|
KABUL: US First Lady Laura Bush flew into Afghanistan
Sunday on an unannounced visit to meet President Hamid Karzai and
visit development projects in an affirmation of support for the
troubled nation.
Soon after arriving in Kabul,
Bush and her entourage headed out to the central town of Bamiyan,
home of the ancient and giant statues of the Buddha that were blown
up by the Taliban regime months before their ouster in 2001.
There she was due to visit a road
construction site, according to local media.
Bush, who has been supporter of
efforts to help Afghan women, is also due to visit other projects
before talks with Karzai at his palace in Kabul in the afternoon.
It is her third trip to
Afghanistan since the US led the invasion that toppled the hardline
Taliban regime for harboring al-Qaeda leaders behind the September
11, 2001 attacks on Washington and New York City.
She first visited in 2005, and
also accompanied her husband President George W. Bush on a visit in
March 2006.
War-battered Afghanistan is now
on the frontline of the US-led “war on terror,” fighting a
resurgent Taliban who are backed by al-Qaeda and carrying out
increasingly sophisticated attacks.
The United States is the main
backer of Karzai’s government, stumping up about half of the
70,000 international soldiers in the US-led and NATO-led coalitions
helping the Afghan government battle a Taliban-led insurgency.
Washington has also provided most
of the development aid that has flooded into the country since the
Taliban were removed.
Despite international efforts
worth billions of dollars and the growing strength of the
international and Afghan forces, the extremist insurgency has
steadily grown over the past two years.
Conflict-related violence left
8,000 people dead last year, 1,500 of them civilians.
Laura Bush’s visit came days
ahead of a meeting in Paris where the Afghan government will ask its
donors to fund a five-year $50-billion plan to lay down
infrastructure needed to develop the weak economy.
The Afghanistan National
Development Strategy says much work has been done since 2001 but the
level of destruction in Afghanistan after three decades of war had
been underestimated.
The New York Times meanwhile
reported Saturday that US officials are increasingly frustrated with
Karzai, arguing that he is not up to addressing Afghanistan’s many
troubles.
“Of course he’s a good guy,
and therefore as long as he’s president we’ll support him,”
the paper quoted a senior State Department official as saying.
“But there’s a lot of talk
inside the administration saying maybe there’s a need for some
tough love to push him to do the right thing.”
Karzai is expected to stand for
re-election next year.
--AFP
|
