World leaders issued a stark warning yesterday to the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, demanding detailed plans of how he will take over responsibility for the country's security and drive out corruption within five years.
The message from the G8 leaders, who are gathered in Canada, will be seen as setting a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops. It will also be seen as a vindication for David Cameron, who said yesterday that he hoped British soldiers would be out of the country in the same time period.
But the message is likely to trigger controversy, as many warn that Afghanistan is far from stable. Nick Harvey, the armed forces minister, said yesterday that there would be no withdrawal before ministers were satisfied that the country would not "slip back into being a haven for international terrorism".
One of the country's foremost experts warned that Afghanistan is edging towards the "horrendous" scenario of civil war and that its population increasingly believes international forces are losing the battle with the Taliban.
In an interview with the Observer, Michael Semple, the former head of the EU mission in Afghanistan, said that the security situation was unravelling to a point where the country could implode into civil chaos. Semple – who is said to retain extensive high-level contacts within the Taliban and advises several government agencies working in Afghanistan – added that last week's dismissal of Nato's top commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, could further undermine trust among the Afghan people in the coalition.
"There is a widespread perception [in Afghanistan] that Nato is not winning this," he said. "A lot of people now expect that the Nato campaign will fail. They don't think that Nato will see it through, and the government is not strong enough to continue. They expect there will be another round of civil war and they are getting ready for that."
Semple said talk of withdrawing international forces, including Britain's 10,000-strong presence in the south, was helping push towards civil war. Cameron has repeatedly stressed his desire to bring home troops as soon as possible – making his views most clear on Friday when he insisted he wanted them back by the next election.
Yesterday he led discussions on the issue with other G8 leaders, arguing that the time had come for Karzai to prove he could deliver on anti-corruption, electoral reform and good governance. In a passionate speech, Cameron said he wanted to see the military surge bound together with a political drive.
His views were reiterated in the G8 communique, which said: "The Kabul conference in July will be an important opportunity for the government of Afghanistan to present its detailed plan and show tangible progress in implementing the commitments made in January 2010 including measures to… make concrete progress to reinforce the formal justice system and expand the capacity of the Afghan national security forces to assume increasing responsibility for security within five years."
The prime minister's apparent eagerness for a full withdrawal is understood to be causing consternation among policymakers in Washington and Kabul, who believe it is sending signals to the Afghan people that UK troops are preparing to go home. Semple said evidence was emerging on the ground that the country was tilting towards civil war – a situation that has dogged Afghanistan for much of its 300-year history.
Semple, a fellow at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, said there were signs of a three-way jostling for power evolving between pro-Taliban Pashtun, anti-Taliban Pashtun and non-Pashtun groups. "The civil war scenario is a horrendous position. You can already see elements of that at the moment. The reality is that the Nato campaign is just about keeping a lid on it, but not forever.
"You handle the drawdown wrongly, you get basically ambushed in Afghan politics and you get this prospect of a civil war," said Semple, who as the third-highest-ranking diplomat in the country was expelled by the Afghan government in 2007 for pursuing talks with the Taliban. Last week Britain's special envoy to Afghanistan, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, stepped down after clashing with senior Nato and US officials over his insistence that the military-driven counter-insurgency effort was failing. The veteran diplomat likened the battle in Afghanistan to "a civil war", and said that the need for peace talks with the Taliban was imperative.
Cameron has yet to clarify his views on negotiations with the Taliban, but is said to be increasingly anxious over the number of British troops being killed, and has braced the public for further casualties during the summer "fighting months" ahead.
A total of 307 UK servicemen and women have died since operations began in October 2001, with 18 fatalities so far this month. Yesterday thousands of Britons turned out across the UK to mark Armed Forces Day and show their support for servicemen and women.
Cameron's withdrawal strategy remains dependent on accelerating the size and capabilities of the Afghan army. Although the Ministry of Defence insist that the growth of that force is on track, Semple said that was far from the case.
"All Afghan army units involved in recent operations alongside Nato have been operating at around about half strength, mainly because of retention issues," he said.
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