With beginning of the new solar Hijri year, insecurity and activities of the insurgency has increased, which caused heavy casualties in Kabul and other provinces. In view of political analysts, the celebration of Nawroz or the solar Hijri year’s first day festival in Arg instead of Paghman was also due to the increased insecurity.
While only days remain to Presidential and Provincial Council elections the fear of increasing insecurity exists, but Afghan government officials promise insured security for election.
Political analyst Ghulam Jailani Zwak analyzes the root factors of the insecurity and behind the scene objectives in reply to the CSRS questions:
The recent security deterioration all over the country and the insurgents, using all their strength, are preventing people from participation in the elections. But looking to the characteristics of the recent insurgency events they were for complicated aims and could have many sides.
Elections:
One of the purposes of the insecurity is upcoming elections. Following the latest incidents some of the international elections observers also left Afghanistan. The massive participation of the people in election campaigns in spite of the existing insecurity shows that people will participate in the election except in those areas under the full control of insurgents.
But even if the elections are held transparently and people participate while the international observers do not exist it will give a pretext to west and some internal parties working for foreign intelligence who will call the election nontransparent.
It’s clear that the upcoming election will of course have irregularities; looking to the experience of the previous elections it is likely that many frauds will happen again. But the absence of the international observers can result in a situation that the foreign parties and their national circles could threaten the elections in case the results are not in their favor.
Attack on Lebanese Restaurant and the Complicated Intelligence War:
The other secret aspect of the recent insecurity can be considered part of a huge intelligence war. One of its examples can be the attack on the Lebanese restaurant and it’s following mysterious killing incidents chain. Following the attack on the Lebanese restaurant in Kabul the chain of the incidents continues. After this attack an English reporter has been killed who was working with a Swedish radio and aimed to work on a story about the attack on the Lebanese restaurant besides his other duties; but he has been killed just two days after his arrival to Kabul. This killing was a complicated issue and it does not seem possible that someone could draw a plan for his killing just in two days.
It is also said that Journalist Sardar Ahmad wanted to do an investigation on the Lebanese restaurant attack, but he was killed in the attack on Kabul Serena Hotel which raises many questions. Whoever wants to talk about Lebanese hotel is killed; question rises why there is too much sensation about it? These incidents show the deepness of the complication.
Peace Negotiation:
Another reason of the insecurity is to sabotage the peace negotiation between Afghan government and the Taliban. Few days ago President Hamid Karzai confidently said, “Peace is to come; we are in communication with Taliban’s leadership”. This is a very important issue and some of the circles consider recent incidents linked to developments in peace process.
Few days ago British ambassador in an interview confidently said that Afghan government has contacts with Taliban leaders and negotiations are taking place. He added that Taliban leadership is now also convinced that they cannot achieve solutions through war.
This statement of the British ambassador is important, since he is an official authority who does not express only his own analysis, his statement should be based on intelligence information because United Kingdom has strong intelligence information, especially their robust contact with Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) in issues related to Taliban.
Therefore we can say that these contacts are true, and there are some improvements in the negotiation. It seems that Taliban are now convinced to pave the way for peace. So the regional and world countries’ intelligence who want the continuation of instability and war in Afghanistan tries to sabotage this negotiation while one of the reasons behind the insecurity can be this.
The Bilateral Security Agreement:
One of the reasons behind the recent insecurity can be the pending status of the Bilateral Security Agreement between Afghanistan and the United States; to force Afghanistan to sign the agreement otherwise the insecurity will increase.
There is no doubt that Pakistan and Taliban are involved in these incidents since the attack on Serena Hotel for instance was carried out by Afghans, not by Jew or Christians or others, but the intelligence always use the internal elements for carrying out such incidents; therefore these incidents also have an internal factor and the CIA and other world intelligence who want to implement their programs in Afghanistan could be helped by Pakistan’s ISI.
The Legitimacy of Upcoming Elections and the Way to Solving the Conflict
If the insecurity continues to spread the way it is now, how much will it affect the legitimacy of upcoming elections and how much will it be possible for people go to polling stations all around the country? This issue is analyzed by Dr. Misbahullah Abdulbaqi in response to CSRS questions:
Though Afghan government commits securing the election process but the fact is that most of the polling stations and the overall elections are facing wide challenges. While many Afghan parties have disagreements with the government, election cannot be a comprehensive solution. Afghanistan’s main problem is war and solutions should be sought to stop it; until there are disagreements between Afghans, the war and bloodshed will continue.
But the war and weapons cannot solve the problem; until a comprehensive understanding does not take place between Afghans the ending the war seems impossible. None of the sides can solve the problem through force, but the ongoing conflict should be solved through inter-Afghan understanding and negotiations.
Afghanistan’s conflict might have external causes and factors, but limiting it only to external factors could be ignoring the will for solution because there are various internal factors. Considering all factors a comprehensive solution should be found and all the factors causing insecurity must be analyzed.
This conflict can be solved when there is first a comprehensive understanding which creates a common agreement between all Afghans, then a transition government is formed, then the constitution is amended and then elections are held according to the new constitution.