CFR.org has a new interview with International Crisis Group analyst Candace Rondeaux previewing Afghanistan’s September 18th parliamentary election. According to Rondeaux, the outlook isn’t good. Candidates, campaigners, and elections officials are all targets for attack; significant fraud is expected despite the efforts of international monitors; and voter turn-out will likely be much lower than previous elections. These factors lead Rondeaux to argue that the elections should be postponed until the security situation stabilizes.
Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections will be held on September 18th in Afghanistan. Tina Blohmreports from Paktika on the difficulties of running free and fair elections there. The problems range from a shrinking number of polling places (190, down from 265 in last year’s presidential elections) due to security issues, to a lack of poll workers brought about by a fear of insurgent reprisals, and the fact that “According to the provincial head of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), after the 2009 election, 1555 of its staff members were blacklisted in Paktika alone due to allegations of fraud.”
Candidates have also found it difficult to campaign in Paktika: “Out of 22 candidates (one of lowest numbers in the country), six were in the province … the rest staying in Kabul mainly due to security concerns.” Blohm also discusses the rising anti-coalition sentiment in the province, raising the concern that international observers are going to be unable to perform their jobs when “the question of movement beyond the provincial capital is central - and in case of the internationals this is unrealistic.”
At Democracy Digest, Michael Allencovers a recent Brookings Institution event featuring Steve Coll, Vali Nasr, and Michael O’Hanlon, exploring the effectiveness of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan. According to Coll, NATO has made a “Faustian Pact” with local warlords by sacrificing the long term development of civil society for short term security gains. Coll also expressed concern that too much emphasis is being paid to centralization at the cost of local governance. O’ Hanlon noted that the Afghan people are generally supportive of the central government, while Nasr emphasized the importance of Pakistan in any calculations of the region.
Last month, in a delegation organized by Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), four members of the House of Representatives met in Europe with ethnic minority leaders from Afghanistan who oppose “President Hamid Karzai and his U.S.-backed initiative to open political negotiations with the Taliban.” Rohrabacher recently stated that no one in Afghanistan wants a central government, adding that “That’s the model that we have been trying to force with our military . . . on the people of Afghanistan.” RepresentativeC.A. “Dutch” Ruppersberger (D-MD) argued that the Afghan people “don’t feel the United States is listening to them because of our relationship with Karzai.” The Northern Alliance, consisting of Tajiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras– minority groups who helped the U.S. military to oust the Taliban government in 2001 –have systematically been “purged” from official positions by the Karzai government and replaced with the country’s largest ethnic groups, Pashtuns. In fear of being increasingly marginalized, minority groups are opposing a deal between the government and the Taliban. Rohrabacher advocated a U.S. withdrawal of 100,000 troops, along with efforts to “back the minorities’ demand for more autonomy and help them rebuild their own militias and take over the fight against the Taliban.” Rohrabacher also said, “We can beat the radicals in Afghanistan. We can’t do it by trying to force people to accept a centralized government that is totally contrary to their culture.” In last month’s meeting, Ruppersberger told the Afghan leaders to work with Afghanistan’s “democratic culture” rather than try to overthrow Karzai.
Writing in Foreign Affairs, Stephen Biddle, Fotini Christia, and J Alexander Thier reject assumptions that a stable system of government cannot be achieved in Afghanistan, arguing that “Afghanistan’s own history offers ample evidence of the kind of stable, decentralized governance that could meet today’s demands without abandoning the country’s current constitution.” They argue that the Karzai government has struggled because it is based on the model of centralized democracy. According to their analysis, “decentralized democracy and internal mixed sovereignty are both feasible and acceptable” options that would also fulfill U.S. strategic interests by preventing terrorist elements from reemerging. On the first option, they propose a power-sharing deal wherein the central government would retain authority over internal security and foreign policy, but many other powers would reside with local democratic governments, pointing out that such a scheme would increase government legitimacy and public support. They describe the second option as a political setup wherein significant powers would still be afforded to local governments, who would not be required to exercise democracy and transparency, so long as they did not cross three “redlines”: violating the state’s foreign policy; infringing on the rights of neighboring districts; and engaging in large-scale theft, narcotics trafficking, or exploitation of the state’s natural resources. While claiming that this option “offers a closer fit with the realities of Afghanistan,” Biddle, Christia, and Thier acknowledge that it “also carries risks and disadvantages that make it less consistent with U.S. interests than either centralized or decentralized democracy,” including its potential to lead to regression on human rights, women’s rights, and corruption.
