Afghan ministers, head of security service survive impeachment vote
byWilfrey Morena-
0
The combo image
released in Afghan media shows (from L) Interior Minister Taj Mohammad
Jahid, Defense Minister Abdullah Habibi and Masson Stanekzai, head of
the National Directorate for Security.
Two Afghan ministers, along
with the head of the country’s security service, have survived a vote of
no-confidence in parliament amid growing concerns that militants seem
poised to seize control of more areas.
The Afghan
legislature summoned Defense Minister Abdullah Habibi, Interior Minister
Taj Mohammad Jahid and Masson Stanekzai, head of the National
Directorate for Security, on Monday over their failure to tackle
mounting insecurity and the Taliban insurgency in the country in recent
months.
The impeachment came less than a month after a massive
attack on Kabul's 400-bed Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan hospital,
Afghanistan’s largest military health facility. Around 50 people were
killed in the attack, which took place just across the road from the
heavily-fortified US embassy. The Daesh Takfiri terrorist group claimed
the attack.
Two
Afghan men weep for their relatives in front of the main gate of a
military hospital in Kabul on March 8, 2017, after a deadly attack that
killed about 50 people. (Photo by AFP)Afghan
Parliament Speaker Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi said the chamber had called the
impeachment vote over "weakness in management and the worsening security
around the country,” especially in relation to the hospital attack.
The
vote also came after reports said that Taliban militants had overrun
the district of Sangin and government facilities in the southern
province of Helmand following months of fierce fighting. However,
spokesmen for the Kabul government denied the claims that the district
had fallen to the militants.
According to estimates, the
government in Kabul controls less than 60 percent of the country while
militants, mainly from the Taliban, either control or contest the rest.
The
UN says nearly 3,500 civilians, including 923 children, were killed and
about 8,000 were wounded as a result of insurgency in Afghanistan last
year.