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October 13, 2007 


Taliban suicide bomber kills 7 in Afghanistan
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A suicide bomber killed one policeman and six civilians in southeastern Afghanistan close to the border with Pakistan on Saturday, a police commander said.

Border police commander General Abdul Razak said the bomber rammed a motorcycle into a police vehicle near the bazaar in the centre of the town of Spin Boldak. Thirty more people were wounded in the attack.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

It came on the second day of the Eid al-Fitr Muslim holiday, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan, at a busy time for evening shoppers.

Taliban insurgents have carried out more than 100 suicide bombings this year, killing more than 200 people in a campaign aimed at convincing Afghans their government and its Western allies are unable to provide security.
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Canada helps out after Afghan suicide bombing
Sat. Oct. 13 2007 1:07 PM ET The Canadian Press
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan -- Canadian doctors based in Kandahar are being sent to an area near the Pakistan border where an attack by a suicide bomber has injured dozens of Afghan civilians and police.

Officials say at least 30 people were wounded when a suicide bomber detonated a vest loaded with explosives in a crowded market in Spin Boldak.

There are no immediate reports of deaths among bystanders. However, officials say at least 12 of the wounded are in serious condition.

Beside doctors, officials say Canada is also sending a number of troops from the base at Kandahar Airfield to help evacuate the wounded.

The bombing happened on the first day of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr. No Canadians are believed to have been in the area at the time.
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Four policemen killed in Afghan blast 
By IANS Saturday October 13, 03:43 PM
Kabul, Oct 13 (DPA) Four police officers were killed and six others wounded by a bomb attack in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, the US-led coalition force said Saturday.

The attack took place in the city of Gereshk Friday evening as hundreds of people had taken to the streets to celebrate the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

More than 5,000 people have been killed in clashes and attacks in Afghanistan since the beginning of the year.
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In Afghanistan, a fiancee aged 3
By ALISA TANG, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - When asked about her engagement party this summer, little Sunam glanced blankly at her family, then fiddled with her gold-sequined engagement outfit — a speechless response not out of shyness, but because she does not yet talk much. Sunam is 3.

The toddler was engaged to her 7-year-old cousin Nieem in June, in a match made by their parents.

Despite the efforts of the government and rights groups, the engagement and marriage of children still persists in this country, especially among poor, uneducated families or in the countryside.

About 16 percent of Afghan children are married under the age of 15, according to recent data from UNICEF. And there is evidence that the poverty of recent years is pushing down the marriage age further in some areas.

The practice can force couples into a miserable union and sometimes expose the girl to violence if she resists.

Sunam's father committed her in marriage as a gift to his sister, Fahima, who does not have a daughter and desperately wants one. Marriage between first cousins is common in Afghanistan because families believe it is better to know their in-laws well. The two families live in the same modest housing compound in Kabul.

"It's a very common problem. I know people in my own family who were engaged this way," said Orzala Ashraf, founder of Humanitarian Assistance for the Women and Children of Afghanistan. "The engagement happens before birth in some cases."

In an unhappy forced marriage, the man can take a woman he loves as a second wife, according to both Islamic and Afghan culture. But the girls are trapped. Some commit suicide — in Kapisa province, just north of Kabul, an 18-year-old girl shot and killed herself because her family would not break off her three-year engagement to a drug addict, Afghanistan's Pajhwok News Agency reported in August.

Others run away, sometimes falling into drugs or prostitution.

"Many girls who want to marry as they wish run away as a threat tactic to their family," Ashraf said. "There is no law that forbids running away, but it is a matter of honor."

The tactic sometimes works. Ashraf helped shelter one 17-year-old girl who ran away from home for a few days, humiliating her parents into letting her marry the man she loved.

The minimum legal age of marriage in Afghanistan is 16 for girls and 18 for boys. Yet child marriages account for 43 percent of all marriages, according to the United Nations. The reasons are often economic: The girl's family gets a "bride price" of double the per capita income for a year or more, according to the World Bank.

In March, the women's ministry and rights group Medica Mondiale started a campaign to encourage marriage registration before a judge, which they hope will cut down on forced and child marriages. Marriage registration is already mandated but rarely practiced.

The families of Sunam and Nieem are convinced that if the two grow up together knowing they will be married, they will be happy to wed in the future. The plan is for them to marry when Sunam is 14 or 15.

Nieem's mother, Fahima, said if the children grow up to dislike each other, the families will break off the arrangement. "It's their whole lives. If they don't like each other they will have problems their whole lives," she said.

But according to the children's aunt, Najiba, the match is unbreakable.

"We are Pashtun people. If we engage them, there is no way to separate them. They will marry," Najiba said. "In our tribe, it is like this. When they get engaged, they cannot divorce."

Many engaged couples do not meet until after they are married. In some cases, two pregnant women — either sisters or good friends — agree to make a match if one has a boy and the other a girl.

Girls from fatherless families — there are many in war-torn Afghanistan — often are forced into the worst engagements. Jamila Zafar, a social worker for rights group Women for Afghan Women, says it took 2 1/2 months of negotiations to free 14-year-old Mudira in Paghman province outside Kabul from her engagement.

Mudira had lost her father, and her uncle forced the girl into an engagement with his son, a handicapped amputee. When the son died, the uncle engaged her for a second time to another handicapped son.

When Zafar's colleagues talked with the uncle and his family, the relatives threatened to kill them and went to Mudira's house to beat her stepfather. Only under pressure from Paghman police and officials was the engagement called off.

