Seek Roots of Terror, Afghan Leader Urges
    By David Pilling and Rachel Morarjee
    The Financial Times

    Wednesday 05 July 2006

    Hamid Karzai, president of Afghanistan, called on the international community on Wednesday to rethink its war on terror, saying that its present strategies were "going in circles".

    Mr Karzai, in an interview in Tokyo, where he is attending a conference on disarming militias, said it was vital to address the root causes of terror beyond Afghanistan's borders.

    "The situation has deteriorated because we have not addressed the sources of terrorism," he said.

    "The sources of terrorism are where they are trained, where they are financed, where they are equipped, where they are mobilised and where they are motivated."

    Mr Karzai's comments come as the bombings which have become a daily occurrence across Afghanistan's south and east further rocked the security of Kabul.

    One person was killed and more than 50 injured in a string of five bombings across the capital yesterday and on Tuesday. A British soldier was killed on patrol on Wednesday, bringing to six the total of UK troop deaths.

    The Afghan president was careful to avoid criticising Pakistan specifically, though his government has often complained that militants are armed and trained across the border before slipping into Afghanistan.

    His government preferred to negotiate with Pakistan, he said, though it might prove necessary to criticise it publicly if the softly-softly approach failed.

    "I am not talking about any country [in particular]," he said. "I am talking about the sources of terrorism. If they are in Afghanistan, if they are away from Afghanistan, wherever they are we have to go to the roots of it."

    Mr Karzai said the causes of the rapid deterioration of security were unclear. He rejected any suggestion that dissatisfaction with his own government, which has been criticised for rampant corruption and links with the opium trade, was to blame.

    "Why are there more soldiers killed today than in 2001, 2002, 2003? What is the cause? We must go and find the cause," he said. "Why is there an engineer killed in Afghanistan who has come to build roads for us? We have to work hard to find out why."

    The Afghan president also addressed criticism that his government had allowed the opium trade to thrive, saying it was counterproductive to crack down on poppy farmers if they had no alternative source of income. This year's opium harvest is reported to be the largest ever.

    "A focus on alternative livelihood for the farmers is the best thing," he said, adding that before the Soviet invasion of 1979 Afghanistan accounted for 60 per cent of the world's raisin exports and was a big exporter of pomegranates.

    "Destroying poppies [alone] is not going to bring an end to poppy production," he said.

    Mr Karzai said Afghanistan was woefully short of police, with some of the most lawless districts close to the Pakistani border having just one policeman per 1,500 people.

    The international community had responded to his call to strengthen the police force beyond the 62,000 originally envisaged, he said.

    "They have recognised what I was saying and have begun to work earnestly on addressing some of the shortcomings. I am satisfied with that now."