Afghanistan
Expected Council Action
In June there will be a number of Afghanistan-related activities involving Council members. The Council is planning to travel to Afghanistan from 19 to 24 June. At press time the terms of reference for the visit had been circulated but not finalised. Turkey will lead the mission.
The Secretary-General’s report on Afghanistan is also due in the third week of June and it will review developments since the modification of the UN mission’s mandate in March. Council members are looking for information on the implementation of the new mandate, the security situation, the peace jirga (expected to take place in early June) and preparations for the forthcoming Kabul conference.
Following the visit to Afghanistan, the Council will have an informal retreat in Istanbul from 25 to 27 June where it will discuss peacekeeping, peacemaking and peacebuilding. Afghanistan is expected to be one of the case studies discussed at the retreat.
At press time it was unclear whether the Council would hold a separate debate on the Secretary-General’s report or whether it would be combined with a Council meeting covering its visit to Afghanistan. Expected timing was also unclear—possibly at the end of June or in early July.
Key Recent Developments
Afghan President Hamid Karzai visited Washington from 10 to 13 May. At a joint press conference on 12 May, US President Barack Obama and Karzai reaffirmed their commitment to a long-term strategic partnership between the two countries.
The Taliban went on the offensive in May with three attacks on high-profile NATO targets. On 18 May a suicide bomber killed six NATO soldiers and 12 civilians, on 19 May there was an assault against Bagram air base north of Kabul and on 22 May insurgents fired rockets into the Kandahar airfield and attempted to storm the base.
The Afghan peace jirga is expected to take place on 2-4 June. A key issue for discussion will be how to reach out to the Taliban, including economic incentives for members of the Taliban. At the Kabul conference in late July, the Afghan government is expected to present concrete plans to flesh out its commitments for stabilising and developing Afghanistan made during the January London Conference.
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime said on 13 May that a fungus had infected half the country’s poppies. As a result opium prices have risen by 50 percent. There is speculation that the Taliban have stockpiles of opium and are waiting for prices to rise further before cashing in.
On 11 May the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Afghanistan, Staffan de Mistura, signed an agreement with the chair of the Independent Election Commission, Fazel Manawi, pledging financial support for the parliamentary elections.
On 17 April the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) appointed two foreign commissioners. (In February Karzai had tried to ban non-Afghan nationals from the ECC but was blocked by Afghanistan’s upper house of parliament.) It also agreed to guarantee 68 seats to women in the lower house of parliament.
On 22 March the Council adopted resolution 1917 renewing and modifying the mandate of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) until 23 March 2011. The mandate was sharpened to reflect priorities, particularly the transition to greater Afghan responsibility, as well as UNAMA’s preparedness to be responsive to the government’s needs and requests. The resolution highlighted UNAMA’s role in supporting the Afghan government in security, governance, economic development and regional cooperation and the implementation of commitments in these areas made at the 28 January London Conference. It decided that UNAMA would continue to lead the international civilian efforts and spelled out UNAMA’s priorities in this area, including:
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promoting more coherent support by the international community to the Afghan government’s development and governance priorities as co-chair of the Joint Coordination and Monitoring Board;
- strengthening cooperation with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and NATO senior civilian representatives to improve civil-military coordination;
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providing political outreach and good offices to support, if requested by the Afghan government, the implementation of Afghan-led reconciliation and reintegration programmes;
- supporting, at the Afghan government’s request, the legislative elections by providing technical assistance, coordinating international funding and supporting through civil society Afghan participation in the elections, as well as electoral reform; and
- playing a central coordinating role in the delivery of humanitarian assistance.
On 18 March the Council held a debate on Afghanistan during which it was briefed by Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Alain le Roy. He highlighted the importance of allowing for Afghan leadership while providing capacity-building and support in developing Afghan institutions. Afghanistan’s representative to the UN, Zahir Tannin, stressed that the government would focus on Afghanisation in the coming year and that its priorities would be reversing the Taliban’s momentum, reconciliation, building capacity and the September parliamentary elections. Among other non-Council members who spoke were Australia, Canada, Germany, India, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, India and Poland. A number of these countries touched on the issues of reintegration and reconciliation, the parliamentary elections and UNAMA’s mandate.
Since the adoption of the new mandate, UNAMA has been reconfigured according to the key priorities of electoral assistance, reconciliation and reintegration of the Taliban into Afghan society, regional cooperation and aid coherence. (Under de Mistura, “aid coherence” is the term being used for donor or aid coordination, emphasising UNAMA’s role in promoting coherence and national ownership in this area.)
Since January, 50,000 refugees have returned home from Pakistan and Iran with assistance from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Key Issues
A continuing issue is the security situation in Afghanistan which continues to be a constraint for UNAMA in carrying out its mandate in some parts of the country.
