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General: far more US troops needed in Afghanistan
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Even after an extra U.S. Army brigade joins the fight against the insurgency in Afghanistan next January, three times that many reinforcements will be needed shortly thereafter, the highest-ranking U.S. general here said Tuesday.
Fingers crossed, Petraeus leaves Iraq
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - U.S. military commanders seeking more troops and better equipment for the fight in Afghanistan were making their case at the top Tuesday, as Defense Secretary Robert Gates
720 Afghan police killed in 6 months
Tue Sep 16, 4:24 AM ET
KABUL, Afghanistan - Insurgent attacks have killed around 720 Afghan police in the last six months as militants have increased the pace of bombings and ambushes, an official said Tuesday.
Killings of Afghan civilians sharply up, U.N. says
By Stephanie Nebehay Tue Sep 16, 10:20 AM ET
GENEVA (Reuters) - Nearly 1,500 Afghan civilians were killed in the first eight months of this year, many in attacks on schools, medical clinics, bazaars and other crowded areas, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
Afghanistan's kidnapping industry
By Martin Patience BBC News, Kabul Tuesday, 16 September 2008 10:30 UK
Six or seven men wearing military-style uniforms approached businessman Mohammed Easa and then pistol-whipped him.
WHO cancels polio jabs for Afghan children after doctors killed
Tue Sep 16, 7:30 AM ET
GENEVA (AFP) - Polio vaccinations for over a million Afghan children have been cancelled, the World Health Organization said Tuesday after two doctors were killed in a Taliban suicide attack.
Pakistan seeks British help over border strains with US
LONDON (AFP) — Britain agrees that US cross-border incursions by US forces into Pakistan "didn't help," Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said Tuesday, as he sought London's help in a simmering row with Washington.
Pakistani troops told to fire on U.S. forces if they cross Afghan border
Directive follows unusual attack on suspected Taliban hideout in Waziristan
Tuesday, September 16, 2008 CBC News Canada
Pakistani troops have been told to fire on U.S. forces if they launch another cross-border raid from Afghanistan, a military spokesman in Islamabad said Tuesday.
US forces the terror issue with Pakistan
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Online September 16, 2008
KARACHI - The United States had been aware of North Vietnamese sanctuaries in Cambodia since 1966, but the US avoided attacking them due to possible adverse international repercussions.
Azerbaijan to double peacekeepers in Afghanistan
BAKU, September 16 (RIA Novosti) - Azerbaijan's parliament is to adopt a law that would double its peacekeeping contingent in Afghanistan, a senior parliamentarian said Tuesday.
Taliban militants kill security officer in E Afghanistan
Xinhua September 16, 2008
Taliban insurgents have eliminated a senior intelligence officer and three of his family members in Afghanistan's eastern Kunar province, provincial police chief Abdul Jalal Jalal said Tuesday.
Khorshied Samad . Back to school in Kabul
The Ottawa Citizen Khorshied Samad Monday, September 15, 2008
Canadians' September ritual is familiar to a privileged few in the West, but increasing violence is threatening much of recent progress on education in Afghanistan
Ashdown: Obama may be Afghanistan's best hope
guardian.co.uk, UK Allegra Stratton, political correspondent Tuesday September 16 2008
The former leader of the Liberal Democrats, Lord Ashdown, warned his party yesterday that there was a real chance of Afghanistan slipping into civil war.
FACTBOX - Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 16
Sept 16 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan reported until 0900 GMT on Tuesday:
Political Tea Leaves in Afghanistan
Washington Post, United States Greg Bruno Council on Foreign Relations Monday, September 15, 2008
On most matters of social development, from health care to literacy, the United States and Afghanistan are worlds apart. But on presidential politics, the disparate democracies both find themselves
Father of children accidentally shot by Canadians faces Taliban threats
The Canadian Press September 15, 2008
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — The father of two children accidentally killed by Canadian troops in Afghanistan says he's been forced to flee his home in the Panjwaii district after being threatened by the Taliban.
Willing To Win in Afghanistan?
The Washington Post By Anne Applebaum Tuesday, September 16, 2008
URUZGAN PROVINCE, Afghanistan-From the top of Cemetery Hill, just outside town, the village of Chura looks like a thin green ribbon winding along the bottom of a narrow valley. To the east
Costs rise despite drop in Pakistani rupee
www.quqnoos.com Written by Zabhiullah Jhanmal Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Strength of Pakistan's currency drops against the Afghani
THE cost of goods from Pakistan continues to rise despite a drop in the strength of the Pakistani Rupee against the Afghani.
Afghan war costs could be thorny election issue
Canada.com, Canada Mike Blanchfield Canwest News Service Monday, September 15, 2008
OTTAWA-Canada's new parliamentary budget officer says federal politicians, including those in the opposition, should be told the overall cost of the six-year war in Afghanistan.
Afghan engineer kidnapped - governor
www.quqnoos.com Written by Abdullah Anwari Monday, 15 September 2008
Gunmen abduct Afghan working for German government
UNKNOWN gunmen have kidnapped an Afghan engineer working for a German company in the south-eastern city of Khost, a senior official said.
MPs warn of deteriorating security near Kabul
www.quqnoos.com Written by Abdulwali Arian Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Innocent civilians killed in recent clashes 40km from the capital, MPs say
MEMBERS of Parliament have expressed concern at what some call the deteriorating security situation in the Tagab district of Kapisa province, which borders Kabul.
Teachers call for ban on weapons in school
www.quqnoos.com Written by Shakeela Abrhimkhil Monday, 15 September 2008
Students say schoolyard violence is on rise after murder in playground
STUDENTS and teachers have criticised the government’s failure to clamp down on students who carry weapons such as swords, knives and knuckle dusters into school.
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General: far more US troops needed in Afghanistan
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Even after an extra U.S. Army brigade joins the fight against the insurgency in Afghanistan next January, three times that many reinforcements will be needed shortly thereafter, the highest-ranking U.S. general here said Tuesday.
Gen. David McKiernan, commander of NATO-led international forces in Afghanistan, told reporters traveling with Defense Secretary Robert Gates that the war is being fought with insufficient resources and that if more troops are not forthcoming, the fighting will last longer and take a higher toll.
He disputed the notion that the U.S. and NATO war strategy has failed and needs to be overhauled.
"Our strategy of approaching counterinsurgency operations is a valid strategy here," McKeirnan said. "Our problem is we don't have enough resources to do it with." The general added that he was referring not only to insufficient military forces but also shortcomings in Afghan governance and a shortage of international economic aid.
McKiernan spoke with reporters before meeting privately with Gates, who was making his first visit to Afghanistan since December. McKiernan said the Army brigade arriving in January fills an urgent short-term need based on an assessment that fighting in eastern Afghanistan is tougher than believed six months ago.
"There are an additional three brigade combat teams" that have been validated by the Pentagon as a requirement, McKiernan said. He would not say exactly how many extra soldiers that entails, but said that it was more than 10,000 — beyond the roughly 3,700 in reinforcements that are scheduled to arrive in January.
There currently are about 33,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan and about 146,000 in Iraq.
McKiernan was asked what the consequence would be of not getting the three combat brigades he believes are needed in 2009 beyond the one Bush is sending in January.
"The danger is that we'll be here longer and we'll expend more resources and experience more human suffering than if we had more resources placed against this campaign sooner," he said.