It is nearly impossible to break engagements "because you're considered the other family's property. You're theirs now. You've been given away," said Manizha Naderi, director of Women for Afghan Women. "It's obviously barbaric. It's going to take generations to change this custom."

One 22-year-old woman from Kabul has tried to break off her engagement for eight years. Her 36-year-old fiance — whom she describes as uneducated, conservative and cruel, "like a Taliban" — has threatened to kill her if she refuses him. His father has also beaten her.

"I have told my mother for eight years that I don't accept this man," the engaged woman said, asking that her name be withheld for fear his family would attack her. "My mother said, 'What can I do? You don't have any brothers, you don't have a father.'"

Her father died in a car accident when she was 6 months old, so a close friend of her father took it upon himself to find her an appropriate husband — his son.

She is educated and works for a prominent international organization. Her fiance is a tailor with a high school diploma.

"I'm young. I want to go to school," she said, at a coffee shop in a Kabul shopping mall. Her voice was full of desperation and resignation.

"This is Afghanistan. That's why I don't like Afghanistan. I will leave Afghanistan."
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Canada soldier to be tried on Afghanistan shooting
Fri Oct 12, 6:06 PM ET
VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - A Canadian soldier will stand trial in military court for the shooting death of a fellow soldier in Afghanistan, the military said on Friday.

Master Cpl. Robbie Fraser is facing manslaughter and negligence charges in connection with the August 2006 death of Master Cpl. Jeffrey Walsh, who died of a gunshot wound while both men were on routine patrol near Kandahar.

The military filed the charges against Fraser last March, but the case had to be reviewed by military prosecutors before a decision was made on holding a court martial. A date for the trial has not been set.

It has been reported that Fraser's gun accidentally went off inside a cramped vehicle while it was traveling down a bumpy road. Fraser's family has argued he was being treated unfairly by the military over the incident.
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US to charge Guantanamo detainee with attempted murder
Fri Oct 12, 4:46 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States will charge a fourth terror suspect held at its Guantanamo detention camp, an Afghan who was 17 at the time of his arrest in Kabul, the Pentagon said Friday.

Mohammed Jawad, now 22, will be charged with attempted murder in violation of the laws of war and intentionally causing injury for allegedly throwing a grenade at a US military vehicle, wounding two US soldiers and an Afghan interpreter.

The charges were presented Tuesday to the "convening authority" that must approve them for the military tribunal tasked with trying the "war on terror" suspects held at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Jawad, who was born to an Afghan family living in the Pakistan side of the border, insisted he was innocent during administrative hearings in 2004 and 2005, saying he had gone to Afghanistan after being promised a well-paid job to remove land mines.

But his recruiter took him to a market in Kabul and handed him a grenade, he said.

"Nobody asked me to throw a grenade. I have never thrown a grenade. I don't understand how to throw it," Jawad said, according to redacted transcripts made public last year.

Jawad insisted that the grenade that exploded was thrown by the recruiter but that Afghan police officers coerced him into making a false confession.

"They tortured me. ... They beat me a lot. One person told me 'if you don't confess, they are going to kill you.' So I told them anything they wanted to hear," he said, adding that Americans did not mistreat him.

Some 330 "war on terror" suspects are being held in Guantanamo at a detention camp that was created after the United States invaded Afghanistan in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Most have never been charged with a crime.
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Afghan prisoners swapped for German hostage: report 
By IANS Saturday October 13, 06:06 PM
Berlin, Oct 13 (DPA) The German government pressured Kabul to release five prisoners from Afghan jails and handed over hundreds of thousands of dollars to secure the release of a German engineer this week held hostage in Afghanistan for months, a news report said Saturday.

Der Spiegel news magazine said pressing President Hamid Karzai to release the five prisoners was a new departure for the German government.

Faced with repeated hostage crises, Berlin has always insisted: 'The German government cannot be blackmailed'.

Nevertheless, there have been persistent reports that large sums have been paid for the release of German hostages in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Rudolf Blechschmidt, a 62-year-old engineer, was released Wednesday along with five Aghan men after they had spent more than two months in captivity in the central province of Maidan Wardak.

The Afghan government subsequently denied reports that five Taliban prisoners had been released in exchange.

Blechschmidt revealed that his captors saw Germany in the same light as the US because of the deployment in April this year of six Tornado reconnaissance jets to assist combat operations.

The German parliament Friday extended the mandate for the Tornados for a year along with that for 3,000 German troops engaged in training and reconstruction in the relatively peaceful north.

There are widespread fears in Germany that, while the Afghan population accepts the reconstruction mission, involvement in anti-Taliban operations will turn Germany into a terrorist target.

His captors shot another German engineer, Ruediger Dietrich, after his breaking down as the result of a forced march days after he and Blechschmidt were captured on July 18.
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Officer hails Afghan 'progress'
Saturday, 13 October 2007, 14:17 GMT 15:17 UK BBC News
A British Army commander has praised his troops for helping to bring about a "more normal pattern of life" in Afghanistan's Helmand province.

Lt Col Stuart Carver from the 1st Battalion, Royal Anglian Regiment, said they had "taken the fight to the enemy" during their six-month tour of duty.

In a letter to his local newspaper, he said witnessing reconstruction projects was the "real" success.

Nine members of the regiment, nicknamed the Vikings, have died since March.

