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June 28, 2007 

Scores of people killed, wounded in floods in Afghanistan
Thursday June 28, 4:45 PM
(Kyodo) _ Scores of people have been killed and wounded after floods triggered by heavy rain hit Afghanistan over the past week, officials said Thursday.
In the capital Kabul, four people were killed and several wounded Wednesday when a sudden heavy rain caused a flood which swept away several houses, the Interior Ministry said.

In Panjshir Province in northern Afghanistan, around 100 people have been killed and injured since Wednesday when heavy rain caused flooding in Rokha and Onaba areas, said Abdul Rahman Kabir, a provincial council member.

At least 10 bodies gave been recovered so far, he said, adding tens of animals have also died and more than 100 houses have been washed away.

In neighboring Parwan Province, five people were killed, eight wounded and four are missing as floods hit several areas, said Abdul Rahman Ahmadi, a member of the provincial council.

More than 50 houses have been destroyed and agriculture land has also been washed away, Ahmadi said.
 
In Kapisa, also a northern province, two people were killed and more than 50 animals were swept away, an official said.

Elsewhere, in Kunar Province in eastern Afghanistan, about 10 people were killed and several wounded in floods, said Abdul Jalal, a deputy police chief.

There were also reports of floods in western and central parts of the country but details were not immediately available.

Flooded riverbanks have covered roads and washed out bridges in several provinces.

The onset of warm weather and unusually high levels of rain and snowmelt in mountain areas have caused floods and landslides.

The steep hillsides in the country are prone to floods and mudslides.
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Taliban free 18 mine clearers held for six days
Thu Jun 28, 2:06 AM ET
KABUL (AFP) - The insurgent Taliban movement has released 18 Afghan mine clearers captured six days ago, but has held on to their equipment and three sniffer dogs, the rebel group and an official said Thursday.

Nine of the men were released late Wednesday and the remaining nine early Thursday, Mine Detection and Dogs Centre head Mohammad Shohab Hakimi told AFP.

"They are all freed. We are very happy. They were a bit depressed but OK. The equipment and the dogs are still with the Taliban," he said.

The group was captured early Saturday in the southern province of Ghazni's Andar district, about 120 kilometres (75 miles) south of Kabul, as they were driving to a minefield that they were working to clear.

The Taliban's "leading council" had decided the men should be freed because they had been working in Afghanistan for years, said a spokesman, Yousuf Ahmadi.

"They were advised and they were set free," he said. The Taliban has warned Afghans against working for foreign companies and the international military forces here to help the government deal with the insurgency.

After nearly three decades of war, Afghanistan remains one of the world's most mined countries despite internationally backed efforts involving thousands of people employed to destroy the devices.

Taliban insurgents have been behind a series of abductions in recent months, including the kidnapping of two French aid workers who were freed late April after several weeks in captivity.

But in early March the Taliban killed an Afghan reporter and a driver they had kidnapped along with an Italian journalist, who was released in exchange for the freedom of five Taliban.
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Kabul suicide attack kills 2 Americans: police
by Waheedullah Massoud
KABUL (AFP) - A suicide car bomb exploded near a foreign security convoy in Kabul Thursday, killing two US nationals and an Afghan woman, officials said, in the third suicide bombing in the capital this month.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force said there were dead and wounded in the attack but it had no details. It had earlier said the blast near an ISAF convoy but a spokesman said later, "Now we are not sure."

"Two foreigners, Americans, are dead," the city's criminal investigation chief, Alishah Paktiawal, told AFP from the scene. "Five civilians are wounded."

He said the company involved was a US-based security firm.

The interior ministry said only one foreigner was killed and the convoy belonged to a group who had been training and mentoring the Afghan police.

"One foreign national was killed, one civilian Afghan woman has been killed. Five foreigners and three Afghan civilians have been wounded," spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP.

The force of the blast ripped off one side of the targeted vehicle, an armoured Land Cruiser, an AFP reporter at the site said.

Pieces of flesh, apparently from the attacker, were strewn up to 80 metres (yards) from the destroyed car and charred chunks of plastic and metal littered the ground.

A policeman at the site of the blast, about 15 kilometres (nine miles) from the city centre, said the two-vehicle convoy belonged to US nationals who were training police and visited a police headquarters in the area nearly every day.

This could not immediately be confirmed.

"I heard a big explosion from the main road and then saw a big flame like you had poured a barrel of petrol on the vehicle," said a shopkeeper named Qalamuddin, who saw the attack.

"We could hear people screaming in the flames in the Land Cruiser. There were two Land Cruisers. One of them was targeted. The other one started firing in the air and drove to a distance and then stopped."

There was no claim of responsibility for the blast but most such attacks are carried out by the insurgent Taliban movement.

It was the first suicide blast in the capital since June 17, when a massive attack rocked the heart of the city.

Police said 35 people, most of them police officers, were killed, making it the deadliest attack since the extremist Taliban movement launched an insurgency after being toppled from government in 2001.

The day before, three Afghan labourers were killed in a suicide blast in the west of the city that was targeted at vehicles of a foreign security company.

US soldiers at the scene after the blast mistakenly shot dead an onlooker.

There have been about 60 suicide blasts across Afghanistan this year, a spike from 25 in 2005.

Six of them have been in the capital, which is heavily secured and where foreign troops are regularly on patrol.

Last year, nearly 300 civilians were killed in about 140 suicide attacks, most of them claimed by the Taliban, according to Human Rights Watch.

The Taliban regularly threaten to unleash a storm of suicide blasts on Afghanistan and claim to have hundreds of men ready to carry out such attacks on foreign forces, whom they label "invaders."

Military officials say the group's reliance on such tactics is a sign of weakness, showing that it does not have the capacity to confront troops in conventional warfare and so has to choose "soft targets."
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Afghanistan must not rush to WTO membership - Oxfam
Thursday June 28, 11:00 AM By David Fox
KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan, seeking membership in the World Trade Organisation by 2010, risks undermining efforts to rebuild its shattered economy unless it treads more cautiously, the international aid group Oxfam said on Thursday.

In a major report, the group said that instead of opening new markets for Afghanistan's exports, WTO membership could herald a flood of cheap imports that will stifle attempts to resurrect the manufacturing sector.

"Liberalising the Afghan economy too soon could undermine vital efforts to reduce poverty and suffering," said Matt Waldman, Oxfam's policy and advocacy adviser in the country.

"The accession process should reflect the development needs of Afghanistan, not the demands of existing members."

Afghanistan's economy is in ruins following decades of conflict, and despite massive amounts of aid since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, the country remains one of the world's poorest.

It trawls the bottom of virtually every economic indicator list, with a GDP per capita of just $315, life expectancy at 46.4 years, 70 percent of the population living below the poverty line and official unemployment at a conservative 30 percent, according to U.N. and World Bank figures.

Afghanistan has been an observer at the WTO since 2004, but aims to become a full member by the end of the decade -- encouraged by some international donors such as the United States and European Union which have much at stake in the country.

Trade experts say full membership could bring some benefits such as speeding up much needed economic and institutional reforms as well as attracting more direct foreign investment and opening new markets for Afghan exports.

But Oxfam warns of the downside in the report, entitled "Getting the fundamentals right - the early stages of Afghanistan's accession process".

Having to open its domestic market to low or tariff-free imports -- particularly from neighbours Pakistan, China and Iran -- could strangle efforts to rebuild the job-creating manufacturing sector, while the privatisation of basic services such as water and electricity could hit the rural areas, the report says.