Gates arrived in the Afghan capital Tuesday evening after presiding at a ceremony in Baghdad where Gen. Ray Odierno took over for Gen. David Petraeus as the top U.S. commander in Iraq. Gates was meeting over dinner in Kabul with McKiernan and was to hold talks with senior Afghan officials on Wednesday.
More U.S. forces have been killed in Afghanistan so far this year than in all of 2007 as a resurgent Taliban-led insurgency has adopted bolder and often deadlier tactics. U.S. officials say the insurgency cannot win a conventional war, but its persistence has left U.S. and NATO leaders seeking reinforcements and has eroded the credibility of Afghanistan's fragile elected government.
McKiernan said he had no doubt that the insurgency could not win in Afghanistan, but he did not say U.S. forces are assured of victory, either.
"We are not losing, but we are winning slower in some places than others," he said.
In the interview, McKiernan also disclosed that he recently issued a revised order meant to govern the tactics and procedures followed by U.S. forces when engaging in air and ground fights against the insurgents. The revision, issued Sept. 2, was in response to a series of attacks that resulted in civilian deaths — most notably the highly publicized allegations that a U.S. attack on an Afghan village compound on Aug. 22 killed as many as 90 Afghan civilians, including women and children. The U.S. military has disputed the allegation but also has launched a new investigation in light of emerging evidence.
McKiernan said 90 percent of his new directive is meant to re-emphasize existing procedures.
"We've put an increased focus on partnering with Afghan security forces," he said in explaining the main change. "In other words, we want to run more and more operations that are combined operations with the Afghan army and/or the Afghan police. That's probably a new emphasis on this tactical directive."
McKiernan said U.S. forces are attentive to the corrosive consequences of failing to protect the Afghan civilian population, but he acknowledged that it is almost inevitable that some civilians will be killed inadvertently.
"There is a fog of war, especially in a counterinsurgency where our adversary doesn't wear a uniform. Secondly, Afghanistan is a huge country. It's very geographically complex and we don't have sufficient forces here, so there is a greater reliance on air power," he said.
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Fingers crossed, Petraeus leaves Iraq
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - U.S. military commanders seeking more troops and better equipment for the fight in Afghanistan were making their case at the top Tuesday, as Defense Secretary Robert Gates got a firsthand look at a war that has not gone as planned.
Gates says he wants more money next year to pay for better surveillance technology and equipment to hunt insurgents in Afghanistan and networks that plant roadside bombs. He was also seeing Afghan government officials, including U.S.-backed president Hamid Karzai.
Earlier Tuesday, Gates saw off Gen. David Petraeus, whose strategy for countering the Iraq insurgency is credited by many with rescuing the country from all-out civil war. Petraeus stepped aside Tuesday for larger duties running both the apparently ebbing Iraq war and the increasingly deadly conflict in Afghanistan.
More U.S. forces have been killed in Afghanistan so far this year than in all of 2007 as a resurgent Taliban-led insurgency adopted bolder and often deadlier tactics. U.S. officials say the insurgency cannot win a conventional war, but its persistence has left U.S. and NATO leaders seeking reinforcements and eroded the credibility of Afghanistan's fragile elected government.
A new report shows a 40 percent rise in the number of Afghan civilians killed in militant attacks and in airstrikes by foreign troops this year. The United Nations report counts more than 1,400 Afghan deaths so far this year. The U.N. tally finds more civilians died in Afghanistan last month than in any month since the 2001 ouster of the Taliban.
The report says 800 of the deaths were caused by Taliban and other militants, while U.S. or NATO airstrikes caused 395 deaths, two-thirds of the casualties inflicted by pro-government forces.
Petraeus' next assignment will be commander of U.S. Central Command, with broader responsibilities. From his headquarters in Tampa, Fla., he will oversee U.S. military involvement throughout the Middle East, including Iraq, as well as Afghanistan, Pakistan and other Central Asian nations. He takes up that post in late October.
On Tuesday, meanwhile, Gen. Ray Odierno became the top American commander of the conflict in Iraq. At a traditional change-of-command ceremony attended by top Iraqi and American military and civilian officials, Petraeus said Odierno's skills and experience make him "the perfect man for the job."
With Gates presiding at the ceremony in a cavernous rotunda of a former Saddam Hussein palace outside Baghdad, Petraeus handed over the flag of his command, known as Multinational Force Iraq, to Odierno and then bade farewell.
Petraeus said the insurgents and militia extremists who have created such chaos in Iraq over the past five years are now weakened but not yet fully defeated. He noted that before he took the assignment in February 2007 he had described the situation as "hard but not hopeless."
He thanked his troops for having "turned 'hard but not hopeless' into still hard but hopeful."
Despite the security gains, insurgents retain the ability to carry out devastating attacks. On Monday evening, a female suicide bomber blew herself up among a group of police officers northeast of Baghdad, killing at least 22 people. Hours earlier, car bombs in the capital killed 13 people.
Because of Odierno's extensive previous experience in Iraq, he is generally expected to be able to continue building on the gains made under Petraeus' command, although an evolving set of difficult challenges face him here and in Washington, where he will soon have a new commander in chief.
A major part of Odierno's job will involve working with Iraqi political leaders, in tandem with U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker. In that role Odierno may call on his experiences in 2004-05 as assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, when he was the Pentagon's liaison to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and frequently traveled abroad with her.
Odierno commanded the 4th Infantry Division during the opening months of the war in 2003. He returned in December 2006, at perhaps the darkest hour for the American-led enterprise, to be the No. 2 commander under Petraeus. He finished that tour in February 2008.
When he arrived in Baghdad on Saturday, Odierno recalled that after accepting the handover from Petraeus, "I felt like I had never left, but I also felt like I was coming back to my second home."
Also addressing the ceremony was Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who said Iraq had become a "vastly different place" during Petraeus' tenure.
"In more places and on more faces we see hope," Mullen said.
Gates recalled the perils faced by Petraeus in February 2007.
"Darkness had descended on this land," Gates said. "Merchants of chaos were gaining strength. Death was commonplace," and people around the world were wondering whether any Iraq strategy would work.
"Slowly, but inexorably, the tide began to turn," Gates said. "Our enemies took a fearsome beating they will not soon forget. Fortified by our own people and renewed commitment, the soldiers of Iraq found new courage and confidence. And the people of Iraq, resilient and emboldened, rose up to take back their country."
Injecting a bit of humor, Gates made note of what he called "one other historical achievement" for the new command team of Odierno and Lt. Gen. Lloyd Austin, who replaced Odierno in February as the No. 2 commander and will remain until next spring.
"Between Gen. Odierno and Lt. Gen. Austin we just might have the tallest command in American military history — about 13 feet of general by my estimate," Gates said. Each of the generals is nearly 6 feet 6 inches tall.
Odierno told the gathering that while much remains for the U.S. military to accomplish here, the Iraqis must take charge. "This struggle is theirs to win," he said.
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720 Afghan police killed in 6 months
Tue Sep 16, 4:24 AM ET
KABUL, Afghanistan - Insurgent attacks have killed around 720 Afghan police in the last six months as militants have increased the pace of bombings and ambushes, an official said Tuesday.
Most of the police deaths have come from frontal attacks by militants, said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. The 720 deaths happened during the first six months of the Afghan calendar.
In 2008, militants killed about 925 police — meaning the pace of attacks this year has spiked.
