The Afghan-UAE relations after the Kandahar incident

 

The United Arab Emirates’ Ambassador in Afghanistan Juma Mohammad Abdullah al-Kaabi, who was injured in an explosion at the Kandahar governor’s guesthouse On 10 January 2017, died in a hospital in UAE. Besides the UAE diplomats, 11 others were also killed in Kandahar explosion including the deputy governor of Kandahar Abdul Ali Shams, an Afghan Senator Serajuddin Safari, a member of Wolesi Jirga Baz Mohammad Jawzjani, head of Kandahar’s external affairs Shah Ahmad Saeed and an Afghan diplomat Yama Quraishi.

On the other hand, following the assassination of the five UAE diplomats, the Afghan President Ashraf Ghani visited UAE and, besides the senior UAE officials, met the families of killed diplomats.

The Afghanistan-UAE relations during the NUG, the Kabul-Abu Dhabi relations after the Kandahar incident and the future of these relations are issues that analyzed here.

Afghanistan-UAE relations; a brief background

Afghanistan has historical, political and cultural relations with the UAE. Diplomatic relations between the two countries were first established in 1973; but during the Afghan Jihad, the UAE’s humanitarian and financial aids to Afghan Mujahideen and migrants increased more than ever. After the collapse of the Dr. Najeeb’s government, UAE opened its embassy in Kabul but after the beginning of the civil war in Afghanistan, the embassy was closed. UAE’s embassy in Kabul reopened in 2004.

Since 2001, the former Afghan President Hamid Karzai and former Afghan Ministers of Foreign Affairs have repeatedly visited the UAE and the Afghan government also signed security agreement with this country in 2013.

UAE is one of the countries that, due to humanitarian reasons, have military presence in Afghanistan. UAE has been vastly engaged in the reconstruction process of Afghanistan. For instance, since 2001, the UAE has assisted Afghanistan in the fields of health, building infrastructures (roads, schools, mosques, universities “the Shiekh Zahed Unversity in Khost province” and hospitals). According to a source, between 2001 and 2012, the UAE has provided $1.5bn in aid for Afghanistan.

In addition, the UAE has also helped Afghanistan to eradicate polio and vaccinate Afghan children. The UAE has appropriated $120m to Global Polio Eradication Initiative program, which is mostly focused on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Moreover, $66m is appropriated to Pneumococcal and Pentavalent vaccines and UAE also contributes to children nutrition in Afghanistan.

According to the UAE Ambassador in Afghanistan, they have trained 18700 Mulla Imams in Afghanistan and they have planned to train 1300 more Mulla Imams, 340 of which will be soon sent to al-Azhar University.

 

The Afghanistan-UAE relations during the NUG

After the formation of the National Unity Government (NUG) in Afghanistan, relations between Afghanistan and the UAE strengthened, agreements were signed between the two countries, and afghan officials repeatedly visited Abu Dhabi. For instance, President Ashraf Ghani traveled to the UAE twice, the First Vice President once and the Minister and other officials of Ministry of Foreign Affairs visited this country several times.

Currently the three following points are significant in Kabul-Abu Dhabi relations:

First; issuing statement, Afghanistan announced its support from Saudi Arabia and the UAE in the Yemen war and, later-on, joined anti-terrorism coalition under Saudi Arabia. On the other hand, Pakistan did not issue any statement to express its support from Saudi Arabia in Yemen war nor did Pakistan sent troops to this war to support Saudi Arabia, which affected the Islamabad’s relations with Abu Dhabi.

Second; Afghanistan and the UAE signed a long term strategic cooperation agreement, which emphasized on security cooperation and war against terrorism.

Third; five UAE diplomats and the injured UAE Ambassador died in Kandahar explosion.

 

Relations after the Kandahar incident

Although, as cited in the first two abovementioned points, efforts were made to improve relations, but the bloody Kandahar attack, once again, challenged relations between the two countries.

The Afghan government, NATO and the UAE decided to conduct investigation about the Kandahar incident. Although the result of the investigations by NATO and the UAE is yet to be published but, at the beginning, the Afghan government accused the Taliban for the attack and said that the attack was planned outside Afghanistan. On the other hand, the Taliban did not accept the responsibility for the attack and said that the attack was the result of internal disputes between the local officials in Kandahar. Thus the situation was complicated. Therefore, first the Afghan Minister of Foreign Affairs and then the Afghan President visited the UAE and met UAE officials.

In such deteriorated security situation, the Kandahar explosion also killed some Afghan senior officials including some Jihadi leaders. Foreign intelligence agencies, increasing influence of the Sunni Arabian countries (neighboring with Iran), and some other factors indicates other foreign factors in this incident.

 

The future of the Afghanistan-UAE relations

Although, both the Afghan government and the UAE have stated that the Kandahar incident will not affect the bilateral relations between the two countries, but still, in the short term, the incident has increased suspicions in these relation and these suspicions will increase if local officials in Kandahar were proved to be involved in this incident.

In the meanwhile, besides the relations between the two governments, the people and traders of the two countries have vast relations. Currently there are more than 150 thousand Afghan workers in the UAE and according to the Afghan embassy, until 2004, the assets of the Afghan traders in Dubai was more than $4bn. But after the deterioration of security situation in the country and with the increase of benefits in the business of immoveable properties, most of the Afghan traders bought properties there. For instance, only in the first months of 2012, Afghans invested approximately $60m.

Hence, since the Kandahar explosion, the UAE did not have any harsh reaction (except for the remarks of a security official) and given the vast bilateral relations, relations between the two countries may not deteriorate.

The end