US-led troops forced out of Samangan

Finns among first to hand over security responsibility to Afghans
Samangan Province, where Finnish crisis management forces in Afghanistan are on patrol, is likely to be one of the first places where responsibility for security is being handed over from the NATO-led ISAF troops to the country’s own security forces, says Pauli Järvenpää, the Finnish Ambassador to Afghanistan.
“Decisions are under preparation right now. The principle is that the Afghans will decide the time and the areas”, Järvenpää said by telephone from Kabul. The beginning of the transfer of responsibility is already several months behind the original schedule.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said at the weekend that he will announce the first shifts of responsibility on March 21st, the traditional Afghan New Year’s Day. Järvenpää says that the details could already be known on March 11th, when the ministers of defence of the NATO countries hold a meeting.

During the spring, Finland should have a total of 195 soldiers in Afghanistan, more than 100 of whom will be based in Samangan.
Järvenpää says that when the Afghans take over responsibility for security, Finland will need to make decisions on delivering civilian aid directly to the area where the Finnish forces now are. So far, Finland has channelled most of its civilian aid through various organisations and the Afghan government.
“We should work together with the Afghans and see what they want, and then look at what is possible for us”, Järvenpää says.

Samangan Province is poor, but it is militarily and politically a relatively easy target for a transfer of responsibility. The situation is more difficult in Blakh Province, which includes the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, which is patrolled jointly by Swedish and Finnish forces, and where the governor, Atta Muhammed Noor is a rival of President Karzai.
Both Karzai and Atta want aid money to be channelled through them. On Tuesday, Karzai also demanded that the Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRT) should be abolished in connection with the transfer of responsibility. The Swedish and Finnish forces constitute one PRT.

Negotiations on shifting responsibility for security are being led by Ashraf Ghani, a respected local politician. He has a list containing smaller places like Samagan, as well as larger Afghan cities such as Herat and the capital Kabul.
This is the first step in a plan to move responsibility for security in the whole country to the Afghan government in 2014.

Meanwhile, the war in Afghanistan is still going on. Järvenpää says that there are more clashes this year than there were a year ago at the same time.
The fighting has been spurred by the exceptionally small amount of snow this winter, and the increase in the numbers of foreign forces in the country.

Not the first time US imperial forces have been kicked out only to later announce a "power-sharing" agreement.

Good on the Afghani's. Well done. We are all behind you.