In a letter to the Eastern Daily Press, Col Carver said: "When we arrived in March many commentators were claiming the war was already lost, but the change in the nature of operations over the six months has been astonishing.

"The Taleban have been beaten back and dislodged from their comfort zones in the Green Zone of the River Helmand because the Vikings have taken a determined fight to the enemy."

'Ferocious combat'

He added that troops had been involved in some of the most ferocious close-quarter combat the British Army has ever seen, as well as dealing with challenging terrain and temperatures exceeding 50 degrees celsius.

He said: "The real measurement of success has not been the numeric destruction of our foe but the embryonic beginning of reconstruction projects and the return to a more normal pattern of life, particularly in the vital town of Sangin."

He said that the 600 men and women of the battalion represented the "best of East Anglia", and that they had risked life and limb to make Afghanistan a safer place and win the trust of the local population.

Fifty-seven soldiers from the regiment, who are due to return to the UK next week, have also been wounded in battle.

Col Carver said: "There will not be a town in East Anglia that does not know someone who has been injured."

A memorial fund has been established to provide assistance to Royal Anglian soldiers who have been seriously wounded and help to the families of those killed.
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Lewanay Bazaar plunge into insecurity
Sher Ahmad Haider 
GHAZNI CITY, Oct 13 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Once a magnet for visitors from all districts of Ghazni as well as Zabul provinces, Lewanay Bazaar has lost its attraction to endemic violence.

Lewanay Bazaar, located in eight kilometres southeast of Ghazni City on the Kabul- Kandahar highway, hogged the headlines when Taliban kidnapped 23 South Korean citizens from the area on July 14.

Following the high-profile kidnap drama, the area of Qarabagh district grew messier, with attacks on government officials becoming a daily occurrence. Lewanay Bazaar became a bustling place during the Taliban regime that was ousted in 2001.

The foundation of the bazaar was laid by two brothers who opened shops in it. Their mother had psychotic problems and thus people came to call Lewanay Bazaar. After the collapse of the Taliban government, the bazaar became a popular picnic spot.

Residents of Ghazni and Zabul thronged it - particularly during Eid. But that was then. Now everyone is trying to avoid treading the marketplace. Gardens and grounds around the bazaar have lately been the scene of fighting.

Syed Abbas, a pharmacist in Lewanay Bazaar, fears a clash can erupt anytime. "Life is very hard here. But what can we do? We have to contend with gratuitous violence." Because of the plummeting security, he acknowledges, the bazaar is not even a patch on what it used to be.

Another shopkeeper, Akhtar Jan (23), agrees no one dares come to the bazaar for shopping. Drivers are weary of possible interception and grilling for hours at a stretch at the hands of rebels. Cabby Muhammad Wali was recently stopped on his way to Qarabagh by hooded militants.

So bad is law and order that some residents are leaving their houses close to the Lewanay Bazaar. Sher Khan recently left the area to settle in Ghazni City. "No one feels secure out there because the masses are teased on different pretexts."

Muhammad Arif, dweller Ghazni City, cannot forget the good time he spent picnicking in the bazaar. He is haunted by the traditional Afghan dance called attan and wrestling events held in Lewanay Baba.

Ghulam Hassan, deputy had of a newly-established police post, says the situation is limping back to normal. Colonel Abdul Shakoor, Ghazni police chief, believes greater and stricter security measures are needed in the area.
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Women issues not forgotten in Afghanistan
HERAT CITY, Oct 13 (Pajhwok Afghan News): As coalition forces assist in building a secure nation with the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), unique issues Afghan women face in this country are being addressed as well.

Ten US military women recently met with Afghan women at an elementary school and the Women Training Centre in Herat City to find out what issues they are facing, and how the ANSF can assist them in their concerns.

When the Taliban led the Afghan government, women were not allowed to pursue education or work outside home. Now women and girls are attending schools throughout the country. Unfortunately, sometimes the new-found freedom comes with fear and complications.

During the visit to the elementary school, teachers asked for Coalition forces to help teach Afghan men the country benefits when women work outside of their home and receive education.

Teachers also asked for more school supplies. Because of inadequate supplies, some women write in pencil so they can erase their work and re-use the paper, one teacher said. The ladies at the Herat Women Training Centre shared many similar concerns.

When Senior Chief Petty Officer Darlene M. Gonzales, contracting team leader for the Afghan Regional Security Integration Command-West at Camp Stone in Herat, asked how the ANSF can help address their concerns, the answer was clear, but not necessarily simple.

Bring security for girls who are going out of home, said Sima Shir Mohammadi, head of the Department of Women Affairs in Herat. She said many Afghans have fears, but women are a little more scared. It doesnt help, she said, recalling the Taliban, who are more prevalent in some villages, are completely against women education.

After years of being suppressed by the Taliban, women do have more rights now and several are working in various jobs. What many men consider acceptable work for women, however, is limited to teaching, tailoring, and jobs that are done in a half-day schedule or inside home, Shir Mohammadi said. Many men here still look at the women and girls as objects meaning they belong to the men.

Many men believe when women spend time being educated, they are not serving the men, which is expected of them, Shir Mohammadi said. This causes problems in Afghan households, which often leads to domestic violence against women.

Another issue Sher Mohammadi hopes to resolve is keeping the Ministry of Women Affairs open to continue the growth of womens rights. She expressed concern over word she had received from members of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistans Parliament, about six months ago, that the Ministry of Women Affairs would only be funded for a year.

