Thank you very much for your presence. I think in my capacity as Deputy [Special Representative of the Secretary General] I had the opportunity to talk to you but since taking up my new position, there has been no time, I must say, to resume the dialogue with you. I am very happy that today provides the first opportunity for this. I thought that we perhaps could spend some time describing for you our view of the United Nations agenda for the next few months and then engage in dialogue.

This is an election year, clearly, and there is a lot of excitement, there is a lot of momentum. We have seen that today with the completion of the one million mark and we believe that this momentum towards the elections is going to pick up further pace. This is certainly a determining factor in the evolution of the political situation. But we also believe that it is essential not to forget that quite apart from the electoral agenda, there are a number of very important processes that we started two years ago, or last year, and it is extremely important to continue to focus on these processes. You are all familiar with the very large institutional building – be it on the police side, the army, security reform, and also the creation and strengthening of the Human Rights Commission, and the upcoming creation of an independent election commission. The Bonn process has become a state building factory and it is important for all of us, as I said, to continue building up on the gains of last year.

It is important [to focus on these processes] for several reasons. It is important because part of the success of the elections will depend on the success of these efforts. It is now envisioned that 20,000 new police will be trained by the month of June. Clearly training more police, training more army will be part of creating a more secure environment for these elections. But it is also important on a longer-term basis. We hope and we trust that as a result of these elections a fully representative government will be elected as specified by Bonn. We also know that no matter how representative a government is, it will very, very quickly lose its authority and its legitimacy if it is not backed by a functional state. And there is a lot of work to be done before the Afghan nation is equipped with a functional state and therefore we insist that we must continue the focus on this major institutional building effort.

In that respect, there are some recent improvements in these efforts and I want to mention in particular the stabilization plan recently signed into law by the Government. It is a plan that tries to improve the element of coordination between those various institutions and we are very excited by the prospects, over the next few months, to implement a provisional strategy that will really be able to focus on the most vulnerable and neglected provinces of this country – more reconstruction, more good governance and more security. We do think there has been a qualitative improvement in the way institutional building is now moving from the capital city, from the headquarters of the various ministries into the provinces.

On the other hand it is clear, as I mentioned at the beginning, that the Bonn process has moved into a new phase. I mentioned the one million mark that we have celebrated today and I think that beyond the figures, if we look at the few registration sites that have been available to people in these eight cities and if we look at the enthusiasm and the mobilization that has taken place around registration, I think we all can concur that something has happened. That in the wake of the CLJ we have now a process of social participation, of political participation that I think makes a difference between the first year of the Bonn process in 2002 and where we are now.

In our view, it is one of the most encouraging aspects of the outcome of the past couple of years of intense work that we have now an Afghan society that is clearly prepared to mobilize. Of course, we on the UN side have a measure of responsibility in making this happen and in furthering this process.

Our colleagues in the UNAMA Electoral Component are trying together with their Afghan counterparts to put together a registration process and ultimately an electoral process that will really give every Afghan, on the balance, an opportunity to register. But I would like to insist that our collective responsibility, our UN responsibility, doesn’t stop with providing this political participation with the proper tools, with the proper registration process and with the proper elections. It is very, very important for us that the aspirations to hold these elections in a free and fair manner be respected and complied with. We believe that for the United Nations, the international community and for the Government there is a major agenda towards the creation of this environment.

Let me mention briefly a couple of the major items on the agenda. First, DDR [Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration], as you know, has been a fairly uneven affair since October when the process was started. The pilot projects have taken place in Kunduz, Gardez, Mazar and now Kabul. They have had, I think, positive results there but clearly there is an aspiration out there in the other provinces that clearly much more progress can be made with regards to DDR. And we do believe that part of the credibility of this electoral exercise rests on further DDR and further cantonment of heavy weapons throughout the country.

Another aspect of this environment is clearly also creating a level playing field for political parties and candidates. No matter whether we have a presidential election, a parliamentary election or a combination of both, there is out there a sense that too many people enjoy a privileged position that could be translated into more political power unless more is done to make sure that more politcal parties are registered, that political parties have access to the airwaves, and that political parties can operate freely across the country. This is the second important aspect of our collective agenda as we move towards the elections.

And thirdly, I think it is important to recall that reconstruction is somehow also part of the creation of that environment. As long as there is in too many provinces a sense that the government is not delivering, there will be a tendency to shy away from these exercises in political participation. More reconstruction we feel is also a part of the creation of a proper environment.

And finally, of course, security. You are all very, very familiar with the issue if only because it has been the hallmark of Ambassador Brahimi to repeatedly focus everybody’s attention on the need to make major improvements in security. But perhaps at no time more than at this time, as we prepare for registration on a massive scale and for elections, is it necessary to insist on the mobilization of domestic security forces and international security forces on behalf of a free and fair environment for the next elections.

