Karzai raps US stance on terrorism

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has slammed the United States for its definition of terrorism, Press TV reports.

Karzai made the remarks in a meeting with a group of some local journalists in the presidential palace in Kabul on Sunday.

He told the journalists that the US government only considers those as terrorists who threaten the interests of Washington and not those who “burn schools.”

Karzai also reiterated his stance towards signing the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) between Washington and Kabul. The Afghan president says that he will not sign the pact and that the matter should be left to the next government after the April elections in Afghanistan.

The deal, which has already received the approval of the Afghan elders assembly (Loya Jirga), will allow US forces to remain in Afghanistan beyond the planned 2014 pullout.

On December 14, the Afghan president said that he no longer trusts the United States, accusing the US administration of saying one thing and doing another. He added that he would not be “intimidated” into signing the deal.

The Afghan president says the country cannot approve an agreement without guarantees that the United States will halt its deadly airstrikes on residential areas and help broker a peace process with the Taliban.

The US airstrikes have been a major source of tension between Afghanistan and the United States.

More than 84,000 foreign troops, most of them Americans, are currently deployed in Afghanistan.

The 2001 invasion of Afghanistan as part of Washington’s so-called war on terror removed the Taliban from power, but the country is still gripped by insecurity.