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Afghanistan welcomes 'war on terror' shift on 9/11 anniversary
by Bronwen Roberts
KABUL (AFP) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai Thursday welcomed a new US "war on terror" focus on Pakistan's border areas as further deadly violence underscored rampant militancy seven years after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Afghanistan's pain after 9/11 is civilian casualties: Karzai
September 11, 2008
KABUL (AFP) - Afghanistan has seen progress since the 9/11 attacks that led to the ouster of the Taliban regime, but it has also suffered much "pain" in civilian casualties, President Hamid Karzai said Thursday.
US death in Afghanistan makes 2008 deadliest year
By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Militants attacking a compound in Afghanistan's east killed a U.S. soldier on Thursday, making 2008 the deadliest year yet for American forces in the country that sheltered al-Qaida
Suicide attack in Afghanistan, two civilians killed
Thu Sep 11, 8:20 AM ET
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - A suicide car bomb blew up near a convoy of private security guards in Afghanistan's southern city of Kandahar Thursday, killing two Afghan civilian passers-by, a governor's spokesman said.
Afghanistan: Taliban accused of using civilians to provoke US attacks
AKI - Adnkronos International
London, 11 Sept. (AKI) - The Taliban are trying to induce American forces to kill civilians, including women and children, in Afghanistan, a senior US government official said on Thursday.
US 'must target Pakistan havens'
Thursday, 11 September 2008 BBC News
The chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff has called for a new strategy in Afghanistan to deny militants bases across the border in Pakistan.
Bush Said to Give Orders Allowing Raids in Pakistan
New York Times By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON-President Bush secretly approved orders in July that for the first time allow American Special Operations forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without the prior approval
Pakistan, Afghanistan agree to reduce regional tension
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-11 23:44:25
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Pakistan and Afghanistan Thursday agreed on several measures to enhance bilateral cooperation, remove misunderstandings and reduce regional tension
Top Military Officer Urges Major Change in Afghanistan Strategy
The Washington Post - Politics By Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, September 11, 2008
The nation's top military officer issued a blunt assessment yesterday of the war in Afghanistan and called for an overhaul in U.S. strategy there, warning that thousands more U.S. troops as well as greater U.S.
Afghans say life no better after invasion
By Saeed Ali Achakzai
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Seven years after the attacks on New York and Washington, the event that sparked off the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, many Afghans say life is no better and some say its worse.
FACTBOX - Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 11
Sept 11 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1330 GMT on Thursday:
Coalition troops kill 'several militants' in Afghanistan
Thu Sep 11, 3:59 AM ET
KABUL (AFP) - International forces killed several suspected militants in eastern Afghanistan in a raid on a "terrorist leader" said to be helping smuggle in foreign fighters, the US-led coalition said Thursday.
Iran paying for NATO's drugs failure in Afghanistan, says Safari
London, Sept 11, IRNA
Young Iranians are paying the price for NATO's "failure" to curb opium production in neighbouring Afghanistan, according to Deputy Foreign Minister for European Affairs Mehdi Safari.
Security still main obstacle for Afghan business
By Jonathon Burch
KABUL, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Security is still the main obstacle facing private business in Afghanistan and the primary reason investors stay away, a group of leading Afghan businessmen said on Thursday, but there are other problems too.
Ethnic antagonism spurs land disputes in north
KHOWAJA BAHAUDIN, 11 September 2008 (IRIN) - Hundreds of Pashtun refugees who have returned from Pakistan to Afghanistan's northeastern Takhar Province say their properties have been seized by local people and militias from other ethnic groups.
8 mln U.S. dollars agreement inked to tackle food crisis in Afghanistan
Xinhua / September 11, 2008
The Afghan government and the World Bank on Thursday signed an agreement under which 8 million U.S. dollars grant will be provided as part of the assisting programs to tackle food crisis in the war-torn country.
U.S. attacks Haqqani network again in Afghanistan
Thu Sep 11, 3:12 AM ET
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led forces targeted Taliban fighters in eastern and southeast Afghanistan, including veteran commander Jalaluddin Haqqani's network, killing several militants, the U.S. military said on Thursday.
On 9/11 anniversary, Pakistan has a new breed of Taliban
By Amir Mir The News International (Pakistan) Thursday, September 11, 2008
LAHORE: Seven years after the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States that shook the entire world, Pakistan, despite being a key American ally in the war on terror, continues to be plagued by the menace
Secrets of the Taliban's success
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Online / September 11, 2008
Kandahar has traditionally been the city of Afghan royalty, warlords and the center of resistance movements against the British and Russia. It was also the spiritual heartland of the student militia
Pakistan premier backs army chief's rebuke to US
By NAHAL TOOSI Associated Press September 11, 2008
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan's prime minister on Thursday backed a harsh rebuke of the U.S. by the Muslim nation's military chief, a sign of a strain in relations seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks forged the two countries' anti-terror alliance.
Afghan foot juggler may break Asian record
www.quqnoos.com Written by Jawad Zahid Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Football player juggles ball on his feet for three hours and 11 minutes
Kayani warns US to keep its troops out
Pakistan Dawn, Pakistan By Iftikhar A. Khan Sept 10, 2008
ISLAMABAD-Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has rejected US claims that the rules of engagement gave the coalition forces in Afghanistan the right to enter Pakistan and declared
Playing politics with Afghanistan
The Globe and Mail - Opinions September 11, 2008
Six months ago, Parliament voted to extend Canada's mission to Afghanistan until 2011, with the provision that our troops would leave the volatile province of Kandahar at that time. It was a rare instance in which the Conservatives
Giant Buddha statue unearthed in Afghanistan
By Sayed Salahuddin Thu Sep 11, 3:39 AM ET
KABUL (Reuters) - Archaeologists have discovered a 19-metre (62-foot) Buddha statue along with scores of other historical relics in central Afghanistan near the ruins of giant statues destroyed by the Islamist Taliban seven years ago.
Dutch defense minister does not rule out longer mission in Afghanistan
Xinhua Sept. 10, 2008
BRUSSELS-Dutch Defense Minister Eimert van Middelkoop has spoke of the possibility of keeping some Dutch troops in Afghanistan after the Dutch mission expires in 2010 as planned.
Children left home alone as mother visits Afghanistan
Police arrest Leeds woman after three children found in house with no adult
David Batty and agencies guardian.co.uk, Thursday September 11 2008
A woman has been arrested after her three children were found home alone in West Yorkshire while she was in Afghanistan.
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Afghanistan welcomes 'war on terror' shift on 9/11 anniversary
by Bronwen Roberts
KABUL (AFP) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai Thursday welcomed a new US "war on terror" focus on Pakistan's border areas as further deadly violence underscored rampant militancy seven years after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Karzai also called for a complete end to civilian casualties in the anti-extremism fight after a US strike last month which Afghan and US officials say left 90 villagers dead.
As thousands of US troops stationed here fell silent to mark 9/11, the latest deadly Taliban car bomb killed two bystanders in Kandahar and another blast in Ghazni wounded seven.
Britain announced that one of its soldiers died in a bomb an attack on Wednesday while the US-led coalition said it had killed "several militants," although locals said three civilians were among the dead.
Karzai welcomed comments from the US military chief and said he had long called for a shift in operations to target extremists launching attacks from Pakistan's rugged border regions to Afghanistan's east.
Taliban militants fled to Pakistan's tribal regions after the hardline regime was toppled by a US-led invasion in late 2001 for harbouring Al-Qaeda. The insurgency has grown increasingly deadly this year.
"Our words have been clear in this regard: a change in strategy is needed, meaning that we must go to places where there is training and hide-out facilities (for terrorists) and jointly we must go there and destroy that," Karzai said.
He spoke after US Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Admiral Michael Mullen said he had commissioned "a new, more comprehensive military strategy for the region that covers both sides of that border."
The United States says the area is a safe haven for insurgents who are a threat to Afghanistan and the world.
Karzai has often said Afghanistan should not be the sole battleground for the "war on terror" with much of the violence plotted and equipped across the border in militant bases.
He paid tribute to the international soldiers in his country to help tackle insurgent violence and expand the Afghan security forces, destroyed in a civil war that preceded the Taliban's 1996-2001 government.
But he also said there had been mistakes, notably the number of civilians being killed in military operations.
"We want civilian casualties in Afghanistan not only to reduce but to stop totally," Karzai said.
The country's campaign against extremist militants would only succeed if it had public support, he said, referring to disaffection caused by the killing of ordinary Afghans.
The issue has come to the fore with Afghan and UN teams saying more than 90 civilians were killed in US air strikes in the western district of Shindand on August 22.
The US military says only five to seven civilians were killed along with 30-35 militants but it has launched a review its initial investigation.
There were, however, new claims of casualties with locals saying US-led coalition troops had killed a woman and two of her sons aged 12 and 19 in a raid in the central province of Ghazni on Wednesday.
The coalition confirmed the operation but said that "several militants" were killed and two arrested.
Elders took the bodies of the dead to the town of Ghazni in protest.
"If the governor of Ghazni does not bring those responsible to justice, the people will either commit suicide or stand and fight against Americans," an elder, Fazal Mohammad, told reporters.
