Afghanistan News February 27, 2003

February 27, 2003

Karzai Calls for Continued U.S. Support
Wednesday, February 26, 2003 2:43 PM EST
WASHINGTON (AP) Afghan President Hamid Karzai appealed Wednesday for the United States to keep rebuilding his country as a main priority, even if it goes to war with Baghdad. ``Don't forget us if Iraq happens,'' Karzai said.

During an appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Karzai expressed solidarity with the Iraqi people and said it would be ``very, very unwise to reduce attention to Afghanistan'' in the event of war, given the possibility that would-be terrorists might try to regroup at the Afghan-Pakistani border.

``We are nearly at the end of the forest, not outside of it,'' Karzai said. He said President Bush gave him assurances in a phone call last month, and he expected to be reassured when he meets with Bush on Thursday.

``We know the Iraqi people very well. They are Muslim, we are Muslim,'' Karzai said. ``We would wish for them what we wish for ourselves. To be free, to be liberated, to have access to a better life.''

With a resplendent green-and-yellow traditional robe draped over his dark business suit, Karzai testified for more than an hour about Afghan reconstruction efforts and the challenges faced by his government. Security was tight; Uniformed police stood outside the hearing room, and Secret Service agents were posted within arm's reach at each end of the oblong table where Karzai sat alone.

Karzai emphasized the progress made by ordinary Afghans, such as 3 million children now enrolled in school and 2 million refugees voluntarily returning to their homes. A committee is now drafting a new constitution to be presented in October, Karzai said, and general elections are expected in July 2004.

``Afghanistan will, by the grace of God, stand on its own feet in two to four years' time,'' Karzai said. He even hailed traffic jams in the capital, Kabul, as a sign that his destitute nation is beginning to blossom economically.

But senators pressed Karzai for more candor.

``If you leave an impression that everything is going well and the problems are manageable, ... the next time you come back your credibility may be in question,'' said Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb.

Karzai then admitted that terrorist operatives are moving back and forth across the border with Pakistan a matter he said he would take up with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf when they meet March 22. Also, the Afghan government is unhappy that reconstruction has not begun in some areas, Karzai said, adding, ``We need a more equitable distribution'' of resources.

But Karzai disputed the notion that Afghanistan is unstable and warlords are beyond government control. ``It is not like that,'' he said. ``The government has more authority ... than that.''

There are currently just under 10,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, providing security, pursuing al-Qaida and Taliban remnants, building roads and overseeing other humanitarian projects and training soldiers for the Afghan National Army. So far, 3,000 Afghan soldiers have been trained, Karzai said.

But the government needs an infusion of cash to pay them, he said. Funds sent to Kabul from international donors can't be used for troop salaries, Karzai said, and his government has not succeeded in collecting tax revenues from the provinces.

``There are worries. And there are areas where we must bring about improvement,'' he said.

Karzai also appealed for more reconstruction aid in order to bolster the country's irrigation system, and direct assistance in laying groundwork for elections.

President Bush Meeting With Hamid Karzai Underscores Ongoing Efforts By U.S. Government to Reconstruct Afghanistan
Thursday, February 27, 2003 5:00 AM EST

WASHINGTON, Feb 27, 2003 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ Since September 11, the U.S. Government has spent $900 million dollars rebuilding Afghanistan, primarily through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). For more than a year, Afghan Reconstruction has focused on education, health, agriculture, infrastructure and strengthening government and the economy. Today, USAID is making a commitment to build or rehabilitate 1,000 schools over the next three years.

USAID CONTRIBUTIONS:
Education: Printed and distributed 15 million textbooks for the first day of school last spring. Trained 1,350 teachers and printed and distributed 30,000 teacher's kits.
Health: Vaccinated 4.25 million children against measles and treated 700,000 case of malaria, preventing 20,000 deaths. Provided basic health services to over 2 million people in 21 provinces 90 percent of whom were women and children.
Agriculture: 75 percent of Afghans are dependent on agriculture for their incomes. The U.S. provided improved wheat seed and fertilizer, which contributed to an 82 percent increase in wheat production and rehabilitated 6,000 agricultural water systems.
Economy/Government: Completed the conversion of the Afghan currency exchanged 13 trillion old Afghanis over three months. Established direct communications between the Afghan central government and all provincial governments. Rehabilitated twenty-four government ministry buildings.
Infrastructure: The Kabul-Kandahar-Herat road project work has proceeded on 40 kilometers of the road (demining, removing old surface, grading) that has already (without the new surface in place) increased speeds from 35/k an hour to 120/k and hour. In addition, 31 bridges have been reconstructed.
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Afghan minister's plane found
Thursday, 27 February, 2003, 11:49 GMT BBC News
A Cessna 402 similar to the one which crashed
The wreckage of the plane in which an Afghan minister was killed when it crashed has been found, according to Pakistan's navy.
Afghan Minister for Petroleum and Mines Juma Mohammad Mohammadi and four senior aides were among the eight people killed in the crash on Monday.

The remains of the twin-engined Cessna 402 were spotted on the sea-bed about 30 metres down and around 80 kilometres (50 miles) west of the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.

As yet, no bodies have been recovered from the wreckage.

Navy spokesman Commander Roshan Khayal told reporters: "We have searched the entire coastal belt, but failed to find the other bodies. Most likely they are still inside the wreckage."

Shock

The bodies of three Afghans and two Pakistani pilots have been recovered, but not that of the minister, another aide and Sun Chang Sheng, the chief executive of a Chinese engineering firm.
Mr Mohammadi's body has not yet been found
Afghan President Hamid Karzai earlier expressed shock and sadness at the deaths.

"We have lost a fine, qualified Afghan minister... And we are very sorry for that," he said in Kuala Lumpur, where he was attending a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement.

The Cessna 402-B crashed on Monday morning in clear weather shortly after taking off from Karachi.

Pakistan navy and Civil Aviation officials have said they suspect a technical fault caused the accident.

Second crash

However, the private relief organisation, the Edhi Welfare Foundation, who owned the plane, say it was in perfect condition.

It was Pakistan's second fatal air crash in less than a week.

In an earlier incident, a Pakistani Air Force Fokker F-27 crashed, killing the head of the Pakistan air force, Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir, his wife and several senior officers.

The Afghan Government has lost two other ministers in the past year.

Tourism Minister Abdul Rehman was assassinated at Kabul airport last February, and Haji Abdul Qadir, the vice-president, was shot dead at his office in July.

Japan to provide 5 mln dlrs for children's health in Afghanistan
Thursday, February 27, 2003 9:24 AM EST
KABUL, Feb 27, 2003 (Xinhua via COMTEX) The Japanese government will provide about 5 million US dollars for a campaign against vaccine- preventable diseases among children in Afghanistan supported by the United Nations, officials said.

An agreement on the assistance was signed between Japan and UNICEF on Thursday at the Ministry of Health here at the presence of Afghan Health Minister Suhaila Siddiq.

The assistance, to be channeled to Afghanistan through the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), will be used for purchasing of vaccines and equipment for the Project of Infectious Diseases Prevention for Children in the country.

Officials said the Japanese assistance will help UNICEF, in partnership with the Afghan government and the World Health Organization (WHO), to continue efforts for the nationwide coverage of ongoing polio and measles immunization programs in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan has successfully immunized nearly 10 million children aged from six months to 12 years against measles, and 6 million children against polio in 2002.