According to Reuters, about 350 clerics in Afghanistan met this week for three days to discuss their reconciliation with the Taliban. The Ulema called on “President Hamid Karzai to enact sharia, or Islamic law, including punishments such as stonings, lashing, amputation and execution.” Recently this week, a 35-year old widow, accused of adultery, was flogged 200 times and then shot in the head three times by the Taliban. The woman, Bibi Sanubar, was pregnant while she was tried and shot dead during the public trial.
Afghan President Hamid Karzaisparked grave concerns in the U.S. administration last week by ordering an investigation of two American anti-corruption units involved in the recent arrest of some senior officials in the Afghan government on bribery and graft charges, arguing that the units were acting outside of the Afghan constitution. Afghanistan’s attorney general indicated that Karzai intends to issue new regulations for the Major Crimes Task Force and Special Investigative Unit. According to Karen DeYoung writing in The Washington Post, “Karzai’s sharp reaction startled U.S. officials in Kabul and Washington, and has been the focus of a series of emergency, high-level meetings,” with one American official calling the situation the “most serious” crisis for U.S. efforts in Afghanistan since last year’s widely criticized elections. A senior U.S. official reported that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasized to Karzai last week that “any steps to undercut or remove powers or authorities from [the anti-corruption units] would be a step backwards.” Meanwhile, Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY), who heads the House Appropriations subcommittee in charge of funds for Afghanistan, commented that the move was “extremely troubling,” adding that “that money will not go forward until I get clearance that the promises and commitments that have been made by the Afghan government to work in good faith to stop corruption have taken place.” In comments to the subcommittee, U.S. Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke had previously stated that “if corruption isn’t dealt with, other things won’t succeed” in Afghanistan.
The Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs held a public hearing addressing corruption in Afghanistan. The committee, headed by Chairwoman Nita M. Lowey (D-NY), requested the testimony of two witnesses: Richard C. Holbrooke, Ambassador and Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan; and Dr. Rajiv Shah, USAID Administrator.
The U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations held a hearing to discuss reconciliation and reintegration in Afghanistan. Touching on issues of governance and civil institution building, the hearing was twelve in a series the Committee has held on Afghanistan in the past 18 months. The Committee—chaired by Sen. John F. Kerry (D-MA), with ranking Committee member Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-IN) in attendance—requested the testimony of three individuals: the Honorable Ryan C. Crocker, former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq and Pakistan; Zainab Salbi, founder and CEO of Women for Women International; and Dr. David Kilcullen of the Center for a New American Security.
Candice Rondeauxwriting in The Washington Post argues that unless substantial electoral reform, increases in transparency, and a firm U.S commitment to secure polling centers all take place soon, Afghanistan’s upcoming parliamentary elections should be postponed from their scheduled date of September 18. Rondeaux proposes that with security at an all-time low in the country, Afghanistan cannot weather another fraudulent, destabilizing election, stating, “Another failure by the international community to confront the electoral system’s flaws will deliver a death blow to Afghanistan’s fragile state institutions and substantially reduce the possibility of making any kind of progress.” She mentions a host of unresolved problems in the electoral processes, including ballot stuffing, a flawed voter registry, the presence of corrupt officials who remain in power from the last round of elections, the international community’s failure to use its veto power on the Electoral Complaints Commission, and the break-down of vetting processes intended to keep known criminals and warlords off of the ballot
Rondeaux notes the importance of the elections, saying that “many Afghans have grown deeply skeptical of democratic processes. Polling and our own research have found that most agree, however, that having some choice in how they are governed and who governs them is better than having no choice at all. They also recognize that members of parliament are more vital to preserving their day-to-day interests than the president or politically toothless provincial councils.” Nevertheless, she cautions that holding the elections in the fall without the necessary reforms and preparation could prove a “disaster” and represent a win only for insurgents.