The Taliban meanwhile claimed responsibility for a suicide car bombing in the southern city of Kandahar that killed a boy and an adult male and wounded six more people.
The target was a convoy including private Afghan guards for the US-based Louis Berger construction company, Kandahar province government spokesman Zalmai Ayobi told AFP.
US military bases in Kabul and at Bagram, north of the capital, meanwhile held ceremonies to remember the 3,000 people killed on September 11, 2001 with one featuring members of the New York National Guard who were among the first to respond.
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Afghanistan's pain after 9/11 is civilian casualties: Karzai
September 11, 2008
KABUL (AFP) - Afghanistan has seen progress since the 9/11 attacks that led to the ouster of the Taliban regime, but it has also suffered much "pain" in civilian casualties, President Hamid Karzai said Thursday.
US military bases in Afghanistan held ceremonies Thursday to remember the September 11, 2001 attacks that killed around 3,000 people in the United States and led to the invasion that removed the Taliban for sheltering Al-Qaeda.
At a media briefing at his heavily secured palace, Karzai offered his condolences on the seven-year anniversary.
"We have had a long journey since then... Afghanistan, thank God, has had lots of achievements," Karzai said.
"Unfortunately Afghanistan has also had lots of pains and sorrow since then. Still Afghan children burn in this fire (of terrorism), still our people are affected by terrorism," he added.
One of the major "mistakes" of efforts to defeat a Taliban-led insurgency had been civilian casualties caused by international forces, the president said.
This topic has come to the fore with Afghan and UN teams saying more than 90 civilians were killed in US air strikes in the western district of Shindand on August 22.
The US military says only five to seven civilians were killed along with 30-35 militants but it has launched a review its initial investigation.
"We want civilian casualties in Afghanistan not only to reduce but to stop totally," Karzai said.
The country's campaign against extremist militants would only succeed if it had public support, he said, referring to disaffection caused by the killing of ordinary Afghans.
Karzai also paid tribute to international soldiers killed in Afghanistan.
The iCasualties.org website that tracks the deaths of troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan says 961 have died in the campaign in this country, 586 of them US nationals.
Most were killed in combat but the figures include those who died in accidents, sometimes outside of the country.
Karzai also endorsed a new US focus on the Afghan and Pakistan border in its "war on terror." The United States says the area is a safe haven, including for insurgents active in Afghanistan.
"We must go to places where there is training and hide-out facilities (for terrorists) and jointly we must go there and destroy that," Karzai said.
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US death in Afghanistan makes 2008 deadliest year
By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Militants attacking a compound in Afghanistan's east killed a U.S. soldier on Thursday, making 2008 the deadliest year yet for American forces in the country that sheltered al-Qaida while the terror group plotted the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The NATO-led force said the soldier was killed in eastern Afghanistan "when insurgents attacked a compound." It provided no other details, but a Western military official told The Associated Press that the soldier was American.
Thursday's death brings to 112 the number of troops who have died in Afghanistan this year, surpassing last year's record toll of 111.
Afghanistan was the launching pad for al-Qaida's terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. In response, U.S. forces invaded in October 2001 and drove the Taliban out of power in a matter of weeks.
At a ceremony in Kabul commemorating the Sept. 11 attacks, Col. Cody Smith said the date is a reminder of the terror experienced by those killed in the U.S. attacks experienced.
"That is what drives me, to fight for freedom all over the world because those people that died were in terror of seeing the fire, of seeing ... their lives being taken from them," Cody said. "We should fight, so that freedom reigns and terror does not."
Osama bin Laden, leader of the al-Qaida network, is believed to be in the lawless tribal belt on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
Once derided as a ragtag insurgency after the fall of their regime, Taliban fighters have transformed into a fighting force advanced enough to mount massive conventional attacks. Suicide and roadside bombs have turned bigger and deadlier than ever.
The number of Arab, Chechen and Uzbek militants flowing into the Afghan-Pakistan theater have increased this year, bringing with them command expertise the Taliban had lacked in previous years.
Top U.S. generals, European presidents and analysts say the blame lies to the east, in militant sanctuaries in neighboring Pakistan. As long as those areas remain havens where fighters arm, train, recruit and plot increasingly sophisticated ambushes, the Afghan war will continue to sour.
Some 33,000 U.S. troops are now stationed in the country, the highest level since 2001. Overall, more than 65,000 troops from 40 nations are deployed in Afghanistan.
U.S. troops in Afghanistan on Thursday remembered those killed in the Sept. 11 attacks during ceremonies at bases around the country. In Kabul, a top U.S. general said terrorism still remains a threat to the world.
Maj. Gen. Robert Cone told those gathered for the memorial ceremony at Camp Eggers that terrorists have struck in London, Russia and Bali, Indonesia since the 2001 attacks in the United States.
"These attacks are reminders that the threat of terrorism is real and still a danger to the entire world," Cone said.
Cone's command in Kabul trains and equips the fledgling Afghan security forces — the centerpiece of the American strategy of turning Afghanistan into a country that can defend itself and away from the days when bin Laden used it as a safe haven to launch the attacks in New York and Washington.
___
Associated Press reporter Fisnik Abrashi contributed to this report.
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Suicide attack in Afghanistan, two civilians killed
Thu Sep 11, 8:20 AM ET
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - A suicide car bomb blew up near a convoy of private security guards in Afghanistan's southern city of Kandahar Thursday, killing two Afghan civilian passers-by, a governor's spokesman said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast but it was similar to scores carried out by the Taliban, who were removed from government in a US-led invasion launched after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
"There was a suicide car bomb attack against one vehicle of a private security company of a construction company in Kandahar city," provincial government spokesman Zalmai Ayobi told AFP.
"Two civilians were killed and six were wounded," he said.
A witness said that one of the dead was a boy on his way to school and the other was an adult male.
Ayobi said the attack was against a convoy of Afghan guards from a security company but the targeted vehicle appeared to have driven off.
"The suicide attacker tried to ram his vehicle into the convoy of the private security company but the vehicles seem to have driven away," he said.
Canadian troops immediately sealed off the area as ambulances rushed the wounded to hospital, an AFP reporter at the scene said.
The bomb blew a crater in the road and parts of the vehicle used in the attack littered the scene, along with bits of the attacker's flesh.
It was the second attack in the tense city since Sunday when two suicide bombers blew themselves up inside the provincial police headquarters, killing five people and wounding nearly 40.
The Taliban, which took up arms in Kandahar province before sweeping to power in the 1990s, claimed responsibility for the police blasts.
Taliban rebels have carried out scores of suicide bombings as part of a growing insurgency launched soon after they were removed from government in a US-led invasion in late 2001.
In one of the most audacious attacks, they used suicide bombers to blow open Kandahar jail in June, enabling more than 1,000 prisoners -- about half of them militants -- to escape.
The suicide attacks on the New York and Washington exactly seven years ago prompted the invasion that drove the Taliban from government in late 2001 for harbouring Al-Qaeda leaders.
Despite the efforts of international troops and a growing number of Afghan security forces, extremist insurgents have been able to increase their attacks -- most often bombings -- claiming thousands of lives.
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Afghanistan: Taliban accused of using civilians to provoke US attacks
AKI - Adnkronos International
London, 11 Sept. (AKI) - The Taliban are trying to induce American forces to kill civilians, including women and children, in Afghanistan, a senior US government official said on Thursday.
James Glassman, the US State Department's under secretary for public diplomacy, was speaking in response to the controversial air strike carried out by American forces that allegedly killed at least 90 civilians in western Afghanistan in August.
"The problem of civilian casualties is a big one," he said in a television interview broadcast on the BBC.
Referring to the attack in Azizabad village in the province of Herat on 22 August, he said the issue was being investigated.
Initially US officials rejected complaints by the United Nations and the Afghan government about the casualties.
The Karzai government also called for a review of NATO and US conduct in the field.
"We don't really know how many people were killed. But there is no doubt that some civilians were killed in a strike against military targets."
But Glassman also used the TV interview to condemn the Taliban and accused militants of deliberately provoking attacks that targeted civilians.
"Let me tell you the difference between the United States and its allies, including Britain and including NATO, and the Taliban," he said.
"The difference is when we kill civilians we do it by mistake. We don't want to kill civilians, absolutely not.
"They kill civilians on purpose. Not only that, they try and lead us to kill civilians because then they can use that in their propaganda war against us."
He said that it was time to clarify the difference between the American approach and that of the militants.
"They try to get us to kill civilians," he said. "They try to induce us to shoot at targets that include women and children who are completely innocent."
"But the Taliban on the other hand are trying to kill people. They are trying to kill civilians."
He said it was important to remember that Afghanistan wanted to be free and wanted to democracy after living under a vicious Taliban regime. But he recognised that the deaths of civilians hurt the US cause there.
"I think we are doing the right thing. The fact that civilians are dying hurts our cause," he said.
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US 'must target Pakistan havens'
Thursday, 11 September 2008 BBC News
The chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff has called for a new strategy in Afghanistan to deny militants bases across the border in Pakistan.
Speaking on the eve of the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Admiral Mike Mullen called for a military strategy that covered both sides of the border.
