Terrorism_in_Afghanistan_-_Negotiation

Negotiation 3 – Terrorism Opening statement Thank you once again for attending today’s discussions. Afghanistan recognises that its future depends heavily on the international community's willingness to continue delivering concrete resources to the Afghan Government. It depends equally on international willingness to help protect the Afghan Government against the Taliban and other extremists who are waging a bloody insurgency in the south and east of the country. Neither of these tasks will be simple, and neither will be completed soon, but the past few years have been a story of success for our country and its people, as well as the international community. The Afghan Government and the international community have built national-level political institutions—including a new constitution, legitimate presidential elections, and a democratically elected parliament. The success of the past few years hasn't lessened the need for international involvement in our country—it has only provided a foundation upon which to build. Now, we need the help of the international community to bolster the Afghan Government's ability to provide sound governance at all levels of government. I would like to add that the Afghan Government won't be able to do it alone. The capacity of the government needs to be strengthened to deliver basic services to the population—especially security. The problems span Afghanistan, but they are especially prevalent in rural areas. The quality of life for millions of Afghans—spread across desolate land and isolated villages—have not advanced and in many areas the Afghan Government does not currently have the capacity to be a recognisable force in the region. The illicit drug trade is a significant hurdle to the expansion of central government authority and it undercuts efforts to rebuild the economy. The drug trade also fuels provincial and local corruption. According to the IMF, the Afghan opiate GDP in 2005 was $2.6 billion—roughly a third of the country's $7.3 billion licit GDP. Key to making progress is bolstering security. Even in areas of the country where the insurgency is not active, security is falling short. There are not enough properly trained, equipped, or well-paid security forces. Even though the Afghan National Army continues to become larger, stronger, and more experienced, progress has been slow and little progress has been made in constructing an effective Afghan National Police force. The Taliban has built momentum this year. The level of violence associated with the insurgency has increased significantly and the group has become more aggressive than in years past. The Taliban almost certainly refocused its attacks in an attempt to confuse NATO's efforts in southern Afghanistan. Kabul 's ability to provide sound governance and badly needed aid to these areas will be key to preventing the Taliban and other extremists from intimidating the population into complying with its activities. Kabul needs help because it lacks capacity—not because it lacks political will or lacks support. President Karzai understands this and recognizes his government's responsibility. We are also concerned with the use of air operations in Afghanistan. Last year Afghanistan has witnessed sharp criticism from its people of civilian casualties caused by air strikes. Such incidents have the potentioal to sharply discourage popular support for the government, essential to the success of any counterinsurgency. We hope that the growing international force presence may allow some reduction in the use of air power such as drone attacks. Thank you Current terrorism problems Al-Qa'ida sees its war against the West as the continuation of a decades, perhaps centuries-old, struggle to defend Islam from political and cultural domination by a Judeo-Christian alliance now led by the United States and Israel . Since Bin Ladin declared war on the United States in 1998, al-Qa'ida has focused primarily on attacks aimed at weakening and punishing the United States and its immediate allies. Understanding the source of al-Qa'ida's resilience is key to defeating it. With regard to the central organization headed by Bin Ladin, that resilience stems from several factors: First, the group's cadre of seasoned, committed leaders has allowed it to remain fairly cohesive and stay focused on its strategic objectives—despite having lost a number of important veterans over the years.  Usama Bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri continue to play a crucial role in inspiring jihadists and promoting unity. Their demise would not spell the end of the threat, but probably would contribute to the unraveling of the central al-Qa'ida organization.  The loss of a series of veteran al-Qa'ida leaders since 9/11 has been mitigated by the group's “deep bench” of lower-ranking personnel capable of stepping up to assume leadership responsibilities. Although a number of individuals are new to senior management in al-Qa'ida, they are not new to jihad: they average over 40 years of age and nearly two decades of involvement in jihad. A second critical factor is the group's physical safehaven in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area. This safehaven gives al-Qa'ida the physical—and psychological—space needed to meet, train, expand its networks, and prepare new attacks.  Many locals have ties to al-Qa'ida dating back to the 1980s war against the Soviets in Afghanistan.  Rooting out al-Qa'ida elements there is complicated by the rugged terrain and a local culture that is intensely suspicious of—and, at times, overtly hostile to—outsiders, including government security forces.  The safehaven not only gives al-Qa'ida and the Taliban a venue for terrorist plotting, but also serves as a jump-off point for its guerrilla forays into Afghanistan. A third important factor is Bin Ladin's extremist ideology and strategic vision, which continues to attract recruits, inspire like-minded groups, and helps our enemies weather setbacks and reconcile themselves to a long struggle.  