Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday said he was determined that the Afghan army should be built up so it can take over responsibility from foreign troops for securing the entire country within five years.
Speaking after being sworn in for a second term as president, Karzai said he wanted Afghanistan’s security forces to be improved in “quantitative and qualitative terms.”
Currently only one of the 34 provinces, the capital, is controlled by the country’s own security forces.
Karzai said that by “accelerating the training and equipping” of the army and police, more provinces could be handed over.
“It is only through this process that Afghanistan’s hope with regard to a quick return of our friends’ soldiers to their countries will be realized,” he told a packed hall of Afghan and foreign dignitaries.
In another ambitious deadline, Karzai gave foreign and national private security companies two years notice before their activities are handed over to the Afghan security forces. Although the private security industry is highly controversial in Afghanistan, the many private companies play a major role in securing everything from military compounds to embassies.
In general though, Karzai’s inauguration speech touched only on well-worn themes, including the long-held but never realized aspiration to turn Afghanistan into a “transit corridor for goods and energy between north and south Asia,” and to pursue peace talks with the Taliban, brokered by the Saudi royal family.
To that end he promised he would summon a loya jirga, a traditional gathering of the country’s tribes and power brokers, increasingly seen as a way for the Taliban to be drawn into a political process.
While Karzai called for Abdullah Abdullah, his main rival in the flawed presidential campaign, to “come together to achieve the important task of national unity,” he did not invite him to join his government, something the former foreign minister had rejected anyway.
On the thorny issue of rampant corruption, Karzai promised a new law obliging ministers and senior officials to declare their assets, in a bid to uncover whether modestly paid public servants possess serious wealth accumulated from bribes and the selling of positions.
Analysts said on Thursday that the legal requirement already exists, as does the High Office of Oversight, an anti-corruption body widely regarded as toothless, which Karzai said should be given more powers.
Nonetheless the Afghan president’s pledges were warmly welcomed by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who had flown into the country the previous night.
She said she was pleased by Karzai’s “agenda for change,” adding: “The idea that government officials will have to register their assets, so that any money or other influence can be more easily tracked is a very bold proposal.”
Privately Western diplomats are not optimistic that Karzai will change his style of government.
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