It warns also that direct foreign investment could have little benefit unless maximum use of Afghan resources is ensured, and questions even the cost of joining the world's trade body -- at least $100 million, according to the WTO.

Latest World Bank figures estimate Afghan exports at around $1.6 billion and imports at $3.9 billion -- leaving a trade deficit that makes up over 30 percent of the GDP.

The country's biggest official export earner is handwoven carpets and rugs -- although many are shipped to Pakistan and re-exported as products of that country. It also exports significant quantities of fresh and dried fruit and nuts, finished leather and some minerals.

It imports virtually all manufactured goods, although even basic items are priced out of the range of most Afghans.

By far the biggest industry in Afghanistan is the illicit drugs trade. The country produces over 90 percent of the world's heroin, which valued at "street prices" in the West would be worth billions.
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Taliban recruiting Afghan children for suicide bombings
By Monte Morin, Stars and Stripes Mideast edition, Wednesday, June 27, 2007
GHAZNI, Afghanistan — The boy looked to be no more than 6 years old, a U.S. officer said.

As the tiny Afghan wandered onto the district governor’s compound, he grew more scared and confused. He’d been given special instructions on what to do once he arrived, but now he couldn’t remember a thing.

The boy walked up to a guard and explained his problem.

“I forgot what to do,” the boy said.

Puzzled, the guard asked the child what on earth he was talking about.

The boy lifted his shirt and revealed a packed explosives belt.

“I forgot what I was supposed to do with this,” the boy said.

As U.S. and NATO forces struggle to stamp out a rekindled Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan’s southern and eastern provinces, officers and cultural advisers say enemy fighters are upping the ante by employing children and teens in a wave of deadly suicide bombings.

By targeting children in impoverished villages, Taliban fighters and their cohorts have used promises of jobs, money, education and simply food to lure young boys to neighboring Pakistan for indoctrination and training as insurgent suicide bombers, the U.S. military said.

While training camps in the ungoverned border regions of Pakistan have long served as the breeding ground for midlevel Taliban fighters, the use of young Afghan villagers as suicide bombers is a recent chilling development, authorities say.

In some instances — such as the failed attempt two months ago to use a boy in a suicide attack on a district governor’s compound in Ghazni province — insurgents simply befriend a susceptible boy and pressure him to conduct the attack.

In the Ghazni episode, the boy bomber was fatherless and his mother was unable to support his family, according to U.S. officials who said they were briefed on the incident by Afghan government and security officials.

“That’s how horrible these guys are,” said Capt. Matt Hagerman, a spokesman for the 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, who described the Ghazni incident after being briefed about it. “They took a six-year-old and put a suicide belt on him. I mean, how low can you get?”

In a country plagued by grinding poverty, money is as much a Taliban weapon as are anti-tank mines, Kalashnikov rifles and intimidation campaigns.

In a series of interviews conducted by U.S. cultural advisers, villagers in the troubled Andar district of Ghazni province have said that Taliban fighters are targeting children between the ages of 8 and 12 and luring them to madrassas, or fundamentalist Islamic religious schools, in Pakistan.

“Once they get to Pakistan they’re brainwashed into becoming suicide bombers,” a U.S. intelligence officer said.

In small villages in the Andar district, a village the size of 300 people can lose between 5 and 10 young boys a year, according to officers in Task Force Fury.

While adult Afghans are more likely to see through the Taliban’s religious and ideological appeals, children are much more easily influenced and fooled, commanders say.

“These kids don’t have any concept of death; they don’t understand what they’re being asked to do,” said Capt. Aaron White, comander of Company D, 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment.
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Jaiswal to lead delegation to Rome for conference on Afghanistan on July 2-3
By ANI Wednesday June 27, 08:58 PM
New Delhi, June 27 (ANI): Minister of State for Home Affairs Sriprakash Jaiswal will lead a high level delegation to Rome to attend a conference on 'Rule of Law in Afghanistan' on July 2-3.

The other members of the delegation are Indian Ambassador to Italy and Afghanistan, Joint Secretary (Police) in Home Ministry, and Under Secretary (Afghanistan) in Foreign Ministry.

The Conference is being jointly organized by the Italian and the Afghan governments, in collaboration with the UN.

The two-day conference envisages obtaining high level political commitment to reform in the justice sector in Afghanistan, endorsing a donor action plan, establishing a coordinated plan for justice assistance to Afghanistan's provinces, and to establish coordinated mechanisms between the judiciary and the police.

The Conference will include a plenary session at political level and technical panels at official level on judicial reforms and police training.

President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, United Nations Secretary General (UNSG) Ban Ki-Moon and NATO Secretary General Jaap De Hoop Scheffer will also participated in the Conference.

The prime objective of the Conference is to reaffirm the commitment by the government and the international community to accelerate the reform of justice and the implementation of the rule of law, as a fundamental pillar of the reconstruction of Afghanistan, said an official release issued here today. (ANI)
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Iran: Is Tehran Sending Weapons to Afghanistan's Taliban?
By Ron Synovitz
June 27, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- The discovery of Iranian-made weapons in western Afghanistan has been confirmed by the United States, NATO, and the Afghan government. But there is no clear evidence to prove the Iranian government has had a role in sending those weapons to Taliban militants, though several independent experts say it's involvement appears likely.

U.S. and British officials say weapons crossing the border from Iran into Afghanistan are turning up in the hands of Taliban fighters.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has said there is no evidence to confirm a direct role by the Iranian government in smuggling weapons to the Taliban. He says the Taliban could be using funds obtained from the illicit opium trade to purchase weapons from criminal groups. But Gates says Washington suspects the Iranian government is involved.

"Our enemy [and the enemy of the Iraqi fighters] is the same and we have the same goal." -- Taliban spokesmanSuspicious But Unproven

"I haven't seen any intelligence specifically to this effect, but I would say, given the quantities we are seeing, it is difficult to believe that it is associated with smuggling or the drug business or that it is taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian government," he said.

Imad Jad, a Mideast expert at Cairo's Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan today that the Iranian government appears to be aiding militants throughout the region.

"Iran has relations with the Hamas movement and is using the issue [of Gaza] for it's own regional vision," Jad said. "And also, for leverage in negotiations with Western countries in order to try keep its nuclear program. So there is an Iranian role in Gaza, indeed. And there is also an Iranian role in Lebanon through Hezbollah. There is an Iranian role in Iraq and strong cooperation between Iran and Syria. So Iran is involved in more than one country in the region."

Ahmed Rashid, a journalist from Pakistan and author of the book "Taliban," has been reporting on Afghanistan since 1979. He tells RFE/RL that he is certain that Iran is also supporting factional warlords and Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

Financial Support

"I have no doubt that Iran has been involved in channeling money and arms to various elements in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, for the last few years," he said. "They have long-running relations with many of the commanders and small time warlords in western Afghanistan. I think Iran is playing all sides in the Afghan conflict. And there are Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns who are being funded by Iran who are active in western Afghanistan. If the Iranians are convinced that the Americans are undermining them through western Afghanistan, then it is very likely that these agents of theirs have been activated."

Rahul Bedi, a South Asia correspondent for the London-based "Jane's Defence Weekly," says he thinks Washington has good reason to suspect the Iranian government is sending weapons to the Taliban.

