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February 3, 2007 


Troops aim to oust Taliban from town
By FISNIK ABRASHI, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Afghan security forces supported by   NATO-led troops soon will launch an operation to recapture a southern town that was overrun by Taliban militants, an Afghan official said Saturday.

Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, the spokesman for the defense ministry, said the Taliban remained in control of the town of Musa Qala in Helmand province, which British troops left after a contentious peace agreement in October.

"We have a plan and we are going to launch that plan very soon," Azimi said. "All our operations are conducted jointly with the police and NATO," he said without elaborating further.

Hundreds of Taliban militants overran Musa Qala on Thursday evening, destroying the government center and temporarily holding elders hostage, officials and residents said Friday.

A number of Taliban militants remain in the town and there were reports they were reinforcing their positions, said Col. Tom Collins, a spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force.

"It is only a matter of time before government re-establishes control, and that is going to happen," Collins said.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said that the Taliban took over the town of Musa Qala in response to a number of NATO attacks on the militants in the area, which he said violated the agreement.

The militants' assault, days after a Taliban commander was killed outside the town, raises doubts about the future of the peace deal, which has been criticized by some Western officials as a NATO retreat in hostile Taliban territory.

"This morning the elders called us and told us that the Taliban are around the district, but not in the center since they are scared of possible NATO bombing," said Zemeri Bashary, the spokesman for the ministry of the interior.

Squadron Leader Dave Marsh, a spokesman for the NATO-led troops in southern   Afghanistan, said that alliance troops stand ready to respond to any decision made by the Afghan government.

British forces are based in Helmand province but left Musa Qala in October after a peace agreement was signed between elders and the Helmand governor. According to the deal, security was turned over to local leaders, while NATO forces were prevented from entering the town.

Some Western officials complained that the deal put the area, which had been a center for clashes between British troops and resurgent Taliban militants, outside of government and NATO control.

Asadullah Wafa, the governor of Helmand province, said the militants destroyed part of the compound housing the district's governor and police. "People have closed down the shops this morning and those living near the area have moved out of fear," he said Friday.

Mohammad Wali, a resident of Musa Qala who estimated that between 200 and 300 fighters were in town, said residents feared fighting between NATO and militants would resume. Raz Mohammad, another resident, said the Taliban had taken about 12 town elders hostage. Collins said there were indications the elders were now safe.

Late last month, NATO said an airstrike outside of Musa Qala destroyed a Taliban command post, killing a senior militant leader and a number of his deputies. NATO said the Jan. 25 airstrike "was outside the area of the agreement" and did not violate it.

However, Wafa said the Taliban told a gathering of elders last week that they considered the airstrike a violation, and it appeared the assault was in retaliation.

Violence in Afghanistan has risen sharply in the last year. Some 4,000 people died in insurgency-related violence in 2006, according to a count by The Associated Press based on numbers from Afghan, NATO and U.S. officials.

American Gen. Dan McNeil on Sunday will replace British Gen. David Richards as the commander of more than 40,000 NATO-led troops in Afghanistan. Military officials have said privately that the change of command will mark a new approach in dealing with resurgent Taliban militants.
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Associated Press writer Noor Khan in Kandahar contributed to this report.
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Taliban vow to hold district headquarters
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - The Afghan government and its   NATO allies prepared to take back a remote district centre occupied by Taliban who vowed to resist, as residents fled fearing military strikes.

The rebels had raised the Taliban movement's white flag over government offices in the small southern town of Musa Qala in Helmand province, which they stormed late Thursday, a provincial tribal chief said citing locals.

The situation was unclear but "we have indications that Taliban are fortifying their positions in the district centre," said Colonel Thomas Collins, spokesman for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

The British military deployed in Helmand under ISAF vacated the town, capital of Musa Qala district, about four months ago after a controversial deal in which the tribal leaders said they would keep control.

Collins said a significant number of Taliban had attacked the town, overwhelming the local police. Members of the town council were briefly detained, Afghan officials said.

"I can't give you a clear idea of what the nature of their control is in the town in this time," Collins said. "They control a small area but to say they control the entire district is going too far."

"The Taliban are there, they're around the district," interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told reporters.

"We're working on a plan -- it will be a serious attack in the very near future," he said.

Scores of civilians had fled expecting a backlash from the government and ISAF, Helmand provincial council member Malam Anwar said citing members of the Musa Qala local council. "The local bazaar is closed," he said.

"The latest report from local sources, which seems to me to be accurate, says some 500 families have moved from the area," said Abdul Satar, head of provincial refugee department.

"They have moved to different areas such neighbouring districts and some even to the provincial centre," he said.

ISAF said the government's authority would be restored "at a time and manner of (its) choosing" and the 37-nation force was ready to assist.

"The Taliban have in the past seized district centres and held them for some hours or days but they are eventually run out," Collins said.

The extremist Taliban movement, which was in government between 1996 and 2001, last year briefly captured a handful of centres in remote parts of southern   Afghanistan before being ejected by military forces.

Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi claimed that the rebels were in control.

"We will resist any counterattack by government and foreign troops. We have got enough troops here and if required we will bring more from other regions, other provinces," he told AFP by telephone from a secret location.

The British military, which has the bulk of its deployment of 6,000 troops to Afghanistan in Helmand, in September withdrew its forces five kilometres (three miles) from Musa Qala town at the request of the government after the local council of tribal leaders said they would see the peace was kept.

Ahmadi claimed the agreement was violated by an ISAF attack last week and this had prompted the rebels to "disband the council and take control."

ISAF countered that the air strike, which it said at the time killed a top Taliban commander and his deputies, was "clearly outside the area covered by the Musa Qala agreement."

ISAF said the deal was potentially a "local solution" to the Taliban-linked unrest raging in southern Afghanistan, but critics said it could provide the militants with a sanctuary.

There are vast swathes of Helmand which fall outside of government authority, with the province producing a quarter of Afghanistan's illegal opium crop which makes up more than 90 percent of the world supply of the drug.

In 2006 the province saw some of the fiercest fighting in the Taliban-led insurgency, which was at its most violent last year. More than 4,000 people were killed across Afghanistan -- most of them rebel fighters.
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Setback for General who put his faith in peace deals
Ahmed Rashid. Daily Telegraph.  8:08am GMT 03/02/2007
General David Richards, the British commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan, faced a major setback to one of his pet projects yesterday on the eve of handing over to an American general.

In his nine months as commander, the general championed the British policy of supporting peace deals with the Taliban conducted by tribal elders so that the guns could fall silent and reconstruction get underway.

The fall of Musa Qala may well herald the early start of a spring offensive by the Taliban to pre-empt the desperately-needed Nato reinforcements now arriving in southern Afghanistan.

Gen Richards said this week he was confident Nato could meet the challenge.

"I have banned talk of a Taliban offensive," he told The Daily Telegraph before the fall of Musa Qala.

"They will certainly give it a go this spring but what I talk of is a Nato campaign because a campaign brings reconstruction, development, improvement of governance and better relations with Pakistan - all within the cloak of more security. "

His legacy remains controversial both in Afghanistan and Nato countries. But even his critics acknowledge that he had a tough assignment with an undermanned and under-equipped force, a lack of international commitment and having to deal with generals around the world as well as warlords in Afghanistan.

Last year, Nato beat back Taliban offensives with only 80 per cent of the troops that were needed, few helicopters and no strategic reserves. Ironically, Gen Richards's diplomatic efforts to bring in more troops is now working just as he leaves.

"My successor will have another 5,000 troops - three crack US battalions of the 82 Airborne Division, 1,000 Poles and more Brits," he said. There are presently 32,000 Nato troops in Afghanistan, while another 10,500 US troops operate under a separate command.

A mobile reserve force of 1,000 US troops - something that Gen Richards has pleaded for but never received - "is now kitting out in Kandahar," he said.

The Afghan army has 40,000 trained troops who are set to receive new equipment in the next two years when its strength will increase to 70,000. "We can hold the ring and more in 2007 and by the end of the year things could be looking very good," said Gen Richards.

Critics, including President Hamid Karzai and senior US officials, have accused Gen Richards of being too soft - towards Pakistan which has allowed Taliban infiltration into Afghanistan; towards European members of Nato who have refused to drop the restrictive caveats their troops operate under and even towards the Taliban due to the deals in Musa Qala.

Gen Richards defended his record. "The Taliban failed to achieve a single one of their military objectives in 2006 - the defeat of Nato, seizing Kandahar, kicking the Brits out of Helmand or a reign of terror in Kabul," he said.

