Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR NICK
GRONO AND
MS ELIZABETH
WINTER
13 DECEMBER 2005
Q1 John Battle: Can I thank our witnesses
for coming and taking part in this session. As Elizabeth knows
well, we have had periodic reports on the situation in Afghanistan
and occasionally our Committee returns to try and do an update
of where we are now as best we can. I think the last report that
our Committee did was back in January 2003[1],
but since that time both Joan Ruddock and I have visited Afghanistan
as well, so we have got some experience on the Committee of visiting
on the ground. We appreciate that as we move towards January and
the donors' conference you will be preparing and putting work
in for that. I am grateful that you can give us a snapshot today
of where you think we are up to. What we would like to try and
get a clearer view of this morning in our session is what the
situation is like in Afghanistan now, whether there have been
improvements in security and whether things are progressing well
even though it has dropped out of the public eye. I want to ask
you about the context of the security challenges facing Afghanistan.
When I was there in 2004 any London-based staff were based in
the compound and could not travel out. Kandahar was out of bounds
entirely, although I went to Herat and I visited communities there
and I had quite a sense that things were easing up at that time.
I came away knowing that the challenges were there, but I was
rather more positive about the future. Since that time the press
reports of 2005 have suggested things have been a bit more difficult.
I just wonder what your assessment would be now at the end of
2005. What are the challenges? Is the drugs trade as strong as
it was before when the Taliban were there? Is your view that the
general security situation is deteriorating or is there a grip
gradually being achieved?
Ms Winter: I think you are right,
that you would have been more optimistic when you last went than
one could be now. Most of us feel that security has deteriorated
and continues to do so. The problem has changed. The problem now
is unpredictability. You are never quite sure what is going to
happen where. I was there last month and there were several occasions
where it was "white cell", which means that everybody
was locked down in their UN compounds. NGO staff are having to
be very careful when they go out to vary their routines and to
take all kinds of avoiding actions. Nobody is quite sure what
is going to happen. Suicide bombers are around now with improvised
explosive devices, sometimes vehicle borne, et cetera.
In terms of the figures, they have increased as well. In 2003,
for example, 13 staff of aid agencies were killed and 36 injured.
In 2004 it had gone up to 34 killed and that includes a variety
of staff involved in aid agencies, three of those were internationals
and 44 people were injured. In 2005, so far—we are trying
to get final figures on this—it seems to be keeping pace
at least with 2004 and possibly increasing. Certainly the perception
people have is that it has got worse, it is not so safe and programmes
are being reduced. We are currently looking at the effect of security
on our programmes and the ability to get out into the areas where
people need us most and we will be sending you the results of
that when it is completed.
Q2 John Battle: Do you want to add
to that?
Mr Grono: I would agree that security
has deteriorated, particularly in the south. As always in Afghanistan
it depends where you are. I was there in July and travelled to
Mazar and Herat and found them to be fairly stable, we were able
to walk around fairly freely, there were not the same restrictions,
but Kabul has got worse this year. We have seen suicide attacks
in the last couple of months, lots of restrictions particularly
on UN staff throughout the year and then growing insurgency in
the south, the interrelationship with the cross-border insurgency
and what appears to be a growing drug problem tying into the insurgency
in the south. Helmand produced twice as much poppy this year than
the next biggest province. There have been reports in the last
week of night letters being distributed in Helmand encouraging
farmers to grow poppy. To the extent that that is true, it is
a very stark demonstration of the linkages that we feel are growing
between the drug industry and the insurgency. The statistics this
year have been of concern. I think it is over 1,000 people have
been killed in the insurgency in the south, there have been heavy
casualties for US forces and it is of particular concern as NATO
now starts its move down south. The overall assessment would be
it has gotten worse.
Q3 John Battle: Did the elections
go any way towards sorting out the warlords and their power?
Mr Grono: It depends on your view.
Our analyst based in Kabul has said that she has felt that there
is a degree of pessimism in Kabul following the elections that
she has not seen before. The Human Rights Commission there has
said that some 80% of the figures elected have some connection
with armed groups. Certainly in Kabul the figure that has been
tossed around is 60% of the parliamentarians are associated with
warlords or former Mujahideen. It is a positive development to
have an election that went relatively well, with a fair turnout
and apparently a large participation of women. We have the assembly
meeting next week and that is an important occasion as we begin
this transition. Elections are never the end of a transition process;
they are very much the beginning of the transition process. Our
hope is that this is the beginning of a transition into a system
of more representative participation among the people, but it
certainly remains to be seen whether that will be the case.
