Germany stepped up pressure on Afghanistan's Karzai

[WillieW]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/11/09/international/i065524S22.DTL

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(11-09) 07:24 PST BERLIN, Germany (AP) --

The United States and Germany stepped up pressure on Afghan President Hamid Karzai Monday to implement major reforms and crack down on rampant corruption.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle told reporters after talks in the German capital that additional military and civilian assistance to Afghanistan will depend on Karzai improving the quality of his government.

"Any commitments ... have to be met by an even greater commitment on the behalf of the government of President Karzai to deliver services for the people of Afghanistan, to begin the effort to root out corruption, to have more accountability and transparency in the way that the government operates," Clinton said.

"We are very clear that we will be expecting more from the government of Afghanistan," she said. She added that the United States and its partners in Afghanistan would lay out specific benchmarks for the government to meet.

"We are going to present to the government of Afghanistan and President Karzai a clear set of expectations and of accountability measures so there can be no doubt as to what we expect from this relationship," Clinton said.

Speaking for the German government, Westerwelle said "it is necessary to make the Afghan government, to make President Karzai realize that good governance has to become his very own yardstick."

"We want to ensure that good and peaceful development can occur within Afghanistan and in return we expect of the Afghan government that it makes its own contribution towards this objective," he said.

Clinton and Westerwelle met on the 20th anniversary of the fall of Berlin Wall

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