Clinton in Afghanistan seeking political end to war

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Kabul on Wednesday on a diplomatic drive ahead of international conferences to be held later this year aimed at finding a peaceable end to the 10-year war. Clinton's plane touched down in Kabul at 9:15pm (16:45 GMT), said an AFP reporter, for a visit aimed at building on the "diplomatic surge" she announced earlier this year, a senior state department official told travelling media. The top US diplomat was due to meet with Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday. "She will be continuing the diplomatic effort... in terms of both transition, standing with Afghanistan and working on the political resolution," said the official, who would not be named. A conference of regional powers to be held in Istanbul in early November, and an international meeting of foreign ministers in Bonn, Germany, in early December, would be part of discussions, he said. After ten years of military conflict in Afghanistan that has cost thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars, Washington is grappling for a negotiated exit to the war ahead of the 2012 US presidential elections. Tentative discussions with the Taliban aimed at full peace talks have so far come to nothing, officials acknowledge, and Western powers have been attempting to draw in the help of Afghanistan's neighbours with little success so far. Peace efforts swerved off course last month with the assassination of former president and chief negotiator Burhanuddin Rabbani, who headed a government council seeking a political settlement with insurgents. "Reconciliation post-Rabbani" was on the agenda for discussion, the official said. Many Afghans hold Pakistan responsible for the war's long course, as senior Al Qaeda and Taliban-linked militants are believed to hold bases along the restive border that separates the two countries. The United States recently vowed to strengthen its troubled alliance with Pakistan, knowing that the nuclear-armed nation will be a key stakeholder in any eventual political settlement in Afghanistan. Diplomatic efforts are meant to complement a military surge of 33,000 troops sent in to Afghanistan nearly two years ago to break the back of the Taliban insurgency. The first tranche of surge troops returned to the US this summer, while the remaining 23,000 troops are set to return by the end of summer 2012, with all NATO-led combat forces scheduled to leave by the end of 2014. There are currently 98,000 US troops out a total NATO-led force of 130,000 deployed to Afghanistan, fighting an insurgency that remains virulent across the country, with the war now focused on the eastern border with Pakistan. But experts doubt the ability of the Afghan army and police to ward off the Taliban on their own, and US officials and officers have mooted the possibility that a smaller US military contingent could remain beyond the 2014 deadline. Long term strategic arrangements between the two countries would also be discussed during Clinton's visit, the senior official said.