G8 warn Karzai to speed up Afghan control

TORONTO - World leaders issued a stark warning yesterday to the Afghan President, Hamid Karzai, demanding detailed plans of how he will take over responsibility for the country's security and drive out corruption within five years.

The message from the G8 leaders, who are gathered near Toronto in Canada, will be seen as setting a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops.

It will also be seen as a vindication for British Prime Minister David Cameron, who said yesterday that he hoped British soldiers would be out of the country in that time.

But the message is likely to trigger controversy, as many warn that Afghanistan is far from stable. Nick Harvey, Britain's Armed Forces Minister, said yesterday that there would be no withdrawal before ministers were satisfied that the country would not slip back into being a haven for international terrorism.

One of the foremost experts warned that Afghanistan was edging towards the "horrendous" scenario of civil war and that its population increasingly believed international forces were losing the battle with the Taleban.

Michael Semple, the former head of the EU mission in Afghanistan, said that the security situation was unravelling to a point where the country could implode.

Semple said talk of withdrawing international forces, including Britain's 10,000-strong presence in the south, was helping push towards civil war.

Cameron has repeatedly stressed his desire to bring home troops as soon as possible - making his views most clear on Saturday when he insisted he wanted them back by the next election.

Yesterday he led discussions on the issue with other G8 leaders, arguing that the time had come for Karzai to prove he could deliver on anti-corruption, electoral reform and good governance. In a passionate speech, Cameron said he wanted to see the military surge bound together with a political drive.

His views were reiterated in the G8 communique, which said: "The Kabul conference in July will be an important opportunity for the Government of Afghanistan to present its detailed plan and show tangible progress in implementing the commitments made in January 2010 including measures to ... make concrete progress to reinforce the formal justice system and expand the capacity of the Afghan national security forces to assume increasing responsibility for security within five years."

The Prime Minister's apparent eagerness for a full withdrawal is understood to be causing consternation among policymakers in Washington and Kabul, who believe it is sending signals to the Afghan people that British troops are preparing to go home.

The world leaders also condemned the alleged sinking by North Korea of a South Korean warship in March and called on Iran to do more to respect human rights.

The countries also called current restrictions on the flow of goods to Gaza "not sustainable". The foreign policy discussions among the leaders of the G8 took place after an opening day of talks during which the group failed to resolve a dispute over the proper mix of government spending and deficit reductions needed to keep the global economy on track.

United States President Barack Obama made the case that the global economy remained fragile and should not be put at risk by countries moving too rapidly to trim their bulging deficits. But leaders of Britain, Germany, Canada and Japan argued that deficit cuts were needed to reassure nervous investors after severe market turmoil.

Demonstrators broke off from a crowd of peaceful protesters at the related G20 summit, torching police cars and smashing windows with baseball bats and hammers. Police arrested more than 150 people.

Police used shields, clubs, tear gas and pepper spray to push back the rogue protesters, who tried to head south towards the security fence surrounding the perimeter of the G20 summit site. Some demonstrators hurled bottles at police.

"We have never seen that level of wanton criminality and vandalism and destruction on our streets," said Toronto police chief Bill Blair.

- OBSERVER, AP