Lakhdar Brahimi To Speak On Afghanistan And Iraq

Lakhdar Brahimi, former Special Advisor to the Secretary-General of the United Nations and a Director's Visitor at the Institute for Advanced Study, will speak on "Afghanistan and Iraq: Failed States or Failed Wars?" at the Institute for Advanced Study on Wednesday, March 28, at 4:30 p.m. in Wolfensohn Hall on the campus of the Institute.

Ambassador Brahimi's talk is the first in the Institute's new annual lecture series, Lectures on Public Policy, which will elucidate and weigh in on issues relevant to contemporary politics and social conditions. The lecture series will also address scientific matters of broad import every few years.

Having assisted in the postwar transitions in Afghanistan and Iraq, Brahimi will speak about the circumstances that have led to the current situation in Afghanistan and Iraq. He will examine the recent history of both countries and offer his perspective on the actions and non-actions that have led to the present crisis.

"Afghanistan was a largely failed state in the last quarter of 2001, when, immediately after 9/11, the Taliban Administration was routed by the United States-led military intervention and the United Nations brokered a peace process at the Bonn Conference," commented Brahimi. "Today, after a successful initial phase, which went some way towards the restoration of peace and stability, Afghanistan is again struggling with its old demons of internal strife. The Taliban are back and seriously threaten the fragile state being built in Kabul. What happened? What went wrong? Who did what? And who failed to do what?

"Today, the confident promise of a model democracy in a united Iraq, ‘at peace with itself and with its neighbors,' is little more than a mirage in the Mesopotamian desert," Brahimi continued. "The world, meanwhile, continues to struggle with fundamental questions: Why was the country invaded in the first place? And who is/are responsible for the present mess?

"The international community will continue to ignore Afghanistan and fail to help Iraq out of its present tragedy at its peril. What is to be done then? And who should be doing what? That there are no easy answers is no reason not to ask the right questions."

About Lakhdar Brahimi

As Special Adviser to the Secretary-General of the United Nations from January 2004 through December 2005, Ambassador Brahimi advised Kofi Annan on a wide range of issues, including the prevention and resolution of conflicts. In January 2004, a few months after the assassination of Sergio Vieira de Mello and 22 of his colleagues in Baghdad, Brahimi led the efforts of the United Nations in the early part of the postwar transition in Iraq.

He presided over the UN Bonn Conference on Afghanistan (November-December 2001), which produced the peace agreement now referred to as the Bonn Process, and went on to oversee its implementation as the head of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA) in Kabul during the following two years (2003-04).

Brahimi previously served as the Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Afghanistan from July 1997 until October 1999. In between his Afghanistan assignments, Brahimi chaired an independent panel, established by Secretary-General Annan, which authored the Brahimi Report on UN Peace Operations in 2000. The acclaimed report assessed the shortcomings of the existing system of peacekeeping and made specific recommendations for change, focusing on politics, strategy and operational and organizational areas of need.

About the Institute for Advanced Study

The Institute for Advanced Study is one of the world’s leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. The Institute exists to encourage and support curiosity-driven research in the sciences and humanities—the original, often speculative thinking that produces advances in knowledge that change the way we understand the world. Work at the Institute takes place in four Schools: Historical Studies, Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Social Science. It provides for the mentoring of scholars by a permanent Faculty of approximately 30, and it ensures the freedom to undertake research that will make significant contributions in any of the broad range of fields in the sciences and humanities studied at the Institute.

The Institute, founded in 1930, is a private, independent academic institution located in Princeton, New Jersey. Its more than 6,000 former Members hold positions of intellectual and scientific leadership throughout the academic world. Thirty-three Nobel Laureates and 40 out of 56 Fields Medalists, as well as many winners of the Wolf and MacArthur prizes, have been affiliated with the Institute.