In summary, a very full plate for the Afghan Government, a very full plate for us. But I would say beyond a very full plate for an Afghan society that clearly now is emerging out of the sort of passivity that normally accompanies a civil war to really take their place in the politically active nations. It is a very exciting development for us and one that we hope we will be able to push further.

With this introduction, I am available for questions that you would like to ask.

Question and Answers

Question: There are signs from America that the [US] Administration is already thinking of the election being delayed. Is that your understanding?

SRSG: It is extremely difficult to put a date on these elections. So for what reason? There are certainly some major question marks. Of course the major one is security and let me elaborate a little on this. As you have probably learned there is a new plan for registration now that expects to provide the opportunity for many millions of voters to register in a fairly short time span towards the spring. But while it must be massive it also has to be balanced. It is absolutely critical that irrespective of whatever side of the Hindu Kush you find yourself you will be able to register under the same conditions. Security will affect this. Whether or not we will able to provide that massive and balanced registration is frankly not known for the time being.

I would also argue that on the other fronts – let’s say in terms of political freedom - much more has to happen; in terms of DDR - much more has to happen so that people feel that these are credible elections and not just a ratification of those in power at the local level. When you measure this agenda against the timeline, certainly there are many reasons to say this is not going to be easy. We at the UN have a major responsibility with regard to the electoral process. And we are doing everything we can so that this electoral process fits within something that has been important to us – and that [is] the Bonn timeframe. But we also accept and recognize, and hopefully everybody as well, that while every effort must be made to try and fit our undertaking within this timeline, there are still too many things that we do not know to be able to commit to any date for this election.

Question: A general criticism is that UNAMA has limited activities in terms of voter registration. For example it has activities in only eight main locations. What is UNAMA going to do to expand and ensure rapid registration?

SRSG: There is an operational plan that is now being finalized that provides for a much larger-scale registration process. I hesitate to qualify the current phase in the eight regions as inadequate because as I said, with fairly few registration sites there has been a fairly massive mobilization. And I think this is important and it certainly gives an indication to all of us about the dynamics that are being organized around elections. Nevertheless you are certainly right. What has certainly happened is that while a million have registered several million have looked around and not seen any facility to register as well. There is frustration out there that the process should pick up speed.

At the same time there is also a concern that is expressed by electoral colleagues – both Afghan and international - that we have to be very careful and that while we register as broadly as possible, we don’t do it in a messy way that we will then pay for it at election time. As you know registration serves a number of objectives. One of these is to allow the electoral administration to figure out quite clearly where people are so that when it comes to the organization of the elections it can be done in a proper way. Therefore the plan that is now being finalized consists of thoroughly preparing for a massive registration campaign that will take place roughly from the 1-25 May. This massive registration campaign will take place simultaneously throughout the 32 provinces in something like 4,200 registration and polling stations. We feel fairly confident that if the work is done properly in the next six weeks Afghans will indeed be able to register in a relatively easy and certainly comprehensive way. So I think that the message that I believe has already been sent by the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) is to be a little bit patient and to help the electoral staff when they are in the districts to identify precisely the best locations for registration to take place and for polling later. But as I said we feel confident that with this new plan the desire to register will be fulfilled.

Question: The United Nations has said that there are a lot of administrative problems and expanding outside the regional cities requires recruiting something like 30,000 people. There is also no electoral law as yet. So if the Government is still insisting that the elections are going to take place in June does that mean that the JEMB or all the involved bodies are compromising internationally accepted standards for free and fair elections?

SRSG: Frankly I think it would be silly to say that the elections will take place on this date. What we are all committed to doing is to make every effort as the constitution prescribes so that they can take place within a certain timeframe, which is the Bonn timeframe. But as I said, that process of creating conditions for elections has many facets. One is indeed, as I have mentioned, organizing the registration in a way that allows people to register massively – hence this notion of having this major compact campaign of registration in May throughout the country. But there are also other facets that I think everybody is perfectly clear about. There is a security facet; there is a facet, which is, as you mentioned, the registration of political parties. What we would invite everyone to do is not to argue back and forth about dates but to really try to make sure that the Ministry of Justice, with regard to registration, the Ministry of the Interior with regard to the training of police; and the international forces the Coalition and NATO, do whatever it takes to really be able to push in a very strong way towards creating these [security] conditions. This is what they will do.

Question: As far as I can see local police are guarding registrations sites. If voter registration sites suddenly increase to 4,000 and then we move on to the second process of holding elections, is a plan also being drawn up for securing these sites? I have heard national army, police, a possible new national guard, even the possibility of NATO troops and I am a bit confused. I’d like to know what the thinking is and the planning behind it?

