afghanistan. >> my name is maria and from afghanistan. >> thank you all for being here. we welcome you to the bay area. one of the things that's interesting, we'll finally get answers about the people of the afghanistan. if there was something you wanted to tell the people in this area about afghanistan, what would you tell them. >> afghanistan culture is over 5,000 years. there are traditional issues if society. the culture is very, very different than afghanistan culture. afghanistan is an islamic country. i can just imagine culture in the united states. >> before we come to the united states -- when we come, we see different things, different culture, different communication. it was amazing for us. i think this is very different. >> i think we have -- one is the gem culture. we have a different culture. there's a culture that belongs to that state. so we also have differents -- differences, about the holidays, about the food. >> talk about gender issues. we know in your community, in your nation, women and men have responsibilities, but sometimes they're different tha

to be born in the afghanistan. plot could be a harder lot for a person as a baby she was left to die in the sun not to have to suffer or her life but she survived and advanced and believes in the future of her homeland fawzia koofi wants more than just to improve the stories of women in afghanistan she wants to be the first woman president in the history of her life. and our guest today if koofi an afghan politician running for president in two thousand and fourteen how is it so great to have you on our show today first of all let me just say that i admire your courage to do what you are doing in afghanistan i'm aware of the situation with women's rights in afghanistan is far from being perfect it's almost a curse to be born a woman there but still these seem to be optimistic about changes to the lives of afghan women what what goes through how exactly have things changed for women in your country since two thousand and one. it's a pleasure for me to be in your show thank you so much for what you have say. while i

it's very important to the economy of afghanistan. afghanistan also stands in the point. if they can stay stable and secure to be able to develop e tth the -- a lot of the resources they have. i want to encourage you, this is something i like to do in the bush institute. that is to be a convener with the people of afghanistan, and corporations, united states corporations to help develop what you all have in afghanistan. but not develop it for export. develop it so that you and the people of afghanistan can learn the skills to build whatever it is you have at home. so that both people are employed at home and you can make not just what you would make by selling your resources, but you would make what you made by selling your resources turned into the products that you build yourself. and you can build your economy in a great way. and i think once men are employed also, and young men are employed across afghanistan, then there's going to be a lot less, a lot fewer young men who will want to join the taliban. but instead, will want to work to build safe lives for themselves,

afghanistan had history. when there was a rapprochement with the president with the shock, then there was another coup, which raises the point that bonnie was saying, that it is crucial for 2014 for afghanistan to have a sensible government. i know of at least one or two candidates that have a plan, as you have described so , sotfully, for the future it is there. it is not that it does not exist. it just needs international backing. >> our former intern, who also wrote a paper that we cite in our new report. >> i actually have two questions. if the iranians get a presence on the table, how do you think the pakistanis make out? my question to you, what about international organizations? talking about iran at the downstream level, no one wants to talk to america. you have any organizations doing .ny work on the ground >> last, the gentleman in the green very quickly. >> i'm a student at johns hopkins university. i had a question about what role do you think -- do you think afghanistan will have a good role in s

afghanistan. -- lists include from the cato institute this is one hour and a half. on may 21, 2000 thousand to the american democrats and republicans -- which pledged to dance the creation of a broadbased gender sensitive and fully represented government in afghanistan. those goals were in keeping with the december 2001 bond agreement. the united states and international community have helped -- pledged to promote lasting peace, respectability for human rights in the country. nearly 11 years later amid a labor -- amid a daily parade of reports citing human-rights violations and rampant parity in large-scale corruption, afghanistan continues to face serious obstacles. what went wrong? typically here is one of two responses. the first is that president george w. bush squandered america's quick and easy victory. but both committee and insufficient number of troops in the beginning and redirecting our energies to iraq, he enabled the top and to resurface. the second explanation for what went wrong was

