International Crisis Group

GRAEME SMITH

The words “civil war” were spoken everywhere in Bonn, Germany, when foreign ministers gathered to discuss Afghanistan this week – except, nobody mentioned those fears during the conference itself.

That failure to speak directly about the looming problems as foreign troops withdraw seemed even more egregious on the morning after the conference, when delegates woke up to the news of twin attacks that killed more than 50 people.

Some officials in Bonn cast doubt on the idea that the bombings represent the beginnings of sectarian war between Sunni insurgents and the Shiite minority in Afghanistan, but it’s hard to avoid the fact that the Sunni-dominated Taliban committed mass killings of largely Shiite Hazara groups during the 1990s. As international forces pull out of the country, the Shiite enclaves may once again become vulnerable.

Sectarian attacks have been almost unknown in Afghanistan over the last decade, as main battle lines followed patterns of ethnicity, not religion. Much of the violence is concentrated in the south and east, dominated by ethnic Pashtuns, many of whom resent the influence of ethnic Uzbeks and Tajiks in the capital.

The Taliban have always claimed to be fighting a religious jihad, however, and disagree with any description of a tribal or ethnic basis for their campaign. If the insurgents succeed in sowing hatred between Shiite and Sunni groups in Afghanistan, they could drive apart the northern groups that now stand against their southern movement. In other words, the attacks may represent advance planning for a civil war.

Even if such concerns were not contained in any of the ministers’ statements in Bonn, they were certainly voiced by delegates as they wondered what will happen after foreign troops pass responsibility for security to their Afghan allies in 2014.

“On the sidelines, there’s a lot of concern about civil war after 2014,” said Candace Rondeaux, a Kabul-based senior analyst for the International Crisis Group.

FULL ARTICLE (The Globe and Mail)

Jean MacKenzie

KABUL, Afghanistan — Bonn 2, as it is called here, has been something of a letdown.

The conference called to mark a decade of international engagement in Afghanistan is being held 10 years to the day after the dramatic gathering in Germany that installed Hamid Karzai as the leader of the interim government, outlined a plan for establishing democracy in Afghanistan, and saw an outpouring of international goodwill and commitment to the struggling, post-Taliban nation.

This time around, few illusions remain. Afghan democracy has never really taken off, Karzai’s luster has been badly tarnished by corruption in his government and by his own erratic behavior, and the international commitment is rapidly fraying.

In his speech opening the conference on Monday, Karzai called for another decade of support, warning that Afghanistan could once again descend into civil war if its funding needs were not met.

“Our young democracy remains fragile,” he told the assembled delegates. “The people of Afghanistan are looking to this conference for clear affirmation of commitment to make security transition and economic progress irreversible.“

Karzai’s concerns are understandable. At present, close to 90 percent of the Afghan government’s budget comes from international assistance, according to the US Government Accountability Office.

Without the billions in aid dollars flowing into the country, the government cannot pay its army and police, or even keep the lights on for very long.

The international community had said from the very beginning that Bonn was not about money; this was not to be a pledging conference, no monetary commitments would be given. Instead, it was all about soothing Afghan fears that the West would run away again, as it did in the 1980s.

"The United States intends to stay the course with our friends in Afghanistan,” said US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in her address to the conference. “We will be there with you as you make the hard decisions that are necessary for your future.”

The conference drew delegates from close to 100 countries, and various civil society groups from Afghanistan were dispatched to plead their cases.

But remarkable by their absence were two of the most important players in the future of Afghanistan: the armed opposition that is mounting an increasingly desperate insurgency, and the Pakistani government that, if both US and Afghan government officials are to be believed, is backing them.

The former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salaam Zaeef, and the Taliban’s last foreign minister, Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, were on the outskirts of the festivities, but did not take part in any formal sessions. Both men had voiced earlier objections to the conference, and had not been invited, in any case.

US Ambassador to Kabul Ryan Crocker had earlier declared that there was no place for the Taliban in Bonn, a statement that irked the Afghan government. One Afghan official, speaking off the record, said that it was not the Americans’ place to decide who would and would not be invited to the conference, which was formally hosted by Afghanistan.

“That was a decision to be made by the Afghan government,” the official said.

In the end, no members of the armed opposition had a seat at the table, repeating what many saw as one of the key mistakes of Bonn 1.

Pakistan boycotted the event in protest of a US airstrike in late November that left 24 Pakistani soldiers dead. The United States is claiming miscommunication; the Pakistanis insist that it was deliberate aggression.

Minus the Taliban and Pakistan, the second Bonn conference could accomplish little of substance.

“This conference cannot produce miracles and one should not have high expectations from it,” said Timor Sharaan, a Kabul-based political analyst. “The first Bonn conference was an agreement between the Western powers and the Afghan factional representatives to legitimatize international intervention in Afghanistan. The second Bonn Conference is part of a Western exit strategy to legitimize the 2014 NATO withdrawal.”

Most would agree that Afghanistan is better off now than in the dark days of 2001, when a harsh Taliban regime had driven the country into isolation, when women were largely closeted in their homes and life, in the words of one young Afghan, “seemed to stand still.”

But the heady hopes of the first Bonn conference have not been realized. While the Afghan government, with its rampant corruption and failure to achieve any kind of national consensus, comes in for a large share of the blame, special ire is reserved for the policies of the countries who had taken Afghanistan’s welfare upon themselves.

“This conference is significant in that it highlights the strategic deficiencies in the policies of the United States and the international community,” said Candace Rondeaux, the Kabul-based senior analyst for the International Crisis Group, speaking from Bonn.

Some of those deficiencies, Rondeaux added, are the lack of enforcement and implementation of the many programs that have been initiated, the lack of genuine political engagement within Afghanistan, and the failure to introduce a substantive regional dialogue.

FULL ARTICLE (GlobalPost)

GRAEME SMITH

The smell of fiasco permeated the first hours of a conference in Bonn, Germany, where diplomats scrambled to revive their failing plans for the next decade in Afghanistan.

The one-day meeting was touted as a major step toward ending the war, gathering more than 1,000 delegates from 85 countries almost precisely a decade after the Bonn Agreement gave birth to the new government in Kabul.

As with the previous gathering in this sleepy little city on the banks of the Rhine, however, the talks were undercut by the absence of any delegate with even the slightest influence over the insurgency. A former Taliban ambassador, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, and former Taliban foreign minister, Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, were rumoured to have visited Europe last week for consultations on the process, but did not appear at the conference – and they themselves often emphasize that they don’t retain much sway over the fighting.

The country most frequently accused of sponsoring the Taliban also boycotted the talks, as last-minute lobbying from U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton failed to convince a Pakistani delegation to make the trip. Islamabad remains furious over the killing of two dozen soldiers along its disputed border with Afghanistan.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Sunday that the boycott was “regrettable,” but that Pakistani diplomats assured him they remain committed to peace.

Candace Rondeaux, a Kabul-based senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, said that Pakistan’s absence should jolt diplomats into understanding that their efforts aren’t working.

“It’s a slap in the face,” Ms. Rondeaux said.

FULL ARTICLE (The Globe and Mail)