MR. MATT MCCLESKEYFrom WAMU 88.5 at American University in Washington, welcome to "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," connecting your community with the world. I'm Matt McCleskey, sitting in today for Kojo. Later this hour, we'll look at the private companies and individuals competing in a new space race. That's ahead, but first, a weekend of violence in Afghanistan is raising prickly questions for the U.S. and its allies. It started with a heated controversy after U.S. military personnel tossed copies of the Muslim Holy book, the Koran into a trash pit to be burned.

MR. MATT MCCLESKEYThat triggered violent protests across Afghanistan. Then this weekend, two American military advisors were assassinated at their desks in the Afghan interior ministry. This cascading series of events potentially complicates plans for a U.S. withdraw and the transfer of security to Afghan forces. Yet some Afghan observers say, we're not getting the whole story and that Western coverage of the violence may be exaggerating the extent of the unrest. What's missing is coverage of the attitudes of the majority of Afghans. Joining me now to discuss this is Ahmad Shuja, an Afghan political commentator and blogger with Afghanistan Analysis and a contributor to UN Dispatch. Thanks for joining us.

MR. AHMAD SHUJAThanks for having me, Matt.

MCCLESKEYAnd on the telephone, Akmal Dawi, an Afghan journalist. You may recall that Akmal joined "The Kojo Nnamdi Show" and America Abroad for our series last year, Joined by War as Kojo's co-host in Kabul. Akmal Dawi, thank you for joining us.

MR. AKMAL DAWIThank you very much for having me.

MCCLESKEYAnd we do want to ask our listeners to take part in this conversation. How do you think events in Afghanistan over the past week will complicate U.S. plans for withdrawal? Give us a call, 800-433-8850, you can also send an email to take part at kojo@wamu.org. Ahmad, I'll start with you. We're hearing a lot, of course, about Afghanistan in the news this past week. Can you help us make sense of what's going on there now?

SHUJARight. It's been a very tumultuous week for Afghanistan, for the past five, seven days. Of course, it started with the burning of the Korans and advertent burnings, but it actually spiraled into a series of protests by Afghans. What's interesting is that there were protests in a number of locations, provinces, but they've, in some parts, turned violent. But as you said, that does not really provide the full picture of what's really going on in Afghanistan.

SHUJAThere is definitely a widespread frustration and anger about what happened because a lot of Afghans feel that their holy book has been desecrated and all of that. But I think the violence has been reported more than the silent majority of Afghans who have been enraged, but not contributed to any of the violence.

MCCLESKEYAnd can the violence be causally linked back to the Korans, particularly the killing of these American military personnel or do we know?

SHUJARight. I think we have to ask ourselves, who benefits from the violence here? And I think it's not -- we just received reports a few weeks ago about, you know, Afghan children starving and freezing to death in IDP camps outside of Kabul. I think those people are not benefiting. The vast majority of Afghans do not benefit, whose shops were burnt and whose cars are burnt and looted in these protests.

SHUJAI think the more unrest there is, the Taliban are going to get more benefits out of it. And obviously, the more the news cycle continues, the more a negative perception of America is going to take hold in the minds of Afghans. And I think that's a net gain for the Taliban who, despite that fact, have also had some PR problems because they said, very bluntly, that despite the desecration, they're going to continue the talks in Qatar.

MCCLESKEYWell, Akmal Dawi, what are you hearing from Afghanistan?

DAWIWell, we're hearing that there were a couple of demos around Afghanistan that turned violent. That over 40 people might have been killed, including four Americans. And 36 Afghans and tens of people have been wounded by bullets. Well, we had the (unintelligible) reporting that in Kunduz, in the North of Afghanistan, in one day, 50 wounded people were brought to a hospital on Saturday. Among then, three died from gun shots. So it was a pretty grim picture, one that, you know, worried a lot of people inside and outside Afghanistan that if they expand, the situation could slip out of control. So it was a miserable situation as it has been in Afghanistan over the past few years.

MCCLESKEYAnd how do you think the killings of the U.S. security personnel over the weekend are complicating the situation there?

DAWIWell, the role of (word?) advisors from Afghan government institutions, I think, you're asking of that, yes?

MCCLESKEYYes.

DAWII think it will, first of all, it will raise a number of questions on the part of (word?) . You know, the self confidence between Afghan government and its international partners. If one incident can really damage the, you know, the long term partnership between (word?) international community, then that's really a big issue that both sides have to think about.

