Afghan Government Says UN Representative Overstepped Authority

Facing international criticism continues to mount, the Afghan Foreign Ministry noted over the weekend that the U.N.’s top official in their country overstepped in issuing instruction for cleaning up the corrupt Afghan government and ridding the country of powerful warlords. After the recent Afghan election was marked by fraud and widespread skepticism, President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called on the government there to clean up. It was the statements made by Norwegian diplomat Kai Eide, however, that drew the most attention from the Afghan government.

Eide warned last week that the Afghan government should not necessarily assume support from international donors and troops if the corruption and influence of warlords continues. Said Eide, "Troop countries are looking very carefully, and more carefully and more intensively, than before at what is happening and that will certainly determine the public mood at this critical juncture. And that’s a factor of conditionality that governments cannot ignore." Eide has also made previous statements about the need for the country’s government to clean up.

Regarding those comments, the country’s foreign ministry offered a statement that read, "Over the last few days some political and diplomatic circles and propaganda agencies of certain foreign countries have intervened in Afghanistan’s internal affairs by issuing instructions concerning the composition of Afghan government organs and political policy of Afghanistan. Such instructions have violated respect for Afghanistan’s national sovereignty." The comments were telling, especially given the fact that one country in the region has already had its sovereignty challenged in a more straight-forward manner, i.e. – militarily – in order to clean up just the sort of corruption that Eide spoke to.