Patrick Cockburn | The Truth About The Afghan Election
President Hamid Karzai is not particularly popular, but as the incumbent he in a strong position, through networks of patronage, to get the support of local and regional king-makers such as warlords, chiefs of police, shuras (local councils), religious, tribal and ethnic leaders. What foreign reporting of elections in both Afghanistan and Iraq misses is the extent to which ordinary Afghans and Iraqis regard their governments as rackets run by political gangsters for their own ends. A common reason, I’ve heard expressed in both Baghdad and Kabul for supporting the incumbent leadership, is that it will have already stolen so much that its members have no need to steal more, while a new government will be equally rapacious but far hungrier.
Donagh is the editor of Irish Left Review.
Contact Donagh through email: dublinopinionAtgmail.com
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August 28, 2009 1:05 am
It would surprise the world if the puppet government installed by the occupation forces allowed government by, for, and of the people in that country. In fact the elections are a sham and not intended to provide local independence and freedom to occur as that would interfere with their grand design to monopolize the middle east Caspian oil with a pipeline through the country to the sea. No the hidden agenda is oil, oil, and more oil, owned and controlled by U.S. Imperialism. That these agressive wars are illegal and unjust violence is found in the Geneva Agreements, Nuremburg Trials, and the UN Charter, which anti-fascist covenants explain that the planning and doing of agressive war is the supreme international crime on the planet earth, as that actuates all other crimes, high, low, big and small. So says the Nuremburg Trials chaired by U.S. Judge Jackson. The Geneva Conventions says that the occupying country or countries must not regime change, which is illegal and against the anti-fascist covenants. Further war crimes are being committed such as 1, targeting civilians, 2) torturing prisoners of war, 3) collective punishment such as bombing villages, towns, and cities throughout the region to rubble in case a ‘militant’ might be nearby. This practice is done by the U.S. Military in the Holyland because the peoples inhabiting the region have taken up legitimate armed struggle to end the illegal invasions and occupations of their countries. Lets be honest, the goal of liberation is not being practiced but the axis powers military methods of might makes right, Unilateralism, and Pre-emptive drone strikes are. We need international law such as the International Criminal Court, the world court of the Hague, and the international war crimes tribunal to uphold the anti-fascist covenants which call these wars of agression illegal, unjust violence against the indigenous peoples of the area.