afghanistan hasn't had an internal problem primarily because afghanistan has supported the rebels in both iran and pakistan. pakistan is now going through it as the insurgency in baluchistan which is a second nationalist insurgency which is in conflict with the taliban both ethnic and ideological lines. the intensification of the ideological part of the regime under a minute led to more discontent among the populations of iran including. the united states may be supporting the pakistan, the baluchistan insurgency from afghanistan iran has charged that pakistan and perhaps the united states and saudi arabia may be supporting the iranian baluchistan inside iran. the truth of these very charges is rather murky. however as a part of our policy in this administration, one of the measures that we tried to take early on in order to send a message to iran that the us presence in afghanistan was directed at the stabilization of afghanistan and not iran was to make it clear that the united states did not support, and though it took quite a long time to get the interagency process he was declar

will ever actually leave afghanistan. to cross like the upcoming election in afghanistan i'm joined by john glaser in washington he's a contributing editor at antiwar dot com and a columnist for the washington times community section also in washington we have michael kugel and he is an associate at the woodrow wilson international center for scholars and in philadelphia we crossed england in he is a political commentator and a writer or gentleman cross-talk rosen a fact that means you can jump in anytime you want john the reason if i go to you first in washington the reason i want to do this program is number one always make the american people and western publics remember what we did in afghanistan that's always a top priority for me i'm number two looking at the headlines democratic transition this is the first democratic transition in afghanistan and i'll give my opinion about that later but don't you think that the that's the wrong focus here is that actually nothing very good has happened in afghanistan the last twe

will ever actually leave afghanistan. to cross like the upcoming election in afghanistan i'm joined by john glaser in washington he's a contributing editor at antiwar dot com and a columnist for the washington times community section also in washington we have michael kugel and he is an associate at the woodrow wilson international center for scholars and in philadelphia we crossed england in he is a political commentator and a writer or gentlemen cross-talk rules and a fact that means you can jump in anytime you want john the reason if i go to you first in washington the reason i want to do this program is number one always make the american people and western publics remember what we did in afghanistan that's always a top priority for me and number two looking at the headlines democratic transition this is the first democratic transition in afghanistan and i'll give my opinion about that later but don't you think that the that's the wrong focus here is that actually nothing very good has happened in afghanistan the last

so i say to you today, as afghanistan sees women standing up in afghanistan to take control of their country's future, not only for themselves, but for all afghans, we have to be determined that they will not stand alone. america will stand up with them as they shape a strong and united afghanistan that secures the rightful place in the community of nations. and that is why president obama and president karzai signed a have a tee strategic partnership agreement last year that lays out our mutual commitments. that's why america's relationship with afghans is changing. it's not ending. there is stop to go. and obviously the road ahead is not easy. the violence that has plagued afghanistan for decades has left very deep wounds. and it is going to take time to heal. we himself know securialso know real challenge. afghans have to strengthen the rule of law, improve access to justice. we also know that discrimination and violence against women continue to be major problems. but i know every one of these women and women this afghanistan today will remain determined and we have an obligation

afghanistan has a banking sector, afghanistan has a strong culture. you've all heard of pomegranates they come from afghanistan. you have heard of grapes. they come from afghanistan. the ones that come from afghanistan, i know you have them in california as well. [laughter] so, ladies and gentlemen, there is a country in afghanistan just like here in america just like the rest of the world. there is wedding and wedding halls, there is music, there is cars honking, there are donkey driven carts. there is society, there is life. this society is out loudly and moving forward as any other society. it is this that i would like you to remember when you think of afghanistan. a country of 5000 years of history, at least. a country that has produced thinkers, philosophers. a country like other countries, and i can tell you that the most recent suffering will be behind us. a new time is beginning, has already begun. with 2014 coming, your sons and daughters will no longer be burdened with protecting afghanistan. the sons and daughters will take the mantle and m

free press in afghanistan, the history of that. >> it's a good question. a began stan is experiencing a free press right after 9/11. there was a big market for afghan journalists practicing the values in standards of journalism, while facing domestic violence, as well. >> so, nowadays, there are -- those of tv channels, radios, publications, and news agencies, which all -- through all these channels, people are feeding the information entertainment, and international events. meanwhile, journalists are one of the group of people which they face a lot of chal frjing -- challenges and traits through the different sources like -- challenging traits like the taliban, like tribal leaders, like some regional countries which they are trying to influence the freedom of speech in afghanistan. >> it's very interesting to be a journalist, but around, it's very challenging to be a journalist around the country. >> i would imagine the american people would be shoked shocked to know about the region and the nation. >> should more should americans know? >> it's a tribal s

