ever: bin Laden and top al-Qaida and Taliban officials, along with many of their fight-
ers, escaped into the mountains of eastern and southern Afghanistan and into Pakistan
as well.
Aided by the United Nations, with financing from the United States and other
countries, leaders of Afghanistan’s ethnic and tribal groups in December 2001 agreed
on an arrangement for an interim government, to be followed by elections for a per-
manent new government. Karzai, a leader of one of the most prominent Pashtun fam-
ilies and a man well known in Western circles, emerged as the leader of the new gov-
ernment, winning the presidency in 2004 in Afghanistan’s first truly free elections. In
balloting the following year, Afghans chose a diverse group of representatives for a new
two-house parliament. When the legislators convened in December 2005, former war-
lords sat next to Western-educated intellectuals, several dozen women, and a few for-
mer members of the Taliban.
Even with billions of dollars in Western aid, the new government struggled to
overcome decades of destruction and provide the services necessary to make the soci-
ety whole. Meanwhile, Taliban fighters, who had been pushed from power but not
defeated in 2001, gradually regrouped. By 2006 the Taliban had reemerged as a major
threat, particularly in their home base in southern Afghanistan. The United States and
its NATO allies, who still provided most of Afghanistan’s security, suddenly found
themselves deploying more troops in an attempt to prevent the country from sliding
into chaos once again.
568 AFGHANISTAN