The US must work closely with Pakistan to "eliminate [the enemy's] safe havens", he told Congress.
But Pakistan insists it will not allow foreign forces onto its territory.
"There is no question of any agreement or understanding with the coalition forces whereby they are allowed to conduct operations on our side of the border," Pakistan's Chief of Army Staff, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, said.
Pakistan's top military commanders are meeting in Rawalpindi, and high on the agenda is thought to be a ground assault by coalition forces in South Waziristan on 4 September, which Pakistan says killed more than a dozen civilians.
In an interview with the BBC, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi said such attacks were unproductive and alienated the local population.
'Inextricably linked'
Adm Mullen's call for a new strategy came a day after US President George Bush announced that about 4,500 extra US troops would be sent to Afghanistan by February 2009, bolstering the 33,000 currently stationed in the country.
Adm Mullen told the House Armed Services Committee he was not convinced the US was winning in Afghanistan and that a new strategy was needed to address the issue of militants in Pakistan.
"In my view, these two nations are inextricably linked in a common insurgency that crosses the border between them," he said.
"We can hunt down and kill extremists as they cross over the border from Pakistan... but until we work more closely with the Pakistani government to eliminate the safe havens from which they operate, the enemy will only keep coming."
Adm Mullen conceded the challenge was great, pointing to Afghanistan's drugs and economic problems, and the "significant political uncertainty" in Pakistan.
James Glassman, a senior US diplomat, told the BBC the US was "trying to help to fight these forces that threaten the very existence of a democratic country in Pakistan".
"I think the world would be a much, much less safe place… if we were simply to abandon Pakistan and stop helping the Pakistanis defend themselves," he said.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has supported this stance, saying Pakistan needs international help to tackle the problem of Taleban enclaves in its tribal areas.
Mr Karzai told the BBC that Afghanistan had asked for help from the international community to combat terrorism, and said Pakistan should do the same.
'More assertive'
The New York Times newspaper reported on Wednesday that President George Bush had approved orders in July to allow US Special Operations forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without Pakistani approval.
"The situation in the tribal areas is not tolerable," an unnamed senior US official told the newspaper. "We have to be more assertive. Orders have been given."
But a surge of US attacks in Pakistan's border region over the past week has prompted outrage from Pakistan's government and army.
Now stating it as a strategy will only add to the pressure on Pakistan's new President, Asif Ali Zardari, as he grapples with the militants, the BBC's James Coomarasamy reports from Washington.
The White House said on Wednesday that the failure to capture al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden showed the limitations of US military and intelligence operations.
On the eve of the seventh anniversary of 9/11, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said President Bush would have liked to see the al-Qaeda leader brought to justice, but that the US authorities did not have "super-powers".
In another development, Canada confirmed its troops would leave Afghanistan by 2011.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Wednesday that his nation - which suffered significant losses in Afghanistan in recent years - had no appetite for keeping its troops on in Afghanistan past a 2011 deadline imposed in March by parliament.
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Bush Said to Give Orders Allowing Raids in Pakistan
New York Times By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON-President Bush secretly approved orders in July that for the first time allow American Special Operations forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without the prior approval of the Pakistani government, according to senior American officials.
The classified orders signal a watershed for the Bush administration after nearly seven years of trying to work with Pakistan to combat theTaliban and Al Qaeda, and after months of high-level stalemate about how to challenge the militants’ increasingly secure base in Pakistan’s tribal areas.
American officials say that they will notify Pakistan when they conduct limited ground attacks like the Special Operations raid last Wednesday in a Pakistani village near the Afghanistan border, but that they will not ask for its permission.
“The situation in the tribal areas is not tolerable,” said a senior American official who, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicate nature of the missions. “We have to be more assertive. Orders have been issued.”
The new orders reflect concern about safe havens for Al Qaeda and the Taliban inside Pakistan, as well as an American view that Pakistan lacks the will and ability to combat militants. They also illustrate lingering distrust of the Pakistani military and intelligence agencies and a belief that some American operations had been compromised once Pakistanis were advised of the details.
The Central Intelligence Agency has for several years fired missiles at militants inside Pakistan from remotely piloted Predator aircraft. But the new orders for the military’s Special Operations forces relax firm restrictions on conducting raids on the soil of an important ally without its permission.
Pakistan’s top army officer said Wednesday that his forces would not tolerate American incursions like the one that took place last week and that the army would defend the country’s sovereignty “at all costs.”
It is unclear precisely what legal authorities the United States has invoked to conduct even limited ground raids in a friendly country. A second senior American official said that the Pakistani government had privately assented to the general concept of limited ground assaults by Special Operations forces against significant militant targets, but that it did not approve each mission.
The official did not say which members of the government gave their approval.
Any new ground operations in Pakistan raise the prospect of American forces being killed or captured in the restive tribal areas — and a propaganda coup for Al Qaeda. Last week’s raid also presents a major test for Pakistan’s new president, Asif Ali Zardari, who supports more aggressive action by his army against the militants but cannot risk being viewed as an American lap dog, as was his predecessor, Pervez Musharraf.
The new orders were issued after months of debate inside the Bush administration about whether to authorize a ground campaign inside Pakistan. The debate, first reported by The New York Times in late June, at times pitted some officials at the State Department against parts of the Pentagon that advocated aggressive action against Qaeda and Taliban targets inside the tribal areas.
Details about last week’s commando operation have emerged that indicate the mission was more intrusive than had previously been known.
According to two American officials briefed on the raid, it involved more than two dozen members of the Navy Seals who spent several hours on the ground and killed about two dozen suspected Qaeda fighters in what now appeared to have been a planned attack against militants who had been conducting attacks against an American forward operating base across the border in Afghanistan.
Supported by an AC-130 gunship, the Special Operations forces were whisked away by helicopters after completing the mission.
Although the senior American official who provided the most detailed description of the new presidential order would discuss it only on condition of anonymity, his account was corroborated by three other senior American officials from several government agencies, all of whom made clear that they supported the more aggressive approach.
Pakistan’s government has asserted that last week’s raid achieved little except killing civilians and stoking anti-Americanism in the tribal areas.
“Unilateral action by the American forces does not help the war against terror because it only enrages public opinion,” said Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to Washington, during a speech on Friday. “In this particular incident, nothing was gained by the action of the troops.”
As an alternative to American ground operations, some Pakistani officials have made clear that they prefer the C.I.A.’s Predator aircraft, operating from the skies, as a method of killing Qaeda operatives. The C.I.A. for the most part has coordinated with Pakistan’s government before and after it has launched missiles from the drone. On Monday, a Predator strike in North Waziristan killed several Arab Qaeda operatives.
A new American command structure was put in place this year to better coordinate missions by the C.I.A. and members of the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command, made up of the Army’s Delta Force and the Navy Seals.
The move was intended to address frustration on the ground about different agencies operating under different marching orders. Under the arrangement, a senior C.I.A. official based at Bagram air base in Afghanistan was put in charge of coordinating C.I.A. and military activities in the border region.
Spokesmen for the White House, the Defense Department and the C.I.A. declined to comment on Wednesday about the new orders. Some senior Congressional officials have received briefings on the new authorities. A spokeswoman for Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat who leads the Armed Services Committee, declined to comment.
American commanders in Afghanistan have complained bitterly that militants use sanctuaries in Pakistan to attack American troops in Afghanistan.
“I’m not convinced we’re winning it in Afghanistan,” Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday. “I am convinced we can.”
Toward that goal, Admiral Mullen said he had ordered a comprehensive military strategy to address the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The commando raid last week and an increasing number of recent missile strikes are part of a more aggressive overall American campaign in the border region aimed at intensifying attacks on Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the waning months of the Bush administration, with less than two months to go before November elections.
State Department officials, as well as some within the National Security Council, have expressed concern about any Special Operations missions that could be carried out without the approval of the American ambassador in Islamabad.
The months-long delay in approving ground missions created intense frustration inside the military’s Special Operations community, which believed that the Bush administration was holding back as the Qaeda safe haven inside Pakistan became more secure for militants.
The stepped-up campaign inside Pakistan comes at a time when American-Pakistani relations have been fraying, and when anger is increasing within American intelligence agencies about ties between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate, known as the ISI, and militants in the tribal areas.
Analysts at the C.I.A. and other American spy and security agencies believe not only that the bombing of India’s embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, in July by militants was aided by ISI operatives, but also that the highest levels of Pakistan’s security apparatus — including the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani — had knowledge of the plot.
“It’s very difficult to imagine he was not aware,” a senior American official said of General Kayani.
American intelligence agencies have said that senior Pakistani national security officials favor the use of militant groups to preserve Pakistan’s influence in the region, as a hedge against India and Afghanistan.
In fact, some American intelligence analysts believe that ISI operatives did not mind when their role in the July bombing in Kabul became known. “They didn’t cover their tracks very well,” a senior Defense Department official said, “and I think the embassy bombing was the ISI drawing a line in the sand.”
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Pakistan, Afghanistan agree to reduce regional tension
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-11 23:44:25
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Pakistan and Afghanistan Thursday agreed on several measures to enhance bilateral cooperation, remove misunderstandings and reduce regional tension, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said.