A related issue is whether the unstable security situation will affect UNAMA’s ability to support the elections.
An issue for the Council is whether and how it can fine tune UNAMA’s role in light of developments.
A related issue is how to accurately track progress in implementing UNAMA’s mandate. Although resolution 1868 in March 2009 asked for benchmarks, with the changes in priorities over the year, this has not proved an effective way of monitoring progress.
A further issue is the role the UN should play in developing regional cooperation mechanisms. A new initiative from UNAMA is a “Silk Road” ambassadorial group made up of the Kabul ambassadors of Afghanistan’s neighbours and near neighbours. The group is expected to discuss shared interests and regional cooperation initiatives.
Among the issues for the Council’s visit to Afghanistan are the security situation, the feasibility of travelling beyond Kabul, how best to convey the Council’s messages to key actors in Afghanistan and ensuring members are able to gain insights that will assist in their decisions on Afghanistan in the future.
Other issues related to the Council mission include whether Council members should seek substantive information on reconciliation and reintegration and whether there will be meetings with civil society representatives. Also an issue is whether there will be discussion on human rights issues such as women’s rights and child protection. The Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict published its conclusions on Afghanistan in July 2009 and asked that children and armed conflict be included in the terms of reference for a visit to Afghanistan. Implementation of the conclusions of the Working Group may therefore also be an issue that comes up during the visit.
Human Rights-Related Developments
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On 24 March the Human Rights Council received the report on Afghanistan of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. The report drew on a survey carried out among poor communities in 14 provinces. While continuing conflict and insecurity were recognised as contributing factors, much of the cause for high poverty levels was attributed to “a massive human rights deficit including widespread impunity and inadequate investment in, and attention to, human rights.” The report noted that abuse of power was a key driver of poverty in Afghanistan, resulting in the government’s being unable to “deliver basic services, such as security, food, or shelter.” The report concluded that transparent and accountable decision-making processes needed to be established to restore the population’s trust in Afghan public institutions, as well as in the country’s international backers. |
Options
The most likely option is for the Council to listen to the briefing from de Mistura but take no action.
A possible option is for the Council to issue a statement touching on the outcome of the peace jirga and the forthcoming Kabul conference, as well as progress in election preparations.
Other options include:
- noting the difficulty of evaluating progress made against benchmarks in the case of UNAMA and discussing alternative ways of measuring progress;
- following-up on the discussions during the Istanbul retreat and considering ways of including Afghanistan in the UN’s peacebuilding architecture;
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discussing ways the UN’s role in regional cooperation and the reconciliation and reintegration process could be strengthened (among the possibilities are the appointment by the Secretary-General of a special envoy to assist in talks and a mechanism for the promotion of regional dialogue); and
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requesting a briefing by Austria as chair of the 1267 committee on developments related to the Taliban on the sanctions list and on the current review process, which is expected to be completed by the end of June.
The most likely option following the Council visit is a report and briefing on the mission.
Council Dynamics
There seems at present to be a high degree of consensus among Council members. The mandate renewal in March went smoothly, with members generally in agreement about the priorities. Members also appear very supportive of de Mistura.
At this point Council members seem to be really focused on seeing how the implementation of resolution 1917 is working in practice given the evolving political and security situation. There is little interest for any further action in advance of the visit to Afghanistan.
The UK’s recent change of government does not appear to have affected its approach to Afghanistan. It wants to see how the commitments from the London Conference relevant to UNAMA’s mandate are being carried out.
Following a change in Japan’s government last year, its focus in Afghanistan has shifted from maritime operations to peacebuilding, and especially national reintegration.
The issue of the UN’s role in reconciliation is one on which some nuances between the P5 members are likely. Russia continues to be sceptical about any reconciliation attempts and resistant to further delisting of Taliban from the sanctions list. The UK and France appear supportive of the idea of reconciliation. There seems to be different levels of emphasis in various parts of the US government.
A number of elected members, such as Austria, Brazil and Mexico, have expressed concern about the impact of the security situation on civilians. The issue of women’s participation in the reconciliation process, the return of internally displaced persons and credible parliamentary elections are also issues of concern to some of the elected members.
Turkey is the lead country on Afghanistan and has been proactive in having Council members consider different dimensions of this issue through organising the Council visit to Afghanistan and having Afghanistan as one of the case-studies during the Council retreat.
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Selected Security Council Resolutions |
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Selected Secretary-General’s Report |
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Other |
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Special Representative of the Secretary-General and UNAMA’s Head of Mission |
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Staffan de Mistura (Sweden) |
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UNAMA: Size, Composition and Duration |
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ISAF Military Commander |
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Army General Stanley McChrystal (US) |
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ISAF: Size, Composition and Duration |
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Operation Enduring Freedom: Size, Composition and Duration |
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