Downing Street's Afghan Agenda

This week's London Conference on Afghanistan will largely be a forum for the UK to confront its domestic worries about West Asia, but it will also confront vital challenges important to Afghans themselves. The UK Foreign Office has been somewhat light on details about the conference schedule itself in terms of representation, nevertheless the event will be countered by a few alternative rallies.

As if to magically answer the questions posed last night by Change.org readers Doug Samuelson, Susan Detwiler, and Aimee Sea, counter-events include one with Afghan NGOs, one with leading Afghan women, and a demonstration by concerned parties from neighboring countries. Here's a sketch on what formal, alternative, and rebellious events are on deck.

There is a lot planned for the week. The obvious question posed by the conference is -- Will this event rally support behind Afghan President Hamid Karzai in time to secure the country, shift power back to the Afghans, and ensure long-term stability? Here on the ground in the cold rain of London, the mood points to a second question -- Why is the UK hosting this conference, why here, and why now?

The UK has been involved in Afghanistan far, far longer than the U.S., even longer than Russia. But until recently, beyond aid, the UK could hardly be considered an Afghan partner or "friend." Skeptics will likely speculate that the UK government (like the U.S.) is predominantly concerned with its own ass: potential oil revenue, reduced costs in aid, and reduced risk of terror attacks launched from Afghan soil.

However, skeptics will have to agree that even if the UK government is in this for self-interest, it may be less bad to make such huge self-interested investments in cleaning up the Karzai regime than either swapping regimes undemocratically, or abandoning the cause and have the Afghan civil war spiral back out of control at an even higher cost of life and terror risk.

UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband spells it out in big letters. The conference will cover "security, governance and development, and regional support." See his draft communique. Perhaps what he's really saying is "clean up and re-sell Karzai; stop the Taliban from helping people who want to kill us; and try to convince people in neighboring countries that we are not in this for colonialism and debauchery but rather for withdrawal, security, and economic self-interest."

Here's the week's schedule so far. As I understand it, the events other than the conference itself are relatively public (with the UK on a high terror alert, they're probably not going to let you in with brass knuckles and plutonium underpants). On that, even we the press will be limited to certain areas (most likely clouded with sleeping gas).

Tuesday, January 26th, offers the Afghan NGO forum, "An Alternative View: Afghans' perspectives on development and security" at Canada House, which will be streamed online at this site.

Wednesday, January 27th, offers a surprisingly brief women's panel, "The Missing Link in Building Sustainable Peace in Afghanistan: Women's Priorities."

Thursday, January 28th, will include of course the formal Afghanistan: London Conference; see Foreign Secretary David Miliband's answers to your questions on the UK government site.

Later in the day, January 28th, at 3:00PM there will be a "Stop the War March," as well as a peaceful demonstrations against corruption, by the Afghanistan and Central Asian Association.

There is also talk of a parallel conference on Yemen, which I'm looking into. More details to come. Peace, and take care.

Photo credit: Downing Street (Gordon Brown meets with Cabinet Secretary Gus O'Donnell)