Assembly urges end to destructive conflict.

The General Assembly on 19 December urged the leaders of all Afghan parties to "renounce the use of force and settle their political differences by peaceful means".

In adopting without a vote resolution 50/88, the world forum also called upon all States to "respect Afghanistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity", refrain from interfering in its internal affairs, and "stop the flow of arms and equipment related to arms production to all parties".

The international community was called upon to respond to the UN interagency consolidated appeal for $124 million emergency humanitarian and rehabilitation assistance for Afghanistan, launched by the Secretary-General for the period from 1 October 1995 to 30 September 1996, "bearing in mind the availability also of the Afghanistan Emergency Trust Fund".

`Yearning for peace'

The Afghan people, who remained "strongly opposed to foreign interference" in their country's internal affairs, had given "every indication of wishing to see" that peace became a "permanent condition", Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali reported (A/50/737 and Add.1) on 8 November. Moreover, many of them believed that, if all interested parties worked with the UN to "try to ensure that such interference ceases", they could "resolve their differences and achieve a lasting settlement and durable peace", he stated.

Indeed, "their yearning for lasting peace and stability, which have been denied them for too long, deserves the active support of the international community", the Secretary-General stressed.

There was a "significant common point"--the establishment of a "representative preparatory body to initiate a political process leading towards a lasting settlement"--in various peace plans that had been put forward, he went on. Although differences remained on the modalities, there seemed to be a "general consensus that such a preparatory mechanism is necessary if Afghanistan is to take the first crucial step out of the current impasse", Mr. Boutros-Ghali observed.

Afghanistan was "effectively controlled by three major military powers": President Burhanuddin Rabbani and his Commander, Ahmad Shah Massoud, together with their ally, Governor Ismael Khan of Herat province; General Rashid Dostum, mainly in the northern part of the country; and the Taliban in the south and south-eastern provinces. However, the Secretary-General reported, the general view of the Afghan people was that President Rabbani, whose mandate had expired on 28 December 1994, "must transfer power to a broad-based representative body".

On 6 November, Mr. Rabbani had announced publicly his willingness to transfer power to an individual or commission and proposed that the warring parties and other neutral personalities should "sit together, under United Nations mediation, to agree on a suitable mechanism and the date for the transfer of power", the report said.

On 14 November, he had submitted a list of names for membership in such a mechanism to Ambassador Mahmoud Mestiri, Head of the UN Special Mission to Afghanistan. General Dostum on 19 November had welcomed the list as a "reasonable basis for negotiations" and himself submitted 10 names, the Secretary-General said.

However, it was reported that on 26 November "intense fighting, involving often indiscriminate rocketing and aerial bombardment was going on in and around Kabul between the Taliban and government forces".

`Critical crossroads'

Afghanistan was "now at a critical crossroads", the Secretary-General stated on 6 December. It could follow either the "route to peace through dialogue and negotiations in a spirit of give-and-take", or the route of "continued war and confrontation where today's victor may be tomorrow's vanquished".

Unfortunately, the current leaders of the principal factions "seem to favour the latter route", Mr. Boutros-Ghali lamented. "I nevertheless continue to believe that peace and stability in Afghanistan are attainable, and that the United Nations should not falter at this juncture", he stressed.

Continued instability would have "grave consequences not only for the Afghans themselves, but also for the whole region", the Secretary-General declared. "Afghanistan is the place where most of the ethnic fault lines in Central Asia converge. The war there has for years had negative repercussions on neighbouring States".

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata on 20 November told the press at Headquarters that there were about 5 million Afghan refugees, of whom 2 million were in Iran and 1.5 million in Pakistan.