Meanwhile, Japan has also agreed to provide nearly 500,000 US dollars for eight reconstruction projects in Afghanistan, a press release of the Japanese Embassy here said.

The projects, including city cleanup, school rehabilitation and bridge construction in different areas of the country, will be implemented by various non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working in Afghanistan.

Grant contracts were signed here on Thursday by Japanese Ambassador to Afghanistan Kinichi Komano and representatives of NGOs, it said.

Japan pledged around 500 million US dollars in aid for Afghanistan over two and a half years at the Tokyo conference on the reconstruction of Afghanistan in January 2002.

Of the amount, Japan has so far delivered 358 million dollars in reconstruction aid and nearly another 100 million dollars in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

Joint U.N., Afghan government team to present disarmament strategy to Karzai next month
By TODD PITMAN, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - A team of United Nations and Afghan government officials is preparing a new strategy to disarm militias in Afghanistan after previous attempts failed, a U.N. official said Thursday.

The plan will be given to President Hamid Karzai on March 21, when he will announce it to the nation, said Sultan Aziz, a senior adviser on disarmament to the U.N. special representative in Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi.

Aziz returned to Kabul this week from an international conference in Japan where donors pledged US$50 million for the so-called "New Beginnings Program," under which weapons are to be collected across the country and combatants are to be offered alternative sources of income.

Separate efforts to disarm factions in the north of the country have been underway for months. But U.N. mission spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva told reporters Thursday that disarmament in the northern Faryab province, near the border with Turkmenistan, has stalled since Jan. 18.

At least six civilians were killed in factional fighting last week near Faryab's capital, Maimana, between supporters of Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum and rival Gen. Atta Mohammed.

Almeida e Silva said the United Nations has observed an "increased presence of armed soldiers in Maimana from both the main factions" since Jan. 18.

Repeated movements of armed personnel were also reported recently in Sadrabaad village in northern Balkh province, Almeida e Silva said, giving no other details.

Meanwhile, the United Nations, citing insecurity and factional skirmishes, has ordered its staff to avoid road missions in several parts of the countryside. There were no missions currently planned in the areas, however, Almeida e Silva said.

He said the troubled areas included Gosfandi village in the northern province of Sar-e-Pol, where rival militias have battled in the last two weeks.

The districts of Shinkay, Adhgar and Shamulzayi in Zabul province, southwest of Kabul, were also off limits because of instability there over the last three weeks, he said.

A U.N. source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Zabul was considered unstable because of ongoing operations by U.S. troops hunting for al-Qaida and former Taliban fighters in the area.

The road from the southern city of Kandahar to Rambasi village, in Dand district, was also off limits after an explosion and an attack on civilian and military vehicles last week, Almeida e Silva said, giving no other details.

No peaceful development in Afghanistan without drug control: report
Thursday, February 27, 2003 3:50 AM EST
KABUL, Feb 27, 2003 (Xinhua via COMTEX) Afghanistan has become an example in disabling impact of illicit drug production on a country's economy, civil society and long-term development, said a United Nations spokesman in Afghanistan on Thursday.

"Massive increases in opium production in the early 1990s in this country helped fuel civil wars, and evidence suggests economic growth and living standards had declined," Manoel de Almeida e Silva, spokesman of the UN Assistance Mission to Afghanistan (UNAMA), told a routine press briefing here.

Quoting an annual report of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB), which was published on Wednesday, the spokesman said chemicals for the manufacture of heroin were being trafficked into Afghanistan through neighboring countries, adding the country was also a major source of cannabis resin, or hashish.

The INCB report urged Afghanistan to develop a comprehensive and coherent national drug control strategy to include all drugs illicitly cultivated, produced and trafficked in the country.

Soon after its formation in late 2001, the Afghan government issued a decree to ban the opium poppy cultivation in the country, however, poppy crops were still cultivated in different areas last year with an opium production of 3,400 metric tons, earning Afghanistan its notoriety as the biggest opium producer in the world.

Afghan officials said the government was drawing up a plan to strengthen rural livelihoods through immediate and long-term development measures, with a view to eradicating the root reason for poppy cultivation in rural areas.

The Afghan government has to take measures to eradicate illicit cannabis cultivation and trafficking in the country, the INCB report stressed.

The INCB, an independent body for implementing the United Nations international drug control conventions, warned in its report that sustainable and peaceful development in Afghanistan would not be possible without totally addressing the drug problem.

Remember Afghanistan
The U.S. is still far from achieving a lasting humanitarian victory.
By Felice D. Gaer and Michael K. Young Thursday, February 27, 2003; Washington Post Page A27
Even as attention shifts to Iraq, America needs to be careful not to forget that its work in Afghanistan is just beginning. We have spent billions of dollars and lost precious lives to vanquish the Taliban. Yet the groundwork is being laid in Afghanistan for a regime that may be almost as repressive as the Taliban, particularly with regard to religious freedom. This is occurring with consent and, in some cases, help from the United States. When President Bush meets with Afghan President Hamid Karzai today, he should tell him that it is essential to entrench freedom, not its enemies.

There are disturbing reports that an extreme and strict interpretation of Islamic law, or sharia, is being nurtured in the post-Taliban era. Moreover, attempts are being made to include some of the harshest and most discriminatory elements of sharia in the new constitution and judicial system. The notorious Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, which enforced religious conformity and meted out harsh punishments under the Taliban, has reemerged in a supposedly gentler guise. Abuses against women and girls continue, apparently with the support of police and the courts. Women and girls finally have the opportunity to go to school, but recent attacks and threats against schools for girls are keeping many away.

Major concerns regarding human rights in Afghanistan include:

. Misguided judicial activism by Afghanistan's chief justice, including the endorsement of amputations and other abusive corporal punishments and public death threats to recalcitrant non-Muslims.

. Coercive measures (including on-the-spot beatings) by official agencies, including religious police organizations, that require Afghans to follow specific religious practices and require women to conform to stringent codes of dress, movement and behavior.

. Blasphemy charges against reformers.

. Torture and other maltreatment of prisoners, including reports of incidents resulting in mass deaths (of which there have been no thorough, credible investigations).

. Mistreatment of returning refugees and internally displaced persons, including reports of forced repatriation.

Religious freedom and other international human rights protections, particularly for Afghan women and girls, must be guaranteed in Afghanistan's new constitution. A draft of the constitution is expected early next month in preparation for Afghanistan's national assembly, or loya jirga, this year. Women's rights reportedly are being ignored, as are equal rights for religious minorities. The new constitution may lessen the human rights protections of the 1964 constitution, which declared: "The people of Afghanistan, without any discrimination or preference, have equal rights and obligations before the law." If efforts to impose a strict reading of sharia are left unchecked and unopposed, a woman's testimony in court will be counted as only half that of a man.

Several key cabinet posts have gone to leaders or members of extremist groups or ruthless warlord factions. Some of these appointments were made on the advice of the U.S. government.

Since 1999, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an independent federal agency, has opposed egregious violations of religious freedom in Afghanistan. Contrary to common perceptions, vigilance on these matters is still needed under the Karzai government.