Mohammed Noor Akbary, a current member of the IROA Parliament, acknowledged in a telephone conversation that the parliament recently discussed the need for the Ministry of Women Affairs. He said that in late September, however, they voted to keep the ministry intact, for now.

Sher Mohammadi contended that the existence of the Ministry for Women Affairs, which operates and funds the Women Training Center in Herat, is the Afghan womens way of taking on these challenges, in some regards.

Sher Mohammadi also suggested that one way to pass new ways of thinking is by educating the ANSF men and other Afghan government employees on the significant contributions women can make. The American women agreed that it is important to seek assistance in educating Afghan men.

Army Capt. Megan S. Detweiler, information operations officer for Task Force Phoenix in Kabul, told Sher Mohammadi and other Afghan women present that American women also faced challenges and a struggle for suffrage in the past, and they had to stand up for their rights.

While Sher Mohammadi and others like her continue to work toward educating the women, Gonzales assured her the Coalition will help in any way they can. For now, this often means providing basic learning materials, supplying copies of pamphlets and providing other supplies.
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How Golden Triangle became an also-ran in heroin trade
Today, the lion's share of opium production has moved to the poppy fields of Afghanistan
Oct 12, 2007 04:30 AM Thomas Fuller New York Times via Toronto Star,  Canada
The enduring image of Southeast Asia's Golden Triangle is of brightly coloured poppy fields, opium-smoking hill tribes and heroin labs hidden in the jungle.

But the reality is that after years of producing the lion's share of the world's opium, the Golden Triangle is now only a bit player in the global heroin trade.

"The mystique may remain, and the geography will be celebrated in the future by novelists," says Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. "But from our vantage point, we see a region that is rapidly moving toward an opium-free status."

The decline of the Golden Triangle is a major, if little noticed, milestone in the war on drugs. The question now is whether that success can be sustained.

Three decades ago, the northernmost reaches of Laos, Thailand and Burma, also known as Myanmar, produced more than 70 per cent of all the opium sold worldwide, most of which was refined into heroin. Today, the area produces about 5 per cent of the world total, says Costa's agency. What happened?

Economic pressure from China, crackdowns on opium farmers and a switch by criminal syndicates to methamphetamine production appear to have had the biggest impact. At the same time, some insurgent groups that once were financed with drug money now say they are urging farmers to eradicate their poppy fields.

As a result, the Golden Triangle has been eclipsed by the Golden Crescent – the poppy-growing area in and around Afghanistan that is now the source of an estimated 92 per cent of the world's opium, according to the United Nations.

Much of the growth in opium production there is in areas controlled by the Taliban, which United States officials say uses revenue from opium and heroin to finance itself.

This shift to Afghanistan has had major consequences for the global heroin market: a near doubling of opium production worldwide in less than two decades.

Poppies grown in the fertile valleys of southern Afghanistan yield on average four times more opium than those grown in upland Southeast Asia.

A striking aspect of the decline of the Golden Triangle is the role China has played in pressing opium-growing regions to eradicate poppy crops. A major market for Golden Triangle heroin, China has seen a spike in addicts and HIV infections from contaminated needles.

The area of Burma along the Chinese border, which once produced about 30 per cent of the country's opium, was declared opium-free last year by the United Nations.

Local authorities, who are autonomous from Burma's central military government, have banned poppy cultivation and welcomed Chinese investment in rubber, sugar cane and tea plantations, casinos and other businesses.

"China has had an underestimated role," says Martin Jelsma, a Dutch researcher who has written on the illicit drug trade in Asia.

"Their main leverage is economic – these border areas of Burma are by now economically much more connected to China than the rest of Burma. For local authorities, it's quite clear that, for any investments they want to attract, co-operation with China is a necessity."

Burma remains the world's second-leading source of opium but is a distant second; its production fell by 80 per cent over the last decade.

Insurgents have long used opium to help finance civil wars in the Golden Triangle. But some are now working to destroy the crop.

At least one faction of the Shan State Army, a group that long had ties to the heroin business, says it is leading eradication efforts.

Kon Jern, a military commander for the group, which is based along Burma's border with northern Thailand, is cracking down because government militias and corrupt officials profit from opium.

"They sell the drugs, they buy weapons, and they use those weapons to attack us," he says. The United Nations credits the Burmese military government with leading the eradication effort in Shan areas.

In Laos, where the political situation is more stable, the government began a crackdown in the 1990s to increase its international credibility and because officials realized their own children were at risk, says Leik Boonwaat, the representative in Laos for the UN's Office on Drugs and Crime. Laos finally outlawed opium in 1996.

He says the government also saw that opium did little to help poor farmers who grew poppies.

"It's mostly the organized crime syndicates that made most of the profits."

The amount of land cultivated in Laos for opium has fallen 94 per cent since 1998. The country produces so little opium that it may now be a net importer of the drug, the United Nations says.

Yet experts warn that the reductions may not hold unless farmers develop other ways to make a living.

Pierre-Arnaud Chouvy, an opium specialist at the National Centre for Scientific Research in Paris, says it took Thailand 30 years to wean opium farmers from poppy production, a transition led by the Thai royal family, which encouraged hill tribes to use their cooler climate to produce coffee, macadamia nuts and green vegetables.

Kon, the rebel commander in Burma, says farmers are finding it difficult to switch crops.

"If they change and grow other kinds of plants, nobody comes to buy their products – the transportation is not good," he explains.

