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Afghan Presidential Hopeful Named Acting Interior Minister
 [An Nahar] Potential presidential candidate Omar Daudzai was appointed as Afghanistan's acting interior minister on Sunday, putting him in a high-profile public role seven months before the country's first democratic transfer of power.Daudzai will move back to Kabul from Islamabad, where he has been ambassador to Pakistain since 2011 during a time of fractious ties between the two rivals and neighbors. Last month Daudzai, a former chief of staff to President 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... , set up an office in Kabul and announced that he would be a "probable" candidate in the elections due on April 5. Karzai, who is barred from standing for a third term, has said he will not back any runner in the wide-open race, but Daudzai is seen as one of his closest associates and loyalists. Daudzai, 55, from Afghanistan's biggest ethnic group the Pashtuns, was a member of the Hezb-e-Islami faction during the Soviet occupation and later went on to work for the United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... Presidential front man Rafi Ferdous confirmed the appointment, which came after interior minister Mujtaba Patang was ousted by parliament last month over accusations that he had failed to thwart the threat from Taliban rebels. Patang was dismissed soon after the Afghan government formally took responsibility for nationwide security from U.S.-led NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all.... troops, but he remained as the "acting" interior minister until Sunday. Afghanistan's 350,000-strong security forces are suffering a steep rise in attacks as the NATO combat mission winds down, with police and army casualties said to have increased by 15-20 percent since 2011. Posted by: Fred 2013-09-02 |
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