KABUL: The leaders of the reconstruction conference - jointly chaired by Japan, the US, the European Union, and Saudi Arabia - argue that the global war on terrorism makes the case for aid to Afghanistan on a level no other country has seen since World War II. But there’s a wariness in the air. The basic lack of government and proven ability to govern effectively could make it difficult to keep donor countries’ faith in Afghanistan’s capacity to turn a new page.

To repair such a profoundly broken country, pledging cash is only a first step. And yet there are already signs of a reluctance to make good on pledges even before the real work of rebuilding has begun.

The United Nations says that of the $20 million in start-up funds promised to Afghanistan in Bonn, Germany in December, only $8 million has come in - and even that required nagging by the UN - leaving the nascent government unable to do much more than talk about governing, much less rebuilding.

Indeed, the financial commitments expected to be made as the conference concludes today will only be the initial steps on a long road to reconstruction.

The actual level of funding to Afghanistan is likely to hinge on how US and British troops, some 4,500 international peacekeepers, and a growing pool of aid workers are treated by the local population. Aid experts look back sadly to the case of Somalia, where US soldiers, who were supposed to deliver food to a war-torn, famine-starved country, were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu, dashing international sympathy. There, warlords and bandits also snatched up much of the food aid, using it to feed troops or to resell for profit.

A disturbingly similar pattern may now be appearing here, as well. Last week, two storehouses belonging to the World Food Programme were looted. In a country where at least one-fifth of the population goes hungry each night, such thefts may be understandable, but should not stand, aid experts say.

The loss of food is less important that what it represents: lawlessness, and the interim government’s as-yet unmet need to prove that it - not regional fiefdoms and random gunmen - is in control.

Mukesh Kapila, head of the Conflict and International Affairs Department at Britain’s national aid agency, says donor countries will be searching for signs that funds and food are able to reach people in need without interference. “This will not happen without a strategic improvement in security,” says Dr Kapila, speaking in Islamabad, after his assessment mission to Afghanistan. “Undoubtedly, there is an uphill struggle ahead.”

Donor skepticism does not come without cause. In recent years, efforts to help rebuild other countries after years of conflict - whether international or internecine - have often been a let-down. In Cambodia, for example, international peacekeepers and aid allocations failed to stop the return of political corruption and the disregard for democratic elections.

Will Afghanistan be different? Kapila says it can, by learning from the mistakes elsewhere. “In East Timor, it took a year for the first dollar to be converted into cash. That’s not going to happen in Afghanistan,” he says.

Getting money to Afghanistan, however, is no easy feat. There is no functioning banking system, just an unofficial network of money-changers and black market movers. The Taliban looted the central bank’s vault before fleeing Kabul. Exchange rates are different in various parts of the country, and the Afghani soared in value after the Dec 5 Bonn Agreement was signed. That means that the dollars promised to Afghanistan in Germany in December are only worth about a third to a fourth what they were a month and a half ago.

The aid that has been injected thus far is in part responsible for driving up prices of basic items, putting them out of reach of people whose incomes have not improved - if they have incomes at all. “If you suddenly input several millions of dollars, you are injecting it in urban economies and it affects the prices of essentials,” says Kapila. “We don’t want to make matters worse for the majority by funding the minority.”

The mere task of prioritizing will be enormous. Electricity, phone lines, fuel, sanitation, and clean water, are all in short supply or nonexistent. Then, there is demining a nation so booby-trapped that farmers are afraid to plow their fields. —Dawn/LATS Service (c) Christian Science Monitor.