Afghanistan News June 22, 2004

June 22, 2004

Afghanistan to send troops to troubled province
KABUL, June 21 (Reuters) - The Afghan government will send hundreds of troops to reassert central authority and disarm rebel militia in the capital of a central province overrun last week by forces of a renegade commander.

Defence Ministry spokesman General Zahir Azimy said a battalion of troops would be sent to Chaghcharan, capital of Ghor province, from the western city of Herat on Tuesday.

"The National Security Council has decided to send one ANA battalion from Herat," Azimy said, referring to the fledgling Afghan National Army. "The ANA are getting ready and tomorrow they will go to Ghor."

It would be the third such deployment of the army to restive provinces where commanders have resisted attempts to disarm their militia forces ahead of elections due to be held in September.

Afghanistan's Electoral Process Is Coming Under Attack, UN Says
June 22 (Bloomberg) -- Afghanistan is becoming ``more volatile'' and gunmen are attacking the country's process for elections scheduled for September, Jean Arnault, the United Nations special envoy, said.

``We are now facing direct attacks with fairly heavy weapons against the office of the electoral process,'' Arnault said yesterday in the Afghan capital, Kabul, according to a UN statement. Attacks in the past three weeks are evidence life in Afghanistan ``has become more volatile.''

Three rocket-propelled grenades were fired at an electoral office in Kabul late Sunday. An office in the southern city of Kandahar was attacked on Friday, the UN said.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said earlier this month the country will go ahead with its first democratic elections in September in the face of the increased violence. Fighters from al- Qaeda and the ousted Taliban regime are blamed for the attacks, which have targeted Afghan officials, UN convoys and election workers. Eleven Chinese construction workers were killed June 9 near the northern city of Kunduz.

Voter registration is increasing with 4.1 million Afghans out of 9.5 eligible voters completing the process, the UN said. An average of 90,000 Afghans are registering each day. Last week, the daily figures twice topped 101,000, the UN said.

The pace of registration ```confirms that an electoral process is something that is meaningful to the overwhelming majority of the people,'' Arnault said.

Arnault, who heads the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, called on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to send additional forces to Afghanistan to support the elections. NATO leads a 6,500-strong international force that is responsible for security in Kabul.

NATO will consider increased its forces when leaders meet at a June 28-29 summit in Turkey.

Envoy Presses NATO Ahead of Afghan Vote
Mon Jun 21, 9:51 AM ET By STEPHEN GRAHAM, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - More NATO troops are urgently needed to secure Afghanistan ahead of September elections, the top U.N. envoy in the country said Monday after militants attacked a voter registration office near the capital.

Assailants also killed an Afghan soldier, and injured a second, who were deployed to protect election workers in southern Kandahar province.

Jean Arnault said that a wave of violence — including recent deadly attacks on foreigners and relief workers — showed increased "volatility" ahead of the polls, and said "the time is now" for NATO to boost its presence.

"The events of the past three weeks have demonstrated that security is not improving. If anything it has become more volatile," he told a news conference in Kabul.

Early Monday, attackers fired three rocket-propelled grenades at the registration office in the main town of Logar province, about 35 miles south of Kabul, damaging the building but hurting no one.

Gen. Atiq Ullah Ludin, the provincial commander, blamed rebels of the former Taliban regime and renegade warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who have vowed to sabotage the vote — seen as key to rehabilitating a country shattered by war.

Arnault expressed concern over an attack so close to the security blanket provided by the existing 6,000 NATO-led peacekeepers in the capital.

"We are now facing attacks directed at us with fairly heavy weapons," he said.

NATO has promised for months to deploy more forces across the north of the country, but nations have been slow to commit troops. NATO leaders are due to discuss the issue at a June 28-29 summit in Turkey.

Security concerns have deepened this month, with the slaying of 11 Chinese road workers and five aid workers, three of them Europeans, in northern provinces, once regarded as relatively stable.

Meanwhile, electoral teams have come under repeated attack in the lawless south and east, where the Taliban and al-Qaida rebels are strongest, leaving two British U.N. contractors dead in May and several Afghans wounded.

On Monday, assailants on two motorbikes sprayed a vehicle carrying two Afghan soldiers, killing one and wounding the second, as they traveled to an election office in Arghandab district, about 20 miles north of Kandahar city.

"The soldiers were our security guards," said Shoaib, a regional election coordinator, who like many Afghans goes by one name. "But this act won't stop the (voter) registration program."

The U.S. military, which has 20,000 troops hunting insurgents in those regions, gave a more upbeat assessment of the security situation.

