Speaking today on al-Jazeera television, Afghan President Hamid Karzai dismissed the notion that he needed to be on good terms with the 113,000 NATO troops in his country, saying that they “have a common purpose” but he doesn’t need their favor.
“I don’t have to have their favour,” Karzai insisted, “they are here for a purpose, which is the stability and safety of Afghanistan.” Karzai said his goal was “to be legitimate and have the trust of the Afghan people.”
At the same time, Karzai insisted Afghanistan had ‘done well’ with its economy, one of the world’s poorest, and that it was a “good model of democracy,” careful not to mention the millions of fraudulent votes in his August reelection.
At the same time, US special envoy Richard Holbrooke insisted that President Karzai was not that important in the grand scheme of things for Afghanistan, saying that he “speaks excellent English” and is “charismatic,” but that the nation has not historically been centrally governed and that it was unrealistic to expect that Karzai would be able to do so.
The US has had something of a double-edged relationship with Karzai, who has earned their ire for his criticism of civilian deaths in NATO attacks. On the one hand the administration was thought to be looking to cut Karzai loose, but later they embraced him in the face of August’s fraudulent vote and praised him as the legitimate ruler of the nation.
hey jojo let the basterd rot like his rag head country will when we leave .
This man chose to remain the new and old mayor of Kabul and not the elected president of a democratic Afghanistan. This is solely his choice as on the inevitable day his excellent command of English( nice citation from Mr Richard Holbrooke ) will not help him being beaten out by enemies or eaten up by Taliban vultures from the past and the new ones he has created by rigging elections.
Liar liar your pants are on fire. Karzai knows that Americans are wakening up and have to leave pronto and leave him rot in Afghanistan or eaten by valtures.This two timer was an exacutive to an American oil company (as was Bush & Rice). I don't think Afghanistians are stupid suckers(not like most Americans) that he has no ties to big American business.
When NATO/Blackwater leaves, by lying now,It ain't going to save his skin :^/
O-jojo….. I doubt that the security will lapse for Karzai UNLESS the U.S., NATO decide. They take fastidious care of their puppets, so as to not frighten others like Mubarak puppet in Egypt… Don't forget when Jimmy Carter was not allowing the puppet Shah Rizi fleeing Iran to come to the U.S.. It took an intervention by Kissinger and David Rockefeller to TELL Carter how the GAME werks.. It cost Carter a second term to shield the despot, but he was convinced by the sharp edges of empire.. It was NOT that long after JFK displeased certain insiders that Carter capitulated …… David Rockefeller
scion of the family that "donated" the land for the headquarters of the U.N. which provided the legal fig leaf for the taking without compensation of Palestine and Muslim holy places and the fountainhead of these current wars, hostility and strife.
Americans expressing various opinions on Afghan politics is an illustration of the "fatal conceit"…the idea that we, brilliant, good hearted Americans, know best what other others should do. That if other countries just do what we say, everything will be all right. "We" have all the answers.
That mentality will be our downfall in Afghanistan, as it was in Vietnam. The tragedy is the senseless loss of life of all nationalities, the upsetting of lives, and wasting of treasure.
As if that isn't enough, war isn't very "green" either.