Experts say that to stay free of opium, isolated villages that depended on it will need assistance and investment for better roads, schools and clinics.

But Burma, with its ruling junta, poses a dilemma for Western countries.

The United States has an embargo on trade with the country, and the European Union has suspended trade privileges and defence co-operation, limiting its aid to humanitarian assistance.

"This policy of boycott and isolation has, of course, meant that only very little development aid and humanitarian assistance is flowing into the country," says Jelsma, the Dutch expert on drugs. "That makes the chances of the sustainability of this decline very questionable."
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Itinerary of Afghanistan trip: site where fifth-century Buddas once stood, ground trod by Genghis Kahn
Associated Press via Midland Reporter-Telegram 10/13/2007
KABUL, Afghanistan -- I'm at least 40 minutes into my flight -- glass of white wine in one hand, book in the other -- when it suddenly dawns on me that this is no ordinary vacation: I'm going to Afghanistan.

Like many people, my image of Afghanistan has been shaped by what I read and see in the media. Women in blue burqas, fields of opium poppies, fierce-looking turbaned men, and tanks churning through dust.

That may well be true, but what I found on a weeklong trip was a surprisingly green country with incredibly welcoming people. Often peeping from beneath those enveloping burqas I saw strappy high-heeled sandals and crimson-colored toenails.

I climbed the ruins of 12th century citadels sacked by Genghis Khan, sat in sunlight beneath a canopy of apricot and apple trees in the Panjshir Valley drinking cardamom tea, and explored the empty niches of fifth century Buddhas famously blown up by the Taliban in Bamiyan.

With suicide attacks in the capital, kidnappings of foreigners and a resurgence of the extremist Taliban in the south, Afghanistan doesn't get many tourists. Most Western countries advise against all but necessary travel to Afghanistan, while some countries have outright banned it. The U.S. Department of State warns of "an ongoing threat to kidnap and assassinate U.S. citizens ... throughout the country."

Still, a few travel agencies, many run by former backpackers, will arrange trips there.

For me, it had become a tradition to do something unusual on my birthday. I have chased hammerhead sharks in Baja, Mexico, explored the jungle lairs of Indonesia's former separatist guerillas and hung out with street kids in China. This year it was Afghanistan.

After e-mails with friends who lived there, security agencies and by chance, the son of a former Afghan diplomat, I had a loose itinerary: Kabul, Bamiyan, and the Panjshir Valley.

Because of concerns about kidnappings, and lack of a tourism infrastructure, independent travel is not easy or recommended, especially for a single Western woman.

So I had two choices -- either a foreign-run travel agency in Afghanistan, spending upward of $1,000 a day, or I could hire a driver for a third the cost.

A friend recommended her driver, Shahabudin Sultani, a soft-spoken Bamiyan native dressed impeccably in a traditional cream Afghan tunic and trousers. And so at 6:30 a.m., we loaded bottles of water and bags of almonds and apricots into a minivan for the journey.

Although it's only 150 miles from Kabul, the drive to Bamiyan takes more than 10 hours along a dirt path that winds high up into the snowcapped Koh-i-Baba mountains before dipping down into a verdant valley. A faster route -- from the south -- is not recommended as it passes through some risky regions.

Dotted along the red craggy cliffs are dozens of fortress-like mud and brick houses with high walls pockmarked by rocket and bullet holes, ubiquitous reminders of war.

Children run along the path switching at donkeys loaded up with bails of wheat or herding goats past rusting Soviet tanks and abandoned mortar guns, some of which have been used as makeshift dams or bridges.

War has been a constant in Afghanistan, as regional powers battled for control of the territory often described as the cockpit of Asia, and the Bamiyan Buddhas were silent witness to much of it.

The two statues, at 174 feet and 125 feet, were hewn out of the red cliffs when Bamiyan, on the fabled Silk Road that linked Rome to China, was a thriving center of Buddhism and culture.

They survived the violent introduction of Islam in the seventh century, although Islamic leaders ordered that their golden-gilded faces and hands be sliced off. They escaped the murderous rage of Genghis Khan, who lost his favorite grandson at the battle for Bamiyan's Red City in 1221, and razed the entire valley in revenge.

During the decade-long resistance against the Soviets, the honeycomb network of 2,000 caves that surround the statues housed thousands of war refugees.

Then came the Taliban, which initially promised to preserve the Buddhas, then blew them up in 2001 to an international outcry.

I stayed at the Roof of Bamiyan hotel in a yurt -- small round huts made of mud and straw and covered inside with Afghan carpets.

The next morning, my birthday, as I watched the sun cast a honey hue across the patchwork valley of green and beige fields, it was not difficult to imagine how the Buddha's gold and jewel encrusted face would have shimmered as it caught the light.

After a breakfast of warm flaky Afghan bread, scrambled eggs and scented black tea, I headed to the village for a better look.

Although Bamiyan is one of the safest places in Afghanistan, I was careful to wrap up, covering my arms and legs and twisting a scarf around my head. I picked my way down the hill and through the dusty pathways of the village, drawing few stares and the occasional smile.

The towering niches, although empty, are more impressive close up. It's still possible to see the outline of the statues, and some parts remain, as if in bas relief, although most is in rubble.

UNESCO and Afghan archaeologists have spent years collecting and cataloguing fragments of the statues and stabilizing the cliff side.

