Rumors are swirling in Afghanistan that the country’s president, Hamid Karzai, is losing faith in the capacity for the West to defeat the Taliban, and some are even accusing Karzai of trying to strike his own deal with the Taliban and arch-rival Pakistan. The rumors follow a dramatic meeting between Karzai and the just-resigned intelligence chief and interior secretary, both of whom defected from the administration after claims that Karzai was unwilling to show interest in evidence proving the Talbian’s culpability in a rocket attack earlier this month. —JCL The New York Times: Two senior Afghan officials were showing President Hamid Karzai the evidence of the spectacular rocket attack on a nationwide peace conference earlier this month when Mr. Karzai told them that he believed the Taliban were not responsible. “The president did not show any interest in the evidence — none — he treated it like a piece of dirt,” said Amrullah Saleh, then the director of the Afghan intelligence service. Mr. Saleh declined to discuss Mr. Karzai’s reasoning in more detail. But a prominent Afghan with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Mr. Karzai suggested in the meeting that it might have been the Americans who carried it out. Minutes after the exchange, Mr. Saleh and the interior minister, Hanif Atmar, resigned — the most dramatic defection from Mr. Karzai’s government since he came to power nine years ago. Mr. Saleh and Mr. Atmar said they quit because Mr. Karzai made clear that he no longer considered them loyal. Read more Related Entries June 11, 2010 British PM: 2010 ‘Vital’ for Afghanistan June 9, 2010 Kandahar Test [A Cartoon From UAE]
The rest is here:
Is Karzai Losing The Faith?
