KABUL — President Hamid Karzai received a resounding endorsement Saturday from a traditional national assembly to negotiate a security agreement that could keep a U.S. military presence in Afghanistan past 2014, when most international forces are to have left.
The size of the force is subject to negotiations, but a future deal could keep thousands of American troops in the country for years.
The nonbinding resolution issued at the end of a loya jirga also suggested some conditions for the talks between Afghan and American officials, including an end to unpopular night raids by military forces searching for insurgents.
The more than 2,000 people who attended the four-day loya jirga meeting asked Karzai to ensure the United States hands over all detainees to Afghan custody and limits any agreement to 10 years. They also said the future pact must be approved by parliament.
“We will act on the basis of your consultation,” Karzai told the assembled delegates. “I am very happy that you have accepted it and have put lots of conditions on it. I accept this resolution. It is the instruction to the Afghan government from the Afghan people.”
As part of a future deal, both sides envision a force of several thousand U.S. service members who would train Afghan forces and help with counter terrorism operations. The pact would outline the legal status of that force in Afghanistan, rules under which it would operate and where it would be based.
The jirga’s findings are likely to bolster Karzai’s negotiating position with the United States during talks underway to craft what the U.S. is calling a Strategic Partnership Document.
Some critics have said that Karzai organized the assembly as a rubber-stamp body, noting that it endorsed all conditions that Karzai outlined at the opening session.
President Barack Obama has already ordered 10,000 U.S. troops to leave by the end of the year and another 23,000 by the end of September. NATO forces also will gradually withdraw. There are currently about 100,000 U.S. forces in Afghanistan out of a total of about 131,000 international troops.
Washington sees the document as a nonbinding set of principles guiding the two nations’ future relationship. The Afghans want a strong and binding agreement to govern the presence of American forces in the country after 2014.
