A few months ago, peace between the Taliban and the US seemed unjust but conceivable. However, after continuous terror attacks, President Trump recanted from his position and ceased the negotiations. Nonetheless, an agreement is likely for the upcoming year.

Since 2001, the US has been present in Afghanistan after an operation that ousted the Taliban regime that had terrorized the country. Today, the radical Islamists have almost regained its strength pre 9/11. In the past two weeks alone, at least 94 government-led forces and 36 civilians have been killed by the Taliban.

The US has been trying to negotiate a peace treaty with the Taliban since summer 2018. After President Trump had ceased the negotiations, the hopes for an agreement decreased drastically. Until two weeks ago, US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad met Taliban representatives again to advance a deal.

However, if the negotiations were indeed to resume, they would be facilitated at a politically explosive time. Presidential elections were held in the country at the end of September. Almost three months later, the election commission has now stated that Ashraf Ghani is ahead with 50.6 percent of the vote. However, the final election result has still not been published. Most importantly, and this illustrates the circumstances in the country, the new President will not have any significant influence on the negotiations, as the Taliban see the government as a western puppet and thus have made it a condition that it cannot participate in the negotiations with the US.

The fact that the self-proclaimed dealmaker himself, President Donald Trump, has agreed to a stipulation as outrageous as this indicates how powerful the Taliban have become again. It is estimated that the Taliban have regained control of between 50-70 percent of the country.

However, the US’ proclivity to facilitate a deal is also based on one only truth: Donald Trump’s promise to bring home the troops. Thus, if an agreement could be reached prior to the 2020 election, it would undoubtedly be found in Trump’s reelection campaign commercials. The fact that the deal is being made with repugnant terrorists, who continue to commit unspeakable crimes is hardly noteworthy at this stage. The latter eludes to the fact that the Taliban possess the leverage in these negotiations, as the whole world is acutely cognizant of the circumstances mentioned above.

However, even for Trump, it would be a reach to spin an immediate withdrawal without any Taliban concessions as a win. Thus, Khalilzad is therefore planning, as a first step, to persuade the Taliban to reduce violence in the country. It is noteworthy that the Taliban have at least avoided major attacks in city centers with many civilians in recent months, which can be interpreted as a signal to the US, even though it merely amplifies the barbarism the US has been facing.

Moreover, the Taliban must promise not to protect terrorist groups that threaten the international community, such as Al Qaeda, once did. The deal also provides for, and this is where it becomes particularly sensitive that the Taliban and central government in Kabul will share power over the country in the future. In view of the current situation, it is hard to imagine how this could work in practice.

In an idealistic world, such a deal would not be worth the paper it is written on. In geopolitics, however, national interests must override morality at times. Thus, the stipulations mentioned above would result in a peace treaty that can secure the ultimate withdrawal of US troops.

Prior to the end of negotiations in September, the roadmap stipulated that after the peace treaty was signed, the Afghan government and the Taliban should conduct negotiations in Afghanistan as a second step. For this, both parties should officially meet in Norway. Then as now, it is difficult to predict what such an agreement could look like.

The situation in Afghanistan remains disastrous. One the one hand, the US should not attempt to keep the peace in a region that is unable ever to become stable and secure. However, a peace agreement with mass-murdering terrorists is a high price to pay for a nation that rightfully prides itself to have brought liberty to many places in the world.

L'articolo What 2020 Holds For US-Taliban Peace Talks proviene da InsideOver.

Security risks, historically low turnout, voter fraud, lapses in the biometric system and bickering amongst political candidates are some of the reasons why Afghans are beginning to feel alienated from the Presidential Elections held in September.

Although more than two months have passed since the election date, the country’s Independent Election Commission (IEC) is yet to count the votes.

The results were initially due on October 19 but the date was extended after the IEC’s ill-trained staff were faced with technical difficulties due to the use of biometric data systems –first time in the country’s electoral history.

However, the IEC officials failed to meet that deadline. On November 2, the commission said votes from all 34 provinces will be tallied again. The results of which, it said, will be announced on November 14.

But another deadline came and went; election officials postponed the results yet again. However, this time around, they did not even give a new date.

Apart from the low turnout and biometric failure on Election Day, the delays in the announcement of the results have raised suspicions over the veracity of the counting process.

What is causing the delay?

The bone of contentions lies with the dispute amongst the top-two candidates – Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah – who have both alleged voter fraud in the counting process.

On the Election Day, the IEC reported that around 26,500 polling stations were open, from which it received ballot papers from around 25,500 stations. However, of the papers received from these stations, the IEC had biometric verification on ballots from only 24,800 stations.

But campaigners have said that of the estimated 24,800 stations, they will only accept votes from around 18,850 stations. The rest of the votes, they say are inadmissible.

