The last decade was the best ever opportunity for our worn-torn country Afghanistan to pave its path and strengthen its foundations for long term development. With international community's financial and non-financial support, noteworthy improvements are observable in democracy, civil society activities, human rights, media, education and other important sectors.
Nonetheless, all those gains are fragile as security remains at worst and the future stands completely bleak. If Afghan leadership had planned better, today would have a completely different Afghanistan that would not hesitate that it would face security and economic chaos after the pull-out of NATO forces. But unfortunately, we are still highly dependent on the international community for maintaining our development and moving towards stability and long term peace.
The complete withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan is to take place by the end of 2014 or even before that. The cooperation from international community will, no doubt, diminish. But this is the time our political leaders must set aside their differences and come together at one platform to save Afghanistan from once again turning into an epicenter for Islamic extremist groups like Taliban and al-Qaida. The government of Afghanistan has a very crucial role to play at this crucial time.
Afghanistan requires formulation of better national and foreign policies and decision making in the best interest of Afghans. In addition, there is a need for an overall institutional reform aimed at improving transparency and accountability. All and all, it is our government that must plan to make use of the opportunities available to it by learning from its past mistakes and mistakes of the ex-governments of Afghanistan.
Today, after more than ten years of international effort and establishment of Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), the lives of the people of Afghanistan are still at the mercy of militants. Insurgents continue suicide/roadside bombings, targeted killings, abductions, etc. And no end to such acts appears to be happening.
If terrorism, that has hit Afghanistan the most, is a regional and/or global issue, corruption, social injustice, poppy cultivation, poverty, flawed politics and many other such issues are up to a great extent our own national issues. The international community has done and still doing much for us. The question is what we have done for ourselves. Have we any achievement in resolving issues that await our own effort?