US presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama praised US troops while having breakfast with them in Kabul yesterday, ahead of an expected meeting with Afghani President Hamid Karzai, a man Obama has chided for not doing enough to rebuild the war-torn country.
Obama and other senators traveling with him met with many soldiers and sailors from their respective constituencies, US military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Dave Johnson said.
“The food was great, but the company was better,” Johnson said.
PHOTO: AP
Obama has made Afghanistan, where Taliban and al-Qaeda-linked militants are resurgent, a centerpiece of his proposed strategy for dealing with terror threats. He has said the war in Afghanistan deserves more troops and more attention as opposed to the conflict in Iraq.
“To see young people like this who are doing such excellent work, with so much dedication ... it makes you feel good about the country,” Obama said, while with the troops inside Camp Eggers in the Afghan capital.
“I want to make sure that everybody back home understands how much pride people take in their work here and how much sacrifice people are making. It is outstanding,” he said in video footage from the military.
While officially a part of a congressional delegation on a fact-finding tour also expected to take him to Iraq, Obama was traveling in Afghanistan amid the publicity and scrutiny accorded a likely Democratic nominee for president rather than a senator from Illinois. Security was tight and media access to Obama was limited by his campaign, and his itinerary in the war zones was a closely guarded secret.
Traveling with Obama were senators Chuck Hagel, a Republican, and Jack Reed, a Democrat. Both military veterans, the senators have been mentioned as potential Obama vice presidential running mates, although Reed has said he is not interested in the job and Hagel would be an unlikely cross-party choice.
On Saturday, Obama and others in the delegation received a briefing inside the US base in Jalalabad from the Afghan provincial governor of Nangarhar, Gul Agha Sherzai, a no-nonsense, bullish former warlord.
“Obama promised us that if he becomes a president in the future, he will support and help Afghanistan not only in its security sector but also in reconstruction, development and economic sector,” Sherzai said.
The area where the meeting took place is not far from where Osama bin Laden escaped US troops in 2001 after his al-Qaeda network led the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Meanwhile, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s remark to a German weekly backing Obama’s plan for Iraq has been “misunderstood and mistranslated,” Baghdad said yesterday.
On Wednesday, Obama in a speech in Washington said he would withdraw US forces from Iraq within 16 months of his taking office next January.
In an interview to German weekly Der Spiegel, Maliki said this “would be the right timescale for withdrawal, allowing for minor adjustments.”
US forces should leave the country “as soon as possible,” he said.
“To date, the United States is struggling to agree on a concrete date for withdrawal because they view such a step as an admission of defeat, which is not the case,” Maliki said.
On Sunday Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said Maliki’s remark was “misunderstood and mistranslated and not conveyed accurately.”
Dabbagh also said that any statement made by Maliki or any of the members of the Iraqi government “should not be understood as support to any US presidential candidate.”
Obama’s campaign welcomed Maliki’s remark in the interview.
Obama has said he will visit Iraq as part of his overseas tour, which began on Saturday in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, US President George W. Bush and Maliki have agreed to set a “time horizon” for military withdrawal as part of a long-term security pact.
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