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| India-Pakistan |
| Pak-Afghan ties: the road ahead |
| 2014-10-02 |
| [DAWN] THE history is so long and fraught and the problems so complex that the start of the Ashraf Ghani ...former chancellor of Kabul University. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. .. presidency in Afghanistan cannot immediately be seen as a new beginning in ties between Islamabad and Kabul. There are though fresh possibilities now that the Hamid Maybe I'll join the TalibanKarzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtunface on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... era is over. Mr Karzai in his final speech in office exemplified quite how impossible it had become to hope for major breakthroughs in ties while he was still around: the rancour and vitriol Mr Karzai directed at Pakistain was neither new nor surprising and had thoroughly poisoned all facets of the relationship. President Ghani, meanwhile, is seen as a pragmatist who is aware that peace and stability in the region will depend on Pak-Afghan relations. Of course, with a power-sharing agreement in place in Afghanistan, it remains to be seen to what extent the Abdullah Abdullah ... the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against Karzai. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun... camp -- especially the hawks in the erstwhile Northern Alliance -- impacts foreign policy and the national security choices of Afghanistan. Despite Pakistain's reaching out several years ago, the remnants of the Northern Alliance, so influential in Kabul during the Karzai era, never really warmed to the idea. Much then could depend on how domestic politics between the Ghani and Abdullah camps shape Afghan policy towards Pakistain. The immediate priority for both the Pak and Afghan sides should be to reduce the acute tensions along the border between eastern Afghanistan and Fata. Where security forces on both sides have targeted sites across the border, there needs to be an immediate cessation. But the problem is really one of sanctuaries and cross-border attacks -- so long as faceless myrmidons on both sides of the border are present and active, the risk of an escalation between Pak and Afghan cops remains very real. Eventually, the two countries, if they are ever to deal with the problem on a long-term basis, will need to move towards better border management in a way that makes it less porous but still accessible for legitimate people traffic. Yet, that surely does not mean putting everything else on hold, especially intelligence cooperation and re-energising military-to-military contacts across the border to make festivities less likely. |
| Posted by:Fred |