Politics

L'Afghanistan aux Afghans !

Mar 29, 2014 Brahma Chellaney

NEW DELHI – L'Afghanistan se prépare pour l'élection présidentielle du 5 avril. Or sa situation est des plus critiques, car son unité et son intégrité territoriale sont toujours menacées après 35 ans de guerres incessantes. L'Afghanistan peut-il finalement échapper au cycle de violences des groupes activistes et d'interventions étrangères qu'il endure depuis plus de trois décennies ?

Les discussions sur la trajectoire du pays après 2014 tournent autour de deux questions clé. La première concerne l'étendue de l'ingérence du Pakistan dans les affaires afghanes, car il aide les talibans afghans et leurs principaux alliés (notamment le réseau Haqqani et la milice de Gulbuddin Hekmatyar). Cette ingérence dépendra du fait que les USA conditionnent ou non leur aide abondante au Pakistan, un pays financièrement à genoux, à sa non-ingérence en Afghanistan.

La seconde question est de savoir si les forces de l'OTAN sous la direction des USA vont continuer à jouer un rôle en Afghanistan. On sait que le président Obama veut maintenir une présence militaire américaine dans ce pays, alors qu'il a déclaré en 2009 que les USA ne cherchent pas à y maintenir des bases militaires permanentes.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 4 Comments on this article

j. von Hettlingen Apr 4, 2014

Mr. Brahma Chellaney asks, "the extent to which Pakistan will interfere in Afghan affairs", given its support to the "Afghan Taliban and its main allies". Buth he hasn't aksed what role India is going to play in Afghanistan, which, for decades, has been the venue of a new "Great Game" played out between the two archenemies India and Pakistan, seeking to gain influence there.
It is no secret that Pakistan's intelligence, the ISI combats only its home-grown militants of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, who seek to overthrow the government in Islamabad, while supporting groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba that had launched attacks on India and the Haqqani network et al. that focuses on fighting the Nato forces in Afghanistan. The Taliban fighters and Islamist militants enjoy safe haven in the tribal areas of North and South Waziristan, which had in the past been targets of CIA drone strikes. Apart from the Kashmir conflict, Islamabad also accuses India of funnelling arms and money to insurgents in Pakistan's troubled Balochistan region.
After the fall of the Taliban in 2001, following a US invasion, India moved quickly to regain its strategic depth and clout in Afghanistan, by pledging $1.6 billion to help rebuild the country, making it the sixth largest bilateral donor. Moreover India had also given at least three Airbus planes to Afghanistan's ailing national airline and sent thousands of Indians to work in development projects.
India's soft-power strategy has been to win the hearts and minds of the Afghans over every sector of the society, which should allow India to gain political advantage and to undercut Pakistan's influence. India's success in Afghanistan stirred up a hornets' nest in Islamabad. That Afghan President Hamid Karzai had lived and studied in India, prompted former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to openly accuse Karzai of kow-towing to India.
The question is whether Karzai's successor would continue to cultivate ties with India. Some in Afghanistan haven't forgotten that India had been a staunch ally of the Soviet Union during the Cold war and had supported Moscow's invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. A decade later, India continued to back the Communist-regime of President Najibullah, while Pakistan threw its entire support behind the ethnic Pashtun mujahideen warlords, particularly the Islamist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who were fighting Soviet troops. So when the Taliban came to power and ended the bloody civil conflict among warlords, India was left without any influence in the country. It ended up backing the Northern Alliance. Pakistan, on the other hand, backed and recognised the pariah Taliban regime.
The coming presidential election will be a tight race and many Afghans hope that the new president would sign the Bilateral Security Agreement with Washington. It is not right for Mr. Challaney to say that "Obama failed to persuade" Hamid Karzai, to sign the agreement. The mercurial Karzai was the one, who played game with his own country's future.
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Harsh Ray Apr 1, 2014

Foreign military intervention has made a bad situation worse. Afghanistan stands devastated. Shouldn't this country be allowed to look after its own affairs under an international compact that halts all outside interference, including by the US, NATO and regional powers?
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Velko Simeonov Mar 31, 2014

There is no "Afghan" Afghanistan, as there is no Afghanistan as an actual country. There is simply a territory that is not claimed by any actual country, inhabited by tribes which might have much in common but do not share a sense of common ethnical background, history or even religious practices even though they are all Muslims. The idea that something at least resembling a normal country will emerge out of that territory is absurd. Most of the government officials cannot even venture out of their offices without dense security. The moment NATO withdraws any small gains that might be identified at present will be eliminated. Even if the US retains forces and bases there, they will be no more able than the Russians to sustain the illusion that there is an actual, credible in international terms government.
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Velko Simeonov Mar 31, 2014

There is no "Afghan" Afghanistan, as there is no Afghanistan as an actual country. There is simply a territory that is not claimed by any actual country, inhabited by tribes which might have much in common but do not share a sense of common ethnical background, history or even religious practices even though they are all Muslims. The idea that something at least resembling a normal country will emerge out of that territory is absurd. Most of the government officials cannot even venture out of their offices without dense security. The moment NATO withdraws any small gains that might be identified at present will be eliminated. Even if the US retains forces and bases there, they will be no more able than the Russians to sustain the illusion that there is an actual, credible in international terms government.
A new reply to this comment has been posted.

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