His peace deal with the Taliban has been lacerated by US officials and his replacement, the American Gen Dan McNeill, who starts work tomorrow, is expected to reject all such deals in the future.
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Looters still ransacking in Afghanistan
By RAF CASERT, Associated Press Writer
BRUSSELS, Belgium - More than five years after the fall of the Taliban regime, the plundering of   Afghanistan's archaeological sites and museums not only continues but has evolved into a sophisticated trade that could be financing the country's warlords and insurgents, experts say.

The International Council of Museums, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the conservation of the world's natural and cultural heritage, on Friday published a "red list" of Afghan antiquities at risk, urging collectors, dealers and museums to be vigilant when they come across objects that might have been stolen.

The list includes pottery and statuettes from the 3rd millennium B.C., golden reliquaries from the 1st century and Islamic panels from the 13th century.

"Ancient sites and monuments, ranging from the Old Stone Age to the 20th Century, are being attacked and systematically looted," the Paris-based organization of museums said in a statement.

Some of the artifacts have turned up in fancy auction houses and antique shops in London, Tokyo and New York, the group said.

"Afghanistan is now at serious risk from organized destruction and plundering," said ICOM Secretary General John Zvereff.

A crossroad of Asian culture for centuries, Afghanistan has always been a treasure trove for archaeologists.

The world was shocked when the Taliban blew up two 1,600-year-old Buddha statues along the ancient Silk Road in March 2001. The fundamentalist Islamic movement deemed the statues, famed for their size and location, idolatrous.

Later that year the Taliban, which had controlled most of Afghanistan since 1996, was ousted by the U.S. and its allies for hosting al-Qaida leader   Osama bin Laden.

However, remnants of the former regime are still fighting to regain power, and there is concern that profits from the sale of looted art could be going to profit the insurgents or the country's warlords.

"Some of the trade is used to finance armaments and militia," said Lucas Verhaegen, a Belgian police investigator of illegal trafficking.

The fledgling government has said that with its police and army struggling against resurgent Taliban fighters, warlords and opium barons, it has insufficient resources to protect archaeological sites and museums.

"The means we have are not sufficient. We see worsening vandalism," said Humayum Tandar, Afghan ambassador to Belgium.

Verhaegen described a highly organized trade that uses complicated smuggling routes to avoid detection — over the 3,500-foot Khyber Pass connecting Afghanistan to Pakistan, on to Lebanon, and then via the airport either in Brussels or Amsterdam to a final destination in Switzerland or the United States.

"The more transit points you have, the more difficult it is to retrace the origins," Verhaegen said. Certificates could be changed along the way to make the art appear legitimate.

Much has been made of an exhibit at Paris' Guimet Museum, where 22,000 pieces of jewel-encrusted crowns, golden daggers and baubles from an ancient burial mound are back on display after being hidden for years by Afghans at great personal risk.

Still missing, however, are more than 55,000 art objects that were stolen from all over the country since the 1980s, said Zemaryalai Tarzi, a prominent Afghan archaeologist.

"Never has a country been looted so systematically as Afghanistan," he said. "It was before the Taliban, it was during the Taliban, it was after. And it continues," he said.
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Islamabad warned against nursing hegemonic ambitious towards Afghanistan
By ANI Saturday February 3, 01:09 PM
London, Feb 3 (ANI): Afghan Foreign Minister Rangeen Dadfar Spanta has warned Pakistan against 'nursing hegemonic ambitious towards Afghanistan', and advised it to stop "using terrorism as an instrument of foreign policy".

Some circles in Pakistan in their self-interest were out to destabilize Afghanistan "because they subscribe to a hegemonic policy against us which is a continuation from the days of Taliban," the Dawn quoted him as saying.

Spanta, who here on his first visit to the UK, asked Pakistan to reduce and control what he termed as cross-border terrorism and to stop financing terrorist cells which (according to him) were being used to train the terrorists.

He said that Afghanistan had been discussing with Pakistan about this matter to remove all the misunderstandings and misperceptions. "We want to be friend of Pakistan, we are ready to open all our roads. Today our bilateral trade has reached over a billion dollars whereas during the Taliban days it was only 23 million dollars," he added.

He further said that a peaceful and stable Afghanistan was in the interest of Pakistan and the region, but warned once again that "there is no chance of Afghanistan accepting the hegemony of another country." (ANI)
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Afghanistan Ready for Talks with Pakistan: Spanta
By Raza Mumtaz 'Pakistan Times' Executive Editor/UK Bureau Chief
LONDON (UK): Afghanistan Foreign Minister Dr.Rangeen Dadfar Spanta said here on Friday that his country was ready for talks with Pakistan on all the outstanding issues facing the two countries.

Speaking at a news conference at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, he said it was in the interest of both the countries to see a stable Afghanistan." If there is stability in Afghanistan, the whole region will be peaceful and prosper and develop as well."

Dr.Spanta said the trade relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan have grown manifold since the ouster of Taliban government.

The volume of trade between the two neighbouring countries now stood at US $ 1.3 billion compared with mere US $ 23 million when the Taliban were in power, he said.

He opposed the mining of the border areas with Pakistan and termed it as "practically impossible and financially not feasible" given the long border between the two countries.

The Afghan Foreign Minister expressed hope that Afghan refugees living in Pakistan and Iran would eventually return home. He said some 4.5 million Afghan refugees were living in these countries and to bring all of them home require huge financial cost.

He noted that the international community has already committed funds to enable these Afghan refugees to return home and was hopeful that all the displaced persons would come back to their homeland in due course of time.

Responding to a question, he said Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline was still a live issue and they were waiting for the appointment of new Turkmenistan leader to succeed late President Saparmurat Niyazov for resuming further discussion on it.

The Afghan Foreign Minister, in UK for the past two days to hold bilateral discussion with the British officials, also opposed nuclearisation of the region.

Responding to another question, he said Afghan government was ready to give amnesty to those political groups who accept the Afghan constitution and abide by the laws of the country.?
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Afghan analysis as general bows out
By Alastair Leithead BBC News, Afghanistan Friday, 2 February 2007, 19:00 GMT
For the last nine months, British forces have been in charge of Nato's mission in Afghanistan, commanded by the charismatic British officer Gen David Richards.

In that time the Taleban have hit back with a bloody insurgency which threatens to undo the progress the country has made with the help of the international community in the five years since the Taleban were overthrown.

Gen Richards took over on 4 May 2006, with 9,000 troops under his command and with an International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) responsible for Kabul, and the relatively peaceful regions of northern and western Afghanistan.

He took Isaf into the lawless south for the first time and assumed command of many of the American forces in the east of the country from the US-led coalition.

On Sunday, he hands over more than 31,000 troops and responsibility for the whole of the country to an American, Gen Dan McNeill.

After following him throughout his nine months, I spoke to three people from very different perspectives to assess Gen Richards' performance as well as giving the general himself a chance to comment on his own performance.

UN mission

The UN mission emphasises how communication has improved between the military and the international and Afghan actors. It has a positive view of the tenure of Gen Richards.

"He is acknowledged around the shop in Afghanistan as being a great leader, not just for Isaf, but for the international effort to support Afghanistan's transition," says Chris Alexander, the deputy head of the UN mission to Afghanistan.

But, he argues, there are still some serious issues that have not been addressed.

"There is a question of sanctuary and external support, there is a question of weak fragile government institutions as well and there is also the unequal, uneven development in the country which has sometimes fed the insurgency just as the narcotics problem has done also," he says.

The big battle in Kandahar province in early September, called Operation Medusa, is widely seen to have stopped a Taleban attempt to launch an attack to try to take Kandahar city.

"Operation Medusa was the centrepiece, operationally, of Gen Richards' time here, a pivotal moment in the story of the insurgency in southern Afghanistan today," Mr Alexander says.

"It restored confidence in southern Afghanistan that the Afghan government and Isaf had the resolve to stand against this challenge."

But Mr Alexander has a stark warning for the months ahead.

"The honeymoon is over. There was euphoria when the Taleban fell and a new government came in and people's expectations were extremely high," he says.

"Those high expectations have not been met and there is disappointment with the government, the international community and neighbouring countries."

Afghan government

Afghan Defence Minister Gen Abdul Rahim Wardak talks of a close relationship with Gen Richards but remains unhappy with the short time that commanders are in place.