"There is something to be said for this," Bedi said. "There are Iranian-made weapons that are turning up both in Iraq and in Afghanistan. And I think it is a sense of deja vu, because it is duplicating what the CIA did when the Soviets were occupying Afghanistan. A lot of the weapons that were given to the mujahedin fighters to dislodge the Soviet [forces] were sourced in third or different countries because of the element of deniability. In this case, I think the Iranians have probably learned from that experience of the CIA and the mujahedin and they are trying to duplicate, more or less, a similar operation."

Earlier this month, Afghan President Hamid Karzai rejected allegations that the Iranian government was sending weapons to Taliban fighters in an attempt to destabilize his country.

"We don't have any such evidence so far of the involvement of the Iranian government in supplying the Taliban," he said. "We have a very good relationship with the Iranian government. Iran and Afghanistan have never been as friendly as they are today."

NATO spokesman James Appathurai also says the alliance cannot prove the Iranian government has been directly involved in smuggling weapons to the Taliban.

Iranian Origin

"The line that you have seen from NATO remains the same, and that is that ISAF and international forces have come across weapons that seem to be of Iranian origin in Afghanistan," he said. "There is, from the point of view of NATO and ISAF, no clear intelligence linking this to the active involvement of the Iranian government."

RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan correspondent Sharafudeen Stanikzai has documented and photographed Iranian-produced land mines and other weapons that are being used by militants in western Afghanistan near the border with Iran.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer also announced this month that a powerful and sophisticated type of roadside bomb that is prevalent in Iraq has been discovered near a university in Kabul.

Until that discovery, suicide and roadside bombs in Afghanistan had never been as deadly or sophisticated as those in Iraq.

The so-called EFPs -- or explosively-formed projectiles -- are capable of penetrating armored vehicles. And the U.S. military has accused Iran of helping Iraqi insurgents to build and deploy EFPs.

Copying Iraqi Insurgents

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan by telephone from an undisclosed location this week that Taliban fighters are, indeed, studying and copying the techniques and weaponry used by Iraqi insurgents.

"We are studying which operations are the most effective on the ground," he said. "We will focus our future operations on Kabul because our enemy is concentrated there. Our enemy [and the enemy of the Iraqi fighters] is the same and we have the same goal. That's why we want to conduct the same kind of operations as the Iraqi mujahedin. The reason is that their operations have caused a large number of casualties to the enemy. They have been successful and so we are now following exactly the same tactics and structure of operations."

In May, Turkish authorities reportedly seized a cargo of machine guns and pistols hidden among construction materials on a Syria-bound train from Iran. Turkish officials say that discovery has led them to suspect that Iran is using Turkey as a transit point to send arms to Lebanon's Hezbollah movement via Syria.

For its part, the Iranian government denies it has provided military support to militants in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, or the Palestinian territories. But Tehran does admit sending what it calls political, moral, and humanitarian support to Hamas and Hezbollah.

But even humanitarian support to those groups has led to criticism within Tehran from ordinary Iranians who say their government should be more concerned about worsening economic conditions in Iran.
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Afghan Government Divided Against Itself
As if the Taleban weren’t bad enough, the Afghan government seems to be facing an insurrection within its own ranks.
By Hafizullah Gardesh in Kabul (ARR No. 258, 27-June-07) Institute for War and Peace Reporting
It has been a difficult few weeks for President Hamed Karzai. Not only has his attorney general publicly accused a former interior ministry official of attempting to kidnap him, his law officers have tried and failed to search the home of a former Kabul police chief, and a high-ranking military official is engaged in a violent dispute with a governor in the north.

Meanwhile, parliament ploughs its own course, removing ministers, suspending legislators and refusing to heed the Supreme Court.

The spectacle has left observers scratching their heads and wondering just how long the situation can last before a major explosion.

In the first week in June, Abdul Jabar Sabet, Afghanistan’s attorney general or chief prosecutor, squared off against a former high-ranking interior ministry official, General Din Mohammad Jurat, in what might have been no more than an example of road rage, Afghan-style.

Sabet was traveling outside Kabul and had got as far as Mir Bacha Kot, about 20 kilometres north of the capital. His car encountered a road block and he got out to investigate.

General Jurat happened to be there at the same time. But this is where things get murky. According to Sabet, when he left his vehicle he was attacked by Jurat’s men, who tried to kidnap him.

What is certain is that he was beaten so badly that he required hospital attention.

Jurat denies that there was any plot against Sabet, and for his part accuses the attorney general of instigating the clash.

In an interview with Tolo TV, he implied that Sabet was not quite mentally balanced.

“[Sabet] was out of control; he was not behaving normally,” he said. “He hit my driver with a water bottle and used abusive language towards me.”

Jurat had his family with him and was, he said, on his way to a picnic.

“A man who is planning a kidnapping does not usually take his family along,” he told Tolo.

Jurat also denies that the attorney general suffered any physical harm.

Sabet issued an arrest order for Jurat, who refused to comply, saying that the attorney general had no authority to summon him.

Others in the government line-up also got involved. Ali Shah Paktiawal, head of the anti-crime department at Kabul police headquarters, arrived on the scene soon after the disturbance began. He told IWPR that Sabet had called him several times to get the road opened.

“When I got there, I saw 30 to 40 armed men surrounding the attorney general and his men and beating them,” he said. “I did not understand who was against whom, and when I went into the crowd, a man pointed a gun at my head. Then my bodyguard grabbed the gun and the man ran away. We still have his weapon.”

Paktiawal said he took Sabet to an armoured police car for his own protection. “While we were getting in, Sabet was shot at six times,” he said.

Zemarai Bashiri, a spokesman for the interior ministry, did not want to go into details about the incident. He told IWPR that Jurat had been sacked from the ministry about five months ago, and now was operating a private security company.

In light of the latest incident, “police have been ordered to arrest Jurat and that is what they are trying to do”, said Bashiri. “Shooting at the attorney general and the police is a crime.”

Jurat’s security company has now been closed, added Bashiri.

But just two days after the fight, approximately 300 community leaders from Panjshir province came to Sabet and apologised on behalf of Jurat, who is from the region.

The attorney general accepted the apology and told the Afghan public on television that as far as he was concerned, the issue was closed.

“I have no further enmity with [Jurat] personally,” he said. “But it is not my concern what the law now chooses to do.”

Timur Shah Stanekzai, the deputy attorney general, was not so magnanimous.

“The courts, the police, and the attorney general’s office do not have the right to forgive someone,” he said. “Only the president can decide this case.”

Also in June, police attempted to search the house of Amanullah Gozar, a former Kabul police chief who is currently advisor to President Karzai on security issues.

According to official sources, Gozar’s men would not allow the police inside; instead, they fought back, wounding one policeman and disarming dozens of others.

The interior ministry’s Bashiri was not forthcoming on this matter, either.

“It was a misunderstanding,” he told IWPR. “The police wanted to arrest a suspect and this resulted in a clash between them and Gozar’s men. The case is being investigated. I can’t say anything else right now.”

These two incidents, while not directly related, point to growing tensions between central government and the newly-launched National United Front, NUF, a political grouping dominated by former Northern Alliance commanders, many from the Jamiat-e-Islami party.

The Northern Alliance was a loose association of militia commanders who fought Soviet troops and then battled the Taleban. But many Afghans associate them with the ravages of the civil war years in the early Nineties, when Afghanistan was all but torn apart by internecine fighting and general criminality.

The problems have not been restricted to Kabul. As reported earlier by IWPR, (“Playing with Fire in Afghanistan’s North” ARR 256), supporters of General Abdul Rashid Dostum, a member of the NUF, staged a protest in the northern province of Jowzjan against the Karzai-appointed governor, Juma Khan Hamdard. Eight people were killed and dozens injured in the ensuing clash with police.

Analysts say that unless they are checked, these tendencies could soon pose a serious threat to President Karzai.

“This National Front and its members from the Northern Alliance are trying to pressure the government and gain influence,” said Fazel Rahman Oria, a political analyst in Kabul. “The government is weak, and Karzai’s policy of letting everyone into the government has paved the way for this type of activity.”

Oria also sees the hand of foreign governments in the incidents. Specifically, Iran and Russia, he said, are anxious to keep Afghanistan from regaining stability. But most worrisome is the Northern Alliance, which now sees a chance to regain power.

Oria believes Northern Alliance figures were behind several recent squabbles between the government and the legislature, as when parliament voted in May to sack Foreign Minister Rangin Dadfar Spanta, only to have the Supreme Court later reinstate him.

Also, said Oria, the alliance is the driving force behind the suspension of female politician Malalai Joya from parliament, and the passage of a controversial amnesty bill that would exempt most of those accused of atrocities during the war years from prosecution.

“Karzai must think of the realities and take practical steps,” he said. “These people are the main cause of the lack of security, corruption, and drug smuggling. He should remove them and fill their places with people from other political parties.”

The time is right, added Oria, because Afghans now realise how dangerous the Northen Alliance is, and would support moves to marginalise the grouping.

“If [Karzai] does not do this, he will face a very dangerous future,” added Oria.

But presidential spokesman Karim Rahimi does not agree that the recent incidents, however annoying, have any wider significance.

“These are not challenges to the government,” he told IWPR. “They just represent the abuse of democracy, and that’s only natural. All countries that are moving from crisis towards democracy face these problems. But the security agencies can control things. We will never return to the past.”

Political analyst Habibullah Rafi is worried about the erosion of the central government’s authority within the country.

“These problems are being created by the National Front, which is composed of Northern Alliance members,” he said. “And the Northern Alliance is backed and supported by those countries that have problems with the Americans.”

The NUF was growing in power, he added, and was pushing for even greater influence over the country. “It is trying to weaken the government to the extent that it can take over,” he said. “And the government is already weak. All of this will have very bad consequences.”

For the people of Kabul, the prospect of the return of the “warlords”, as they were known, is not a happy one.

“Karzai should have killed these snakes in his bosom,” said Saifullah, a shopkeeper in Kabul. “Instead, he brought them to power. Now they have bound his hands and feet and are encircling his throat. Soon they will eat him.”
Hafizullah Gardesh is an IWPR editor in Kabul.
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Critics urge wider mandate for Afghan detainee probe
DANIEL LEBLANC From Wednesday's Globe and Mail June 27, 2007 at 4:55 AM EDT
OTTAWA — The military inquiry into the handover of detainees in Afghanistan needs a broader mandate to investigate whether prisoners were also abused in Afghan hands, key observers of the thorny issue said yesterday.

The Department of National Defence, however, said the inquiry will not be given a greater scope, and a spokeswoman for Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor said the minister will not interfere in the process to change the inquiry's mandate. Mr. O'Connor's struggle with the detainee issue this year has led to growing speculation about his future in the Harper government.

The debate over the military inquiry was fuelled by a recent report in The Globe and Mail that the military inquiry into the handling of detainees captured by Canadian troops is looking at only their treatment before their transfer to Afghan authorities.

That restricted mandate does not reflect the fact that after the military inquiry was struck this year, the Canadian government signed a broader agreement on prisoner follow-up with Afghanistan.

 But Lieutenant-Commander Philip Anido said there has been no movement in government to get the board of inquiry to look at their monitoring.

"That would be a whole different level of inquiry for us," said LCdr. Anido, spokesman for the board of inquiry.

Amin Attaran, a University of Ottawa law professor whose research into the treatment of Afghan detainees prompted the creation of the military inquiry, was highly critical of the current mandate.

"This is an absolutely unacceptable way of doing things," he said in an interview.

Prof. Attaran said that the military inquiry can look at the entire issue, even if the monitoring of the detainees is now handled outside of DND by Correctional Service Canada.

New Democrat MP Dawn Black, who has been following the issue closely, said she is already skeptical about the military inquiry, and will be even more so if its mandate is not broadened.

"If you want to have any confidence into what the board of inquiry can do, yes, it needs a broader and more expansive mandate," she said.

Chief of the Defence Staff General Rick Hillier ordered the board of inquiry more than four months ago after allegations that three detainees may have been abused by Canadian soldiers.

There has been much controversy on the file since then. Mr. O'Connor admitted he misled Parliament for nearly a year by claiming that the International Committee of the Red Cross would report to Canada if it found abuse in Afghan prisons.

In May, the Harper government reached an agreement with the Afghan government that included monitoring arrangements to ensure detainees aren't tortured after being handed over.

But the military inquiry will "make findings and recommendations on orders, directives, procedures, and training" that were in effect as of April, 2006. hat means the board will make its recommendations based on a detainee transfer and monitoring situation that no longer exists.

The convening orders for the board of inquiry allow it to seek permission to expand or change the scope of its probe.
With a report from Paul Koring
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‘Afghan writer in custody of Political authorities’
* Released detainee says agencies’ personnel tortured Dost and shaved his beard four times during detention
Staff Report Daily Times, Pakistan
PESHAWAR: Intelligence agencies have handed over Afghan writer Abdur Rahim Muslim Dost to the Landi Kotal assistant political agent (APA) in the Khyber Agency, a fellow detainee told Daily Times after his release from the Landi Kotal political lock-up.

“Dost told us (detainees) in the lock-up that the agencies first kept him for eight months in the cell, then handed him over to the Landi Kotal APA, who detained him for unknown charges,” said Muhammad Saifullah, who was released by the political authorities on June 13 after receiving a notice from the Peshawar High Court (PHC) seeking an explanation for Saifullah’s detention. He said the political authorities detained him unlawfully for 18 months in a fake case, but released him soon after the PHC issued a notice.

“Muslim Dost said he was again detained by Pakistani intelligence agencies after he co-authored a Pashto language book titled ‘Da Guantanamo Matay Zaulanai’ or the Broken Chains of Guantanamo, published in September 2006. “Earlier Dost was released on September 24, 2004 by the US from the Cuba jail,” said Saifullah, adding that he wrote against the agencies and US forces in his book, which was sold out in the country. Saifullah, of Karak, also said the Afghan writer had told other detainees at the Landi Kotal lock-up that the agencies’ personnel had shaved his beard four times and also tortured him during detention.

The PHC division bench, consisting of PHC Chief Justice Tariq Pervez Khan and Justice Mohammad Qaim Jan Khan, disposed of Saifullah’s writ petition filed against his detention. Dost’s family members had also moved a civil miscellaneous application in the main writ petition to the PHC, claiming that the intelligence agencies had handed Dost over to the Khyber Agency political authorities. The PHC directed the additional advocate general (AAG) on June 22 to contact the Khyber Agency political agent and find out if Dost was in the political authorities’ custody as claimed by his family. However, Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Salahuddin, who was representing the Interior Ministry and the agencies, told the court that the ministry and agencies expressed ignorance about Dost’s whereabouts. In addition, Khyber Agency tribal journalists also met Dost and confirmed his presence in the political lock-up in Landi Kotal on June 23. Dost had sought their help for his release.