The commission has recommended to the Bush administration and to Congress that the United States promptly appoint a high-ranking official to the embassy in Kabul with the responsibility to promote, coordinate, monitor and report on the implementation of international standards of human rights including religious freedom in the new Afghan government. This person would encourage the Karzai government to guarantee these rights in the new constitution and would ensure that U.S. and U.N. aid went only to those local leaders and law enforcement officials who "firmly demonstrate respect for human rights," as the U.N. Security Council has specified. The envoy would send a message that security and respect for human rights must go hand in hand.

The United States and other nations must take this opportunity to secure the just and lasting peace made possible by military victory. Warlords must not be given free rein to reestablish repression. What we do in Afghanistan is a prelude to Iraq. We must not let the opportunity to advance religious tolerance and human rights slip through our grasp or the grasp of the people of Afghanistan.

Felice D. Gaer is chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom and director of the Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights of the American Jewish Committee. Michael K. Young is vice chairman of the commission and dean of the George Washington University School of Law.

Snowy Afghan Foothills Attract Visitors
Thursday, February 27, 2003 3:16 AM EST
PAGHMAN, Afghanistan (AP) Under a blue sky in the foothills of the mighty Hindu Kush mountains, six Afghan men sip tea and share bread on a blanket of sparkling snow covering nearly everything in sight.

Winter is an unlikely season for picnics even in Afghanistan but that hasn't stopped this group of friends from lounging in the fresh mountain air northwest of the capital.

``We call it a snow picnic,'' says Ahmad Wali, a 25-year-old from Kabul. ``We haven't had this much snow for a long time, so we had to come out and enjoy.''

The heaviest snows in five years have blanketed huge tracts of Afghanistan in recent weeks, blocking roads, tunnels and mountain passes.

A 45-minute drive past Kabul, Paghman has attracted day-trippers keen to escape the capital for decades.

The town was the birthplace of King Amanullah, who ruled in the 1920s and built a monument here to commemorate Afghans who died fighting the British in 1919. The Victory Arch, however, was badly destroyed during the last two decades of war.

In the spring, summer and fall, Paghman's hillsides are packed with well-to-do Afghans who take advantage of the Friday Muslim sabbath to have a tranquil lunch outdoors amid craggy hills and cherry trees.

In the winter, only the diehard make the trip.

On a recent Friday, Wali and five other Kabulis spread a gray waterproof car-cover across the snow and unpacked supplies of bread, steak and chicken. Hot tea was served up in thermoses, and Coke cans were buried in the snow to keep them cold.

A few villagers came over, offering tea in a traditional greeting to guests.

``We said no, but invited them to sit down and eat with us,'' said Abid Abid-ul-haq, 41.

After lunch, an attempt to make a snowman quickly degenerated into a snowball fight that ended with one picnicker screaming ``Cease-fire! Cease-fire!''

The winter day attracted foreigners from the capital as well.

A few European aid workers donned snow shoes and took to the hills, walking through the snow.

A four-car convoy of armed German peacekeepers also made the trip, pausing by the road to take pictures of each other. The 4,000-strong multinational force is usually restricted to Kabul.

Despite the troubles, most Afghans consider the snow a blessing.

``We've had drought in Afghanistan for years. We need it,'' said Wali, who works at the U.S. embassy in Kabul.

Now, It's Business That Booms
With Bombs Mostly Silenced, Commerce and Confidence Are Growing in Kabul
By Marc Kaufman Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, February 26, 2003; Page A16
KABUL, Afghanistan The day Taliban soldiers fled this capital, Sabir Latifa had $9,000 in savings from his dried fruit exports and a head filled with ideas about how to do business in a changed Afghanistan.

He started small by fixing up some guesthouses for the journalists and aid workers who flocked to Kabul when the Taliban left in November 2001. Then he branched into cars and a hotel and the capital's first private Internet cafe. Fifteen months later, Latifa has a business empire he says is worth $500,000, and he hopes to build a water bottling plant, more hotels outside Kabul, a computer store and even a chain of Internet cafes around the country.

He did it all in the midst of political chaos, with frequent security concerns, without the help of a bank to lend him money, and in an investment climate that can only be described as extremely challenging.

But Latifa, a longtime Kabul resident, says that where others saw unacceptable risks, he saw the opportunity of a lifetime.

"There is so much money to be made in Afghanistan now," he said in English learned in a Pakistani refugee camp. "The country has been held back for 25 years, and now is the time to invest and do business. Afghans are very good at this we've been doing it since the time of the Silk Road."

Although countries around the world have promised more than $4 billion in aid to rebuild Afghanistan, there are today very few visible signs of the planned roads and schools and infrastructure projects. There are, however, signs throughout the capital, and in many provinces, of fast and dramatic change as Afghans and some intrepid foreigners open shops, businesses and even factories, quickly put up buildings to house them, and buy enough cars to create daily traffic jams.

In a city that had a handful of shopworn eating places two years ago, a new Chinese or Italian or American hamburger restaurant opens almost weekly, as well as kebab shops by the score. Small hotels have sprung up, and a $40 million Hyatt is on the way. The food bazaars are bustling and there are downtown blocks filled almost entirely with bridal shops. Rebuilt homes are rising from the ruins, and every little storefront seems to be stuffed with bathtubs or fans or with men building and carving things to be sold.

President Hamid Karzai, who will meet President Bush in Washington on Thursday, points to this mini-boom as one of the most important accomplishments of his fledgling administration, a sign that people are voting with their money. "People wouldn't start businesses and rebuild their homes here unless they believed that peace and security were coming to Afghanistan," he said in a recent interview. "This is the most positive sign of all."

Shair Bar Hakemy, the business adviser to Karzai and himself a refugee turned entrepreneur who made a fortune in Texas commercial real estate and hotels, said that the price of real estate in some parts of Kabul is now higher per square foot than in downtown Dallas. "My family and friends back in America have difficulty seeing past all the headlines about troubles here," he said. "But the truth is that Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan are changing quickly for the better."

Many of those perceived troubles are real and worrisome, and nobody would mistake Kabul for a prosperous and peaceful city. Sections are still in ruins, and many of the 600,000 returning refugees who have flooded the city live precariously on the margins. Islamic militants remain determined to destabilize and oust the Karzai government through violence, and periodic attacks continue. There is also concern that the flashier developments could offend conservative Afghan attitudes and create a dangerously wide divide between the relatively rich and the very poor.

But whatever the risks, the Kabul of today is almost unrecognizable as the austere city ruled not long ago by the Taliban or as the place where warring Islamic militias demolished neighborhood after neighborhood, or where Soviets presided over a rebellious socialist state.

While the current business mini-boom involves mostly small-scale projects, some see it as a harbinger of bigger investments from abroad.

"Large foreign investors look to local entrepreneurs the people on the ground for signals on the business environment in a place like this," said William B. Taylor Jr., the special representative for donor assistance at the U.S. Embassy. "And the signal now is pretty positive."

Since last summer, the embassy has held monthly round tables to bring together local and international businessmen and Afghan government leaders to discuss opportunities and problems. American diplomats say the meetings started with five firms, and now could easily draw 100 if there were a room large enough to hold them all. Topics include such basics as the absence of banks, the fact that property ownership is often unclear, and a bureaucracy that can be infuriating and corrupt.

"The goal is to show businessmen that while there are obvious challenges here, there is also a government committed to building a private sector," a U.S. diplomat said. As part of the outreach effort, the Afghan government will sponsor, with American assistance, a trade and investment show in Chicago this summer. The United States is also helping with some financing of projects. Before Hyatt agreed to manage a Kabul hotel, for instance, it needed assistance from the Overseas Private Investment Corp., a federal agency that specializes in making loans where other banks won't.

