President Ashraf Ghani on Saturday said the international community has kept Afghans away from their fundamental right of peace over the last four decades, reiterating that the people of Afghanistan want permanent and dignified peace.

Addressing a ceremony on Armed Forces Day, Ghani said Afghan security forces have played a prominent role in fighting international terrorism and that they can protect the values the country has achieved over the last 20 years. 

Referring to his recent address to the UN Security Council, President Ghani said: “My main sentence was that for the last 40 years, the international community has kept a massive nation away from their fundamental right which is peace and this is unacceptable.”  

“We want peace and we want dignified peace and a peace that is ensured by the power of our security and defense forces and with the will of the people. This peace will come,” he said. 

Ghani said the violence must end and that there should be no more bloodshed and no one should remain deprived of education anymore. 

He added that Afghans will decide on the next president and the next government. 

“The people of Afghanistan have elected their government and president and they will elect the next president of Afghanistan,” Ghani reiterated. “It is the right of the nation and the security and defense forces will prove that change will be legal and based on the nation’s will; otherwise, the tenure of the Republic is clear.” 

He said that the Afghan security and defense forces are conducting over 90% of counterterrorism operations.  

“Today’s Afghanistan is not the one it was in the past, the one that was protected by others. Today, you are safeguarding it. We are very close to self-reliance,” he said.

The Armed Forces Day was celebrated in various ceremonies countrywide. 

Addressing the same event, Deputy Defense Minister Shah Mahmoud Miakhil said the Afghan government and the Afghan forces made a big sacrifice by agreeing to release the Taliban prisoners.