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Contributions from
the Column
Studies and reports
Islands of stability in a sea of poppies
PRSPs remain unconvincing so far
“The atrocities committed
would today be termed genocide”
Hopes pinned on civil society
10/2004 |
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[ Afghanistan ]
Islands of stability in a sea of poppies
The German Development Ministry, harbours doubts about the benefits of the mission in Kunduz in northern Afghanistan. According to Erich Stather, State Secretary of the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the German Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) sent by the Ministries of Development and Defence as well as the Foreign Office is following more of a military logic than a development logic. The mission was not initially geared towards where in Afghanistan development policy might sensibly be worked on, but rather how President Hamid Karzai's government could be supported in terms of security. Only then was it asked how development cooperation could contribute. “This is not in accordance with the usual development approach,” Stather said in mid-September at an InWEnt policy dialogue on the subject of “Development Policy and the Armed Forces” in Berlin. Nevertheless, the Development Ministry now also wants to contribute to the second German PRT in Faizabad. Five development projects, worth 250 000 euros, will start this year.
Criticism of the operation in Kunduz also came from Hans-Joachim Preuss, General Secretary of development NGO Deutsche Welthungerhilfe/German Agro Action. As Preuss stressed, German Agro Action had already been active in northern Afghanistan before the German reconstruction team arrived. The security of Agro Action staff “is not automatically enhanced by the presence of the armed forces.” Communication between the military and aid organisations is inadequate and armed forces’ staff is often rotated, which means fundamental issues of cooperation have to be constantly re-clarified. According to Preuss, the Bundeswehr’s civil operations, such as building streets or wells did not follow development considerations but were more concerned with security, for example, the security of routes for possible evacuations. From Agro Action’s viewpoint, there is “little coherence” in the military and civil organisations’ activities.
The international mission in Afghanistan contains a contradiction which continuously undermines the efforts of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), under the umbrella of which the Provincial Reconstruction Teams operate. In their hunt for alleged terrorists and Taliban as part of operation “Enduring Freedom”, the USA has no scruples to cooperate with the provincial warlords and turn a blind eye to their drug trafficking. Enduring Freedom thus fosters two main reasons for instability in Afghanistan – and sabotages ISAF’s mission to strengthen the government in Kabul.
BMZ Director-General Ursula Schäfer-Preuss is therefore pleading for ISAF and Enduring Freedom to merge under an integrated ISAF commando – on the condition that no more terrorists would be hunted down in the scope of this new operation. However, Jon Greenwald, Vice President of the International Crisis Group, expressed doubt in Berlin that a merger would solve the problem. “There is a great danger that ISAF would then get completely pushed aside.” In any case, the USA cannot be prevented from hunting terrorists in Afghanistan, as long as they consider it necessary – with or without the consent of the international community.
Winrich Kühne, head of the Berlin Centre for International Peace Operations (ZIF), therefore demands more honesty in the assessment of the PRTs. In his view, they do not follow a “grand design” as is often claimed by government officials, but are rather a simple stopgap measure. “The reconstruction teams are all the international community can do in Afghanistan under the given conditions.” The teams may create islands of stability as was hoped for. They will not, however, dry up the sea of poppies that surrounds them. (ell)
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