Q4 Mr Singh: Nick, you mentioned
the growing insurgency in the south. I understand that the UK
will take charge of ISAF[2]
in May 2006. What is the implication for British troops there,
and what challenges will the UK face in taking over that role
in May next year?
Mr Grono: They will be facing
very big challenges. The situation in Helmand is very different
from that in Mazar and the provinces in which the British PRT[3]
is operating there. Our assessment is that the British have done
an excellent job in the north. Their model of running a PRT is
the one that we endorse with the focus on security, stabilisation,
for the most part keeping out of the development sphere and the
humanitarian sphere. We particularly support the fact that they
have operated mobile observation teams and have spread the security
blanket throughout the area in which they are operating because
this is a very important way of showing support for the Afghan
government institutions. All of that is going to be much more
difficult in Helmand. It is very unclear exactly what kind of
force structure is being proposed. I saw a news report this morning
about discussions going on within the British government about
the size of the forces that are going to be committed down south.
There had been reports that you are talking of about 2,000 troops
in Helmand plus perhaps another 2,000 in Kandahar and Kabul and
now there is speculation that there may be no more than 1,000
going to Helmand, which has big implications on what can be done
down there and how effective you can be. Helmand is the biggest
drug producing province. PRTs have traditionally stayed relatively
clear of the whole counter-narcotics issue. If you identify counter-narcotics
as one of the main threats to the stability of Afghanistan as
you go forward, that is something that the security forces will
have to start coming to grips with. The challenges will be to
have a presence that supports the institutions there and to be
as effective as you can and, in the view of the International
Crisis Group, to have more active support for counter-narcotics
programmes.
Q5 Mr Singh: Given that around 90 US
soldiers were killed last year, are we expecting the same number
of British casualties?
Mr Grono: There must be an expectation
that there is a risk of British casualties. Over the last two
weeks we have seen reports of suicide attacks against the Canadians
in Kandahar, against the Americans and against the Afghan National
Police. Clearly those that wish to destabilise Afghanistan and
those behind the insurgency will be targeting international groups,
as they have been doing, as NATO expands its presence in the south.
There will certainly be that risk.
Q6 Mr Singh: Is there any sign of
any members of the international community pulling out of Afghanistan
because some of the areas are too dangerous?
Mr Grono: We are seeing a lot
of discussion with the Dutch, for instance, who had been supportive
in sending up to 1,000 troops down south, I think they were going
to Oruzgan, but their parliament has not yet approved that deployment
and certainly they have been concerned about the deployment. The
issue comes back to the nature of the international community's
involvement with Afghanistan. Afghanistan is a dangerous place.
If your intention is to stabilise Afghanistan and particularly
the south then there is this risk, but your overall objective
over time is to strengthen the functioning of the government so
that it can deal with the security threats and support stability.
Q7 Mr Singh: You mentioned the role
of the Provincial Reconstruction Teams. I understand there are
19 operating now, but they are all operating to different guidelines
and criteria. What do you think is the long-term impact of PRTs
in terms of development in relation to Afghanistan and its reconstruction?
Are they working? Are they having an impact? They are new things
in terms of the civilian/military overlap between them. How is
that working?
Mr Grono: I will give you the
Crisis Group view and I am sure Elizabeth has a view on behalf
of the NGOs. At the moment I understand there are 22 PRTs, nine
of which are operating under NATO and the rest under the US-led
coalition, and they are quite different in the way they operate.
The US coalition, who came up with the model, partly building
on their Vietnam experience, the hearts and minds attempt, viewed
them very much as sending a small team into Afghanistan bringing
security but also demonstrating concrete development progress,
which meant that they were very heavily involved in quick impact
projects, building schools, digging wells, et cetera. The
Germans, the Spanish, the Italians and the British all lead their
own PRTs.
Q8 Mr Singh: Is that a European approach
they have got?