or nato troops in afghanistan. let me make clear, however, that plans are not decisions and assure you that we are not about to decide to abandon all that we in the afghan people have achieved. based upon the results of the expressions of public opinion throughout the country and discussions the route my own visit last week, i don't believe that there can be any serious doubt that the afghan people want the united states and nato forces to state and recognize that the bilateral security agreement is a necessary prerequisite. also the keystone of a much wider international permanent involving over 70 countries ready to provide economic and security assistance to afghanistan beyond 2015. the regional neighbors with the exception of a iran also understand the importance. and a stand that they have all personally urged the president to conclude this agreement. as you know, several of these leaders are no fans of american military presence in central asia, but they all seem to recognize that without continued internatio

and afghanistan. but the security of both pipelines we have to compare one tribal area that is a relatively unsafe area on the peace pipeline that goes through the relatively safe area in pakistan and iran. asked to baluchistan, by the way, sharif was also involved in the peace pipeline. it's nothing that he's forced to take but baluchistan as you know the insurgency historically you don't have rules in that area and the most surprised area and also the report shows the pakistan government that broke down on the insurgency and it's very similar. but most control of and of course iran over the region so so they are not doing enough to secure the border. it's going on for quite some time but in the media you would see that they are kind of blaming the pakistan government for being upset with the borders and not anything in pakistan of course they believed that sharif is close but there is a difference when one of the officials put it out the other day that it's close to saudi arabia but is not the agent

the corollary is you cannot win in afghanistan if you lose in afghanistan. they are linked in that way. this is too often left out of our discussion entirely. one of the reasons to care about afghanistan is because of pakistan. >> and because of pakistan's nuclear weapons. >> yes. >> another question from the audience. he said, why blame our leaders when it is the media that constantly reports on corruption, failure programs, etc.? i would say we both their responsibility. without any question. the media is culpable. there is some good reporting on afghanistan. not nearly enough. there is some terrible reporting on afghanistan. what i would point out here to you is that the journalists writing about this stuff are getting calls from government officials who, by the way, love to leak things when they are the ones doing the leaking. they are very active in going after leakers when they do not like weeks because they -- leaks because they counteract the message. apparently the media does not seem to raise much of an objection about that. there is a lot lacking

the transition in afghanistan and the way forward for u.s. afghanistan, and pakistan. i lead a delegation to cobble this weekend with mr. kennedy and dr. barra. we had the honor to meet with our men and women that serve our country in afghanistan. they do a tremendous job day in and day out. while in afghanistan, we had the opportunity to speak with mr. karzai and it seemed like he was pre-optimistic about the final security agreement. he was looking forward to its completion, now, however, he is balking at signing the agreement. it is grand council endorsed. as recently at this last weekend, he has lashed out at the u.s. and accused us of threatening him. karzai's flirting with iran is dangerous to our security interest. we are complex and concerned. >> we are pleased to be joined by representatives of the u.s. department of state, the agency for international development, and the department of defense. ambassador james dobson serves as the representative for afghanistan and pakistan. he has filled a number of senior positions at the state department and white house.

store of afghanistan. he will sign the book after the program. i think today's program can be very interesting you've may hear different perspectives, learn a lot about the history of afghanistan, and if you read these two books you'll get the cop text and host of afghanistan. if you read at that time's book you'll see a character who comes to life during part of the period of history we're going to talk about today. so start off, please public tamim. [applause] >> thank you all for being here. thank you to the commonwealth club. let me just check the time so i don't go over. i'm sure all of you are very interested in what is going on in afghanistan right now, who is contesting for the presidential seat in the elections next year, what happensfter the nato forces withdraw, if they do. but as a historian, we can get into all that with questions but as a historian, i'm interested in hour we got here. and i feel that how we got here is part of the question of, where do we go from here? and in this book, games

