The EU’s foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, arrived in Kabul yesterday for a day-long visit he said was aimed at finding ways to improve international efforts to help the struggling nation. Solana, last in Afghanistan in 2004, was due to meet Afghan President Hamid Karzai as well as lawmakers, the commander of a NATO-led military force, and new UN envoy Kai Eide, his office said.
The diplomat told the Daily Outlook Afghanistan newspaper he was visiting at a “particularly important time of renewed commitment by the international community” to the country at a NATO summit this month and ahead of a Paris meeting of Afghan donors in June.
That commitment was also reflected in the appointment of Eide, he said. The Norwegian arrived last month with a mandate to sharpen the multibillion-dollar international effort that is often criticized as disjointed and wasteful.
“This is the moment to reflect on what we, the international community, can do, working in conjunction with our Afghan partners, to enhance our efforts,” Solana told the paper in comments published yesterday.
“It is important that Afghan solutions are found to Afghan problems,” he said.
The diplomat’s spokeswoman, Cristina Gallach, told reporters in Brussels ahead of the visit that Solana’s trip would be focused on the June 12 Paris conference of Afghanistan’s donors.
Solana told the Kabul-based newspaper that he would tour the headquarters of a European police training and mentoring team during his visit.
The boosted European mission of 230 people is setting up across the country to train Afghanistan’s weak police force, which is on the frontline of an insurgency led by Taliban Islamic extremists.
Solana, who is due to travel on to Pakistan, which is also facing extremist violence, stressed in his published comments that the solution to Afghanistan’s problems involved more than a military effort.
“The approach must be global and joined up, encompassing the rule of law, development, reconstruction, economic growth, rural development and education,” he said.
“It is very important that the efforts should be led by Afghans,” he said, reflecting growing demands by Karzai and his government for more ownership of the work here.
In Pakistan today, Solana will be one of the most senior EU officials to meet the country’s new leaders following the Feb. 18 polls.
“We want to have solid relations with this new government, at the moment when it is necessary to consolidate the democratic process and the line of reform,” she said.
Solana’s trip, to include talks with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and new Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, would also focus on the relationship between Pakistan and India and their dispute over Kashmir, she said.
Millions of dollars have poured into bets on who will win the US presidential election after a last-minute court ruling opened up gambling on the vote, upping the stakes on a too-close-to-call race between US Vice President Kamala Harris and former US president Donald Trump that has already put voters on edge. Contracts for a Harris victory were trading between 48 and 50 percent in favor of the Democrat on Friday on Interactive Brokers, a firm that has taken advantage of a legal opening created earlier this month in the country’s long running regulatory battle over election markets. With just a month
North Korea blew up sections of roads in its own territory that are part of links once used to connect the southern part of the peninsula with the north, in a show of defiance after it accused Seoul of flying drones over Pyongyang. North Korea detonated bombs north of its eastern and western borders at around noon yesterday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said. South Korea’s military later fired off warning shots within its border, said the JCS, which also confirmed there were no reports of damage in South Korea from the detonations. A video released by the South Korean
US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is in “excellent health” and fit for the presidency, according to a medical report published by the White House on Saturday as she challenged her rival, former US president Donald Trump, to publish his own health records. “Vice President Harris remains in excellent health,” her physician Joshua Simmons said in the report, adding that she “possesses the physical and mental resiliency required to successfully execute the duties of the presidency.” Speaking to reporters ahead of a trip to North Carolina, Harris called Trump’s unwillingness to publish his records “a further example
‘PROVOCATION’: Accusing Seoul of flying drones over Pyongyang to drop propaganda leaftlets, the North told eight artillery brigades ‘to get fully ready to open fire’ Tensions on the Korean Peninsula rose again after North Korea ordered troops along its southern border to be ready to fire and military leaders in Seoul said Pyongyang might be preparing to blow up roads connecting the two nations. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said it detected efforts under way in North Korea to destroy the eastern and western roads connecting the two nations, warning that an explosion could take place as early as yesterday. That followed North Korea’s announcement last week that it would “completely separate” its territory from the South, blaming Seoul’s joint drills with the US and the