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KABUL, Oct 12: The United Nations warned international donors on Saturday that current aid levels were not sufficient to restore peace and stability in Afghanistan.
Speaking at the start of a meeting between donor countries and institutions and the Afghan government, the UN special representative for Afghanistan said the country needed massive investment to help peace take hold.
“There has been significant international support; however it is not quite sufficient to bring back peace and stability to the country,” Lakhdar Brahimi said.
“Micro-level programmes are well on the way, but without massive nationwide large-scale investment, the country cannot handle some of the most immediate peace-building tasks.”
Donors pledged $4.5 billion to war-shattered Afghanistan over five years in January, but this has been slow in arriving and the government complains it is much less than was offered to countries like Bosnia and East Timor.
Brahimi said hundreds of thousands of jobs needed to be created and masses of refugees reintegrated. He said factional fighters and farmers growing opium needed help to find alternative livelihoods.
He said much would also depend on what steps were taken to improve security, while the attempted assassination of President Hamid Karzai last month showed how difficult this task was.
Brahimi said government steps towards the creation of a national army also needed to be implemented fast and generously supported by donors. But the UN envoy also had some words of encouragement.
He applauded the interim government for making “great strides” since its formation under the Bonn agreement 10 months ago to replace the Taliban, and said the goals set out by Karzai at the January donors meeting in Tokyo had mostly been met.
HOPE FOR FORCEFUL ACTION: “A few weeks before the anniversary of the Bonn Agreement, I hope the international community will turn its undoubted commitment to Afghanistan into more forceful action,” he said.
In his speech to the meeting, Karzai said the government would like to see a gradual shift in focus from humanitarian assistance to the reconstruction of basic infrastructure to enable Afghanistan to become self sufficient again.
The government presented a draft development budget targeting six priority areas, — education, road repair, water and power, urban and rural development and rebuilding of war damaged government buildings and appealed for assistance.
“We would like very soon from now to be able to produce our own food and to be able to stand on our own feet and definitely, definitely not to need humanitarian assistance,” Karzai said.
“I am sure, ladies and gentlemen, you will be as kind to us today as you were in Tokyo,” he added.
On Friday, Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai said the money pledged in Tokyo should be seen as only as the start of international assistance and was far from enough put it Afghanistan back on its feet.
He noted that the World Bank, United Nations and Asian Development Bank had last year estimated Afghanistan’s needs at some $10 billion while the government itself had said it required $17-$20 billion.
On Thursday Karzai said that of $1.8 billion aid pledged for this year, only $890 million had actually been received.
He said $800 million had gone to UN agencies and NGOs and only $90 million to the government, although another $55 million was due to support introduction of a new afghani currency, which was launched on Monday.
Donors have cited security risks and lack of transparency in government as reasons for slow aid disbursement.—Reuters
