POLITICAL BACKGROUND - HAMID KARZAI

POLITICAL BACKGROUND
The former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) occupied Afghanistan from 1979 until early 1989. By late 1987, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimated that one million Afghans had died in the fighting between Soviet troops and the mujahidin resistance forces (supported by arms from the United States and Islamic nations such as Pakistan). The Soviets withdrew in 1989, partly because of instability in their own government. (The USSR broke apart into independent states in 1991.) Afghanistan
experienced internal chaos and President Muhammad
Najibullah struggled to maintain control of the country as
pressure from the mujahidin and outside forces increased.
The country floundered, with rival factions battling for
control of the government. In 1992, the mujahidin gained
control of Kabul and Najibullah’s government fell.
An interim government was established by a coalition of
Islamic groups known as the Seven Party Alliance (SPA).
Rival groups continued to clash violently and UN attempts to
broker peace among the groups were unsuccessful.
Burhanuddin Rabbani became president of the Interim
Government in 1992, but maintaining control of the various
factions in the country proved nearly impossible. Alliances
continually shifted after President Rabbani took office; he
was scheduled to leave office in December 1994 but refused
on the grounds that political authority would disintegrate
totally.
One of the major forces vying for power was the Uzbek
militia of General Abdul Rashid Dostum, whose break with
Najibullah in early 1992 helped overthrow the communist
regime. In January 1994, Dostum led an unsuccessful
rebellion against Rabbani. Another faction was the Iranbacked
Hizb-e-Wahdat (Unity Party, an alliance of eight Shia
Muslim groups). In early June 1992 Hizb-e-Wahdat had
agreed to join the mujahidin regime but broke with Rabbani
in January 1994.
In 1994, a new group known as the Taliban (Students of
Religion, or Seekers) formed and began rallying to control the
country. Consisting of Islamic clerics and students from
seminaries that sprung up in Pakistan among the communities
of Afghan refugees, the Taliban movement came into
being after the war against the Soviets and Najibullah. The
Taliban seized control of the southeastern city of Kandahar in
November 1994 and continued to gather strength.
In February 1995, the Taliban gained control of areas on
the outskirts of Kabul and demanded that Rabbani surrender.
When Rabbani refused, and the Taliban rejected UN efforts
to include it in a peaceful transition, an 18-month stalemate
around Kabul ensued. In its drive to Kabul, the Taliban
amassed about 25,000 troops, a few hundred tanks, and ten combat aircraft. In September 1996, Taliban victories east of
Kabul led to the destruction of the Rabbani government’s
defenses, and the government withdrew to the valley north of
Kabul. With the Taliban capture of Kabul, the Northern
Alliance formed, made up of differing factions that had one
thing in common: their passionate interest in ousting the
Taliban. Northern Alliance forces continued to fight for
control of the north.
In spring 2000, the Taliban, claiming a series of defections
from the Rabbani Northern Alliance camp, began preparations
for a renewed offensive to gain the remaining part of
Afghanistan not under their control. The Taliban government
was led by mujahidin fighter-turned-religious-scholar,
Muhammad Omar. He is thought to have been born in
Kandahar in 1962. Described as a determined man, Omar
had served as deputy chief commander in the Harakat-i-
Inqilab-i Islamic party of Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi
during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s.
Virtually unknown until the Taliban’s capture of Kandahar,
Omar remained a mysterious figure with reportedly strong
ties to Osama bin Laden and other Islamist radicals. Under
Omar’s Taliban government, the Afghan people were
subjected to harsh imposition of Islamic law. Women were
forbidden from working outside the home (except health
workers), girls’ schools were closed, and a strict Islamic dress
code was imposed. The Taliban lost international support as
it imposed harsh punishments on those who violated Islamic
law. The UN and other international aid organizations
(including UNHCR, UNICEF, Save the Children, and Oxfam)
cut back or ceased operations in protest; many staff members
were female and unable to adhere to the strict regulations.
Taliban control did restore peace by suppressing and
disarming members of rival militias. The roads were
reopened, leading to a greater availability of food in areas
under Taliban control.
When terrorists attacked the World Trade Center in New
York and The Pentagon in Washington, D.C., on 11
September 2001, international attention focused on Afghanistan.
Most experts implicated Osama bin Laden and his close
associate, Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar, in the
attacks. The U.S. government, with support of its allies,
undertook a month of massive air attacks until the Taliban
was driven out of power in October 2001 and an interim
government was installed in December 2001. Hamid Karzai
was named chairman of the interim government.
In the weeks and months following the fall of the Taliban,
life in Afghanistan was fraught with danger. U.S.-led military
operations were ongoing. International peacekeepers, aid
workers, and Afghans became victims of grenade attacks, fire
fights, and bombings, making the security situation
precarious. Thus, the task of reconstruction and providing
aid to Afghanistan has proven difficult. In January 2002,
donor countries pledged US$4.5 billion for the reconstruction
effort. However, less than half of the amount earmarked for
2002 was ever actually delivered.
In June 2002, a loya jirga (council of elders) was convened
to choose a government to lead the country for 18 months to
two years until elections are held. Karzai was elected transitional
head of state, garnering 1,295 of a possible 1,575
votes. On 19 and 22 June Karzai introduced a 28-member
cabinet representative of many different ethnic and political
backgrounds. He named three vice presidents—Mohammed
Qasim Fahim, Karim Khalili, and Haji Abdul Qadir. Vice
President Qadir was assassinated on 6 July 2002. Karzai
himself narrowly escaped assassination on 5 September 2002,
as a gunman dressed in an Afghan military uniform shot at
him and Kandahar’s governor Gul Agha Sherzai as they were
getting into their car. On 22 November 2002, a plot to
assassinate Karzai or his defense minister, Mohammed Fahim,
was thwarted.
As of January 2003, there were still two million Afghan
refugees in Iran and approximately 1.5 million in Pakistan. In
2002, an estimated two million Afghans returned home.

