Afghanistan in a transition of politics and society

In Afghanistan, where the future has looked so bleak for so long, many are beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

That beaming light is the prospect of a new government for all Afghan people, now that the socially oppressive Taliban regime has been deposed.

"We hope that the international community will assist not just in the reconstruction and rebuilding of Afghanistan but in the unity of the country," Mohammed Gardezi said at a press conference held at the University last Monday.

Gardezi was Afghanistan's minister of agriculture until the creation of the interim government in December.

He and Abdul Arazou, who is to be Afghanistan's interim government's ambassador to Iran, said the international community should not impose undue interference on Afghanistan's rebuilding.

Gardezi, Arazou and other key figures in the rebuilding of the country met two weeks ago to discuss the country's security and viability at the Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination's Workshop on Afghanistan, a part of the Wilson School.

Nisama Danishyar, a cultural attaché to the Afghan consulate in Iran, has been leading the cause for women's rights in her country.

Under the five-year reign of the Taliban, women were stripped of their rights and responsibilities. Now Afghanistan's women have lost their confidence, she said at the press briefing.

Arazou added that he hopes women will play an equal role in the formation of the new government.

The nation also faces the problem of warlords, which have fought to protect their groups from the constant militant terror which has plagued the country for the past two and a half decades, said Wolfgang Danspeckgruber, head of the Liechtenstein Institute and organizer of the workshop.

Now, however, these groups are likely to resent a centralized government which will not make the needs of warlords a top priority.

"The decentralization is accepted or is preferred [by some of the attendees], but obviously people realize that the power center needs to maintain some sort of authority," Danspeckgruber said.

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Because weapons were pumped into the nation by the United States and by other nations during the Soviet Union's control, not only may warlords have the power to prevent the formation of a centralized government, but also may have weapons of mass destruction.

Afghanistan may also find itself in the middle of the back and forth between India and Pakistan. Because Pashtuns are split by the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, Pakistan could use their influence over that border as a sign of power toward India.

"Any tension between India and Pakistan will directly reflect with Afghanistan territory," Danspeckgruber said.

During the conference, attendees were given the opportunity to visit Ground Zero. Some of the Afghan members called the site the birthplace of the new Afghanistan, Danspeckgruber said.

Without the events of Sept. 11 and the following U.S. disposal of the Taliban rule, Afghanistan may not have made it to the accomplished state that it has now reached, he said.

The idea for the workshop started in November and came from a high-level U.S. administration official who Danspeckgruber would not name.

Afghanistan's interim government, established in December, was formed under the provision that it would last six months. In June it will be replaced by a new temporary government. That intermediary government will have the responsibility of establishing the permanent government's constitution.