Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Month: July 2010

Campaign trail (3): the candidates and their strategies

Martine van Bijlert •

While half of the world is on holiday and the other half is going through the wiki-leaked documents or is wondering how to follow-up on the successes of the Kabul conference, the electoral campaign in Afghanistan is going ahead – at least in parts of the country. The cities are covered in posters and banners, […]

Political Landscape Read more

Extracting Change in Afghanistan’s Development Quagmire

admin •

Eurasianet.org, 29 July 2010 Ignore the title and read how a program on community monitoring could be making small but crucial changes.

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Wikileaks, Strategic Communications and (Im-)Plausible Denials

Thomas Ruttig •

Wikileaks, with its publication of some 75,000 classified US military documents on the war in Afghanistan on Sunday, has brilliantly made use of the summer slump. Instead of escaped crocodiles at lakes popular with swimmers (a favourite of the German media in former years) or silly ideas of backbenchers, we have been given the chance […]

International Engagement Read more

Afghanistan war: How USAID loses hearts and minds

admin •

Christian Science Monitor, 28 July 2010 The story about how a over-reported but under-staffed and under-achieving development project lost hearts and minds in Badakhshan – with the usual ingredients: Afghanistan-unexperienced companies, subcontracting, and spening pressure, i.e.

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Aus Bündnistreue zur Sowjetunion: Eine kurze Suche nach der DDR-Entwicklungszusammenarbeit mit Afghanistan und den Spuren, die sie hinterlassen hat

Thomas Ruttig •

Thomas Ruttig, in: T. Kunze/T. Vogel (eds.), Ostalgie international: Erinnerungen an die DDR von Nicaragua bis Vietnam, Christoph Links Verlag, Berlin, 2010. In Loyalty to the USSR: A short quest for GDR development cooperation with Afghanistan and the traces it left: Chapter in an anthology about the GDR – i.e. East German – engagement in […]

External publications Read more

Kabul Conference (4): Don’t Mention the War

Martine van Bijlert •

The Kabul Conference has ended, the foreign ministers have left, the roads have reopened for traffic. Most Afghans seem unimpressed. Several of the ‘big speeches’, and probably quite a few of the ‘smaller’ ones, impressed upon the audience that it was actions, not words that would ultimately count. They are of course right and I […]

Political Landscape Read more

A City Tour for V.I.P.’s Attending the Kabul Conference

admin •

New York Times blog, 21 July 2010 Unfortunately, this tour was virtual only. The NYT’s Kabul bureau chief and her Afghan colleagues Sharifullah Sahak and Abdul Waheed Wafa report what Hillary Clinton and Gen. Petraeus COULD have seen if they had been able to leave the well-protected conference venues: people losing some days’ income because […]

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Kabul Conference (3): More plans and programs, but what has happened to the earlier ones?

Thomas Ruttig •

There are mixed feelings among Afghans on the eve of Kabul International Conference. Many people who are involved in convening the Conference, are extremely excited and proud that it’s the FIRST international event being hosted and planned by the Afghan government during the past ten years. However, there are some other critics who continue with […]

International Engagement Read more

Voters Angry at “Warlord” Candidates

admin •

IWPR, 19 July 2010 Another encouraging story of Sarepul citizens who moved to block former commanders from running for parliament, and in an factionally balanced way: one Jamiati, one Jombeshi. This is while exit-prone Western governments look for ‘local strongmen’ as allies.

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Kabul Conference (2): How to spend three quarters of a billion dollars

Kate Clark •

AAN has seen and studied the – not yet public – Afghan government’s plan to reintegrate Taleban who lay down their arms. We also took a look at an earlier draft (see an earlier blog) and have been following the process since well before the London conference. Now comes the moment, at the Kabul Conference, […]

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Kabul Conference (1): Outsmarted and made to pay

Martine van Bijlert •

For weeks I have dismissed the Kabul conference as yet another conference – as something diplomats do, when they don’t know what to do. It was, as usual, preceded by a merry-go-round of pre-meetings and document-drafting-sessions and discrete enquiries (who is coming from your side? are you pledging?), which made it look like simply more […]

International Engagement Read more

New NDS boss – who is he?

Kate Clark •

The appointment of a new head of NDS (National Directorate of Security) has come with a lot less fanfare than the departure of the old one, Amrullah Saleh, who resigned after deep disagreements with the president over policy towards the Taleban. The acting director, Engineer Ibrahim Spinzada, has returned to the shadows and his day […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

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