American University Foreign Policy Students Visit Embassy of Afghanistan
The Embassy of Afghanistan hosted a group of students from the American University Washington Semester Program on January 23. Political Counselor M. Ashraf Haidari led the students in a discussion of the development of Afghan-U.S. relations since early 1980s, and explained the critical role the U.S. has played in helping rebuild the country over the past six years. Haidari briefed the students on Afghanistan’s rebuilding achievements in cooperation with the international community, describing the dire situation of Afghans on the eve of the international intervention in 2001. “We lacked a legitimate government, a parliament, a judiciary, and the foreign Taliban had imposed on the Afghan society a gender apartheid denying women their human and Islamic rights including access to education and employment,” he said. Haidari described the process that established state institutions, as well as the establishment of Afghan democracy through Presidential and Parliamentary elections. He noted, however, that unless Afghanistan’s early democratic achievements were consolidated towards permanent peace, stability, and prosperity, the country would remain a victim of predatory state and non-state actors in the region, particularly cross-border extremism and terrorism.
“Today, Afghanistan faces many interlinked challenges, which we and our international partners have to overcome through an integrated and well-coordinated strategy,” Haidari told the students. The central challenge, however, he pointed out was the Taliban’s cross-border insurgency, destabilizing Afghanistan and derailing its rebuilding process. Haidari answered the student’s questions about news reports of increased Taliban attacks, the general state of security and regional politics. Haidari insisted that Afghan security forces in partnership with the international community were making progress in stabilizing the country, having moved into regions where there had been no government presence for decades. Naturally, areas where terrorists had previously operated with impunity became more volatile as international forces applied pressure on the Taliban. “We have a greater cause than that of the Taliban insurgents: we strive to establish a moderate Islamic state at peace with itself and with others which the Afghan people demand and have strongly supported so far.” He called on Afghanistan’s international partners to recommit to the country’s long-tem rebuilding by focusing their efforts on empowering the Afghan government to stand on its own feet.
