Afghanistan News March 24, 2004

March 24, 2004

U.S. Troops Foil Attack, Kill Afghan Militant

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - U.S. troops shot dead Wednesday a man attempting to hurl a grenade at a convoy of U.S. special forces in Afghanistan's restive southern province of Kandahar, an Afghan official said.In the third attack on U.S. forces in southern Afghanistan in a week, a man armed with six grenades appeared on a bicycle as the convoy was leaving a U.S. base in Kandahar city, said Mohammad Rasoul, a city security official.

"The attacker's body is lying on the street," Rasoul told reporters. "It is beyond recognition. He had several bombs with him. We do not know for sure who he was."

The U.S. forces were unharmed, he said.

The turbulent southern region, a bastion of Afghanistan's former Taliban rulers before U.S.-led forces routed the hard-line Islamist regime in 2001, has experienced a wave of violence against U.S. troops.

Two U.S. soldiers were shot dead and three injured last Thursday when suspected Taliban fighters fired on patrol vehicles in the southern province of Uruzgan.

Five days ago a suspected Taliban suicide bomber threw a hand grenade at a vehicle carrying U.S. soldiers in neighboring Helmand province, wounding two of them, a spokesman for the provincial governor said.

More than 600 people, including militants, aid workers, Afghan and U.S.-led troops, have been killed in Afghanistan since August last year -- mostly in the south and east.

The attacks often target some 13,500 American-led forces who are hunting Taliban, al Qaeda fugitives and other militants.

About 100 people were killed in clashes Sunday in the western city of Herat between government troops and forces loyal to the provincial governor.

Earlier Wednesday, a U.S. military spokesman said four Afghan soldiers were killed and four U.S. soldiers wounded when munitions being used in an Afghan army training exercise in the southeastern town of Gardez exploded accidentally.
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AP: U.S. sets up base in Afghan mountains

ON THE AFGHAN BORDER (AP) — Using bulldozers to slice bunkers and a helicopter landing pad out of a mountainside, U.S. special operations forces dug in Tuesday on a peak overlooking Pakistan — fortifying the area for the intensifying battle against al-Qaeda and Taliban forces.

Special operations forces — who include Green Berets, Navy SEALs, and CIA operatives — are playing a secretive but leading role in the battle against al-Qaeda and Taliban suspects believed to be hiding out in the mountains of Pakistan's tribal areas.

Remote posts like this one near the Afghan city of Orgun, scratched out of a mountainside to house a small contingent of U.S. forces and a larger Afghan militia unit, serve as forward launch pads for the fight.

An Associated Press writer on Tuesday became the first to report from the special operations' observation post since the start of Operation Mountain Storm, a 2-week-old American offensive designed to capture Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants.

Village elders in this hamlet of 45 families in Paktika province said the Americans arrived 18 days ago with Afghan militia.

The camp is home to 60 Americans, working with 200 Afghan militia, the Afghan militiamen say. The Westerners wear T-shirts and sunglasses, and most sport beards and mustaches, with pistols strapped to their legs. Rank and file U.S. soldiers must remain in uniform and are banned from growing beards, but special operations forces are not subject to the same regulations.

Villagers see the Americans out building their base and patrolling, at times with allied Afghan militia — helping close the border against what villagers say are frequent incursions by al-Qaeda and Taliban.

The U.S. military says its forces also are sharing information with Pakistani troops across the border — intelligence typically coming everywhere from satellites to intercepted radio calls.

On Tuesday, the Americans were erecting 100 yards of wire fence along the border beside their base. They also dug holes, which will become bunkers, to live in while their Afghan allies put up tents.

Workers used construction equipment to level a helipad.

Americans around the camp refused to speak to AP. Relaying their request through Afghan militiamen, they eventually asked the reporter to leave, saying no journalists were allowed in the area.

The U.S. military as a matter of policy does not comment on special operations. But asked about buildup along the Afghan-Pakistan border in the area, U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty said: "We do have some positions that are constantly changing. We are constantly rearranging."

On the Pakistan side, President Gen. Pervez Musharraf has said about a dozen U.S. "technical experts" are in his country. Some are located across the border from the special operations post in Miran Shah, Pakistani intelligence officials told AP.

Last week, a Pakistani army spokesman, Gen. Shaukat Sultan, said a dozen or so U.S. intelligence agents were in the country "assisting Pakistan in technical intelligence and surveillance." The CIA declined to comment.