For $3 -- plus a negotiable "tax" -- it's possible to explore the caves. I'm escorted by an earnest young Afghan archaeological student to the smaller statue, Buddha's wife.

As we approach a locked wooden door in the base of the cliff, my guide begs off, saying he wants to attend a party, and leaves me with a set of heavy keys, a yellow hard hat and a warning that "some parts are still unstable."

I inch my way up a narrow, dark and crumbling staircase that branches out on several levels into empty caves, some of which bear a hint of the elaborate paintings and frescoes that once decorated the now-musty interior.

The walls crumble beneath my touch. I step gingerly on the decaying floor, acutely aware that mobile phone reception is sketchy here and shouts for help would be futile. When at last I reach the top, I sit for a while in a Buddha-shaped cave where the devout once came to pray, looking out over green fields of wheat and potatoes to the snowy mountains of the Hindu Kush.

Most people leave after seeing the Buddhas, but there are other sites worth seeing, including the lakes of Band-i-Amir, five pools of sapphire blue set amid desert canyons, and the ruins of the Red City and the City of Screams, which were built in the 12th century and razed by Genghis Khan a century later.

The Red City, or Shahr-i-Zohak, sprawls out over three levels atop a red cliff mountain at the entrance to the Bamiyan valley. Sultani, my driver, used to play there as a boy, and practically skips his way to the top following our mandatory military guide, as I scramble up the path behind, clinging to parts of the citadel's fortifications and keeping an eye out for red-painted rocks, an indication of land mines.

Both Shahr-i-Zohak and Shahr-i-Gholghola, the City of Screams, were heavily mined during decades of war, although most have been cleared.

For my last adventure in Bamiyan, we head to Dragon's Valley, a mountain ridge in a valley of undulating anonymous gray sand dunes. Legend has it that a dragon terrorized locals, demanding each day a young girl and the occasional camel to eat. Until that is, Islam's dragon slayer Hazrat Ali split the beast in two with his sword leaving a fissure 3 feet wide at some points, and sparking a mass conversion to Islam.

The ribbed mountain does look like a dragon's scaly back. Inside the chasm you can hear the dragon's mournful rumbling -- bubbling spring water streaming like tears from the dragon's eyes.

Over the next few days I pack in a day trip to the Panjshir Valley, visiting the marble and stone tomb of Ahmad Shah Masood, a resistance hero who was assassinated by al-Qaida a few days before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The tomb is perched high on a hill with a commanding view of the valley he defended from Soviet troops.

I'm picked up early the next day by Great Game Travel company for a daylong tour of Kabul, the capital, that jumps between the fifth century city wall to 16th century Babur Gardens to the buzzing Kabul market. Here fighting cocks are sold for $100 each, and women in sky-blue burqas teeter on high heels as they jostle to buy tea and spices.

Standing on a hill looking over the city, our guide Ghulam Sakhi Danishjo points out the Kabul stadium where the Taliban once carried out public executions.

What happens there now? "Oh," said Sakhi, "now, they just play soccer."
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Afghan villagers accuse US troops of burning Koran
13 Oct 2007, 2130 hrs IST, AFP via Times of India, India
ASADABAD (AFGHANISTAN): Hundreds of angry villagers demonstrated in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday, alleging that US troops had burnt the holy Koran, a charge the US-led coalition rejected.

Residents of Kunar province blocked a road for several hours before parliamentarians, in their home districts for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, were able to calm the crowd, a report said.

The protesters alleged coalition forces had torn and burnt a Koran during an overnight raid in which they had arrested four men.

The reporter saw torn pages of the Muslim holy book in the village of Kodu, which is about 20 kilometres (12 miles) south of the provincial capital Asadabad.

The owner of the house where two men were arrested said the soldiers had burst into his house in the early hours of the morning and gone through his books.

"They tied up and took two of my sons with them," the man, Char Gul, said. "They went through our books, spread them on the floor. They tore and set ablaze a holy Koran and they took another Koran with them," he added.

An elder, Haji Mumtaz, said the raid started at midnight and lasted until early morning. "They took them with four people and they desecrated the holy Koran," he said.

The coalition, which is rounding up Taliban and Al-Qaida militants, confirmed there had been an operation and that four men were detained but rejected the allegations about the Koran.

"The coalition force involved in this incident didn't desecrate any religious articles," said coalition spokesman Army Major Chris Belcher.

"We respect all religions and treat the holy articles with the respect they deserve," Chris added.

Afghanistan is a deeply devout country and allegations of abuse of Islam have in the past touched off protests that have turned deadly.

In April, 2005 thousands of people took to the streets to protest allegations in Newsweek magazine that the Koran was desecrated at the US detention camp at Guantanamo Bay.

Violence erupted at one demonstration, leaving at least 15 people dead and 120 wounded. Newsweek later retracted the story, which alleged that a Koran had been flushed down a toilet.

Hundreds of Afghans demonstrated in several cities February last year to protest European cartoons deemed insulting to the Prophet Mohammad. Eleven people were killed.

The extremist Taliban also stir up anti-US propaganda to gain support in their bid to topple the US-backed government through an insurgency that the Islamic hardliners launched soon after being toppled from government in 2001.

The Kunar province police chief, Abdul Jalal Jalal, said it was not clear what had happened in the latest incident, and authorities had sent a delegation to the area to find out.