Syed Mohammad, Dost’s brother, stated in his writ petition that Dost was picked up by intelligence agencies’ personnel. He later filed a civil miscellaneous application in his previous writ petition in the PHC, saying the agencies had now handed Dost over to political authorities.

The petitioner said he met his brother after nine months in the political lock-up at Landi Kotal in Khyber Agency. He said during midnight between May 24 and 25, 2007, intelligence agents blindfolded Dost and took him to several police stations, including Nasir Bagh Police Station, allegedly to try and implicate him in a false terrorism case. The petitioner said the police refused to register any false case against Dost at the behest of the agencies, adding that after the police’s refusal, the agents handed Dost over to the Khyber Agency political authorities.

Dost and his younger brother, Badruzzaman Badr, have spent three-and-a-half years in US custody at Bagram Airbase, Kandahar Airport and later at Camp X-Ray in Cuba. They were initially arrested from Peshawar on November 17, 2001, soon after the fall of the Taliban government in Afghanistan and then handed over to US officials. However, they were released on September 24, 2004, after US officials declared them innocent, and after their release they published a 500-page book on their experiences at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere as prisoners. During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Dost used to edit several magazines published from Peshawar and has authored 37 books on politics, religion and poetry.
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Soap to clean up Afghan economy
Wed. Jun. 27 2007 10:57 PM ET CTV.ca News Staff
Violence-ravaged Afghanistan is faced with the daunting task of ridding itself of a reputation as a war zone that harbours Taliban militants. Even the country's agriculture sector is known mainly for its poppy production.

Journalist and author Sarah Chayes is trying to cleanse the country of that dubious distinction and simultaneously jump-start it's economy. It is a daring venture into an industry not known to Afghans.

In 2005, Chayes founded a co-operative known as Arghand -- named after the city of Arghandab, where it is based. The soap-manufacturing operation is run out of her home and the tools are donated by the Canadian forces. The company makes hand-crafted specialty soaps from crops and herbs that are abundant in the local area.

"Everyone looks at this barren landscape and they can't imagine that there are really nice crops." Chayes said. "There's pomegranates, apricots and almonds"

The most valuable crop for Chayes is the pomegranate. The specialty fruit grows well in the local area but it is the findings of a recent study that have Chayes excited.

"University of Michigan Medical School comes out with this study, showing that pomegranate seed oil stimulates regeneration of the epidermis," Chayes said.

Not only is the soap lauded for its medicinal value, each bar is molded to look like a river-polished piece of local marble. The 125-gram bars sell for $7 each. Indeed, the products are so popular at North American retailers that Chayes cannot produce enough to keep the shelves filled.

Even though the company has yet to make a profit, Chayes hopes to makes it as successful as her other Afghan ventures. Before Arghand, she had teamed up with Quyam Karzai, the older brother of the Afghan president, to create an organization known as Afghans for Civil Society in Kandahar. The organization helped rebuild a village, launch a radio station, and establish a women's income generation project in the country.

Chayes came to Afghanistan as a reporter for a Paris-based radio service in 2002.

When confronted by the struggle of the Afghan people, she decided to leave reporting and took on the task of restructuring the society and bridging the gap between Afghanistan and the world.

"It seems to me the most important thing people who are a healthy and of active age can do is to figure out how to build bridges rather than build walls," she said.

Noolah, a former bodyguard who works with Chayes, supports her efforts.

"Knowledge is a far better weapon than guns. With this type of business skill, we can one day lift up the whole country," he said.

With a report from CTV's Steve Chao in Kandahar
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Afghanistan begins to mirror Iraq situation
Tuesday, 26 June, 2007, 01:58 AM Doha Time  By Richard Norton-Taylor
LONDON: Senior military officers, defence officials and even ministers are making no secret of their view that British forces in Iraq are on a hiding to nothing, that their very presence is counterproductive. The British Army would like to sneak out without anyone noticing, leaving the south in the hands of Iranian-backed Shia militia.

Afghanistan, they say, is different. There, British troops are fighting for what ministers call a “noble cause”. But the problem, they now privately admit, is that the spiral of violence in Iraq is plainly being repeated in Afghanistan, albeit without the sectarian violence.

In one of the bloodiest days since the Taliban was overthrown in 2001, at least 24 people were killed on June 17 by a suspected suicide bomber in the centre of Kabul and at least seven children were killed by US air strikes on a school near the Pakistan border. On June 20, the Agency Co-ordinating Body for Afghan Relief, Acbar, which represents nearly 100 aid and humanitarian organisations, roundly condemned foreign, particularly US, troops for the “disproportionate or indiscriminate use of force”.

Shortly before June 17 attack in Kabul, a well-placed senior British official commented: “One of the most damaging legacies of Iraq is the spreading of suicide bombings.”

These officials have no agenda, certainly no political axe to grind. They are professionals whose job is to defend British interests and security from domestic and foreign threats. Their comments are therefore all the more telling.

British soldiers used to say they preferred gunfights with the Taliban in southern Afghanistan to the improvised explosive devices and sniper fire in southern Iraq. They are now facing the prospect of being at the receiving end of the Taliban’s shift away from open combat to the ‘asymmetric’ attacks familiar from Iraq.

Ministers describe Afghanistan as a noble cause because, they say, vital British interests are at stake — the country cannot be allowed to become a failed state again, a base for terrorists, and so on. Senior military officers echoed these warnings. No doubt many of them genuinely believe in the strategic importance of Afghanistan for the West.

But they are also desperately frustrated, not so much because of the lack of support from other countries or because of equipment shortages, but because of the scant resources devoted to winning Afghan ‘hearts and minds’. As students of staff colleges, they also know that in the long history of warfare, never has aerial bombing succeeded in defeating an insurgency.

UK Defence Secretary Des Browne says he appreciates the significance of the point and that Robert Gates, his new American counterpart, has also grasped it. What seems clear, however, is that the policy of the West — as enacted by Nato — in Afghanistan remains hopelessly confused and contradictory.

Take the opium poppy crop. “We’ve got to stop talking about poppy eradication when British soldiers need the co-operation of Afghans, many of whom are poppy farmers,” General Sir Mike Jackson, the former head of the army, recently told the independent Iraq Commission inquiry in a swipe at the US.

Yet the poppy harvest, allowed to reach record levels, also helps fill the coffers of the Taliban and feeds corruption. Without a huge injection of foreign aid — and there is no evidence that anyone wants to provide it — it may not be long before British commanders start saying: “Let’s get out of Afghanistan as well as Iraq.” – Guardian News & Media
* Richard Norton-Taylor is the security affairs editor of the London-based Guardian newspaper.
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Afghan deportees face abuse in Iran, unknowns in homeland
By Farhad Peikar Jun 28, 2007, 8:07 GMT Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Islam Qala, Afghanistan - Mohammad Najaf looks weak and fatigued after spending three days without food and water, saying he suffered from heat and beatings in an Iranian prison. He is now free but has no money, no family and no place to go.

Najaf, 42, is one of about 100,000 Afghan refugees who have been forcibly deported by Iranian authorities since the spring, according to Afghan and UN statistics. He left Afghanistan for neighbouring Iran shortly after the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but on the eve of World Refugee Day last week, he saw his home country again for the first time since he was a boy. He was expelled from Iran and was sitting disheartened on the other side of the border at Islam Qala, about 150 kilometres west of Herat city.

After living for 27 years in Iran, Najaf's memories of Afghanistan are faint.