Afghan villagers near the new post said they welcomed the U.S. crackdown, saying they have come under a growing cross-border rocket barrage from Pakistan.

"So many rockets. We are living in fear of rockets," said shopkeeper Shawar Khan in Sisandi, a village near the U.S. encampment.

Both sides of the border around Miran Shah have come under repeated rocket attacks by militants hoping to hit U.S. or Afghan military posts. Authorities blame al-Qaeda fugitives and allied Pakistan tribesmen. Taliban fighters are believed to be hiding in the mountains as well.

No uniformed American forces have been seen in recent days along one of the front lines in the U.S. campaign against terror suspects based in Pakistan's North and South Waziristan, locals say.

Across the border and about 45 miles to the south, in South Waziristan, Pakistan's military has arrested scores in its toughest and bloodiest operation against terror suspects in the tribal areas since Musharraf allied with the United States against terror in 2001.

These mountains in Afghanistan are a hot spot as well.

On March 5, U.S. special operations forces killed nine suspected insurgents near this stretch of border when a group of 30 to 40 men appeared to try to flank a U.S.-Afghan position here, the U.S. military said.

Village leaders say Taliban and al-Qaeda attackers cross the border at will. Asked for proof, they laughed, as if there could be no doubt.

"Everyone can come easily into Afghanistan. Everyone can go easily into Pakistan," said Mohammed Khan, another shopkeeper in Sisandi. "There are no Afghan checkpoints."

"For 2{ years, they are coming and attacking" from Waziristan, said Shawar Khan. "That's why in this area, there are no schools, there's no health clinics, there's no development. Everyone is afraid to come to our area."

Since the Americans' arrival, villagers have stayed inside after dark, saying the U.S. security outweighed the inconvenience of the curfew.

The U.S. and Afghan forces have closed this part of the border, at least, to any attacks, Mohammed Khan said.

"Right now, from this area, it's impossible that anyone can come," the villager said. "But it's a huge border."

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Four Soldiers of New Afghan Army Killed
By STEPHEN GRAHAM, Associated Press Writer

KABUL, Afghanistan - Four soldiers from the U.S.-trained Afghan National Army were killed by an accidental explosion during a training exercise, the American military said, in the deadliest incident yet involving the fledging force.

Five more Afghan soldiers and four U.S. soldiers were injured in Tuesday's blast near Gardez, 60 miles south of the capital, Kabul, in eastern Paktia province, spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty said.

The casualties were the result of an "accidental detonation during demolitions training," Hilferty said. He didn't elaborate.

Two of the wounded Americans and one of the Afghans were taken to the main American base at Bagram, north of Kabul, for treatment.

None of the victims was identified. But Hilferty said the injured Americans were from Camp Phoenix in Kabul.

The camp is the base for Oklahoma National Guard troops involved in training the new Afghan National Army.

Some 1,500 Afghan troops are currently being deployed to the western city of Herat after a burst of factional fighting that killed up to 50 people, including a Cabinet minister.

The troops also have fought alongside soldiers from the 13,500-strong U.S.-led coalition against Taliban militants and their allies in the south and east.

Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Gen. Zahed Azimi confirmed that the Gardez incident was the deadliest yet for the new force.

An ANA soldier also died Mar. 18 in an operation in the central Afghan province of Uruzgan which Hilferty said Wednesday was winding down. Two U.S. soldiers, eight Afghans that the military said were enemy fighters and a civilian also were killed during fighting Mar. 18 around the village of Miam Do.

Hilferty said searches of two compounds in the area on Tuesday uncovered "nothing of significance."

The U.S. military said Monday that hundreds of American and Afghan troops were hunting Taliban rebels in the area. U.S. warplanes attacked a compound there on Friday.

More than 100 coalition soldiers were still in the area Wednesday but were "pulling out," Hilferty said.

Uruzgan is a rugged province believed to be a possible hiding place for the Taliban's fugitive supreme leader, Mullah Omar.

In Kandahar, American forces fought a brief gun battle with a lone suspected Taliban attacker, killing the fighter, an official said.

A jeep carrying the U.S. soldiers came under assault rifle fire in an ambush close to their base in the southern city, said Maj. Mohammed Rasool, an Afghan military official. The U.S. troops returned fire, killing the attacker.