Talking to journalists here Thursday, Qureshi said that during his telephonic conversation with his Afghan counterpart Rangin Dadfar Spanta the two sides agreed to hold joint mini jirga, or council of elders, in early October in Islamabad.
"Exact dates for the jirga are being finalized which would go along way in improving relations between the two countries," he said.
Qureshi said that Afghanistan had withdrawn its objection to holding of the proposed regional economic conference on Afghanistan in Pakistan and the conference would now be held in the third or fourth week of November this year.
The two foreign minister also agreed for early convening of the Joint Economic Commission.
"Afghan finance minister would invite his Pakistani counterpart for a visit to Kabul where the two sides would exchange views on ways and means to boost trade and forge cooperation in different fields," he said.
"During telephonic conversation it was also agreed that the frequency of political engagements would be increased to minimize chances of misunderstanding between the two countries," the foreign minister said.
"National security advisors of Pakistan and Afghanistan would visit each other's country to have in-depth consultations on security issues and how to achieve the objective of a stable and peaceful region," Qureshi said.
Qureshi said that during his forthcoming visit to New York, he would have a detailed meeting with the Afghan foreign minister as a follow up of talks between Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
"We would also work out modalities for re-engagement," he added.
Qureshi said that the statement of the chief of the army staff on the issue of operations inside Pakistan was reiteration of the country's policy.
Editor: Yan
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Top Military Officer Urges Major Change in Afghanistan Strategy
The Washington Post - Politics By Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, September 11, 2008
The nation's top military officer issued a blunt assessment yesterday of the war in Afghanistan and called for an overhaul in U.S. strategy there, warning that thousands more U.S. troops as well as greater U.S. military involvement across the border in Pakistan's tribal areas are needed to battle an intensifying insurgency.
This Story Top Military Officer Urges Major Change in Afghanistan Strategy Country Guide: Afghanistan "I am not convinced that we're winning it in Afghanistan," Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House Armed Services Committee yesterday. But, he added, "I'm convinced we can."
On the day after President Bush announced he will cut troops in Iraq and bolster them in Afghanistan between now and early 2009, Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates also signaled that they would give increasing priority to the Afghan war and the expanding insurgent sanctuaries in Pakistan.
"The war on terror started in this region. It must end there," Gates told the committee.
Violence has mounted for more than two years in Afghanistan from an increasingly sophisticated and brazen insurgency, one fueled by havens in Pakistan. As a result, the war is exacting a worsening toll on coalition forces, with the number of U.S. troops who died there so far this year -- 109 -- projected to surpass last year's high of 117. U.S. and NATO troops remain hampered by manpower shortages, a lack of helicopters and a disjointed chain of command.
"Frankly, we are running out of time," Mullen said, and stressed that not sending U.S. reinforcements to Afghanistan is "too great a risk to ignore."
He said the new influx of U.S. forces into Afghanistan that Bush announced Tuesday -- an Army brigade and Marine battalion with a total of about 4,500 troops -- does not meet the demands of commanders there, but is "a good start."
Already, total U.S. forces in Afghanistan have grown from 21,000 troops in 2006 to nearly 31,000 today. Many NATO countries restrict their troops' combat roles; others have set an end date for their involvement in the war, with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper saying yesterday that all of his country's troops will withdraw in 2011, according to the Associated Press.
At a time when Bush has characterized Afghanistan as an increasingly critical front in the battle against terrorism, and when Army Gen. David H. Petraeus is set to take the helm of the region in his new post as head of U.S. Central Command, Mullen announced that he is commissioning a "more comprehensive" strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He indicated that a key element of the strategy would be to secure a greater role for the U.S. military in helping Pakistan to crack down on insurgents in cross-border tribal areas, a role Mullen said he has "pressed hard" for Pakistani military leaders to allow.
Afghanistan and Pakistan "are inextricably linked in a common insurgency that crosses the border between them," Mullen said. "Until we work more closely with the Pakistani government to eliminate the safe havens from which they operate, the enemy will only keep coming," he said, noting how insurgents have recently launched "infantry-like attacks" on U.S. military positions.
Mullen did not detail how the U.S. military could better help Pakistan battle insurgents in tribal areas, although he reiterated that the United States will remain involved in training Pakistan's Frontier Corps.
The U.S. military in recent months has intensified its unilateral attacks on insurgent havens in Pakistan, using artillery, missiles from unmanned drones and other munitions, as well as, according to Pakistani officials, U.S. military air assault by helicopter into the tribal area of South Waziristan.
But Pakistani officials have bristled at the U.S.-led actions, and Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, chief of the Pakistani army, said yesterday that his country will oppose further incursion of U.S. troops. In a statement issued hours after Mullen's testimony, Kayani referred to a recent cross-border raid led by U.S. commandos in South Waziristan, saying coalition forces are barred from operating inside Pakistan. "There is no question of any agreement or understanding with the Coalition Forces whereby they are allowed to conduct operations on our side of the border," he said.
Yet even if the Pentagon could achieve a better coordinated regional strategy, Mullen stressed that military forces can do only so much to pacify the area. "No amount of troops in no amount of time can ever achieve all the objectives we seek," he said, adding later: "We can't kill our way to victory."
Greater efforts by U.S. civilian agencies and the international community are essential, he said. For example, he criticized the shortage of civilian personnel in Provincial Reconstruction Teams in Afghanistan, saying that without more experts in agriculture, education, commerce and jurisprudence, the PRTs "will remain but empty shells."
Gates also underscored that civilian efforts "must be on the same page" as those of the military. "I am still not satisfied with the level of coordination and collaboration" between military and civilian partners on reconstruction and strengthening the Afghan government, he said.
Despite their focus on Afghanistan, both Gates and Mullen said that the situation in Iraq remains uncertain and could require more forces in the future. "I worry that the great progress" by U.S. and Iraqi forces could override caution and lead to an excessively rapid drawdown, said Gates, noting that U.S. commanders in Iraq remain concerned about "many challenges and potential for reversals."
In sum, he said, "we should expect to be involved in Iraq for years to come, although in changing and increasingly limited ways."
Still, both leaders made it clear that they intend to change the Pentagon's formulation -- first voiced by Mullen in testimony last December -- that "in Afghanistan, we do what we can. In Iraq, we do what we must." Yesterday, in contrast, Gates said he thinks it will be possible in comings months "to do militarily what we must in both countries."
"They are both a priority right now," Mullen concurred.
Correspondent Candace Rondeaux in Islamabad, Pakistan, contributed to this report.
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Afghans say life no better after invasion
By Saeed Ali Achakzai
SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Seven years after the attacks on New York and Washington, the event that sparked off the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, many Afghans say life is no better and some say its worse.
Following the overthrow of the hardline Islamist Taliban in late 2001 by U.S.-led and Afghan forces, Afghans hoped their country, ravaged by decades of war, would finally see peace.
But with al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden still on the loose, a worsening security situation and the slow pace of development, Afghans have become disillusioned and frustrated.
A recent spate of civilian deaths caused by U.S.-led air strikes has added salt to their wounds.
"After the 9/11 attacks, when the U.S. and her allies overthrew the Taliban government, the U.S. promised the Afghan nation stability, safety and jobs," Haji Allah Dad, a 60-year-old trader in the southern town of Spin Boldak, said.
"But they have done nothing for us. They drop bombs on the civilian population and have killed thousands of Afghans in the last seven years, while the Taliban get stronger day by day."
Spin Boldak is a bustling town in the southern province of Kandahar, the spiritual home of the Taliban and where the militant group still draws much of its support.
In February, a suicide bomber in Spin Boldak killed 37 civilians and wounded 30 more. The attack came just one day after another bomber killed more than 100 people in Kandahar city.
"We feel no change in our lives," said Mohammad Usman, a 40-year-old shopkeeper from Spin Boldak.
"They (foreign forces) are not the enemy of the Taliban, they are the enemy of the Afghan people. The U.S. army calls us al Qaeda and kills us but we don't know what al-Qaeda is."
CIVILIAN CASUALTIES
Violence has surged in Afghanistan over the last three years with more than 2,500 people killed, including 1,000 civilians, in the first six months of this year alone, aid agencies say.
While most civilians are killed in insurgent attacks, usually bystanders in suicide blasts, it is the killing of ordinary Afghans by foreign forces that evokes the greatest emotions.
The issue has caused a rift between the Afghan government and its Western backers, and undermines public opinion for the continued presence of foreign forces in the country.
Ali Jan, a 30-year-old bearded man from Spin Boldak, wants the Taliban back because under them life was safer, he says.
"In those times there were no security problems. Now U.S. forces began killing Afghan civilians and destroying our country," said Ali Jan, adding that he had paid the Taliban money during this holy month of Ramadan.
"We are forced to help the Taliban against the occupying forces because the Taliban are Muslims and Afghans. They are fighting for the freedom of Afghanistan," he said.
Frustration at the country's deteriorating security is not confined to the volatile south. Taliban insurgents have been able to launch increasingly daring and deadly attacks inside the relative safety of Kabul.
"Life did change in the first years after the invasion," said Azim, a money-changer on one of Kabul's streets.