Mr Grono: No, it is not. We put
out a paper a couple of weeks ago[4]
arguing that there should perhaps be a European approach building
on their very heavy role in these PRTs. The Germans have very
restrictive rules of engagement. Potentially they do not go out
of their base overnight. The British take a much more robust view
of extending security throughout the province. In terms of the
development focus, we support the British view, which is that
ideally you establish security which allows room for others or
a better place to do development. The problem you see with some
of the US PRTs, for instance, is that you build a school but there
are no teachers there because you have not integrated your development
efforts with the rest of the development work that is going on,
or you build a well, but who is there to maintain a well if it
is not part of a cohesive approach? So the approach adopted in
Mazar, which is the security blanket but enabling NGOs and/or
the Afghan government to carry out development, is a better approach.
Ms Winter: Our view certainly
is that PRTs should be PSTs, provincial stabilisation rather than
reconstruction, because all evidence now points to the fact that
their activities, quick impact projects, et cetera, are
not really sustainable. They do not take into account the community's
views and so on. If you look at the multi-donor evaluation, which
I will be providing references for[5]
they came to the same conclusion, ie that the PRTs should be concentrating
on stabilisation. I think that the British PRT did that. They
have just had a PRT best practice conference at which they were
trying to work out ways forward and whether they could come to
agreed terms of reference for PRTs in future. It looks at the
moment as if national caveats may remain and a lack of clarity
of mandate and so on, all of which would be unfortunate.
Q9 Mr Singh: You are saying that if you
move into an area and you build a school the local people are
not necessarily going to jump up in joy because of the school,
are you not?
Ms Winter: No, I do not think
they would. I think they would probably see it for what it was.
One can understand that if you are looking after a group of soldiers
with not much to do in a particular place you want to find something
that seems to be worthwhile. I think if you ask most Afghans and
certainly people involved in trying to reconstruct Afghanistan,
they would say give us security and then we will be able to do
the rest.
Q10 Mr Singh: What impact is the
move south now of British troops and ISAF going to have on the
British view of PRTs? Are they going to be able to maintain that
civilian/military balance or is it going to be completely security
led?
Ms Winter: Again they are looking
at this at the moment from all sorts of angles. They are looking
at it from what is NATO's policy, if it has a joined-up one, what
resources will they be allowed to do their work and what is it
going to mean if the Americans withdraw their firepower and their
financial resources, et cetera. All of these things remain
fairly unclear, although the Americans are talking about withdrawing
4,000 troops next year and maybe more later on. They talk about
it in terms of troop adjustment and possibly leaving their financial
resources intact. These things remain unclear. I suppose what
we would say is that if anybody can do it the British can, but
they have a formidable task ahead of them and there is currently
no overarching strategy for Afghanistan, either a military one
or in terms of the reconstruction of the country.
Q11 Mr Singh: I am very concerned
about that. If the US withdraws 4,000 troops what are the implications
for the UK in terms of troop resources?
Ms Winter: And what are the implications
for them as to whether they have to deal with a counter-insurgency?
How will they engage in that? What is their role going to be in
counter-narcotics? Neither the US nor the European soldiers have
wanted a role in that.
Q12 Mr Singh: It sounds like a very
gloomy scenario, does it not?
Ms Winter: I think if the result
of the current discussions is a much more robust view, that they
want to bring stability and that they are going to work out how
to do it, then it is a less gloomy scenario. If it remains a scenario
of different people doing different things in different ways without
much coordination and without that overall vision then we are
in trouble.
Q13 Joan Ruddock: It sounds as though
you are suggesting there needs to be a total review of policy
towards Afghanistan.
Ms Winter: I think that would
be very welcome from all sorts of angles. I think the report that
was done by this Committee before was very timely and helpful[6].
I would say it is now time to look at things in more detail again.
We would be very happy to assist with that.
Q14 Joan Ruddock: John Battle asked earlier
on in passing about parliamentary elections and I would just like
to pursue that a bit further. Nick, you said that there were rumours
about there being 60% or so of people connected to armed gangs
or standing armies effectively. What I have heard is that it is
actually a combination of those who are essentially warlords,
former Mujahideen and the very conservative Right, the Islamicists
basically. Within that group, clearly in Afghan terms, many of
those people will now be considered to be legit in terms of having
given up the use of arms to achieve their ends. Can one separate
out those groups? Is it quite as gloomy as 60% of parliamentarians?
We may not approve of their backgrounds or think they are helpful
to democracy, but they may not be people who still hold standing
armies.
