Bridget Kendall:
Welcome to this BBC Interactive forum on Afghanistan. The Afghan national assembly, known as the loya jirga, has overwhelmingly elected Hamid Karzai as head of state and over the next few days the delegates must choose a transitional parliament and elect its members. Under a plan mandated by the United Nations, they must also work out the shape for a new government to serve until elections are held next year.

The BBC's John Simpson has been following Afghanistan's turbulent history since 1980 and he joins us live from Kabul now to answer your questions. John, before we come to some of the hundreds of questions we've got here, can I ask you what's the mood like where you are with the loya jirga still going on?

John Simpson:
It's quite calm - it's quite settled down. There was a lot of fuss at the beginning of the week - people saying this was a stitch-up, it was all unfair etc. In fact it's been quite noticeable how those complaints have died down and people have come or are starting to come, I think, to accept the results so far.

Hamid Karzai

Bridget Kendall:
R.S, USA: Does Hamid Karzai have the necessary characteristics for a successful leader? He has the confidence, charisma and support from inside and outside his country but was the loya jirga right to further confirm his leadership?

John Simpson:
It's hard to see who else they could have chosen. He is a man with a lot of good qualities. He has stood up for things in the past. He is not a corrupt man. He's been his own man so that although he's a Pashtun which traditionally are a tribe that received a great deal of support from Pakistan, he himself was quite critical of Pakistan's over-involvement in Afghanistan's affairs. He is a man of some understanding, of some education and he's a rather westernised figure. In one way or another, he does look at the age of 44 as a good and rather impressive leader of Afghanistan. But not perfect by any means and they'll be a lot of people still who say that he's method of getting the top job is something difficult for his record. The fact that the Americans, the British and others helped him in so strongly.

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Bridget Kendall:
We've had an e-mail from Samim M. Salem, USA:In the course of history, a loya jigra has put Afghanistan back on the path of peace and stability during times when Afghanistan was in national crises. Can it do so now?

We have another e-mail from Osman Wardak, Australia: So far it has been a rather messy gathering. Do you think it will leave Afghanistan in the same mess the country has been in for the past twenty years?

John Simpson:
To answer that last question first, no, absolutely not. I don't think there's any question of that now unless the agreements which we saw at Bonn and the system which the loya jirga has quite overwhelmingly supported breaks up in some way. It's difficult to see how that might happen, but of course it's not impossible. But if the Bonn agreement, which the United Nations brokered, and the loya jirga result continues and goes on from strength to strength, then I think we're looking at a complete change in Afghanistan's history. I think we'll see the return of central government - of a strong and accepted government and the reduction in warlordism and all the other horrors which have dogged this country for the past quarter century.

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Bridget Kendall:
A Stanekzai, Afghanistan: Haven't the last few days raised doubts as to the legitimacy of the loya jigra? Haven't the closed door "private" talks greatly jeopardised the authority of the interim government?

John Simpson:
Of course that was something that a lot of delegates here were quite offended about - the idea that Hamid Karzai's election was just a foregone conclusion and that all the deals had been done in advance behind closed doors. Also the way that the American Ambassador, for instance, announced that the King wouldn't be standing as a candidate for the presidency before the King had himself made that announcement. All of these things created a lot of anger and a lot of disturbance among many of the delegates.

But it's not just my impression - it's the impression of quite a lot of people, including the UN - that those early days of the loya jirga have now changed and that people have accepted the inevitability that Hamid Karzai is the natural leader of this country and that really there wasn't any alternative and I think that explains why there was such a landslide in his favour. It wasn't necessarily that everybody would have chosen him as the ideal or the perfect leader but they knew that he was the only one that was possible.

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Bridget Kendall:
M A Jamal, Pakistan: Does the success of the loya jirga depend on the composition of loya jirga itself? Does this loya jirga represent "all" ethnic and racial groups in Afghanistan?

John Simpson:
It doesn't, of course it doesn't. In many ways, how could it I f less than one-tenth only of its delegates are women - that of course is an absurdity for a state which wishes to be regarded as modern. How could it when there are people who have definitely been left out. How could it when there were deals done by individual local magnates which ensured that their city, their area, their province, received greater representation than others. But looking at it as a whole and looking at it over the week, regardless of the recalls and the bumps here and there, I think it has been a pretty representative outfit and indeed that is what the vast majority of the people who attended it - whether they supported the general thrust of it or not - that's what they believed.

Bridget Kendall:
What about the question of the Taleban, who of course used to rule Afghanistan. Steven, UK: Do you think the loya jigra should have included all major warring fractions including Taleban and anti-Taleban and ethnic groups?

John Simpson:
The point to make first of all is there aren't warring factions anymore because there isn't a war. The Taleban has been comprehensively destroyed - it never had a serious following in this country. It got to where it was by all sorts of means which had nothing to do with public support whatsoever and it's frankly vanished as a force in Afghanistan. So the idea that you should have representatives of a force which doesn't any longer stand for anything in this country and at this loya jirga, would, I think, have just made a mockery of it - completely pointless. So I don't think that destabilised it.

