Pulling out, pushing on? Or just going home?”

Støre based his address on some of the following key points: 

 

• Thank you for the invitation. Important forum and discussions taking place here.
  
  
• Change and dynamism: Where are we in 10 months’ time?
  
  
• The title “Pulling out, pushing on? Or just going home?” The challenge: Getting these things right. Enabling Afghanistan to run Afghanistan. When to withdraw.  
  
  
• Challenging – because of a situation that is difficult to read, to interpret. What is the true situation? Risk of misreading events. 
  
  
• I) Complexity: Transition. Afghan priorities (budget, money) and ownership.
  
   
• Transparency. Human rights.
  
   
• Mutual expectations.
  
   
• Afghan leadership: with ISAF present/when ISAF has withdrawn.
  
   
• Political solution. What is intended. What is needed. 
  
  
• “An Afghanistan good enough is good enough”. What is good enough? 
  
  
• II) Is a political solution sustainable? Fighting insurgency, corruption and other problems: Will never be better than the quality of the government we try to support.
  
   
• Outreach. Does governance work?
  
   
• Army – and government.
  
   
• Fighting other people’s war.
  
   
• Human rights situation.
  
            
• Returning to: “An Afghanistan good enough”. Living with warlords. Political realities. The ethnic groups, the ethnic mix. 
  
  
• Reconciliation. On the verge, different traditions, difficult tests.
  
   
• III) Long term/short term. 
  
  
• Military capacity, capacity building.
  
   
• The discussion military/civil. Now paying the price for blurred lines. Well documented that so-called quick impact projects carried out by military forces rarely bring about stability or achieve what they set out to. 
  
  
• Afghan police. 
  
  
• IV) The region.