Babrak Karmal government. Mikhail Gorbachev, then General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, said, "The main reason that there has been no national consolidation so far is that Comrade Karmal is hoping to continue sitting in Kabul with our help." Karmal's position became less secure when the Soviet leadership began blaming him for the failures in Afghanistan. Gorbachev, worried over the situation, told the Soviet Politburo "If we don't change approaches [to evacuate Afghanistan], we will be fighting there for another 20 or 30 years." It is not clear when the Soviet leadership began to
Prime Minister of Singapore from the Cabinet in 2011 but remained as members of Parliament. The role of Deputy Prime Minister is the second-highest post and senior Cabinet Minister in Singapore. The holder will sometimes assume the role of Acting Prime Minister when the PM is temporarily absent. Since the mid-1980s, Singapore has usually had two Deputy Prime Ministers at a time. Only Ong Teng Cheong and Tony Tan served under more than one Prime Minister during their time as Deputy Prime Minister. In the cabinet of Goh Chok Tong in the 1990s to 2004, current Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and former President