Spokesman Lt. Col. Tucker Mansager said Monday that allegations of deteriorating security "fly in the face of the successes we are seeing in voter registration."

So far, just over 4 million have signed up — less than half the estimated number of eligible voters.

Arnault said there was public willingness and determination to take part in the election and he hoped that between 8 million or 10 million would sign up by the end of July.

He also urged warlords to cooperate with lagging, U.N.-backed efforts to disarm militiamen, with only 9,000 laying down arms so far — against an end-of-June target of 40,000.

Country make-up of NATO-led peacekeepers in Afghanistan
KABUL, June 22 (AFP) - Mandated by the United Nations and currently commanded by NATO, the International Security Assistance Force has been operating in Afghanistan's capital Kabul since shortly after the late 2001 fall of the Taliban.

ISAF was created in accordance with the Bonn Conference in December 2001 and the first mission was undertaken by the United Kingdom. A multinational reconnaissance team arrived in Kabul on January 1, 2002, to bolster British marines stationed here ahead of the arrival of ISAF. NATO assumed command of the force in August 2003, making Afghanistan The alliance's first ever mission outside the Euro-Atlantic region.

In December 2003, NATO agreed to expand the force beyond Kabul and late that month a German contingent took control of provincial reconstruction team in the northeastern city of Kunduz.

There are more than 6,400 ISAF troops in Afghanistan from the following countries:

NATO NATIONS: Belgium - 293 Bulgaria - 34 Canada - 1,576 Czech Republic - 19 Denmark - 57 Estonia - 7 France - 565 Germany - 1,909 Greece - 127
Hungary - 26 Iceland - 17 Italy - 491 Latvia - 2 Lithuania - 6 Luxembourg - 9 Netherlands - 153 Norway - 147 Poland - 22 Portugal - 8 Romania - 32 Slovakia - 17 Slovenia - 18 Spain - 125 Turkey - 161 United Kingdom - 315 United States - 67

NON-NATO NATIONS: Austria - 3 Afghanistan - 81 Albania - 22 Azerbaijan - 22 Croatia - 47 Finland - 48 FROM (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) - 11 Ireland - 6 New Zealand - 6 Sweden - 19 Switzerland - 4 Total: 6,472

Scattered teams of troops bring mixed results in Afghanistan
KABUL, June 22 (AFP) - Presented as the ideal solution to bolstering security in Afghanistan, provincial reconstruction teams have been slow to demonstrate their effectiveness ahead of the race towards democratic elections, observers say.

As nations mull committing troops so NATO can expand its command of these teams in northern Afghanistan, concerns have surfaced that since their introduction in early 2003 they have had only piecemeal success.

As security has deteriorated, some say the small groups of foreign troops and civilian experts may have dangerously blurred the line between the work of humanitarians and that of soldiers.

'We are very concerned ... and have argued for a security strategy which improves ambient security for ordinary Afghan lives and allows NGOs (non-governmental agencies)... to get on and do our job,' says Barbara Stapleton, of the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief.

'The NGO community doesn't think that NATO expansion via the provincial reconstruction teams is going to deliver the improvement of security... which is urgently required.'

Provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs) were first mooted in 2002 Shortly after the fall of the Taliban regime. Envisaged as an evolutionary initiative, the teams were never given a written mandate but their often-stated primary objective was the expansion of the central government's authority.

Yet success in this domain rested on factors beyond the control of PRTs such as the removal of 'people considered to be criminals, guilty of human rights violations, involved in narcotics trade' from all levels of government, Stapleton says.

NATO runs only one PRT, in the normally quiet northeastern city of Kunduz. But the alliance is poised to take over as many as five ahead Of elections scheduled for September.

The 15 operational teams, mostly run by the US-led coalition, present not only fundamentally different approaches to their missions but a mixed bag of results, says senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, Vikram Parekh.

The bulk of the teams are in the troubled south and southeast where Afghan and foreign troops are fighting a guerrilla insurgency. Usually housed within military bases, these groups focus on reconstruction and development and cooperate with Afghan militia forces.

They 'do not address the most important thing which is to assist the government in providing its own security', says Parekh. In the north, the teams are more focused on rebuilding the security sector -- re-training police, building courthouses and customs houses -- and assisting with the disarmament process.

These teams have distanced themselves from the often corrupt local commanders and have gathered valuable information on the security situation which could be critical for the government's plan to disarm tens of thousands of militiamen, Parekh says.