However, following the initial delay in the announcement of results and verifying the votes, the IEC managed to add data from around 8,400 more stations to the tally. Subsequently, to recount the votes, it had to extend the announcement date to November 14.

However, this time around, the revisions in the total number of stations were not accepted by the election campaigners.

After the IEC announced the revised ballot numbers, Abdullah, the incumbent chief executive, boycotted the recount.

He said that “we have decided not to participate in the vote recounting process. The IEC’s impartiality will be questioned if it does not review its decision and our next decision will be made after that.”

He complained that “votes from 2,400 ballot boxes have been entered into the servers that don’t have data.”

“There are more than 100,000 votes that came outside the valid time (Before and after the voting process started),” he alleged.

Moreover, he asked the IEC to review its decision on adding the new votes while earning that any “illegal decision” on the election will result in a crisis.

On the other hand, in a recent article published online, Ashraf Ghani’s advisers said that “their margin is so comfortable that even if half a million votes are thrown out, they would still win. Mr Abdullah’s advisers, on the other hand, say if all fraudulent votes are removed their candidate will win in the first round and if some level of questionable votes gets counted, the most likely scenario is a runoff.”

But as the IEC continues to extend the deadlines and candidates allege fraud, it is the Afghans who continue to look at the turn of events with increased pessimism.

For them, the only glimmer of hope has been its democracy but trust in that too is beginning to falter.

L'articolo Postponement, Pessimism and the Afghanistan Presidential Elections proviene da InsideOver.

The fourth presidential election after the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 was held on September 28. The use of Biometrics Voters Verification (BVV) and voter lists were the most distinctively novel features of the 2019 presidential election.

Around 9.6 million people registered to vote and the Afghanistan Independent Election Commission (AEIC) had set October 19 to announce the preliminary result of the election. However, despite the euphoria of having the technology to ensure transparency and efficiency in the election, It is almost more than a month since the election was held and neither the exact number of the credible voters nor the preliminary results have been announced.

Shocking news soon leaked into the country revealing that the locks of the doors of the Data Server of AIEC, where biometric data was kept, were found broken. 

Initially, the Independent Election Commission had denied any such incident. However, a day later on October 22 the AIEC member, Raheema Zarifi, announced the confirmation of the intrusion into the Data Server room of biometric devices at a press conference, and said that an investigation into the incident had been launched.

The presidential candidates blamed the incumbent President Ashraf Ghani, who is attempting to hold the office for another five-year term. Speaking at a press conference, Ali Ahmad Osmani, the head of the opposition candidate Abdullah Abdullah’s election campaign claimed that “members of the rival team have also accompanied the security forces while they have entered into the data centre”.

Weeks later, November 14 was determined as the new day for the preliminary result announcement, by the Head of Afghanistan Independent Election Commission, Hawa Alam Nuristani. The delay in announcing the preliminary result of the presidential election frustrated the candidates and people, raising their suspicions about potential behind-the-door manipulation of the final result.

The technology in use

The previous presidential elections were marred with massive fraud and ballot stuffing. For example, the presidential election in 2014 was damaged by extensive systematic fraud, which resulted in a powering sharing deal between the two top candidates.

To create transparency and accountability in voting, the political parties deemed the use of BVV imperative to prevent any fraud in the election. The idea of using BVV technology guarantees the candidates that the election will be transparent and provides the people who are risking their lives, defying the Taliban threats and voting to elect the candidate of their choice with reassurance that their vote is fairly administered and meaningful.

The method used in the 2019 election is a combination of manual voting and the BVV machines. The BVV did not replace the old system, but has been applied as an additional anti-fraud measure.

At the polling station, a voter’s biometric data is registered before the voters cast their votes. The data is then entered into a central database, printed and attached in encrypted form to the ballot paper. According to the IEC, this will enable them to identify those who vote more than once and to invalidate duplicate votes and ballots that are without biometric verification sticker or that have fraudulent voter details.

Elections since 2001

The election of the president in Afghanistan may have shortcomings, though it has achieved a tremendous goal of rooting out the use of violence to resolve political conflict to some extent. The presidential election in 2004 was destroyed by violence and allegations of fraud. In the presidential election 2004, millions of voters were listed with around 11,612,771 registered and the final voters’ turnout recorded as 8,128,940. Out of which 60 per cent were men and 40 per cent were women. Nonetheless, the fraud perpetrated failed to receive as much attention both nationally and internationally as it did in 2009. Hence, President Hamid Karzai was declared as the victor.