"But now security has become worse and people are escaping Afghanistan. If the insecurity continues, people will turn against the U.S. like they did against the Taliban."
(Writing by Jonathon Burch; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Alex Richardson)
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FACTBOX - Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 11
Sept 11 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1330 GMT on Thursday:
KANDAHAR - A suicide car bomber killed two civilians and wounded six others when he blew himself up near a U.S. security firm convoy in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar, provincial governor spokesman Zulmai Ayubi said.
GHAZNI - U.S.-led coalition forces killed several insurgents after fighting erupted during an operation targeting a foreign militant in Ghazni province, the U.S. military said.
SOUTHEAST AFGHANISTAN - U.S.-led forces targeted Taliban fighters in eastern and southeast Afghanistan, including veteran commander Jalaluddin Haqqani's network, killing several militants, the U.S. military said.
EASTERN AFGHANISTAN - One soldier from the NATO-led force was killed in eastern Afghanistan when insurgents attacked a compound, the alliance said. They did not release the nationality of the soldier.
HELMAND - An explosion killed a British soldier in southern Helmand province on Wednesday, Britain's Defence Ministry said.
GHAZNI - Seven people were wounded when a bomb planted on a bicycle exploded near the governor's office in Ghazni province, southeast of Kabul, an official said on Thursday.
(Compiled by Jonathon Burch; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Coalition troops kill 'several militants' in Afghanistan
Thu Sep 11, 3:59 AM ET
KABUL (AFP) - International forces killed several suspected militants in eastern Afghanistan in a raid on a "terrorist leader" said to be helping smuggle in foreign fighters, the US-led coalition said Thursday.
The man targeted in the operation near the Pakistan border on Wednesday was also believed to have close ties to senior Taliban commanders, the force said in a statement.
Residents and local officials however said the victims were civilians.
"Coalition forces targeted a regional terrorist leader... who is suspected of facilitating the movement of foreign fighters into Afghanistan," the US-led coalition said.
When soldiers arrived in the Andar district of Ghazni province, they came under attack and responded, killing "several militants" and arresting two.
The statement gave no number of dead, nor make it clear if the targeted man was killed or captured.
Residents and officials in the village of Shahpouri, in Ghazni, said three people -- a mother and two sons, aged 12 and 19 -- were killed in a coalition air strike.
A village elder said the husband and third son were injured and arrested.
There was also a raid on Wednesday on a compound of a subcommander in the network of a Taliban group headed by Jalaluddin Haqqani, the coalition said.
Haqqani, who was a close aide to fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Omar, has not been seen since the fall of the hardline regime in Afghanistan in 2001.
One man was arrested and weapons and other military equipment was found and removed, the statement said.
The raid was in Bak district, which is on the border with Pakistan's tribal areas where Islamist extremists are said to have bases.
The United States led the invasion that ousted the Taliban regime for sheltering Al-Qaeda after the September 11 attacks seven years ago Thursday.
Despite the presence of tens of thousands of international soldiers, a Taliban-linked insurgency has grown over the years.
US Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday he was not convinced that "we're winning it" in Afghanistan.
He said he had ordered a "new, more comprehensive military strategy
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Iran paying for NATO's drugs failure in Afghanistan, says Safari
London, Sept 11, IRNA
Young Iranians are paying the price for NATO's "failure" to curb opium production in neighbouring Afghanistan, according to Deputy Foreign Minister for European Affairs Mehdi Safari.
Safari said the volume of opium-based drugs being smuggled through Iran from Afghanistan - the source of more than 90 per cent of the world's opium - had increased fivefold over five years, and the drugs themselves had become far more potent.
"Unfortunately the situation in Afghanistan every day is getting worse and worse. If you compare it to five or six years ago, it is more than gloomy," he warned.
The deputy minister was speaking in an interview published in the Guardian newspaper Thursday at the end of a three-day visit to Britain, where he held wide-ranging discussions with various ministers and officials.
Britain has been the lead nation responsible for countering narcotics in Afghanistan since the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001.
Counter-narcotics is one of the few areas of cooperation between Iran and Britain, but Safari expressed frustration at not only the lack of progress but the increase in poppy cultivation that has led to record harvest.
"Iran has a very young generation and you know what effect such drugs have on our population. So this is a big headache for us," he said.
The deputy minister pointed out that of the laboratories producing drugs were in Helmand province, the centre of Afghanistan's opium production, where British forces are garrisoned.
"I wish we could have just opium. But with 350 laboratories are converting opium to heroin and crystal (also known as crack)," he said.
The Guardian said that Safari had listened to politely to ministers and officials at the foreign office, but left with little hope that the situation would improve.
"They say our duty is to fight against the terrorists, not to fight against the drugs. But you cannot differentiate between the two acts. This is very correlated," he said.
"This is a good income for the insurgents and the terrorist groups," the deputy minister said, suggesting that the issue had to be dealt with as "package: terrorists, insurgents and narcotics." British diplomats were said to have acknowledged that Iran has borne the brunt of the Afghan drug trade, and has played a significant role in attempting to close the smuggling routes across its borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan.
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Security still main obstacle for Afghan business
By Jonathon Burch
KABUL, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Security is still the main obstacle facing private business in Afghanistan and the primary reason investors stay away, a group of leading Afghan businessmen said on Thursday, but there are other problems too.
Afghanistan's economy is recovering from decades of conflict and although it has improved significantly since the fall of the Taliban in 2001 - real GDP growth exceeded 7 percent in 2007 - the country remains one of the poorest in the world.
Half the population live below the poverty line and around 90 percent of government spending comes from outside donors. "Peace is vital for business in Afghanistan," said Hayat Dayani, president of Afghanistan's third-largest bank, Pashtany Bank.
"With peace we can build the Afghan economy," said Dayani at a news conference at the bank's headquarters in Kabul
Representatives from around 15 of the country's major companies met to express concerns over worsening security and how their businesses were affected.
Afghanistan has seen a rise in violence over the past three years, with the Taliban launching more daring and deadly attacks. More than 2,500 people were killed in the conflict in the first six months of this year alone, aid groups say.
Dayani has seen the bank grow since taking charge in 2007.
"From 2001 to 2007 there was no growth and the bank was about to be closed down," Dayani told Reuters. "In my first year, we opened four new branches and managed to achieve our record net income since our establishment in 1954," he said.
But incidents like kidnappings and suicide attacks greatly hinder day-to-day business, Dayani said.
"If we have a month with no explosions or no suicide attackers, we see the difference in the way the public use the bank's services," he said.
"As soon as we have two or three attacks, the public stays away. They are afraid," he said.
AVIATION
Poor security especially affects the bottom-line of Afghanistan's fledgling airline industry.
"If there was peace and no threats about hijacking we would not have to spend so much on security. At least 5 to 6 percent of operational costs is spent on security," Fedawi Mohammad, vice president of private airline Kam Air, told Reuters.
The airline, which began operations in 2003 with one aircraft, now has a fleet of seven offering several flights a week.
Mohammad listed the short operating hours of Afghanistan's main airport in Kabul as another obstacle facing the aviation industry. Currently civilian aircraft are only able to operate from Kabul airport during daylight hours.
Airlines in addition have to pay 10 percent tax on all their revenue, on top of other charges for navigation, landing and parking.
"Sometimes it is very difficult for the airlines to pay this. The airlines are not always flying at full capacity. Even if our business is limited we have to pay the full tax," said Farid Nazari, sales and marketing Manager of Safi Airways.
The insecurity also plays on pilots and crew who are all from abroad.
"They are frightened to come to Afghanistan. This is a big problem," said Nazari.
Despite all the problems, there was still money to be made in Afghanistan if investors could be drawn in, said Dayani.
"It's a great country to invest in. There are great possibilities to do good business and make money," he said. (Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Paul Tait)
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Ethnic antagonism spurs land disputes in north
KHOWAJA BAHAUDIN, 11 September 2008 (IRIN) - Hundreds of Pashtun refugees who have returned from Pakistan to Afghanistan's northeastern Takhar Province say their properties have been seized by local people and militias from other ethnic groups.
About 500 Pashtuns (Afghanistan's largest ethnic group) sheltering in dilapidated government buildings in the Khowaja Bahaudin District in Takhar said they left the area during the war against the Soviets in the 1980s.
On their return from Pakistan, the returnees claimed, they found their lands and houses seized, mostly by Uzbek militias (Uzbeks are the fourth-largest ethnic group).
Their allegations were confirmed by the Ministry of Refugees and Returnees (MoRR).
"Pashtun returnees have been denied access to their own lands and houses in Takhar Province," Shir Mohammad Etibari, the minister, told IRIN in Kabul.
Etibari said Pashtun returnees were also facing ethnicity-related resentments over resettlement in some other northern provinces where mostly Uzbek and Tajiks (the second-largest ethnic group) make up the majority.
Millions of Afghans from around the country fled, mostly to neighbouring Pakistan and Iran, over the past three decades and about 4.3 million of them have returned since 2002, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
Tens of thousands of Pashtuns also moved to the mostly Pashtun south after the Taliban (which were largely Pashtun-based) were defeated in 2001, aid agencies reported.
