Afghanistan's Character Shreds NATO Ideals

Afghan student journalist's death sentence upheld: a rejection of open democracy?

Written by Joshua Grenzsund

Wednesday, 13 February 2008

Source: NATO On Jan. 30, Afghanistan’s Meshrano Jirga (from the country's House of Elders) issued a statement endorsing the death sentence of journalist Sayed Perwiz Kambakhsh and criticizing the international pressure to nullify the Balkh provincial court’s ruling. The following day, the jirga withdrew its statement, as legal experts pointed out the unconstitutionality of the parliamentary body’s involvement in judicial affairs and 200 protesters marched in Kabul to protest Perwiz’s sentence. However, the jirga, headed by President Hamid Karzai’s ally Sibghatullah Mojaddedi, maintained its support for the prosecution of anti-Islamic activities. This succession of statements coincides with the release of three reports on the political and military state of affairs in Afghanistan, all of which assess that things are going poorly. The analysis released by the US Afghanistan Study Group flatly claims that “the mission to stabilize Afghanistan is faltering.” Additionally, Afghanistan recently rejected the United Nation’s choice of Paddy Ashdown as an envoy with expanded authority. Taken together, all these represent the country's wholesale rejection of Western ideals at the same time that NATO powers struggle with their own commitment to Afghanistan’s stabilization and democratization. The ASG analysis warns that “Afghanistan stands today at a crossroads,” citing theTaliban’s “anti-government insurgency that has grown considerably over the past two years” as well as public opposition to the war in several NATO countries that is “threatening to fray the coalition in the next two years.” Most recently, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper notified US President George Bush that Canada will not renew its troops’ mission, in the violent south, unless it receives more support from other NATO nations. Their mission is scheduled to end in 2009. In response to the rejection of Ashdown, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice acknowledged that “the international community has not yet found a way to coordinate its effort in a way that is effective and efficient and can fully support the Afghan government in reconstruction." This failure to maintain the momentum built up from the 2001 invasion through the 2004 parliamentary and presidential elections has opened up the space for the inertia of Afghan independence on its own terms. The Taliban’s disturbing resurgence in Afghanistan’s south is matched by the government’s legislative and judicial branches’ equally disquieting use ofShari’a law as a cover for corruption and intimidation. The death sentence of Perwiz illustrates this brash confidence flies in the face of the country's recent foreign occupation. Half a decade is all the country’s leaders needed for the mujahideen-like tenacity and patience to wear down international resolve. Perwiz has been convicted of blasphemy for printing, and sharing with friends, an Internet blog article that criticizes a passage of the Koran. Shortly after his arrest this past October, his case was, unusually, referred to the Balkh Shura-ye Ulema (Council of Religious Scholars) instead of a civil court. The council recommended a death sentence for apostasy and rejection of Islamic faith — a civil court later heard the case and convicted Perwiz of blasphemy. Though Perwiz is afforded three appeals, he was denied counsel at his initial trial and many are deriding the harsh sentence as a blatant move by corrupt judges and lawmakers to intimidate Perwiz’s brother Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi, a journalist who has been critical of several Afghan politicians in northern Afghanistan. Yaqub’s reporting for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting has covered alleged human rights violations, killings, kidnappings, armed robberies and other instances of intimidation carried out by warlords-turned-leaders in Baghlan and Faryab provinces. One of Yaqub’s articles reports that “a former regional strongman was now ‘masquerading’ as the head of a security firm” and that these armed fighters, possibly 25,000 nationwide, are equally dangerous to the population, whether they are recognized as outlaws or as legal private security personnel. Yaqub has also been openly critical of General Abdul Rashid Dostum, an ethnic Uzbek who is very influential in the country’s north. Though Dostum currently serves as chief of staff to the commander-in-chief of Afghanistan's armed forces in Kabul, several of his former sub-commanders have expanded their influence in the north at a time when most international attention is focused on the Taliban in the south. One of Yaqub’s articles characterizes Abdul Rahman Shamal, a former Dostum lieutenant, as “a king … accompanied by armed men on horseback.” The article also describes private prisons, extortion and widespread abuses. The growing intimidation of Yaqub, peaking with the sentencing of his brother, demonstrates the extreme lawlessness that existsunder the faltering veneer of western-style stabilization. In the context of Perwiz’s and Yaqub’s treatment by religious scholars, the courts and now the Afghan jirga, Jean Mackenzie, IWPR Afghanistan Program Director, said that this indicates “a frightening new level of attacks on freedom of speech and the media in Afghanistan.” This crackdown on free press is just a symptom of a more elemental reality that the fractious country is fueled by guns and drugs. Those in control of the money and fighters cannot tolerate the depth of corruption exposed to the public to any degree; they turn to the severe punishments of Shari’a law to discourage investigative reporting. As a seemingly final insult to the international efforts to institute a free democracy in Afghanistan, IWPR reported that those most pleased with the government’s posturing is the Taliban, who have posted praise on their website saying that they encourage the “jihadi and brave Afghans toadminister severe chastisement to the perpetrator of this action.” Many previous occupiers of Afghanistan have been likewise blindsided by synchronous turns of events that repeatedly reveal a reality that runs counter to would-beliberators' or occupiers’ aspirations. Though President Karzai must approve Perwiz’s death sentence for it to be carried out, he has so far been largely silent on the issue, even amid growing international concern. This failure to lead his nation towards democratic ideals indicates Afghanistan’s reassertion of its indomitable, if fractured, identity and its final preparation for throwing out this latest wave of foreign occupation and foreign influence. Though the warlords and the Taliban are not likely to unite in the absence of an international occupation, they will do so in order to achieve their individual short-term goals and force out the foreign body within their borders. 2008 thecampusword.com