In addition to planning attacks of its own, al-Qa'ida supports terrorist activities by other groups and seeks to encourage Muslims worldwide to take up the cause of violent jihad.  Al-Qa'ida spreads its propaganda through taped statements—sometimes featuring relatively sophisticated production values—as well as books and websites.  As a Western nation, we have limited tools to counteract this propaganda. We need to make sure our own message is clear and we need work with our Muslim allies. Finally, it's important to note that the asymmetric nature of al-Qa'ida's style of warfare gives it certain advantages.  Our open society presents an almost endless source of targets, and the enemy has demonstrated its ruthlessness through a willingness to attack civilians—including other Muslims—a preference for spectacular, high-casualty operations, and its own adherents' desire for martyrdom.  As 9/11 showed, even a handful of committed attackers, with relatively modest resources, can inflict terrible damage. US/NATO Drone Attacks - Obviously this is a very touchy issue to all parties - Although the drones have been successful in surveillance usage, and to some extent striking at leaders of the Taliban, the increasing civilian casualties have stoked anger and anti-Americanism - Although the UN says it recorded no civilian deaths from drone strikes in Afghanistan last year, because the drones have been mainly used to attack low-level Taliban fighters in remote places it is hard to tell actual figures - However, report by Washington-based New America Foundation found that 32% of those killed in drone attacks since 2004 were civilians - Understandably, Afghanistan recognises that the drones are a crucial tool for the US to disrupt Al Qaeda and Taliban operations and leadership strategies o However need to find a solution to reduce amount of civilian deaths o Such deaths create resistance to the US led forces and are causing many Afghans to join the Taliban to get US troops out after losing family and friends o In US’s best interests to re-examine the situation and perhaps tighten the rules for airstrikes - Drones are useful in that they can offer continuous protection and a broad view of their surroundings - Afghanistan strongly opposes the growing use of bombs that can increase civilian casualties and as a result give more people reason to side with the Taliban - Important to keep in mind that not everyone digging by the side of the road is automatically an insurgent Reconciliation initiatives While some observers have supported reconciliation outreach initiates to insurgent leaders as an avenue towards final settlement of the conflict in Afghanistan, we believe that any reconciliation efforts would likely have a direct bearing on security efforts in Afghanistan because they concern the former adversary, insurgents, in the fight. As such, leadership-level reconciliation initiatives would risk institutionalising formal political roles in the future Government of Afghanistan for known terrorists. Such an inclusion might alienate parts of the Afghan population who suffered under the Taliban regime. Also, such alienated people may take up arms to protest such deals. Institutionalising leading roles for former Taliban or other insurgent leaders might also push the orientation of the Government of Afghanistan in a more repressive direction. However, Afghanistan does believe that through careful planning and consideration, reconciliation could be reached with ‘foot-soldiers’ of the Taliban that are simply civilians unhappy with the international troop presence in their country and recent civilian deaths caused by drone attacks. By only using drones for surveillance and monitoring, and ensuring that such civilians reconsider their position with the Taliban. Many people simply are afraid of the insurgents, and therefore we need to ensure that the Afghan army is trained and deployed to such areas to increase security concerns and trust of the government. Such reconciliation would separate those driven by poverty and general dissatisfaction from true insurgents, perhaps through some combination of economic incentives, opportunities for political participation and removal from targeting lists. We hope that the increased Pakistani pressure on Afghan Taliban officials inside Pakistan, combined with the Afghan and coalition operation inside Afghanistan, will undermine the Taliban’s confidence and capability, and will encourage fighters to “lay down their weapons, respect the democratically elected governments in both countries and want to reintegrate into society.” New multiparty agreement ideas Developing the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) The development of the ANSF is essential to the future security and stability of Afghanistan. The Government of Afghanistan, with the support of the international community, would like to further increase the Afghan National Army (ANA). As Afghan National Police (ANP) capabilities grow, it may increasingly assume responsibility for some domestic missions currently performed by the ANA. As total ANSF numbers and capabilities grow, Afghan forces may increasingly assume responsibility from international security forces. And when the security challenges from the insurgency diminish, the ANSF may shift from counterinsurgency to more traditional peacetime focus, including external defence for the ANA and civilian law enforcement for the ANP. A major recent survey of Afghan popular opinion indicated that the ANP is he second most highly regarded public institution, after the ANA. This is encouraging as it means that the corruption experienced before international involvement is slowly being eradicated, and that general support and trust of the security forces are growing. Of course, funding and sustainment of the ANSF is a major concern for Afghanistan. Our senior officials estimate that it will cost approximately $3.5 billion per year