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6 militants, 2 civilians killed in Afghan raid
By AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - An overnight raid early Friday killed six militants and two civilians in western Afghanistan, the U.S. coalition said.
Taliban behind French soldier deaths killed: coalition
Thu Sep 4, 7:51 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) - US-led Coalition forces in Afghanistan have killed five Taliban subcommanders in recent weeks, including a bomb-maker and two behind the August 18 attack that left 10 French soldiers dead, they said.
NATO, Afghans to coordinate to avoid civilian deaths
Thu Sep 4, 2:21 PM ET
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - NATO and Afghanistan agreed on Thursday they needed to coordinate more closely to avoid civilian casualties in operations against militants, an alliance spokesman said.
Plan Would Shift Forces From Iraq to Afghanistan
By MICHAEL R. GORDON and THOM SHANKER The New York Times September 5, 2008
WASHINGTON — The United States would carry out a modest shift of American forces from Iraq to Afghanistan by early next year under a confidential recommendation to President Bush by the Pentagon’s
FACTBOX-Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 5
05 Sep 2008 14:08:31 GMT
Sept 5 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1400 GMT on Friday:
Afghan al-Qaida figure warns of attacks on West
By KATARINA KRATOVAC
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Al-Qaida's top commander in Afghanistan warned of more attacks against the West in a video posted on the Web that paid tribute to a suicide bomber said to have carried out the June bombing of the Danish Embassy in Pakistan.
Pakistani FM invites Afghan counterpart to visit
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-05 23:16:49
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi has invited his Afghan counterpart Rangin Dadfar Spanta to visit Pakistan, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday.
Afghanistan's war has a new battlefield
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Sep 6, 2008
KARACHI - In anticipation of a new era in Pakistani politics under president-in-waiting Asif Ali Zardari, the first volleys have been fired in a renewed joint Pakistan-North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Afghan gov't condemns killing and injuring int'l soldiers
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-04 17:05:21
KABUL, Sept. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Afghan Foreign Ministry on Thursday described attacks on international soldiers as "coward" act of terrorists and condemned it.
Afghan women's strength on display in gyms
Jason Motlagh, The Washington Times Friday, September 5, 2008
KABUL, Afghanistan-On a recent morning at the Iron Men gym, it was the Afghan women who did the heavy lifting. A crowd of beefy men looked on as a dozen female competitors in red tracksuits
Inside the Taliban's deadly ambush
Using heaviest weapons in their arsenal, a specially recruited squad lay in wait for Canadians near site of fearsome 2006 battle
The Globe and Mail GRAEME SMITH September 5, 2008
KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN-The ambush that killed three Canadians this week was a carefully planned trap, using an elite team of Taliban fighters and the insurgents' most powerful weapon
Afghan mission too costly for Canadians, survey finds
Toronto Sun By MURRAY BREWSTER THE CANADIAN PRESS Fri, September 5, 2008
OTTAWA - A new poll suggests a majority of Canadians believe the country is paying too high a price in blood and treasure for its involvement in Afghanistan.
Collateral Tragedies
Thursday, Sep. 04, 2008 By MARK THOMPSON/WASHINGTON time.com
There is no fog of war at 20,000 ft. above Afghanistan. For nearly three years, as U.S. warplanes and drones hit targets spread across the country's corrugated, dun-colored mountains and green poppy-growing
Slain Afghan judge had received death threats
Reuters via Stuff.co.nz, New Zealand Saturday, 06 September 2008
Afghanistan's top anti-drug judge had received phone calls and text messages before he was murdered warning him to acquit a suspected drug dealer or face death, a spokesman for the anti-drugs tribunal said on Friday.
Tories lay out specifics of Afghan exit strategy on election eve
The Canadian Press
OTTAWA — The Tory government has laid out a few more details of its Afghanistan exit strategy just days before an expected federal election call.
Marble dealers warn of decline in stone trade
www.qoqnoos.com Written by Zabiullah Jhanmal Thursday, 04 September 2008
Price of marble will fall unless government stops cheap imports, traders say
EXPORTERS of marble and granite say trade in the two stones will decline if the government fails to reduce the amount of low-quality stone imported from neighbouring countries.
First female police officers take up batons
www.quqnoos.com Written by M Reza Sher Mohammadi Thursday, 04 September 2008
Four months of intense training give women the chance to become officers
FEMALE police have been promoted to officers for the first time in the history of Afghanistan’s fledgling democracy.
Kabul and a man’s fight against corruption
Dawn - International By Jason Burke September 05, 2008
KABUL-General Ali Shah Khan Paktiwal, the chief of the Kabul criminal investigation department, sits forward in his chair, stubs out a Marlboro Red and stabs the air with his finger.
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6 militants, 2 civilians killed in Afghan raid
By AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan - An overnight raid early Friday killed six militants and two civilians in western Afghanistan, the U.S. coalition said.
The raid in Farah province targeted a Taliban commander named Mullah Fazel, said Ghulam Farooq Nahimi, an Afghan army commander. Nahimi said Fazel was killed in the raid, though Farah's deputy governor said Fazel was alive but had serious wounds.
The operation killed a woman and child in Fazel's compound, Nahimi said. He said the operation in Bakwa district involved airstrikes.
The U.S.-led coalition said militants ambushed a combined patrol of Afghan and coalition troops from an isolated compound with "intense and accurate" gunfire and rocket propelled grenades.
The coalition said six militants and two civilians were killed during the battle. Two civilians were also wounded, it said. They were evacuated to a coalition medical facility.
The issue of civilian casualties in military raids is particularly sensitive in Afghanistan right now. The Afghan government and the United Nations mission here has said that a U.S.-led raid in Herat province last month killed 90 civilians, including 60 children.
