Examination of witness(Questions 100-114)
DR MUKESH
KAPILA CBE
MONDAY 25 NOVEMBER 2002
100. Can I touch on the Human Right Commission
and the independence of that? This is effectively a government
led commission and, in order for it to be independent, should
the way this Commission exists be reformed?
(Dr Kapila) Sorry, I am not quite clear on that.
101. Are there any plans to review the independence
of the Human Rights Commission?
(Dr Kapila) The Commission is independent—
102. But it is effectively government led.
(Dr Kapila) Well, it is linked to the government in
the sense that it is part of a family of institutions created
by the Bonn process. I am not aware of any meddling or undue attempt
to influence the Commission in any mischievous sense at the present
time but I am open to be corrected on that. There are, however,
genuine problems about the capacity of the Commission and therefore
its credibility from that perspective. Also, I think there is
a tension between the work of the Commission that is concerned
with human rights promotion and looking towards the future and
the other work of the Commission which is to figure out how to
bring about accountability and do justice to the past, and there
I think the debate is very fractured.
Ann Clwyd
103. Can I follow up that last point, Dr Kapila,
and also welcome you back to the Committee. It was not our impression
that the Commission had much power and it was not our impression
that it had many resources. You give it a room and some offices
and you call it a Human Rights Commission and do not give it very
much else. That is rather an easy thing to do but to give it some
power is a different thing. We were told that it had very few
resources so I do not quite have the same rosy view of it as maybe
you have.
(Dr Kapila) I hope I did not give a rosy view but
I certainly agree with you that the Commission has a lot of work
ahead for it to do but it cannot do that work unless it has capacity
and resources. The resource side is easy: the programme of the
Afghan Human Rights Commission is fully funded. There is at least
to my personal knowledge $11 million pledged from donors because
every donor under the sun wants to do human rights in Afghanistan.
There is absolutely no shortage as far as human rights work in
Afghanistan is concerned. The problem is utilising the money,
turning it into a set of programmes which have substance and credibility
as opposed to rhetoric and a lot of promises being made. This
depends on the physical capacity of the Commission, and there
I agree we are facing some real challenges. The problem is that
if people from outside come and try and help the Commission to
get on with the job then they are accused of interfering because
then it ceases to be independent; on the other hand it itself
has been somewhat slow in getting going with the routine of its
work. But behind the scene discussions have gone on to try and
bring a more managerial capacity to the Commission so it can get
on with doing the practical things it needs to do. Certainly I
agree this is a very weak institution that needs a lot of work.
104. I wanted to ask you about ISAF, because
we spent four days in Afghan and whoever we talked to they all
said the same—that they wanted to see ISAF expanded: they
said that in Kabul things were pretty good in comparison with
the rest of the country but outside Kabul they were not, and the
only way they thought they could deal with that was to see the
expansion of the ISAF force. Now I know our own Prime Minister
has, right from the beginning, argued for that expansion but the
Americans did not want it and now I understand the Americans have
had a change of heart, but I do not quite know what they are proposing.
Do they mean they are going to bring troops to expand that force,
or are they going to export the extension of existing number of
troops to outside Kabul? Could you clarify the situation for us?
(Dr Kapila) I shall try to the best of my knowledge.
Firstly, I think I very much welcome that comment and I would
like to take this opportunity to say bluntly and clearly the United
Nation's view is that ISAF should be expanded, and our extreme
disappointment at the Member States of the United Nations who
have the military assets who could have made this happen by now
but have not seen fit to do so. The cost of not doing so is evident
in the difficulties that we as aid workers have faced over the
last few months, and the dangers and risks that we undertake,
and the deeply unfair burdens that are placed upon civilian workers
who are expected to work under circumstances and create so-called
security through aid when the military are unwilling or unable
to be deployed to do that. So our disappointment and concern is
as clear as it can be and it has been stated on a number of occasions.
My own understanding of ISAF expansion is that, while most Member
States are now open to the principle of ISAF expansion, no Member
State, including the UK, has come forward with any practical propositions
to that effect. All that has been said by Member States is that
physical expansion of ISAF is very difficult and that the ISAF
effect should be promoted through innovative and imaginative ways.
Now I am afraid our innovative and imaginative faculties have
been severely stretched in the last few months, and unless somebody
can come up with more imaginative and innovative ways, we certainly
do not know what more to do on that particular front. It is a
question properly addressed to the UK Government and to other
governments which sit on the Security Council and elsewhere.
