The Afghan government could fall within weeks if NATO pulled out troops now, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said on Friday as he urged British opponents of the war to give the fight to rebuild the country more time.
In an interview at the end of a visit to Kabul for the presidential inauguration of Hamid Karzai, Miliband said: “If international forces leave, you can choose a time — five minutes, 24 hours or seven days — but the insurgent forces will overrun those forces that are prepared to put up resistance and we would be back to square one.”
At the end of a day spent visiting British troops and officials at the headquarters of the international military effort, Miliband said Afghans were “sad that they need anyone, but they are passionate that my goodness they do — because if we weren’t here their country would be rolled over.”
PHOTO: REUTERS
He agreed that public anxiety about the war is growing in Britain as a result of rising casualties.
“Afghanistan wasn’t on the front pages until the last six months for obvious reasons,” he said. “Now, for tragic reasons, there is a lot of interest. What we have to do is explain to people that the costs of staying are real but they are less than the costs of leaving.”
He called for the three main party leaders in Britain to remain united in support of the war, despite growing unease, in particular from Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg.
“Nick Clegg and David Cameron [leader of the UK Conservatives] ask serious questions about different aspects of the campaign. They can do that and they should be asked,” Miliband said.
But he challenged opponents of the war to show that retreat would not harm both Afghanistan and Britain.
“I don’t think British opinion is about to flip to a position that says withdraw now,” he said. “But there is a high degree of concern about the casualties, understandably, there is a high degree of concern about the complexity of effecting a strategy in a country with history as complex as this, and there is a high degree of concern about all the partners that we have got.”
“There is a natural reaction to 18, 19, 20-year-olds, your neighbors, relatives and your friends being killed. It makes you ask, why are we there, can you succeed, is it worth it?” he said.
Concerns about Karzai’s failure to combat bribery and extortion in Afghanistan led British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to warn earlier this month that he would not put UK troops “in harm’s way for a government that does not stand up against corruption.”
After meeting Karzai yesterday, Miliband said the Afghan president had asked him “to convey to the British people his gratitude for the sacrifices being made by British soldiers in defending his country. In particular he repeated to me, as he had to the prime minister, his condolences and his shock at the terrible killing of five British soldiers by an Afghan policeman.”
Miliband said Karzai’s estimation of a three to five-year deadline for the handover of security control to Afghan forces would not mean an end to western involvement.
“My argument is not stay or go, my argument is we stay for a purpose, for a period, for progress,” he said. “Artificial timetables just give succor to your enemy. We are going to transition, and transition is a better word than exit.”
“The argument we have to take on is the argument that it is futile, and we have to take it on directly by saying that it is making a difference towards a goal,” he said.
Miliband agreed that Britain should look beyond its military efforts in the south of the country.
“It is important we don’t fall into a trap of ‘Helmandshire,’ that we are creating a colony,” he said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS