Word: loya
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...suburb outside the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif last week, Dostum was in campaign mode. Next month the country will hold its long-awaited loya jirga, or grand assembly, which will choose a transitional government. Dostum relaunched his old political party, the National Islamic Movement. Known simply as Jombesh, the group has a platform that rests on secular democracy (despite its name) and respect for minority rights, which translates to a federalist agenda. Addressing a congress of 2,000 party functionaries, Dostum hit out at "extremism" and "fundamentalism." Read: the Islamic politics of Jamiat...
...That does not appear to be in Dostum's plans. With his Jombesh rejuvenated, he no doubt intends to emerge from next month's loya jirga in a stronger position. He surely hopes the assembly will erode the power of Jamiat, which today controls the three key ministries of Defense, Interior and Foreign Affairs. Whether or not that happens, Abdul Rashid Dostum is one politician who still fields an army. Whoever rules in Kabul is not apt to forget...
...Evidence linking Hekmatyar to the attacks has yet to be produced and some Western diplomats dismiss the "coup plot" as a government attempt to sideline rivals ahead of the June 22 'loya jirga,' a national assembly that will choose an interim government to rule for the next two years. Even if the Hekmatyar threat is exaggerated, Karzai must still deal with internal splits. "The cabinet is deeply divided," says the interim leader's adviser. "But that's the government given to him by the U.N. in Bonn and he has to work with it." A power struggle between Defense Minister...
...Fires are expected to spread in the run-up to the loya jirga. "The next few months will be an especially fragile period," CIA director George Tenet recently told the U.S. Senate. Pashtun royalists hope people will rally around former King Mohammed Zahir Shah, even though he has returned with the constitutional rights of an ordinary citizen rather than those of a monarch. But Afghanistan's volatile ethnic divisions are just as likely to turn the frail 87-year-old king into a symbol of division than one of peace...
...TIME, concludes that a full-fledged "power struggle" is under way. "Those elements that have the most to lose from a stable and democratic order in Afghanistan have begun to react," U.N. undersecretary for political affairs Kieran Prendergast says. Moreover, in the run-up to the June 22 loya jirga, or grand meeting of all Afghanistan's regional elders, which will decide who succeeds Karzai's administration, tension is only expected to increase. Against the warlords, the frail 87-year-old former King Mohammed Zahir Shah is not anticipated to prove the instrument of peace his supporters hope...