is a particularly crucial party in all what is happening in afghanistan. it was because of the terrorist attack on the not to states that the international community notably surf us and i said. started the engagement to military engagement in afghanistan and it is now only clear and very dominant engagement of the united states that we can have certain solutions but why do you thing after some many here is a waging a gang of waging a war against the taliban and the taliban of was proclaimed alamy of the united states one day american invasion into afghanistan began so after all those years of typing. root out the influence of taliban in afghanistan why do you think the americans are changing tactics well i will leave assessments of different phases of disengagement. to military and political historians for me the most important thing is. that. the international community together with afghanistan came to the conclusion that there is no military solution to the situation the deal in the solution is political one and therefore. the political truck must be pr

want troops to remain in afghanistan? >> well, there is a strong feeling here that if we don't have a presence there that it's a question whether the afghan security forces will be able to maintain the kind of posture that's going to enable them to survive beyond our leaving. we are concerned about the possibility here that they may not have the cohesion, and that we can make a great deal of difference in terms of particularly our training with them, monitoring them, mentoring them rather. so this is important. there's one other element here, too. that if we're not there physically, the question is, will our funds be there? because really their ability to have any security force is going to be contingent upon the funds that we and others have promised. we're talking about something in excessive of $4 billion. >> that's a lot of money. >> yes. omar, mr. ambassador, when president karzai called this loya jirga, he could, i suppose, go directly to the afghan parliament. why going to the loya jirga, and why on this issue of j

military action in afghanistan. so over the following decade we have seen as a huge drop in support about whether we should have gone there in the first place. i'm going to argue somewhat controversially that i feel the u.s. has said it's going to stop combat operations by is december of 2014i am not clear what that means. it hasn't been announced what it's going to look like if the option hangs over the future u.s. role but i'm going to argue that several major factors should give one pause in exit in afghanistan. first is you wouldn't know by political statement that the first is al qaeda's global leadership today is still located in this region in the afghanistan pakistan region. it has been weakened by the strikes which we have seen with the human rights reports that is a controversial step. but in my view a civil war where a successful taliban led insurgency would almost certainly allow al qaeda back into afghanistan and pakistan. i was just there last month along the border and i will say up front there is sti

, a sovereign afghanistan, that can govern and secure itself for the future. >> afghanistan will, with the help that they provide be able to provide security to its people and to protect its borders. >> panetta said he and karzai made good progress but he declined to say whether they had agreed the size of the u.s. force that will remain in afghanistan. >> after a long and difficult path, we are finally, i believe, at the last chapter of establishing in afghanistan, a sovereign afghanistan that can govern and secure itself for the future. >> afghanistan will, with the help that are you providing, be able to provide security to its people and to protect its

afghanistan. we also welcome our listening and internet audiences and invite everyone to visit us online at www.commonwealth club.org. and now it's my pleasure to introduce our speakers. tamim was born in kabul where father was a professor and his mother taught the first school for girls. he is the writer, lecturer, teacher and director of the san francisco writer's work shop. , in, in... block -- he has written the game without rowells. ... he will also sign the book after the program. i think today's program will be very interesting. you may hear differing perspectives and a lot about the history of afghanistan. if you read these two books, which are both wonderful, you will the context and the history of afghanistan. if you read the other you will see a character that comes to life during the history that will talk. be will start off. [applause] >> thank you all for being here. thank you to the commonwealth club. let me check the time so i don't go over. i am sure all of you are interested in w

they hijacked afghanistan. afghanistan was alive. that is different from its relationship with pakistan or yemen or somalia. where they operate essentially either in an area with no state or in a state that is hostile to them. but isn't capable of suppressing them to the degree we would like. operating within a state that is actively compliant, obviously, considerably expands their capacity to plan and mount large-scale terrorist operations as we found in september 2001. the worst of all situations is the taliban remain linked to al qaeda and they come back and govern the country. that is something -- the risk of that i do not put that very high. i do not put the cost of reducing that risk further very high, either. if there is as 5% but you could reduce it by spending $4 billion a year, i would argue that is worth $4 billion. other people i would argue what did 9/11 cost us? we could lose a couple of buildings every decade. and a few thousand citizens rather than losing much larger amounts of money. they will come to a different ris

