Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label during

Karzai chides U.S. during Hagel’s Afghanistan visit

Chuck Hagel is in Afghanistan for his first official visit to the country since taking on the role of defense secretary. Hagel spent much of his first morning in Afghanistan touring a training center for officers and enlisted men and women. KABUL — Afghan President Hamid Karzai lashed out at the United States in strikingly acerbic terms Sunday, implying that the American military was stoking violence in collusion with the Taliban to justify a prolonged presence here and charging that foreign troops were harassing Afghan university students. The remarks painted an embarrassing picture of discord that marred Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s first foreign trip as Pentagon chief and plunged the tenuous allies into crisis mode at a time when the United States is struggling to wind down the unpopular war in a dignified manner. Afghan and American officials provided differing accounts about why a joint news conference scheduled for Sunday night that had been expected to be the center