Browne: Reconstruction critical to Afghan mission success

Speaking on BBC Radio Four's 'Today' programme Mr Browne, who was in Afghanistan to see for himself the progress being made by UK troops stationed in Helmand Province, as well as seeing a number of reconstruction projects, told the BBC how he believes it is vital that the UK continues to provide support to what is undoubtedly a challenging mission:

"We're in Afghanistan for the same reason as all the 42 other countries of the international community who are represented there, 37 of them with military effort in the country. That is to ensure that a country which has gone through three decades or more of dreadful violence and lost two million of its own people securing its own freedom, has the opportunity that it and its citizens deserve to have the best future that they can have in an already challenging environment and to ensure that this ungoverned space, as it had become after thirty years of that sort of violence, never again is allowed to become a training ground for terrorists.

"Kabul is a much different and much more progressive city than it was in 2001 when the Taliban were removed from power in the north and the west of the country and there are many measures of progress in Afghanistan including the fact that many millions of people have chosen to come back and live in Afghanistan having previously been refugees, not to mention the number of girls who are now at school, and these are counted in hundreds of thousands if not in the millions.

"In the southern part of the country there is a very complex environment involving warlords, the Taliban and terrorists. It had been an ungoverned space for decades. The people have been subjected to the most horrific violence in the villages and communities of the south, and we are beginning to make a difference but it is not an easy thing to do.

"What we are seeking to do in this complex environment is a number of things. One is that we're trying to create a degree of security and we're doing that community by community; in Helmand Province we have succeeded in the Lashkar Gah area of creating a level of security that allowed me in my most recent visit to move around the streets of Lashkar Gah and meet with local politicians there and discuss with them."

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Mr Browne went on to explain how important the reconstruction work being carried out in the south of the country is to the future stability of the region:

"We have a very important reconstruction project at the Kajaki Dam which will be iconic in terms of development, producing electricity for 1.5 million people and extending the valley's ability to be able to grow crops to the commercial level so that people can move out of growing poppies. This is a very complex and difficult thing to do.

"It is a long term commitment and our people are doing an exceptionally good job there but it has to be complemented by, at the same time, the growth of governance from the Afghans themselves because they have to take increasing responsibility, not just the security forces, but in governance in order to hold the stability that we can generate.

"We are making progress and what we have to do is that very difficult balancing act of making progress militarily, which we can do. The British can over-face the Taliban in any circumstances and can drive them out of communities. The challenge is then to be able to build those communities, local government, their links to the provincial governance and to the Central Government in such a way that that is sustained.

"This is a long term commitment and it's a long term commitment not just for us, but for the whole of the international community, but mostly for the Afghans themselves and we're there with them."