Mr Grono: The challenge whenever
you try and form a judgment on this is that you are looking at
a country that has been through 25 years of warfare and most of
those who stayed were impacted in one way or another. One of the
things that is happening now is the fight over who becomes speaker
and the leading candidates are Qanooni, former President Rabbani
and the Hazara party leader Mohammed Mohaqiq, all of whom have
fairly strong ties with the past. You can break the parliament
up in a number of ways. One way of looking at it is that there
are essentially four overlapping groups: the Mujahideen; the second
group being independents, technocrats and tribal leaders who are
not associated with a particular party; the Leftist former Communists;
and then former members of the Taliban, and there is a lot of
overlap between those groups. One of the challenges we have highlighted
is how well does parliament operate. The electoral system was
designed to favour individuals over parties and to that extent
it has worked. Part of the reason why you have a fairly high representation
of former Mujahideen is that they were better able to mobilise
their supporters, particularly the Hazara vote in Kabul. Mohaqiq
was first and I think a Hazara was third on the list, and it was
not a very strong turnout, which is part of the reason why we
were opposed to that particular system, because it does not encourage
political party participation. If you are looking at issues such
as women's involvement in elections, you have a high number of
women in the sense that you have 68 women, I think it is 25%,
and that is because you have the set asides; about 13 women won
seats in their own right if you did not count that quota. One
of the things we have argued for is support for the development
of the women who are in parliament and we hope perhaps that you
might get a women's caucus. Part of the attraction of women candidates
in the election was that they would be able to say they did not
have blood on their hands. A woman led the vote in Herat. One
hopes that you will have an effective operating parliament but
we are not sure. The issue of former warlords and former Mujahideen
is something where we will see how it plays out. If it becomes
a squabble over the spoils of office then you are going to see
a great deal of disillusionment among the people of Afghanistan.
If you see a reasonably coherent structure then maybe the people
of Afghanistan will be more supportive, but there is a long way
to go.
Q15 Joan Ruddock: Presumably the
international community could be quite helpful in terms of trying
to increase the capacity amongst parliamentarians because that
seems to me to be the critical thing, i.e. how they become an
effective parliament without all these pressures anyway. They
need the support and resources that are just not there at the
moment.
Mr Grono: There are a couple of
programmes underway. When we were out there in November last year
after the presidential election we were flagging up that nothing
was being done in preparation for the election of parliamentarians.
When I was out there in June/July very little had changed. There
is very little support for staff and people have not participated
in a parliamentary democracy. The last parliament in Afghanistan
was in the late Sixties. A new parliament building is being built
and they are being housed in the old parliament building until
then. The parliament is quite powerful in a number of respects.
It has the power to call ministers before it and to question them
and to have a vote of no confidence in them. It has to approve
all legislation passed by the transitional government. It is quite
critical to the effective functioning of the government of Afghanistan.
It is very disappointing that more work has not gone in to preparing
parliamentarians for that role.
Q16 Joan Ruddock: In terms of the
government's policy overall, one of the things many of us regard
as one of the great failures has been the inability to provide
for the rights of women, particularly with the judicial system
being so ineffective in terms of protecting women against violence.
What help do you think the international community should be giving
to the Afghan government to try and improve the situation for
women in Afghanistan?
Mr Grono: This is an area I have
not done a lot of work on. We put out a report recently on EU
engagement with Afghanistan[7]
and we suggested that the EU might want to set aside 5% of its
development assistance specifically focused on women—at
the moment 2% is being set aside—with a view to developing
more effective programmes, starting with things like supporting
a women's caucus, supporting women in particular. A lot of these
women will never have spoken in public. A lot of these women are
being put in a situation that is very alien to them. More broadly,
I just do not have the expertise to comment on what programmes
the international community should be supporting.
Ms Winter: I think it is part
and parcel of assisting capacity overall, so it is not just the
capacity of parliamentarians, although that is very significant.
They take their seats on 19 December and then it is estimated
it might be six months until the procedures are worked out and
all the other things. I think there is a need for DFID, for example,
to continue their work on governance, public administration reform
and building state institutions, et cetera. I know that
several of the ministries would welcome that. On the question
of women, I think it is the same in a way for men, i.e. you have
to build up access to justice, reduce impunity and so on and then
look at gender mainstreaming. We have recommended in the past
that DFID has some expertise in this field and they should look
at that in terms of the overall review of what is happening in
Afghanistan. There are various ways in which help can be given.
