Afghanistan's foreign minister, Abdullah Abdullah is running for president in the upcoming elections, on the promise to rid Afghanistan of corruption and violence.
One of the appeals he is using in his campaign is maintaining the relative freedom and peace, if one could call it that, that Afghanistan has enjoyed while US and NATO troops were present in his country.
A lot of Afghans are terrified at the thought of a NATO free Afghanistan, in particular women. As the Taliban makes more and more approaches to power, either through talks of inclusion or by recapturing territory lost to US troops and now vacated as the evacuation nears, both citizens and politicians know it's just a matter of time before they have to confront the reality of the Taliban again.
There is little hope that the 'new' Taliban will not act as the old one. Although the US has tried to extract promises of better conduct by the terrorist group, it is widely known that the Taliban has no allegiance towards the US, or anyone else for that matter.
The biggest problem he faces however, is within, not without. As Karzai's tenure ends, his legacy could turn out to be a dark one. A man like Karzai was ill suited to run a post-apocalyptic scenario that was the Taliban routing of 2001. Karzai is rumored to be corrupt and some even say addicted to opium, which is now more than abundant in the country. Karzai is a man who wants to please everyone, yet has forgotten to rule in the manner that would have seen his country make a meaningful transit from occupied to sovereign.
The previous elections in fact, were seen as rigged, so much so that Abdullah withdrew from the race. Is there truly hope that this time around the elections will have a fairer outcome? Both Karzai and Abdullah speak of international monitoring, but the last time around such monitoring, although present, failed to preserve the integrity of the elections.
Abdullah, like Karzai, knows that the Taliban must play a role in Afghanistan if there is to be some measure of peace. If the terrorist group is excluded, they will return to their pre-invasion tactics, shouldered by innumerable groups affiliated with other terrorist groups in Pakistan. But the Taliban has already started to kill and terrorize parts of the country, even before the full withdrawal of foreign troops.
Although Abdullah has the backing of other important coalition members, and is seen as a moderate, his government could see just as much difficulty in reigning in the terrorist presence as the present one. At issue of course, is the fractioning of Afghanistan into territories that are in the hands, more or less, of warlords and separate tribal factions. Even with their inclusion or collaboration, there are looming, large doubts as to the future of Afghanistan.
Partial Source : AJ / 10.03.13
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