Afghanistan's 82,000 police have less training and less firepower than the Afghan army, making them a favorite target for militants. The police also travel in small groups through some of Afghanistan's most dangerous territory.
Meanwhile, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said its forces killed 10 militants in Wardak province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on Sunday. Insurgents attacked the soldiers with a rocket and NATO soldiers responded with artillery and fighter aircraft, NATO said.
The battle took place about 40 miles southwest of Kabul.
More than 4,100 people — mostly militants — have died in insurgency related violence this year, according to an Associated Press tally of figures from Afghan and Western officials.
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Killings of Afghan civilians sharply up, U.N. says
By Stephanie Nebehay Tue Sep 16, 10:20 AM ET
GENEVA (Reuters) - Nearly 1,500 Afghan civilians were killed in the first eight months of this year, many in attacks on schools, medical clinics, bazaars and other crowded areas, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
The death toll, up 39 percent from the same period in 2007, includes 800 killings blamed on Taliban and other militants as well as 577 caused by Afghan forces and their U.S.-led coalition allies. Responsibility for another 68 deaths was not clear.
The U.N. human rights office said the spike in fatalities had coincided with "a systematic campaign of intimidation and violence" by Taliban forces targeting doctors, teachers, students, tribal elders, civil servants, former police and military personnel and public construction workers.
"The number of killings by the Taliban and other anti-government forces almost doubled by comparison with the first eight months of 2007, with the numbers killed by government and international military forces also increasing substantially," it said in a report.
There were 330 civilians killed in Afghanistan in August alone, spokesman Rupert Colville said.
"That's the highest number of civilian deaths to occur in a single month since the end of major hostilities and the ousting of the Taliban regime at the end of 2001," he told a news briefing in Geneva, where the U.N.'s human rights work is based.
Air strikes by international forces caused nearly 400 civilian deaths in the year through August, the U.N. office said, calling for accountability and greater transparency about those attacks.
The Taliban carried out 142 summary executions and also used suicide attacks and improvised explosive devices, according to the report drawn up by human rights officers attached to the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan.
COMMUNITIES FEARFUL
In a statement, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanetham Pillay said there was "substantial evidence" that the Taliban was seeking to intimidate and attack Afghan civilians thought to support the Afghan government, the international community and military forces.
While most Taliban attacks focused on military and government targets, "such operations were frequently undertaken in crowded civilian areas such as bazaars or busy roads," the U.N. report found.
"Such attacks terrorize communities and make them fearful of supporting or even associating with the government," it said. "Schools and medical services, in particular, have become prime targets for attack by anti-government elements."
It singled out a suicide bombing during a dog fight in Kandahar province last February which killed 67 spectators, and a bomb in July at the Indian embassy in Kabul which killed 50.
An air strike on a wedding party in Nangahar province last July killed 47 civilians, including 30 children, and a strike in Azizabad village in western Herat's Shindand district on August 22 caused 92 civilian deaths, including 62 children, it said.
The U.S. military, which initially said 30 to 35 militants were killed in Azizabad, plans to reopen the investigation into the incident after a cell phone video emerged showing bodies of people said to have been killed in the strike.
Pillay, a former International Criminal Court judge who took up as the top U.N. rights official this month, said civilians must to be shielded from the ongoing fighting in Afghanistan.
"It is also imperative that there is greater transparency in accountability procedures for international forces involved in incidents that cause civilian casualties," she said.
(editing by Laura MacInnis and Robert Hart)
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Afghanistan's kidnapping industry
By Martin Patience BBC News, Kabul Tuesday, 16 September 2008 10:30 UK
Six or seven men wearing military-style uniforms approached businessman Mohammed Easa and then pistol-whipped him.
They dragged the money trader - who was by then barely conscious - into their vehicle and sped off.
"When I woke up, I was tied up, and blindfolded," says Mr Easa, recalling his ordeal seven months ago. "They beat me and I thought any second I might die."
Mr Easa's kidnap is not an isolated incident - on average a businessman is kidnapped at least once a week in Afghanistan.
According to the Afghanistan International Chamber of Commerce (AICC), 173 businessmen have been kidnapped across the country in the last three years: a number of them have been killed.
But as the insurgency appears to spread, exacerbated by the general sense of lawlessness that accompanies any security vacuum, Afghan business leaders fear the kidnapping phenomenon could worsen.
They fear it will hasten the rate of entrepreneurs fleeing the country.
Safe - for now
Initially, Mr Easa's kidnappers demanded a $2m ransom from his family.
"I told them that we didn't have that kind of money," he says.
After several days of negotiation, Mr Easa's family managed to stump up $500,000 - $200,000 of their own money, and the remainder as loans from friends.
When the ransom was paid, the kidnappers dropped him off in a quiet part of the city late at night.
Mr Easa says he now feels safe in the city."I don't have any money now, so nobody will want to kidnap me," he says, by way of explanation.
But many other businessmen do not. Azarakhsh Hafizi, the chairman of the AICC, fears the kidnapping trend could increase.
Mr Hafizi also worries about the impact that these kidnappings are having on Afghanistan's economy.
He says that the Afghan government must do more to protect the lives of businessmen and their capital to stop the flight of commerce leaders from the country.
"Every day people are leaving and setting up in Dubai and Germany," he adds.
"Without investment we cannot create jobs."
Government collusion?
Many business leaders blame the kidnappings on organised crime groups operating inside Afghanistan but with strong links to criminals in Asia and even Europe.
"Sometimes they demand that we pay a ransom to them in a foreign country," says Mohammad Amin Khosty, the general manager of Shahzada market, Afghanistan's main money exchange.
In the last two years, more than 15 of the market's traders have been kidnapped, he says.
He says that corrupt government officials and the Afghan security services often collude in these crimes.
In the face of this threat, many businessmen have upped security and the Afghan Ministry of Interior now allows businessman to legally carry weapons.
Haji Ahmed Shah Hakimi decided to buy a Russian pistol after a botched kidnap attempt.
The weapon nestles between his car seat and the gear box as he drives round Kabul.
"If anything happens now, I can defend myself," he says, with a smile.
But Mr Hakimi says he no longer leaves Kabul, no longer drives at night, and regularly travels with his brothers, who act as informal bodyguards.
Like other businessmen, however, he knows there is one thing that money cannot buy here - and that is security.
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WHO cancels polio jabs for Afghan children after doctors killed
Tue Sep 16, 7:30 AM ET
GENEVA (AFP) - Polio vaccinations for over a million Afghan children have been cancelled, the World Health Organization said Tuesday after two doctors were killed in a Taliban suicide attack.
"Campaigns in the southern region are cancelled," WHO spokeswoman Sona Bari told AFP.
The programme was due to start on September 21 and was intended to reach 1.2 million children aged under five in Afghanistan's southern regions, she said.
Two Afghan doctors working for the WHO were killed in a suicide car bombing in southeastern Afghanistan Sunday that was claimed by the Taliban.
The WHO said that a similar campaign in the eastern provinces of Nangarhar, Kunar and Laghman was still likely to go ahead, as were future campaigns in the south in October and November.
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Pakistan seeks British help over border strains with US
LONDON (AFP) — Britain agrees that US cross-border incursions by US forces into Pakistan "didn't help," Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said Tuesday, as he sought London's help in a simmering row with Washington.
