The process of disarming Afghanistan’s
warlord militias — the linchpin to establishing
stability and rule of law before presidential elections
on October 9 — has been paralysed for months.
The three-year, $300 million UN-Japanese
plan known as DDR—disarmament, demobilisation and
reintegration—has made little progress as warlords
continue to terrorise local populations and defy President
Hamid Karzai and the central government. “Warlords
are a bigger threat than the terrorists, because you can’t
build state institutions or enforce rule of law or build
a stable environment before the elections,” says
Lt-Gen Rick Hillier, who heads the international security
force in Kabul. “You have to create in the warlords’
minds that DDR is irreversible, that you are gone.”
Most Afghans agree. “Elections without
DDR are not feasible,” says Vice President Hedayat
Amin Arsala. Earlier this year the UN and the ministry
of defence agreed to collect all heavy weapons from the
warlords and disarm 40 percent of their soldiers by June
30 to prevent the intimidation of voters. The plan was
not just to reduce militias, but to disband entire units.
But the process has been impeded by warlords’
refusal to disarm, the lack of cooperation by Defence
Minister Gen Mohammed Fahim (see main story), US reluctance
to pressure their warlord allies and Karzai’s slowness
in getting tough.
The warlords include over half a dozen
regional leaders who control territory and troops. Some
of them function as corps commanders nominally under the
Afghanistan government but effectively independent, others
entirely outside the government. On July 20, after ten
days of negotiations with the warlords, Karzai removed
three corps commanders from their posts, including Gen
Atta Mohammed, a Tajik based in Mazar-e-Sharif, who had
openly defied the government in early July. In a compromise,
all three were given other key jobs in their provinces.
There is not even agreement on how many
militiamen there are. The UN says its original estimate
of 100,000 men who have to go through DDR has been revised
to around 60,000, as many unit commanders were drawing
salaries for non-existent troops. Chief of army staff
Gen Bismillah Khan, a Fahim ally, insists that the figure
of 100,000 men is still correct. Karzai says the real
threat comes from 20,000 men.
Meanwhile only 30 percent of nearly 5,000
heavy weapons such as tanks and artillery had been collected
by the June deadline. That’s not including those
belonging to Ismail Khan in western Afghanistan, who has
not even allowed the UN to conduct a survey of his heavy
weapons.
In the ten militia corps around the country,
only 12,000 men had gone through DDR as of mid-July. Two
corps in Kabul and Parwan, directly under Fahim, have
contributed the least to the DDR process. Of 84 military
units only six, outside Fahim’s control and loyal
to Karzai, have actually been decommissioned.
All the major players share the blame.
For months the US defence department refused be involved
in DDR or allow US forces to be used to pressure the warlords
to disarm. And Karzai was slow to get tough—due
to lack of US support for DDR, says a senior aide to the
president. On July 14, Karzai finally passed a decree
threatening warlords that if they failed to comply with
DDR, they “will be considered disloyal and rebellious”
and “will face the severest punishments.”
Afghan Election Timelines
For Presidential Elections 2004.
* July 26. Nominations close for
* Presidential candidates.
* July 31. Voter registration finishes
in most provinces.
* August 2. Deadline for public objections
to candidates.
* August 10. Final list of candidates
issued.
* August 29. Voters lists finalized.
* September 7. Campaign opens.
* October 6. Campaign closes.
* October 9. Polling day.
Parliamentary elections. 2005.
* December 2004. District boundaries finalized.
* January 2005. Population for each province
and district finalized.
* January 2005. Deadline for nominations
for candidates.
* February 2005. Final lists of parties
and candidates.
* March-April 2005. Campaign period.
* April 2005. Parliamentary elections.
Source: Joint Electoral Management Body
and UN, Kabul