"Some new officer comes and it takes him some time to know the ground realities and the environment here and once he is fully able then I think he leaves," he says.

"This frequent changeover of forces and officers is definitely impacting on everything."

He also criticises the international community for not providing the Afghan National Army (ANA) with better resources much earlier.

"The ANA has been armed with 30-year-old weapons all used during the war with the Soviet Union... the result was that it was not an effective force," he says.

He is, of course, a lot happier now that the American government has pledged $8.2bn (£4.16bn, 6.3bn euros) to help fund the Afghan security forces.

Journalist and author

Nato's strategy has been to try to bring security and then provide development and help bring in better governance to win the people over.

This has involved trying to win hearts and minds.

Ahmed Rashid, a journalist and author of a book on the Taleban, argues the use of air power has killed civilians.

He says only bringing in more troops would help.

"The Taleban had calculated that, as Nato and British troops moved into the south, there would be this lull with the handover, so Nato forces were met with this huge and unexpected offensive.

"Richards had to reorganise his whole strategy and his whole philosophy around the fact that the softly-softly approach was clearly not appropriate," he says.

He also believes the communication is not in place to allow development to follow.

"Nearly a year after the deployment, there's a complete lack of co-ordination between the big aid agencies," he says.

"There's just this complete disconnect between the military and these aid agencies, and of course, with the private, international non-governmental organisations."

His summary, a common theme among commentators on Afghanistan, is that the source of the problem lies beyond the country's borders.

"There's no doubt that the Pakistani military has been very brazenly supporting the Taleban for the last five years.

"It is, in my opinion, totally impossible to defeat the Taleban, or to bring peace to southern Afghanistan, without dealing with the issue of Pakistan.

"I think at the moment the Taleban has the psychological ascendancy," he says.

"I think there's a widespread belief amongst a majority of Afghans that the Taleban are coming back."

Outgoing commander

Yet Gen Richards himself is, not surprisingly, brimming with confidence despite the challenges that remain.

He points to the victory in Operation Medusa as the most significant moment in his command.

"What I am saying to you is, like the chess player, we are working through the problem. We have neutralised the Taleban militarily. We are now energising the reconstruction and development and improvement of governance."

On Pakistan, he has built a relationship with Gen Musharraf and is more positive than most: "It's whether or not you believe that the government of Pakistan is actually helping us. I believe that they are," he says.

He is realistic though, predicting that there will be an upsurge of Taleban violence this spring.

"I have no doubt about that, but I am confident that just like they really, really tried last summer and failed, that we are on top of them," he says.

"I already have a plan for our spring campaign which will continue to disrupt their efforts.

"It's been a huge privilege and I think what we have done, when there was much scepticism about Nato and Isaf last year, is prove that Nato is actually a great going concern and can do what it has been asked to do."
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'Black list' of Afghan antiquities seeks to halt illegal trade
Sat Feb 3, 1:25 AM ET
BRUSSELS (AFP) - The International Council of Museums published a "black list" of archaeological treasures illegally smuggled out of   Afghanistan, in a bid to stifle trade in the stolen antiquities.

"This initiative is aimed at preventing the trafficking and contributing to closing down the outlets," ICOM secretary general John Zvereff told a Brussels news conference on Friday.

Afghanistan, which has endured conflicts since 1979, has already lost tens of thousands of valuable archaeological artefacts, stolen from museums or smuggled out of dig sites for sale overseas.

The "non-exhaustive" new list includes descriptions and colour photos of 18 categories, from classical Gandhara stucco busts to Muslim period (seventh century) manuscripts.

As with its three previous "black lists" -- for Africa, Latin America and   Iraq -- it is not a catalogue of stolen goods but a resource for professionals, including museums, auction houses, experts and collectors, to alert them to key categories of stolen antiquities, said ICOM's Jennifer Thevenot.

The former Taliban regime in 2001 oversaw the destruction of the giant Bamyan buddhas and part of Kabul's national collection and their adversaries, warlords and administrators, either turned a blind eye or engaged in organised pillaging.

"Like the four and a half tonnes of gold, silver and bronze coins from the fifth century BC to the third century AD were discovered at Mir Zaka (100 kilometres/60 miles south of Kabul) and taken out of the country in the years 1992-94" under president Berhanuddin Rabbani, said Zemaryalai Tarzi, former director general of antiquities in Afghanistan.

Some Afghan artefacts have found their way into prestigious museums, some of which are ICOM members, including New York's Metropolitan Museum, added Tarzi.

Afghan ambassador to Brussels, Tandar Homayun, said that since the Taliban were toppled in 2001 the Kabul government had taken two main measures on the issue; introducing a new law banning the trafficking in works of art and creating a special police force to guard historic sites.

"Unfortunately we don't have sufficient means and sites venerated by the population continue to be despoiled at night," he admitted.

The museums organisation chose Brussels for its presentation as Belgium is a "major transit point for works of art," said Zvereff.

Created in 1946, the Paris-based ICOM has some 22,500 member from 114 national committees. A non-governmental organisation (NGO), it maintains formal relations with   UNESCO and has a consultative status with the   United Nations' Economic and Social Council
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Afghanistan: Amnesty Bill Could Threaten Faith In Democracy
By Ron Synovitz Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty
February 2, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- The lower chamber of Afghanistan's parliament passed a bill on January 31 that would grant immunity to all Afghans involved in war crimes during the last quarter century. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) warns that the legislation -- if approved by the upper chamber of parliament and signed by President Hamid Karzai -- could mean failure for the process of national reconciliation.

The legislation comes despite calls by human rights groups for trials against alleged war criminals -- including some members of parliament and the government.

Some observers argue that the legislation could make ordinary Afghans lose faith in democracy.

By Politicians, For Politicians

The bill passed by Afghanistan's Wolesi Jirga grants immunity to all Afghans involved in war crimes during the last 25 years.

RFE/RL Afghanistan analyst Amin Tarzi predicts that the upper chamber of parliament will quickly pass the bill in its current form. Tarzi also thinks President Karzai will support the legislation.

"I do not believe that President Karzai will veto this law passed by the lower house," Tarzi says. "Karzai's plan is to offer an olive branch to the Taliban. When you look at the wording of this, it is not only [about] the alleged crimes of the people who are in parliament or the jihadi leaders. This is actually part of a broader effort to bring in the Taliban or anybody who is an opponent of the government. It actually is forward-looking. But short-term forward-looking, at the expense of human rights and democracy."

Mohammad Mohaqeq is a former mujahedin leader who has himself been accused of war crimes and is one of the key legislators behind the amnesty declaration. He disagrees with critics who say the law means the end of any hope for reconciliation.

Mohaqeq, who placed third in the 2004 presidential race, tells RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan that the legislation was designed to bring peace and reconciliation to Afghan society.

"It mainly says that all of those who were involved in the 2 1/2 decades of war should be united together and join in the process of national reconciliation," Mohaqeq says.

Forgotten Victims

Adrian Edwards, the chief spokesman for UNAMA, tells RFE/RL that the law could have the opposite effect -- because it does not allow for a truthful debate that includes the voice of war crime victims.

"It's crucially important that the victims are not forgotten in this debate," Edwards says. "It really is up to the individual to decide whether they can forgive or not. And in that sense, for the [Afghan] National Assembly or any other body to suggest that there should be some blanket forgiveness -- we don't think that's the right way to go. We need to hear the voices of the victims, too. And if this process [of national reconciliation] is going to be successful, their voices will have to be equally heard."

Tarzi agrees that the bill could stifle any truthful debate.

"What is being forgotten right now is the vast majority of people on all sides who suffered. Afghans wanted some sort of a closure, saying, 'Mistakes were made. We are apologizing,'" Tarzi says. "And for the people who [committed such crimes], at least, to not be in positions of power. This legislation, in effect, basically exonerates -- and it disallows even criticism or discussion of anything that happened in the past 25 years. This is a broad mandate [lawmakers have] given to themselves, basically, because a lot of the parliamentarians are people who, at least in the view of the Afghans, are guilty of war crimes."

Foreign Experience

In a statement, UNAMA says international experience shows that "truth is vital to reconciliation." It notes that Karzai's government has fully endorsed an "Action Plan on Peace, Reconciliation and Justice" required under the internationally backed "Afghan Compact" of 2006. UNAMA also notes that the Afghan Constitution guarantees all citizens the right to freedom of expression -- and that people from all parts of Afghan society should be encouraged to join the debate about dealing with war crimes in the country's past.

