A new political bargain in Afghanistan

Reports by official US agencies, such as the Government Accountability Office, make it crystal clear: the Afghan government is stealing money from the international community and from the Afghan people, on an alarming scale. US and European officials in Kabul are dismayed but seem paralysed: their response is to vow to ‘stay the course’.

That course is now at a dead-end. A new political bargain with Kabul is urgently needed if the Afghan government and its foreign backers are to win the support of the country’s population.