US led Afghanistan towards destruction for 20 years: Official

Tehran, IRNA – Iranian President’s special envoy on Afghanistan affairs said that the Americans occupied Afghanistan for 20 years, and directed that country towards destruction by eradicating all its infrastructures. Hassan Kazemi Qomi made the remarks in a special news interview of an IRIB TV channel in response to a question of the outcome of the American military forces’ 20-year presence in Afghanistan for that nation. He said that now a year passes since the American military forces’ escape from Afghanistan now. Kazemi Qomi added that this means the US espionage services are still active in Afghanistan and they continue their destructive acts under various scenarios. “The Americans occupied that country for 20 years and led it towards destruction and extinction of its infrastructures," he said. They resorted to mass "murder of civilians and brought to power an incompetent government. Besides financial corruption in that government, the Americans did not even permit a professional and strong army take shape in Afghanistan,” he said. The official pointed out that this means that both the government and the army were quite dependent on the Americans for proving their existence. Kazemi Qomi emphasized that for instance that the root cause for a major part of lack of security in Afghanistan was the acts of the Americans themselves. “They paved the path for the entry of the terrorist groups into Afghanistan and that was definitely one of the notorious acts of the Americans during those 20 years,” he said, adding that you heard a lot about explosions in marriage ceremonies, for instance. He added that in the cultural and social fields, too, the Americans were acting quite badly. “In a country with a religious and traditional society, they kept on promoting quite a liberal culture. Of course a broad majority in the society did not yield to such moves. They also promoted the drug abuse secretly. When the Americans arrived Afghanistan’s narcotic drugs’ production was around 200 tons, which was of course 2,000 tons a year before that. But during the Americans’ presence it reached 10,000 tons,” he said. Kazemi Qomi said that a very sad phenomenon in Afghanistan was facing a large population of drug addicts, where although the puppy flower plantation had always been high, but the number of drug addicts had always been very low. But during those 20 years the addicts comprised about a tenth of the Afghan nation. Follow us on Twitter @IrnaEnglish