No U.S. soldier was reported injured. The attack left their vehicle poked with bullets marks, Rasool said.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pakistan angered by US Afghan envoy remarks on Taliban

Tue Mar 23,12:08 AM ET
ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Islamabad has reacted angrily to remarks from the US ambassador to Afghanistan, who said Taliban and Al-Qaeda fugitives were launching attacks from Pakistani soil.
"If (Zalmay) Khalilzad has any specific information or intelligence, he should have shared this information with us instead of making these generalised insinuations through media," Pakistan foreign ministry spokesman Masood Khan told a weekly press briefing.

Khalilzad in an interview carried by Daily Times newspaper Monday has said that senior Taliban are plotting attacks on Afghan and US targets from safe havens in Pakistan.

"We hope that Mr. Khalilzad while serving as US ambassador in Kabul will remember third country principal and maintain his impartiality."

Khan said if Khalilzad had any messages for Pakistan he could always contact Islamabad through its ambassador in Kabul.

"He must not allow his personal predilections to affect Pakistan-US relations. We would like him to be a friend of Pakistan.

"We would like him to promote closer Pak-US relations by not making such statement and we are in touch with State Department," Khan said.

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Tue Mar 23,12:37 PM ET By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - One day before the Sept. 11 attacks, senior Bush administration officials agreed that the United States would try to overthrow Afghanistan's Taliban rulers if a final diplomatic push to expel Osama bin Laden from the country failed, a federal panel reported Tuesday.
The independent commission reviewing the attacks said in a preliminary report that in the years before the attacks the Clinton and Bush administrations chose to use diplomatic rather than military options, which allowed bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders to elude capture.

The commission said that three years before the attacks, Saudi Arabia won a commitment from the Taliban to expel bin Laden, but Afghan leaders later reneged.

"From the spring of 1997 to September 2001, the U.S. government tried to persuade the Taliban to expel bin Laden to a country where he could face justice," the report said. "The efforts employed inducements, warnings and sanctions. All these efforts failed."

The panel, known formally as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, presented its findings as it began hearings with top-level Bush and Clinton administration officials. The aim was to question officials on their efforts to stop bin Laden in the years leading up to the attacks.

Secretary of State Colin Powell stressed administration efforts to fight terrorism, an implicit rebuttal to criticism in a recent book by President Bush 's former counterterrorism coordinator, Richard Clarke, who is expected to testify Wednesday.

"President Bush and his entire national security team understood that terrorism had to be among our highest priorities and it was," Powell said.

Shortly before the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration was debating how to force bin Laden out of Afghanistan. At a Sept. 10, 2001, meeting of second-tier Cabinet officials, officials settled on a three-phase strategy. The first step called for dispatching an envoy to talk to the Taliban. If this failed, diplomatic pressure would be applied and covert funding and support for anti-Taliban fighters would be increased.

If both failed, "the deputies agreed that the United States would seek to overthrow the Taliban regime through more direct action," the report said. Deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley said the strategy had a three-year timeframe.

The report described Saudi Arabia as "a problematic ally in combating Islamic extremism," noting its lax oversight of charitable donations that may have funded terrorists.

Clinton designated CIA Director George Tenet as his representative to work with the Saudis, who agreed to make an "all-out secret effort" to persuade the Taliban to expel bin Laden.

Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki bin Faisal, using "a mixture of possible bribes and threats," received a commitment from Taliban leader Mullah Omar that bin Laden would be handed over. But Omar reneged on the agreement during a September 1998 meeting with Turki and Pakistan's intelligence chief.

"When Turki angrily confronted him Omar lost his temper and denounced the Saudi government. The Saudis and Pakistanis walked out," the report said.

The Clinton administration had early indications of terrorist links to bin Laden and future Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as early as 1995, but let years pass as it pursued criminal indictments and diplomatic solutions to subduing them abroad, the commission's report said.

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told the commission that President Clinton and his team "did everything we could, everything we could think of, based on the knowledge we had, to protect our people and disrupt and defeat al-Qaida."

The preliminary report said the U.S. government had determined bin Laden was a key terrorist financier as early as 1995, but that efforts to expel him from Sudan stalled after Clinton officials determined he couldn't be brought to the United States without an indictment. A year later, bin Laden left Sudan and set up his base in Afghanistan without resistance.