While much of the money being invested today is coming from Afghans here and abroad, U.S. and international military and aid programs are surely making the expansion possible. More than 4,000 foreign troops are now in Kabul and another 9,000 U.S. and allied troops are stationed in Afghanistan, many at the Bagram air base 35 miles north of the capital. Without them, the relative peace in Kabul would not likely last long.

Several thousand diplomats, aid workers and other foreigners also live in Kabul, and the most visible part of the new business caters to their needs. It remains an open question whether the new Kabul can sustain itself when some of those relief workers go home.

But the Afghan government, along with some embassies, is working to keep and expand the international presence. The first big wave of foreigners to arrive after the Taliban fled were journalists, who often paid top dollar for homes and services. Most are now gone, but more permanent businessmen are taking up the slack. According to Commerce Minister Seyyed Mustafa Kazemi, the number of foreign firms setting up shop in Afghanistan is growing fast.

He said that in the past six months, his ministry has approved 2,600 business licenses, compared with 2,045 in the 45 years before. Many were given to foreign firms, he said, or those headed by Afghans living abroad who want to return to their homeland. These licensed businesses are the large ones that will pay all taxes and other government fees; most Afghan businesses still open without registration and beyond the reach of central government tax collectors.

"The markets of the world are saturated now, but Afghanistan is a virgin market," Kazemi said. "Our resources have not been developed, our people are have been forced to buy substandard products, and there are opportunities everywhere. . . . This ministry wants to be a friend to the business community, and that has never really happened before."

Latifa, the hotel and computer pioneer, said he didn't get much help from his government, but neither did it stand in his way. And while he is eager to form joint ventures with foreign investors, the financing he has gotten so far has come the old-fashioned way, from his savings and loans from friends, family and those who worked on his projects.

"When I opened the Internet cafe, my friends thought I was crazy," said Latifa, 33. "But it's been in business about two months now, and it has already paid for itself."

"The government and [international aid organizations] won't make Afghans stand on their own feet," he said. "Businessmen will do it."

Albania sends second contingent to Afghanistan
Wednesday, February 26, 2003 5:28 PM EST
TIRANA, Feb 26, 2003 (Xinhua via COMTEX) An Albanian contingent of 23 soldiers left here Wednesday to take up a peacekeeping mission in Afghanistan, ATA news agency reported.

This is the second contingent sent by Albania to Afghanistan. The soldiers, who are from the special commando battalion of the Albanian armed forces, will fulfill their mission in the next six months.

At a ceremony held at the airport of Rinas, Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano said, "You are a precedent to our efforts to adhere to the Atlantic Alliance (NATO)."

NATO appraised the success of the first peacekeeping contingent, which returned to Albania on Tuesday after a successful conclusion of their 6-month mission in Kabul.

The Albanian special commando battalion was created in 1998 and its soldiers have been trained for several years by Turkish instructors for military, peacekeeping and humanitarian missions.

British Man Arrested in Afghan Shootout
Wednesday, February 26, 2003 3:33 PM EST
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Afghan police detained a British man who allegedly killed two Afghans with a pistol during a shootout at the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul, state television reported Wednesday.

An unidentified American was reportedly injured in Tuesday's exchange of fire at the hotel, which has mostly foreign guests.

The shootout was sparked by a ``conflict of interest concerning a commercial dealing'' between the men, according to the state TV report.

The cause of the incident was not clear and a police investigation was under way, the report said. It gave no other details.

On Tuesday, Afghan police said a British man identified as a bodyguard of an American man and his Afghan wife was wounded in the clash.

A Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that an injured British man was taken into police custody but gave no other details. He also said he was not aware that any Americans had been wounded.

U.S. Embassy spokesman Alberto Fernandez declined to comment. Katherine Brooker, a British Embassy spokeswoman, said officials were looking into the report but she did not provide further comment.

Afghanistan: Kabul calls for jobs for former combatants
KABUL, 26 February (IRIN) - The Afghan Ministry of Defence has called for increased job opportunities for thousands of fighters before they can be disarmed and reintegrated into civil society. "Mujahideen [combatants] will not be demobilised until job opportunities are created for them," Afghanistan Deputy Defence Minister Attiqullah Baryalai, told IRIN in the capital, Kabul.
The minister's comments followed the establishment of a new commission under the Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) programme which seeks to collect and store weapons currently in the possession of fighters, militia and Mujahideen and eventually demobilise them so they can take their place in civil society.

The commission was established on 11 January following a decree by President Hamid Karzai. "They [combatants and militia members] should be respected and given sustainable means of income and livelihood," General Baryalai remarked.

According to the commission, at least 100,000 ex-Mujahideen fighters need to be demobilised and reintegrated into Afghan society. "It is not very easy. The government of Afghanistan is facing a big challenge," the DDR Interim Chairperson, Moeen Merastya told IRIN, explaining that they had to work on demobilisation and disarmament, while at the same time, finding jobs and incomes for those to put down their weapons.

Turab Shah Qalandari, a 28-year-old former combatant, highlights the problem. "Without this gun I am nothing and have no skills," Qalandari told IRIN, explaining that he took up arms early on during his adulthood. "I would certainly prefer a respectable and sustainable way of supporting my family if I could afford it and were offered something better," he maintained.

But in a country with very few opportunities for the unskilled finding an alternative living for Turab will prove difficult. "Hopefully a large number of ex-fighters will be received by government and other civil organs and the ongoing demining activities by international agencies," Merastya said.

The illiterate would be given vocational training in addition to literacy classes. "Young combatants will be sent back to their families to join schools," the DDR interim chairperson said.

Some donors have been supporting demobilisation in Afghanistan. Japan has pledged US $35 million to the work of the DDR through the United Nations Development Programme(UNDP). In addition, at a donors conference in Tokyo last month, attended by representatives of 40 countries, there were other pledges amounting to US $50 million for the DDR process in Afghanistan.

The UN in Afghanistan has said it is committed to ensuring that the DDR programme works. "I think you will see this year the range of development and reconstruction programme is accelerating which will allow people to start working and gain employment," Deputy Special Representative for Secretary General, Nigel Fisher, told IRIN in Kabul.

He added that besides the DDR, which itself would hopefully generate skills training and jobs for tens of thousands of former combatants, the UN had a series of other programmes which would help stimulate economic and social development this year.

Iran: Afghan repatriation nears 400,000 mark
ANKARA, 26 February (IRIN) - The number of Afghans who have returned to their homeland from Iran is approaching the 400,000 mark, says the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
"We're very close to the 400,000 target," the agency's spokeswoman, Laura O'Mahony, told IRIN from the Iranian capital, Tehran, on Wednesday. "We could well hit that figure next week."

According to UNHCR figures for Tuesday, 395,752 Afghans had voluntarily gone home since the joint programme with Tehran began on 9 April 2002. Of this number, 265,212 refugees - almost 38,000 families - had received assistance from the refugee agency, while another 130,540 had returned home spontaneously - without assistance.

As part of the voluntary programme, returnees register at one of 10 voluntary repatriation centres (VRCs) located throughout the country - including the cities of Mashhad, Zahedan, Qom, Esfahan, Kerman, Shiraz, Yazd and Arak, as well as two in Tehran. There they are provided with an assistance package, including a small monetary grant to facilitate their return.

