Islamabad | Thursday
CRACKS began appearing on Thursday in the landmark power-sharing accord signed in Bonn as leading Pashtun royalist Pir Sayed Ahmed Gailani complained that the agreement was not balanced.
The royalist Afghan spiritual leader, who heads the so-called Peshawar Group which participated in the Bonn conference, said the new interim administration lacked balance.
”The new set up is not so balanced. Many who had a significant role in the jihad (war against the Soviets) were not considered,” Gailani told a news conference here.
Gailani, who sent his son to Bonn but did not participate in person, played a leading role in the mujahedin struggle against the 1979-1989 Soviet occupation of Afghanistan but lived in Pakistan during the Taliban years.
So far he has not been named to any of the posts in the 29-member interim cabinet which will rule Afghanistan for six months from December 22 under a UN-backed accord signed in Bonn on Wednesday.
Other royalist figures were given prominent roles, including Pashtun elder and former deputy foreign minister Hamid Karzai, who was named interim cabinet chairman.
Gailani said the division of ministerial posts was ”almost the same as under (acting president Burhanuddin) Rabbani,” the nominal leader of the Northern Alliance ethnic minority factions.
Rabbani’s 1992-96 coalition government, dominated by minorities at the expense of the main Pashtun ethnic community, was a time of disastrous factional infighting and civil war.
”Their previous policies did not lead to prosperity and peace in Afghanistan and I hope they will not repeat their previous mistakes,” Gailani said.
”I still say that previous mistakes should not be repeated. I am hopeful that the United Nations and international community will fulfil their commitments to getting people for a Loya Jirga (grand council) so that things are settled.”
Under the terms of the Bonn accord, the interim government would run Afghanistan for six months before an emergency Loya Jirga – or grand traditional assembly of elders — appoints an 18-month transitional government.
It also gives a symbolic role to former king Mohammed Zahir Shah (87) and provides for a UN security force for Kabul.
Gailani stressed it was crucial that a UN peacekeeping force be deployed to ensure peace and security in Afghanistan.
He said Karzai would need cooperation from all sides to run the country.
”One person can make no difference unless the whole team cooperates. I hope he will get this cooperation,” he said, adding however that ”as a whole I consider this development as useful for Afghanistan and its future.” – Sapa-AFP