“The man who served as [Afghan] President Hamid Karzai’s top intelligence official for six years has launched an urgent campaign to warn Afghans that their leader has lost conviction in the fight against the Taliban and is recklessly pursuing a political deal with insurgents. In speeches to small groups in Kabul and across northern Afghanistan over the past month, Amarullah Saleh has repeated his belief that Karzai’s push for negotiation with insurgents is a fatal mistake and a recipe for civil war. He says Karzai’s chosen policy endangers the fitful progress of the past nine years in areas such as democracy and women’s rights. ‘If I don’t raise my voice we are headed towards a crisis,’ he told a gathering of college students in Kabul.”
– Joshua Partlow, “Minority Leaders Leaving Karzai’s Side over Leader’s Overtures to Insurgents,” The Washington Post, July 23, 2010