'They are not arranged in a way that would allow them to take on a column of tanks,' he says. Stapleton says many of the teams in the south are also encroaching on humanitarian work, rushing into areas where non-governmental organisations have been working for years because of 'political pressure to get results fast'.

'We don't doubt that a PRT can put four wells in in a day. However we question whether those wells will still be in use in a year's time,' she says.

The commander of NATO-led peacekeepers in Afghanistan, Canadian Lieutenant General Rick Hillier, says the teams have been effective but maintains they were designed to rebuild institutions destroyed by war. 'To help with security around a large part of the country... is not really the forte of the PRTs themselves,' he says.

Despite complaints, noone wants to see the idea thrown away. 'In the absence of any other international mechanism to directly address the security situation, the presence of PRTs in some parts of the country might well provide added-value,' says Stapleton.

Provincial Afghan electoral office hit by rocket attack
KABUL, June 21 (AFP) - Armed men fired rocket-propelled grenades on a United Nations electoral office in a province neighbouring the capital Kabul but noone was injured, a spokesman said Monday.

Remnants of the Taliban regime have threatened to disrupt the electoral process, including the registration of voters for presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for September.

The men attacked Sunday night in Pul-e Alam, Logar province about 60 kilometres (37 miles) south of the capital, Joint Electoral Management Body spokesman Mohammed Azam told AFP.

'Armed men attacked at about 1:30 am (2100 GMT) with rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) the UN offices in charge of voter registration in Pul-e Alam,' Azam said.

'At least three RPGs were fired on the building. Four vehicles have been slightly damaged,' he said, adding there had been no casualties as a result of the violence.

Over the past two months militants have intensified their guerrilla attacks on Afghan and US troops and UN and government buildings, particularly in former Taliban strongholds in the south and southeast.

Pul-e Alam is the capital of Logar province and the attack is the Second in the region in three months. On June 6, suspected Taliban killed a police officer in an attack on a district headquarters.

Afghan, Pakistani leaders to meet for talks on combating terrorism, drugs
Associated Press Monday June 21, 1:34 PM
Afghan President Hamid Karzai will meet his Pakistani counterpart soon to discuss a push against terrorism and drugs sought by world leaders, a spokesman said Monday.

Karzai telephoned Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on Sunday to seek the meeting, which will probably take place in late July, Afghan presidential spokesman Hamed Elmi said.

Officials have yet to decide on a venue, Elmi said.

The proposal comes after Karzai returned this week from meetings with U.S. President George W. Bush and an appearance at the G-8 summit of leaders from wealthy nations.

"All the world wants this fight against terrorism and for drug control," Elmi said.

Afghanistan is the world's largest producer of opium, the raw material for heroin. Taliban and al-Qaida militants battling Afghan, American and Pakistani forces near the Afghan-Pakistan border are believed to profit from refining and trafficking the drug, though government-allied warlords also are involved in the trade.

Three hurt in oil tanker explosion at Pakistan-Afghan border
QUETTA, Pakistan, June 21 (AFP) - At least three people were injured when an oil tanker bound for southern Afghanistan exploded and set ablaze three trucks at a checkpost in the Pakistani border town of Chaman, officials said Monday.

The Shell company tanker was awaiting customs clearance when it blew up at about 10:15 pm (1715 GMT) Sunday, Assistant Superintendent of Pakistani customs, Qaiser Beg, said.

He said the fire engulfed two more tankers parked in the area resulting in minor injuries to three people. The cause of the explosion is unknown, Beg said. An investigation is under way to determine if the explosion was accidental or an act of sabotage, he added.

The tanker was loaded at the southern port city of Karachi from where oil is routinely shipped to southern Afghanistan's Kandahar city for coalition forces in Afghanistan. It was carrying aviation fuel for Kandahar airport.

Pakistan's Habib Bank to Open More Branches in Afghanistan
Monday June 21, 8:04 AM Asia Pulse
ISLAMABAD, June 21 Asia Pulse - Habib Bank (HBL) is considering opening more branches in Afghanistan after the success of its operation that started on February 14 this year.

In an interview with VOA Muslimul Haq, President HBL branch in Kabul said the bank has attracted huge number of people since it has opened its branch on February 14, this year.

Most of the Afghans have knowledge about the services of this bank for the last 25 years he said, adding this is the first ever bank in Afghanistan which has swift technology.

He said the bank can send money in 24 hours to any country of the world and also from abroad one can receive in the same duration.

He said the bank also accepts cheques in dollars and has the intention to give loans to the people. To a question he said the bank would open its branches in near future in Jalalabad, Kandhar, Herat and Mazar-e-Sharif.