Disparate claims
Returnee families insist they possess formal and traditional documents proving their ownership over disputed properties.
"We are not making false claims," said an elderly man, Haji Wali Khan.
However, their claims were rejected by people who occupy or control the lands.
"We don't accept their deeds ... they've forged documents," charged a local man, Sayed Hakim.
Some Uzbek and Tajik locals also criticised previous governments for alleged arbitrary distribution of public land to Pashtuns.
"Documents issued during the reign of Zahir Shah [1933-1973] are no longer valid here," said an Uzbek leader, Jamshid.
Government under fire
President Hamid Karzai appointed a government commission to resolve the land disputes in Takhar Province and to help the reintegration of returnees.
However, after several days of heated talks the commission returned to Kabul virtually empty-handed.
"We were only able to ask all parties to avoid confrontations until the end of Ramadan [30 September]," Wahidullah Sabawoon, head of the commission, told IRIN, adding that the government was intending to clarify property ownership documents via the judiciary after Ramadan.
Etibari criticised the government for "weak" and "insufficient" intervention.
"The government cannot compel commanders and militias and cannot enforce the rule of law," Etibari said.
Amid the tensions, children, women and the elderly who have been settled in deserted buildings reportedly lack access to safe drinking water, food, health services and education.
Government officials in Kabul said they were trying to send two trucks of food aid to returnees in Takhar Province to meet their immediate needs.
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8 mln U.S. dollars agreement inked to tackle food crisis in Afghanistan
Xinhua / September 11, 2008
The Afghan government and the World Bank on Thursday signed an agreement under which 8 million U.S. dollars grant will be provided as part of the assisting programs to tackle food crisis in the war-torn country.
"The initiative of the agreement on The Afghanistan Food Crisis Response Project, which is signed by Afghan Finance Minister Anwar-ul-Haq Ahady and World Bank Country Manager Mariam J. Sherman, is to enhance wheat and other cereal production by supporting small scale irrigation at the community level," said a World Bank statement released here.
"As part of The Bank's new Global Food Crisis Response Program, the project focuses on medium-term investments needed to increase food security over time," it said.
"The project will support the rehabilitation of around 500 small, traditional irrigation schemes critical to the recovery of the country's agriculture," it said.
The statement also noted that the whole project will be implemented by the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development through elected Community Development Councils in the provinces most affected by drought and food shortages.
Nearly 70 percent of Afghanistan's wheat production comes from irrigated lands, according to the Afghan finance minister.
"It is important that we give priority to the rehabilitation of irrigation systems," Ahady said.
As a leading lending agency, the World Bank has contributed more than 1 billion U.S. dollars towards rebuilding Afghanistan since 2002, with part of them soft loan.
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U.S. attacks Haqqani network again in Afghanistan
Thu Sep 11, 3:12 AM ET
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led forces targeted Taliban fighters in eastern and southeast Afghanistan, including veteran commander Jalaluddin Haqqani's network, killing several militants, the U.S. military said on Thursday.
The raids came days after U.S. drones fired missiles into Pakistan's tribal area killing 23 people, mostly relatives of Haqqani who was once backed by the United States during the war against the Soviet invasion and occupation.
Separately, a bomb planted on a bicycle went off near the governor's office in Ghazni province, southeast of Kabul, wounding seven people, an official said.
Security is tight across Afghanistan on the seventh anniversary of the September 11 attacks.
U.S.-led coalition forces targeted a Haqqani sub-commander who had been directing roadside bomb attacks in Khost province near the border with Pakistan. One militant was held in the operation on Wednesday, the coalition said in a statement.
Also on Wednesday, fighting erupted in Ghazni province during a coalition operation against a militant helping foreign fighters enter Afghanistan. Several insurgents were killed, the U.S. military said.
"When forces arrived, several men attempted to engage the force. Coalition forces responded with small-arms fire, killing the militants," it said in a statement.
Violence in Afghanistan is at its highest level since the ouster of the Taliban in 2001, with more than 2,700 people killed this year, including 1,100 civilians, aid agencies say.
(Reporting by Hamid Shalizi; Writing by Sanjeev Miglani; Editing by Alex Richardson)
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On 9/11 anniversary, Pakistan has a new breed of Taliban
By Amir Mir The News International (Pakistan) Thursday, September 11, 2008
LAHORE: Seven years after the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States that shook the entire world, Pakistan, despite being a key American ally in the war on terror, continues to be plagued by the menace of Talibanisation with home grown militants persisting with their calls for Jihad.
As the Bush era is coming to a fag end amidst an unending war on terror, the threat of Islamic militancy keeps spreading its tentacles across the globe; the rigid ideology of Taliban claiming new grounds and the al-Qaeda network seemingly thriving.
Despite the deployment of over 80,000 Pakistani troops along the rugged Pak-Afghan border to counter al-Qaeda and Taliban-linked Islamic militancy, the situation is far from stable in the trouble-hit tribal region which is crucial to three world capitals -- Washington, Kabul and Islamabad.
The growing forces of the Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters in the border region not only pose a grave threat to NATO troops in Afghanistan, but also to the people of Pakistan where Taliban militias, like their Afghan counterparts, are trying to impose their harsh medieval version of Islamic law.
Although the Musharraf regime had decided to align with the US soon after 9/11, the harsh reality is that the infrastructure built during the last two decades by the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment was not dismantled. This happened mainly due to the fact that Pakistan, since 9/11, was being ruled by a military dictator who deemed it fit to employ a misguided policy both in Afghanistan and Jammu & Kashmir.
Subsequently, with the Islamic militancy gaining new grounds, the Jihadis literally marching ahead, the Taliban nowhere near defeated either in Afghanistan or in Pakistan and the al-Qaeda still unbroken on both sides of the border, senior US government officials as well as the commanders of the Afghanistan-based NATO and ISAF troops are openly accusing the Pakistani establishment of pursuing a policy of running with the hare and hunting with the hound.
Resultantly, a Pakistan-based Taliban movement, inspired by the past Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, is growing in Waziristan Agency along the Pak-Afghan border, challenging the efforts of the coalition forces to stamp out insurgents in Afghanistan and hunt down Osama bin Laden, Mullah Mohammad Omar and other fugitive al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders.
The Waziristan Agency, making headlines in the international media since 2002 due to frequent clashes between the Pakistani security forces and the al-Qaeda and Taliban-linked militants, is virtually under the control of the local Taliban who have established their grip in the North and South Waziristan areas, besides gaining a significant base from which they wage their resistance against the Allied Forces in Afghanistan.
New militant leaders, new militant cadres and new militant groups are coming up in the Pak-Afghan tribal belt quite often while the old Jihadi leadership of the1980 Afghan war vintage no longer enjoys the kind of hold and sway which they used to command in the past, especially before September 11, 2001.
This new generation of militants is all Pakistani which emerged after the US invasion of Afghanistan and represents a rebellion against the Pakistani establishment joining hands with the United States in the ongoing war against terror. While these extremist elements might be representing a minority view, their threat seems real.
The new breed of the Pakistani Taliban is led by young militants who, unlike the original Taliban, are technology and media-savvy and are influenced by various indigenous tribal nationalisms, honouring the tribal codes that govern social life in Pakistani rural areas.
Though they are called Taliban because they share the same ideology with the Taliban in Afghanistan, they are totally Pakistani. Their holy war is aimed not just at infidels occupying Afghanistan, but also the infidels who they believe are ruling and running their homeland and maintaining the secular values of the Pakistani society. They aim at nothing less than cleansing Pakistan.
Since the 9/11 terror, the Bush administration had been describing Pakistan's former military ruler President General (retd) Musharraf as the most trusted American ally in the war on terror. However it was under Musharraf that FATA in 2008 is not much different to the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan before 9/11.
Most of the top militant commanders are now in FATA and NWFP largely because their military might mushroomed in the Musharraf years. Baitullah Mehsud, a former trainer at a small time fitness centre in Waziristan and now the fugitive Amir of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Maulana Fazlullah, a former ski lift operator in Swat and now the renegade Amir of the Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM) and Mangal Bagh, a former truck conductor and now the rebel Amir of the Lashkar-e-Islami (LI) are regarded by their followers as the uncrowned kings of Waziristan Agency, Swat Valley and Khyber Agency respectively.
Aged between 30 and 33, all the three Taliban-linked Jihadi commanders are young and have created ripples not only in the Pak-Afghan border areas owing to their militancy but have also caused alarm bells across the border in Afghanistan which is gradually coming under their growing influence.
Despite being declared most wanted criminals by Pakistan for their involvement in several deadly incidents of terrorism, including suicide bombings directed against the security forces, neither the Musharraf regime nor the new government in Islamabad have been able to challenge their power. Both these governments had first launched military operations against the forces of Baitullah, Fazlullah and Mangal Bagh, but eventually decided to hold talks with them as a last resort to strike peace deals in Waziristan, Swat and Khyber.
Hardly four years ago, no one had even heard of these commanders. It is largely believed that they were groomed by none other than the establishment to secure the border with Afghanistan which it thought had become vulnerable after the fall of the Taliban regime and the subsequent assumption of power in Kabul by the pro-India and anti-Pakistan Northern Alliance.