Tarzi says that instead of blanket immunity for all war criminals, the best historical example for Afghan reconciliation is the Truth and Reconciliation Commission set up in South Africa to deal with the abuses of the Apartheid era.

"For any country that goes through a prolonged war, there is always a healing process needed," Tarzi says. "We have examples of international courts of justice. In the case of Afghanistan, the example that would have been best to be followed was the example of South Africa -- and basically, that was truth and reconciliation. The main issue was not to kill people and not to put more people in jail, but to acknowledge the mistakes of the past and have the people who [committed crimes] -- and least the ones who were [in positions of power] -- take responsibility. And try to do good things in society. But not [for such people to] be in the leadership role."

Critics and supporters alike say the bill could lead to an amnesty for fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar and former Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar -- who now heads his own militant group.

That could complicate Kabul's relations with the international community.

The Wolesi Jirga bill also dismisses allegations of war crimes published by Human Rights Watch (HRW) against some lawmakers. The bill rejects documentation by HRW researchers as "inaccurate reports" that are "based on malicious intentions."

Brad Adams, the Asia director of HRW, tells RFE/RL that the group's reports compile accurate facts known by all Afghans.

"Our reports have been based on the stories of Afghans," Adams says. "They've told us what happened to them. And they've told us who did it to them. And they named these people. So these are the facts. It's up to the government to make sure that people who were responsible for these crimes are held accountable. This is not something that one makes political deals about. Everybody in Afghanistan knows what happened -- things that had more or less been put to one side. And [the war criminals] were more or less hoping that everybody would forget. We've recorded people's stories and have made sure that the world didn't forget."

Adams and Tarzi warn that ordinary Afghans could become cynical about democracy if alleged war criminals in the parliament are able to declare a blanket immunity for themselves.
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Afghanistan: Mass Media Law Comes Under Scrutiny
By Amin Tarzi
February 2, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- The prospects for advancement and freedom in Afghanistan's media sector are perhaps closer now than at any other time in the country's history. The difference is even more marked if one compares the situation to that under the Taliban regime.


Since the demise of the Taliban regime in late 2001, the dissemination of information has gotten steadily easier and its purveyors more professional. But signs have recently emerged of efforts within both the executive branch and the legislature, the National Assembly, to curtail the activities of the media under the pretexts of national security or religion and culture.

Much discussion is emanating from the National Assembly's Wolesi Jirga (People's Council), which is due to review the Mass Media Law that President Hamid Karzai decreed shortly before the legislature came into existence in 2005.

Constitutional Context

In January 2004, a Constitutional Loya Jirga (Grand Assembly) approved a new constitution for Afghanistan. It declares that "freedom of expression is inviolable...[and] every Afghan has the right to express his thought through speech, writing, or illustration or other means, by observing the provisions" of the constitution. The same article (Article 34) further gives every Afghan the "right to print or publish topics without prior submission to the state authorities in accordance with the law." The constitution also stipulates that directives related to the media "will be regulated by the law."

Freedom of expression is further strengthened by Article 7, which obliges the state to "abide" by international conventions to which Afghanistan is a signatory, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Lawmakers are faced with a historic responsibility. They can increase the country's vulnerability to the arbitrary exercise of power. Or they can pave the way toward a more inclusive, tolerant, and democratic society that is mindful of the country's religious and cultural values.
But the freedoms enshrined in Afghanistan's Islamic constitution are also guided by Article 3, which stipulates that "in Afghanistan, no law can be contrary to the beliefs and provisions of the sacred religion of Islam."

The 2004 constitution calls for the mass media to be governed through legislation. Consecutive administrations -- first the Interim Authority in February 2002 and then the Transitional Administration in March 2004 -- approved temporary media guidelines before President Karzai decreed a new media law just days before the Afghan National Assembly was inaugurated in December 2005.

The draft media law already contains problematic clauses, and there are indications that the Wolesi Jirga could try to make the law more restrictive.

Viewed in that light -- assuming that the executive branch believes in freedom of the media and that the judiciary is not bent on curtailing freedoms to make political statements -- the current law already looks like a positive first step, allowing Afghanistan to become a democratic state.

Wolesi Jirga And Media Law

The Wolesi Jirga is essentially reviewing the 2005 media law in order to change it from a presidential decree to a law. Within the lower house, matters related to the media fall under the Wolesi Jirga's Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission.

Virtually all of that commission's proposed modifications of the existing media law are of a restrictive nature.

The current media law has no preamble, but Article 1 states: " P Constitution.< Afghan the of 2 and 1 Articles on based is sentence last The Islam.? [religion] sacred religion its Republic Islamic an Afghanistan for principles Islam?s obey shall MML Koran. Noble guidelines within (MML) Law Media Mass ?The begins: that preamble nine-part a with it replacing 1, Article revoke Commission Affairs Cultural Religious by amendments proposed injunctions consideration into taking Rights, Human Declaration Universal in enshrined media mass expression ?principles observing to commits law 2, In country.? activities organize [to] thought freedom right ensure order Rights 19 pursuance Constitution 34 accordance enacted been has This>

The proposed preamble further emphasizes the role of religion by recalling Article 3 of the constitution, which stipulates that "no law can be contrary to the beliefs and provisions of the sacred religion of Islam."

In a seemingly redundant statement, the proposed preamble then states that the MML should be in accordance with the Afghan Constitution and the "international covenants" that the country has signed.

While the 2005 media law was intended to cover all mass media, the proposed amended law states that the media law "is the first legislative step related to Radio and Television and supporting independent media in the reconstruction process of Afghanistan...but it does not cover all related matters." It adds that other areas -- such as electronic commerce, intellectual property (copyright), and "access to information held by the public authorities" require "separate laws to be construed in harmony with the [media law]."

The proposed Article 11 would call for the formation of a High Council of Media to "keep track" of income and expenditure of mass media, ensuring that they are "overt and transparent." The Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission's recommendation on the composition of the High Council of Media is still in flux, but so far the names include members of the Wolesi Jirga, a representative of the Ministry of Justice, a mullah from the Ministry of Religious Endowments and Islamic Affairs, and the head of the Journalism Faculty at Kabul University. There are no recommendations for the inclusion of members of civil society; nor is there any suggestion to include a representative of the media industry itself. If Afghanistan's media sector is to develop in a democratic direction -- while respecting the country's constitution -- media professionals and media lawyers should be included on the High Council of Media.

The Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission's proposed Article 33, on the "Dissemination of Prohibited Material" -- which in the original MML included four categories: "matters contrary to Islam or insulting to other religions," "insulting or accusative matters concerning individuals," matters contrary to the Afghan Constitution or Afghan criminal codes, and the exposure of the identities of victims of violence -- is modified to include four additional restrictions: "material jeopardizing stability, national security and territorial integrity of Afghanistan," "material providing false information which might disrupt public opinion," "publicity and promotion of any other religion other than Islam," and "material which might damage physical well-being, psychological and moral security of people, especially children and the youth."

Most of these restrictions -- including those listed in the original media law -- contravene provisions of Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, given the supremacy of Afghanistan's religious beliefs over other laws -- as clearly stated in that country's constitution -- an argument can be made that restrictions in the media law should either be limited to constitutional limitation or, if listed separately, clarified further to prevent abuse in the future. As listed in the media law -- particularly in the additional restriction proposed by the Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission -- there are also vague terms such as "insult" and clauses open to interpretation, such as "information which might disrupt public opinion," that beg clarification or deletion from the law.

There are also proposals for the creation of "independent" commissions to oversee complaints against Afghanistan's state-owned radio and television stations and against the official news agency (Bakhtar). But ensuring the independence of these commissions arguably demands that they not be included in the media law. Their creation and funding belongs in the arena of open and public debate within the National Assembly, and commission members deserve to be allowed to vote on their commissions' internal hierarchies.

Forward-Looking Law
Afghanistan has taken strides forward in the past four-plus years in the realm of media freedom. The current challenge is to avoid basking under slogans touting what has been achieved -- and instead to enact laws and regulations that protect the safeguards enshrined in the Afghan Constitution. At the same time, there is an obligation to list clearly the constitutional restrictions on the media.

To demonstrate real progress, the media law that the Wolesi Jirga's Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission proposes should do more than simply protect existing freedoms and create space for a professional and self-regulating media. It should also protect basic media freedoms against unwarranted encroachment (eds: intrusion) by any future executive.