What I do think it could have done was to have taken in more people who would in the past have sympathised and partially supported the Taleban - and there's a lot of serious-minded figures in this country who did that and who've now perhaps changed their minds about it - but I think it would have been better if they'd been brought in. But, I don't think frankly that's the important aspect of it. I think the important thing is that a large majority of a fairly representative body now has chosen the type of government and the person who should be in government.

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Bridget Kendall:
There's been some talk about the question of sharia law and whether Afghanistan should introduce that - is that a hot debate?

John Simpson:
I don't think it's a hot debate - there are of course certainly people that feel that way. I don't think under the government of Hamid Karzai that's a possibility either. I think it'll be much more western looking than that would imply. But that doesn't mean of course to say that there may be elements, there may be areas, where it could well be reintroduced or introduced if it hasn't been there already. But I think in terms of the government, I don't think we're going to have that kind of government. I think it's going to be a much more western-oriented government than that.

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Bridget Kendall:
Curtis Carter, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: When do you think America will stop interfering, and let Afghanistan choose their own leaders?

John Simpson:
If you look at the history of Afghanistan, over the past 20 - 25 years, I think in fact it's the lack of interest by the United States and other outside powers that has got it into the mess that it ended up in. I think it was the way in which the United States and also Britain and other western European countries which had been so strongly in favour of the Mujahideen and against the Russians when the Soviet invasion took place at the end of 1979 - the way in which they just simply turned their backs on this country and left it to its own devices. That really was the big problem - that nobody was interested in what happened here, nobody cared except the countries round about Afghanistan who meddled in its affairs in the most outrageous way - creating warlords, encouraging them to attack the government, to attack Kabul and so forth. Many, many of the deaths - a great majority of the deaths in the last 10 - 15 years have been due to that kind of interference which was the opposite of American interference.

Bridget Kendall:
Kabir Mohmand, USA: Isn't the biggest challenge to the loya jirga the influence of America? Do you think America influenced the decision by the former King to step aside?

John Simpson:
I certainly think that was true. I don't think there's much doubt about it. The fact that the American ambassador did announce the King's decision three hours before the King himself did is I think a pretty clear indication of that. I think that important thing is that the outside great powers should be interested in this country in the sense of building its power up and building up its government - protecting it and doing what it can. On the side, it's not much more than that - to help it when its need it. It needs reconstruction very badly.

It needs also the presence of foreign troops to maintain order. It doesn't need very much more than that. It doesn't need phone calls from Washington or London to tell the government here what to do - I think that would be outrageous interference and I do hope that that doesn't happen. There aren't any signs of that at the moment. But if the United States hadn't taken the stand it did, we might have had now a president who was aged 87 who could only rule through a council of people who would themselves be constantly fighting each other and I think that would have been a far worse situation for the country than what has actually happened now.

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Bridget Kendall:
Aimal A, Canada: General Mr. Fahim, of the Northern Alliance, said "that the ministries should be given to all the ethnic groups with respect to the ratio of their population and that their education and experience should be disregarded." My question is how can inexperienced people run the government?

John Simpson:
To be absolutely honest, I've never heard General Fahim saying anything of the sort. On the contrary, what he tends to say is the "behind closed doors" sort of argument that government should be run and then people should be told afterwards. General Fahim, it has to be said, is in many ways many people feel here, is more one of the problems about this country than one of its solutions. He was the former head of the secret police, under President Najibullah, and I don't think there's any doubt about it that if President Karzai is able to, he will slowly ease him out of power.

Now as to the question of ministries being divided up according to some kind of rotational system - some kind of representational system - I don't think that's very likely at all. I haven't heard anybody else mention that. Of course the government will be largely inexperienced, there is no doubt about that. In fact, I'm not sure you'd want people from the 1992 to 1996 period being too heavily involved in the government because that period created such problems for Afghanistan. But I think you'll find the ministries and so on will chosen along perfectly normal and usual lines.

Bridget Kendall:
And more of a balance from now on between those who represented the Northern Alliance and those who represent the Pashtun community in the south - the majority of people in Afghanistan.

John Simpson:
Of course that's absolutely essential - there's no way around that. At first the Northern Alliance did seem to be pretty clear that it wanted to run the show and I think that's another important aspect of external involvement here - the Americans, the British and the Europeans - that they made it absolutely clear to the Northern Alliance that that wasn't going to be a lasting system. That you can't simply ignore the largest population group in the country and have a satisfactory system here. There are signs now, quite clearly, that the Northern Alliance element of the new government and that Hamid Karzai - who isn't of course formerly in any sense a member of the Northern Alliance - that they've understood that and they've realised the essential nature of opening up the government and allowing people from other groups to take a proper part.

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Bridget Kendall:
Hasib Ashraf in the UK and Nazir Fatah in Canada want to know if you think that the discussions happening now can only succeed if the "warlords" that have held top cabinet positions and have been so influential up to now are removed?

John Simpson:
I think this is absolutely essential. This what Hamid Karzai himself said both in his speech and privately that he knows that this is big problem for him. It has to be said there are some warlords already who are showing signs of understanding that things have changed in this country. But I think the essence of it is that if you have strong government at the centre - if you have a strong and reliable police force and a strong and reliable army with the help of outside countries - western countries and others - then I think the problem of warlordism starts to go away right from the start. And when it does start to go away, then I think it will be very, very difficult to reinstall it in any sense.

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