the least) to see a man who famously compared Karzai’s rule to King Lear playing such a large role in organizing a conference that would essentially give greater control over the near future of Afghanistan to Hamid Karzai, whom Dr. Ghani said owed “his Presidency to the very forces that are negative” even after the highly contested second Afghan Presidential election.

Whereas Dr. Ghani’s connections to Western elites made him the target of criticism during the Presidential elections, those very connections have very likely worked to both his and President Karzai’s favor in organizing the Kabul Conference.

16) At the end, the National Consultative Peace Jirga as a representative of the Afghan people strongly condemns the inhumane attack by Israeli army carried out on the convoy of aid groups that was on its way to Gaza Bank where poor Palestinians are besieged.

The United Nations and the international community is urged to end the brutal siege of Gaza.

Final declaration of the Kabul peace jirga [Abdulhadi Hairan]

The Afghan government, in a press release issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, condemned the attack. “We ask the UN and the international community to take strong steps in addressing the issue,” it said. The statement said that the ships were carrying aid to poor people, and said the passengers were humanitarian workers of various backgrounds.

Gaza: Reaction in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan [New York Times]

According to the BBC, the world at large is concentrating far too much on security and not enough on long-lasting, effective development work which will lead to real change in Afghan power dynamics:

Afghanistan still has the second highest maternal mortality rate in the world and the third highest rate of child mortality.

“Only 23% of the population have access to safe drinking water and only 24% above the age of 15 can read and write,” said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the office of the UN human rights commissioner.

Corruption contributes to poverty in Afghanistan – UN [BBC}

Thus, the United Nations states the effects on daily lives of Afghanistan’s nearly 22 million people living in some form of poverty should be taken into account when making policy decisions:

“Poverty actually kills more Afghans than those who die as a direct result of the armed conflict,” Norah Niland, Representative of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Afghanistan, told reporters in Kabul today.

“Poverty is neither accidental, nor inevitable; it is both a cause and a consequence of a massive human rights deficit,” she added.

“The deficit includes widespread impunity and inadequate investment in, and attention to, human rights. Patronage, corruption, impunity and over-emphasis on short-term goals rather than targeted long-term development are exacerbating a situation of dire poverty that is the condition of an overwhelming majority of Afghans.”

Human rights abuses exacerbating poverty in Afghanistan, UN report finds [UN News Centre]

The Electoral Complaints Commission was the group responsible for uncovering much of the the massive fraud in the second Afghan Presidential election this summer, including suspicious activities by the Independent Election Commission, who initially announced Karzai as the victor of the contentious election:

On Saturday, a spokesman said Mr Karzai would now accept some foreigners on the body, because the nation was on a “transitional phase” to democracy.

“The Afghan government has shown its readiness to accept two non-Afghans on the Electoral Complaints Commission and this has been announced to the United Nations,” Waheed Omar said.

However the ECC would still be controlled by Afghans, who would have a majority of the votes, Mr Omar said.

Afghanistan: Karzai to let foreigners on poll watchdog [BBC]

Though Karzai’s representatives said the amendment was a bid got ‘afghanise‘ the election process in Afghanistan, however, the Times sees the move as yet another self-serving power play by the oft-criticized Afghan President accused of widespread election fraud himself:

At a time when American, NATO and Afghan troops are putting their lives on the line to battle the Taliban, Mr. Karzai seems interested only in his own political power. That is hugely destructive. Mr. Karzai’s failure to build a credible, honest and even minimally effective government is the Taliban’s No. 1 recruiting tool.

The Electoral Complaints Commission adjudicates violations and will play an important role in the September vote for a new Parliament. By law, it has five members: three non-Afghans appointed by the United Nations and two Afghans, one named by the Supreme Court and one by a human rights commission. Mr. Karzai will now be able to appoint all five members.

Power Grab [New York Times]

As bribes are needed for the people to cross roads, receive medical treatment, receive a license and a number of other everyday necessities, the public dishonesty is taking a massive toll on the daily lives of the Afghan people.

The report claims that Afghans are more concerned with the dishonesty than they are about insecurity and unemployment. The accuracy of such a large claim is up for debate, but with Karzai’s network of politicians (including warlords) and a non-functioning bureaucracy, it is not difficult to see how said dishonesty can rise to the top of the Afghan people’s concerns:

The report, based on interviews with 7,600 Afghans conducted between August and October last year with people in 12 provincial capitals and more than 1,600 villages around Afghanistan, found that graft was part of everyday life.

