How is Finland supporting Afghanistan?
The international community and the Afghan government are preparing for mutual negotiations on issues regarding the country's development and stabilization and engaging the Afghan regime in promoting the country's progress in London on 28 January. Finland will, among others, announce its further contributions. Finland is supporting Afghanistan through development cooperation, civilian crisis management and military crisis management.
Stabilization of Afghanistan is a challenging mission which claims strong support and commitment from the international community. Several countries have already announced substantial extra contributions, and the London conference on 28 January is an important interim milestone in the early 2010.
The operating conditions in Afghanistan continue to be extremely hard, even though many positive developments exist. Unquestionably, the Afghan government must take on more responsibility and the western aid community must enhance coordination of their operations under the leadership of the UN and the assistance mission UNAMA. The London conference will pay particular attention to promoting security, better governance, provincial cooperation and the efforts to reintegrate former insurgents to the civilian society.
The President of the Republic and the Cabinet Committee on Foreign and Security Policy outlined the Finnish support for Afghanistan on 22 January. Finland will enhance its support comprehensively by means of development cooperation, civilian crisis management and military crisis management.
Afghanistan has been an important target for Finnish cooperation efforts for nearly a decade. The country has received over a 100 million Euro in development assistance and a great number of Finns have taken part in development cooperation as well as civilian and military crisis management in Afghanistan.
In the beginning of January 2009, the Embassy of Finland in Kabul was upgraded as an Embassy led by an Ambassador. The Embassy personnel also includes a Counsellor of Development Cooperation. The resources for managing development cooperation will be enhanced during the spring.
Afghanistan is a major receiver of Finnish development aid
Last year, Afghanistan received 18 million Euro of official development assistance from Finland. According to the 2009 action plan and financial plan, the projected development assistance by 2013 is 24 million Euro.
Finland directs its support to two main sectors. The first deals with good governance, promotion of human rights, the rule of law and the reform of security sector. Secondly, Finland supports rural development and finding replacement livelihood for drug production. Particular attention is paid to promoting gender equality.
Finland supports the Afghanistan Reconstruction Fund, The Law and Order Trust Fund in Afghanistan, Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, the UN Office on drugs and Crime UNODC's fight against drugs, Marie Stopes International's Reproductive Health Programme, and various security projects of the ISAF crisis management operation led by Nato and authorised by the UN and the Provincial Reconstruction Team in Mazar-e-Sharif.
In 2010, Finland intends to direct even more development assistance to Mazar-e-Sharif region in northern Afghanistan, where Finland has stationed also peacekeepers operating together with the Swedish peacekeeping forces.
Finnish humanitarian aid to Afghanistan is routed through the UN system and the Red Cross. Humanitarian aid, amounting to 1-2 million Euros annually, is provided on the basis of need. In 2009, Finland supported Unicef with one million Euros and the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA's Country Office in Afghanistan with 180.000 Euros. The OCHA Country Office was founded in 2009 to coordinate provision of humanitarian help independently instead of the UN assistance mission UNAMA, which had coordinated the aid earlier.
Finland has supported humanitarian mine clearance in Afghanistan since the beginning of the 1990's through the UN mine clearance programme UNMAS. Funding has increased substantially since 2008 totalling 1.9 million Euros in 2009 through UNMAS and the HALO Trust. Finland has supported Finnish non-governmental organisations operating in Afghanistan with roughly one million Euro, with intentions to raise the sum already this year.
Finland gives Afghanistan priority in international crisis management
Finland doubled its contributions for civilian crisis management in Afghanistan in 2009. Operations focus on the EU police mission EUPOL Afghanistan, which supports development of policing and criminal justice system under Afghan ownership. Finland is one of the largest contributors in the mission with nearly 25 experts, and the goal is to increase the number of experts to just over 30. Some of the Finnish experts of civilian crisis management are working at the EU Special Representative's office in Kabul.
Furthermore, Finland supports the EUPOL mission with a bilateral training programme intended for police-prosecutor coordination implemented by the Crisis Management Centre Finland. Finland contributes also to the Nordic rule of law training programme. The Afghan police forces are also supported through the Law and Order Trust Fund for Afghanistan governed by the UN development programme UNDP.
Since 2002, Finland has taken part in the international security assistance force ISAF, led by Nato and authorised by the UN. There are roughly 120 Finnish soldiers currently operating in civilian crisis management in Afghanistan. Most of them work with the PRT Mazar-e-Sharif led by Sweden in northern Afghanistan.
The prevailing political decisions mandate a total of 145 soldiers. In accordance with the alignments by the President of the Republic and the Cabinet Committee on Foreign and Security Policy the strength of Finnish military crisis management personnel is supposed to be temporarily raised by over 50 soldiers, which amounts to a total strength of up to 195 soldiers in the beginning of 2011. The Parliament will receive a report on the matter.
The plans for PRT Mazar-e-Sharif will be driven by the leading country Sweden. According to ISAF priorities, the Team focuses on cooperation with and training of the Afghan security authorities. Objectives include a stronger presence in all operating provinces of the PRT and development of the Afghan security authorities to gradually transfer the responsibility to the Afghans.
Finland will still pursue the earlier decisions for contributing 30 people to training the Afghan army, which is one of the priorities of the ISAF operation. Eleven Finnish soldiers are currently working in groups referred to as Operational Mentor and Liaison Teams (OMLT). Finland has increased its financial support for the Afghan army via a Nato voluntary fund. In 2009, the sum was 600.000 Euros and a similar amount is planned for the current year.