October this year will mark 12 years since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan and with the 2014 deadline looming join us as we look ahead at the path to troop withdrawal.
Are the Afghan Army and the police ready to take on full responsibility for national security? How is the Karzai administration handling the transition and what will we see emerge from the elections in 2014?
In 2012 coverage of the situation in Afghanistan has been sparse, the war has become costly and unpopular with the public. We will also be discussing what role the western media should play in covering the transition in the year ahead.
Chaired by David Loyn, BBC foreign correspondent and author of Butcher and Bolt and In Afghanistan: Two Hundred Years of British, Russian and American Occupation.
The panel:
Tamim Ansary is an Afghan American author, his books include Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World through Islamic Eyes, West of Kabul, East of New York and most recently Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan.
Freelance journalist Kitty Logan has been reporting on Afghanistan for over a decade. She first worked in the country on a UN project when the Taliban still held power in 2000. From 2002-2004 she was based in Kabul as Afghanistan producer/stringer for Sky News. In January 2013 she will have just returned from covering the latest news in Afghanistan.
Author and award-winning journalist Christina Lamb, most recently she was Washington Bureau Chief for The Sunday Times. She also worked as a foreign correspondent for more than 20 years, living in Pakistan, Brazil and South Africa.. She is author of many books including best-selling The Africa House, The Sewing Circles of Herat and My Afghan Years.
John D McHugh is a multimedia photojournalist and filmmaker. Since 2006 he has worked extensively in Afghanistan, covering the war against the Taliban. He has embedded with US, Canadian, British, Danish and Afghan troops. His work has been published in Newsweek, Time magazine, The New York Times, The Guardian and many others. He has recently made four films on Afghanistan for the People & Power strand on Al Jazeera English.
Neil Crompton, FCO director for Afghanistan and South Asia & Deputy SRAP. He has held many positions at the FCO including counsellor for the foreign and security policy group & JIC rep in Washington, Iran coordinator and deputy director for Iraq and head of the Iraq Policy Unit.