Afghan, foreign forces arrest alleged drug refiner, officials say
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) Afghan and foreign troops raided the home of a suspected drug refiner, detaining him and seizing a stock of opium and heroin, officials said Monday.

The raid took place Sunday in Khogyani, a town in eastern Nangarhar province 110 kilometers (70 miles) east of the capital, Kabul, Khogyani mayor Faiz Salam Akhunzada said.

Akhundzada said Afghan interior ministry forces backed by U.S. troops raided the house. But Gen. Mohammed Yunus Noorzai, the provincial police chief, said the foreign forces were British.

Noorzai said two others detained in the night-time operation were quickly released.

Akhundzada identified the arrested man as Said Wali, who allegedly ran heroin maunfacturing factories in the area. He said an unspecified amount of opium and heroin was secured during the operation.

Britain is leading an effort to build up an Afghan counternarcotics force able to crack down on a booming trade that experts say could turn the country into a ``narco-state.''

U.S. forces have supported raids by Afghan forces in the past and the American government is funding a separate drive to destroy this year's bumper crop of opium poppies.

Afghan political party demands president's resignation
KABUL, June 21 (AFP) - Hundreds of people, mainly supporters of a newly-emerged political party Monday poured onto the streets of the Afghan capital to demand the resignation of US-backed President Hamid Karzai.

Some 500 people attended the protest organized by Afghanistan's National Congress, a party comprised of mainly ethnic-Tajiks, Afghanistan's second-largest ethnic group.

'Based on the Bonn accords the period of President Hamid Karzai's administration is over,' according to letter from the party to the United Nations.

Signed following the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001, the Bonn accords called for an Afghan election by June 2004. 'We demand Karzai resign,' the statement added.

The demonstration in Kabul city center lasted for several hours and disrupted traffic in the city but ended peacefully. Nearly two dozen new political parties have emerged following the collapse of the hard-line Taliban regime which banned all political activities.

Afghanistan is due to hold its first democratic elections in September. However, there are doubts as to whether the polls can go ahead because of unrest in north and northwest provinces and a Taliban-led insurgency in the south and southeast of the war-torn country.

US general's report on Afghan prisons not yet complete
KABUL, June 21 (AFP) - A comprehensive report on the US-run prison system in Afghanistan due to be completed in mid-June has not yet been finalised, a spokesman for the US coalition said Monday.

Prompted by serious allegations of prisoner abuse here and in Iraq, the review of around 20 US-run prisons in Afghanistan is being compiled by Brigadier General Charles Jacoby at the request of the US commander of coalition forces here Lieutenant General David Barno.

'General Jacoby ... has briefed General Barno on the general findings of the review,' spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Tucker Mansager told a Kabul press conference. 'The detailed report is still being compiled right now.'

In addition to the 'top to bottom' review of prisons, the United States is also investigating two allegations of prisoner abuse, including one by a former police colonel who claims he was beaten, humiliated and deprived of sleep while in custody.

Three Afghans have also died in detention since late 2001. On Friday US authorities indicted a man contracted by the CIA over the death of one man in an American jail in northeastern Asadabad in 2003.

Mansager said a visit by the International Committee of the Red Cross To the detention site in southern Kandahar had not yet taken place. 'The Kandahar facility that they are going to visit ... does not have the proper facilities for the ICRC to go in to be able to speak to either persons under control or detainees,' he said.

Some 390 prisoners are detained at the primary jail at Bagram, 50 kilometres (31 miles) north of Kabul, which is regularly visited by the Red Cross while there are some 18 other 'transit' prisons in the provinces.

‘Al Qaeda had much more interaction with Pakistan’
WASHINGTON: The chairman of the September 11 Commission said on Sunday that Al Qaeda had much more interaction with Pakistan and Iran than it did with Iraq, underscoring a controversy over the Bush administration’s insistence there was collaboration between the terrorist organisation and Saddam Hussein.

Thomas Kean made the comment even as he and other commissioners tried to steer clear of the debate over one of the administration’s primary justifications for invading Iraq. “We believe that there were a lot more active contacts, frankly, with Iran and with Pakistan than there were with Iraq,” said Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey.

“Al Qaeda didn’t like to get involved with states, unless they were living there. They got involved with Sudan, they got involved where they lived, but otherwise no,” he told ABC television’s “This Week”.

One commissioner, Republican John Lehman, came to the defence of Vice President Dick Cheney, who is the most aggressive promoter of the idea that there were strong Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda. Lehman said new intelligence that “we are now in the process of getting” indicates one of Saddam’s Fedayeen fighters, a lieutenant colonel, was a prominent Al Qaeda member.