DAWIIt's a big victory in, you know, in many views to the Taliban who try to be on top of the news to have a strong propaganda in terms of inciting people to violence and saying that they have people inside the government of Afghanistan. That at times between the Afghan government and its international partners, they're weak or fragile, they're not genuine. It certainly will damage, you know, the kind of partnership that Afghans are aspiring to have with the international community.

MCCLESKEYWell, Ahmad Shuja, the latest U.S. strategy has been a plan to replace NATO combat forces with small teams of advisors who would work with Afghan forces. If those advisors pull out, how would that affect the ability of Afghanistan to build its own security capacity?

SHUJAThat's an excellent question, Matt. But I don't think that the pullout of those advisors is going to be permanent.

MCCLESKEYOkay.

SHUJABut we also have to actually remember that the advisors that have actually been pulled out are already there. It's not the part -- they're not part of the new contingent of advisors that are going to come in the mid 2013 who are going to replace in the combat troops.

MCCLESKEYOkay.

SHUJASo that's important to understand. But the advisors that already are in the ministries who've been pulled out, France, Canada, Germany. They've pulled out their soldiers and advisors, it's not going to be a permanent pull out. They're going to come back and -- but we have to understand that when they do come back, it's not going to be business as usual. Things are going to change. The way they're going to be advising the Afghans are going to be changed.

SHUJAThey're going to be trust issues and between them and the Afghans. And there's also always the factor of cultural differences that have actually caused some of these violent incidents. But also, they're going to have to change the way they actually advise and there are some thought about whether they'd be able to pull off, you know, 10 hour shifts inside these ministries or will they reduce some of those hours and how that's going to effect the, not only the ministries, but also the aid that's going to be coming in.

SHUJABecause, on the one hand, you have military aid training of the Afghan security forces, but also capacity building inside Afghan ministries, which is equally important because if Afghanistan can't govern itself, even if the terrorism and the insurgency is gone, than we have a very difficult situation at hand.

MCCLESKEYWhat you're saying, the news coverage here in the U.S. and elsewhere around the world, what do you think is right in that news coverage, what are we missing in that news coverage?

SHUJAWell, I think there's little doubt about the facts that the news coverage has been, you know, portraying in the West. But I think what's important to remember is that Afghanistan has 34 provenances and we've only seen protests in about roughly, I think, fewer than 10 provinces. And even fewer of those, a handful, have actually turned violent. And in those violent incidents, there have been losses of American and ISAF lives and also losses of Afghan lives. Inordinately, a larger number of Afghans have been killed in these protests.

SHUJABut also Afghan property has been lost and cars and shops have been damaged. I think that's important to understand. But even more important is that there is a silent majority of Afghans that are enraged or frustrated by the burnings of the Koran, the, you know, desecration of the corpuses and what is known as the kill team of American soldiers killing Afghan civilians for, quote, "sport," according to some Western news reports. These incidents have actually enraged or frustrated a lot of Afghans and the very slow pace of reconstruction and development in Afghanistan. But the Afghans, by and large, 32 million people haven't poured onto the streets, but they are very frustrated.

MCCLESKEYAnd Akmal Dawi, what reports are you hearing from Afghanistan? Is there any actual strong news reporting coming out from the ground around the country?

DAWIWell, the media of Afghanistan as every other aspect of the society does not have a very strong professional capacity in terms of reporting what has really been happening inside of Afghanistan. The media largely relies on international media coverage of events in Afghanistan. What happens appears in Washington Post or New York Times or what has been reported by Reuters or AP, certainly deflects back to the Afghan media. As I can say, there's a huge (unintelligible) in terms of awareness of the Afghan media, how the situation has been reported and the repercussions of the reporting as Shuja was pointing out.

DAWIThe silent majority has been enraged, but definitely they kept quiet. And the apologies that were offered by U.S. officials, to a large extent, cooled down. A lot of frustration that was there before, the apologies were offered. So the journalists in Kabul, unfortunately, haven't really portrayed that big aspect, that big majority of enraged, but silent Afghans.

MCCLESKEYNow, you're both Afghan nationals, living in the U.S. I'd like to ask you both to talk a little bit about what it's like watching this story unfold from Washington? Akmal Dawi, you first.

DAWIWell, the way I look at the story is that, you know, it's pretty frustrating that all we hear about Afghanistan is a bunch of rioters going through streets in some parts of Afghanistan. And that has been for fear that Afghanistan is a really unmanageable situation that, you know, the overall misperception about Afghanistan that's not going to be stabilized.