Speaking after talks with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, he said Britain had a better understanding of Pakistan than other countries, and voiced hope Brown could influence others.
"He's very much aware and he understands Pakistan's situation, and the fact that he wants to help the democracy - and the situation doesn't help democracy -- I think answers it," he told reporters after the talks in London.
He declined to comment on whether Brown thought the raids were wrong, but said: "He did agree that they didn't help."
"Britain has always had a better understanding of the sub-continent than any other country so if they will take our point of view and put it across to the world I think it will be better."
US and Afghan officials say Pakistan's tribal areas are a safe haven for Al-Qaeda and Taliban rebels who took sanctuary there after the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in late 2001.
But Pakistan has vowed to defend itself against violations of its air space and incursions by US forces from Afghanistan, straining the relationship between the "war on terror" allies.
On Monday, Pakistani officials said that shots were fired when US-led coalition helicopters based in Afghanistan neared the border with Pakistan, although there were conflicting accounts of the incident.
The alleged clash took place amid high tensions in the border region a week after Pakistan accused US troops of carrying out a direct attack in the same area that left 15 people dead.
Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, are widely believed to be hiding in the mountainous region.
Earlier Brown said in a joint statement with Zardari that Pakistan and Afghanistan must take the lead in clamping down on extremism along their border, although the international community can help.
"The prime minister and President Zardari agreed that the UK and Pakistan had a shared agenda in tackling violent extremism in both countries," they said in a statement issued by Brown's Downing Street office.
They noted "a particularly acute problem with extremism emanating from the Afghanistan/Pakistan border region. This had an impact on Pakistan as much as anywhere else, but was also impacting on UK forces in Afghanistan."
Brown said last week that a "new strategy" was needed for Pakistan's Afghan border areas, to prevent extremists crossing back and forth across the frontier to attack NATO-led forces.
"What's happening on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan is something where we need to develop a new strategy," he told a monthly press conference last Thursday.
"We are trying to prevent people from moving back and forward."
But on Tuesday he and Zardari said "it was for the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan to lead the efforts to combat this extremism, with the support of the international community.
"In this context, the prime minister welcomed the early meeting between Presidents Zardari and (Afghan President Hamid) Karzai and the prospect of improved practical co-operation between the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan on their mutual vulnerability to violent extremism," they said.
Zardari, the widower of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, was sworn in as president last week. He is on a visit to Britain for his daughter Bakhtawar's admission to the University of Edinburgh.
Zardari will return to Pakistan on Thursday to address the joint sitting of parliament.
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Pakistani troops told to fire on U.S. forces if they cross Afghan border
Directive follows unusual attack on suspected Taliban hideout in Waziristan
Tuesday, September 16, 2008 CBC News Canada
Pakistani troops have been told to fire on U.S. forces if they launch another cross-border raid from Afghanistan, a military spokesman in Islamabad said Tuesday.
On Sept. 3, U.S. special forces attacked a suspected Taliban position on Pakistani territory, in what’s believed to be the first cross-border ground assault of the Afghan counter-insurgency.
Pakistan's civilian leaders have protested the raid but said that the dispute with Washington should be resolved through diplomatic channels.
The Pakistani army’s Maj.-Gen. Athar Abbas said the new orders were a response to the raid, in which U.S. helicopters ferried troops into the Pakistani territory of South Waziristan, a known stronghold of the Taliban.
"The orders are clear," Abbas said in an interview with the Associated Press. "In case it happens again in this form, that there is a very significant detection, which is very definite, no ambiguity, across the border, on ground or in the air: ... open fire."
Heavy price
The Pakistani army statement came as the top U.S. military officer, the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, Adm. Michael Mullin, arrived in Islamabad for talks with civlilian and military officials. No details of his visit have yet been released.
U.S. military commanders have said Islamabad isn’t doing enough to prevent the Taliban and other militant groups from recruiting, training and re-supplying their forces in Pakistan's virtually lawless border lands known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.
Taliban forces are also believed to operate from Pakistani territory further southwest, across from Afghanistan’s Kandahar province, where most of Canada’s 2,500 soldiers are based.
Pakistan acknowledges the presence of al-Qaeda fugitives and Taliban forces and admits it has difficulty preventing militants from seeping through the mountainous border with Afghanistan.
However, it insists it is doing what it can and paying a heavy price, pointing to its deployment of more than 100,000 troops in its increasingly restive northwest and a wave of suicide bombings across the country.
After the Sept. 11, 2001, airplane hijackings, Pakistan declared its support for Washington and allowed a limited number of U.S. troops onto Pakistani territory during the invasion of Taliban-led Afghanistan.
The move was hugely unpopular with many Pakistanis, and analysts said anti-American feeling in the mainly Muslim country of 170 million people has grown extensively since then.
Earlier this year, elections brought about a sea change in Pakistani politics, eventually forcing the resignation of the former military dictator Gen. Pervez Musharraf.
Washington is known to be uncertain of whether the new civilian president and government in Islamabad have enough authority over the country’s military to remain an effective ally in the war against Islamist militant organizations such as al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
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US forces the terror issue with Pakistan
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Online September 16, 2008
KARACHI - The United States had been aware of North Vietnamese sanctuaries in Cambodia since 1966, but the US avoided attacking them due to possible adverse international repercussions. However, as the going got tougher in Vietnam, in 1969 president Richard Nixon extended the war theater to Laos and Cambodia, which only plunged the region in a quagmire and ultimately led to the conclusive defeat of American interests.
Similarly, in the South Asian war theater, Washington has been aware of Taliban and al-Qaeda sanctuaries in the Pakistani tribal areas for many years, but President George W Bush deferred to Pakistan to deal with them.
This has changed in recent months, given the Taliban's resilience in Afghanistan, largely made possible by their bases inside Pakistan. US Predator drones and US special forces have carried out five attacks in September inside Pakistan's tribal areas, even though Washington is well aware of the consequences of such cross-border action.
These include a possible revolt in Pakistan's establishment against the "war on terror" and a spurt in anti-American sentiment, which could cost the pro-US administration of President Asif Ali Zardari dearly.
Clearly, Washington is frustrated with the situation in Afghanistan, and it no doubt rankles that the American "empire" is being thwarted by a bunch of "cave-dwellers".
In the years following the fall of the Taliban in 2001, Pakistan handed over a number of al-Qaeda members to the US. Whether or not they were significant was not so much the point as the arrests created a feeling in the US that the "war on terror" was working, and funds and troops for it flowed freely.
Those arrested included Abu Zubaida, the alleged military operations commander of al-Qaeda, in 2002. A joint Pakistan-US raid in the southern port city of Karachi created a stir on the first anniversary of September 11, 2001, when the alleged 20th member of Hamburg cell, Ramzi Bin Shib, was arrested. He was unable to join his co-conspirators in the September 11 attacks in the US as he could not get a visa for the US.
Then come Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, an alleged mastermind of September 11, followed by many others who made the headlines. Altogether, Pakistan handed over 700 "icons of terror", but in 2007 the arrests stopped. There are several reasons for this.
The US placed high rewards on the heads of suspects, for instance, US$25 million for Khalid Sheikh. But invariably, all but less than 1% went to the Pakistani government, and not the people involved in the investigations and capture, or the informants.
Further, the Pakistani courts under now deposed chief justice Chaudhary Iftikahar began to challenge extra-judicial arrests, which put a brake on the free-wheeling security agencies.