An unofficial translation of Afghanistan’s new electoral law was published today by Democracy International. The official authoritative language of the law is in Dari. On February 17, President Hamid Karzai acted on the basis of Article 79– which allows the President to issue a decree in case of an emergency, and also gives the Afghan National Assembly the power to reject decrees –and issued a presidential decree amending the country’s Electoral Law. Since only the lower house (Wolesi Jirga) and not the upper house of the National Assembly rejected the decree, Democracy International reports that “it is now widely acknowledged that the Article 79 Electoral Law decree forms the framework by which Wolesi Jirga elections will be held on September 18, 2010.” (Read the entire document as a pdf).
Tablet Magazine today released the first section of a two-part series of analyses on President Obama’s policy in the Middle East. The article included commentary from four regional experts: Elliott Abrams of the Council on Foreign Relations, Robert Malley of the International Crisis Group, Dore Gold of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, and Andrew Exum of the Center for a New American Security.
Abrams proposes that the administration’s approach to the region is creating a “diminished America” and a power vacuum. He argues that the administration has overemphasized the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in U.S. policy; according to Abrams, the key struggle in the region is not territorial, but ideological– pro-Western moderateness vs. Islamist-jihadism. To him, America’s main challenge is not Israel, but Iran.
Malley calls the success of the administration’s policy “mixed,” and suggests that Obama has succeeded in improving the image of the U.S. abroad, but not its credibility. He points to a number of factors inhibiting concrete results. Most of all, Malley blames what he characterizes as the administration’s mistaken, overly black-and-white perception of the region as divided into two camps– militants vs. moderates, whom the U.S. must support.
Gold observes that Obama began his term at a time of increased divergence between American and Israeli policy priorities, as Israel’s government has moved to the right and focused more on security issues, while the U.S. administration’s approach has emphasized diplomacy and dialogue. He notes that while Obama focused on the Israel-Palestinian conflict early in his administration, Israel’s chief concern has become Iran.
Finally, Exum comments that the administration’s policies in the region have centered on the “three I’s”: Israel, Iran, and Iraq. Citing Obama’s overall record on Israel and Iran as a failure– noting that relations with Israel’s leaders have been “badly managed,” while Iran appears poised to continue its nuclear program despite the new UN sanctions –Exum interestingly counts Iraq’s fragile stability as “the lone U.S. success story in the Middle East.” On the other hand, he points to Obama’s focus on Afghanistan as evidence that the administration is placing less interest and importance in the Arab world.
Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY), chairwoman of the U.S. House Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs announced on Monday that she will not approve the inclusion of further aid to Afghanistan other than humanitarian assistance in the Fiscal Year 2011 Appropriations Act, citing government corruption and misuse of funds as her motivation for the cuts. Lowey stated, “I do not intend to appropriate one more dime for assistance to Afghanistan until I have confidence that U.S. taxpayer money is not being abused to line the pockets of corrupt Afghan government officials, drug lords and terrorists. Furthermore, the government of Afghanistan must demonstrate that corruption is being aggressively investigated and prosecuted.”
The Congresswoman’s remarks come in the aftermath of an annual report released in November of last year by Transparency International, which ranked Afghanistan second worst in the world in terms of its levels of corruption, coming behind only Somalia.
James Traub asks in Foreign Policy whether Afghan president Hamid Karzai is worth the battle in Afghanistan, commenting that he was able to brainstorm a list of only 5 reasons for staying the course and 10 for abandoning the U.S. effort, among them “Karzai is too corrupt” and “Karzai doesn’t believe in it.” Nevertheless, Traub concludes that the consequences of leaving the war-torn country could prove too high, as a U.S. withdrawal would be likely to strengthen Islamic radicalism worldwide, in his assessment. If the U.S. is to carry on, Traub proposes, it must push Karzai to “take governance seriously” and remove his corrupt allies, or otherwise “get out of the way” so that others can lead.
Meanwhile, a spokesman for Karzaidisagreed with the negative assessments of his government coming out of Washington, stating, “We are accountable for the money that international community is donating for Afghanistan and there is transparency in usage of these donations.”
