What did Karzai say to Clinton?

Posted By Josh Rogin Monday, April 5, 2010 - 3:25 PM Share

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is claiming he was surprised at the reaction to last week's comments about a conspiracy by the West to interfere in last August's election.

When he called Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last Friday, he told her that had no idea his statements, which blamed the United Nations for the "massive fraud" he now admits helped keep him in power, would run afoul of the U.S. and NATO allies pouring blood and treasure into Afghanistan to prop up his own government against a fierce Taliban onslaught.

"Karzai, during the course of the conversation, expressed surprise his comments had ‘caused a stir,'" State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told The Cable, adding that Karzai did not actually go as far as to apologize or retract the comments.

"He clarified what he meant. He assured us that his comments were not directed at the United States," Crowley said.

Some of those comments, however, were directed at American diplomat Peter Galbraith, who was the U.N.'s No. 2 official at the time of the election and was later sacked for complaining about the fraud.

And the Karzai-Obama dispute over who should control a key Afghan electoral oversight commission is far from over. Karzai escaped the ruling of the Afghan Parlaiment's lower house, which said he couldn't choose all five commission members, when then upper house neglected to ratify that decision.

Meanwhile, there are signs the Obama administration remains concerned about Karzai's remarks as it works with the Afghan president to move forward on a host of issues, not the least of which is the impending military campaign in and around Kandahar.

U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry also spoke with Karzai prior to the Clinton call, and Clinton had conversations about Karzai's comments with members of her Afghanistan team as well as White House officials about how to respond.

Clinton, who feels she has a rapport that allows her to speak candidly with the Afghan leader, was chosen to handle the issue. She told him to concentrate on the upcoming "peace jirga," the reconciliation conference Karzai is organizing for early May.

"Our message to Karzai was to focus on the future and not the past," Crowley said.

So is it all resolved then? Depends on whom you ask.

"We reached a good understanding by the time the conversation was over," Crowley said. "We understood that this had the potential to have this spiral in a negative direction and we're satisfied that we've moved on."

But Karzai reportedly told a meeting of tribal leaders this weekend that if the international community continues to pressure him, he might just join the Taliban or halt the ongoing military offensive. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Monday morning called those comments "genuinely troubling."Crowley declined to directly address Karzai's latest comments in his Tuesday press conferece, but did issue this warning.

"His comments do have an impact in the United States and he should be aware of that," said Crowley.

AFP/Getty Images

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SURESH SHETH

9:17 PM ET

April 5, 2010

US mollycoddles Pakistan at the expense of Afghanistan

The Obama Administration’s propensity to clutch at straws as it prepares for a hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan has been its illusion that there has been a ‘turnaround’ in Pakistani policies of supporting the Taliban because of the arrest of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the second-ranked Taliban leader, by a joint team of the CIA and ISI in Karachi. The reality appears to be that the CIA stumbled upon a Taliban hideout in Karachi and the arrest of Baradar was purely coincidental. More important, his arrest was an embarrassment, as Baradar was secretly —and unknown to the Pakistanis — in touch with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and a UN Envoy.

Both Mr Karzai and Baradar are Durrani Pashtuns, sharing common tribal loyalties. An infuriated Karzai now finds his reconciliation efforts with the Taliban undermined, with the Pakistanis procrastinating on his demand for the extradition of Baradar to Afghanistan. Pakistan, which for years has denied the presence of the Mullah Omar-led ‘Quetta shura’ on its soil, now brazenly demands that it should be the prime intermediary in any process of reconciliation with the Taliban — a demand the Obama Administration appears to be meekly succumbing to.