And last but not least, al-Qaeda members became much more cautious about moving or living in Pakistan's cities, instead retreating to safe havens in the tribal areas or in Afghanistan, where it was virtually impossible to track them down.
This situation was not good enough for the US, especially in a presidential election year. The first US demand came in 2007 in president Pervez Musharraf's time.
But as al-Qaeda members were no longer roaming the streets of the cities, they could not be delivered. The best Pakistan could do was provide information on their likely locations and descriptions of them.
Pakistan and the US then agreed on intelligence-sharing, with the understanding that the Americans, with their superior technology, would pinpoint suspects, notify Islamabad, then attack them.
According to a top Pakistani official who was a part of the recent strategic dialogue with the Americans, none of these understandings was documented - they were verbal agreements between US officials and Musharraf. When Zardari's government was reminded of such agreements by Washington, a Pakistani official who had accompanied Musharraf confirmed them, although there were no minutes. On this basis, the US went ahead with its drone and special forces attacks inside Pakistan.
Now, for the first time, there are efforts to institutionalize Pakistan-American relations as well as that between the Central Intelligence Agency and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence.
There are many issues to sort out.
Pakistan keeps on giving the US information on the hideouts of Baitullah Mehsud, the anti-Pakistan tribal warlord and self-proclaimed head of the Tehrik-i-Taliban. But Washington wants information on Taliban figures such as Jalaluddin Haqqani and his son Sirajuddin, as well as veteran mujahid Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, whose arrest or killing would better boost the image of the "war on terror" in the US.
Similarly, Pakistan has repeatedly given information on Egyptian ideologue Sheikh Essa, who was once hit by a drone attack but only wounded, whereas the US wants the low-down on Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri - a much more difficult or even impossible task.
The US is not waiting around, though, and it can be expected more attacks will be made into Pakistan, even though, in its impatience, the US is notching up new Mai Lais - the mass murder of hundreds of unarmed citizens in Vietnam by US Army forces on March 16, 1968.
Last week, more than 20 women and children were killed by US special forces in a raid on Angorada in South Waziristan. The US later admitted the soldiers had followed the wrong target.
As with the bombing of Cambodia and Laos nearly 40 years ago, the latest US offensive could mark a decisive turning point in South Asia.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief.
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Azerbaijan to double peacekeepers in Afghanistan
BAKU, September 16 (RIA Novosti) - Azerbaijan's parliament is to adopt a law that would double its peacekeeping contingent in Afghanistan, a senior parliamentarian said Tuesday.
"A draft law on doubling the number of Azeri peacekeepers deployed in Afghanistan will be submitted for consideration during the fall session," first deputy speaker Ziyafet Askerov said.
A total of 45 Azerbaijani peacekeepers are currently serving in Afghanistan as part of the International Security Assistance Force, a NATO-led security and development mission in the country.
The former Soviet republic has also deployed 150 peacekeepers to Iraq since May 2003, and has been part of the NATO Partnership for Peace program since 1994.
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Taliban militants kill security officer in E Afghanistan
Xinhua September 16, 2008
Taliban insurgents have eliminated a senior intelligence officer and three of his family members in Afghanistan's eastern Kunar province, provincial police chief Abdul Jalal Jalal said Tuesday.
"Armed Taliban militants entered the house of Sharifullah, a senior officer of National Security Directorate, in Kunar province Monday night and killed him along with his wife and two sons," Jalal told Xinhua.
The bloody incident took place in Khas Kunar district, he added.
Taliban insurgents, who often target government interests and "soft targets" such as teachers and aid workers, have yet to make any comments.
Abdullah Wardak, the governor of Logar province, was killed by roadside bombing planted by Taliban insurgents outside Afghan capital Kabul on Saturday.
Spiraling insurgency and Taliban-linked violence, according to officials, have left around 4,000 people dead with over 700 police so far this year in war-battered Afghanistan.
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Khorshied Samad . Back to school in Kabul
The Ottawa Citizen Khorshied Samad Monday, September 15, 2008
Canadians' September ritual is familiar to a privileged few in the West, but increasing violence is threatening much of recent progress on education in Afghanistan
The feel of fall is in the air again, the mornings crisp and cool, and the days grown shorter. Yellow buses have appeared driving children to school, many wearing new clothes, lugging new backpacks filled with school supplies, and a hearty dose of apprehension and excitement about school days ahead. It is an image that most of us in the West are quite familiar with, but in reality exists for only a privileged few.
In Afghanistan this image exists only on celluloid or in the imaginations of many a bright-eyed child. Afghan children do not take yellow buses, nor carry new backpacks brimming with supplies or nutritious lunches to school. They are considered extremely lucky if they can go to school at all, and if they happen to be school age girls able to get an education, they are part of a small percentage -- a shrinking percentage at that.
Since the fall of the Taliban nearly seven years ago, more than 5.4 million Afghan children have returned to school, an estimated 1.75 million of them girls. It is an achievement worth recognition, but so much more needs to be done. A recent Oxfam report estimates half of school age children do not attend school -- with significant gender and provincial disparities. From 1996 to late 2001, only 700,000 boys were allowed to attend school, run under strict Taliban code.
Women and girls were forbidden to attend school or receive an education, instead relegated to forced domesticity. They were also forbidden to work, travel without a male relative, receive medical attention by male doctors, and suffered a host of other indignities as non-citizens under the ruthless Taliban regime. The very few who did study or teach did so in peril through underground schools, and thousands did defiantly holding out hope against illiteracy and oppression.
In 2002, a few months after my arrival in Kabul, I witnessed Afghan girls and young women returning to school for the first time since the Taliban regime had been driven out. Thousands of them clogged the dusty streets, dressed simply in long black skirts and flowing tops, their hair covered by white head scarves. Many of them held hands in delight, giggling, laughing aloud, some hidden by umbrellas against the bright morning sun, as they proudly walked to school; the majority of them for the first time after six years of medieval darkness. It was a breathtaking parade of joy and hope, of sunny optimism after the fall of tyranny.
Inside barren classrooms, some without roofs, some even without walls, adorned with only a chalkboard and a few desks if any, the students lined up by age group to receive their lessons. The younger girls were in the front rows, faces scrubbed clean, eyes sparkling with excitement. In the back were teenagers, perhaps a bit embarrassed to be in the same class with much younger girls, but just as eager to learn. This was their chance to study and stimulate their minds, and to try and catch up on so much stolen time.
Out of a population of approximately 28 million, an estimated 11 million Afghans are illiterate. The estimated literacy rate among women is 15.8 per cent compared to 31 per cent for men, and drops considerably in the rural areas. These epidemic proportions are in dire need of improvement and earnest support by the Afghan government and international community. Although 3,500 new schools have been built since 2002 with the help of the United States, Canada, EU members, and other donor nations, many thousands of communities still do not have access to schools, with thousands of children still forced to learn in cross-border madrasas where the seeds of intolerance and exclusion are sown.
Sadly, over the last two years, instead of an increase in numbers and overall attendance at school by Afghan students, there has been an overall decrease, especially among girls, because of the terror tactics used by the Taliban and growing insurgency along the tribal belt provinces. More than six per cent of newly built schools have been burned down by the Taliban during the last 18 months -- easy soft targets for their cowardice -- and 220 students and teachers brutally killed in 2007 alone. Families have been openly told not to send their daughters to school, otherwise face the same tragic fate as the others. Fear has once again gripped the psyche of the Afghan people, and disheartened the intent of the donor community.
