Saturday, November 5, 2011

Major General Peter Fuller Fired Over Karzai Remarks

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(The New York Times) KABUL, Afghanistan — A senior American general stationed in Afghanistan has been fired for criticizing President Hamid Karzai in a published interview.

The NATO and American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. John R. Allen, announced in a news release on Saturday that he was dismissing Maj. Gen. Peter Fuller, the deputy commander for programs at the NATO training mission in Afghanistan, effective immediately. “The decision follows recent inappropriate public comments made by Major General Fuller,” General Allen said.

The statement was issued early Saturday morning in Kabul, where General Fuller had been on a speaking tour. It came shortly after a Thursday interview with the two-star American Army general was published by the news Web site Politico.

General Fuller was responding to remarks made by President Karzai a week earlier in which he told a Pakistani interviewer that Afghanistan would come to Pakistan’s aid if attacked by the United States.

“Why don’t you just poke me in the eye with a needle! You’ve got to be kidding me,” General Fuller said. “I’m sorry, we just gave you $11.6 billion and now you’re telling me, ‘I don’t really care?’ ”
General Fuller also described President Karzai as erratic and inarticulate... (continued)

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