But repatriation figures during the winter months have dropped due to the cold. On 5 December, IRIN reported that the total number of returnees stood at 362,949 - or some 30,000 less than Tuesday's figures.

"It's clear that the number of families repatriating this time of year has gone down, which is understandable," O'Mahony said. "Obviously people don't want to be making such a long journey during the winter with children," she explained, noting, however, with Nowruz, the Iranian new year, just one month away, those numbers were expected to increase as temperatures would by then also have risen.

Snowy conditions along the border area, particularly around Dogharun in eastern Khorasan Province, the main exit point for Afghans, had caused some convoys of returnees to postpone their departure by a few days, but the spokeswoman was quick to point out that people continued to return just the same. "Perhaps not every day, but every other day," she noted.

Meanwhile, at the secondary border crossing at Milak in southeastern Baluchestan-Sistan Province, the rise and fall of water levels in the Helmand river over the past few months had also resulted in some delays, but the effect had been minimal as Dogharun remained the primary border crossing along the 900-km-plus frontier.

Regarding UNHCR's planning figures for voluntary repatriation from Iran this year beginning in April, O'Mahoney said the agency hoped to facilitate the voluntary return of some 500,000 Afghans, or 100,000 more than last year's target.

According to figures provided last year to IRIN by the Iranian government's Interior Ministry's Bureau of Aliens and Foreign Immigrants Office (BAFIA), the coordinating body for refugee affairs, some 2.3 million Afghans were officially living in the country, making Iran - alongside Pakistan - one of the two countries hosting the largest numbers of Afghan refugees.

Blair Accepts Concerns Over Guantanamo Bay Inmates
Wed Feb 26,11:19 AM ET
LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Wednesday inmates held by the United States at Guantanamo Bay for over a year could not be left in limbo indefinitely.

The United States is holding more than 600 prisoners from 40 nations, captured during the Afghan war, at its Navy base in Cuba. They have not been declared prisoners of war or charged.

Blair was pressed in parliament by Labor lawmaker Geraint Davies about the case of Feroz Abassi, a British national still held at "Camp X-Ray."

He was captured in Afghanistan in December 2001 as U.S. and British troops fought the country's Taliban rulers and sought out Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network.

"It is a highly unusual and difficult situation. We are still receiving quite valuable information from people that are there," Blair said.

"However, I agree that it is an irregular situation and certainly we would want to try to bring it to an end as swiftly as possible."

President Bush has authorized military tribunals to try the inmates, some held as suspected al Qaeda members, but defense officials have said they have no time frame for the tribunals.

Human rights groups have complained bitterly about the prisoners' treatment.

Davies said Blair must press the U.S. authorities to charge and punish Abassi or return him without delay to Britain.

The United States has held the men it calls "unlawful combatants" at high-security detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay since January 2002.

Nineteen inmates have tried to kill themselves, most by hanging, since then, according to the Pentagon.

Senior Afghan Official Is Shot Dead
Wed Feb 26,10:10 AM ET AP
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Assailants gunned down a senior government official leaving a mosque in southwestern Afghanistan in what police said may have been a Taliban-orchestrated attack to discourage Afghans from working with the government.

No one claimed responsibility for Tuesday's killing of Habibullah Jan, a district administrator in Nimroz province. Jan's body guard was wounded in the attack in Dilaram, 135 miles northwest of Kandahar, said Nafas Khan, the provincial deputy police chief. Jan was buried Wednesday.

"We suspect the Taliban because we know they have started their terrorist activities in Nimroz," Khan said.

Police took 12 men into custody. It wasn't clear whether they were being questioned as suspects or because of suspected affiliation with the former Taliban regime.

Taliban, al Qaida and renegade rebel leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar have circulated pamphlets declaring a jihad, or holy war, against U.S. forces in Afghanistan, as well as Afghans working with the U.S.-backed government.

American forces are combing Afghanistan for Hekmatyar, his loyalists and Taliban and al-Qaida fugitives.

Afghan Factions Clash Over Scrap Metal Near US Base
Thu Feb 27, 7:11 AM ET
BAGRAM, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Rival commanders squabbling over scrap metal traded mortar fire near the U.S. headquarters in Afghanistan on Thursday after President Hamid Karzai appealed in Washington for subsidies to placate unruly militias.

U.S. military spokesman Roger King said the exchange occurred north of Bagram Air Base, for the second time this week.

"There are two sub-unit commanders who both operate north of the base and they are in a dispute over who owes who money and who should have access to the profits generated by some scrap metal," King said.

"They are attempting to settle it with mortars."

The latest clash comes after at least six people were killed in fighting between forces from opposing warlords which broke out in the north of the country at the weekend as Karzai was in Japan seeking funds for a program to disarm warlord armies.

Karzai was pledged $51 million but the program is expected to cost nearly three times that.

In Washington on Wednesday, Karzai asked U.S. senators to support a request that the United States subsidize his budget to allow him to pay 100,000 irregular provincial militiamen.

He said this would be to ensure "they remain well-behaved" until the Japanese-led disarmament drive took off.

Petty disputes over money or land and bigger problems tied to ethnic and tribal differences have been a constant threat to Karzai's government since it took power after the overthrow of the Taliban regime by U.S.-led forces in late 2001.

King said the U.S. military was monitoring the fighting near Bagram.

"If it goes on we may go out and suggest to them that it is in the best interests of everyone that the shooting stop," he said.

Under the disarmament plan, which has United Nations backing, private armies would be disbanded and their fighters absorbed into a new national army or provided alternative work, such as rebuilding Afghanistan's destroyed highways.

Coalition forces treat two Afghan children injured by mines near U.S. base
Thu Feb 27, 2:59 AM ET AP
BAGRAM, Afghanistan - Two Afghan children injured by mines near the air base that serves as U.S. military headquarters in Afghanistan were treated by coalition doctors, a U.S. military spokesman said Thursday.

Col. Roger King said both children had limbs amputated on Wednesday, but were in stable condition. No other details were available.

Unexploded ordnance - including land-mines, missiles and bombs - are spread throughout Afghanistan, which is still struggling to emerge from 23 years of near continuous-warfare that has left it one of the most heavily mined nations on earth.

Meanwhile, King said rival Afghan factions battled north of Bagram Air Base on Thursday, but no casualties were reported.

Minor skirmishes have erupted in the area several times since January, and U.S. forces in the past fired flares to try to deter it.

Most areas outside the capital are under the control of local warlords who sometimes take up arms against each other.

US close to cornering Taliban forces
By Scott Baldauf | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN - An ongoing operation northwest of Kandahar has brought US forces into contact with the largest concentrations of Taliban fighters in nearly eight months.

Operation Eagle Fury involves nearly a brigade of American Special Forces and elite units of the 82nd Airborne Division, along with Afghan fighters loyal to the central government in Kabul. Spread out over the long Baghran Valley in Helmand Province, companies of US forces have spent the past two weeks moving north from village to village, searching houses for Taliban fighters and weapons caches. They've rounded up more than a dozen suspected Taliban fighters.

If the US operation succeeds, American forces will have cornered Taliban forces - and perhaps some top Taliban leaders - in a high-walled valley with few opportunities of escape. Like Operation Mongoose, set in the Adi Ghar mountains southeast of Kandahar late last month, Eagle Fury started with a foiled Taliban attempt to ambush US forces. In four or five clashes that followed, the US encountered anywhere from five to a couple dozen Taliban at a time.