The Religious and Cultural Affairs Commission -- and in fact all of their colleagues in the lower house -- are faced with a historic responsibility.

They can increase the country's vulnerability to the arbitrary exercise of power. Or they can pave the way toward a more inclusive, tolerant, and democratic society that is mindful of the country's religious and cultural values -- which are fully protected within the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan's constitution.
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`Accelerate' aid, Afghan envoy says
A year after world pledged $10.5 billion, Canada sees progress and dangers ahead
February 01, 2007 - BRUCE CAMPION-SMITH, Toronto Star - OTTAWA BUREAU
OTTAWA–Canada and the international community must be "more aggressive" in boosting development efforts in Afghanistan, says that country's top diplomat in Ottawa.

Speaking on the first anniversary of the Afghanistan Compact, an ambitious strategy meant to improve the country's security and economy, Ambassador Omar Samad said nations must now "accelerate" the implementation of that plan.

"We have to be more aggressive in terms of development aid ... and in making sure that the Afghan people feel that this compact ... is making a real difference in their lives," Samad said.

He made his remarks on Parliament Hill with Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay in an appearance meant to tout the progress made so far in Afghanistan.

At a London conference a year ago, Canada joined nearly 70 other nations and international bodies to pledge $10.5 billion (U.S.) to help Afghanistan fight poverty, improve security and crack down on the drug trade.

Canada's investments in Kandahar – development spending will rise to $20 million this year, up from $16 million last year – are already producing "tangible, touchable" signs of progress," MacKay said.
"You can see that dams (are) being built for greater irrigation and access to water supply," as well as roads to bring crops and goods to market and that bridges must be built to improve mobility around the country, he said.

But there were notes of caution sounded too, as Samad called 2007 a "critical" year in his country's transformation from war-ravaged nation to stable democracy.

"Thousands of Afghans have laid down their arms and joined this process. There are still thousands more who haven't. Amongst those are hard-core Taliban leaders who we don't expect to change," Samad said.

It's the resilience of those hard-core fighters that has sparked fears of a spring offensive – once snows melt in mountain passes and the weather improves – aimed at disrupting the work of allied troops, including 2,500 Canadians based in Kandahar.

"Traditionally in the winter, the insurgency reduces somewhat but based on our experience in past years I think they will mount a challenge in the spring again," said David Sproule, Canada's ambassador in Afghanistan.

"We are prepared for that," he told reporters in a telephone call from Berlin, where he was attending a meeting of nations involved in the compact.

Canadian troops are braced for a spring insurgent offensive but are hoping the progress they've made over the last year will take the punch out of the predicted attacks, said Col. Eric Tremblay, director of current operations for the Canadian Forces.

The big difference is that the Canadians, who moved into the Kandahar region almost a year ago, have pushed into rural areas along with Afghan security forces, where they are in regular contact with tribal elders and community leaders, Tremblay said.

In Afghanistan, NATO commanders said yesterday their success at removing key Taliban leaders has had an impact as well. Brig.-Gen. Richard Nugee, of NATO's International Security Assistance Force, said it will be NATO troops who will be launching the real offensive, referring to coming military operations but giving no details.

NATO allies are also examining ways to shore up and expand the Afghan border police to combat the influx of Taliban insurgents from Pakistan, a senior Canadian officer told Canadian Press.
"It's going to take a lot of work and a lot of effort to build up a robust network of surveillance and presence on this side of the border," said Col. Mike Kampman, chief of staff to Brig.-Gen. Ton van Loon, commander of coalition forces in southern Afghanistan.

A consensus seems to be building among NATO partners for each country to take over responsibility for the improvement of the border police in its own province. For example, Canada could take a lead role in Kandahar province, while the British handle volatile Helmand province, Kampman said.

This year, Sproule said Canada will focus its efforts in Kandahar on building new infrastructure, improving the justice system and boosting the Afghan national police force.

with files from Associated Press
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Mulla Omar is surely in Afghanistan, claims Musharraf
By ANI Saturday February 3, 12:03 PM
Islamabad, Feb 3 (ANI): Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has said that he was "500 percent sure" that the Taliban leader Mulla Omar was hiding in Afghanistan.

The President also said that no Taliban leaders were in Pakistan, although a top commander Mulla Dadullah had been there and authorities had tried three times to catch him, reported the Daily Times.

He added that the attempts to target Dadullah were carried out with "total intelligence cooperation" with foreign forces in Afghanistan."

Mulla Omar reportedly visited Pakistan when he was a madrassa student.

"All Taliban leaders are now in Afghanistan and leading the insurgency," said Musharraf, adding that the Taliban leaders would be arrested if they entered Pakistan. (ANI)
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U.S. House Speaker Calls for More European Aid for Afghanistan
House of Representatives delegation criticizes new Iraq strategy - By David McKeeby - USINFO Staff Writer
Washington – A delegation of U.S. lawmakers is calling for more international help to rebuild Afghanistan and also is criticizing the Bush administration’s new strategy for Iraq.

Afghanistan is “a fight that needs our concerted effort and that of NATO nations,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters at a January 30 press conference, “but we need much more of an effort.”  

Pelosi, a California Democrat, took leadership of the U.S. House of Representatives January 4 following her party’s triumph in the November 2006 elections.  She and a group composed of five other Democratic and one Republican congressmen discussed their recent trip to meet with leaders in Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and saluted U.S. diplomatic and military personnel. 

“Sadly, the war in Afghanistan is far from over,” she said, characterizing the struggle to defeat remaining militants and help the Afghan people rebuild their country as “a forgotten war” overshadowed by ongoing operations in Iraq.

NATO member states must honor their pledges to dedicate more troops to the International Security Assistance Force, which took over from the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan in 2006, Pelosi said, and join the United States in redoubling efforts to support Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government.

“For years, we have been calling for NATO to take over the Afghan mission,” Congressman Tom Lantos, a California Democrat who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said.  “And while, technically, NATO has done so, NATO has done so in a half-hearted, unsatisfactory, shabby fashion.”

Lantos criticized the limitations placed on NATO forces from Germany, France, Italy and Spain. These limitations, he said, complicated allied commanders’ jobs and unfairly placed the burden of the mission on forces from Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States.  “It is an outrage that this gigantic military alliance cannot provide the troops necessary to win this battle, which is an eminently winnable battle.” 

“I'm disappointed that our NATO partners haven't done a better job in putting more folks into Afghanistan,” Representative Ike Skelton, a Democrat from Missouri who heads the House Armed Services Committee, said.  “The NATO partners have committed themselves to the fight, and they must step up with more forces.” 

Members of the delegation emphasized that the alliance must do more to help Afghanistan secure its border. “There are many things the Pakistanis are doing well,” Lantos said, “but it is self-evident that they have not yet succeeded in closing the frontier to Taliban terrorist groups … Pakistan will have to do better.” 

Ohio Republican David Hobson agreed, adding that NATO also should help the Afghan government eradicate the booming opium trade that is disrupting Afghanistan’s recovery and flooding Europe’s streets with heroin. 

“The military effort against the Taliban is not over, and more troops are needed, and our NATO and European partners have got to do their fair share,” he said.

Pelosi characterized the current situation in Iraq as catastrophic and strongly criticized the Bush administration’s plan to “surge” thousands more troops into Baghdad and al-Anbar province to help the democratically elected Iraqi government bring sectarian violence under control.
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NATO to step up efforts to control Afghan border: general
LONDON, Feb 2, 2007 (AFP) - NATO forces are getting ready to step up efforts to take control of the Afghan side of the country's border with Pakistan, the alliance's military chief said in an interview published in the Financial Times on Friday.

"NATO needs to work with Pakistan for a reduction if not elimination of the unlawful and illegal movement across the border," General John Craddock, NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe, was quoted as saying by the business daily.

In an interview conducted on a flight back to Europe after a visit to Pakistan and Afghanistan, Craddock was also asked if NATO was planning any military action to temper the flow of insurgents across the border.

"ISAF is developing plans for that very effect," he responded, referring to the International Security Assistance Force, the NATO-led grouping made up of about 33,000 troops from 37 nations.

During his visit to Pakistan, Craddock met with Pakistani military commanders in Islamabad, describing the discussions as "frank, candid and promising."

He also said that he was not aware of any problems along Afghanistan's border with Iran, commenting: "As far as the west is concerned, the border with Iran, I have not heard of any untoward problems there."