105. Before you move on from that, the UK itself,
in fact, despite saying that it is ready and that it supports
the idea of expansion, has reduced the number of troops in the
area. That is correct, is it not?
(Dr Kapila) I am not able to comment on the reason
why the UK Government has done that but clearly our position is
very clear, and that is to have a strong continued presence in
Kabul and to have that presence in other areas as well around
the country. The US proposal, as I understand it, is still under
formulation but essentially it goes back to the very beginning
of our discussion where, as I understand it, it consists of joint
civil military teams reaching out and working in different areas
and, as I said then, I do not know any more than that but if it
is along those particular lines that is a step in the right direction
in the absence of anything else.
106. Can I ask you about the warlords and their
power? The warlords have been supported by many of the people
in the coalition, as we know, to keep them in that coalition.
How much does the aid and military support that has been given
to the warlords undermine the development process, as you see
it?
(Dr Kapila) I think it undermines it considerably.
Where the warlords' position has been strengthened over the last
few months I think many commentators have said that the regional
leaders or faction leaders are stronger now than they were a few
months ago, and to that extent it makes the job of the central
government, of the Karzai government, even more difficult and
other workers on the international community to bring assistance
to the poorest and most vulnerable people that much more risky,
and undoubtedly that has happened in the last several months.
107. Can you tell me which UN agency is leading
in terms of disarmament, demobilisation and so on? Which agency
is doing that?
(Dr Kapila) There is a combined draft UN plan for
DDR—demobilisation, disarmament and re-integration—and
UNDP is the co-ordinating point for that. The plans envisage a
pilot phase starting off initially with the less controversial
combatants like children and the disabled and so on and moving
on to the real demobilisation. However, in the absence of a wider
security sector reform, it is impossible to start a DDR programme
in formal terms. Actually some form of demobilisation is taking
place as people find economic opportunities and hide or give up
their weapons, but that is not tantamount to a proper DDR programme.
108. I think people who have seen various films
over the last two weekends on Afghanistan have been shocked at
the way the warlords are responsible for so much carnage in Afghanistan,
strutting around as though they were major players in the new
administration. Is there a place for these warlords at all given
their past record, and do leopards ever change their spots?
(Dr Kapila) The formal UN position on this complex
question is that it is up to the Afghans themselves and Afghan
political process to consider who they want in their government
now and in the future, and I suppose it could be said that if
the government is supposed to be representative of the people
and the leaderships that are currently present, then it is going
to have to represent these people somehow. Now, at the same time,
the UN's position is that people need to be held accountable for
what they have done and to have a reckoning with the human rights
and other abuses that have taken place. The exact process of that
reckoning is a matter for the Afghans which brings us back to
the question of Afghan Human Rights Commission because one of
its programmes which is very important is for it to orchestrate
a national consultation to determine how one can bring about a
resolution, if you like, to deal with the past and the warlords.
109. Finally, last week when the new UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights was here, he talked about the mass
graves which have been located in Afghanistan, and he was anxious
to protect them until the UN are able to excavate them and find
out precisely how those people died. Has the UK offered support
for that, because I understand they did want the UK to help in
the guarding of these sites?
(Dr Kapila) I am not aware of that. I believe that
the UK Government is considering that particular request, I have
been advised of that, but I am not aware that a definitive answer
has been resolved. Incidentally my next assignment is with Sergio
de Mello as his Special Adviser starting next week, so no doubt
I will be involved in it from the High Commissioner's end, so
I may have an answer to this question in a few weeks' time.
Chairman
110. Has the UN done any assessment of what
troops and resources would be required in order to effect an extension
of ISAF outside Kabul? Has a bid been put in?
(Dr Kapila) Yes and no, in that I have heard and seen
a number of options that have been debated. For example, they
talk about something like 25-40,000 troops being required on top
of the ones in Kabul. On the other hand, there are other options
that have been talked about like using rapid reaction forces—instead
of having a permanent Kabul type presence, to have a smaller number
of troops going in and out and linking that to the training of
the Afghan national army. Certainly the latter option, ie, a modest
presence but linked with the training of the army, might be quite
a sensible way forward.
Hugh Bayley
111. Has the return of refugees and internally
displaced people gone too quickly, and is that why so much money
has been diverted from reconstruction to humanitarian relief?
