Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Month: September 2014

Afghanistan signs deal to keep US troops

AAN

Daily Telegraph, 30 September 2014 AAN’s Kate Clark quoted here on the financial repercussions of the BSA signing: “It’s not the American soldiers, but the money in the pockets of the army and police, that’s the critical thing. If you’re trying to fight an insurgency with soldiers and police who are not getting paid, then […]

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Vliv Karzáího doma zůstane velký

Thomas Ruttig

Haló (Czech Rep.), 30 September 2014 A quote from AAN’s Thomas Ruttig, on the future role of ex-president Karzai (apparently from an older AAN dispatch): Thomas Ruttig, spoluředitel nezávislé výzkumné organizace Afghanistan Analysts Network v Kábulu, upozorňuje, že Karzáí si dobře připravil půdu, aby zůstal v politické hře. »Úspěšně spolupracoval se všemi hlavními prezidentskými kandidáty a […]

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US and Afghanistan sign long-awaited security agreement

Thomas Ruttig

al-Jazeera US, 30 September 2014 A brief quote of AAN’s Thomas Ruttig on the future NATO training mission in Afghanistan: “’If the Afghan government and Afghans want this, this is good,’ said Thomas Ruttig, a co-director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network. ‘They need training, not such in how to fight but on the rules that […]

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President Ghani sworn in ny chief judge. Photo c/o ToloNews.

Elections 2014 (53): Ghani sworn in as Afghanistan’s new president

Kate Clark

Afghanistan finally has a new president – and a chief executive officer (CEO). Ashraf Ghani’s first act after being sworn in was to sign a decree establishing the new position of CEO and then appointing to it his bitter election rival and now partner in government, Abdullah Abdullah, who was thereby enabled to also take […]

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Afghans are riding a secret Kabul-Canada express

AAN

Los Angeles Daily News, 29 September 2014 In an article about some Afghan army officers defecting during a training stay in the US, the author builds the link to the current Afghan situation and the elections, quoting AAN’s Kate Clark: “In the end, the deal to form a successor administration to Karzai’s was done behind […]

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Afghanischer Stillstand [Keine Opposition. Nirgends.]

Thomas Ruttig

Frankfurter Rundschau, 29 September 2014 Op-ed commentary by AAN’s Thomas Ruttig on the Afghan election result (what it means for Afghan democracy), resulting in the conclusion that, with the competing camps of Ghani an Abdullah joining hands in the ‘government of national unity’, the political opposition now also officially joins the government, leaving not much […]

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Elections 2014 (52): The not yet officially announced results – electoral maths with unknowns

Thomas Ruttig

After over five months, Afghanistan has finally an election result … kind of. In a remarkable step, the Independent Election Commission (IEC) announced the winner of the run-off on 21 September 2014, but did not release the results – apparently one of Abdullah’s unbending conditions for reaching a final agreement on the national unity government. […]

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Ein neuer Präsident und ein Wahlsieger

Thomas Ruttig

Neues Deutschland, 27 September 2014 In this guest article for the Berlin-based daily, Thomas Ruttig looks at the agreement on the government of national unity and the election outcome. With figures indicating that fraud detected in the audit has not turned the election outcome in Abdullah’s favour and his camp taking over the new positions […]

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Karzai struggles against foreign detentions – state releases Taleban?

Kate Clark

In the last weeks of his presidency, President Hamed Karzai has again been trying to eradicate the last traces of foreign involvement in detentions, sending a commission to investigate the so-called Tor Jail, an American interrogation facility on Bagram airbase, and reactivating the Afghan Review Board, which had been sifting detainees transferred by the US […]

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Tumultuous birth of Afghanistan’s power sharing accord

AAN

BBC, 24 September 2014 Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s chief international correspondent, quotes AAN’s Kate Clark in her analysis of the Afghan election outcome, the apprehension it created and the personnel – much of it with a well-known past – involved in it: “At best, they will now work as partners with a common goal.” observes […]

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Will Afghanistan’s new leader settle the country’s relations with the U.S.?

AAN

Washington Post, 24 September 2014 Stating that “there are still questions over whether Afghanistan’s new government will remain unified, following a contentious elecion process that threatened a major political crisis”, Dan Lamothe in the Post’s Checkpoint blog on military affairs (here in the BSA context) quotes from AAN’s dispatch about the Ghani-Abdullah power sharing agreement: […]

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