We can't sweep Afghanistan under the rug
Victor Angelo
Mario
Draghi, the Italian Prime Minister and current leader of the G20, is convening an
extraordinary summit of the group for October 12, with only one item on the
agenda: Afghanistan. This is an urgent meeting that cannot wait for the annual
summit, which is scheduled for the last two days of this month. The concerns
about Afghanistan are essentially twofold: the humanitarian drama, already much
worsened at the moment, but which will become catastrophic with the imminent
arrival of winter; and defining the conditions necessary for the international
recognition of the Taliban regime.
The
European Union has meanwhile approved a humanitarian package of 200 million
euros. Other aid is urgently needed, not least because the donor community
pledged more than a billion dollars on September 13, in response to an appeal
launched by António Guterres. But, as always, promises are one thing, but their
materialization is another. In addition to logistical difficulties and
insecurity, the humanitarian agencies need guarantees of neutrality from the
Taliban. This is the only way to ensure that food aid, medical and health care,
and educational support reaches those in need without exclusion on the basis of
ethnicity, gender, religion, or power relations.
Still
in the humanitarian area, there are three other major issues.
One
is the payment of salaries to civil servants and security forces who have not
been paid for months. I don't think there is a willingness at the G20 level to
finance this. Recently, my former colleague Jan Egeland, a recognized voice in
the humanitarian field and who now heads the prestigious Norwegian Refugee
Council, wrote an open letter on this subject to the UN Secretary-General. It
called for mechanisms to be put in place to find a solution to pay salaries to
the Afghan civil service, as was already largely the case under the previous
government. The letter was a follow-up to his recent visit to Afghanistan and
his shock at the widespread poverty.
Another
issue concerns the electricity supply. Millions in Kabul and the country's
largest cities are at risk of being left in the dark. With the onset of winter,
this could be yet another cataclysm to add to all the others. Afghanistan
imports about 70 percent of the electricity it consumes. Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan,
Tajikistan and Iran are the suppliers. With the Taliban victory and the
administrative chaos that followed, payments for electricity imports have
ceased. If the situation does not change soon, it is very likely that some of
these countries, especially those that were part of the former Soviet Union and
have no sympathy whatsoever for the extremists in Kabul, will suspend supply.
If this happens, popular unrest will take on a new dimension.
How
long Afghanistan will need exceptional humanitarian aid is the third big
question. Assistance must have a time horizon. The country needs to build an
economy that allows it to import the energy and basic commodities it cannot
produce, and to have a reasonable standard of living. The economy should not be
based almost exclusively on opium production.
Recognition
of the new regime, including its representation in the UN, will depend on the
position that each G20 member adopts. Recent events show a tendency to
establish occasional contacts, while at the political level there will continue
to be talk of values, human rights, national inclusion, or the fight against
terrorism. And to show a lot of mistrust towards Taliban governance. As time
goes by, if there is no extreme migratory crisis or terrorist attack that affects
the Western world, the new Afghan regime, whether recognized or not, could be
just one more to add to the list of repressive, failed and forgotten states.
(Automatic translation of the opinion piece I published in the Diário de
Notícias, the old and prestigious Lisbon newspaper. Edition dated 8 October 2021)
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