December 5th, 2011
01:47 PM ET

Taliban could return, Karzai warns at conference

The Taliban could make a comeback and take over Afghanistan again, the country's President Hamid Karzai warned Monday at an international conference on Afghanistan's future.

"If we lose this fight, we are threatened with a return to a situation like that before September 11, 2001," Karzai said.

There has been progress in Afghanistan since the overthrow of the Taliban in the wake of the hijacked plane attacks on the United States, he said.

But, he warned, "Our shared goal of a stable, self-reliant Afghanistan is far from being achieved."

Karzai chaired the meeting in Bonn, Germany, aimed at discussing the state of affairs in Afghanistan and pushing for international contributions and support.

 

 

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soundoff (14 Responses)
  1. Katherin wonton

    Save money build drones to patrol

    [youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXjBYp94fSU&w=560&h=315]

    December 5, 2011 at 1:56 pm | Report abuse |
  2. saywhat

    Karzai is hanging on to power because of our presence in Afghanistan, not because he is a popular leader. And he wants that to continue.
    Talibans are an undeniable part of the equation and cannot be ignored or defeated militarily. To think & wish that we could just bomb them out is plain foolish. Their absence & that of Pakistan at the Bonn conference is a sign of probable failure of that exercise.
    This whole Afghan mess which we got ourselves mired into needs statesmanship, foresight and diplomacy to resolve. Alll neighboring countries & influences within the country have to be taken aboard if we want a respectable and face saving exit.

    December 5, 2011 at 1:59 pm | Report abuse |
  3. saywhat

    @ Katherine wonton

    Sorry but drones are a part of the problem not solution. Tanks & bombing runs alone have never worked. That is history's lesson particularly in that part of the world.

    December 5, 2011 at 2:02 pm | Report abuse |
  4. Andreas Moser

    This whole talk about the security situation is moot. It's the (Afghan) economy, stupid: http://andreasmoser.wordpress.com/2011/11/26/the-afghan-economy-in-numbers/

    December 5, 2011 at 2:06 pm | Report abuse |
  5. saywhat

    Most of you wouldn't know or remember that Ronald Reagan hosted Taliban leaders ( including Mullah Omar?) at the White House in 1985. He called them equivalent of our Founding Fathers.
    Then we idolized them as Freedom Fighters & CIA funded them. No way we can think of extricating ourselves from the Afghan open-ended foolishness without talking to them.
    @ Andreas Moser
    Why didn't you say so when we decided to invade Afghanistan. Could have sent a team of Economic advisers instead. with an economic aid package. Better still could have done that right after the Soviets were kicked out by Talibans. Think what we may have saved.

    December 5, 2011 at 2:20 pm | Report abuse |
  6. Afghanistan's troubles

    Afghanistan's biggest trouble is the TAPI. (Trans-Afghan Pipeline Infrastructure) The Taliban gov. refused Russians access, and so Russia invaded and the US helped the Taliban freedom fighters oust Russia. Why did the USSR want the TAPI? To get their Caspian Basin oil through Afghanistan to China. During the Reagan years, the USSR fell apart. The caspian Basin area was carved-up into tiny little countries, who each sold their share of the basin's resources to the American Carlyle Group headed by Bush, Baker, Carlucci, etc. As long as the Taliban ruled, there was simply no way to get the oil and Ng to China. After Iran falls (for the same reason) alternate routes will be available to get those resources to China, and the Taliban probably will once again rule Afghanistan.

    December 5, 2011 at 2:50 pm | Report abuse |
  7. bobcat ( in a hat )

    The taliban is just waiting us out. As soon as we leave, the country will be theirs for the taking. The Afghanistan military will just join with them because they are too scared to fight.

    December 5, 2011 at 3:56 pm | Report abuse |
  8. Joey Isotta-Fraschini

    This is the reason that the Karzai regime and the Taliban need to get together and reach a negotiated settlement as soon as possible. The NATO forces also need to get out of there too. The only true accomplishment the NATO forces did is to make the lives of the Afghan people much harder than before. Furthermore, we never had any right even to be in Afghanistan!

    December 5, 2011 at 7:34 pm | Report abuse |
  9. Pablo

    So let me get this straight...a guy who the west put into power, is not supported internally and has worked against western interests, who has consistently worked with the Pakistani intelligence agency covertly undermining western interests...is asking for "help" from the blindingly inevitable? What a shocker.

    December 5, 2011 at 8:25 pm | Report abuse |
  10. s kel

    Hes to scared and weak to want to seek an agreement JFI, hes a puppet. The taliban??? Ha! Tooooo extream and evil.

    December 5, 2011 at 11:22 pm | Report abuse |
  11. doug blackman

    You think? of course, job not done until Taleban brought to their knees. Keep up the good fight.

    December 6, 2011 at 2:45 am | Report abuse |
  12. ronvan

    Just another reason we should NEVER have been there! We have completely fooled ourselves into thinking that we could change anything in these countries. They have been fighting and killing each other for centuries. For them it is a way of life, brainwashing their children from birth!

    December 6, 2011 at 2:31 pm | Report abuse |
  13. Afghanis prefer the Taliban party

    The Taliban political party has much more support from the Afghan people than the current puppet regime. Afghanis see ont one red cent from the oil and natural gas that flows through their land to China. ALL of the profits go to westerners and the puppet regime they sponsor. What peoples desire to be led by men who are either foreigners themselves or are mere puppets? None. Not you...not me...and not the Afghani citizenry.

    December 6, 2011 at 3:11 pm | Report abuse |
  14. Afghanis prefer the Taliban party

    @ronvan. Are you really so ignoraant that you didn't notice who does mist of the world's fighting? Who supplies most of the worlds weapons of war? Who invades, occupies, and drags-home foreign peoples oil and produce to feed their already obese people? Who trains their children from birth that invading foreign nations is done for God&Country? Who wears Africa's diamonds as African children starve? Afghanistan? Iran? Iraq? NO! the war mongers do you tard.

    December 6, 2011 at 3:17 pm | Report abuse |
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