If anyone wonders why the Taliban are so fearful of girls and women getting an education, we need to revisit the misguided ideology that drives them. Educated minds will rebuild with purpose and dignity, perhaps becoming future leaders. Educated women are movers and shakers in Afghanistan, true agents of change becoming empowered ministers, MPs, journalists and human rights activists. They are a force to be reckoned with, held up as role models by so many young girls, and respected by both men and women who long for real change in their country.
Since the Taliban's aim is only to destroy, murder and intimidate, rebuilding Afghanistan is far from their agenda. They want to leave it a barren wasteland, a war-torn and opium-riddled country, inhabited by impoverished and illiterate men and women. Nothing speaks louder than the torching of more than 110,000 textbooks headed for schools over the last few weeks.
Without hope and awareness there cannot be real progress, and this is what the Afghan people so desperately need besides security, economic development and sustainability, and lasting peace. Every Afghan child and adult needs access to proper schools and trained teachers, protected and secure against the scourge of terrorism. The Afghan government needs to reinforce its strategy to protect education by working hand in hand with local communities and the international organizations involved in this sector.
We need to continue the course for the Afghan people, who deserve our unyielding support in the face of such overwhelming challenges.
Khorshied Samad is the former Kabul bureau chief and correspondent for Fox News Channel, and is the spouse of the Afghanistan Ambassador to Canada.
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Ashdown: Obama may be Afghanistan's best hope
guardian.co.uk, UK Allegra Stratton, political correspondent Tuesday September 16 2008
The former leader of the Liberal Democrats, Lord Ashdown, warned his party yesterday that there was a real chance of Afghanistan slipping into civil war.
Appearing in Bournemouth, Ashdown released a memo he sent to the prime minister in December last year revealing advice he offered to the government, but told his audience that since then the situation in the country had worsened.
Ashdown, whose foreign experience included four years as the EU's high representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina, was a contender to become the UN's envoy to Afghanistan but his appointment appeared to be blocked in January of this year, a month after the date of the memo he has brought to light this week.
Speaking last night about events in the 10 months since his memo, Ashdown said: "I fear there is nothing that has happened over the past year or so in Afghanistan which has caused me to alter this analysis. Indeed almost everything that has happened there makes me more gloomy that I was when I wrote this minute."
The original memo Ashdown sent to the British government in December 2007 said: "We do not have enough troops, aid or international will to make Afghanistan much different from what it has been for the last 1,000 years." Even if such resources were found, Ashdown wrote that he did not think it would be possible to turn the situation around within 25 years.
Ashdown called for a regional agreement, similar to the Dayton peace agreement, involving all the regional players and especially Iran, saying he thought a change in the White House might be the answer. He said: "A new president in the US might just be able to do this. Indeed, given [Barack] Obama's courageous statements in favour of multilateralism and dialogue with old enemies, he might well be the single person in the world best placed to pull off such an enterprise."
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FACTBOX - Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 16
Sept 16 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan reported until 0900 GMT on Tuesday:
KABUL - About 720 police have been killed in attacks by Taliban-led insurgents since March across Afghanistan, the Interior Ministry said on Tuesday. In all, 1,119 policemen were killed the previous year.
MAIDAN WARDAK - Taliban ambushed a convoy carrying officials of Ghazni province in an area of neighbouring Maidan Wardak on Tuesday, an official said.
In a clash that followed the ambush, police killed at least six of the assailants, he said, adding there were no losses on the government side.
KUNAR - An intelligence officer, his wife and two of his sons, were killed in their house in an attack by Taliban fighters in Kunar province in the east, an official said on Tuesday.
The Taliban could not be reached for comment about any of these incidents.
(Compiled by Sayed Salahuddin, Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Political Tea Leaves in Afghanistan
Washington Post, United States Greg Bruno Council on Foreign Relations Monday, September 15, 2008
On most matters of social development, from health care to literacy, the United States and Afghanistan are worlds apart. But on presidential politics, the disparate democracies both find themselves enmeshed in prolonged electoral contests with potentially transformative results. A year before Afghans cast ballots for their president, voters, politicians, and analysts already are dissecting President Hamid Karzai's political record. And like the American contest, the race for Afghanistan's top office often is cast as a referendum on the country's future.
In five years as Afghanistan's first democratically elected president, analysts view Karzai's record as decidedly mixed. Afghan officials point to progress expanding citizens' access to health care, education, and a healthy growth in tax revenue. According to the International Monetary Fund's most recent figures, Afghanistan's gross domestic product (GDP) increased 8.2 percent between 2006 and 2007, to $7.7 billion (PDF). And in a new 2008 survey of the opium trade, the United Nations credited strong leadership (as well as bad weather) for a 19 percent decline in opium poppy cultivation from 2007. The majority of the heroin-derived crop is now confined to the country's southwestern provinces (PDF), where permanent Taliban settlements and organized crime rings remain active.
Karzai has vowed to build on these gains. In an interview with the Associated Press on August 19, Karzai confirmed he would seek reelection. Afghanistan's constitution allows for presidential candidates to run for two consecutive five-year terms (PDF); Karzai was elected to his first term in 2004 with 55 percent of the vote. But Karzai's mandate has not translated into unwavering support. An October 2007 opinion poll (PDF) by the Asia Foundation found that despite generally positive feelings about the direction of their country, the vast majority of Afghans felt the government cared little about the public's problems. Of late, Karzai has appeared intent on challenging those opinions by highlighting popular nationalist themes. Reacting to continued anger over errant U.S. air strikes, including an August 22 strike in Herat that may have killed dozens of children (Reuters) -- the Pentagon disputes the death toll -- Karzai fired two senior Afghan army officers for "negligence" (al-Jazeera). Karzai's government ha
s also called for a status of forces agreement to govern the presence of U.S. and NATO troops (Guardian).
Some aspects of Afghanistan's troubles are beyond Karzai's control. Resurgent Taliban and al-Qaeda elements have regrouped in neighboring Pakistan, and the lawless border region has become a staging ground for the planning and execution of attacks in Afghanistan. Pakistani officials are unwilling or unable to reign in the militants, according to an investigation by the New York Times' Dexter Filkins. To fill the void President Bush has said he will increase the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan in coming months, and has called for a massive increase in the size of the Afghan National Army. U.S. Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Michael Mullen, meanwhile, told House lawmakers on September 10 that he is commissioning a strategy overhaul for the Afghan war effort, one that covers both sides of the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. "I'm not convinced we're winning it in Afghanistan; I am convinced we can" (Stars and Stripes), he said.
But the help can't arrive soon enough for critics and potential challengers, who see many reasons to dump Karzai. They cite a surge in insurgent violence (CDI), drug-related corruption (NYT), and high poverty rates among them. Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, an ethnic Tajik with roots in the Soviet-era insurgency whose 1996 ouster cleared the way for the Taliban's rise, called Karzai's tenure "a great tragedy" (Bloomberg). Rabbani says Afghans are "looking for a change," and opposition candidates are already stepping forward to offer it.
