New York: A draft report by American intelligence agencies has concluded that Afghanistan is in a "downward spiral" and casted serious doubt on the ability of Kabul to stem the rise in Taliban's influence there.

The classified report found that the breakdown in central authority in Afghanistan has been accelerated by rampant corruption within the government of President Hamid Karzai and by an increase in violence from militants who have launched increasingly sophisticated attacks from havens in Pakistan.

The report, a nearly completed version of a National Intelligence Estimate, is set to be finished after the November elections and will be the most comprehensive American assessment in years on the situation in Afghanistan, a media report said, quoting American officials familiar with the document.

Its conclusions represented a harsh verdict on decision-making in the Bush administration, which in the months after the Sept 11, 2001, attacks made Afghanistan the central focus of a global campaign against terrorism, the New York Times said.

Beyond the cross-border attacks launched by militants in neighbouring Pakistan, the intelligence report asserted that many of Afghanistan's most vexing problems are of the country's own making.

The report cited gains in the building of Afghanistan's national army, the officials said. But they said it also laid out in stark terms what it described as the destabilising impact of the booming heroin trade, which by some estimates accounts for 50 per cent of Afghanistan's economy.

Reports issued by the Central Intelligence Agency for more than two years have chronicled the worsening violence and rampant corruption inside Afghanistan, and some in the agency say they believe that it has taken the White House too long to respond to the warnings, the paper said.
Source : PTI