US ‘Troubled’ by Karzai Threat to Join Taliban

A top US official has said that the Obama administration is ‘troubled’ by the anti-US rhetoric of Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, describing his threat to join Taliban as a bit of a head scratcher, said media reports.

Besides, the White House expressed its disappointment at the sudden outburst of anti-US statements from Karzai, said reports.

“That particular comment is a bit of a head scratcher. But beyond that, we were troubled by some of his comments last week. We think we have addressed them. We are moving forward,” Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs P J Crowley was quoted as saying while talking to reporters at his daily news briefing.

“We want to see the Government of Afghanistan step up, take responsibility in key areas, demonstrate the kind of leadership that the Afghan people are expecting of it. We are there in Afghanistan because it is in our national interest to do so,” he was quoted as saying.
“We are obviously spending significant resources both on the military side and the civilian side to do that. But there are clearly things that we want to see the government step up and do, and we are working with President Karzai and his government to see that happen,” Crowley was quoted as saying.

These comments by the State Department and the White House came in the wake of a series of anti-US rhetoric from Karzai.

First he held foreign forces responsible for an alleged fraud in last year’s presidential polls and then threatened to join the Taliban if his voices were ignored. Also, he alleged that the West was interfering in internal affairs of Afghanistan.

“The remarks are genuinely troubling. The substance of the remarks – as have been looked into by many – is obviously not true. We will continue to work with President Karzai and others in the Afghan leadership to take the steps that are necessary to ensure that our military and ISAF make security gains that the governance structure is in place to hold those gains,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was quoted as saying.

He affirmed that the scheduled May 12 White House meeting between the US President Barack Obama and Karzai was still on.

“President Karzai is the democratically-elected leader of Afghanistan and we will continue to work with him and others to meet the benchmarks that we feel they have to meet in order to ensure the security of the Afghan people.

We have established – and part of the discussion the President had with President Karzai a little over a week ago was to reiterate some of those benchmarks,” Gibbs was quoted as saying.

(Based on internet reports)