Speaker John Bercow to trade places with Afghan counterpart

Bercow to spend time in Kabul as part of parliamentary exchange programme designed to help foster democracy in Afghanistan The Speaker, John Bercow, is to be dispatched to Kabul in a unique parliamentary exchange scheme to help impart his knowledge of managing the British House of Commons to his Afghan counterpart. British MPs and peers will also twin up with Afghan parliamentarians in a new scheme to help foster democracy in Afghanistan. Bercow and Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi, speaker of the Afghan parliament, have been lined up for the parliamentary support programme exchange scheme agreed between the two countries. Asked if Bercow had been approached to participate in the exchange, a Downing Street spokesman said: “I am sure he is fully supportive of our efforts.” It comes a week after David Cameron was clearly irritated by twice being cut short by the Speaker at prime minister’s questions . The moves to increase inter-parliamentary co-operation come amid concern in the British government at recent efforts by the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, to overturn the results of 25% of Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections, which has further inflamed international concern about democratic progress in Afghanistan. Cameron raised the matter with Karzai in his bilateral meeting on Tuesday morning. Cameron had reminded journalists on Monday that his aspirations for Afghanistan were even more modest than previous prime ministers, telling a gathering of US and UK troops that they were not fighting to “create a perfect democracy” nor “create a perfect country” but to build up the Afghan troops so that they could take the reins themselves. Speaking in Kabul, Cameron said he had raised the issue of the relationship between the Afghan “executive and parliament”. In June, Karzai set up a special court, which overturned the results in a quarter of parliamentary seats from last year’s elections, effectively making null and void 62 MPs’ results. John Bercow Commons Speaker House of Commons David Cameron Afghanistan Hamid Karzai Allegra Stratton guardian.co.uk

Posted by on July 5, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.