the corollary is you cannot win in afghanistan if you lose in afghanistan. they are linked in that way. this is too often left out of our discussion entirely. one of the reasons to care about afghanistan is because of pakistan. >> and because of pakistan's nuclear weapons. >> yes. >> another question from the audience. he said, why blame our leaders when it is the media that constantly reports on corruption, failure programs, etc.? i would say we both their responsibility. without any question. the media is culpable. there is some good reporting on afghanistan. not nearly enough. there is some terrible reporting on afghanistan. what i would point out here to you is that the journalists writing about this stuff are getting calls from government officials who, by the way, love to leak things when they are the ones doing the leaking. they are very active in going after leakers when they do not like weeks because they -- leaks because they counteract the message. apparently the media does not seem to raise much of an objection about that. there is a lot lacking

he is the primary negotiator for afghanistan. his sensehan side, was that things were moving in the right direction. he was positive we could sign the bilateral security agreement. president karzai said the same thing to me. there are difficult issues we're working for now. they are non-negotiable from the u.s. perspective. i think the team is working hard to address that now. >> thank you very much, general. we appreciate your leadership and all those who served under need you, you do an excellent job. >> thank you, senator. >> i just have a few additional questions. term say "ife and i'ved sanctuary always thought there were interchangeable but you do not. can you explain to was the difference in your vocabulary between safe haven and sanctuary? >> we use the term safe haven where we cannot get to the enemy. sanctuary will use with regard to pakistan. when we talk about any safe havens, inside the force, we talk about enemy safe havens that are geographically within afghanistan and sanctuaries are those areas outside afghanista

in afghanistan. we drove across kabul to the university in afghanistan. i wish every american could go american university in afghanistan. there, if every american could go there, or if american could see what is happening just in that one across kabul to it, i believe it would change most americans about what we have accomplished theh our allies and with afghan security forces in afghanistan. the city now is full of cars, isere is traffic jams, there shops opening all over the place. people are in markets. drive -- we couldn't across kabul, they wouldn't let across kabul years before. it just simply was too dangerous. it is still a dangerous place, by the way. i don't want to sound pollyannish here. things havent is changed for the better in afghanistan and the american people, sadly, don't know it. relative to the american by way ofy itself part of the story, of course, is the growth in the number of students. when it opened i think it with 53 students. there is now 1,000 students there. 300 of them are women. and they have a broad number of courses. i

you don't have that in afghanistan. a lot of these people that come in and want to be soldiers or policemen can only be veted by the elders in the village. so you don't know who you are. what we tried to do was bring in bio metrics and you'll probably read about that now, how do we reset and establish a good background way to determine who should be armed and who should be in uniform over there and who shouldn't be and that's some of the things we were doing. corruption is very real. but it's acceptable. we don't like it but in afghanistan, people accept corruption as a way of life. so another challenge was how do we change the mind set, how did we make people realize it's not right to do the kind of things they were doing which was grafting, taking money and being a corrupt society, taking money from people just to move throughout their town. one of the ways we did that was trying to be sure we took people and spent time with the police officers themselves. we probably spent way too much -- too much emphasis on contrac

afghanistan. let me set that within another set of figures. with iraq, after 8.8 years of war, 4480 six americans killed, thousands more with life- changing wounds. depending on which estimate you want to take, close to 3 trillion american dollars spent. close to a quarter of a million iraqis killed. that many more are seriously wounded or close to a million displaced from their homes, very few have returned. we replaced one strong-arm later with another. this one is allied closely with our regional adversary, iran. then we look at afghanistan. close to 2200 americans killed. that many more seriously wounded. posted $1 trillion spent. tens of thousands of afghans killed. i've asked myself this hypothetical, just to try to set in context what these wars have costs relative to what we have achieved. if the united states and gone into iraq like it did in 2003 and in afghanistan in 2002, and then left, would the cost of the war been any worse than what actually happened between 2003- 2011 in iraq and

