Afghanistan: Supreme Court to Decide Foreign Minister's Fate

Silver hair blowing in the wind, acting Afghan Foreign Minister Rangin Dadfar Spanta stood at the podium next to his German counterpart, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, at a recent news conference. Toward the end, one journalist asked a simple, yet complicated question: When will Dadfar Spanta's status be clarified?

The 53-year-old foreign minister response was telling: he used the tone of a man unsure of whether he possesses the energy to win this present political battle. "Whether here in the ministry, or somewhere else, my wish is to serve the Afghan people and to struggle for democracy. As a democrat, I've spent 80 percent of my life working toward democratic values and I respect the laws which govern democracy, be it social justice, human rights, or belief in the equal rights of men and women," he said.

Spanta, a scholar with a doctorate in political science, has been foreign minister of Afghanistan for the last year. But since May 12, he has been waiting for the Afghan Supreme Court to clarify his fate, which is tied to a power struggle between the legislative and executive branches of Afghanistan's nascent democratic government. In early May, parliament voted to remove Spanta, but President Hamid Karzai is challenging the legislature's authority to make cabinet changes. Karzai believes cabinet appointments and firings are the chief executive's prerogative.

The Supreme Court has no deadline to issue its decision, and until its ruling is announced, Spanta will continue to serve as foreign minister. The international community, including the United Nations, is supporting Spanta, and is anticipating a decision in his favor. The UN said the Afghan constitution gives parliament the right to give no-confidence votes to the cabinet, but it does not have the right to fire cabinet members.

The origin of the constitutional row goes back to Karzai's controversial move to replace former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah with Spanta. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

The move received parliament's blessing at the time, but developments over the last year, culminating in Iran's expulsion of tens of thousands of Afghan refugees in April, resulted in the majority of MP voting no-confidence in both Spanta and Minister of Refugees Akbar Akbar. In explaining their no-confidence vote, legislators assailed the two ministers for ineffectiveness in representing Afghanistan's interests in the international diplomatic arena.

Ahmed Behzad, a member of parliament's lower house, had helped Spanta campaign and gain approval from other members in 2006. But on May 12, he voted against the minister. "He's without a doubt one of Afghanistan's worthy scholars. But he didn't meet our expectations last year. We didn't see any positive changes and instead, we saw a lack of interest