Since it had become harder for the Pakistani establishment in the wake of the 9/11 attacks to make use of the already established and equally known Jihadi groups in Afghanistan to protect its so-called geo-strategic agenda in the region, the khaki decision makers deemed it fit to create and nurture a new breed of Jihadis along the Pak-Afghan tribal belt, which now challenges the writ of the state by presenting themselves as the Pakistani Taliban.
Therefore, seven years down the road since the 9/11 attacks, the United States, that granted the status of a non-NATO ally to Pakistan due to its role as a frontline state, has intensified pressure on Islamabad to do more for dismantling the al-Qaeda network in the Pakistani tribal areas, saying if there is one country that matters most to the future of the Osama-led terror network, it is none other than Pakistan.
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Secrets of the Taliban's success
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Online / September 11, 2008
Kandahar has traditionally been the city of Afghan royalty, warlords and the center of resistance movements against the British and Russia. It was also the spiritual heartland of the student militia, the Taliban, that emerged in the 1990s to combat the vicious civil war that was tearing the country apart.
The Taliban took over Kabul in 1996 and opened the country to al-Qaeda's training camps, while Osama bin Laden settled in Kandahar. After the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States and the US-led invasion of Afghanistan a few months later, the Taliban agreed to lose their government but, in the tradition of the Afghan code of honor of Pashtunwali, they refused to hand over their most wanted guests to the Americans.
Seven years after 9/11, the resurgent Taliban movement is exclusively led by Kandahari clans, which still boast of their sacrifices for the Islamic brotherhood in the name of Pashtunwali, but they maintain that the Taliban have never harbored - and never will - an aggressive agenda towards the world community.
In a interview with Asia Times Online, Mullah Abdul Jalil, a pioneer of the Taliban movement in Kandahar, elaborated. "There is a lot of rhetoric out of anger and frustration against the West because of the NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] oppression of the Afghan people, but the Taliban leadership still strictly abides by its code of conduct for the resistance against foreign occupation forces in our country," said Jalil, who served as deputy foreign minister and foreign minister during the Taliban regime (1996-2001) .
"Our code of conduct is documented in the Asasi Qanoon [Basic Law of Afghanistan]. Under article 103, it is mentioned that we don't want any disruptions in any country of the world. The Taliban are only a national resistance movement against foreign occupation forces in Afghanistan," said Jalil.
Jalil, 49, hails from Kandahar and attended an Islamic seminary in Quetta, Pakistan, but did not finish his studies because of the emergence of the Afghan resistance to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Jalil is a thin, down-to-earth man, his hair and beard already snow white, which he ascribes to the years of turmoil he has witnessed in his country. He has never been a military commander, but has always been a part of Taliban leader Mullah Omar's closest inner circle and he is still proud to be one of his close confidants.
Along with the Taliban's foreign minister in 2001, Mullah Abdul Wakeel Muttawakil, Jalil was not comfortable with al-Qaeda being in the country, but when questioned on the matter he initially evaded answering with a smile, saying only that "it is unnecessary to open up controversies".
However, he did then elaborate, "Arabs are different from the Taliban. If today they boost attacks on Western targets, they do so independently. We have nothing to do with their claims. We have always limited our battle to that against NATO and although we could work in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Russia, China or Iran, we never had any role in these areas.
"Afghanistan has always been a poor country and has never had the capacity to be aggressive against anybody, nor will it do so in the future. This is exactly what Mullah Omar told the Chinese ambassador during the last days of our government in Afghanistan. Even if we provided a place for the people of Eastern Turkistan [Xinjiang province in China] because they migrated to Afghanistan, we did not fuel their [separatist Uyghur] movement from Afghanistan," Jalil insisted.
Jalil's comments did not ring true. Several Taliban commanders, including the slain Mullah Dadullah and Pakistan Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, besides scores of al-Qaeda members, have maintained that the only way to win the Afghan war against NATO is to attack Western targets in Europe and America. I cited some of their statements to Jalil and asked, "Are they lying, or are you?"
"Nobody is lying. There are issues here to understand. First, there were people like Mullah Dadullah [a senior military commander killed by NATO in 2007] . He was emotional and often engaged in rhetoric - many times - different from Taliban policies, so much so that on several occasions he was warned by the Taliban leadership about his statements to the media.
"Second, it is necessary to understand that there is a sea of difference between the people who call themselves the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Taliban [led by Mehsud] and the Taliban. We have nothing to do with them. In fact, we oppose the policies they adhere to against the Pakistani security forces.
"We individually speak to all groups, whether they are Pakistanis, Kashmiris, Arabs, Uzbeks or whosoever, telling them not to create violence in Pakistan, especially in the name of the Taliban. But although we don't have any control over them, we don't allow such groups to come into our areas. None of these is involved with us in fighting against NATO troops in Afghanistan," Jalil said.
Warming to the subject, Jalil continued, "Nobody has the right to explain any war strategy on our behalf. Our strategy is decided by Mullah Bradar alone. He is the deputy of Mullah Omar and the present chief of military operations. Last year we laid down a policy of a guerrilla war. We cannot afford any mass uprising or face-to-face war, it would only cause a lot of unnecessary casualties."
"But don't you think that in this long process of a guerrilla war, especially as the Taliban don't have the latest weaponry, it would make the Afghan population sick and tired of the Taliban-led resistance?" I asked.
Jalil responded quickly, "Not at all. The Taliban emerged from Kandahar, which has a special dynamic in Afghanistan, and they have never accepted foreign occupation. The Taliban still draws its military leaders from Kandahar, and look at the history of Kandahar ... when I say Kandahar I don't mean the present divisions, it means the entire regions of Helmand, Urzgan and Zabul ... it has always produced the best military leaders.
"The Taliban are not a stand-alone entity. Ninety percent of the present resistance in Kandahar survives because of the masses. They provide shelter to us in their homes, feed us and provide money for us to go back and fight against the foreign forces, and they never mind if in the course of this they suffer casualties because of aerial bombardments," Jalil said. (At least 540 civilians have been killed in the conflict so far this year, a sharp increase over last year's total of 321.)
"Look, the conviction of the masses is the essential thing. The reason why there is not as strong a resistance in the north is that the people are not behind it. Certainly, people across Afghanistan are against the foreign occupation, but for a resistance [to succeed] it needs a special temperament, zeal and strength to face all sorts of hardships. Kandaharis have always shown this and that's why they are ahead of everybody in fighting against foreign troops," Jalil said.
NATO has projected divisions within the Taliban and pointed to the emergence of several former mujahideen leaders to rival the authority of Mullah Omar. Prominent among these is Jalaluddin Haqqani, Anwarul Haq Mujahid and commanders loyal to veteran Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, founder of the Hezb-e Islami (HIA).
"Maulana Jalaluddin Haqqani is a very respected personality in Afghanistan, but he cannot command the resistance because of his age [58] and illnesses. He has always been a part of the Taliban shura [council] and has never parted ways with the Taliban. Now his son Sirajuddin Haqqani is a main commander, but he always coordinates his actions with the Taliban and is completely subject to the Taliban's discipline.
"Anwarul Haq Mujahid has now been officially appointed as the governor of Nangarhar province [which is under the Taliban's shadowy emirates banner] so all these [NATO] projections are wrong. As far as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is concerned, we are striving for the same cause, but we don't have any regular contact."
Jalil continued, "However, let me tell you, most of the places which were previously Hezb-e Islami strongholds are completely under the Taliban's command. For instance, the HIA recently claimed the killings of [10] French soldiers in Sarobi [50 kilometers east of Kabul]. Actually, it was done by Taliban commander Qari Baryal, who commands the region of Sarobi, the Tagaab Valley and up to Bagram [near Kabul]. The same goes for Wardak and Kapisa [provinces], where the Taliban have largely replaced the HIA's network in the resistance."
There is widespread speculation that the Taliban might attack Kabul any day soon as they now have strong pockets all around the capital. Jalil differs, "Practically, we are in Kabul. We are in Sarobi, which is part of the Kabul district. We are in Maidan Shehr [Wardak province and just 30 kilometers east of Kabul], we are in Nangarhar, which is not far from Kabul. But at present there is no plan to mobilize any attack on Kabul. The reason is the non-availability of resources."
Given the Taliban's long and tough struggle since being ousted in 2001, I raised the issue of whether they might be tempted to compromise with former rivals, such as ethnic Tajik and former president Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani, who recently claimed to have had talks with the Taliban. Or perhaps the Taliban might even engage with the Americans or British.
"During the last [2005 parliamentary] elections, Rabbani and Professor Abdul Rab Rasool Sayyaf [a member of parliament] did speak to the Taliban through mediators. However, they wanted the Taliban's support in the elections. We rejected that idea and since then we have never communicated. We have never had dialogue with the British or with the Americans. There are individuals who have talked to them and this may have created the misunderstanding that the Taliban communicated with them," Jalil said.
I was taken aback by this response. After the US invasion, some overtures were made between the Taliban and the US Central Intelligence Agency - CIA. (See US turns to the Taliban Asia Times Online, June 14, 2003.)