Dr. Abdullah Abdullah who claimed to have succeeded in the 2019 election first appeared as a presidential candidate in the presidential election held in Afghanistan on 20 August 2009. The 2009 election was characterised by a lack of security, low voter turnout and the electorate’s little knowledge about the election process. Cases of widespread corruption, intimidation, and other electoral fraud, forced a second-round run-off vote, under the heavy US and ally pressure. However, the runoff was canceled after Abdullah refused to participate citing the lack of transparency in the election process. The voter’s turn out in the 2009 Presidential Election was 4,823,090.

The 2014 presidential election was a big landmark in the nascent democratic system in Afghanistan with its first projected peaceful transfer of power from President Hamid Karzai to an elected successor since 2001. The 2014 election saw an increase in voter participation across the country, with an additional 1,302,143 votes cast for a total of 7,947,527 votes. With a total voting population of approximately 25,354,494, Afghanistan witnessed a 31.35% voter turnout for the runoff election, versus 26.2 per cent during the first election.

After the runoff election, Afghanistan descended into chaos as both Ghani and his rival, Abdullah Abdullah, accused each other of fraud, which sent the US Secretary of State John Kerry to work out a compromise solution. Thus the top two contenders Dr. Ghani and Dr.Abdullah formed the “unity government” sharing power; Ghani was made President and Abdullah was made the country’s newly created position of Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

2019 Presidential Election

On October 3, the Afghanistan Independent Election Commission (AIEC) reported that the number of votes cast on September 28 throughout Afghanistan were 2,695,890. They added: “the numbers could change after the verification of invalidated biometric votes”.

After failing to announce the preliminary result on time, Hawa Alam Nuristani Head of Afghanistan Election Commission said “We are not sacrificing quality for the sake of speed. We are committed to the quality result of the presidential election in 2019.”

Although it was criticized by the presidential candidates, however, the US Ambassador John R. Bass wrote on his twitter that the Afghanistan IEC “is fully implementing anti-fraud measures before announcing preliminary results in the #AfghanElections. We agree it is better to release an accurate result instead of a rushed one. Urge all candidates to support the independence of the process”.

On October 26, AIEC member Mawlana Mohammad Abdullah announced that around 900,000 to 770,000  of the votes cast would be invalidated based on the electoral law of Afghanistan, which lacked legal biometrics. The German company Dermalog which provided the BVV technology sent all voter information to the IEC. On the same day, the commission released new vote numbers, saying that the Dermalog Company had identified 1,843,107 valid votes out of the 1,929,333 votes already transferred to the commission’s central database.

Officials in the Independent Election Commission (IEC) said on October 31 that 47,000 cases of underage, duplicate photos, and photos taken of photos had been detected by the Dermalog server and shared with the IEC which would further be invalidated as well. Speaking at a press conference, Mawlana Abdullah said the commission is now waiting for cases of duplicate fingerprints and biometric data captured before 7 am and 5 pm.

According to presidential candidate Dr. Abdullah’s campaign team, “there are 137,000 fraudulent votes and they must invalidate”. But the Election Commission said Dermalog will provide an explanation on the 137,000 votes in the next two days. “These 137,000 votes were sent to the commission’s database only one day after the elections, and these votes are fake” added a member of the campaign team.

“The Council of Presidential Candidates believes that if there is even one fraudulent vote and someone makes his way to the president’s office with that fake vote then this will not be acceptable,” said presidential candidate Shahab Hakimi.

Could technology restore the lost faith in the Election Commission?

Although the biometric technology was brought to end corruption and to ensure the voters that their votes would bring the most voted candidate to the Office, the scenarios unfolding and the delays make the actions of the AIEC more dubious. The utilization of biometric devices was not without any problem, the first was the lack of awareness of how to use it. The second was a number of biometric devices were lost only to be found later.

One of the election observers who goes only by first name Mansoor said “despite the BVV technology being used, the voter’s turnout was very low”, “one could see in every 10 to 15 minutes a voter would come up in a polling centre”, he further added. “The voting procedure has substantially improved, but it will be interesting to see what the final result will be and how the AIEC will handle the outcome” he further added.

“Even though the biometric device was used it will be very difficult to restore the people’s confidence in the Election Commission especially with the way they handle the current election,” said a political and security analyst who preferred to remain anonymous. “The voter’s turnout was the lowest since 2001, nonetheless, the AIEC has still not been able to announce the initial result.” “Initially the turnout numbers were around two million 600 thousand, it has since reduced to 1.8 million, it will further cut by few hundred thousand and the actual number will be just slightly above a million vote”, he further added.

The number of people registered to vote was around 9.6 million people, it the lowest percentage of a voter casting their vote on Election Day since 2004. Had the AIEC managed the election in a professional and timely manner, it would have helped in building confidence over the institutions but it has further made people uncertain about the progressive transfer of power in Afghanistan.

L'articolo Election and Technology: Will the Biometric Voting Save Democracy in Afghanistan? proviene da InsideOver.