to increase the ANSF force structure, and then $2.2 billion per year to sustain it. As you are all aware, Afghanistan has few natural resources and little economic activity, other than poppy production, that could generate significant revenue in the near future. We propose and formally ask the US and NATO to continue to bear the near-term burden of developing the ANSF until it reaches its current endstrength target of 134,000 troops. When these endstrength targets have been reached, to sustain the force beyond the time frame we suggest that Afghanistan (depending on the current economic situation) assume some level of financial responsibility that would increase as stability of the country increases. During this time we again formally ask that the US and NATO help the Aghan government to sustain the troops needed to ensure stability and security of Afghanistan. In the long term we suggest making part of the force available to serve in multi-lateral peace operations, and for Afghanistan to become a net exporter of security by providing trained, inter-operable ANSF to serve in UN peace operations or other multi-lateral coalition efforts across the world. Playing such roles in the international community could help our government secure international support and respect. Strengthen Counternarcotics Efforts Borderlands already have become land bridge for criminal drugs and criminalized transit trade economies in the region. Transborder political and military networks between Afghanistan & Pakistan are reinforced as well as funded and armed by criminal activities such as trafficking in drugs, arms and people. Since drugs and insurgency are caused by, and effect, each other they need to be dealt with at the same time and urgently. Afghanistan sees such illegal transportation as a concern because many weapons lie along Afghanistan/Pakistan border in the hands of the Taliban soldiers. The problem is a problem that needs to be stopped quickly as possible. Possible solutions to this would be the recognition of international border and tightening monitoring and transportation laws, which have been discussed in detail in earlier negotiations. It is in Afghanistan’s best interests not to have dangerous weapons in the hands of the Taliban, and therefore we endorse the agreement between NATO and Pakistan regarding the increase in border security. However, a number of issues still need to be addressed. In particular, recent reports have shown that poppy cultivation in Helmand province (part of Taliban stronghold) increased by over 160% in 2006, 45% in 2007 and even more in recent years. This i ncrease in production overlaps with sharp rise in Taliban attacks on coalition, and therefore it is obvious that much of Taliban funding comes from drug trade. Therefore to reduce and eventually eliminate the Taliban, there needs to be a reduction and elimination of the poppy cultivation. As you know, Afghan and Western partners are currently undertaking massive military assault on southern Taliban strongholds. Success of such operations depends on convincing Afghans they can trust the police and the government and will be safe. People are deeply suspicious of the police going in because they have such bad experiences with police before – therefore need to regain trust. Many in Marjah saw government as replacing one evil with another. People in this region need a better relationship with the government and police force, and therefore both need to become more involved in the area. A possible idea might be to take full advantage of the October 2008 NATO decision expanding the interpretation of the counternarcotics role ISAF may play, to include targeting drug facilities where a connection with the insurgency is show. Also, more diligently cultivating the cooperation of the community through strengthening of the system of incentives available to those who lend their support may be beneficial. Community and Tribal Outreach Program In Afghanistan, local community leaders are often tribal leaders, and local community structure is intimately linked with tribal structure, though not necessarily clearly or consistently. Fostering local community support for security initiatives generally involves working with tribal leaders, among others, but given Afghanistan’s complex tribal affiliations, the risk of getting it wrong is relatively high. A community guard program would attempt to avoid getting it wrong by focusing on the concept of community outreach rather than tribal outreach. In the program each local community, including all relevant tribes, would select representatives to a shura; the sura, in turn, would select project participants to help provide security, for example through neighbourhood watch efforts and guarding fixed sites. One goal, is that local residents adopt a not in my village attitude towards insurgents and criminals. We suggest and request funding for such a program to be provided by the US. We understand that such US accountability requires madate formal US oversight, but we suggest additional Afghan oversight provided by ANSF representatives and the moral authority of the community shura (council). The goal would be to empower locals, both local governance and tribal structures, to make them work for themselves. The idea is to bridge the gap between the government and the people, and to make the people feel responsible. The initiative would draw on the model of arbakai – a traditional Pashtun institution, which tribal based forces help defend a village on a temporary basis. This familiar association may help smooth the introduction of community outreach. We do not suggest arming any civilians as we should not create new warlords or reinforce old ones. Instead, a system could be put in place to encourage community members to report any suspicious activity to the ANFP and international forces. With such a program in place, insurgents would find it increasingly hard to hide in villages where they are not wanted and face risk of being reported.