Country profilesAfghanistan

Humanitarian profile

Afghanistan is struggling to recover from more than a quarter-century of conflict, with violence still raging in parts of the country. The Taliban, toppled in 2001, are fighting to oust tens of thousands of foreign troops and Afghanistan's Western-backed government. The country is one of the most heavily mined in the world and home to a booming narcotics trade.

Country snapshot

Afghanistan, a landlocked, mountainous country, has long been fought over because of its strategic position along the "Silk Route", an ancient trade route linking the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Indian subcontinent. Three decades of recent conflict have left Afghanistan's aid-dependent economy and infrastructure in tatters, and caused more than 250,000 Afghans to be uprooted within their own borders. Many more are refugees.

The country is wracked by an insurgency led by the resurgent Taliban, which was in power for five years before U.S.-backed Afghan forces toppled the hardline Islamist movement in 2001 for harbouring al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai was re-elected after a fraud-plagued election in August 2009 but faces a tough challenge leading a country in which tribal alliances and a rugged landscape have never allowed for a strong central government. Rampant corruption in a country that still produces about 90 percent of the world's opium is a major concern for donors and military allies alike. Chronic instability means that Afghanistan is one of the poorest and least developed countries in the world.

Government

President Hamid Karzai is Afghanistan's first democratically elected president, winning a poll in 2004. He had previously been picked by Washington to lead an interim government following the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001.

In 2002, the Afghan Interim Authority took over a public administration that lacked financial resources and capable bureaucrats, and had nonexistent or very weak ties with the provinces.

A new constitution agreed on 4 January 2004 established a presidential system of government with all Afghans equal before the law.

The human rights and gender provisions were a major improvement on the 1964 Constitution. A minimum number of seats for women are guaranteed in both houses of the National Assembly. There are also provisions for minority languages and the rights of the Shia minority.

Karzai, a Pashtun and member of Afghanistan's largest ethnic group, won a second five-year term as president in an August 2009 election that was marred by widespread fraud. He was re-elected amid mounting criticism from the West over his failure to rein in corruption during his first full-term.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime says that bribery consumes $2.5 billion annually -- an amount equal to 23 percent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), while government ministries have been blamed for either tolerating rampant corruption or being powerless to stop it.

The government administration has been weakened by a fragmented and inefficient bureaucracy, and difficulty in attracting and retaining skilled professionals with management and administrative experience.

Despite some priority restructuring and reforms, administrative systems are slow and cumbersome with limited delegation of authority to lower ranks or provincial departments.

Economy

Decades of war has damaged Afghanistan's economy. About 80 percent of the population is involved in agricultural activity.

Industry is small scale and includes handicrafts, textiles and carpets, while exports consist mainly of fruit, nuts, vegetables and carpets. The Central Asian country possesses a wide variety of natural resources such as natural gas, coal, oil and gem stones but insecurity has made it difficult to exploit these commodities.

Afghanistan has long produced about 90 percent of the world's opium, a thick paste from poppy that is processed to make heroin. While the industry is mainly controlled by criminal gangs and corrupt officials, the Taliban are said to siphon off millions of dollars from the opium trade by imposing taxes on farmers and smugglers in return for ensuring safe passage of the drug.

According to the World Bank, 90 percent of Afghanistan's national budget is financed by foreign countries and multi-lateral organisations. The security sector receives the largest slice of the budget, accounting for more than 40 percent of operating spending.

Aid to Afghanistan amounted to $6.3 billion in 2008-09, representing 45 percent of gross domestic product, making it one of the world's most aid-dependent countries. Two-thirds of that aid is not channelled through the government's budget but an "external budget", due to concerns about corruption and the government's capacity to make use of the money.

The authorities struggle to disburse the money that is available. Planned development spending worth 9 percent of GDP remains unrealised each year. The rate of execution of planned spending on core development goals fell to 43 percent in 2008-2009 from 54 percent the previous year.

Much of the population suffers from shortages of housing, clean water, electricity, medical care, and jobs. Crime, insecurity, and the government's inability to extend rule of law to all parts of the country also threaten economic growth.

History

Ahmad Shah Durrani is credited with unifying the Pashtun tribes and founding modern Afghanistan in 1747. Competition over Afghanistan between imperial Russia and Britain in the 19th century became known as the "Great Game". Afghanistan eventually gained independence from notional British control in 1919.

After almost 200 years of monarchy, King Zahir Shah was ousted in 1973 in a coup by his cousin, Mohammed Daoud, who went on to play neighbouring USSR against Western powers. Five years later Daoud was overthrown and killed in a Marxist coup.

The Soviet Union invaded in 1979 ostensibly to protect its southern borders, triggering nearly a decade of conflict with anti-Communist mujahideen resistance fighters. The groups were funded by several foreign powers, including the United States.

In 1989, the USSR withdrew but that did not bring peace to Afghanistan because mujahideen factions then turned on each other.

In 1996, Kabul fell to the Taliban, which was founded among puritanical religious students -- weary of infighting among warlords -- by a former imam of a village mosque Mullah Omar. The Taliban initially brought a measure of stability. It espoused an austere and conservative form of Islam with religious police patrols that violently enforced a moral code in which women were barred from education and employment and forced to wear all-enveloping burqas. Music was banned as decadent and television outlawed.

The Taliban was toppled by U.S.-backed Afghan rebels in 2001 after refusing to turn over al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden following the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

After the Taliban regime fell, the United Nations brought together Afghanistan's tribal leaders at the U.N.-sponsored Bonn Conference which elected cosmopolitan and multi-lingual Hamid Karzai as interim leader. The meeting also established a process for political reconstruction that included the adoption of a new constitution, a presidential election in 2004, and National Assembly elections in 2005.

In December 2004, Karzai became the first democratically elected president of Afghanistan. He was re-elected for another five-year term in August 2009 in an election that was tarnished by widespread fraud.

One of his immediate challenges is dealing with a resurgent Taliban. The U.N.-mandated International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), led by NATO is assisting Afghan authorities, alongside a U.S.-led combat force, in fighting the Taliban insurgency. Tens of thousands of foreign troops are based in Afghanistan.

Legal snapshot

The constitution establishes a nine-member "Stera Mahkama" or Supreme Court as well as subordinate high courts and appeals courts outside the capital Kabul.

The roles of Islamic and secular law in the national judicial system have not been well established. In rural areas, local elders and tribal authorities known as jirgas resolve

criminal cases using both local custom and sharia laws. In some areas, Taliban laws have remained in effect.

An Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission established by the Bonn Agreement is charged with investigating human rights abuses and war crimes.

However, there is an almost total absence of well-trained and accountable judiciary has led to a culture of security violations and impunity.

Widespread corruption within the judicial system impedes the correct enforcement of law, allowing wealthy drug lords and influential insurgents to go unpunished.

The Afghan government has taken steps against this by issuing anti-corruption legislation, but graft remains a huge challenge.