West's botched funding fuelling insurgency: Report

The "West" suffers from the contagious hubris that characterises U.S. foreign policy. Afghanistan itself is primarily a U.S. reaction to 9/11--or perhaps an extension of U.S. hegomony with 9/11 providing an excuse. The U.S. has managed with the help of others including NATO to establish a pro-Western government but that government does not fit the ideal image of the West. It is decidedly influenced by Islamist ideals that go counter to toleration, and women's rights, in many cases. The government also contains warlords whose record on human rights was if anything worse than that of the Taliban. Corruption is rampant. It is not clear how this can be solved by occupiers without alienating the general population even more. Somehow
the U.S. and others believe they can invade, overthrow governments, and then as occupiers create a regime in the desired image. No matter the occupiers lose soldiers shoulder huge costs and are unlikely to ever achieve their aim. The best that can happen is that the Afghan govt. manages to forge some agreement with the Taliban that will create some semblance of security and send the occupying troops packing.


West's botched funding risks fuelling insurgency, report finds
OLIVER MOORE

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

March 25, 2008 at 3:55 AM EDT

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — A group of nearly 100 aid organizations operating in Afghanistan issued a scathing report today that accuses donor countries of botching development funding so badly they risk a spreading insurgency.

The 33-page report, entitled Falling Short, paints a worrying picture. Among their complaints, the groups say that Western countries have come up with far less funding than promised, have been unwilling to tackle Afghan corruption and have used aid funding as a political rather than humanitarian tool.

"Given the links between development and security, the effectiveness of aid also has a major impact on peace and stability in the country," Matt Waldman wrote on behalf of the group.

"Yet thus far aid has been insufficient and in many cases wasteful or ineffective. There is therefore no time to lose: donors must take urgent steps to increase and improve their assistance to Afghanistan."

The report was released by the Agency Co-ordinating Body for Afghan Relief, a group of 96 aid organizations that includes numerous local groups, as well as such global heavyweights as the Aga Khan Foundation, Oxfam, Save the Children and World Vision International.

These groups say donor countries are delinquent with promised funding. The ACBAR report notes that $25-billion (U.S.) has been pledged for development aid but that $10-billion of that total has yet to materialize.

Canada and Japan, however, are notable as the only two nations to have come through with 90 per cent of their pledged aid.

Ehsan Zia, Afghanistan's Minister of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, said yesterday the report is misguided to focus on the numbers alone.

"It's important to distinguish between the amount and the way it is used. The way it is used is more important," he said in a telephone interview from Kabul. "The aid which is being delivered is being effectively used."

Mr. Zia acknowledged that "there is always room for improvement," but argued that Western criticism about corruption often goes too far. "I don't think there is so much corruption as is being spoken about."

The report paints a very different picture of business practices in the Kabul government. It alleges that the government does not know how one-third of the $15-billion in aid so far provided has been spent, a situation that is "largely due to lack of co-ordination and communication," according to the report.

The report goes on to argue that too much of the aid that does come into the country is spent in the south. People in the "most insecure" provinces of the country received more than $200 per capita in aid in the past year, according to the report, which notes that people in some other provinces received less than one-third that amount.

While the south is certainly the area most in need of stability - and most analysts agree that quelling the insurgency requires a mixture of military force and development assistance - the NGOs in ACBAR believe such an approach is worsening the insurgency.

"Given the links between poverty and insecurity, the resentment which these significant disparities has generated, and the perverse incentives created for secure areas, which perceive that insecurity attracts aid, this approach is dangerously short-sighted and has contributed to the spread of insecurity," the report says.