Clinton pledges US will not abandon Afghan women as Karzai seeks reconciliation with Taliban

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Clinton to Afghan women: ‘We will not abandon you’

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Thursday that women’s rights should not be sacrificed in any settlement between the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Taliban militants.

“We will not abandon you, we will stand with you always,” Clinton told three senior female Afghan officials who accompanied Karzai on his four-day trip to the U.S., which wraps up Friday with a visit to U.S. troops in Fort Campbell, Ky.

Clinton said it was “essential that women’s rights and women’s opportunities are not sacrificed or trampled on in the reconciliation process.”

Her comments came amid concerns that any political deal with Afghan insurgents could erode the gains women have made since a U.S.-led invasion drove the Taliban from power in 2001.

Karzai came to the U.S. this week in part to persuade the Obama administration to back his plans for ending the war through negotiations. But insurgents and their sympathizers routinely intimidate or attack women who work outside the home, wear Western dress or try to attend school.

Appearing later with Karzai at a Washington think-tank, Clinton made the same point again. Militants who lay down their arms, she said, “must respect women’s rights.”

Karzai meanwhile sought to allay fears that negotiations with the Taliban would turn Afghanistan away from its alliance with the U.S. and commitment to human rights.

Sitting next to Clinton at the United States Institute of Peace, Karzai called low-level Taliban sympathizers “countryside boys” who are not enemies of the United States or their government. “We must try legitimately to return them,” he said.

He distinguished rank-and-file militants from their leadership, for whom “reconciliation is more difficult and more to the future.”

Karzai and Clinton both said a planned operation to root out the Taliban from Kandahar would not be a traditional military offensive.

They said the upcoming operation would be done in coordination with local elders and rely heavily on their support for success. Karzai raised eyebrows in the U.S. last month when he said locals would have veto power over the plan.

But he and Clinton said they agreed on the strategy.

Clinton said the operation in Kandahar would not be a “huge, massive assault,” but would take into account the bustling, vibrant nature of the city and its urban nature.

Kandahar is considered make-or-break for the expanded U.S.-led military commitment to Afghanistan, and the key test of whether the U.S. counterinsurgency strategy is working.

The NATO effort in Kandahar is already under way in outlying districts and is expected to move into the city of more than 1 million in June. The U.S. hopes to finish most of the fighting by the end of summer.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, told reporters Thursday it will be months before Americans can judge whether this year’s major military push into Kandahar had succeeded.

“It will be the end of this calendar year before you know,” McChrystal told reporters.

That’s when some of the harder work begins, McChrystal suggested, because it will take much longer to persuade many Afghans to support the Kabul government. “They remain to be convinced,” he said.

Karzai’s crowded schedule Thursday included a visit to Arlington National Cemetery’s Section 60 — a resting place for military killed in Afghanistan as well as in Iraq, Vietnam, World War II and other conflicts.

At one point, Karzai picked up and examined one of the pebbles that have been placed at many of the graves by loved ones and visitors to the area.

Later, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., brought the Afghan president and four of his ministers to the Senate floor for a firsthand look at the American legislative process in action.

Karzai, who removed his signature lamb’s wool hat for the occasion, was greeted with a standing ovation — if only because the chamber was already packed with senators milling around after casting their votes on a financial bill.

Congressional officials said it was a rare, if not unprecedented, visit by a foreign leader to the chamber.

Thursday’s events cap a series of meetings aimed at ending months of sniping and frustration over management of the war and the fraud that marred Karzai’s re-election last year. Both President Barack Obama and Karzai said at the White House on Wednesday that such disagreements are normal with so much at stake.

Obama on Wednesday said that despite his commitment of tens of thousands of additional troops, the Afghan war will get worse before it gets better. He stressed, though, that his plan to begin withdrawing U.S. forces next summer remains on track.

In Karzai’s meetings with U.S. officials, including Clinton and Gates, the Afghan president repeatedly has called for the U.S. to respect Afghanistan’s sovereignty and has expressed frustration with operations that have killed innocent bystanders.

Karzai also has sought reassurance from Washington that his country will not be abandoned after U.S. forces withdraw. Obama, Clinton and others have said America will not cut and run.

Associated Press Videojournalist Bill Gorman and Associated Press writers Matthew Lee, Pauline Jelinek and Jennifer Loven contributed to this report.