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| Afghanistan |
| Afghans summon US envoy over 'civil war' remark |
| 2013-09-12 |
[Al Ahram] Afghanistan's Caped 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... summoned Washington's ambassador in Kabul to protest a fellow American diplomat's remarks that Afghanistan is experiencing a civil war, the US Embassy confirmed Wednesday. The comments by James Dobbins, the US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistain, struck a nerve among Afghan leaders because they are trying to ease growing fears about what will happen once US-led foreign troops complete their withdrawal from this country next year. Already, as foreign troops have reduced their presence, Talibs have stepped up attacks, and some fear that the years after the 2014 withdrawal could see a return to the bloody civil war of the early 1990s, when ethnic-based factions fought one another for control of the country. The Afghan Taliban are dominated by ethnic Pashtuns, who have long had a rivalry with Tajiks and other ethnic groups in Afghanistan. In a recent interview with Voice of America's Deewa news service, Dobbins said, "there already is, of course, a civil war in Afghanistan." That has drawn rebukes from Karzai front man Aimal Faizi, who argued that if Dobbins' assertion was true, then the US was an actor in a civil war instead of fighting terrorism. In a news conference with local media on Tuesday that was later posted to YouTube, Faizi also noted that Dobbins' comments come at a sensitive time as the U.S. and Afghanistan are aiming to sign a deal that could leave some foreign troops in place after 2014. US Ambassador James Cunningham was summoned to the presidency on Tuesday over the matter, the embassy confirmed. US Embassy front man Robert Hilton declined to characterize the meeting, but the mission has issued multiple statements downplaying Dobbins' remarks. Its latest says the envoy was merely using "a standard academic term in the context of describing the need for Afghans to speak to Afghans to achieve peace." |
| Posted by:Fred |