Until recently, contact with the enemy for many US soldiers has been limited to rocket attacks on US bases - most of which miss entirely - or the occasional homemade bomb or land mine placed near US bases. The growing aggressiveness by guerrillas is a relief for US forces, who greet the possibility of a real engagement with the Taliban as a possible turning point in the war.

"We want them to attack us, so we can engage them and destroy them," says one Special Forces soldier from the US firebase at Spin Boldak, who took part in the initial firefight that led to Operation Mongoose. "If we can draw them out of their hiding places, we can destroy them."

While the Taliban seem to be regrouping, it's not clear whether their growing assertiveness is a sign of confidence or desperation.

US military sources, for one, say the Taliban are entering a field of battle where US forces have a distinct advantage.

"The past two operations suggest that the level of the training and performance seems to be worse than ever," says Maj. Greg Liska, commander of the Civil Military Operations Command at the US base at Kandahar Airport. "We've had a number of people attempting to lay mines who have blown themselves up." Civil- affairs soldiers under Major Liska's command have accompanied US combat forces during Operation Eagle Fury, assessing humanitarian needs of the local population.

Afghan commander Abdul Razzaq Achakzai, head of border security in Spin Boldak, agrees that the enemy seems to be getting weaker rather than stronger. "They can cross the border stealthily, like a thief in the night, and then escape, but they cannot come out in force so that people can see them," says Commander Achakzai. "And the people help us whenever the enemy of Afghanistan comes to disturb us. They are tired of war, and they don't want to help the enemy."

US soldiers say they are adjusting to the rugged terrain and complicated tribal societies where alliances quickly change. "We are getting better at what we do, and we have a better understanding of how their culture works," says the US Special Forces soldier.

Still, past US operations haven't been all successful rounding up fighters. In Operations Anaconda last spring, the bulk of Taliban and Al Qaeda forces, which the Americans thought were cornered in the Shah-e Kot mountains, managed to escape. And the Taliban's guerrilla tactics in ensuing months, such as firing rockets at American bases, have also met with little effective US response.

Another frustration remains a thorn to US forces along the Pakistani border. "We know [the Taliban] are getting safe haven in Pakistan," says the soldier, "but we can't cross that line and chase them, so it causes some problems for us."

The timing of the battles here in southern Afghanistan - a five-province region that formed the birthplace of the Taliban movement and the home of many of its top leaders - is taken by some as a sign that the Taliban and its allies are coordinating their attacks with an expected US attack on Iraq. Radio broadcasts linked to the former anti-Soviet guerrilla leader, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, have called for a jihad against US forces in Afghanistan.

The war here is being fought on many fronts, including psychological ones. In border towns like Spin Boldak, anti-American leaflets are dropped in marketplaces late at night, warning the local Afghans to stop cooperating with US forces. In bigger cities like Kandahar, where US forces occasionally patrol, and where international aid groups begin the long process of reconstruction, land mines and booby traps are laid to kill US forces. In many cases, these Taliban bombs kill innocent Afghans instead, causing substantial fear among the local population.

US forces, for their part, have responded by engaging their enemy with a combination of ground forces and deadly aerial bombing.

Operation Eagle Fury began Feb. 10, when a group of five apparent Taliban fighters fired on a US military patrol near the town of Baghran. US soldiers called in an airstrike of F-16 jet fighters, which dropped 500 pound bombs on a series of caves where the attackers had taken refuge. No US or militant casualties were reported at the time.

US forces are also trying to dispel what they call "disinformation campaigns" aimed at exaggerating the civilian casualties from US bombing. Recent reports that US planes had killed hundreds of civilians in the northern Baghran Valley, for instance, are simply untrue, says Major Liska.

"I have a feeling this will be like the other reports," he says of the reports broadcast by the BBC Pashto language service and a handful of Pakistani newspapers. "First they said there were 17 civilians killed, then they said 20. The truth is that only one civilian has been injured, and there are no deaths."

Even that one civilian injury - an 8-year-old boy from the village of Lejay - shows that US military operations in the Baghran Valley have been largely accurate. According to US military spokesman, Col. Roger King, the boy had been wounded because he had accompanied his father, who was firing onto US forces from a mountain ridge.

The boy is now in stable condition; his father is in US custody.

Leaflet threatens those who aid US
For the past few months, leaflets urging Afghans to resist US forces have appeared in Afghan villages along the Pakistani border. Few ever reach the hands of Afghan officials, however. This leaflet was discovered last Friday in Spin Boldak, about 2-1/2 miles from the border. The Monitor obtained the leaflet, titled "Al Jihad," from border chief Abdul Razzaq Achakzai, and Monitor interpreter Ali Ahmad Safi translated it from Pashto:

"In the name of God, the beneficent, the merciful.

"We inform all those who are currently with Americans or helping them that they should go away and leave them. Americans are the enemies of God, they are the enemies of the Koran, and the enemies of all Muslim nations.

"God has said: Christians and Jews cannot be the friends of Muslims until Muslims obey their own religion. We warn you not to be with them and not be their guards, or else you will be treated the same as Americans. This means we will kill you with poison, or we will blast you with bombs, or we will cut your head from your neck or we will shoot you.

"Our target is the Americans. We fight and make holy war (jihad) with Americans. Accept our requests and go away from their group. If you don't accept our requests, your future will be like the Russians' friends or even worse than them. Of course in this world, try to understand, try to understand.

"This is a call to mujahideen nation, Al Jihad."

UN Says Fighting in Afghan North Hurts Aid Work
By Sanjeev Miglani
KABUL (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Thursday it had suspended aid work in parts of Afghanistan because of fighting between rival factions and uncertain security conditions.

U.N. spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva told a news conference that tensions had risen in the northern provinces of Faryab, Balkh and Sari Pul and there had been no progress there in a tentative program to disarm fractious regional warlords.

The U.N. had suspended operations in Gosfandi district of Sari Pul province due to factional skirmishes, he told a news briefing.

At least six people were killed in several days of fighting between soldiers of Uzbek warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum and fighters of Ustad Atta Mohammad which erupted last weekend in northern Faryab province.

Both men are members of the country's transitional administration headed by President Hamid Karzai, who is abroad seeking financial assistance to help disarm regional militias and absorb their fighters into the army or find them jobs.

The United Nations' aid programs in three districts of the southern province of Zabul, once the stronghold of the fundamentalist Taliban, had also been halted for the past three weeks because of an uncertain security situation, the spokesman said.

Karzai is due to announce a strategy next month to disarm warlord militias before national elections in mid-2004, the U.N. said.

"Both the election and a constitutional Loya Jirga are markers for us, every effort will be made to finish the process in time," Sultan Aziz, adviser to U.N. Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi told the news conference.

A Loya Jirga, or a grand assembly, is expected to be held in October to finalize a new constitution and open the way to elections.

A soldier's life in Afghanistan HL:
Wednesday, February 26, 2003 5:16 PM EST
Feb 27, 2003 (The Christian Science Monitor via COMTEX) The more than 9,000 US troops in Afghanistan are Americans whose lives were changed more than most by Sept. 11. They have been airlifted to a country wracked by war for 30 years, with the weighty responsibility of ensuring it cannot again become a base of operations for radical Islamic terrorists.