interests in afghanistan. the professor talked about the importance of a continued relationship with the united states and the afghan people are tilted in that direction. not just one or two of us talking about it. i think now the problem is having sat down the red lines, to see whether, in fact, there is any potential here for whatever kind of give is necessary for moving ahead before the afghan elections and the delay that would seriously, i think, disrupt our possibility, in a planning sense, to be able to stay on. and i think that is that conversation susan put forward. >> david, i don't often channel donald rumsfeld but as i was listening to him answer this question, i was thinking, sometimes you just have to deal with the afghan president you have rather than the one you wish you had. and i wonder if the united states is already looking past karzai, that this is a bump in the road, a last-minute complication, but since he is going to leave in the spring, in theory, sur worried about who is taking over. >

afghanistan? >> our number 1 bottom line after 2014 and in 2001 when we went in was terrorism. l-qaeda still exists. the threat of a resurgent al-qaeda is something we can't accept. so we need to make sure that afghanistan is never again a haven for terrorism. >> ambassador pickering, how would you answer that question? >> i would agree with david that terrorism is an issue. i think that we have a difficult problem because over the years, we have created several impressions or misimpressions about why we are in afghanistan. one of those is the swiss democracy misimpression. another of those -- is. >> i thought that shorthand would work. that misimpression, i think, is that we are somehow there to assure that afghanistan becomes a modern, functioning democratic state as opposed to finding ways, i think, to work within the construct of afghanistan, to try to help put the situation as we leave it on a more stable footing than when we found it. and i think that great nations who intervene are always,

she had recently moved back to afghanistan to live with her husband. according to police, she was working as a health worker in the province and had been filming the lives of local women as part of her work. >> i was shocked when i heard that she was shot dead, yesterday night, possibly, by talibans. i cannot understand why she went back to afghanistan when she was targeted several times. in the year 1995, in the year 1994. >> police said taliban militants arrived at her home in the capital, tired of her husband and other members of the family, took her out and shot her. they dumped her body near a religious school, police added. she became well-known in india for her memoir, which recounted her life in afghanistan with her husband and her escape. she was the subject of a 2003 bollywood film, "escape from taliban." >> the afghan police arrested two militants and an execution style murder of a right who had critically written about the tele-van and a memoir that was later made into a bollywood movie -- execution style murder of a writer who had critical

in afghanistan, the police are not so concerned with traffic control, traffic is insane in afghanistan. so you'll see traffic lights but they don't work. they are not so concerned with chasing criminals. what they are concerned with is protecting themselves and protecting the villagers. in a lot of places throughout afghanistan, the police might be the only thing that's separating the villagers from the taliban. they are what would be more considered a paramilitary source. -- force. ufrptly prrp unfortunately they are not trained nearly as well as the taliban, they don't have the same equipment and they are greatly outnumbered by the enemy moving freely through afghanistan. so the focus of effort needed to be switched to say how do we fix that because the populations are concentrated in the districts and we needed to look at how we would fix the police in the districts, how we would train these folks and figure out who's, who should be in there and who shouldn't be. when i was in kabul, i worked very closely with the chief of police up there and with all the different sections of the p

aljazeera, afghanistan. >> meanwhile, the war in afghanistan has claimed thousands of american lives. the number of forces killed at 2,290. of that number, 1,797 u.s. troops were killed in action, 493 were killed in non-hostile incidents, and 19,494 are listed as wounded in action. >>> the son of a korean war vet said that his father is being held against his will in north korea. his son said that the authorities took his 85-year-old father off of a plane last month. newman was about top leave after being a tourist. he talked to the korean officials will his military service. >>> the negotiations in iran and six world powers are back at the bargaining table in geneva, trying to end the long standoff over iran's nuclear program. phillip joins you us live from geneva, and where are we today? >> reporter: well, del, we're well into the second day, the first full day of negotiations. they're behind closed doors, and folks are keeping their cards very close it their chests. we know there's apparently a draft resolution that's being passed around and the language of it is being discussed, a

of afghanistan in 2014. her book is called "the favored daughter: one woman's fight to lead afghanistan to the future." please welcome to the program fawzia koofi. [cheers and applause] hello. thank you for coming. [cheers and applause] nice to see you. [cheers and applause] you know, we get a lot of people on this show and they are all very nice. but your story is so astonishing and so inspiring that i am embarrassed. it begins with your birth and your mother feeling like because you are a girl, you are not worthy, and they leave you to die. and yet here you are running for president of afghanistan. how -- [cheers and applause] -- it's -- humbling and -- walk us through just a little bit of that journey. >> it's true. actually my story is a part of many afghanistan woman story but the fact that i made it for everyone to hear the life of an afghan woman is first of all i was educated. because my mother as a womg suffered so much and she didn't want another woman to suffer as much as she suffered. she doesn't

