G8 eyes farms, free trade and fair elections for Afghans (Roundup)

Jun 27, 2009, 12:26 GMT

Trieste, Italy - Afghanistan needs farms which produce something other than opium, free elections and the chance to trade with its neighbours and the rest of the world, the foreign ministers of the world's eight leading industrialized economies said Saturday.

'The pursuit of peace, stability and development in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the region are linked,' G8 foreign ministers and their counterparts from Afghanistan and Pakistan said in a joint statement.

The members of the G8 - Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States - met for three days of talks in the Italian port of Trieste, with Afghanistan and Pakistan the focus of their attention.

Italy holds the G8's rotating presidency.

The meeting called for more aid to help Afghanistan grow conventional crops such as wheat, in order to encourage Afghan farmers not to grow opium poppies.

US special envoy to Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke 'announced that the US will reduce its funding for the eradication of poppy cultivation, but at the same time will be allocating several hundreds of millions of dollars in support of legal crops,' Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini, who chaired the talks, said.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Afghan opium kills 100,000 people a year in Europe and Asia. Afghanistan provides over 90 per cent of the world's illegal opium, some 7,000 tons per year.

To fight that trade, G8 foreign ministers called for wide-ranging measures to cut down on opium farming by giving Afghan farmers a chance to grow legal crops and training them in modern techniques.

They also called for increased cooperation and intelligence- sharing, so that international forces and the Afghan and Pakistani authorities can crack down on drug smugglers.

Frattini also urged Iran, which is the transit route for an estimated 40 per cent of the world's opium, to join international efforts to clamp down on the trade, even though it refused to attend the Trieste talks.

'There is probably no other country in the world with (opium) addiction rates as high as Iran: that is a very good reason for us to cooperate in the future,' Frattini said.

He also urged Pakistan and the European Union, two of Afghanistan's most important trading partners, to speed up work on free-trade agreements with Afghanistan, as a further way of allowing Afghans to make money legally.

'The EU maybe needs to make bolder progress' on trade, he said.

After a separate meeting with regional players such as India, China and Australia, the ministers also urged the Afghan authorities to make sure that August's presidential election is free and fair, so that ordinary Afghans feel they have a stake in their country.

The group 'emphasized the need for the presidential decree on non- interference of state institutions to be scrupulously applied, such that the equal rights of all candidates to participate fully in the process are not impeded,' a joint statement said.

The group 'affirmed the impartiality of its members regarding the outcome of the elections, and stressed its utmost commitment to the credibility and transparency of the process.'

And the G8 ministers praised Pakistan's offensive against Taliban- linked insurgents in the restive north-west of the country on the border with Afghanistan, pledging to do all they could to help the some 2 million civilians who have fled the fighting.

'The G8 supports Pakistan's decisive action against violent extremism and militancy and acknowledge Pakistan's ongoing counter- terrorism efforts,' their statement said.

The G8 'commits to working closely with the United Nations and humanitarian agencies to help provide assistance to those affected,' the statement added.