LONDON: The Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan is a “failure of the international community,” Britain’s Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on Monday, assessing that the West’s intervention was a job only half-done.
“All of us know that Afghanistan is not finished. It’s an unfinished problem for the world and the world needs to help it,” he told BBC television.
He maintained the 20-year intervention by US-led forces “wasn’t a waste, it wasn’t for nothing” but accused Western powers of being politically short-sighted.
“If it’s a failure, it’s a failure of the international community to not realize that you don’t fix things overnight,” he said.
HR McMaster, the former US national security adviser sacked by ex-president Donald Trump in 2018, accused his country of “wilful ignorance” for its failure to realize the Taliban would swiftly take control.
Both Wallace and McMaster have criticized a deal secured by former US president Donald Trump that would have seen the US withdraw all its troops by May 2021 in exchange for security guarantees from the Islamist militants.
The deal weakened the Afghan government and security forces and strengthened the Taliban, McMaster said, adding: “We stood idly by and we turned a blind eye. This was utterly predictable.”
John Bolton, who replaced McMaster as national security adviser before also being sacked by Trump, said the withdrawal made the United States look like “suckers” in Beijing, Moscow, Tehran and Pyongyang.
Britain last month withdrew most of its 750 remaining troops but is now sending 600 soldiers back to help with repatriation.
Officials are aiming to take 1,200 to 1,500 people from Afghanistan a day, with the first flight having landed at a British air force base on Sunday night.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said Britain would help some 3,000 nationals to leave but questions are being asked why he did not do more to oppose Washington’s withdrawal.
He has convened another meeting of his emergency and contingencies group — the third in four days — and parliament has been recalled.
Former NATO secretary general George Robertson, who in 2001 invoked the alliance’s collective defense clause, said he was “sad and sickened” by the scenes from Afghanistan.
“I find it ironic at best but tragic at worst that the anniversary of 9/11 is going to be commemorated in a few weeks’ time with the Taliban back in control of Kabul,” he told BBC radio.
The Times newspaper called the rapid pullout “unforced and unnecessary” and said it was becoming “the greatest disaster in American foreign policy for almost 50 years.”
NATO’s former top civilian representative in Afghanistan, Mark Sedwill, called it a “humiliating moment for the West.”
Taliban takeover is world’s failure, says UK
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Taliban takeover is world’s failure, says UK
- UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace: ‘All of us know that Afghanistan is not finished. It’s an unfinished problem for the world and the world needs to help it’
- Ben Wallace: ‘If it’s a failure, it’s a failure of the international community to not realize that you don’t fix things overnight’
Bangladesh’s religio-political party open to unity govt
- Opinion polls suggest that Jamaat-e-Islami will finish a close second to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party in the first election it has contested in nearly 17 years
DHAKA: A once-banned Bangladeshi religio-political party, poised for its strongest electoral showing in February’s parliamentary vote, is open to joining a unity government and has held talks with several parties, its chief said.
Opinion polls suggest that Jamaat-e-Islami will finish a close second to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party in the first election it has contested in nearly 17 years as it marks a return to mainstream politics in the predominantly Muslim nation of 175 million.
Jamaat last held power between 2001 and 2006 as a junior coalition partner with the BNP and is open to working with it again.
“We want to see a stable nation for at least five years. If the parties come together, we’ll run the government together,” Jamaat chief Shafiqur Rahman said in an interview at his office in a residential area in Dhaka, days after the party created a buzz by securing a tie-up with a Gen-Z party.
Rahman said anti-corruption must be a shared agenda for any unity government.
The prime minister will come from the party winning the most seats in the Feb. 12 election, he added. If Jamaat wins the most seats, the party will decide whether he himself would be a candidate, Rahman said.
The party’s resurgence follows the ousting of long-time Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in a youth-led uprising in August 2024.
Rahman said Hasina’s continued stay in India after fleeing Dhaka was a concern, as ties between the two countries have hit their lowest point in decades since her downfall.
Asked about Jamaat’s historical closeness to Pakistan, Rahman said: “We maintain relations in a balanced way with all.”
He said any government that includes Jamaat would “not feel comfortable” with President Mohammed Shahabuddin, who was elected unopposed with the Awami League’s backing in 2023.
