Karazi says history to judege his record as Afghan president

04.04.2013

Source: Khaama Press

As Afghanistan is getting close to presidential election which is due to be organized in early 2014 amid NATO troops withdrawal, Afghan president Hamid Karazi has said that history will judge his track record in office.

Karzai became Afghan president in 2001 after the US launched a military offensive against Taliban militants and he is barred by the Afghan constitution from seeking a third term in next year’s elections.

While speaking during an exclusive interview with the Al Jazeera, president Karzai said, “My place in history will be judged by Afghan history; by what I have done and it will be judged better after 2014 when I am no longer the president.”

Pointing towards several acheivements, including makeing Afghanistan “home for all Afghans once again”, president Karzai said, all Afghans had been fighting one another and running away from each other” were now living side by side.

“Let’s leave it to then, and I hope it will be good.”, Karzai said.

In regards to growing violence across the country presidnet Hamid Karzai denied he had failed to rein in the Taliban and to restore security across the country.

“We never planned to eliminate the Taliban. Not me, not the Afghan people, not the Afghan government.”, he told Al Jazeera during his meeting in Qatar to discuss Afghan peace talks with the Qatar officials.

He said, “The moment I was declared the head of the interim government in Bonn, Germany, I was in Kandahar, Afghanistan, [and] I declared a complete amnesty to Taliban and Afwa, to the Taliban, from the leadership to everybody else.”

Karzai also insisted that he wanted to reintegrate Taliban militants into Afghan society “like all other Afghans”.

He said, “I’m still calling them brothers. I’m still trying to have them be part of the country again and participate in the Afghan life, as we all do, the Afghans.”

Karzai also said his Sunday talks with Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani centred on how the energy-rich Gulf state can “facilitate the peace process.”

The Afghan president previously opposed a Taliban office in Qatar over fears that his government would be frozen out of any future peace deal involving the Islamic extremists and the United States.

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