Ashraf Ghani Quotes
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We will not let the price of peace be greater than the price of war, we will firmly safeguard the achievements of the past 13 years under former President Karzai.
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My immediate priorities are peace and stability. I want to differentiate between stability and security: Stability comes from the hearts of people and acceptance of the judicial system. Security comes from the barrel of a gun and the threat of the use of force. We're seeing violence at an unprecedented level. We've become numb to bloodletting. Enduring peace cannot come unless we build a state that can guarantee our individual rights and obligations.
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Do not ever threaten an Afghan with violence. We will rise as one and we will face every threat the way we have taken on thousands of previous armies and conquerors.
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None these organizations [terrorists] could continue operating without the narcotics networks, human-trafficking and oil smuggling. Addressing it requires a truly creative global response similar to that used to stand up against Germany's aggression in World War II.
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The Americans made the decision out of principle to buy Russian equipment for us because our pilots and mechanics were trained on Russian aircraft. But, then, as a result of the Ukraine crisis, the US Congress imposed sanctions on Russia and the equipment could no longer be delivered to us. I am proud of our security and defense forces.
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What is common among all of these groups [Taliban, Islamic State etc.] is the intent to destroy. The majority of terrorists who come to Afghanistan are from China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan or North Africa. They were expelled from their countries and pushed to ours - this is their battlefield - and all of them, be it the Taliban or others, are interlinked with the criminal economy.
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There won't be some overnight miracle cure. But the measures I take will be sustainable. Our goal is to cease food imports within four years. This will create a minimum of 2 million jobs in agriculture.
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Economics taught in most of the elite universities are practically useless in my context. My country [Afghanistan] is dominated by drug economy and a mafia; textbook economics does not work in my context.
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We [Afghanistan government] were in the process of cleaning up the government when these attacks happened in the north - not only in Kunduz, but also in other provinces. Our special forces are limited - we cannot be everywhere at the same time and we had to defend every district regardless of how insignificant it might be, because of the very social and political makeup of this country.
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The most significant thing is public participation. That assures the Afghan public that our promises are not empty.
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Ninety percent of our police are fighting terrorists, so we don't have enough oriented towards their key duty, which is enforcement of the law. But these are precisely the inheritance that we want to overcome. Particularly the mark for success for us would be that a woman can not only walk in the streets of every major city, but can go from one province to another without any hindrance.
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It's fair to say average Americans think that the average Afghan doesn't want American troops in their country.
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Terrorism attacks peoples' trust in the system of their state. There is protection, but only if there is collective action and collective understanding about how to really deal with this phenomenon.
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We could form a government of national unity fighting corruption. The ordinary Afghan is sick and tired of it, because it's she or he that pays the price.
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The key demand for me from the public across the 34 provinces is to transform the state into an instrument of the rule of law, transform the economy into a productive system and change the education system.
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My priority is inclusion and justice. We need a system of justice that is applied across the board. That is what this country is striving for. We've suffered from a variety of exclusions. In the past, I compared our situation to a person with scissors who first cut the sleeve, then the fingers, then our body politic to pieces. My job is to stitch the wounds together. We need an agenda of inclusion: the youth, the women, the poor feel an enormous sense of exclusion.
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We live in an interconnected world, and you cannot prevent people from leaving. What you need to do is to create opportunities. At the same time, people are also coming back.
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When I first raised the issue of the so-called Islamic State at the Munich Security Conference in February, speaking about its economy, its flexibility and pathology, people thought I was trying to scare them. But now we have experienced just that. If al-Qaida was version 2.0 of terror, then the Islamic State is version 5.0.
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Peace cannot come without the engagement of those who have been before. Gen. Dostum will make peace possible. He was engaged in conflict of the past. Forgiveness is an extremely important part of our culture. But, like Rwanda and South Africa, we need to fashion our own solution.
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Salaries are a huge area of corruption.
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I'm not taking power. I'm catalyzing systemic change.
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Women are part of the constitution.
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Crisis for others is a source of despair. For me, it's an opportunity to bring reform. I owe this country a debt I cannot repay.
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The bureaucratic culture that we [Afghanistan] have inherited is an obstacle. Hierarchies may be extremely efficient for dealing with certain events, but they are not quick in responding to global, flexible networks.
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Our current administration is a patchwork - some from the French, some from the Swiss, the Turks, the Ottomans; then the Russians came; now we have a global presence. We need to create a system that is organic and can function for the whole state. Currently, foreign policy here is domestic policy.
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It [terrorism] happened because intelligence, leadership and police failures made it possible.
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Peace is a national issue, not only government's responsibility.
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We are organized by territories, whereas terrorists are organized into networks. States are very slow and terrorists are extremely fast. Intelligence sharing needs to expand beyond the regional and become global and not country-focused. We need to acquire speed and agility.
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Deadlines concentrate the mind. But deadlines should not be dogmas.
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The economy is the silent elephant in the room.
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