DAWIThat Afghanistan is a failure. Unfortunately, that hasting of reporting has -- those kinds of misconceptions of -- about Afghanistan. The real reporting that we are missing to see or read in the United States is a huge blow to the international mission is Afghanistan. And it disappoints me, you know, reading and watching the news from Afghanistan.

MCCLESKEYAhmad Shuja, how about you?

SHUJAYeah, I think there's a lot of Afghan journalists on Twitter and other social media outlets that are doing excellent reporting. Often times, these reporters are actually on the scenes of these violent incidents. But what's unfortunate is that their voices don't get echoed in the Western media and, of course this being Washington, D.C., a lot of the talk is about how the next policy, you know, is going to be formulated (unintelligible) and all of that. But what's really missing from here -- I mean, all of the debate, the narrative here is a very America centric narrative.

SHUJAYou don't really have -- because this is a partnership. The Afghans, like it or not, are going to be part of the long term partnership with the U.S. And so there's very little -- to the point that there's really no Afghan voice in the policy circles, in the print media, in the electronic media. That's what's really, I think, is lacking and that sort of -- and sometimes really frustrates me.

SHUJABecause some of the analysis that comes out in the media, some of the reporting really lacks a good degree of nuance that I think some Afghans could provide if they were given access to the media here. But also the policy formulation circles also lack, you know, Afghan input. At least the debate, the narrative, Afghans have to frame it in their own terms. And that's not happening.

MCCLESKEYWell, what is the status of the partnership? How able are both sides with NATO and the Afghan government, how able are they to come together and work on this transition of security?

SHUJAThat's a very good question. A lot of people have been thinking about that, talking about that. The sticking points right now, from the Afghan side, is night raids, the issue that President Karzai wants to be handed over the Afghans. And night raids, he wants the night raids to stop. But then he also wants control of, you know, prisons that are currently being run by U.S. troops, to actually be handed over to Afghanistan to Afghan troops.

SHUJAThose two are the sticking points from his side. But then the Americans have, excuse me, qualms about that. The Americans also, Senator Lindsey Graham has been pushing for this, you know, bases inside Afghanistan with substantial troop presence. That is going to complicate things with the talks with the Taliban who want no U.S. presence as of this point. So the strategic partnership agreement on one side, but also the peace talks that are supposed to be starting in Qatar on the other side are also going to affect how the things are going to pan out.

MCCLESKEYAnd I would imagine for the NATO side as well, the fact that some of the American military personnel have now been killed in the Afghan interior ministry building has got to complicate that as well.

SHUJAPrecisely. And I think the fact that this being the elections year, a lot of that calculation of how fast the troops are going to be withdrawing and all these other things are going to be affected by that as well.

MCCLESKEYWell, let's go to the phones. Mohammad, in Silver Spring in Maryland, thanks for calling, you're on the air.

MOHAMMADThank you for taking my call. I have a couple of keywords that I picked up. One was the fact that your guest stated the word inadvertently burned. And I am sure I have read this, but this was done as if we are punishing -- I don't know which one of these words is true, whether this was punishment, burning the Koran or whether this was inadvertently as they were disposing material, it accidentally get burned. And the other word was partnership.

MOHAMMADAnd my comment about that is to have a trustworthy partnership, it's best for us to be honest, to come out and saying the words of (word?) he made a mistake, how can we set it right? That would be the best apology or the best way to address this. These are the two comments. I'll take the answer off the air.

MCCLESKEYThanks for calling, Mohammad. Well, Akmal Dawi, what we do know about whether this was intentional or was it some sort of punishment, as he mentioned? What are we hearing?

DAWIWell, what we understand is that officials is insisting that it was an unintentional mistake that occurred in Bagram, that the soldiers were following normal procedures that are in place for the disposal inmate's possessions. We have no evidence to suggest otherwise for the time being. But what amazes a lot of people, both inside and outside Afghanistan, is this lack of understanding of U.S. troops in Afghanistan of Afghanistan's cultural sensitivities and religious sensitivities.

DAWIAnd so, certainly a lot of people would not accept simply that it was unintentional issue. But you also have to put it into perspective. Before this incident, there were a lot of grievances against U.S. forces in Afghanistan, their lack of respect to Afghan culture. And as Shuja mentioned, the kill teams, the night raids, the prisons, detainees, all those issues have come together and contributed to this crisis of Koran and disrespect.

DAWISo you have to look into that perspective and Afghans may not accept it easily that this was one incident and that was unintentional. An apology will really, really solve it.

MCCLESKEYAhmad Shuja?

