Presentation by Kawun Kakar

Fellow Afghans and ladies and gentlemen,

As we sit here today Afghanistan stands at a most delicate cross-road in its modern history.  After 23 years of war, more than a million dead, millions of refugees, thousands maimed, a generation lost to war, and cultural treasures looted and destroyed, the Afghan nation today chooses between more destruction or reconciliation, peace and development.  If that decision is left to Afghans, there is no doubt that they will choose the latter enlightened path.  Afghans are tired of war and can’t sustain it anymore, as my recent travels to Afghanistan made it clear to me.  During my almost one year work as a UN human rights officer I traveled to Herat, Kandahar, K! abul, Jalalabad, and Mazar and witnessed the inhumane conditions that our fellow Afghans live in today. 

Picture a woman that I saw in Laghman, whose husband and son were killed by the Soviets, only to lose her two sick daughters because of absence of medication. 

Or picture a nine year old girl that I saw in Kabul who dreamt of being a STUDENT one day.

Or picture a mother that I saw five months ago in Mazar who fed her children grass mixed with flour. 

All of these Afghans and millions of other similarly situated Afghans, without any doubt, yearn for peace and an opportunity to live normal lives. 

So the question remains: why has peace been so elusive for Afghans?  And why have recent Afghan peace treaties led to war than to peace?

There are many external and internal factors for the absence of peace in Afghanistan , as our several scholars explained at this conference yesterday and today.  I agree with a lot of the statement made and do not wish to repeat them.  I want to add a point that past treaties failed to establish lasting peace because the Afghan nation was not represented in signing them.  For example the Geneva Accords where the Soviets agreed to pull out its troops from Afghanistan was signed in 1989 by Pakistan and the Soviet puppet regime in Kabul which was only supported by the communists and a handful of oth! ers.

Similarly, the Peshawar , Islamabad and Jalalabad Accords were signed in the early 90s by Mujahideen faction leaders who did not represent the will of the people, but stood for partisan and personal gains.  These so-called peace treaties accommodated the wishes of the warlords and of their foreign sponsors, but ignored the rights of the people to decide their own fate.  These treaties also did not hold any communist or Mujahideen warlord accountable for the unspeakable atrocities committed on Afghans.  As such the treaties formed lacked moral mandate, lacked justice and lacked popular support and failed to establish lasting peace in Afghanistan .&n! bsp; Peace treaties signed by Afghan factions whose power and allegiances remain fluid do not last long in Afghanistan .   

Today, the UN has embarked on another mission to broker peace in Afghanistan .  The peace process is led by an able diplomat, Special Representative Lakhar Brahimi, who has held consultations with Afghans, the neighboring countries of Afghanistan and with other international actors.  The consultations have resulted in an agreement among members of the Rome Process, the Northern Alliance , the Peshawar Convention and the Cyprus Process to hold talks in Germany on Monday, as it was stated yesterday by Prince Mustafa Zahir.  Certainly, the current peace process reaches beyond warlords; that is it includes political group! s that are not militarily engaged on the ground.  The meeting on Monday is a prelude to other larger meetings and to the formation of an interim government and an Emergency Loya Jirga.  In view of the limited popular support for previous peace treaties, it is hoped that the current process would include at a later stage members of the Afghan civil society, national personalities and women activists and community leaders so this time the peace process has broader support of the Afghans. To be successful, all Afghans must be involved in the peace process and their true representatives must sign the final document.

The International Bill of Human Rights gives all human beings the right to choose their governments.  So it is matter of Afghans’ human rights that they must be represented in a process that determines their future government.  The UN Secretary General has also placed human rights at the center of the Special Representative’s mandate.  The Special Representative is responsible to “ensure that the humanitarian and human rights dimensions of the evolving situation are central to political and security discussions” as the Special Representative “manage[s] peacemaking activities involving the warring parties and other concerned, with a view to facilitating the establishment of a fully representative multi-ethnic and broad-based government.”  Similarly, other human rights organizations, s! uch as the Amnesty International, have advocated for making human rights the agenda of the forthcoming peace process.

The Institute for Afghan Studies also recommends to the government of Canada and to others to ensure that human rights is central to the settlement of the Afghan conflict.  Specifically, the Institute recommends:

1.                  A durable peace can be ensured by a broad consultation and participation of the widest possible representatives of the Afghan society.

2.                  Any peace settlement must require the parties to immediately end all forms of serious abuses, including extrajudicial killings, torture and arbitrary detention of civilians and hold the parties responsible for any breaches thereof.

3.                  Any peace settlement must include the formation of an accountability process, whether it will be an international tribunal such as for the former Yugoslavia or whether it will be a domestic judicial process or truth and reconciliation process such as in South Africa .  An accountability process could end the cycle of collective revenge in Afghanistan and hold responsible all those who have committed crimes against humanity in Afghanistan .  An impartial and neutral accountability process would also warn the current commanders that they would be brought to justice if they commit crimes against humanity or other crimes in contravention of the international law or international norms. 

4.                  A peace settlement must require the deployment of international human rights field monitors throughout Afghanistan to report on and create an atmosphere for the enjoyment of rights by Afghans.

5.                  And finally, any peace settlement should end systematic discrimination against women and ensure the full respect of their fundamental rights.

Based on my personal experiences, I can attest that the government Canada is one of the strongest supporters, financially and otherwise, of the human rights in Afghanistan .  The Canadian support for the UN human rights office for Afghanistan is but one example of Canada ’s care for human rights in Afghanistan .  So at the Institute, we are confident that the government of Canada would extend support for making human rights central to the peace process and we hope that others would extend their f! ull support for human rights as well.

Thank you,