In the past year, one Afghan out of two had to pay at least one kickback to a public official such as a police officer, judge, prosecutor or member of the government.

The average bribe was $160 in a country where economic output per capita is just $425 a year.

In total, Afghans paid out $2.5 billion in bribes over the previous 12 months, equivalent to 23 per cent of Afghanistan‘s Gross Domestic Product and similar to the proceeds of Afghanistan’s opium trade, the report said.

U.N. report finds corruption rife in Afghanistan [Reuters]

As numerous other reports have stated, the frustrated Afghan populace are once again turning to the Taliban out of desperation at the lack of basic resources and advancements in their nation over the course of the last 9 years:

“The political strategy is too often shaped as an appendix to military thinking,” Mr. Eide said.

Mr. Eide went on to detail the exact problems currently hampering tangible development in Afghanistan. According to Eide, much of the lack of material change in Afghanistan is due to a lack of engagement among foreign governments with the Afghan government itself. As Mr. Eide points out, the Afghan government cannot be empowered and given legitimacy if the rest of the world is unwilling to work with them and provide the Afghan government with the tools necessary to bring about change in the lives of the Afghan people:

“If these negative trends are not reversed and reversed soon, then there is a danger that the combination of them will become unmanageable,” he said.

Mr. Eide noted that 80 percent of the aid flowing into Afghanistan went to projects financed directly by foreign governments, most of it bypassing the central government and thus weakening its ability to deliver services and speed crucial economic development. “These figures do not demonstrate a mind-set in which Afghans are allowed to take the lead,” Mr. Eide said.

While acknowledging corruption, he cited examples of the many unmet needs of civilians.

There are some seven million boys and girls enrolled in elementary schools this year, for example, but just 60,000 university slots and 20,000 places in vocational schools. The government has the ability to train its own personnel, but salaries are too low to make such management posts attractive. And Afghanistan is rich in iron ore but lacks the ability to mine it.

“If we do not take these civilian aspects of the transition strategy as seriously as the military, then we will fail,” he said.

Both Mr. Eide and the Afghanistan ambassador, Zahir Tanin, talked about the need to try to reconcile with moderate elements of the Taliban willing to enter the political arena.

U.N. Envoy to Afghanistan Warns of Peril of Emphasizing Security Over Social Issues [New York Times]

In November 2008 Afghan President Hamid Karzai stated he would provide security for Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar if he reached out to the Afghan government. In May 2009 Karzai’s administration was rumored to be negotiating with Mullah Omar, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Sirajuddin Haqqani. By the following month the United States and the United Kingdom were said to be open to negotiations with lower-level Taliban. A month after that, Karzai himself re-iterated that engagement with the Taliban was the best way to end the bloody insurgency.

Now those former Taliban who left the terrorist group amid promises of government are said to be having second thoughts. At the same time, the number of Taliban defectors is has been greatly decreasing as the Karzai Administration works out a new plan to try to lure lower-level Taliban back into the fold of the Afghan state:

“The government said it would give me land and a job if I left the Taliban. They have broken those promises. Now I will break them.”

“We have broken many promises,” said General Khan Mohammed, co-director of the Kandahar office of theAfghanistan National Independent Peace and Reconciliation Commission (known by its Dari acronym, PTS). “The government has broken many promises.”

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and NATO leaders have vowed to start a well-funded Taliban amnesty program later this year. Until then, the four-year-old PTS remains Afghanistan’s most focused endeavour to lure insurgents from the battlefield.

Its pitch is simple, according to Gen. Mohammed: Renounce all Taliban ties and receive free care of war wounds, a temporary housing subsidy, a job and an empty plot of land.

Despite this simple pitch however, the Afghan people remain leery of any promises made to them by a government they have been critical of many years now. As 2010 begins with civilian casualties in Afghanistan, the United Nations names Afghanistan as the worst nation to be born in, and American Jihadists try to make their way to Afghanistan, finding an effective way to engage with the Taliban while still ensuring the rights and security of the Afghan people is becoming more important as each day passes in the lives of the Afghans.

How ‘broken promises‘ brought down a heralded effort to reform the Taliban [The Globe and Mail]