Cheney has said he probably had intelligence the commission did not have and “the vice president was right when he said that,” Lehman said on NBC television’s “Meet the Press”.
Lehman said the press was “outrageously irresponsible” to portray the staff report as contradicting what the administration said.

The commission’s vice chairman, former Democratic Rep Lee Hamilton of Indiana, said the White House and the commission agree on the central point: There is no evidence of a collaborative relationship between Al Qaeda and Iraq in the Sept 11 attacks on the United States.

“The vice president, I believe, said that there was a response by Iraq to some of Osama Bin Laden’s requests. We found no evidence of that response,” said Hamilton. Cheney said it’s “never been proven” and “it’s never been refuted” that Sept 11 hijacker Mohammed Atta met a senior Iraqi intelligence official on April 9, 2001 in Prague, Czech Republic.

Hamilton said the commission has a picture of Atta taken in Virginia just a few days before the supposed meeting in Prague, as well as his cell phone records with calls placed in the United States at the time of the meeting. Hamilton noted that such data “is not conclusive proof” on Atta’s whereabouts and Hamilton added that the vice president himself was saying the proof was not clear one-way or the other.

Along with differences over Saddam’s government and Al Qaeda, a new question arose over whether President Bush or Cheney gave the order on Sept 11 to shoot down the fourth of the hijacked airliners.

But the commission’s inquiry has led members into related areas as well, prompting Lehman to level strong criticism at Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, saying they have been paying “a kind of blackmail” and “certainly turned a blind eye for a long period of time to Al Qaeda operations and Al Qaeda operatives in their countries”. Ap

Iran, Afghanistanform Joint Economicrade Committee
Monday June 21, 1:41 PM Asia Pulse
MASHHAD, Khorassan prov, June 21 Asia Pulse - Khorassan province Deputy governor general for planning, administrative and financial affairs, Hossein Zare, here Saturday said that a permanent committee will soon be formed to coordinate Iran-Afghanistan joint economic and trade undertakings.

Addressing a meeting of provincial Export Promotion Committee, he added that the committee aims to plan and organize the trade activities of Iranian businessmen in Afghanistan. "Iran`s Trade Union has been established in Afghanistan and is being supported by Khorassan province governorate," he added.

Turning to the common border between Khorassan and Afghanistan and the decisive role of the province in the trade and economy of that country, he said that an exhibition of Iranian products will be held in Kabul within the next three months to introduce Iranian goods to the Afghan market.

"Various domestic products, in particular building materials and educational books will be presented in the upcoming event," he added. The official also announced that three international fairs are scheduled to be held in Khorassan province on food industry, cattle, poultry and minerals among other products.

Indian River High graduate killed in Afghanistan
By CHIP GUY Staff reporter 6/21/2004 Delaware Online
Russell White, a 19-year-old Marine from Vines Creek near Dagsboro, was shot and killed in Afghanistan, his family said today.

White, an Indian River High School graduate, was sent to Afghanistan just over a month ago, said his father, Gregg White. He said his son had been sent to join troops who will be conducting a mountainside search for Osama bin Laden later this summer.

White, who last heard from his son Saturday night, did not know the exact time or circumstances of his son’s death. Pentagon officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

The elder White said his son had been inspired to join the military by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

“He wanted to get bin Laden. He was fighting for our freedom,” said White, 48. “Those were the words out of his mouth … I’m doing this so you can have freedom.”

The family learned of Russell White’s death at 5:30 this morning, when military officials visited them at their home, White said.

White and his wife said they talked to their son for about 20 minutes on Saturday, when he called to wish his father a happy Father’s Day.

See complete coverage in Tuesday’s News Journal and at www.delawareonline.com.

U.S. Marine dies in "non-hostile" incident at Afghan base
Associated Press Monday June 21, 3:26 PM
A U.S. Marine died of a "non-hostile injury" inflicted by a weapon at the main American base in Afghanistan, the military said Monday.

The soldier, who wasn't identified, died late Sunday at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, spokesman Lt. Col. Tucker Mansager said. The incident was under investigation.

Mansager said there were "weapons involved," but declined to say whether the injury was self-inflicted or an accident, of if anyone else was involved.

"That's what the investigation will determine," he said.

About 90 American soldiers have died in and around Afghanistan since the launch of Operation Enduring Freedom in the wake of the Sept 11, 2001 attacks.

The U.S. government has classified more than one-third as non-hostile, including traffic fatalities and other accidents.