"Obviously we are very vigilant. We watch that closely."
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A political curtain-raiser for the Taliban
Asia Times 02/02/2007 By Syed Saleem Shahzad
The Olsi Jirga, the Afghan lower house of parliament, has granted immunity to all Afghans involved in the country's 25 years of conflict, despite calls by human-rights groups for war-crimes trials.

The decision will cover fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Omar and former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who now heads his own militant group. The decision is just another dent in the US-led "war on terror" campaign at a time when the Taliban-led spring uprising is imminent and the Taliban show no desire to initiate dialogue for peace.

As the temperature has risen in Kabul to 1 degree Celsius - from minus-13 only two weeks ago - reconciliatory efforts on the part of Kabul have gained momentum.

The purpose of the initiative is to split opinion within the Taliban-led resistance, which has increasingly drawn in warlords across the country. From the tone of President Hamid Karzai's statements, though, it is clear that he does not intend to go as far as power-sharing; he talks of dialogue with "an enemy who is after our annihilation and is shedding our blood".

The amnesty decision, nevertheless, is significant. The overwhelming majority in the Olsi Jirga is former mujahideen, including Speaker Younus Qanooni and Professor Abdul Rab Rasool Sayyaf. The single largest group is Hekmatyar's Hezb-e-Islami, besides a sizable presence of former Taliban, including diehards such as Mullah Abdul Salam Rocketi, whose "defection" from the Taliban was made under considerable duress.

In early 2006, politicians in Kabul would have learned of the jump in support for the Taliban and their planned spring offensive for that year, which many believed would be successful. As a result, politicians drew up a political blueprint premised on the Taliban capturing Kabul and other key cities. In effect, they were acting as the Taliban's political wing. The latest act of granting immunity can be viewed as a continuation of this, and it sends a very strong message to all segments of Afghan society.

Spring sprung The Taliban's plan for a mass uprising has now become an issue of honor, and this year it is many times better prepared than last year.

It is estimated that last year the Taliban were able to draw from a pool of about 40,000 foot soldiers, many of them secure in the Pakistani tribal areas of North Waziristan and South Waziristan. This year, the number of fighters has risen by many thousand, many of whom have already been launched from Pakistan into the Gramsir district of Helmand province across the border.

Thousands of others are ready to go from Pakistan's Bajaur agency into Kunar, Nooristan and then up the northeastern valley of Tagab to besiege Kabul.

In addition, there is a strong presence of Taliban in the Afghan provinces of Paktia, Paktika, Khost and Ghazni - possibly as many as 100,000. The Taliban have also regrouped in the western provinces of Faryab, Herat, Ghor and Baghdais, where they have sizable forces.

Within the next few weeks, Mullah Omar is expected to make major decisions on the appointment of new commanders and also make changes in command structures.

The roadmap for 2006, which centered on the fall of Kandahar and mobilization of Taliban forces to Kabul, is also likely to be altered, possibly allowing for an assault on an eastern city. This happened in 1991 when Khost was the first city to fall to the Taliban, followed by Jalalabad and finally Kabul in 1996.

Nonetheless, whether the Taliban move first on the east or the southwest, Kabul is clearly reading the signs, and preparing for the possibility of the Taliban entering Kabul.
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BANGLADESH: Saarc Editors' Conference begins in Delhi Feb 9
Convergence in media will be discussed at first conference
The Daily Star Friday, February 2, 2007
New Delhi --- Promoting understanding among the people of the region and core media values are among the subjects that would come up for discussion at the first-ever South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) Editors' Conference to be held in New Delhi on February 9 and 10.

Growth trends and quality issues in regional news media, convergence and challenge of the Internet, freedom, social responsibility, accountability, state, market and the media as well as media and foreign policy are some other key issues which will be addressed by the conference, an Indian leading newspaper reported yesterday.

The Hindu quoted Indian External Affairs Ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna as saying that the conference is being organised as a build-up to the 14th Saarc summit to be held in New Delhi on April 3 and 4.
The Indian external affairs ministry and the Media Development Foundation, a not-for-profit public trust that runs the Asian College of Journalism in Chennai, are organising the conference.

Sarna said it was possibly the first time in the media field that such a public-private venture is being organised.

The media, he said, was developing very quickly in South Asia and a fruitful discussion could be held on several issues and trends in order to promote understanding among the peoples in the region.

The spokesman said the common platform provided by the external affairs ministry and Media Development Foundation would be used to bring together professional journalists and cover the print, broadcast and Internet media.

A concept note on the conference said the purpose behind the conference was to have a free and open discussion and frame media-related issues that can help initiate a wider public and civil society debate in South Asia.

Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon will deliver the inaugural address at the conference on February 9 while External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee will attend the closing ceremony the next day.

Among the foreign participants expected to attend the conference are Kanak Mani Dixit, Yuvraj Ghimire and Narayan Wagle (from Nepal), Editor of The Daily Star Mahfuz Anam, Shyamal Datta and Saiful Bari (Bangladesh), Rehana Hakim, Imran Aslam and Najam Sethi (Pakistan), Sonam Kinga, Tashi Phuntsho Wangdi and Dasho Kinley Dorji (Bhutan), Thavarajah, Jatila Wallabada, Singha Ranatunga (Sri Lanka), Abdullah Naeem and Mariyam Suhana (the Maldives) and Hamida Osman, Zaid Mohseni and Barry Salam (Afghanistan).

Indian editors who have confirmed their participation include N Ram, N Ravi, T N Ninan and Vinod Mehta, according to The Hindu.

Media Development Foundation Chairman Shashi Kumar will be the moderator at the conference.
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Plenty of Afghan reconstruction info on internet: minister
February 1, 2007 - CBC News - Canada has pledged to spend about $100 million to help Afghanistan rebuild itself and the federal government website is the best place for details, the minister in charge of international development said Thursday.

Josée Verner, minister of international co-operation, said in question period in Ottawa that the government is being accountable for funding it has announced for reconstruction projects in Afghanistan.
Michael Ignatieff, a Toronto Liberal MP, asked Verner how the government is tracking its reconstruction money in the troubled country.

"Canada has earmarked millions of dollars for development [in] Afghanistan but we are completely in the dark about how that money is being spent," Ignatieff said in French.

"Can the minister of international co-operation tell us what accountability measures are in place to ensure that the money invested in reconstruction is properly spent and getting to the Afghan people?" he asked.

Verner said the answer is a few clicks away. "As you know, the Canadian government has made a commitment to helping with reconstruction in Afghanistan," she said. "I would invite the member to consult the internet site to see what we are doing to help Afghanistan and you will see the results that we have obtained."

Canada has said it will spend close to $1 billion over 10 years in Afghanistan to rebuild the country, reduce poverty and enable the Afghan government to establish its authority.

Canada has set up an embassy in Kabul, as part of its mission, and has more than 2,000 troops stationed in Kandahar. Forty-four Canadian soldiers have died since Canada first sent troops to the country in early 2002.

Canada has also announced funding for several projects, including the building of schools, clinics, roads, drainage and waste management systems, promotion of literacy programs and efforts to clear land mines.

Wednesday was the first anniversary of the Afghanistan Compact, a five-year agreement between the United Nations, Afghan government and Western nations that sets out goals for security, governance and development.

According to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canadian involvement in Afghanistan is guided by the agreement. It was adopted in London, England, a year ago. "Rebuilding Afghanistan after decades of war and oppression takes time," Harper said in a news release on Wednesday.

"We must remember that development cannot occur in the absence of stability and security. Our brave men and women of the Canadian Forces are working alongside our development workers and diplomats to ensure that progress can continue."

Harper told Ignatieff in question period on Thursday, after being asked about attempts to "rebalance the mission," that the mission is something of which Canadians can be proud. "Let me tell you what the mission is about," Harper said.

"It's about the best traditions of this country, brave men and women putting on the Canadian uniform, defending freedom and democracy and protecting the rights of people around the world."
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"Pak's help is crucial in winning Afghan war"
Washington, Feb 1 (ANI): A conservative US think tank's official has advised the US administration to put "pressure" on Pakistan to ensure that the Taliban find "no safe haven within its borders", else, according to her, American plans to stem the growing Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan will have only limited impact.

Lisa Curtis of the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation, said that the effectiveness of US' policy towards Pakistan over the next few years would largely determine whether the US prevails in the global war on terror.

The Pakistan-Afghanistan border area is one of the "most dangerous terrorist safe havens in the world", she said and added that although Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf deserved credit for apprehending hundreds of Qaeda operatives, the continued presence of the Taliban and Qaeda terrorists along the border posed a "threat to American interests and the US relations with Pakistan".

