Bavaria must also make a contribution to strengthening peace and democracy

The Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV) described the Afghanistan policy of the CSU on Monday as inconsistent and illogical. "On the one hand the CSU is calling for a rapid withdrawal of the Bundeswehr from the Hindukush, but on the other is making no contribution to the training of the Afghan police, who will have to protect the people from attacks from the warlords and criminals when the German troops have been withdrawn”, criticised the Asia consultant of the human rights organisation, Ulrich Delius, in Göttingen. Bavaria must also make a contribution to the strengthening of peace, democracy and human rights. One cannot for years warn of the dangers of terrorism and then do nothing to strengthen democratic states in the fight against terrorism.

Damage is caused to Germany’s standing in Afghanistan if leading Bavarian politicians call for the rapid withdrawal of the Bundeswehr for populist reasons, but refuse the cry for help from Kabul in the training of the police, warned Delius. Peter Ramsauer, the chair of the CSU party in the German Parliament, spoke to the "Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung” after the disaster of his party in the provincial elections in Bavaria in an interview published at the weekend and called for a clear plan from Angela Merkel for a withdrawal in the foreseeable future of the Bundeswehr from Afghanistan.

In February 2008 the German Minister of the Interior, Wolfgang Schäuble, and Foreign Minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, had announced that the number of German police trainers in Afghanistan would be increased from 60 to 120 persons. The officers will be provided by the German Federation and by most of the German provinces. It is only Bavaria which has so far not sent any police trainers to Kabul.

Sharp criticism was also given recently by the chair of the Bundeswehrverband (German Armed Forces Federation), Bernhard Gertz. In an interview with the newspaper "Rheinpfalz am Sonntag” he said: Provinces refusing to help in the training of the police "are leaving German soldiers on the Hindukush in the lurch.”