pakistani342
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2013
- Messages
- 3,485
- Reaction score
- 6
- Country
- Location
political theater in the extreme ?
original article here excerpts below:
KABUL, Afghanistan — From presidential candidates to grocers and spice merchants, many Afghans threw up their hands in frustration and exasperation with their elected president on Monday. They had watched Hamid Karzai on TV the day before, and many were baffled by what they saw.
Karzai had brusquely rejected the recommendations of a special grand council he had personally convened to vote on whether Afghanistan should sign a security agreement with the United States. After the council, or loya jirga, enthusiastically endorsed the pact, Karzai refused to sign and launched an angry diatribe against the United States. It ended in a tense face-off with the elderly loya jirga chairman, who supports the deal.
...
"This president — I don’t have any idea what he’s doing," Azrakhsh Hafizi, a loya jirga committee chairman who is also directs the Afghanistan International Chamber of Commerce in Kabul, said in an interview. "Presidents come and go, but the people are the owners of this country. He should listen to them."
...
Virtually all 50 loya jirga committees recommended not only signing the 10-year agreement, but doing so before the end of the year. Karzai insists on waiting until after the Afghan presidential election in April.
...
"Really, it’s like he’s losing control of his mind," former defense official Baryalai said. "He makes new problems for himself every day."
Of Karzai’s demand that the U.S. somehow secure peace in Afghanistan before he’ll sign the agreement, Baryalai added: "I have no idea what that means. Nobody does."
...
"If the foreigners leave next year," Harroon said, referring to U.S. and international combat troops, "then the next day, the Taliban will be back and taking over."
The absence of a post-2014 U.S. force here could plunge the country back into civil war, warned Said Kamal, 26, a grocery shopper. "Karzai needs to sign for the country’s security — and now," he said.
...
"If the president doesn’t sign,there will be chaos in the military," said Baryalai, the former defense official. "But they believe he will eventually sign. They know he says one thing today, something else tomorrow."
The pact would permit U.S. trainers, plus U.S. special-operations troops for counterterrorism missions. A poll of 2,768 Afghans by Tolo TV here found that 65% favored granting U.S. legal jurisdiction for troops in Afghanistan — a key provision of the accord — versus 30% opposed and the rest with no opinion.
original article here excerpts below:
KABUL, Afghanistan — From presidential candidates to grocers and spice merchants, many Afghans threw up their hands in frustration and exasperation with their elected president on Monday. They had watched Hamid Karzai on TV the day before, and many were baffled by what they saw.
Karzai had brusquely rejected the recommendations of a special grand council he had personally convened to vote on whether Afghanistan should sign a security agreement with the United States. After the council, or loya jirga, enthusiastically endorsed the pact, Karzai refused to sign and launched an angry diatribe against the United States. It ended in a tense face-off with the elderly loya jirga chairman, who supports the deal.
...
"This president — I don’t have any idea what he’s doing," Azrakhsh Hafizi, a loya jirga committee chairman who is also directs the Afghanistan International Chamber of Commerce in Kabul, said in an interview. "Presidents come and go, but the people are the owners of this country. He should listen to them."
...
Virtually all 50 loya jirga committees recommended not only signing the 10-year agreement, but doing so before the end of the year. Karzai insists on waiting until after the Afghan presidential election in April.
...
"Really, it’s like he’s losing control of his mind," former defense official Baryalai said. "He makes new problems for himself every day."
Of Karzai’s demand that the U.S. somehow secure peace in Afghanistan before he’ll sign the agreement, Baryalai added: "I have no idea what that means. Nobody does."
...
"If the foreigners leave next year," Harroon said, referring to U.S. and international combat troops, "then the next day, the Taliban will be back and taking over."
The absence of a post-2014 U.S. force here could plunge the country back into civil war, warned Said Kamal, 26, a grocery shopper. "Karzai needs to sign for the country’s security — and now," he said.
...
"If the president doesn’t sign,there will be chaos in the military," said Baryalai, the former defense official. "But they believe he will eventually sign. They know he says one thing today, something else tomorrow."
The pact would permit U.S. trainers, plus U.S. special-operations troops for counterterrorism missions. A poll of 2,768 Afghans by Tolo TV here found that 65% favored granting U.S. legal jurisdiction for troops in Afghanistan — a key provision of the accord — versus 30% opposed and the rest with no opinion.
