ISAS Briefs

The Americans are firm in their commitment to pull their combat troops out of Afghanistan by the end of December 2014. As that deadline approaches, there is considerable diplomatic activity aimed at steadying the situation in that war-torn country. The favoured approach is to involve the countries in Afghanistan's immediate neighbourhood in helping the nation deal with what promises to be a difficult period of transition. The most recent effort of this type was made in February 2014 in a summit held in Ankara, Turkey, involving the host, as well as Afghanistan and Pakistan. However, as this paper suggests, a multilateral effort must involve a larger group of countries to obtain the desired results, and the effort should go beyond addressing the role of Islam in Afghanistan's political system.