Under the leadership of President Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan has made great achievements in 2004, and the adoption of a post-war constitution and the presidential election are the two major bolsters of the war-ravaged country's faster reconstruction.  

In early January, over 500 delegates from across the country attended the historic Constitutional Loya Jirga or Grand Assembly. During the three weeks, they solved all crucial issues in the draft constitution prepared by the transitional government and unanimously ratified the first constitution in the post-Taliban nation.

"I pray to God the Almighty that this constitution would lead to building a civil society and achievement of economic, social, political and cultural prosperity for all and ensure peace, equity and brotherhood within the Afghan nation," Karzai said after the adoption of the constitution.

The constitution, which has 12 chapters and 160 articles, paved the way for the country's first-ever direct election on October 9, and Karzai, who came to power with the US backing after the fall of Taliban three years ago, got the mandate with 55.4 percent of the votes to govern the nation for another five years.

With the election, a determined Karzai, who turns 47 on December 24, not only strengthened his authority but marginalized his political rivals, mainly Jihaid leaders or former anti-Soviet resistance figures.

Through the polls, Karzai also managed to isolate his armed opponents, the fundamentalist anti-US Taliban remnants, whom he had failed to wipe out in a military way.

In addition, Karzai aggressively pushed ahead with the UN-backed Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) program launched late last year, under which over 27,000 former militia combatants have been disarmed.

The nationwide program has not only helped Karzai shrink local commanders' power but enabled him to extend the central government's control beyond the capital city to the vast countryside.

Under the DDR, over 60,000 militiamen loyal to different commanders and warlords will be disarmed before the parliamentary election scheduled for next April to allow the president to smoothly implement his agenda.

The continued disarmament program has strengthened Karzai's hand to take action against defiant regional leaders and expand his control in far-flung areas where establishing law and order was impossible in the past.

To demonstrate his authority and boost central government's credibility, Karzai in 2004 has also resorted to an administrative reform, replacing or removing several regional strongmen and warlords from their official posts.

Vice President Mohammad Qasim Fahim, western Herat province's strongman Ismael Khan and military leader of north Afghanistan General Atta Mohammad are among the prominent figures who have fallen prey to the reform and lost their military fiefdoms.

The transitional government had been successful in economic recovery as the economic growth registered 16 percent in the outgoing year.

The reconstruction process is now going on uninterrupted as major projects of road building and private-run housing schemes are underway in many parts of the war-ravaged country.

Hundreds of national and international companies, according to officials of the Commerce Ministry, have invested millions of US dollars in different fields during 2004.

The donor nations at the Berlin conference in early April pledged US$8.2 billion, of which US$4.4 billion is disbursed in the Afghan year of 1383 (from March 2004 to March 2005).

In mid April, Afghanistan hosted an international conference on trade and investment, during which some firms from the 10-member Economic Cooperation Organization of Central and West Asian Countries (ECO), the region's major economic group, promised to invest in the country.

To attract more investment, a trade exhibition was held in Kabul in November, during which 400 companies from several nations including Iran and the United States put their products on display.

Dozens of world leaders, including Pakistani President Pervez Musharaf, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and US Vice President Dick Cheney, made tours of Afghanistan in the outgoing year.

Meanwhile, the country also witnessed the return of around 1 million of its citizens from exile, mainly from the neighboring countries of Pakistan and Iran.

However, Afghanistan has made little progress in the war against the blooming illicit drugs in 2004, as the transitional government failed to check and eradicate the menace.

Director of the UN Office on Drug and Crimes (UNODC) Antonio Maria Costa expressed concern last month that Afghanistan's opium cultivation, having jumped 64 percent to a record 131,000 hectares, the highest drug cultivation in the country's history, has become the largest in the world.

"The fear that Afghanistan might degenerate into a narco-state is slowly becoming a reality as corruption in the public sector, the die-hard ambition of local warlords and the complicity of local investors are becoming a factor in Afghan life," Costa warned.

With an output of 3,600 tons of opium in 2003, Afghanistan became the largest producer of the raw material used in manufacturing heroin, and the harvest this year would have reached over 4,000 tons if the climate cooperated.

A host of other daunting challenges also require the elected administration to deal with in the new year, including Taliban-related militancy, taming regional leaders and warlords, and reducing the poverty of the country. The president is confident that he can meet the challenges.

"Our principal promises are ensuring lasting stability throughout the country, elimination of poppy cultivation, fight against drug trafficking, disarmament of former combatants, eradication of poverty and provision of public service," Karzai pledged before the nation immediately after taking oath as the country's first popularly elected head of state.

The president said he is committed to delivering on these promises over the next five years.

(Xinhua News Agency December 21, 2004)