The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) hosted an event with Dr. Abdullah Abdullah – former foreign minister of Afghanistan and one-time independent presidential candidate – where he discussed a number of issues central to Afghanistan including the prospects for peace and effective governance as well as his expectations for the upcoming parliamentary elections.
Click here for POMED’s notes in PDF, or continue reading below the fold.
After a “professional and legal investigation,” the Afghan Ministry of Economics announced that it was dissolving 172 foreign and domestic NGOs — some at their own request, some for lack of funds, and others for “misconduct.” The ruling was based upon the assessment of the Filtration and Dissolution Committee, established by President Karzai to monitor the activities of Afghanistan’s 1,500 non-profit organizations. According to Al Arabiya’s report, shutting down ineffective aid groups is seen as a way for the Afghan government to “remove potential thorns.”
In a piece at Foreign Policy, BYU professor Valerie M. Hudson teams up with Patricia Leidl, an international communications consultant, to reveal what they believe is the single most glaring deficiency in U.S. policy toward Afghanistan: poor support for Afghan women. More precisely, failing to provide security for Afghan women, 87 percent of whom report being beaten on a regular basis. Sadly, Hudson and Leidl report that President Hamid Karzai’s government not only fails in its most basic responsibility to protect women from abuse and discrimination, but also foments ill-treatment through “legislation that denies or severely limits women’s rights to inherit, divorce, or have guardianship of their own children.” Other laws legalize the rape of minors and allow men to “prohibit women’s access to work, education, and health care by denying them the right to leave their homes except for ‘legitimate’ purposes.”
Such mistreatment holds consequence in many areas of Afghan social, economic, and political life, and Hudson and Leidl implore President Obama to, as part of the coalition’s comprehensive strategy to stabilize Afghanistan, start building more egalitarian institutions of democratic governance that will “groom a moderate, educated middle class of young women and men … to shape their society in a progressive way.” Progress in Afghanistan, they say, is not only a function of military success, but also the natural result of empowering women to participate in rebuilding the state.
At a town hall meeting hosted by the U.S. Global Leadership Council, Dr. Rajiv Shah, USAID Administrator, announced the creation of a new plan to revitalize the organization, including the formation of a new policy bureau, the rollout of procurement reforms, and the formation of new systems to increase its transparency, monitoring and evaluation.
Click here for POMED’s notes in PDF, or continue reading below the fold.
The Brookings Institution, in collaboration with Sabanci University, held the sixth annual Sakip Sabanci Lecture with Philip H. Gordon, Assistant Secretary of European and Eurasian Affairs, to discuss the Obama administration’s perspective on Turkey, its relationship with the United States and the European Union, and its role across the Middle East and throughout the world.
For POMED’s notes in PDF, click here. Otherwise, continue reading below.
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) hosted a morning-long event to discuss the prospects for democracy in Iran and to evaluate the current state of U.S.-Iranian relations.
Following some brief welcoming remarks by Trita Parsi, president of NIAC, Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) delivered the opening address by stating that “Iran is at a crossroads like no other.” As members of the Green Movement fight and die for more basic freedoms, “the world is watching how this popular movement plays out.” Eshoo, whose district has one of the largest Iranian-American populations, expressed appreciation for the role played by technology in combating the government’s abuse of power, specifically citing Facebook’s creation of a mobile application that could not be blocked by Iranians and the decision by Twitter to delay maintenance to help dissident Iranians communicate during last summer’s protests. She also criticized the U.S. invasion of Iraq for emboldening Iran and expressed skepticism about the value of sanctions in achieving U.S. goals: “We have to work very hard to educate our colleagues of the very failure of sanctions because they will end up hurting the people we want to help.”
For POMED’s notes in PDF, click here. Otherwise, continue reading below.
The House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing this morning to address President Obama’s FY2011 budget request for global development and international aid. USAID Administrator Rajiv Shahprovided testimony about particular goals and objectives for USAID moving forward, and answered the committee’s questions regarding a variety of development trends and projects.
For POMED’s notes in PDF, click here. Otherwise, continue below the fold.