It is unclear yet what funding will be available for Afghanistan
next year. The other aspect of it is—and this is something
we have brought up in previous evidence—the role that civil
society will have in holding parliament and the government to
account. There is a useful report that has just come out from
the EU observer mission which went to look at the elections on
democratization in which they also talk about the role of civil
society[8].
That is something that DFID has said in the past they wanted to
support but it is a little unclear still how that will happen.
They are supporting the input of civil society to the London conference.
There is a plan for a consultation process which will go ahead
from now until January and then there will be a meeting in Kabul
before the London conference. So there are some moves afoot, but
I think it would be very good to have a look at what happens after
that. It is within the context of a more assertive Afghan civil
society that they are beginning to understand a bit more about
what their role might be and to wish to flex their very small
muscles at the moment. They have had some encouraging meetings
with President Karzai and others in the government about this
kind of thing. I think there is also a feeling, in preparation
for the IANDS or the Interim Afghan National Development Strategy
which is taking place now, that it is a more Afghan-led process
than it might have been in the past and there is a real sense
of wanting to have ownership and wanting to be part of the decision-making
process on that. All of these fledgling things should be supported
by donor governments.
Q17 Joan Ruddock: In respect of 1325,
the UN Security Council Resolution on women in post conflict,
do you think that DFID has sufficient regard to that responsibility
in terms of its Afghan programmes?
Ms Winter: I do not know if I
know the answer to that. My gut instinct is probably not, but
I have not sat down and looked at what they have actually been
doing. I think for many donors, whether they are supporting civil
society or whether they are supporting issues to do with violence
towards women, it is often a sentence in a report. I think what
we advised last time was that there should be an evaluation of
what they have done in terms of gender mainstreaming and civil
society development, et cetera. I am not aware that they
have done anything, but that does not mean that I know everything
they have been up to.
Q18 John Barrett: I want to move
on to counter-narcotics operations and the various strategies
that have been employed and other alternatives, like aerial spraying
compensation and possibly the conflict between the donors and
what is the best way forward. Is it better to take a slightly
harder approach as sometimes the Americans have in saying there
has been a lack of leadership by President Karzai and that also
the UK approach is maybe just a bit too soft an approach? The
Americans often base their experience on what has happened in
Colombia and say that they do not want a repeat of Colombia in
Afghanistan. I wonder if you could reflect on a few of these subjects
and then we can probe some of them further.
Ms Winter: I think our view would
be that the UK approach is to be long term, to look at alternative
livelihoods, or ways in which people can earn a living is perhaps
a better phrase for it. Alternative livelihoods have become synonymous
with counter-narcotics work and it is not the same thing. I think
their approach is that it is going to take a long time and they
have to go gradually and sensitively. Aerial eradication, as certainly
the Afghan government has agreed, is not the way forward and eradication
itself is not the way forward at the moment. I think people need
to look at long-term strategies, to work together on what might
work, to look at what has happened in other countries and just
go forward gradually.
Q19 John Barrett: Is there a problem
on the ground because UK/US governments and others are not pulling
in the same direction?
Ms Winter: I think it has been
a problem on the ground. There have been times when it has been
advisable not to do eradication according to some people and it
has gone ahead with very limited results in fact, except to annoy
the local population, to upset the farmers who have lost their
livelihoods or it has been used to settle old scores and so on.
It has not done much to reduce production in the long term.
1 International Development Committee, First Report
of Session 2002-03, Afghanistan: The transition from humanitarian
relief to reconstruction and development assistance, HC 84. Back
2
International Security Assistance Force Back
3
Provincial Reconstruction Team Back
4
International Crisis Group, Rebuilding the Afghan State: The
European Union's Role, Asia Report No 107, 30 November 2005. Back
5
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, Danida, (Oct 2005), A
Joint Evaluation: Humanitarian and Reconstruction Assistance to
Afghanistan 2001-05, From Denmark, Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden
and the United Kingdom. Back
6
op cit footnote 1 Back
7
op cit footnote 4 Back
8
Afghanistan: European Union Election Observation Mission,
Final Report, December 2005: http://europa.eu.int/comm/external_relations/human_rights/eu_election_ass_observ/afghanistan/final_report.pdf Back
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