"It would be politically risky for Musharraf to crack down on the Taliban as they were assisted by Pakistan security services in the 1990s, and still has close ties to some intelligence officers and religious parties. Musharraf has to contend with a growing perception that he is doing US bidding in the war on terror at the expenseof his country's interests. US officials understand Musharraf's constraints, but they are increasingly frustrated by the continued cross-border movement of Taliban forces," the Daily Times quoted her as saying.

She further said: "Public debate on limiting US assistance to Pakistan could actually weaken Musharraf's hand in convincing his military commanders that the US is a reliable partner. Islamabad has been most responsive in the past to targeted, hard-headed diplomacy. Only this type of tough diplomacy will persuade Islamabad that the US will remain in Afghanistan until the Taliban are defeated."

According to her, US officials should take a more direct role in mediating differences between Kabul and Islamabad. Part of this effort involves encouraging both sides to pursue the development of cross-border tribal jirgas, she said and added that failure to fully confront Pakistan's reluctance to crack down on the Taliban would have disastrous implications for the war on terror. (ANI)
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AFGHANISTAN: Rebuilding 'not on track'
KABUL, 1 February (IRIN) - The international community pledged billions of dollars for the recovery of Afghanistan in 2006, and in return, the Afghan government promised to introduce policy reforms to improve its people's lives. Out of this was born the Afghanistan Compact, which established targets and benchmarks to be met by the Afghan authorities over five years.

In February 2006, 64 countries and 11 international organisations meeting in London agreed to contribute US$10.5 billion towards the reconstruction of Afghanistan until the end of 2010. They identified security, governance and economic development as the three key areas that the government needed to focus on to ensure stability and progress.

One year on, analysts say the Afghan government is behind in meeting even the most basic targets. In a report released in New York on Tuesday, Human Rights Watch (HRW) says the Afghan government is failing to meet the basic security and human rights needs of its citizens.

"Afghanistan hasn't really met any of the benchmarks, particularly those addressing the wellbeing of the Afghan people," said Sam Zarifi, Asia research director at HRW. "Kabul and its international backers have made little progress in providing basic needs like security, food, electricity, water and healthcare."

For example, one of the benchmarks was to cut the proportion of Afghans living on less than $1 a day by 3 percent annually and reduce the number of people suffering from hunger by 5 percent.

However, an estimated 6.5 million people perennially face hunger while more than half the country's 30 million inhabitants live below the poverty line, says the United Nations.

Another target was to disband all illegal armed groups in the country by the end of 2007. HRW has voiced concern over the slow progress of the UN-backed disarmament programme, which has fuelled doubts over the government's ability to dismantle the many armed groups operating in the country.

The HRW report says hundreds of illegally armed groups, many ostensibly allied with the government, continue to exercise power throughout Afghanistan. "In many parts of the country, warlords and their militias have perpetrated serious human rights abuses such as illegal land grabs, intimidation of journalists and factional and ethnic violence," the watchdog said.

"Security is the first pillar of the compact, but tens of thousands of Afghans don't feel safe enough to lead normal lives," Zarifi said. "Life is so dangerous that many Afghans are unable to go to school, get healthcare, or take goods to market."

Nassrullah Stanikzai, a lecturer at the political science faculty of Kabul University, echoed that view. "Unfortunately, we had a very harsh year. Our people do not feel any improvements in their lives. We saw more suicide bombing … more civilian deaths and more human rights violations in 2006," he said.

More than 1,000 civilians were killed in 2006 in attacks by the Taliban and other anti-government forces, most in southern Afghanistan. In all, more than 4,400 Afghans died in conflict-related violence, twice as many as in 2005 and more than in any other year since the Taliban fell in 2001, according to HRW.

The Afghan government has conceded that it has encountered unexpected problems but remains confident it will meet the compact's requirements. "The government has tried its best during the past year to implement all the benchmarks of the compact properly, but certainly there were problems such as insecurity," said Siamak Herawi, President Hamid Karzai's deputy spokesman. He added that "the compact has a five-year lifespan [and] if there are no security constraints, I am sure we can implement all the compact benchmarks successfully".

Adrian Edwards, UN spokesman in Afghanistan, said the world body was committed to the successful fulfilment of the benchmarks of the Afghanistan Compact. But "realistically some of the benchmarks of the compact may have to be adjusted to reflect the changing realities in Afghanistan over the five years", he said.
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Facts on the ground in Pakistan
Pakistani officials are angrily rebutting charges their country is providing a sanctuary for al-Qaida and Taliban, while attacks by Islamic extremists there suggests that they may not see Pakistan as a safe haven, either.

By Shaun Waterman in Washington, DC for ISN Security Watch (01/02/07)
In briefings in the past few days in Washington and Brussels, Pakistani officials have lashed out at their critics, arguing that, since 11 September 2001, they have apprehended hundreds of al-Qaida and Taliban fighters, and suffered more than 1,000 military and civilian casualties as a result.

"We are already standing on our head, what else can we do?" asked Pakistani Ambassador to Washington Mahmud Ali Durrani last week in a briefing here for the Urdu language media. ISN Security Watch was provided with translated quotes by a reporter who was present.

"We have gone beyond our capacity to help [in] the war against terror," Durrani complained, referring to his government's support for the United States. "We are even helping those who say that we are not doing anything."

Durrani said he did not understand US media criticisms of Pakistani efforts. "They say that we are not doing anything. Then they also report that suicide bombers have killed Pakistani soldiers. If we are not doing anything, why are they killing our soldiers?" he asked. "If we are supporting them, why are they killing our people?"

In Brussels on Tuesday, Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz told lawmakers from the NATO countries assembled for the North Atlantic Council that criticism of Pakistani efforts in the lawless tribal areas on its remote and mountainous Afghan frontier was "baseless," according to an account carried by the semi-official Associated Press of Pakistan.

"It is time for all of us and not just for Pakistan to do more to help Afghanistan," the agency quoted Aziz as saying. "The problem lies within Afghanistan and so does the solution."

Last week, it might have been easy to dismiss this as the kind of injured posturing that has typified Pakistan's response to even the mildest of suggestions that there might be sympathy for al-Qaida and Taliban extremists in the country.

But a series of terror attacks since the weekend, beginning with a suicide bombing at the Marriott hotel in Islamabad on Friday - and significantly including sectarian attacks on Shia worshippers during the holiest day on their religious calendar - strongly suggests that violent Islamic extremists are doing their best to undermine and destabilize the Pakistani government.

That is not the behavior of a movement that believes its allies and protectors are in power. The targets of the weekend's violence are significant in this context. Just the day after Friday's attack in the capital, another suicide bomber blew himself up outside a Shia mosque in Peshawar in Pakistan's remote northwest, killing 15 and wounding at least 30 others - mostly police officers.

Then on Monday, the second-to-last day of Muhurram, the festival of mourning observed mainly by Shi'ites, a third suicide bomber killed a police officer protecting a Shia religious procession and a bystander in Dera Ismail Khan, another northwestern city, and rocket fire injured 11 worshippers at another Shia mosque in the region.

Ashura, the climax of Muhurram, was marked on Tuesday by the usual parades, but authorities were on high alert. In Islamabad, the marches took place "inside a ring of steel of the kind last seen during the visit of [heir to the British throne] Prince Charles and [his wife] Camilla," wrote Guardian blogger Declan Walsh. In both Islamabad and Karachi, thousands of police and intelligence agents were backed up by rifle-wielding snipers on rooftops, with armored cars and tanks in reserve.

There is nothing new, alas, about sectarian violence in Pakistan. Violent Sunni Islamic extremist groups have a long history of attacks against Shiites, and more than 2,000 people have died in religious violence there over the past 20 years - the vast majority of them in such attacks, according to the International Crisis Group.

And without any formal claims of responsibility as yet, it is hard to trace the lineaments of culpability through the tangled skein of extremist networks operating in the country. Sunni extremists unconnected to al-Qaida and the Taliban may have carried out the attacks for their own reasons.

But the timing, on the heels of Pakistani military strikes against Taliban- and al-Qaida-linked targets in the tribal areas, is highly suggestive; and analysts have long noted the extensive links between the three types of extremist groups in Pakistan: Taliban-linked fighters in the northwest; jihadis dedicated to expelling India from the part of disputed Kashmir it controls; and religiously and socially motivated sectarians in the Pakistani heartland.

