Friday, November 1, 2013

Post-Kabul Conference

" Pacha mehmani dasht" (The king had a party) says an old disabled woman who missed a whole week of her physiotherapy at one of the non-profit Orthopedic centers in Kabul, since she was coming from Bagrami, one of the Kabul districts and the movement was heavily restricted for the past two weeks around Kabul in the wake of Kabul Conference
Access to information is a rare commodity in Afghan markets. The common Afghan hardly gets any valid and credible update on the state of affairs of the government. While television and radio are the main providers of news to Afghans, certain areas of Kabul did not have power for over two days and nights before the Kabul Conference and during the day of the Conference.

" As the Kabul Conference ends here, the Kabul process starts" were the concluding remarks of the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon at the end of the Kabul International Conference on Tuesday.

After seven hours of speeches and promises, a new promise and a new process seems emerging from the Kabul Conference. The new promise is the date of 2014 and the new process is called the Kabul process. How would the Kabul process fulfill its promise by the set deadline is the question that we will know more about as the time swifts on towards 2014. Answering to the question of what would be the Kabul Process, one of the Afghan government officials who was part of the organization of the Conference told me that its the start of an Afghanization process in which Afghan government will implement its own policies and will convene international conferences on Afghanistan in Kabul.

The Kabul Conference that took place in Kabul after many months of preparations and efforts of the Afghan government and its international allies seems to have more of a similar outcome as the Consultative Peace Jirga that was held in Kabul early June. Both events, bestowed a certain level of legitimacy on the part of the Afghan government and more than the substance, the events have symbolic significance for Afghanistan. In more than 30 years, this was the first international event hosted by the Afghan government and the level of international attention on Afghanistan is unseen before. But will the Afghan government be able to utilize the commitment and legitimacy it has received from the international community...time will tell.

Many Afghans are relieved that the Conference took place without any major interruptions, apart from some rockets that were fired on Kabul on the night of the Conference. The empty streets of Kabul rehashed the memories of a time when Afghans feared getting out of their homes, just ten years ago.Though a member of the National Directorate of Security on the condition of anonymity said that they were only able to secure Kabul for the Conference due to direct involvement of NATO forces.

As the world leaders present in Kabul Conference endorsed the peace processes that have taken place in Kabul and supported the initiatives of Re-integration and Re-conciliation of the Taliban militants, the voices and concerns of some sectors of Afghan society went unheard. BBC's Channel 4 interviewed Afghans in Bamian province and spoke with Hazara community who expressed their concerns that the return of the Taliban would in turn bring miseries to them and other non-Pashtun ethnic groups in Afghanistan. People in Bamian are still living with the fear and terror of the memories of massacres that happend in Yakawlang and other instances of violence like the blow up of the Buddhas by the Taliban militants during the time that the Taliban were in power in Kabul.

Furthermore, the Conference ignored taking a stock of the past programs and initiatives and instead new priorities and programs were introduced by the Afghan government. Many critics were looking forward to see an update of the progress made on the implementation of the Afghanistan National Development Strategy which was hardly discussed in Kabul Conference. However, as the international community members continue to affirm their commitment for Afghanistan, an effective monitoring system whether those commitments reach to Afghanistan and Afghans is still missing in the tenth year since Bonn agreement. Interestingly, when Afghans hope that the United Nations will be ensuring oversight and effective aid coordination, the United Nations Secretary General too seemed to heavily rely on the Afghan government to improve its functions, a demand from the people of Afghanistan that has turned into a dream now.

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