The hearing follows explosive allegations in Clarke's book. Clarke was Bush's former counterterrorism coordinator and a holdover from the Clinton administration.

He said that he warned Bush officials in a January 2001 memo about the growing al-Qaida threat after the Cole attack but was put off by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who "gave me the impression she had never heard the term (al-Qaida) before."

The commission's report Tuesday said Clarke pushed for immediate and secret military aid to the Taliban's foe, the Northern Alliance. But Rice and Hadley proposed a broader review of the al Qaida response that would take more time. The proposal wasn't approved for Bush's review until just weeks before Sept. 11.

The 10-member commission had invited Rice to testify, but she has declined, with the White House citing separation of power concerns involving its staff appearing before a legislative body.

Other potential diplomatic failures cited by the commission:

_ The United States in 1995 located Mohammed in Qatar. He was then a suspect in a 1995 plot to plant bombs on American airliners in Asia. FBI and CIA officials worked on his capture, but first sought a legal indictment and then help from the Qatari government, who they feared might tip Mohammed off. In 1996, Qatari officials reported Mohammed had suddenly disappeared.

_ The U.S. government pressed two successive Pakistani governments from the mid 1990s to pressure the Taliban by threatening to cut off support. But "before 9-11, the United States could not find a mix of incentives or pressure that would persuade Pakistan to reconsider its fundamental relationship."

_ From 1999 through early 2001, the United States pressed the United Arab Emirates, the Taliban's only travel and financial outlets to the outside world, to break off ties, with little success.

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Government confirms troop deployment following deadly violence in Herat KABUL , 23 March (IRIN) - The Afghan government has deployed a substantial number of troops to the troubled western province of Herat following Sunday's violence that claimed the life of Aviation and Tourism Minister Mirwais Sadiq, among others.
"The government has sent 1,500 soldiers from the Afghan National Army to prevent further violence in Herat, boost security and underscore Kabul's authority," Javid Ludin, a spokesman for President Hamid Karzai, told IRIN on Tuesday in the capital.

Initial reports said up to 100 people had been killed in Herat city after fierce factional fighting erupted following the assassination of Sadiq, son of Herat's governor, Ismail Khan.

Troops loyal to Khan fought running gun battles with soldiers backing rival commander General Abdul Zahir shortly after Sadiq was killed, apparently by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Sources in the city told IRIN that the death toll was much lower and that fewer than 10 bodies had been recovered following he street fighting. This was confirmed by Ludin. "Much less than a hundred people were killed."

Officials said Khan, one of the country's most powerful men who has controlled large parts of western Afghanistan since the Taliban fell in late 2001, was also targeted by a failed assassination attempt earlier in the day.

On Monday, the top United Nations envoy in Afghanistan appealed to all parties to restore law and order in the western city, where Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Special Representative Jean Arnault noted "with grave concern" that, while fighting had subsided somewhat, the house of Chief Justice Khodad had been burned by protesters.

"No one was hurt in the act, but this attack raises the urgent issue of protecting the life and property of civilian leaders, no matter what their views might be," Arnault said in statement issued by his spokesman.

He called upon all parties involved in the confrontation "to exercise restraint, to protect the lives of civilians, to do all in their power to reduce tensions in the city and to allow the restoration of law and order".

Sadiq was the second aviation minister and the third senior government minister to be killed since the fall of the Taliban. In February 2002 Aviation Minister Abdul Rahman was killed at Kabul airport, apparently by pilgrims angry they were unable to take flights to Mecca. Vice-President Haji Abdul Qadir was shot dead by unknown attackers in mid-2002.

In a statement, Karzai said he was "deeply shocked" by the killing of his minister, who was appointed in 2002. "The president mourns this tragic loss and offers his deepest condolences to the father of the deceased, Mr Ismail Khan, the governor of Herat, and his family," it said.

A high-level government delegation is currently in Herat to investigate the incident, Ludin confirmed. "The safety and security of the people of Herat is the government's priority."

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Afghanistan Vows to Disarm Warlords

Tuesday March 23, 2004 12:31 PM By STEPHEN GRAHAM Associated Press Writer

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - The Afghan government will work to disarm unruly warlords ahead of landmark elections, a spokesman said Tuesday following a battle in the western city of Herat that killed a Cabinet minister.

Aid workers and officials said the mood in Herat was subdued ahead of the funeral of Mirwais Sadiq, President Hamid Karzai's aviation minister and the son of Herat Gov. Ismail Khan, one of the country's most powerful warlords.