In sum, the attacks look very much like an effort by the extremists to ferment sectarian conflict - perhaps inspired by the success of a similar strategy in Iraq - as a way of destabilizing the government in revenge for its renewed assaults on their leaders.

So it is perhaps understandable that senior Pakistani officials - some of whom have personally been the target of assassination attempts by al-Qaida-linked extremists - were a little upset by recent public comments from the US government about the terror group's leaders enjoying "a secure hideout" in Pakistan.

"We believe that instead of looking for scapegoats it would be more desirable to increase cooperation, especially real time intelligence sharing, rather than resorting to public pronouncements, which only embolden the enemy," Aziz told the NATO lawmakers in a thinly veiled swipe at recent congressional testimony from US Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte.

Afghan officials have complained for years that they regularly provided intelligence to Islamabad on the whereabouts, satellite telephone numbers and vehicle registrations of Taliban leaders based in the Pakistani city of Quetta, but that no action was taken against them.

Pakistani officials, for their part, have retorted that the information was stale and useless by the time they got it.

Relations between the two countries are tense, and after a trip this week to the region, GOP Congressman David Hobson, Republican-Ohio, noted that poor chemistry between their leaders was impeding progress against the Taliban insurgency US and NATO forces were facing in Afghanistan.

"There also needs to be some resolution [of] the personal tensions between [Pakistani] President [Pervez] Musharraf and [Afghan President Hamid] Karzai," he told reporters at a briefing Tuesday.
So obvious are the tensions over cross border infiltration that they have even become a subject for humor. Karzai, who became a father for the first time last week, "is blaming the Pakistanis" for the birth, one diplomat joked. "It is [cross-border] infiltration."

In an effort to improve intelligence cooperation between the two wary neighbors, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan last week opened a joint operations center staffed by intelligence officials from NATO and the Pakistani and Afghan militaries.

Aziz also told NATO lawmakers that "Availability of better technological capabilities, which we are seeking from Western countries, would improve our surveillance as well as interdiction capabilities" on the border with Afghanistan.

He said that over 80,000 Pakistan military and paramilitary personnel had been deployed on the long border to stop cross-border infiltration.

Aziz added Pakistan was proceeding with plans for selective fencing of certain routes across the border that he said were heavily used by drug traffickers and other "miscreants." In the past, officials have said they planned to use landmines in some areas, too.

But the border is almost by its nature porous. It is not recognized by the Afghan government or by the Pashtun tribes whose land it divides; it encompasses - especially in the tribal regions - some of the most remote and inaccessible terrain on the face of the earth; and it separates three million Afghan refugees, many living in chaotic, sprawling refugee camps, from their homeland.

Durrani said that 15-20,000 people crossed the two main border posts in the northwest every day. "How can we know which of these bearded Afghans are ordinary citizens and who are Taliban?" he asked.
But the mention of the refugee issue is also a not very coded reference to what a close Musharraf ally this week called America's "original sin" in the region - abandoning Afghanistan to bloody chaos after US and Pakistani-backed Islamic holy warriors had forced the Soviet Union out of there in the 1980s.

"The United States is blaming Pakistan for its own mistakes," Pakistani Senator Mushahid Hussain, chairman of the Pakistani parliament's foreign relations committee and a leader of the ruling Muslim League, told a forum in Washington on Monday.

This resentment is widespread among Pakistani officials and it is corrosive of their ability to really take ownership of the issue of extremism. As long as they continue to see the problem as someone else's "fault" they will find it hard to confront.

Shaun Waterman is a senior writer and analyst for ISN Security Watch. He is a UK journalist based in Washington, DC, covering homeland and national security for United Press International.
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Ex-US official calls for acceptance of Durand Line
NEW YORK, Feb 1 (Pajhwok Afghan News): An influential American opinion builder, former diplomat and eminent South Asian expert has said Afghanistan be asked to officially accept Durand Line as its border with Pakistan.

Karl F Inderfurth, who was the Assistant Secretary of State from 1997 to 2001, believes that this would go a long way in solving the problem in the region.

"Washington and other capitals should urge Afghanistan to officially accept the so-called Durand Line of 1893 as the border with Pakistan," Inderfurth urged the members of the House Armed Services Committee.

Drawn out by the British colonial rulers in 1893, the poorly marked 2,640-km Duran Line is being disputed and contested by Afghanistan as its international border. Afghanistan Loya Jirga of 1949 declared Durand Line as invalid as they saw it as ex-parte on their side.

"Although President Karzai does not publicly dispute this border, his government has been reluctant to accept it officially lest this cause internal political trouble," he said.

"A comprehensive settlement to secure Afghanistan's border with Pakistan is long overdue," Inderfurth said, and argued that a secured Afghan-Pakistan border was the key to bringing lasting peace in Afghanistan.

And the key to securing the Afghan-Pakistan border is to improve the troubled relations between the two neighbours and improve their level of cooperation, he said.  Afghanistan has been opposing the recent Pakistan's effort to fence the Durand Line.

At present, the Rankin Professor of the Practice of International Affairs at George Washington University, Inderfurth said: "Providing security to Afghanistan can't be accomplished without doing more to secure the Afghanistan-Pakistan border." 

The Taliban can lose every firefight with superior NATO, US and Afghan National Army forces and still turn southern and eastern Afghanistan into a "no development" zone and stir insecurity in Kabul and elsewhere, he said.

"As long as the Taliban have a "safe haven" in Pakistan - to use the recent words of Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte - they can continue their insurgency indefinitely, making it virtually impossible for Afghanistan to become a country at peace with itself and its neighbours," Inderfurth said.
Lalith K. Jha
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Power capacity of Mahipar, Sarobi dams to be enhanced
KABUL, Feb 1 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The government of Germany will provide three million euros to the Ministry of Water and Energy for the reconstruction of Mahipar and Sarobi dams.

This was announced by Mir Mohammad Sediq Eshan, deputy minister for Water and Energy, during a news conference here on Thursday. 

He said Germany had constructed two dams in 1967. They had granted 17.5 million euros to Afghanistan for reconstruction of the two dams during the previous five years.

He said one part of the amount would be spent on survey for searching new sources of energy like sun and wind.

He said the three turbines at the Sarobi Power Dam had limited capacity of generating 33 mega watts electricity. It is because only three turbines (45 per cent) are working. With the German assistance, the remaining turbines would start operation to enhance its power generation capacity.

He said the Mahipar Dam had the capacity of producing 22 mega watt electricity, but only 16 mega watt was produced at the moment. There would be an 80 per cent increase in its capacity after its renovation.

He said the reconstruction work at the Sarobi Dam would complete before the end of 2007. After their reconstruction, the two dams would not need any more rebuilding for the coming 20 years.
Zainab Mohammadi
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Afghanistan Compact Anniversary Marked in Canada
Embassy of the I.R. of Afghanistan in Canada January 31, 2007
Ottawa – The Ambassador of Afghanistan to Canada joined H.E. Foreign Minister Peter MacKay at a press conference on Parliament Hill Wednesday marking the anniversary of the Afghanistan Compact signed between the Afghan Government and the international community in London on January 31, 2006.

Ambassador Samad thanked Canada and other donors for their continued comprehensive engagement and contributions towards security, stability and development in Afghanistan, as stipulated in the Compact.

Minister MacKay said Canada's presence in Afghanistan is helping reconstruction efforts in the country, as outlined in the international agreement. He added that a balancing of the mission is contained in the Compact that sets out benchmarks in various areas of security, governance and development for five years.

The Afghan envoy stressed the need to fulfill the goals and timelines set out in the compact during the remaining four years through aggressive and accelerated means and commitments.

The Ambassador also thanked H.E. Prime Minister Stephen Harper for issuing a statement of support Wednesday in which he called the Compact ”a milestone agreement,” and outlined Canada’s contributions through programs to support schools, healthcare, infrastructure, small loans and other developmental initiatives.

Ambassador Samad said that overall the international community agrees with the Afghan government that development cannot effectively occur in the absence of stability and security. He added that “security in Afghanistan also has a regional component which needs to be seriously addressed if we are going to succeed in our efforts and protect civilians and NATO forces, including Canadians, from terrorist infiltrations and disruptions.”

The Afghan Ambassador also attended a Senate session on Wednesday during which The Honorable Speaker, Sen. Noel Kinsella, called for an official recognition of the Afghan Ambassador. In return, Amb. Samad expressed his gratitude of the Senate’s recognition period.
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