At the NATO Summit in Lisbon in November 2010, Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai had asked Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel to host a follow-up conference ten years after the 2001 Bonn Conference. In order to prepare the second Bonn Conference, the Afghan Government worked in collaboration with the International Contact Group on Afghanistan, which consists of the Special Representatives on Afghanistan of 50 states. The Contact Group was headed by the German Special Representative Michael Steiner, and the German diplomat Holger Ziegeler was appointed conference coordinator.