SRSG: You know we were very much in two minds at the beginning in terms of providing security based on domestic constraints. Clearly there is an ongoing process of transition between what are essentially militias to what we hope will be professional trained police. And we certainly were expecting that as much as possible the registration could rely on as well trained as professional police as possible. It turned out, as you described, that in fact in a large number of situations the process relies quite largely on what we call provincial police. So far so good. In other words, so far this kind of fallback position has not betrayed the objective of making sure that there is no interference. So I would tell you we have learned that we have a tool that we should not shy away from utilizing.

That said, what concerns us now is not so much the trained or non-trained nature but essentially the availability of security forces - both domestic and international - on a scale large enough to accommodate the 4,200 polling stations throughout the country. And that is certainly where we expect that international forces will step up to the plate. There have already been several statements by the coalition that they will place their forces at the disposal of this process. This is good news. We certainly hope that NATO will follow up on the broad commitment made that it will help beyond the provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs) to secure the electoral process. We are very much prepared to engage with both NATO and the coalition to discuss with our Afghan counterparts in the JEMB and the Electoral Commission, the best way of combining international and domestic forces. I should add perhaps one thing: up until now we have discussed in very broad terms that registration and elections are still in the planning. Now that as you said, we have been confronted with the realities on the ground I think we are discovering that there is no one size fits all. We are absolutely convinced that throughout country from north to south there will probably be different solutions to different security situations. What is important is that now that we have lets say a registration plan that everybody feels will meet the target of 10.5 million people, we should engage in very detailed discussions with the Ministry of the Interior, the Coalition and NATO to make sure that they can collectively provide this kind of safe environment.

Question: This means you will have provincial police/local police guarding the polling stations. Aren’t you worried with the effect this will have on the way people feel or are encouraged to vote?

SRSG: No. As I said we are very keen to protect the process from interference. And clearly in some circumstances the presence of local militia would be an interference factor. That is why we would like to make sure that every electoral team has a chance to look at the situation, district-by-district, almost polling station-by-polling station to make sure that they put together the right mix. We certainly as I said at this stage do not discard the use of provincial police in large cities. As I said so far there has not been a pattern of interference or intimidation. But we will be looking very carefully at the situation on a case-by-case basis.

Question: Are you worried about Taliban interference in this registration? Have you received any threats or warnings from them?

SRSG: Last year you will remember we had some really strong signals during the CLJ and there were warnings by people claiming to be Taliban. They rejected a process that they considered too be a farce. They were very keen to prevent people from participating. As you know it was perhaps a surprise to some of us that these warnings had very little impact. It was striking that in areas that were considered to be unstable from this point of view the registration of district representatives was in fact massive. Remember the 85 percent in Khost and Kunar and so on and so forth.

So if we are to judge by that precedent and that is the only one we can go by, we have to expect that yes there will be people – and I hesitate to label everyone as Taliban – but there will be people who will abhor this exercise as something that is simply too alien to their particular political agenda. But there is also good reason to believe that if we have the same momentum this year as we had last year the exercise will carry on. As I said and I am sorry to insist on this, there are one million people [registered] and in provinces like Paktika and in the north and the south there is an excitement that exists around registration, which is not a traditional exercise.

Afghans have gone through Loya Jirgas, very traditional and respectable mechanisms for political participation. Registration was never one of them. And having so many people so enthusiastic about participation really gives us the sense that there is a momentum out there that will be really very difficult to stop.

Question: How will you guarantee free and fair elections given the tens of thousands of Afghans who will be working in the process? Who will supervise them?

SRSG: Maybe I should say that we are quite confident that there is a large number of Afghans who can be relied on to be impartial. We do not think that is a preserve of the internationals. This is not to acknowledge that indeed that one must make sure, and that is part of the international dimension of the process, that some very strict criteria of impartiality are factored into the process. If you read the decree that was issued by the [Afghan] President on the new structure of the of the management of the electoral process you will see that there are some strong safeguards that have been built in that to make sure that impartiality will be the rule. Overall under this decree, the UN plays three roles that I believe complement each other. As you know the UN is involved in the JEMB on an equal footing with the Afghan Interim Commission and we hope soon after with the Afghan Permanent Commission. That certainly gives an opportunity for the electoral skills of internationals who are experienced in these matters to be combined with a better knowledge of Afghan realities.