One announced candidate is former Attorney General Abdul Jabbar Sabit, an anti-corruption crusader, whom Karzai tossed from office a day after announcing plans to run (Pajhwok). (Karzai claimed Sabit's presidential bid was illegal). A host of other current and former Afghan politicians have also announced or appear poised to do so, according to a list of "contenders" compiled by the Afghan news website Quqnoos. Other names cited among Afghan political analysts as possible contenders include former Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali and U.S. Ambassador to the UN Zalmay Khalilzad (though neither man has announced plans to run).
Whether Afghanistan will see a strong opposition ticket, or even hold free and fair elections, is another matter. But as some U.S.-based Afghan experts see it, elections won't solve Afghanistan's problems. Seth G. Jones of the RAND Corporation says Karzai remains the most popular politician in a war-ravaged country, is Pashtun, and owns broad multiethnic support. "In other words," Jones writes in Foreign Policy, "Karzai is still the best game in town."
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Father of children accidentally shot by Canadians faces Taliban threats
The Canadian Press September 15, 2008
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — The father of two children accidentally killed by Canadian troops in Afghanistan says he's been forced to flee his home in the Panjwaii district after being threatened by the Taliban.
Ruzi Mohammed says he was threatened by insurgents for speaking with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Canadians from the Provincial Reconstruction Team about compensation for the mistaken shooting last July.
Now jobless and living in a small rented house in Kandahar city for 4,000 afghanis, or US$80 a month, the frustrated 31-year-old said he's still anxiously awaiting compensation.
"Karzai said 'Sorry' on behalf of Canadians and promised me that he will send me to pilgrimage and provide me a house in Kandahar city, but I'm still waiting for that," he said.
"Canadians promised me compensation but I'm not sure what the amount is."
Told it could take four weeks for the cash to flow, Mohammed said he needs it now.
"lf Canadians will not support me now, I am compelled to join the Taliban and to take revenge for my two innocent children," he said.
"Before, I was drilling to feed my family and now I am jobless. I don't have other children. I had two children and they are no more."
Canadian Forces spokesman Maj. Jay Janzen said the compensation process is slow for his own safety.
Because handing him a pile of cash would make him a target for theft or worse, officials from the Provincial Reconstruction Team helped him open a bank account and are in the process of depositing funds.
"We don't want a situation where we give a local Afghan a large amount of cash and send him on his way," Janzen said, adding the military doesn't release details about the amount of compensation. "It's just not a prudent thing to do."
Janzen said Mohammed was given a first instalment to open the bank account and that a test payment was wired to him after he provided the military with his new banking information. The third instalment, he said, is now being processed.
"We're told this being Afghanistan, these things can take time to make their way through the system," he said, adding a fourth and final payment will be issued after this one has cleared.
But the process is not just financial, he added. Meeting with him is also an opportunity to express remorse for what's happened.
"It's about making amends and coming to terms with people and making the best of a tragic situation," he said.
Janzen refused to elaborate on the reception Canadian officials got from Mohammed, but said discussing the situation was obviously a difficult thing for him.
While he appeared to understand Canada's purpose in Afghanistan, Mohammed's anger was still evident during an interview with The Canadian Press.
"Canadians must be very careful while living in Kandahar. They must respect our women and must love our children, because basically, they have come to help poor Afghans, not to shoot them," he said.
"It hurts me and my wife still whenever we remember our beautiful and innocent children."
Mohammed's four-year-old daughter Maraka and two-year-old son Tor Jan were gunned down when the vehicle they were riding in failed to pull over for a passing Canadian military convoy.
Fearing a possible suicide attack, soldiers opened fire with a 25 millimetre cannon when the vehicle came within 10 metres of them despite repeated hand gestures and audio warnings to stop.
An investigation by the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service into the incident is nearly complete and the results are expected to be released within days.
Human Rights Watch says 434 civilians were killed in Afghanistan by coalition air strikes and ground fire in 2007. In the same year, 950 civilians were killed by insurgents, according to the New York-based organization.
Civilian deaths have become a mounting concern that has threatened the Afghan government's relationship with coalition forces. This grew worse in recent weeks after a massive U.S. air strike in Herat province killed 90 civilians including 60 women and children.
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Willing To Win in Afghanistan?
The Washington Post By Anne Applebaum Tuesday, September 16, 2008
URUZGAN PROVINCE, Afghanistan-From the top of Cemetery Hill, just outside town, the village of Chura looks like a thin green ribbon winding along the bottom of a narrow valley. To the east, the west and the north are dry, uninhabitable mountains. To the south, through a gap in the mountains, it is just possible to see the next narrow valley.
For the Dutch captain whose soldiers graciously invited me along on their patrol up that hill, this geography means a great deal. The green valley of Chura, he explains, is "secure": That means that when his Charlie Tiger Company patrols the one-street bazaar, nobody shoots at the soldiers. It also means that the Dutch "provincial reconstruction team" -- NATO's name for troops who deliver aid, and the central focus of the Netherland's mission here -- can keep up their work on Chura's small health clinic, bring better seeds to Chura's farmers, build Chura's schools. During the patrol, villagers come out to shake hands with the reconstruction team leader who is walking with us and to ask the medic for advice. Children put their thumbs up and shout "Alles Gut," the rough Dutch equivalent of "okay."
It is a positive, happy story: Not just a success for the Dutch but for NATO, which also works with French, Australian, American and Afghan troops in Uruzgan, and which sponsored my trip there. It is an important story, too: Uruzgan, in the Pashto-speaking south of Afghanistan, is the birthplace of Mohammad Omar, the Taliban's founder.
Unfortunately, this story is not complete without explaining that the next valley, the one visible through the gap in the mountains, is "insecure." There is no Dutch base there, and when Charlie Tiger Company goes on patrol in that direction, the soldiers don't take journalists. "Insecure" means that there are snipers and roadside bombs, such as the one that recently blew up a Dutch vehicle near here; it means the tribal leaders there are rivals of the tribal leaders here; it also means that a German aid group has indefinitely postponed plans to build a road to Chura, and that Chura's doctor doesn't feel safe far from his clinic. Not all Taliban, he explains in a low voice, approve of medicine.
And this, in a microcosm, is the dilemma we face in Afghanistan, well understood on the ground but occasionally worth restating for outsiders: Where there is a real military presence, it is possible to bring peace and development to Afghanistan. But where there are no foreign troops, there is often anarchy. Though European governments like to draw a line between bringing "security' and engaging in counter-terrorism in Afghanistan, on the ground those missions blur.
Though Americans like to talk about "winning" and "losing" the war in Afghanistan, on the ground it's clear that those categories aren't relevant. Of course we can "win": The real question is whether we are willing to pay the high cost of victory.
The problem is complicated by the nature of the enemy in Afghanistan, best described by NATO's commander in Afghanistan, U.S. Army Gen. David McKiernan, as an "insurgent nexus" that includes not only remnants of the original Taliban but new "Taliban" who work for the money they receive from across the Pakistani border, tribal leaders with their own agendas, criminal syndicates and opium dealers. These groups cannot dislodge a Dutch or American base, they cannot rule the country, and they cannot win mass popular support. But with a handful of weapons and some homemade bombs, they can make the coalition forces in Afghanistan pay a high price for their good intentions -- and erode support for the Afghan mission in foreign capitals.
And this they will succeed in doing unless the extraordinary ambition of this enterprise is better understood. No government with troops in Afghanistan has explained to its voters that the troops' achievements are so fragile, that safety established in one valley does not imply safety in the next, and that the task of "reconstruction" is so integrally linked to military work.
