KABUL: A senior aide to Afghan President Hamid Karzai accused the United States yesterday of trying to pressure elements of his government to accept a security deal that would shape the post-2014 US military presence in the country.
The bilateral security pact (BSA) was thrown into doubt last month when Karzai said he would sign only if new conditions were met, and even then only after April elections. If the pact is not signed Washington says it will consider a complete military withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Failure to sign could could also put Western aid running to billions of dollars in serious jeopardy, exposing the central Asian country’s shaky economy to collapse.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, National Security Adviser Susan Rice and Washington’s top diplomat for Afghanistan and Pakistan, James Dobbins, have all visited Karzai recently to convince him to sign by the end of the year.
“There is no doubt that certain elements within the Afghan government are facing pressure from the US However, this will not achieve anything,” Karzai’s spokesman, Aimal Faizi, told Reuters in an emailed statement.
“If there is a perception in Washington that certain elements in Kabul can force President Karzai to succumb to any pressure, it is seriously flawed and mistaken.” Faizi declined to elaborate on who these “elements” were.
Robert Hilton, spokesman for the U.S. embassy in Kabul, declined to respond, only repeating that it was the view of the US that signing the document “promptly” was in the interests of both countries. There are 47,000 US troops in Afghanistan. The United States has been in discussions with Afghan officials about keeping a residual force of about 8,000 troops after the end of the Nato combat mission next year. Reuters