SHUJAYeah. To piggy back on what Akmal said, I think it's important to also remember that the violence, however abhorrent it is, it has to be decoupled from the religious sentiments that have, you know, heard by the burnings of the Koran. Violence is an issue of the rule of law. Nobody, however aggrieved, however scarred your religious sentiments are, are allowed to actually go violent, to kill people, to attack bases and to burn people's properties.

SHUJAI think should be dealt with as a matter of rule of law. But the legitimate expression of anger by going out in the streets and demonstrating is a different matter. I think those two needs to be decoupled.

MCCLESKEYLet's go to Nick in Winchester, VA. Nick, thanks for calling, you're on the air.

NICKHi, thank you. I appreciate very much this last statement about decoupling demonstrations of anger from violence. But what I'd also like -- and maybe this is a failure of the media to report, but I don't get any perception that Islam spokesman here in the United States or leaders in the Middle East could make a genuine effort to condemn this kind of activity. We all have sensitivities about our religion.

NICKBut you can't say on the one hand that Muslims are offended by the term crusade, and Westerners should not be offended by the term jihad. You cannot, on the one hand, say that Islam is a religion of peace and then try to excuse this kind of violence or any other kind of violence.

MCCLESKEYWell, thanks.

NICKAnd obviously the same things apply to us.

MCCLESKEYMm-hmm.

NICKLet's say, you know, this burning of the Koran or that idiotic minister in Southern Florida and, you know, if you want to respond or otherwise, you could just...

MCCLESKEYThanks for your call, Nick. What have we been hearing from Muslim leaders in Afghanistan and around the world in response to the apology from President Obama.

SHUJAThere have been different reports stating that the Mullahs, which are leaders of prayer congregations in mosques have actually called for calm and appealed for restraint from some of these protesters. And there have been reports in the U.S. media that has been effective to some degree. And so, that is true. There have been calls from other ulama, which is a congregation of wise people, religious leaders. They've actually also called for restraint, but they've also called for actions like this not to be repeated.

SHUJABut internationally, there's been a very interesting lack of condemnation or response from Muslim circles or the Islamic world. And I think that has led some Afghans to questions. And this is literally the title of a blog post by a friend of mine who is a blogger and a commentator who said, is the Koran only for Afghans to be defended? And I think that sort of conveys some of the sentiments that the Afghans feel.

SHUJABut it's also important to remember that this is very different from the Terry Jones incident where he was deliberately provoking by threatening to burn the Koran. This is an inadvertent sort of attempt, well, not attempt, but an inadvertent incident of the Koran burnings, which makes a huge difference in terms of perception and how the Islamic world would react to it.

MCCLESKEYAnd that, of course, the minister that our caller referenced in Florida is Terry Jones. Well, Akmal Dawi, we just heard about some of the response from the religious side in Islam. What about from the Karzai government in Afghanistan? Has there been any statement there on this recent violence?

DAWIOf course there has been. A number of statements from President Karzai (unintelligible) so on the first day, when the demonstrations started, he issued a statement calling for calm. President Karzai went on public TVs yesterday calling on people to respect the apology that has been offered by the Americans and to, you know, keep silent and calm. But you have to understand, Afghanistan is a really, really difficult environment. It's not an ideal and stable part of the world.

DAWIThere you have deal with a lot of foreign interventions, both, you know, regional and international. The country has been exposed to violence, to propaganda and all sorts of violence for a very long time. And one statement from a president who has been really in a difficult situation is not going to solve all the problems with an apology from Washington. And it will take time until policies are rectified, until people feel that their leaders are honest with them, and then you could expect that whether you'd be (unintelligible) violence from legitimate rule of law, that violence is not prohibited under the rule of law.

DAWIBut the rule of law has never been strong in Afghanistan. You can't speak about the strong -- a system where people have to abide by the rule of law and (word?) themselves from violence. So, it's a difficult situation. It's a difficult environment and these kinds of situations have occurred in the past and will certainly continue in the foreseeable future.

MCCLESKEYAkmal Dawi, an Afghan journalist. Ahmad Shuja is an Afghan political commentator and blogger with Afghanistan Analysis and a contributor with the UN Dispatch. I want to thank you so much for joining us for this conversation following the weekend of violence in Afghanistan. Thanks for being with us.

SHUJAThanks for having us, man.

SHUJAThank you.

MCCLESKEYWe're going to take a short break. I'm Matt McClesky filling in today for Kojo Nnamdi. And when we come back, we'll be talking about the private space race with companies and individuals looking to get into space. That's coming up in just a minute on "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," here on WAMU 88.5. Stay with us.