"The Americans have not come here to desecrate our religion and disrespect our culture," he said. "But if anything like this has happened, we hope that the authorities of the foreign forces penalise the perpetrators." 
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Texas firm accused of overbilling U.S. government in Afghanistan
By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON Associated Press Writer
HOUSTON — A mom-and-pop Texas company that provides security in Afghanistan is accused of overbilling the U.S. government by charging for nonexistent employees and vehicles, an American security official with close ties to the company told The Associated Press.

Houston-based U.S. Protection and Investigations, which does security work for the U.S. State Department arm USAID, is the latest firm to face scrutiny since private guards allegedly killed 17 Iraqi civilians.

The overbilling by USPI could add up to millions of dollars, the American security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in Kabul.

Eric Dubelier, USPI's attorney, called the official's allegations "factually incorrect." He said no one has accused the company or any of its employees of wrongdoing. He acknowledged the government is conducting an inquiry into the firm but declined to elaborate.

USPI was founded two decades ago by Barbara and Del Spier of Hempstead, about 50 miles northwest of Houston. The firm is headquartered in Houston but the Spiers reportedly spend much of their time in Afghanistan.

According to its Web site, USPI's five years of work in Afghanistan have included contracts with several international companies and organizations to provide security for mine clearing and the construction of roads and buildings.

In a 2004 interview with the Houston Chronicle, Barbara Spier said helping the United States meet its goals in Afghanistan was worth the sacrifice of working in such a dangerous country.

"I come back here and all I hear is bad, bad, bad," she told the newspaper. "But over there, the people are wonderful. They don't want us to leave. They are afraid the Taliban will take over again."

The company employs more than 3,600 people in the war-torn country, nearly all of whom are Ministry of Interior supplementary troops, its Web site says.

Other USPI employees are highly paid Americans such as Evan McAdams, a former Fort Bend school district police officer who joined the company so his family could afford to buy a new house. He was killed in 2005 in a vehicle collision near Kabul.

USPI's hiring practices in Afghanistan have drawn criticism from the International Crisis Group, a Belgium-based think tank that works to prevent and resolve deadly conflict.

In a 2005 report on disarmament in Afghanistan, the group said a majority of the men on USPI's payroll are associated with private militias and have not gone through formal channels.

"Many have used their authority to engage in criminal activity, including drug trafficking," the report said.

Later that year, the firm drew attention again when an Afghan official said an American supervisor for USPI allegedly shot to death his Afghan interpreter and was flown out of the country the next day. USPI officials have declined to comment on the incident.

The American security official said agents from the private security firm Blackwater USA raided USPI's Kabul office last month and seized computers and office files.

Blackwater helps provide security for the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan. It also employs the guards accused of killing the Iraqi civilians.
___
Associated Press writers Jason Straziuso and Fisnik Abrashi contributed to this report from Kabul.
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UK plans Farsi TV channel, new embassy in Kabul
LONDON, Oct 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The British government plans to improve security across its embassy network and provide for a new embassy in Kabul under a 183 million capital investment programme.

An additional funding of 37 million a year by 2010-11 will be used to support London's counter-radicalisation programmes, addressing weakness in governance, education, civil society, human rights and rule of law in priority countries.

The Brown government announced on Wednesday funding for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) would grow from 1.6 billion in 2007-08 to 1.7 billion by 2010-11.

According to the announcement, 21 million pounds a year by 2010-11 will be provided for the launch of a new Farsi television channel and 24/7 Arabic TV - services that will give the BBCWS a tri-media presence (radio, online and TV) in Afghanistan, the Middle East and Iran.

By the year 2010-11, the British Council will receive an additional 3 million pounds annually for its Reconnect initiative to build understanding with Muslim societies, particularly amongst alienated younger populations.
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UNODC backs Kabul's stance on poppy eradication
NEW YORK, Oct 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has supported the stand taken by the Karzai government that on the issue of poppy eradication in Afghanistan.

"We always agree with the host government and so we will go by what the Karzai government says, Antonio Maria Costa told reporters at the UN headquarters on Wednesday after releasing a report on "Opium Poppy Cultivation in South East Asia Laos, Myanmar and Thailand."

The latest UNODC periodic report on poppy cultivation in the so-called Golden Triangle reveals that for the first time in several years poppy production in troublesome Myanmar has increased by 46 percent.

Like Afghanistan, Costa said, poppy cultivation in Myanmar was concentrated more in one province and more so in areas where the authority of the central government was the weakest.

Responding to a question about a recent report in The New York Times that Afghanistan is rethinking its stance on poppy eradication with the possible option of using herbal pesticide, Costa said the news was true.

"We have not been asked to look into the matter yet, he said, adding until now the Karzai government has been objecting to any such move.

Costa said the chemical herbicide referred to in The New York Times was very popular in Europe and is nothing more than a weed killer. Besides Europe, where it is utilised on a mass scale to destroy weeds, it is also used in several countries like Columbia for poppy elimination.

Acknowledging that there has been a raging debate in a number of countries about its use, he said the amount of the chemical herbicide being used in Columbia is less than one percent of the amount being used by many European countries.

He noted the government of Ecuador had objected to the use of this chemical herbicide by the Columbia authorities in fields near its border.
Lalit K. Jha
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M-1 to cater to traffic from Afghanistan, CARs
ISLAMABAD, Oct 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): A multi-billion motorway between Peshawar and Islamabad will cater to international traffic from Afghanistan, Central Asian Republics (CARs) and China to ports and industrial areas of Pakistan.

