‘Disenchanted’ Karzai loses hope in US, leaning towards Pak to end Taliban insurgency
By ANIThursday, June 10, 2010
LONDON - Disenchanted over the failure of the US led allied forces’ to reign in the Taliban and Al-Qaeda even after more than eight years, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai is said to have lost hope in the American strategy concerning his country and is increasingly looking towards Pakistan to end put an end to insurgency.
According to sources close to Afghanistan’s intelligence services chief Amrullah Saleh, who resigned last week after the Taliban’s attack on a peace jirga, Karzai has lost confidence in the ability of NATO forces to defeat the Taliban.
Saleh, head of the National Directorate of Security, did not reveal the reason for his resignation from the post, however, he has told his close aides that Karzai was ‘dangerously’ stepping out of the strategy of his western backers.
“There came a time when Karzai lost his confidence in the capability of the coalition or even his own government to protect this country,” The Guardian quoted one of Saleh’s close aides, as saying.
Sources said Saleh is deeply concerned by Karzai’s noticeably ’softer’ attitude towards Pakistan.
“The president has long dropped his past habit of excoriating Pakistan for aiding the Taliban,” they said.
Friends of the former Afghan intelligence chief also revealed that Karzai was looking for an alternative strategy as the NATO troops have proved ineffective in dismantling the terror sanctuaries flourishing along the country’s eastern border, the newspaper said.
They said that the Afghan President was striking a ‘less robust attitude’ to Pakistan and the Taliban.
Questions are also being asked as to what prompted Saleh to resign from his post immediately after the rocket attack on the peace jirga, and sources disclosed that both Saleh and Interior Minister, Hanif Atmar, had a heated debate with Karzai after the later questioned how the attackers were able to target the jirga.
Saleh’s colleagues also revealed that Karzai even accused the two men of a plot with the Americans and the British to wreck his peace plan, it added. (ANI)
