A rchive Date
[ 05-03-2005 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Afghanistan ]
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[http://www.cbc.ca/news/indepth/targetterrorism/backgrounders/afghan_accord_faqs.html
The Afghan accord
Martin O'Malley & Ashish Dewan, CBC News Online | December 2001
After nine days of talks, ending with a final all-night negotiating session in Bonn, four Afghan groups signed an historic accord to establish an interim transitional government for Afghanistan after 20 years of war.
Welcoming the hard-won agreement, the Uited Nations special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi reminded delegates of the “huge responsibility” they faced. “You must live up to your commitment to promote national reconciliation, protect human rights, encourage relations with your neighbours,” Brahimi said. “You must serve your people in a democratic and transparent manner.”
Who are the four Afghan groups?
They are the Northern Alliance, the Peshawar Front based in Pakistan, the Cyprus Group supported by Iran, and the Rome Process representing former Afghan King Zahir Shah.
Who heads the power-sharing interim council?
This will be the task of Pashtun tribal chief Hamid Karzai. He is head of the Popalzoi Pashtun clan, which has links to the Afghan royal family. Karzai, 46, is considered a moderate Muslim. He was educated in the United States and speaks English fluently. He played a prominent role as Afghan foreign minister in the early 1990s after the mujahedeen defeated the communists.
How long will the interim council run the country?
The interim council takes over in Kabul on December 22. It will govern for six months, at which time a traditional Afghan tribal council – known as a loya jirga – will convene to discuss and plan a post-Taliban regime in Afghanistan. It is expected the loya jirga will be opened by the former king. It will create a new interim government to run the country for two years, when elections will be held.
Who makes up the interim council?
ETHNIC REPRESENTATION: INTERIM COUNCIL
The Northern Alliance will dominate the council, with 17 of the 30 cabinet seats. Ethnically, the council will include 11 Pashtuns, eight Tajiks, five from the Shi’a Hazara population, three Uzbeks, with the remainder drawn from other minorities. The Pashtun are the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, with about half of the country’s population of 26 million.
What are major portfolios on the interim council?
Karzai will be the chairman (when selected, he was with his tribesman in southern Afghanistan preparing for the final push on Taliban-held Kandahar). Other important posts:
- Dr. Abdullah Abdullah heads Foreign Affairs, as he did for the Northern Alliance
- Mohammed Fahim of the Northern Alliance heads Defence
- Dr. Sima Simar of the Rome Process heads Women’s Affairs
- Younis Qanooni of the Northern Alliance heads the Interior Ministry
- Suhaila Seddiqi heads Public Health
- Sardar Muhammed Roshan of the Rome Process heads Reconstruction
- Ishaq Shahryar of the Peshawar Group heads Transport
Who are the two women who will have cabinet seats?
Dr. Sima Samar runs an organization in Quetta, Pakistan, that provides medical assistance and education for Afghan women and children. Besides Women’s Affairs she will serve as one of Chairman Karzai’s five deputies. She attended Kabul University where she obtained a medical degree in 1984. She fled Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion and worked as a doctor in a refugee camp in Pakistan. She has received many death threats from the Taliban.
The other woman is Suhaila Seddiqi, a Tajik and former army general who has never left the city of Kabul.
For a list of rules enforced by the Taliban on Afghan women, click here.
Does the Afghan accord specify any peacekeeping role in the country while the interim council does its job?
The accord reached in Bonn proposes asking the United Nations for a multinational peacekeeping force for the city of Kabul. It does not specify the size of the force or how long it will be needed. Such a peacekeeping force could be expanded to work in other areas of Afghanistan.
Were there special incentives that enabled the various factions to agree to the accord?
Donor countries have promised an unspecified amount of aid and reconstruction money – said to amount to billions of dollars – if the ethnic factions reached an accord. If an accord had not been reached, the aid and reconstruction money would not be forthcoming.
 World Fact Book (CIA)]]
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