Similarly, in the wake of moves to revive the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan pipeline project, an initiative began in Quetta last year (See Taliban, US in new round of peace talks Asia Times Online, August 21, 2007) which led to the idea of regional jirgas (tribal councils) to start peace talks with the Taliban. The scheme was destroyed because of the strong adverse reaction to the government storming the Taliban-sympathetic Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) in Islamabad last year.
"When Mullah Abdul Razzak held talks with the Americans he had left the Taliban. At that time he was completely independent that's why you cannot call it a dialogue between the CIA and the Taliban. It was purely a case of an individual act. Mullah Abdul Razzak only rejoined the Taliban one year ago. The same goes with Mansoor Dadullah or whosoever held the dialogue. They did it against the Taliban's policy." (Dadullah was later expelled from the Taliban.)
The interview was over and I broke the evening's Ramadan fast with Jalil, and suggested a photograph.
"No. This is the secret to our survival. We never allow photographs, and that is why we can move freely in Afghanistan and the tribal areas [of Pakistan] as nobody recognizes us. Especially with my white hair, nobody suspects me of being Taliban," Jalil said with a smile.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief.
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Pakistan premier backs army chief's rebuke to US
By NAHAL TOOSI Associated Press September 11, 2008
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan's prime minister on Thursday backed a harsh rebuke of the U.S. by the Muslim nation's military chief, a sign of a strain in relations seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks forged the two countries' anti-terror alliance.
Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the powerful but media-shy army leader, said nearly a week after a deadly American-led ground assault in Pakistani territory that Pakistan would defend its sovereignty and that there was no deal to allow foreign forces to operate inside its borders.
He said unilateral actions risked undermining joint efforts to battle Islamic extremism.
"Reckless actions" which kill civilians "only help the militants and further fuel the militancy in the area," he said.
"The sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country will be defended at all cost and no external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan," he said in the Wednesday statement.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, in comments reported Thursday by state media and confirmed by his office, said Kayani's words reflected government opinion and policy.
The ground assault last week, and a barrage of suspected U.S. missile strikes in Pakistan in recent days, suggest growing American impatience with Pakistan's progress in eradicating militant safe havens in its semiautonomous tribal regions bordering Afghanistan.
U.S. officials say clearing militants from such pockets in Pakistan's northwest is critical to reducing attacks on NATO and American forces in Afghanistan.
"Until we work more closely with the Pakistani government to eliminate the safe havens from which they operate, the enemy will only keep coming," Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.
A Pentagon spokesman would not directly respond to Kayani's remarks, but said the two countries were cooperating.
Still, the Pakistani leaders' comments indicate growing frustration and fading trust in both countries on the anniversary of the attacks in the United States.
Many Pakistanis blame their nation's alliance with the U.S. for fueling violence in their country, while U.S. officials worry that Pakistan's government is secretly aiding militant networks — keeping them as a wedge against longtime rival India.
While Pakistan's government earlier issued strident protests over the ground assault, even summoning the U.S. ambassador, Kayani's statement was significant because he so rarely speaks publicly and because he heads Pakistan's most powerful institution.
In his first public criticism of American policy, Kayani indicated he was sensitive to anger among Pakistanis, and possibly even within the military, over the assault and suspected missile strikes, analysts said Thursday.
"It expresses a deep concern in Pakistan and was quite timely because of the feeling in Pakistan as if the army and the government of Pakistan has surrendered to whatever Americans want to do in the tribal regions," political analyst Rasul Bakhsh Rais said.
The New York Times reported Thursday that President Bush secretly approved orders allowing American Special Operations forces to undertake ground assaults inside Pakistan without getting prior Pakistani government approval.
Asked to comment on the report, the Foreign Ministry referred to Kayani's statement.
U.S. officials have acknowledged that American troops carried out the operation in South Waziristan but have not given details. The mission's goal and results remain unclear. Local residents said at least 15 people died.
The cross-border strike comes at politically sensitive times in both countries.
The Bush administration is on its way out, leading some analysts to speculate it is turning to missiles and ground assaults in Pakistan to try to score last-minute victories in the face of a growing Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.
In Britain, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he and Bush would hold a videoconference Thursday to discuss a new approach to policing the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Pakistan, meanwhile, just elected a new president, Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of slain ex-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who is generally considered pro-American and has said terrorism is Pakistan's chief challenge.
Zardari was sworn in Tuesday and visited his wife's grave to pay respects Thursday. He has faced some criticism for not being more outspoken in condemning U.S. strikes in Pakistan.
Also Thursday, residents found the bodies of two men believed to be among 25 police recruits reported abducted by militants in northwest Pakistan. The partially beheaded bodies were found in an open area in Orakzai town, said Khan Afzal, the mayor of nearby Hangu district.
Meanwhile, the bullet-riddled bodies of three men active in anti-Taliban activities were found Thursday in the Bajur tribal region, witnesses and officials said.
Government official Jawed Khan said the bodies were found with a letter saying, "This is the result of working against the Taliban and cooperating with the army instead of joining jihad."
Tribal leaders in the Salarzai area of Bajur have denounced the Taliban. Recently, armed tribal members torched and destroyed several suspected militant houses and hideouts.
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Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad and Zarar Khan in Islamabad, Riaz Khan in Peshawar, and Habid Khan in Khar contributed to this report.
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Afghan foot juggler may break Asian record
www.quqnoos.com Written by Jawad Zahid Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Football player juggles ball on his feet for three hours and 11 minutes
AN Afghan football player may have set a new Asia record for the number of "keep ups" completed with a football.
Ahmad Saier Quraishee, a member of Maihan FC, juggled a football on his feet 20,800 times in front of journalists and the Football Federation of Afghanistan.
The incredible feat took three hours and 11 minutes to complete, breaking the previous record held by an Iranian who managed 13,500 keep ups.
The Football Federation will send a video of the record attempt to the Asian Football Federation for confirmation.
"I love football and was interested in kicking footballs from childhood and was always practicing. I want to thank God for helping me to break the Asian record," Quraishee said.
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Kayani warns US to keep its troops out
Pakistan Dawn, Pakistan By Iftikhar A. Khan Sept 10, 2008
ISLAMABAD-Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has rejected US claims that the rules of engagement gave the coalition forces in Afghanistan the right to enter Pakistan and declared that the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity will be defended at all costs.
In a statement issued here on Wednesday, the COAS said: “The rules of engagement with the coalition forces are well defined and within that the right to conduct operations against the militants inside own territory is solely the responsibility of the respective armed forces.
“There is no question of any agreement or understanding with the coalition forces whereby they are allowed to conduct operations on our side of the border,” he said.Gen Kayani’s statement dispelled a perception that some of the air strikes carried out inside Pakistan by drones and warplanes of the US-led coalition had been authorised by Islamabad.
The statement has come on the heels of President George Bush’s description of the Afghan-Pakistan border area as a frontline in the war on terror and against the backdrop of a series of incursions by Nato forces in which missiles were fired from unmanned drones in the tribal areas and at least one incident ground troops attacked the Angoor Adda area of South Waziristan.
Observers here saw in the COAS statement a strong rebuttal of the oft-repeated assertions by the western media and political and military figures that US and Nato forces in Afghanistan had a ‘right’ to take their war on terror into Pakistan.
Pakistan has been asserting that any credible information about terrorists in Pakistan should be provided to it and that its forces were fully capable of acting on it.
Although it was not the first attack by Nato forces inside Pakistan, the increase in the frequency of attacks days before the presidential election in Pakistan was seen by many as a major shift in the US policy towards Pakistan.
The army chief referred to his meeting with US senior officers on the USS Abraham Lincoln on August 27 and said that they had been informed about the complexity of the issue that required an in-depth understanding and more patience for evolving a comprehensive solution. He said that Pakistan’s viewpoint was elaborated in detail and it was stressed that in such situations, the military action alone could not solve the problem. Political reconciliatory efforts were required along with military action to win hearts and minds of the people.
During the discussion, the imperative of public support at large for military operations also came under discussion.
Later, United States Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen acknowledged a better understanding of ground realities by the COAS and remarked: “He (the COAS) is committed to doing what is best for Pakistan and he is going to stay the same.” He reiterated that ultimately it was “our national interest which will always guide our policy”.
General Kayani also regretted the killing of innocent civilians in the Angoor Adda incident on Sept 4. He said that such ‘reckless actions’ only helped the militants and further fuelled the militancy in the area. He said the Pakistan Army had conducted successful operations against the militants in the past and at present was committed to eliminating them from the affected areas of Fata and Swat.
“Our security forces have given huge sacrifices in this war and it is the presence of the army which has denied the freedom of movement and operation to Al Qaeda and the affiliates.” He said that the support of the people of Pakistan would play a decisive role.
The COAS stressed the need for a collaborative approach for better understanding of a highly complex issue. He said that trust-deficit and misunderstandings could lead to more complications and increase the difficulties for all. The constraints of operating in these areas must never be lost sight of.
“There are no quick fixes in this war. Falling for short-term gains while ignoring our long-term interest is not the right way forward. To succeed, the coalition forces will be required to display strategic patience and help the other