In Kabul, Karzai's spokesman, Jawed Ludin, played down reports that more than 100 people were killed in Sunday's battle with tanks, rockets and mortars between troops loyal to Khan and a local militia commander.

Ludin said the death toll was no higher than 50. But he said the ferocity of the clash only increased the government's determination to disarm feuding faction leaders.

``Unless the disarmament process is expedited and produces results, there will still be threats of falling back on the road to ensuring security for the people,'' Ludin told a news conference.

The latest fighting illustrates the limited reach of Karzai's government outside the capital Kabul, two years after U.S.-led forces drove the Taliban from power.

The Defense Ministry has announced plans to impound before the elections all the heavy weapons held by the militia commanders who still control most of the country. Dozens of tanks, rocket-launchers and artillery pieces left over from two decades of war have been collected near the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif as well as Kabul.

But the thousands of troops maintained by Ismail Khan - and other rival commanders in the west of the country - have yet to be touched by the heavy weapons program or a U.N. campaign to demobilize militiamen.

Only about 5,000 fighters have gone through that program, which is supposed to ensure that elections - scheduled for June - are not marred by intimidation. None were from the west.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told The Associated Press on Sunday that the Afghan government agreed to demobilize 40,000 men by the end of June. But Khalilzad said Afghan officials were holding out against the idea of disbanding whole units.

Asked if the units engaged in Friday's fighting would be disarmed, Ludin said that the government would do ``everything that is necessary'' to prevent additional fighting. About 1,500 men from the new U.S.-trained Afghan National Army were sent to the city to keep the peace.

Khan, a respected Afghan resistance commander against the 1980s Soviet occupation and later against the Taliban, is nominally loyal to Karzai. But there have been tensions with the cash-strapped central government over revenues from trade over the Iranian border.

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Spain May Add Peacekeepers to AfghanistanBy KATRIN BENNHOLD, International Herald Tribune March 24, 2004

MADRID, March 23 — Spain's prime minister-elect, who has pledged to pull troops out of Iraq unless the United Nations assumes supervision of the occupation force there, is considering increasing the number of Spanish peacekeepers in Afghanistan, officials in his Socialist Party said Tuesday.

Less than two weeks after the deadly train bombings in Madrid, Prime Minister-elect José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero wants to signal his commitment to fight terrorism and show the United States that Spain remains a loyal ally, said one senior party official.

The new government wants "to send a message that the Socialists do not believe in appeasement," the official added.

Since Mr. Zapatero's surprise victory on March 14, he has faced two tasks: responding to overwhelming opposition to the American-led war in Iraq among his supporters and maintaining good relations with the Bush administration.

Mr. Zapatero has confirmed a campaign pledge to pull Spain's 1,300 troops out of Iraq unless the United Nations assumes greater control by June 30.

Critics, notably in the United States, have accused Mr. Zapatero of handing a victory to terrorists.

A decision to beef up Spain's military presence in Afghanistan may help the new Socialist government find acceptance at home and abroad, said José Miguel de Elías, director of the polling agency Sigma Dos. "It's a very interesting proposal, because it offers an international compromise while responding to a demand by the people to fight terrorism," he said.

There was no reaction from the United States Embassy here on Tuesday night.

As Mr. Zapatero continued planning for a new government, the police on Tuesday revised the death toll from the March 11 train bombings to 190, down from the previous estimate of 202, after DNA analysis showed that difficulties in identifying body parts had distorted the count.

Mr. Elías said Spaniards, hardened by years of regional terrorism from Basque separatists but unaccustomed to the scale of carnage on March 11, expected any government to show a firm resolve against terror. But close to 90 percent of the population opposed the military campaign in Iraq last year, which was backed by Prime Minister José María Aznar and may have played a role in his party's defeat. A major reason for the war's unpopularity was its perceived lack of international legitimacy

By contrast, the international force in Afghanistan has the blessing of the United Nations and operates under NATO command, so increasing Spain's 125-member contingent in Afghanistan would be a far easier sell than an increase for Iraq, Mr. Elías said.

Mr. Zapatero's government also hopes that concentrating Spanish soldiers in an area still suspected of harboring important members of Al Qaeda would be more acceptable to voters, not least because of investigators' suspicion of a Qaeda link to the March 11 train bombings.