KABUL— Afghan President Hamid Karzai is seeking to bolster his negotiating position in talks with the U.S. at a gathering this week of some 2,000 delegates from the provinces, a meeting that has already sparked insurgent attacks and drawn criticism from the country's political opposition.

The gathering, known as the Loya Jirga, is slated to open today. The planned strategic partnership agreement between Afghanistan and the U.S. will be discussed, as well as attempts to open peace talks with Taliban insurgents.

The Taliban have repeatedly vowed to disrupt the meeting, which also will include  Karzai, government ministers and foreign ambassadors. On Monday, an insurgent attempting a bomb attack was shot by security forces near the Loya Jirga venue at the Polytechnic University of Kabul.

The U.S. and Afghanistan have been negotiating for some nine months a strategic agreement to outline what American military, political and economic presence will remain in Afghanistan once most foreign combat troops leave in late 2014. Some aspects of the planned agreement, such as base rights for U.S. forces, are highly controversial.

Initially, Karzai's administration hoped the Loya Jirga—a traditional gathering, with many attendees hand-picked by the government—would endorse the agreement with the U.S., giving it a degree of popular legitimacy. However, significant disagreements between the U.S. and Afghanistan still remain, and no text or technical details will be submitted to the conference. American and Afghan officials say that, while progress is being made, there is no deadline for the pact to be finalized.

Mindful of how the U.S. neglected Afghanistan after the Cold War, Karzai's administration is seeking guarantees of continued financial support for Afghan security forces, and for the economy, after 2014. The U.S. is reluctant to make formal long-term financial commitments that would, in any case, require approval by future administrations and Congress.

Karzai also wants to quickly assert control over detentions by foreign troops, and to curtail controversial night raids by U.S. Special Operations Forces. While specific basing arrangements and the future status of American troops are to be determined later in separate talks, the planned agreement would create the framework for the continuing presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan past 2014.

"We have been very clear that we do not seek permanent bases in Afghanistan or a long-term military presence that would be a threat to Afghanistan's neighbors," said White House spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden.

Still, plans for continuing U.S. use of Afghan military facilities after 2014 have drawn the ire of neighboring nations including Pakistan, Iran and Russia—fueling Afghan calls for a quid pro quo from Washington.

"We want to be sure of the U.S. commitment to Afghanistan. We're not going to let the snake bite again while we're left on our own," Shaida Mohammad Abdali,  Karzai's deputy national security advisor, said in an interview on Monday. "We're taking a risk, but the cost of the risk should be worth it."

Describing the Loya Jirga as "the most successful, proven democratic institution in Afghanistan," Abdali said the Afghan government is seeking guidance from its people at today’s week's meeting. "We want a partnership that will be irreversible, the Afghan people's partnership with America," he said.

While the Loya Jirga is recognized as a national decision-making body by the Afghan constitution, this week's meeting wasn't convened following constitutional procedures and isn't empowered to make binding decisions. The meeting was declared unconstitutional by the Afghan Parliament, though 171 of the 249 Afghan lawmakers have since registered to attend, according to government officials.

Fawzia Kofi, one of the lawmakers boycotting today’s meeting, said only the elected parliament may discuss the strategic agreement with the U.S. Considering that the deal still remains to be negotiated, this Loya Jirga, Kofi added, "is a waste of time, money and security."

The key Afghan negotiators on the agreement, Deputy Foreign Minister Jawed Ludin and Rangin Dadfar Spanta, national security adviser, were grilled about the Loya Jirga and talks with the U.S. at Monday's Parliament session. "No Muslim, none of the Parliament members and none of the ordinary people in Afghanistan want the permanent American presence in Afghanistan," thundered lawmaker Abdulsattar Darzabi.

Another lawmaker, Abdulsattar Khawasi, proclaimed that the U.S. wants to keep Afghan bases to dominate the region—and that letting it do so would only intensify the war.

In Iraq, such nationalist sentiments have torpedoed U.S. efforts to secure an agreement on a continuing military presence, prompting President Barack Obama to order the withdrawal of all remaining American troops from that country by year end.

The Taliban are playing to this resentment. The insurgent group said in a statement on Monday that "the people who will approve permanent American bases under the banner of the coming so-called Loya Jirga will be considered national traitors, and will be deserving harsh penalties."

The Taliban on Sunday released a document outlining what they said was the government's secret plan for securing the Loya Jirga, sparking fears of attacks on the meeting. The interior ministry dismissed the leaked document as a fake, and said Monday it had detained Zabihullah Mujahid, the senior Taliban spokesman who emailed the plan to Kabul-based reporters.

Hours after the ministry made the claim, however, Mujahid—whose voice is familiar to reporters after years of frequent conversations—responded on his usual cellphone number, laughing at the news of his purported arrest. 

(Source: The Wall Street Journal)