'I don't actually remember which province I belong to,' he said. '... I don't know if I have any relatives to go to here. My parents lived and died in Iran.'

Najaf was arrested while working at an iron-melting factory three days before his deportation and since then has had no contact with his wife and five children, who were all born in Iran but are now likely to face the same fate as their father.

The expulsions began in late April and are aimed at repatriating 1 million unregistered Afghan refugees by March. Another 900,000 Afghans live as registered refugees in Iran, part of the millions of Afghans who fled their country after the Soviet invasion as well as those who left when the hardline Taliban took control of about 90 per cent of the country from 1996 to 2001.

Despite the return of more than 3 million Afghans to their country since 2002, Afghanistan still has the largest refugee population in the world with more than 4 million people living abroad, mainly in the neighbouring countries of Iran and Pakistan.

Each day in the border town of Islam Qala, at least 20 buses arrive from Iran, each carrying about 40 refugees like Najaf, said Ghulam Rabbani, head of refugee camps in Herat province.

Most of the deportees interviewed by Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, including Najaf, said the Iranian authorities beat them and gave them no food or water during their imprisonment. The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission said of the fraction of the deportees it has interviewed, nearly 3,000 reported torture by Iranian police, and at least six Afghans have been reported to have died in Iranian custody.

'The police put some 20 people in a room, 6 metres long and 3 metres wide,' deportee Mohammad Noorzai said. 'There was no water, no food. It was so hot, and they were torturing us. They made us sit down and get up over and over again. They hit us to leap-frog for hours until we could not move our legs.'

Noorzai said he believed the treatment was aimed at scaring refugees so they would not want to return to Iran.

All of the recently returned Afghans were forced to pay for their transportation to the Afghan border, Fatullah Rahmani, another deportee said, adding that those who don't have the money remain in prison until some other refugees help them pay and get out.

Rabbani, who interviews deportees upon their return to Afghanistan, said he has been told of one death in which Iranian police killed a man by throwing him off the second floor of a building where he were working. The Afghan rights commission said five other Afghans died in hospitals after being deported as a result of injuries inflicted by Iranian police.

Iran has described the deportations as a means of creating employment for Iranians, whose jobs, they claimed, are robbed by Afghan refugees who work for longer hours and lower wages, but political analysts said they see political motivation behind the move as Iran faces mounting Western pressure over its nuclear programme.

'Unfortunately, Afghanistan is caught between two rivals,' said Seema Samar, head of the rights commission said, referring to Iran and the United States. She said the repatriations are a move by Tehran to exert pressure on the US-backed Afghan government.

'Iran knows Afghanistan has become an important place for the US and NATO countries, so by putting pressure on Afghanistan, they can make the Western countries relax pressure on Tehran,' said Dad Noorani, an Afghan writer and political analyst.

Noorani also accused Iran of fomenting instability in Afghanistan by assisting the Taliban and other opposition groups with weapons and explosives.

The expulsions prompted the Afghan parliament to impeach two of President Hamid Karzai's cabinet members, the ministers for foreign affairs and refugees, late last month after a vote of no-confidence for not better tackling the refugee issue.

The move also prompted Karzai to write a letter to his Iranian counterpart, Mahmud Ahmedinejad, and ask him to decrease the number of deportees.

'The numbers of deportees have been reduced from around 2,000 a day to around 1,000 a day at the Islam Qala crossing point,' Rabbani said, adding, however, 'The torture and maltreatment is still endemic.'

New York-based Human Rights Watch,in a report for World Refugee Day, called on Iran to immediately investigate abuses in its prisons and to hold those responsible accountable for violating the rights of Afghans in the course of apprehensions, detentions and deportations.

'Many of those expelled are living in the desert, short of food, water and shelter,' said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. 'The Iranians, the Afghan government and the UN should all be ashamed of themselves.'

Afghan authorities interview the returnees, most of whom are then left to their own devices. Two organizations run by Afghan businessmen offer bus rides to the poorest of the returnees into a city or to a government shelter, where up to 100 refugees can be given free accommodation and food for up to two days. Then, they are on their own.

Although many deportees in Islam Qala said they would return to Iran if they could get a legal visa, some said they had nothing in Afghanistan and had left so much behind in Iran that if they had to, they would probably be willing to risk returning illegally.

Najaf soon left the border office for Herat city, wondering whether he would ever manage to get a passport and visa to make him able to reunite with his wife and children.
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Afghan artisans tying knots for Indian carpet-makers
Pak exporters monopoly in Kazak Chobi design ends
By Mansoor Ahmad The News International (Pakistan)
LAHORE: Indian carpet exporters have acquired the services of Afghan weavers to make inroads into the innovative kazak designed monopolised by Pakistan with the assistance of carpet weavers from among the Afghan refugees.

The News has learnt that after a thaw in relations with the present Afghan government the first thing the Indians did was to take away hundreds of Afghan carpet weavers to India where they are making the same kazak designed (now renamed Chobi) by them.

President LCCI Shahid Hasan Shiekh a leading carpet exporter said that the Indians are offering the same carpet varieties for $70-80 per square meter that Pakistani exporters sell at $110 per square meter.

He said traditionally wages in the Indian carpet manufacturing sector are 30-40 per cent lower than Pakistan.

He said Pakistani carpet weavers had accepted this challenge of low cost production by introducing intricate and innovative designs in order to fetch better rates.

He said by the time the Indians copy these varieties Pakistani exporters would introduce newer varieties to keep a competitive edge.

He said the carpet varieties that Pakistan produced in partnership with Afghan weavers was very intricate to copy; as the weaving dyeing and finishing techniques were quite different from traditional carpets manufactured in India and Pakistan.

He said Pakistani exporters expected this edge to last longer but the Indians look to challenge Pakistan in this respect, as the installation of a friendly government in Afghanistan coupled with the return of some Afghan weavers to their native country could provide them that opportunity.

Pakistani carpet manufacturers entered the US carpet market in the late 90’s with a bang by introducing for the first time the vegetable dyed kazak designs manufactured with the help of Afghan weavers who are masters of this art.

Innovation in new designs has so far saved carpet exports from complete collapse. Before the introduction of these new varieties of carpet exports from Pakistan were $287 million in 1992-93 and gradually declined in the next five years to $134 million.

The carpet exports started reviving and hit record exports of $290 million three years back. The exports declined to $254 million last year and further decline to around $220 million as the Indian competition in Afghan variety intensified.

A leading carpet exporter said that these are testing times for Pakistani carpet exporters. It is said that though the Indians produce similar Chobi designs as produced by Pakistan their quality is still inferior and buyers prefer Pakistani carpets.

The low price demanded by the Indians he added acts as a spoiler as foreign buyers put pressure on Pakistani carpet exporters to lower down their prices. He said Pakistan this year exported more carpets in terms of square meters but as the unit value declined by over 8 per cent the exports in value declined too. Another exporter Talha Zubair said there is some silver lining as well because hand knotted carpet manufacturing is on the decline in the traditional carpet producing countries like Turkey, Iran and China due to increase in workers wages.

He said the carpet production in Turkey has declined to 10 per cent from its average production two decades back and Iran has seen a 50 per cent decline in carpet production while the Chinese are opting out of hand knotted carpet weaving business.
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Officials: Soviet-Era Caches, Not Iran, Arming Taliban
via antiwar.com June 27, 2007 by Tahir Qadiry
MAZAR-E-SHARIF, Afghanistan -While United States officials accuse Iran of arming a resurgent Taliban, officials here say the weapons are actually part of vast caches left behind by the Soviet army that fought a nine-year war in Afghanistan before withdrawing in 1988.