But the work is dangerous. Forty American soldiers have died in Afghanistan, and hundreds more have been injured. In recent weeks, US forces have engaged in the fiercest battles in more than a year.

Highly trained Special Operations troops, who can identify themselves by first name only, have borne the brunt of the combat in Afghanistan, displacing many of the conventional foot soldiers. Now, as the Afghanistan campaign approaches the 1-1/2-year mark, the dangers of war persist, but they are buffered by long periods of boredom.

For those whose duties bring them in contact with Afghans, the challenge of developing rapport is complicated by cultural differences that can easily lead to explosive misunderstandings.

A series of snapshots of the American military in Afghanistan, taken at various stages over the past eight months, offers a glimpse into the lives of Americans fighting overseas.

A ride with bones

Kunduz, Afghanistan
A Green Beret A-team operates out of a mud-walled compound in Kunduz, a former Taliban stronghold in northern Afghanistan. With the nearest American base hundreds of miles away, the 12-man Special Forces unit is alone in a dangerous neighborhood.

Staff Sgt. Dick, a barrel-chested Green Beret with a thick mane of curly gray hair, rides horseback through the dusty streets of Kunduz. He has torn the arms off his fatigues to beat the August heat, but still wears a bulky flak jacket. Children run from their homes and shout in English at the rough-riding soldier.

"Thank you," one boy calls out.

"You're welcome, buddy," Dick says. "You're plumb welcome."

"Friend, friend," another child shouts.

"You better believe it," Dick says, and rides on, down the sinuous alleyways of the adobe-walled neighborhood. Dick is a member of the 2nd Battalion of the 19th Special Forces group, an Army National Guard unit based at Kenova, W.Va. Though he doesn't speak Dari, the local language ("my second language is vulgarity," he quips), he makes friends on his rides through town.

"I was out this morning, saw a guy on a great big horse," Dick recalls. "He looked at me, puffed up his chest. I was like, 'Yeah, let's go.' We raced for about a mile, then he reared up his horse on its back legs like Gene Autry."

Dick is known to his cohorts as Bones, a nickname that dates back to when he was growing up skinny in a coal camp in West Virginia. As a teenager he did a tour of duty in Vietnam, and fought in the Tet offensive. Now 54, Bones is the oldest man in his unit, but he keeps fit. He passed the grueling combat diver course when he was 49. In the words of an officer in Bones's unit, "He's as hard as woodpecker lips."

For Bones, a ride through town is much more than a day at the races. Special Forces soldiers try to mesh with local communities, developing relationships, learning customs, and establishing a "ground truth" to pass on to superiors.

Horse patrols may or may not yield useful intelligence, but they remind friend and foe alike of the presence of the US military. Nonetheless, American soldiers have been targets of hit-and-run attacks, and Bones is ready for trouble. He wears a 9-mm pistol strapped to his leg and keeps an M-4 rifle in a holster slung from his saddle. His pockets are stuffed with hand grenades, and he carries 120 rounds of rifle ammunition and 75 bullets for his pistol.

"If somebody hits me, unless they hit me pretty quick, they're going to have a problem," he says.

Bones is yet to be involved in a firefight, but four members of his battalion have been seriously wounded in Afghanistan. Two have died. One man was killed while disposing of a captured rocket. Another, Gene Arden Vance Jr., of Morgantown, W.Va., died in an ambush in eastern Afghanistan. Vance was recently married, and had canceled his honeymoon when his unit was called up.

"If you didn't think this was real, you do when people die," Bones says.

Green Beret A-teams are vulnerable to hosts with superior firepower, but in Afghanistan, alliances with warlords allow them to fight at battalion strength, at least in theory. In practice, however, nothing comes easily, and Afghan militiamen sometimes have divided loyalties. Firefights have reportedly broken out between American units and Afghan soldiers paid to be on their side.

In Kunduz, Green Berets suspect that militiamen loyal to Daud Khan, a commander nominally allied with the US military, are betraying American intentions and foiling operations to capture Taliban and Al Qaeda remnants. One man under Daud Khan's command has admitted to harboring the same Islamic militants the Americans are actively pursuing. Suspicions run so deep that Bones isn't sure whom to trust.

"You don't know who's a good guy and who's a bad guy," Bones says. "But if he's shooting at you, he's definitely a bad guy."

Long days short on action

Bagram, Afghanistan
The 101st Airborne Division is a famed battering ram in the US Army's arsenal. But in an age of surgical strikes, the unit spends much of its time confined to base. Sometimes, however, with little warning, the 101st is called to action.

Headquarters platoon of 3rd Battalion's Alpha Company is housed in a capacious green canvas tent with a blue battle flag flying outside. The company is on Quick Reaction Force status and must be ready to fight at a moment's notice. In one corner of the tent, amid crates of ammunition, a few soldiers watch "Blow," starring Johnny Depp, on a laptop computer. It's 8 in the morning. "Gladiator" already screened at 6:30.

About noon, a soldier with a yellow mail sack plops a box in front of Pfc. Ronald "Doc" Bernier, a 22-year-old from Boston. Just before he left the States, his wife gave birth to a baby boy, who is just now taking his first steps. Private Bernier finds the box stuffed with holiday cards.

"I can't believe you got all that mail," says Pfc. Eric Jarvis, 20, who occupies a cot next to Bernier. "Is it, like, from a class? People you don't know?"

"It's Christmas cards from last year," Bernier says, knifing open an envelope with his finger. "I'm going to be busy today."

It is July 2002, and "Dear Soldier" letters written in the wake of the 9/11 attacks are just now finding their way to forward- deployed troops.

Suddenly, the tent becomes a welter of activity. Soldiers snap magazines into their rifles and pull on body armor. A Special Forces base near the Pakistani border has come under attack, and Alpha Company must be ready to assist. Bernier checks his backpack - morphine sticks, pressure bandages, plastic and gauze pads. Satisfied, he wolfs down the contents of an MRE (Meal Ready to Eat, the ubiquitous American ration packs), then straddles his cot, ready to go.

"I'm kind of pumped," he says. "We'll see what happens." So far, Bernier's experience of combat has been limited to DVDs of Hollywood war movies.

Two hours later, the company is taken off alert. Alpha Company will not be going out. Not today, anyway. In the command tent, "South Park II" screens for the third time in two days. Bernier lies back on his cot. "Always happens," Bernier says. "You're going out and then, oops, you're not."

Two days later, Alpha Company is again on alert. This time, they launch. Massive, two-prop Chinook helicopters ferry the soldiers to Hesarak, a village south of Kabul. In addition to their usual combat gear, the soldiers carry gas masks. Their primary objective is a suspected bioweapons laboratory.

As soon as the Chinooks touch ground, soldiers pour out of the back ramps and fan out in a defensive perimeter. The helicopters, like a fleet of drab green school buses, peel away and lumber up to the safety of higher altitudes. Overhead, Apache attack helicopters are ready to provide close air support. Children from Hesarak perch on mud walls, watching the US troops take up positions in their village.

One child approaches a heavy machine gun crew across an open field. The soldiers vehemently wave him off; he has walked into an interlocking field of fire. But the child continues to advance, in halting steps, with a book in his outstretched hands.

"There's a kid walking toward us," one of the soldiers reports over the radio. "He's making hand signals. He's got a book."

"Well, talk to him," a voice barks back. "But tell your guys not to touch the book."

