What role for the UN in Afghanistan?

Which factions should be involved in a new Afghan government?

The United Nations is increasingly being seen as part of the solution, when the future of Afghanistan is considered by world leaders. But does Afghanistan want the UN? Ian Pannell reports from Northern Afghanistan.

So what happens after the war? Do we just leave an even more broken Afghanistan to its own devices - or must some international agreement be reached to rebuild the country and so make it less of a bolthole for the agents of international terrorism?

Speaking in London on Monday morning, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw outlined his vision for the future of Afghanistan, warning that a diplomatic initiative under the leadership of the United Nations must be in place, if and when the Taleban regime falls.

More and more, the United Nations is being seen as the solution - by leaders as diverse as China's Jiang Zemin at the APEC talks in Shanghai, and the EU leaders in Ghent.

This is fraught with huge problems, the biggest of which is: -Does Afghanistan want the UN? Without local consent, there is no prospect of success.

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