Word: karzai
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...struggles to install an able and acceptable government in Iraq, there seems to be a palpable longing for a figure like Hamid Karzai. Anointed by Washington, Karzai was named head of Afghanistan by a delegation of his countrymen soon after the fall of the Taliban. With the 24-member Iraqi Governing Council bickering to a standstill, the idea of a dominant Karzai-like leader in Baghdad is gaining widespread appeal. In an interview last week with a San Diego television station, Secretary of State Colin Powell seemed almost wistful: "We don't yet see somebody like the gentleman who took...
...fighting intensifies, the focus of Bremer's two-day huddle at the White House has been on how to establish a sovereign political authority - even a provisional one, like President Hamid Karzai's government in Afghanistan. The Bush administration remains plagued by internal division over how to proceed in Iraq, with the result being contending answers that range from handing over sovereign authority to the IGC to nixing the Council in favor of an interim government. Bremer's comments before leaving Washington that the next move is up to the IGC suggest he is taking back some form of challenge...
...transitional authority is risky, then simply appointing one, as in Afghanistan, may be even more so. In Afghanistan, the political process was conducted under UN auspices, and followed months of intense consultation that established a political consensus among all of the country's neighbors (including Iran). While Karzai had no popular constituency inside Afghanistan, he carried a sufficiently broad international backing to allow him to balance the contending claims of contending Afghan warlords. But achieving the Karzai effect in Iraq would likely require a similar consensus from regional stakeholders including the Arab League, Turkey and Iran, and even possibly...
Taliban hard-liners have in recent weeks attacked allied and Afghan forces with growing frequency in the mountainous hinterlands of southeastern Afghanistan. But this has not dissuaded Afghan President Hamid Karzai from beginning discreet talks with moderates in the Taliban ranks. The unprecedented talks, which began last week, seem to have the Bush Administration's blessing. Karzai's mediator to the Taliban is its former Foreign Minister Mullah Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, who was released last Monday after 20 months in custody at a U.S. military base near Kabul...
...Karzai's chief aide, Omar Daudzay, told a Kabul radio station that "the talks were initiated at the Taliban's request." But why has Karzai, of all people--the man who rode into Afghanistan on a motorcycle soon after the Sept. 11 attacks to foment an anti-Taliban revolt among Pashtun tribes--responded to their overtures? In a word, pragmatism. The Taliban and al-Qaeda are gaining ground in remote areas, where they have found support among Pashtun tribesmen who feel Karzai's government is too top-heavy with Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara tribal leaders--their rivals for political power...