(Dr Kapila) You are correct in that a record number
of refugees and IDPs—two million or thereabouts—have
gone back. Is that too quick? No, is the answer, in my view. I
think people aspiring to return to their homes freely and voluntarily
is something to rejoice over, and having visited numerous times
both refugee camps as well as travelling around Afghanistan, I
can only applaud the feeling of wanting to go home. Now, I think
it is true that helping these people to move back and giving them
the basics, if you like, has absorbed a great deal of resource,
but some of that would have had to be spent anyway in refugee
assistance if they had remained refugees, so I do not think overall
it would have made much of a difference.
112. Can you say a bit more about the push and
pull factors? Are neighbouring countries trying to encourage people
to leave, to return to Afghanistan, and if so, how? There are
some reports that people who had returned are leaving and returning
to Pakistan. Do you know how many? Is there such a thing as a
sustainable rate of return?
(Dr Kapila) This gives me an opportunity to record
the United Nation's deep appreciation to refugee hosting countries
like Iran and Pakistan who have been extremely generous over decades.
Indeed, the generosity of Iran and Pakistan in hosting refugees
might be an example to some of the countries of the European Union,
and certainly what the neighbouring countries have done is far
more than what some of the western countries have done in that
respect. Moving on to your question, I think that there are push
factors inevitably, in that there have been tensions within Pakistan
and tensions within Iran. These tend to be localised and they
tend to shift and overall I think the fact that most of the refugees
are still in Iran and attending schools and are in employment
and so on points to the fact that the authorities and the social
climate remains broadly supportive. In Pakistan the refugees are
also heavily integrated, or they are in defined areas in the north
west province, so my own assessment would be yes, there has been
an increase in pressures and tensions, but considering the numbers
that are still there and receiving assistance and are integrated
into the communities, this is not yet a significant feature.
113. My colleagues who visited Afghanistan went
to the Shomali Valley and saw some repairs or reconstruction of
irrigation and water systems there, which were being done under
a food for work basis. Given that the absence of a cash economy
is quite a major problem in Afghanistan, would it make more sense
to shift to a cash for work approach rather than a food for work
approach?
(Dr Kapila) Yes. I think probably a mixture of approaches
is necessary in different circumstances. The cash for work approach
has been a bit of a problem at the moment because of the economic
financial situation generally—there has just been a new
currency introduced and it was a complex process figuring out
the move to the new currency and I think cash for work programmes
in that context, especially on a large scale, created both financial
as well as practical problems. In principle I would agree that
cash for work must be the starting point. In practice it does
depend, however, on the availability of goods and services. Also
many donors provide inputs in kind, so if donors are giving food,
as many major food producing donors are, then we have no alternative
but to use that and to try and make that effectively deployed.
John Barrett
114. Is the ARTF an effective mechanism for
channelling funds and, if so, what potential is there for increasing
the proportion of money going through the ARTF, and could eventually
all funds be channelled through it and would that be a good idea?
Is this the most effective way of channelling funds for long term
reconstruction?
(Dr Kapila) The answer is absolutely yes. Not only
is it effective, but it is brilliant. I think the way the ARTF
has been designed, which includes a leading role for the Afghan
administration itself deciding on the utilisation of the funds—and
the reduced transaction costs which are priorities that are within
the fund, and all the details of all this are on the World Bank's
website, point to probably basically the best way for putting
money into it, and this is reflecting the fact that now there
are roughly 20-25 countries contributing, some of them who have
never been donors elsewhere, so it has been made as easy as possible.
We would certainly urge countries, including the UK which has
already taken a good leading position on this but could do more,
to use that particular area for channelling investments. Should
all funds go through the ARTF? In an ideal world possibly but
I think maintaining a degree of diversity is quite useful. For
example, it is right and proper that certain civil society development
organisations and the independent Human Rights Commission should
continue to be funded independently, and it is important for the
separateness and independence to be visible and seen, and having
separate channels of funding is quite important for that. I think
also we are not there yet but arguably, if it got so successful
that this fund became a huge monster of a fund, then the transaction
costs might get worse, but I quickly add to that that we are not
in that enviable position yet so I think this is only a theoretical
concern!
Chairman: Dr Kapila, thank you very much
for answering all our questions and answering them so comprehensively,
and we wish you all the best in your next appointment.
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