Ustad Basir Arifi, secretary for the Disarmament of Illegal Armed Groups (DIAG) program in northern Afghanistan, told IPS that weapons abandoned by the Soviet Union there are now being moved by professional smugglers to the southern provinces where the Taliban Islamist movement has its stronghold.

"Huge caches of weapons remained with the people from the Soviet Union period. These are now being smuggled to the south of Afghanistan. These weapons are bought in the north of Afghanistan and smuggled to the south to be used against government and foreign forces," Arifi said.

According to Arifi, security officials have on several occasions intercepted weapons being smuggled to the south. He said the DIAG has urged the government to take firm measures to avoid all this.

Abdul Aziz Ahmad Zai, the chief of DIAG, said his group was "very concerned over the issue. It shows that the Taliban are being fortified."

Zai did not rule out the possibility of weapons originating from outside Afghanistan. "Smugglers could be bringing weapons from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan to the north. A good transit point could be Badakhshan province," he said without mentioning Iran.

Zai said powerful syndicates were carrying out the smuggling. "However, our security officials and the Interior Ministry are working very actively in this regard," he added.

According to Zai, the recent riots in northern Jowzjan province were an indicator of the fact that weapons were freely available to people. He also said that there still were armed groups in the north of Afghanistan. "It is a very great concern for us that there are lots of illegal armed groups in the north," he said.

Gen. Abdul Manan, representative of the defense ministry in the DIAG program, said the government has been able to collect 70,000 heavy and light weapons from the whole country under the DDR and DIAG programs. But he believes that at least a million more pieces were in the hands of armed groups in the north.

A gun smuggler operating from the Balkh province district told IPS that he has been in the business for the last two years. The Pashto-speaking, bearded man, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he regularly comes to the north to buy different kinds of weapons. "I have employed people to collect weapons from people who have them and these are ferried to the south."

"I have my customers in Kandahar. When the weapons reach there, they come and receive it. I make a good profit. I can buy an AK-47 for $200 in the north and sell it for $400 in the south," he added. Occasionally he smuggles explosives as well.

Ahmad Shah, 45, a resident of Chemtal district in the Balkh province, freely admitted to supplying the smugglers with guns. "I earn my living through running this business," he told IPS.

Atta Mohammad Nur, the governor of Balkh province, neither accepts nor rejects the fact that the weapons are being smuggled to the south. "It could be right. Insurgents are doing their utmost to disrupt life in the country. They could be smuggling weapons from north to the south," he said.

Rohullah Samun, spokesman for the Jowzjan governor, accepts that vast amount of weapons still exist in the province. "People do have weapons. There are lots of illegal armed militias in Jowzjan and its neighboring provinces. Some of the warlords are regrouping," he said.

The reference was to Abdorrashid Dostum, one of Afghanistan's most formidable warlords. Dostum, who once supported the Soviets, has had a hand in the many regime changes that this war-torn country has seen over the last three decades and retains enormous influence in Jowzjan.

Dostum was among leaders who helped the U.S.-led forces to overthrow the Taliban government in 2001. Until recently he was regarded as the strongman of the north, but his role has been reduced to that of a military adviser to Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai.

On June 13, U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns told CNN television in Paris that there was "irrefutable evidence" that Iran was supplying weapons to the Taliban.

Ironically, the Taliban owes its origins largely to mujahedeen that were once armed and backed by the U.S. against communist rule in Afghanistan and the Soviet occupation.
(Inter Press Service)
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Musharraf Tells Pakistan Tribesmen to Expel Al-Qaeda Terrorists
By Paul Tighe and Khaleeq Ahmed - June 27 (Bloomberg) -- President Pervez Musharraf told Pakistan's tribal leaders to expel al-Qaeda terrorists sheltering in the region bordering Afghanistan, saying their presence destroys peace and security.

``Foreign terrorists are the biggest threat to our country and therefore they have to be flushed out,'' the official Associated Press of Pakistan cited Musharraf as telling a meeting of tribal leaders, known as a jirga, in Peshawar, northwestern Pakistan, yesterday.

Tribal leaders must implement agreements reached in North and South Waziristan provinces since 2004 to expel non-Pakistani terrorists, Musharraf said. ``You do not go back on your words,'' he told the jirga.

Musharraf, who has deployed 80,000 soldiers in the northwestern tribal region for anti-terrorism operations, said in April that 300 gunmen were killed by tribesmen over a period of weeks. Pakistan last year rejected a report by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group that said the accords with tribal leaders curbed army operations and boosted the activities of al- Qaeda and the Taliban.

The president has faced opposition from Pakistan's Islamist groups over his support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism that began in 2001. His government has been criticized by neighboring Afghanistan for failing to stop al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters using camps in the tribal district to carry out cross-border attacks on Afghan territory.

Grand Jirga - A grand jirga of tribal leaders from Pakistan and Afghanistan will be held soon to develop a strategy for settling disputes and maintaining public order on the 2,430-kilometer (1,510-mile) border the countries share.

``We are the custodians of the frontiers of the country and soldiers without pay,'' APP cited Malik Waris Khan Afridi, a tribal elder, as saying in an address to the jirga.

The infiltration of gunmen across the Afghan border will have undesirable consequences in the region, Musharraf said, according to APP. A withdrawal of all international fighters from the region will be brought about only by achieving peace in Afghanistan, he added.

Pakistan's government is providing funds for the development of the region, known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the president said. He appealed to the jirga to focus on development, saying tribal leaders have the option of ``progress and prosperity or backwardness.''

Anti-Terrorism - Pakistan's anti-terrorism operations have resulted in the arrest of about 700 suspects since 2001, including alleged al- Qaeda commanders Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Mohamed Abdullah Binalshibh, both accused of helping plan the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington.

The government increased security in the capital, Islamabad, yesterday after intelligence agencies said there was information that suicide bombers entered the city to carry out attacks, Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema, the Interior Ministry spokesman, said at a briefing.

Security around the diplomatic enclave, which houses more than 40 embassies, has been heightened, Cheema said.

Musharraf has pledged to boost economic growth in the world's second largest Muslim nation of 165 million people in an effort to reduce the threat of terrorism.

Pakistan is the only country implementing an anti-terrorism strategy that uses military, political and economic development to try to eradicate extremism, Musharraf said last month in an interview with Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper.

``It has been realized that the wave of terrorism cannot be suppressed by force and we have to change the mindset of the militants to tackle the problem,'' Cheema said yesterday.
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Kabul limos prove hit with locals
By Soutik Biswas BBC News, Kabul Wednesday, 27 June 2007
When Said Maqsud's gleaming white Lincoln limousines rattle down Kabul's pot-holed streets, people gape at them and talk about the long, strange-looking cars.

"Some say it looks like an egg with two yolks. Others say it is like an airplane without wings," says Mr Maqsud, a maverick Afghan businessman who has opened Kabul's first and only limousine service.

"Still others ask me, 'Why don't you cut this into two cars and make more money."

A limousine service looks like an audacious business venture in a country like Afghanistan, which is plagued by violence and double digit inflation.

More than half of its people live in poverty, and at least 40% are without jobs.

But Shams Limousine, Mr Maqsud's company with a fleet of three second-hand Lincolns shipped in from Los Angeles, appears to be doing brisk business in the Afghan capital.

