Thousands of tribal chieftains and politicians will gather this week in the Afghan capital to discuss a security pact with the United States which will shape Washington’s future military presence in the war-scarred nation

Thousands of tribal chieftains and politicians will gather this week in the Afghan capital to discuss a security pact with the United States which will shape Washington's future military presence in the war-scarred nation.
  
The bilateral security agreement (BSA) will determine how many US soldiers stay in Afghanistan when most of NATO's troops deployed in the country since 2001 -- currently numbering 75,000 -- leave at the end of 2014.
  
Key obstacles include the question of legal immunity for those US troops who remain -- an issue that scuppered a similar pact in Iraq. And the Taliban have branded the meeting a US-designed plot, vowing to pursue and punish its delegates as traitors if they approve the BSA.
  
We believe that concluding the BSA will send an important signal of clarity about the future of our relationship with Afghanistan and what the future of Afghanistan can look like," US ambassador to Kabul James Cunningham said recently.