The state-controlled Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) news agency reported the project would also help cut transportation costs, benefiting consumers. Called M-1, the motorway, scheduled to be opened later in the month, will provide a faster and alternative route between Islamabad and Peshawar.

National Highway Authority (NHA) official Altaf Chaudhry was quoted as saying on Wednesday the six-lane M-1 would form part of the National Trade Corridor (NTC). It will be linked with the Peshawar-Torkham Expressway.   
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Most irresponsible armed groups yet to surrender arms
KABUL, Oct 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): It has been two years since the Disarmament of Irresponsible Armed Group (DIAG) programme was launched, but only 124 of 1818 such outfits have surrendered weapons so far.

Senior official of Counter-Terrorism Department at Interior Ministry Saeed Anwar Majmar Ahmadi Thursday said this on Thursday on the occasion of delivering 25 Klashnikov assault rifles collected from various parts of Kabul to DIAG officials.

Over the last two years, 34,655 arms including 4,154 heavy weapons have been received as part of the DIAG programme that began in October 2005 under the chairmanship of Vice-President Karim Khalili.

An official of the Afghanistan New Beginning Programme (ANBP), who wished to remain anonymous, told Pajhwok Afghan News DIAG progress was largely stymied by insecurity and non-cooperation from provincial governors.

According to the Afghanistan Compact, all irresponsible armed groups should be disarmed by 2008, but the target appears pretty difficult to attain.

Majmar Ahmadi said the weapons recovered included ammunition and landmines. He added more than 1700 ammunition depots had been found and about 30 tonnes of arms and ammunition destroyed.
Ahmad Khalid Mowahid
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CJFE to honour Pajhwok's managing editor
TORONTO, October 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) has decided to honour Farida Nekzad of Afghanistan and Sahar Al-Haideri of Iraq with the 2007 International Press Freedom Awards.

The two have been nominated for the award in acknowledgement of their commitment to the freedom of expression and overcoming tremendous odds to report, the journalist body said on Thursday.

Farida Nekzad works as a journalist promoting press freedom and women's rights in Afghanistan. She is the current managing editor of the Pajhwok News Agency, the sole independent news agency in Afghanistan.

Sahar Al-Haideri was killed this year for unflinchingly reporting on humanitarian issues in Iraq, including the plight of women and minority groups, CJFE said. She wrote in the most dangerous circumstances, challenging and exposing the human rights violations of the extremist groups in her home town of Mosul.

"Ali Iman Sharmarke is the recipient of the Tara Singh Hayer Award, which recognises Canadians for courage in journalism. Sharmarke returned to his homeland of Somalia to help rebuild the media in the war-shattered country. He was killed on August 11, 2007, when his car drove over a remote-controlled landmine as he was returning from the funeral of another journalist, Mahad Ahmed Elmi." 

This year marks the 10th year anniversary of the International Press Freedom Awards. In the 10 years since the awards inception, approximately 1,000 journalists have been killed on the job. CJFE is planning to mark the anniversary with a dramatic look back on a decade of award winners through a retrospective of their struggles and triumphs to report the news in a dangerous world.

In a statement emailed to Pajhwok Afghan News, CJFE hoped Farida Nekzad and the husband of Sahar Al-Haideri would be able to travel to Toronto to attend the awards ceremony at the Arcadian Court on November 1, where they would be guests of honour.

"We feel this years winners represent the best of the local journalists, working in impossible war-time conditions, and never giving up until they get the story out," said Chair of the Awards committee, Carol Off. "The fact that two out of three of our winners have died for their work is a stark reminder of how dangerous that work can be."
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Two districts of Bamyan headed for famine, officials warn
Frontier Post (Pakistan) 11 Oct 2007
BAMYAN CITY (PAN): The Bamyan Disaster Management Committee said food crops in Punjab and Waras were extensively damaged by recent floods and asked for over 22,000 tonnes of food items for the vulnerable people. Muhammad Ishaq Poya, member of the provincial council and the Disaster Management Committee told Pajhwok Afghan News on Tuesday more than 50 percent of food crops were damage by a persistent cold wave following floods earlier in the year. According to an assessment by the committee, UNAMA and Agha Khan Development Network (AKDN), he claimed, 12,000 tonnes of wheat were needed for the dwellers of Punjab and 10000 tonnes for Waras residents. Waras administrative chief Muhammad Azim Farid warned: “If the requested help is not delivered before the winter, residents of the two districts run the risk of being hit by a severe famine.” Farid added residents of the two districts were heavily dependent on agriculture, but half of their crops had been harmed. General Muhammad Nader Fahimi, deputy governor of the province, argued roads would be blocked by winter snows if assistance was not sent in time. More than 60 avalanches, floods and landslides in Bamyan took a toll on farmlands. However, the Afghanistan National Disaster Management Authority (ANDMA) in Kabul assured it had taken steps to dispatch 20,000 tonnes of foodstuff to the affected districts, clear roads and provide health services to 18 vulnerable provinces. ANDMA member Ghulam Haider identified Bamyan, Maidan Wardak, Ghazni, Logar, Paktia, Ghor, Daikundi, Parwan, Panjsher, Sar-i-Pul, Badakhshan, Faryab, Baghlan, Nuristan, Kunar, Takhar and Khost as vulnerable provinces. Adrian Edwards, UNAMA spokesman, claimed 50 per cent of the food items had been rushed to the provinces. Forty percent of the food would be distributed to women and children and the rest to work-for-food programme workers.
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