and afghanistan. in fact it was in 2008 when then senators joe biden, chuck hagel and john kerry, chuck hagel his pick to be defense secretary, john kerry his pick to head up the state department, went to afghanistan and actually met with hamid karzai, had a very contentious meeting with him as they confronted the issue of corruption in afghanistan. so certainly this is a relationships that that has had tension over the years and that is something as well that these new picks for the national security team and foreign relations team are going to be confronting and they certainly have experience with, wolf. >> all right. if we're in that two minute warning, i think they will be announcing the introduction of the proptwo presidents walking will. an opening statement by president obama and then karzai and then questions. very limited number of questions. i think two questions maybe from each side from the afghan side frrks t, from the u.s. side and then they will answer questions. they've been meeting in

plays on all of those issues afghanistan borders iran afghanistan has an increasingly important relationship with china and of course the predominant muslim population afghanistan has a lot of affinity with other with the other muslim populations in the middle east and then more broadly across asia so i think afghanistan will be important player in all of these and all of these drama but the united states is now i think myopically focused on trying to in a sense defeat the islamic republic of iran to roll back what it sees as this this challenge to the problem merican governments that existed in the middle east and to roll back what it sees is the right the rise of china but afghanistan has for centuries emerged as a central player in these these various geo political games and will again do so whether washington likes it or not you know my leverage to it was trying to get political risk consultancy thank you for being on the program. top stories of. the syrian foreign ministry slammed the top international peace envoy to the conflict zone and flagrantly comes out to me said he does not see

forces afghanistan. i want to take this opportunity to thank general allen for his thoughtful and devoted leadership in afghanistan, for his forthrightness and his interactions with me and the rest of the members of this committee. when senatoreid and i visited afghanistan in january, we saw a real signs of progress, including the afghan security forces increasingly taking the lead responsibility for protecting their country. good news stories about afghanistan and the afghan security forces don't seem to get the coverage of the u.s. media that is given to negative stories. for example, it was widely reported that only one of the 23 afghan brigades is rated by isaf is independent. on the other hand we heard from our commanders in afghanistan that 87% of operations in afghanistan's critical regional command east are carried out solely by afghan security forces. another success story is now the 18,000 strong afghan local police program. these community defense forces when coordinated with district level na

there are mountains and afghanistan. it is known for its mountains, and the mountains in this book to figure rather prominently. there are several travels in which people are traveling across the desert. and afghanistan is known for that sort of talk biography. i changed the wording. it was inspired by blake, although that is not the actual wording. tavis: since you mentioned typography, i know that afghanistan is always a central character in your novels. we will come back to that, but how does the typography, how does the geography play in this particular novel? >> well, there is a number of passages in the book where characters are actually travelling across the country and happen to whether the elements and typography, crossing mountains, and, in fact, the book begins with a fable, where one of the characters makes this rather difficult journey and ends up climbing mountains, and so on, so it is a recurring image in the book, and what i loved about the problem is the word eco. -- echo. there are things that happen in

up next in worlds apart can afghanistan's elections in two thousand and fourteen do anything to quell decades of violence. please speak your language. programs in documentaries in arabic it's all here on all t.v. reporting from the world talks about six of the p.r.p. interviews intriguing story to tell you. introduce the arabic to find out more visit arabic don't call. the first. hello welcome to worlds apart afghanistan is slated to hold presidential elections next year a move that has already been described as being make or break moment for the country and while the international community is eager it's a system down astonished and a crowd to. this in that simply too risky to have a battle for power at a time when more afghani people are killed than in many of the previous here as well to discuss that analogy one by one could this be zealots. special envoy to afghanistan mr copas thank you very much for your time i know that your mission has a very special role in assisting the april vote and i understand that the democratic transition is invalid in the afghanistan's call but a cons