The child makes his way slowly over to the machine gun crew. A pause, and then another radio transmission.

"He wanted us to know he passed his tests, that he studied hard in school," the machine gunner reports.

Assault teams, meanwhile, sweep the suspected weapons lab. Forensic specialists dust for fingerprints, while intelligence officials remove cassette tapes, documents, and blocks of a paste-like material. (Initial laboratory tests confirmed the presence of ricin, a highly toxic derivative of the castor bean. More accurate tests conducted later in the US came out negative.)

Hours later, Alpha Company collapses its positions. Bernier abandons his casualty collection point in an apple orchard and withdraws to a stubbly wheat field to wait for the helicopters. A soldier nearby mutters, "Another mission where I don't get to shoot anything."

Bernier doesn't seem to mind.

"Fine by me," he says.

At the gate

Bagram, Afghanistan
The majority of American soldiers in Afghanistan serve support functions - laundry, logistics, accounting - on sprawling, city-like bases. For one American military police officer, the front line of the war on terror is the front gate.

American MPs at Checkpoint 5, a labyrinth of barbed wire and concrete barricades that is the main entrance to Bagram Air Base, have interpreters to help them talk with Afghan nationals. When "terps" are unavailable, the soldiers fall back on cheat sheets in Dari, with helpful phrases such as "stop," "keep moving," and "the dog will bite you."

Staff Sgt. Kirby West, an MP from Andrews, Texas, oversees security at the gate with the help of Sadou, an 80-pound German shepherd. Together, they inspect trucks for explosives and check day laborers for weapons. The safety of everyone on base depends on Sergeant West's vigilance and Sadou's phenomenally sensitive nose.

In dealing with Afghan laborers, West, clean-cut, with a linebacker's build, is courteous but quietly forceful. In some cases, Sadou helps him keep order.

"People start to listen a little more, because the dog is barking," West says.

Conflicts at the gate arise between American soldiers, who see the need for security as paramount, and Afghans civilians and military, who say they feel bullied. With the help of interpreters, West has learned that Americans are considered rude and overly aggressive. Militiamen provided by a local warlord to help police the gate resent having to ask permission to enter a base that was a free-fire zone before the Taliban fell. An especially helpful point of cross-cultural sensitivity regards a notion common among Afghans pertaining to dogs and the afterlife.

"They believe that if they have been bit by a dog, they will not go on to see God," West says.

With inspections at the gate going smoothly, West decides to make a run by the garbage dump. To people from nearby villages, the dump is a rich source of construction materials and discarded MREs, but it is strictly off limits to Afghans. Earlier that morning, a trash truck was swarmed by scavengers, forcing an American soldier to fire her weapon into the air. Villagers sometimes fend off American soldiers with rocks and "MRE bombs" (each MRE container can also be rigged into a crude explosive device). The last time that happened, one of West's colleagues released his dog for what's ominously known as "bite work." An Afghan stone thrower was hospitalized with deep puncture wounds.

West pulls up to the dump in his pickup truck and releases Sadou from a kennel in back. Sadou strains at the leash.

"He smells all that food," West says. West and Sadou patrol around mounds of garbage and trucks offloading still more rubbish. About a dozen Afghans sort through a mountain of trash, even as it is consumed by flames. At the sight of West, they scatter. Two men shuffle away with a box brimming with metal envelopes of food rations. A straggler hides behind a mountain of dirt that has been pushed up by bulldozers. West whistles, and points to the gate.

As an MP, West interacts with Afghans more than most US soldiers do, but he doesn't expect to make many friends.

"When they curse at you in English, it's a real friendly type deal," West says. "When they revert back to their own language, that's how we know they're angry."

Meanwhile, back at the ranch

Kunduz, Afghanistan
Special Forces units occupy "safe houses" - unfortified bases - in every corner of Afghanistan, but the term may be misleading. Some soldiers fear that even their homes back in the US aren't necessarily safe.

The Special Forces safe house in Kunduz is a boxy two-story building on a dusty side street in a residential neighborhood. A gravel lot in front is crowded with all-terrain vehicles and pickup trucks that have been converted into gunships. Indoors, the walls are stacked to the ceiling with cases of cereal, MREs, and water. The livingroom is carpeted with Afghan rugs and lined with pillows. In keeping with local customs, combat boots, sandals, and running shoes are left in a pile by the door.

Chief Warrant Officer John, a medic, a demolition expert, and a sniper, occupies a corner room on the ground floor. He has jet-black hair and arched, inquisitive eyebrows, and often wears a United Airlines cap while on operations, a reminder of the 9/11 attacks. A handmade wooden cabinet houses his fishing magazines (John brought a rod and reel with him, not knowing that fishing in Afghanistan would be as simple as tossing a hand grenade into a river in the company of a local warlord), along with letters from home and a diary, which he keeps meti-culously. Pinned to the wall are photographs of John's family and a "death letter" he has written to his wife.

"That's a letter I hope she never reads," John says.

Special Forces bases, especially in eastern Afghanistan, come under rocket and mortar fire so often that the shelling, inaccurate as it may be, has become routine. The safe house in Kunduz has yet to come under attack, but in the event it does, John's room doubles as an excellent fighting position. Tear down the West Virginia flag in one window, and John has a clear shot to the front gate. Behind an American flag, another window doubles as a shooting port over the front door. The window sills are stacked with sandbags and lined with hand grenades and cartons of ammunition. In case of evacuation, John will burn his diary, the letters from his wife, and his store of plastic explosives and pull the pin on a thermite grenade he has placed on his cabinet. "If it gets to that point, they're probably killing me anyways, so I wouldn't want them to get any benefit out of it," John says.

While a stick of C-4 could easily be used to rig a booby trap, and the diary of a soldier with a high security clearance could yield useful information to an enemy combatant, it's not immediately clear how letters from home could have any strategic value. But in a fight against terrorist organizations, with their predilection for soft targets, many Special Forces soldiers worry that spouses and children back home could become unwitting actors in the war on terror.

"Worst-case scenario, somebody goes to your house and kills your family," John says. Such attacks have never materialized, though US military officials say they were threatened by Saddam Hussein during the Gulf War.

Nonetheless, information security has become institutionalized in the US military. Garbage dumps like the one at Bagram are strictly off limits. At the US Army post office in Uzbekistan, return addresses are routinely cut out of pieces of mail before they are forwarded to soldiers in the field. Even so, forward-deployed troops are encouraged to burn their mail after it has been read.

Because of the sensitive nature of their missions, and because they are often collocated with even more covert groups, such as the CIA and the Army's Delta Force, Special Forces soldiers are drilled in "operational security."

But the average Special Forces soldier isn't much of a blab. Like most Green Berets, John describes himself as a private person. Back in the States, most of his friends are fellow soldiers. His wife socializes with "Special Forces wives." Even when he goes to a restaurant, he takes care to sit in the back corner, so he can cover the door.

Some of John's precautions seem excessive even to members of his unit, but other Green Berets are even more circumspect. For them, the 9/11 attacks produced a world where everything is potentially dangerous. Even as he is searching out Al Qaeda remnants in remote corners of northern Afghanistan, John is forced to consider the possibility that Al Qaeda will come to the US and find him and his family instead.

"You're hunting them, they're hunting you," John says. "I don't want to be the first to find out how serious this war is going to get."

By David Buchbinder Special to The Christian Science Monitor