'Cheapest limo'

Locals usually hire the luxury cars for their wedding and office parties at $140 for 10 hours, which, according to its cheerful 40-year-old owner, is the lowest rate in the world - "the cheapest limo you can get in the US will set you back by $150 an hour," he says.

Afghans love big weddings. In the cities, families borrow money and spend up to $30,000 or more to have a "proper" wedding, and often spent the next 10 years repaying marriage debt.

"So there is nothing morally wrong in having a limo service here," says Mr Maqsud.

"A wedding is the biggest event in an Afghan's life, and the families want to have the best time. I am just providing a value-added attraction to a marriage."

No wonder his limo company posters say: "If you want to have a memorable wedding party, just call Shams Limousine."

The limos come with DVD players, alcohol-free bars stacked with fancy decanters and stereos playing Iranian pop.

In the present peak wedding season, the company's order books are full - all the three cars are busy.

The cars are decorated with flowers at the florists at Shar-e-Naw, the city's high street, and then driven through Kabul's pot-holed streets to weddings by the two liveried chauffeurs, Abdullah and Bismillah.

Sticking to tradition

The company also hires out its limos for office parties, a short spin around the city and a $100 airport pick-up. Foreigners don't use the cars much, because according to Mr Maqsud, the "suicide bombings are a dampener".

The businessman launched his unusual business two years ago after realising that people were ready to make their weddings livelier.

He trawled the internet and flew to Los Angeles to pick up two second-hand limos. It cost him all of $70,000 and seven months to buy the cars and ship them into landlocked Afghanistan via Karachi.

Mr Maqsud soon realised that he had to tailor the cars to Afghan traditions - two of the limo were black, but he had to repaint them white, because the colour is seen as auspicious by most Afghans. The bar, of course, could have only soft drinks.

And though the cars can carry up to eight passengers, sometimes 14 people cram in to join the revelry.

"As long as people marry, business will be good. I have no worries about security or any such thing," he says.

The peripatetic businessman fled Afghanistan for Peshawar in 1985 during the Soviet invasion.

He says he lived there for two years before paying $40,000 to a "human trafficker" to smuggle his 10-member family into Germany.

'Giving happiness'

He lived in Germany until 1992, picking up local citizenship, and trading in cars, clothes and spices from Iran. For the next 10 years he lived in Moscow, Benin, Senegal and Togo, this time trading raisins, spaghetti and old German cars.

Mr Maqsud says he got bored by all of it again, and returned to Hamburg in 2001 to launch an Afghan eatery in the city. He ran the restaurant for three years, before "my mother pestered me to get married and drove me back to Afghanistan".

Returning to Kabul, he married his niece, and thought up the limo business while attending weddings in the city.

"I thought people would be happy with a limo wedding. And I was right. I gave a few free rides to friends and family, and people began pouring in with orders," says Mr Maqsud.

Now he has no plans to return to Germany, because business is good. He now plans to add a jeep limo to his fleet, and reckons it will be a big hit.

"I am happy here because I am giving happiness to people. I don't want to return to the West. People here love my cheap limos," he says.
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EC mulls 44 million to the fight against torture
KABUL, June 26 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The European Commission is mulling an allocation of 44 million to the fight against torture and support victims of the barbaric practice, says Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy Benita Ferrero-Waldner.

In her message on the International Day Against Torture, Benita Ferrero-Waldner said on Tuesday: I would like to pay tribute to all the victims of acts of torture on all continents, as well as to all those who are deeply committed to fighting for the eradication of this barbaric practice.

She added the European Commission had made the fight against torture a key priority in its external relations and spared no efforts in fighting against this scourge of mankind by consistently raising the issue in its relations with third countries.

Ferrero-Waldner continued the Commission also highlighted the issue in multilateral fora and by providing substantial funding to support projects aiming at the prevention of torture and through assistance to torture victims across the world.

Under the European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR), she pointed out, the EC had spent on average 11 million per year in support of torture prevention and rehabilitation projects over the past five years.

This makes us the lead global donor in this field. The Commission is committed to continue this substantial support and envisages allocating well over 44 million during the next four years to the fight against torture.

As in the past, a substantial share of these funds will be allocated to torture rehabilitation centres, inside and outside the EU, as well as to numerous torture prevention initiatives by NGOs around the world." 

Afghanistan received a first funding allocation of 0.5 million in 2006 under the EIDHR to finance projects strengthening the culture of human rights through media and university training, among others.
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Miscreants set fire to three schools in Kunar
ASADABAD, June 26 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Unidentified gunmen torched three primary schools during the last 24 hours in Shigal district of the eastern Kunar province, officials said on Tuesday.

Deputy Director of Education Department Ghulamullah Waqar said hundreds of students were enrolled in the three schools in Nangata, Chonas and Gadolai areas of the remote district.

Arson attacks on the two schools in Nangata and Gadolai left all tents and stationery torched, he said. The miscreants went on to target a third school at a mosque in Chonas, setting fire to bundles of textbooks.

Shigals administrative chief Muhammad Rahman Danish told Pajhwok Afghan News the district headquarters was at a walking distance from Chonas, where police rarely showed up.

He had demanded of tribal elders, clerics and scholars to help them protect schools. Danish alleged gunmen in NATO uniform had set fire to the school.

Residents and governmental officials often blame Taliban and other militant groups for arson attacks on educational institutions. But Zabeehullah Mujahid, who introduces himself as Taliban spokesman, condemned the torching of schools.

"Neither do we kill children nor burn schools and condemn those behind these acts," Mujahid said in a phone call to Pajhwok Afghan News from an undisclosed location.
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District attorney gunned down in Herat
HERAT CITY, June 26 (Pajhwok Afghan News): A district attorney known for his bold opposition to thugs and outlaws was killed by unidentified gunmen in the western Herat province Tuesday morning, officials said.

Fazl Haq Jo was shot dead on his way to the city from Guzara district, said Maria Bashir, head of the provincial attorney office. The unidentified assailants made good their escape after perpetrating the crime, she added.

In a brief chat with Pajhwok Afghan News, Maria Bashir said Haq Jo had relentlessly campaigned for 27 long years against unlawful actions of armed groups and individuals, and that appeared the motive behind his murder.

The official believed the district attorney might have been murdered by local strongmen nominated in three different cases he was hearing. Haq Jo's driver and neighbourer escaped unhurt in the attack.

She alleged powerful gunmen, refusing to submit to the law, continued to intimidate a number of officials through letters, telephone calls and physical attacks in some instances.

Provincial police spokesman Col. Noor Khan Nekzad said it was too early to say who killed the attorney and why. Police were probing the case, he continued.
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4500 kilograms of hashish torched in Paktia
GARDEZ, June 26 (Pajhwok Afghan News): A large quantity of hashish seized by Paktia security personnel last month was torched in this provincial capital on Tuesday.

Abdur Rehman Mangal, deputy governor of the province, informed Pajhwok Afghan News the 4500 kilograms of raw hashish burnt had been recovered in Gardez.

Five men arrested with the contraband were currently in jail, said Mangal, who stressed stern action against drug smugglers and traders in accordance with the law.

He also urged residents of the province to give up poppy cultivation, grow other cash crops and contribute to the reconstruction effort.

Also present on the occasion, Paktias news police chief Brig-Gen. Asmatullah Alizai promised he would accord top priority to cracking down on drug smugglers and improving the security situation.
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