The nearly 5,000 new troops promised last week by President Bush represent the beginning of a recognition of the scale of the challenge, but only that.
Other resources are needed, too, as widespread use of the newly fashionable word "surge" indicates. A NATO official in Kabul spoke of the need for a "civilian surge," meaning an increase in the already high levels of aid; a U.N. official wants a "political surge," meaning greater attention to the negotiations that will ultimately bring insurgents in from the cold. They are right, but so is the U.S. military, which has quietly invested billions in training the Afghan army: Joint missions are now the norm. At a gleaming new air base outside Kabul, I watched an American colonel, a survivor of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the Pentagon, proudly show off the embryonic Afghan air force, created with American mentors, refurbished Soviet helicopters and older Afghan pilots with Russian training. "I am out fighting Taliban, even in my dreams," one of them told me.
And someday he may be able to do that, even without our help. But in the meantime, that extraordinary, multimillion-dollar air base, just like the blond Dutchmen patrolling Mullah Omar's province, serves as a reminder that we haven't exactly "neglected" Afghanistan, as Barack Obama and others often say. It's just that we haven't yet faced up to what we have undertaken to do here. Afghanistan is bigger than Iraq, more rugged, more impoverished and vastly more complicated, with more languages, more ethnic groups, more tribes and more-lethal neighbors. It has only begun to test our stamina.
applebaumletters@washpost.com
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Costs rise despite drop in Pakistani rupee
www.quqnoos.com Written by Zabhiullah Jhanmal Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Strength of Pakistan's currency drops against the Afghani
THE cost of goods from Pakistan continues to rise despite a drop in the strength of the Pakistani Rupee against the Afghani.
Businessmen blame Pakistan’s insistence on selling its goods in American dollars for the rising costs.
Insecurity, rising fuel prices, the lack of market controls and bribery on the major trucking routes are also creating major hurdles for businessmen, increasing the cost of goods in Afghanistan.
Zubair Jamal, a businessman, said: "Our first problem is with government officials who have paid no attention to the increase in prices or to the problems that we are faced with along the highways."
Spokesman for the Commerce Ministry, Jawad Omar, said: "The problem of high prices is not the government’s fault. We have problems in the ports and borders, and our businessmen are making some mistakes like hoarding and holding monopolies."
Meanwhile, the strength of the Pakistani Rupee has declined in relation to the Afghani by 20% over the past four months.
Pakistani goods have failed to drop in price despite this decline.
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Afghan war costs could be thorny election issue
Canada.com, Canada Mike Blanchfield Canwest News Service Monday, September 15, 2008
OTTAWA-Canada's new parliamentary budget officer says federal politicians, including those in the opposition, should be told the overall cost of the six-year war in Afghanistan.
In an interview with Global National, Kevin Page says he is nearing the end of a special probe that tallies Canada's military involvement in Afghanistan. However, he said that he believes all-party consent is required to allow him to release the report during a federal election campaign.
Page, who was appointed in March, had hoped to release a preliminary estimate on the cost of keeping Canada's 2,500 troops in Afghanistan this month, when the House of Commons was due to reconvene.
But Prime Minister Stephen Harper's decision to call a federal election has effectively delayed the release of that figure.
"Certainly for parliamentarians and opposition, they have an important oversight role. They should know what those costs are ... It would be important to get the kind of transparency we need going forward," Page told Global News.
Releasing that figure now, during a federal election campaign, could be a thorny issue.
The mission in Afghanistan has had a low profile during the first nine days of the federal campaign, but if the cost of the war were revealed, it could cause headaches for the governing Conservatives, as well as the opposition Liberals, who originally committed Canadian troops to Kandahar while they were in power in 2005.
"At minimum, it would take an all-party agreement, and probably we'd be setting a precedent," said Page, who could be accused of interfering in the election if he were to release his figures now.
NDP foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar, whose party has called for an immediate withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan, has asked Page to release his cost estimates.
Dewar has argued it is wrong that the full cost of the war was not discussed in Parliament and for it not to be part of the election debate.
"It's absolutely fundamental that we have a costing of how much the war has cost us to date and until 2011," Dewar has said. "It's critical for Canadians who are about to decide on their political choices."
Dewar was not available for further comment because of the death Monday of his mother, Marion, a former Ottawa mayor and longtime New Democrat.
Previous estimates of the cost of the mission, based on the federal government's own spending estimates, have pegged the cost of the war at about $7 to $8 billion.
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Afghan engineer kidnapped - governor
www.quqnoos.com Written by Abdullah Anwari Monday, 15 September 2008
Gunmen abduct Afghan working for German government
UNKNOWN gunmen have kidnapped an Afghan engineer working for a German company in the south-eastern city of Khost, a senior official said.
Arsallah Jamal, the governor of Khost, said attempts to free the kidnapped engineer were launched soon after Sunday’s abduction from the city’s technical college.
The engineer, a resident of Herat, was taking Iftar when he was kidnapped, Jamal said.
He was working for the German Technical Co-operation, a development organisation. No one has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.
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MPs warn of deteriorating security near Kabul
www.quqnoos.com Written by Abdulwali Arian Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Innocent civilians killed in recent clashes 40km from the capital, MPs say
MEMBERS of Parliament have expressed concern at what some call the deteriorating security situation in the Tagab district of Kapisa province, which borders Kabul.
Clashes between Afghan army troops and militants in the district, about 40km from the capital Kabul, have left innocent civilians dead, the MPs said.
But the head of Parliament’s defence commission said the increase of ANA forces in Tagab has been effective in decreasing insecurity in the province.
In the last month, the district has witnessed frequent ground operations by coalition forces and there have been civilian casualties in some of the operations.
Faryab MP, Sardar Muhammad Rahman Oghli, said: "We must call on the people to support the government.
"The situation in Tagab has become critical but unfortunately people are not aware of the ongoing situation in Tagab, where many innocent people are being killed."
Head of Parliament’s defence commission, Muhammad Iqbal Safi, who is also a Kapisa MP, said violence had decreased in the district.
He said: "The Taliban have become very weak in Tagab district recently and a people’s military council, which is made by the people themselves, has taken the security control in Tagab. Also the strength of the police and the Afghan army is increasing in the district everyday."
MPs have already warned that the security situation in provinces surrounding Kabul is on the decline.
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Teachers call for ban on weapons in school
www.quqnoos.com Written by Shakeela Abrhimkhil Monday, 15 September 2008
Students say schoolyard violence is on rise after murder in playground
STUDENTS and teachers have criticised the government’s failure to clamp down on students who carry weapons such as swords, knives and knuckle dusters into school.
Teachers urged the government and the security forces to act immediately before violent clashes erupt on school grounds.
Last week, a student was stabbed to death by a classmate at a playground in Kabul and teachers fear similar murders will occur unless the vicious weapons are banned.
Clashes have already erupted in some schools in Kabul, with students fighting each other with knives, swords and forks.
Teachers also say that people who are not enrolled in schools are coming into classrooms.
One female student said: "Security is so bad inside the school that we cannot even walk in the yard and read our lessons there."
The Deputy of the head of student affairs, Murtaza Mihran, said he was working with police to enforce a ban on weapons.
One Kabuli said: "Inside a school, a student is killed in front of the teacher and headteacher. Is this a school or a place of violence?"
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