Within the Secretariat, as established under the decree, the UN provides quite a lot of advice and Support. Many of the key functions – civic education, registration training – will have a component of international support. At the field level we have an interesting structure, whereby in every province and region, Afghans, to a large extent who have been working with the CLJ process and the internationals will work side-by-side in a sort of co-leadership arrangement to provide planning training and recruitment. Bottom line we feel that we have a process that relies widely quite early on Afghan ownership but has at the same time the kind of safeguards that the international community would expect from a process of that nature.

Question: If UNAMA wants women to participate in the elections it requires village village-by-village registration because some women will not be allowed to travel to centres?

SRSG: I don’t know how you read the figures. Apparently we have 25 per cent women who have registered. Right there is a bit of as surprise for some who thought that maybe a very conservative traditional society would not right from the start allow a quarter of the registration population to be women. I think that is a bit of good news. At the same I think that if you look at the breakdown province-by-province you realize that some lag behind quite severely. It is also interesting that in these provinces there have been very strong statements in recent days and weeks by religious leaders about not only the authorization but the duty of leadership at the local level to allow women to register. I don’t know if I’m reading too much into this but we may well have some healthy competition among the provinces to make sure that no province is somewhat disenfranchised by the failure to register women. It may be too optimistic but I think that’s the way to go. I think there are series of events that are going to take place from 3-8 March where women from all the outposts of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs will gather in Kabul. I think they will also then be joined by all the women who participated in the CLJ and in the lead up to 8 March they will try and bolster women’s registration.

Question: At what point will you be able to set a date for the elections? What are the criteria? Is it when you get 70 percent?

SRSG: I don’t know. I think that as you said there are dates and dates. Right now, we at the UN for the part that concerns us directly which is the support to the Afghan electoral commission with regards the electoral process, we put our effort within the mark of the Bonn timetable and we hope that the very difficult challenges of deploying 4,200 polling stations with 33,000 people we hope that we will be able to collectively meet that date and then that is the effort, this is what we are trying to push ourselves and others to do. And then there will be the actual date. Lets remember that the CLJ was supposed to take place in October, we did everything we could to hold it on October and then a number of external factors pushed back the date. I think no one at the time felt that it was a betrayal of the CLJ process to hold it a bit later so the bottom line is we are going to make every effort and we hope that everybody else will make every effort on the security front which we think is absolutely critical and then hopefully the result will be elections at the right time.

Question: If it is more important that you have a legitimate election, wouldn’t it be better to concede a little on the date issue to ensure that the security is there?

SRSG: I think, like you said, there is way too much attention being placed on the date right now. We have a framework [Bonn Agreement] and this is a framework that we have been operating with for the past couple of years. We are not going to take that framework and throw it out the window. That framework sets out that this summer we will try to have an election. We certainly, absolutely do not separate the concept of an election from the concept of bringing about a free and fair election. That is why I spent a little bit of time in my initial overview to comment on the number of things that must happen. We are completely alien to the notion of herding people to registration sites but at the same time they shouldn’t feel that they have absolutely no chance to express their view and elect the people of their choosing. You must be very confident that when we place our efforts within the Bonn process we absolutely do not disregard in any way the major tasks that must be accomplished within the timeframe that we must have free and fair elections.

Question: Would you say that given the difficulties of holding any elections in the next several months, it is advisable not to try and have parliamentary elections at the same time?

SRSG: This issue exists at the political level. There was a debate over the sequential versus simultaneous elections during the CLJ [Constitutional Loya Jirga] and the debate is still out there. There are political forces that have strong views on this. From what we gather from having spoken to a fairly representative segment of Afghans is that debate is not yet out there and therefore I think it is a bit difficult to make that decision based on a clear mandate from the people of Afghanistan. The people realize that the elections are something that are going to take place and they are coming. This is something that they will have to prepare for. If you ask presidential versus [parliamentary] elections you will not get a consensus throughout the country on this.

Our concern, for the time being, is that while the mechanics of having a presidential election and having parliamentary elections are fairly similar. The kind of environment that you have to create for the second one is clearly much more demanding than the one that you have to create for the first. While no similar exercise has taken place before, I think one is justified in believing that if you create a power contest in every district of this country, including in these districts that currently are under the thumb of a local militia, there will be more interference and there will be more intimidation than if you have an exercise that just takes place at the national level with perhaps very intense competition between presidential candidates.

What does that mean for us? Not that we are going to anticipate on the decision that we made with regard to simultaneous or sequential but that we would very much like that the country should prepare itself to accommodate the need of parliamentary elections. We insist that DDR is a key part of the electoral agenda, that a level playing field for political parties is a key part of the electoral agenda, and that more police, more security and more international forces are needed as part of the electoral agenda. These things may not be absolutely as necessary for a presidential election as they would be for a parliamentary election but as long as we are making every effort to hold them both at the same time, we should be making every effort that the environment we create is actually adequate for both.

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