ALBANIA - FATOS THANA NANO - PRIME MINISTER

 

The Republic of Albania is situated in southeastern Europe
and is bordered to the south by Greece, to the east by the
Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), to the
north by Serbia and Montenegro, and to the west by the
Adriatic Sea. The total area is 28,748 sq km (17,864 sq mi),
of which over two-thirds is mountainous and the rest river
valleys and coastal lowlands.
The country’s total population was estimated at 3.5
million in July 2002. Over 95% are ethnic Albanian, with
Greeks comprising most of the rest. Outside of the country’s
borders live about an equal number of ethnic Albanians,
mainly in the Kosovo region within Serbia and Montenegro,
and also in Macedonia, Greece, and Italy. About 70% of the
population are Muslim; however, atheism is also widespread
as a result of an official ban on religious worship from the
1960s to 1990. By 2002 the government had relaxed this ban,
and the practice of religion increased slightly. The Albanian
language has two main dialects, Geg and Tosk (considered
the official dialect).
The country’s gross domestic product (GDP) was
estimated at US$13.2 billion in 2001, with per capita GDP
estimated at US$3,800 that year. The national currency is the
lek. Albania’s natural resources include oil, gas, coal, and
metals. Agriculture and mining constitute the largest industries.
Frequent drought, obsolete equipment, and the need to
consolidate numerous small farms have hampered the growth
of the agriculture sector.

AFGHANISTAN - HAMID KARZAI

 

The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, located in Central Asia,
is a landlocked nation slightly smaller than Texas. It has a
total land area of 647,500 sq km (250,001 sq mi). It is
bordered on the north by the former Soviet republics of
Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan, on the east and
south by Pakistan, and on the west by Iran. A strip of land
less than 80 km (50 mi) wide and known as the Wakhan
corridor extends to the northeast. It forms a 76-km (47-mi)
border with China. The population was estimated in 2002 at
27.7 million, although decades of warfare make accurate
population counts impossible. The capital, Kabul, is located
in the east-central part of the country. The 2002 population
of Kabul was estimated at 2.1 million; a large number of
displaced persons, many of them refugees from neighboring
countries, returned to the city in 2002.
The average elevation is 1,200 m (4,000 ft). The towering
Hindu Kush mountain range, running southwest from the
Wakhan corridor in the northeast, has elevations of more
than 6,200 m (20,000 ft). In the provinces north of the Hindu
Kush the altitude drops to about 460 m (1,500 ft), enabling
farmers to grow cotton, fruit, grains, and other crops. The
central part of the country features a plateau with lush valleys
suitable for grazing sheep, goats, and camels. In the
southwest, the land is a barren desert where the temperature
extremes are the greatest found anywhere in the country.
Decades of violent civil and international conflicts have
caused widespread poverty, devastated the roads, bridges,
and infrastructure, and left the countryside riddled with
dangerous land mines. (The United Nations [UN] estimates
that 7–10 million land mines remain buried in Afghanistan,
rendering much farming and grazing land useless.) Earthquakes
in the northern Hindu Kush region, overgrazing, and
rampant deforestation by citizens in search of fuel and
building materials all combine to present the government in
2002 with the challenge of resurrecting even the most basic
services.
Pashtu and Dari (Afghani variant of Persian) are the
official languages. Dari is the language spoken in Kabul and
has historically been the principal language of Afghan literature,
government, and business. Many Afghans are bilingual
and almost all are Muslim.