Karzai says more support needed after Afghan poll
2005-09-13

Category Taliban People Hamid Karzai Pervez Musharraf Event Afghan Terror War

HERAT, Afghanistan - Afghanistan's foreign backers should not see Sunday's elections as a signal to disengage but rather to increase support until the country can stand on its own feet, the president said on Tuesday.

Speaking to government officials and tribal elders in the western city of Herat, Hamid Karzai said it would be years before Afghanistan was able to go it alone and foreign troops and money were still needed.

"The international community should not immediately think Afghanistan's work has been done and it's over and let the Afghan people forge ahead with their work with their own resources.

"No, of course not, we want the international community not only to continue their contributions to Afghanistan, particularly monetary ones, after the establishment of parliament, but also to increase them so the success reaches maturity."

The national assembly and provincial council elections are the next big step in Afghanistan's difficult path to stability. They follow Karzai's presidential election win last October.

The polls mark the formal end to a four-year process of international support launched in Bonn after U.S.-led forces overthrow the Taliban, but international players are to meet in London in January to chart a new programme of assistance.

The United Nations said last week Afghanistan's political transition remained far from secure and long-term international commitment was needed.

RUMSFELD PRESSURES NATO

Karzai's comments came as U.S. officials said Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld would step up pressure on NATO allies on Tuesday to drop curbs on their troops' role in Afghanistan.

NATO is supposed eventually to take control of the international military mission in Afghanistan from the United States, but doubts have been expressed about the willingness of some countries to see their troops battling the Taliban.

Security has been the main worry in the run-up to the election, which will determine what kind of parliament Karzai will have to deal with.

In an interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation broadcast on Tuesday, Karzai defended the fact that people accused of rights abuses had been allowed to run in the polls, saying it was in the interests of national reconciliation.

He said voters had the choice of who to vote for and, if there was a future tribunal to prosecute past abuses, parliament could decide whether to lift the immunity of anyone elected.

Karzai also reiterated his view that U.S. and other international forces should reconsider their approach to bringing peace to Afghanistan to focus on the "sources of terrorism" where extremists get their training and inspiration, but stopped short of pointing the finger at neighbouring Pakistan.

The interview came after Kabul announced that the former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, had been freed from U.S. custody under an Afghan government reconciliation programme.

Karzai's efforts to persuade Taliban fighters to give up their insurgency has lured only a trickle of defectors but four prominent former Taliban members are running in the election, alongside warlords blamed for serious rights abuses.

A spokesman for the Taliban, which has denounced the elections but pledged not to attack polling stations, welcomed the release of Zaeef and hoped more prisoners would be freed.

On Monday, fed up with accusations that Pakistan allows Taliban fighters to cross into Afghanistan, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf offered during a visit to Washington to erect a border fence to prevent incursions from either side. (Reuters)