The U.S. coalition said its investigation found that 30 to 35 militants and up to seven civilians were killed in that operation in Azizabad village.
More than 3,800 people, mostly militants, have died in insurgency related violence this year, according to an Associated Press tally of figures from Western and Afghan officials.
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Taliban behind French soldier deaths killed: coalition
Thu Sep 4, 7:51 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) - US-led Coalition forces in Afghanistan have killed five Taliban subcommanders in recent weeks, including a bomb-maker and two behind the August 18 attack that left 10 French soldiers dead, they said.
"Coalition forces have positively identified five Taliban subcommanders killed during operations over the past month in Kapisa province," the Coalition said in a statement from Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan, and released in Washington.
Among the five were Ahmad Shah and Mullah Rohoullah, killed with six others by airstrikes in Nijrab district on August 30 after coalition forces ran into armed resistance while searching a compound.
Both were heavily involved in helping move weapons and foreign fighters into Afghanistan, the statement said, as well as facilitating Taliban operations, including the August 18 ambush on the French patrol.
Ten French soldiers were killed and another 21 injured in the attack by about 100 Taliban in Sarobi, 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of Kabul.
It was the deadliest ground battle for international soldiers in the country since they toppled the Taliban regime in 2001.
Coalition forces said that on August 23 they killed subcommanders Khairullah Nezami and Qari Ezmarai in Tag Ab district.
Nezami, they said, helped to arrange the making and planting of bombs and coordinated the movement of suicide bombers in the Taliban network.
A fifth subcommander, Qari Nejat, was killed together with four additional insurgents in an operation in Nijrab district on August 5.
The Coalition linked Nejat with the July 21 suicide bombing in the Tag Ab bazaar that injured six Afghans, the July 16 kidnapping of three Afghan policemen in Jalokhel, and the torture and beheading of an Afghan on June 30.
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NATO, Afghans to coordinate to avoid civilian deaths
Thu Sep 4, 2:21 PM ET
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - NATO and Afghanistan agreed on Thursday they needed to coordinate more closely to avoid civilian casualties in operations against militants, an alliance spokesman said.
More than 500 civilians have been killed during operations by foreign and Afghan forces against the militants so far this year, according to the Afghan government and some aid groups, fuelling public anger and causing a rift with foreign forces.
NATO spokesman James Appathurai said there was "a general shared view" in a meeting between NATO ambassadors and Afghan Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak that there needed to be closer coordination between Afghan and NATO forces.
There was also agreement on the need to give "a much more important role to Afghan forces in the conduct of searches, which are sensitive in Afghanistan, but also with regard to planning of offensive operations," he said.
The two sides also agreed on the need for closer coordination, including with the United Nations, when it came to investigating civilian casualties so discrepancies in numbers did not occur, Appathurai said.
Anger has mounted in Afghanistan over a August 22 raid in Shindand district of the western province of Herat in which Kabul says more than 90 people, mostly women and children, were killed, an allegation backed by the United Nations.
The U.S. military disputes the figure, saying its investigation found five to seven civilians were killed in the operation carried out with the Afghan National Army.
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force did not take part in this operation, but has been responsible for civilian casualties in the past.
Villagers said false information about the presence of Taliban militants in the area had been fed to the coalition forces which led to the raid.
The U.S. military has offered a three-way investigation into the civilian deaths, which the Afghan government and the United Nations will take part in.
The ambassadors and Wardak also discussed Afghan proposals to almost double the size of the Afghan army to 122,000 and NATO would probably back the plan if it were approved, Appathurai said.
(Reporting by David Brunnstrom; editing by Keith Weir)
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Plan Would Shift Forces From Iraq to Afghanistan
By MICHAEL R. GORDON and THOM SHANKER The New York Times September 5, 2008
WASHINGTON — The United States would carry out a modest shift of American forces from Iraq to Afghanistan by early next year under a confidential recommendation to President Bush by the Pentagon’s top civilian and military leaders, according to Bush administration officials.
The number of American combat brigades in Iraq would shrink to 14 in February from 15, according to the recommendation. All told, the number of American forces in Iraq, currently about 146,000, would drop by nearly 8,000 by March.
The reduction is smaller than some officials had earlier suggested might be possible before President Bush leaves office in January, given the significant decline in violence in Iraq. But it reflects the caution of Gen. David H. Petraeus, who is leaving his post as the senior American commander in Iraq this month, about the still-unsettled situation in Iraq.
The recommendation on the troop shift was presented to Mr. Bush on Wednesday in a video conference by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. American officials said the recommendation was the product of extensive consultations between the Pentagon officials and General Petraeus.
Under the proposal, an Army brigade and a Marine battalion would be sent to Afghanistan by early next year, adding about 4,500 troops to American forces there. They would represent a partial but still significant move toward meeting repeated requests from American commanders in Afghanistan for three more brigades, a reinforcement that the commanders say is necessary to carry out the mission there and to combat a resurgent Taliban.
The recommendation indicates that the next president will inherit a force in Iraq that has slightly more troops than in January 2007, when President Bush announced his troop reinforcement plan. Some administration officials voiced hope in July that the additional troop withdrawals by the end of Mr. Bush’s term could amount to as many as three brigades.
As the consultations over troop cuts began, General Petraeus took a very cautious approach about further reductions in Iraq, recommending that 15 brigades be maintained in Iraq through next June, administration officials said. But Mr. Gates endorsed a recommendation by Admiral Mullen that the number of brigades be reduced to 14 early next year. Other administration officials argued that such a reduction was necessary to demonstrate to the American public that there was a return from the security gains made during the so-called surge and to keep the pressure on Iraqi officials to make political progress.
The recommendation reflected a common approach that was arrived at following extensive discussions between the Pentagon and General Petraeus, the officials said. Mr. Bush is expected to approve the recommendation, though officials said that adjustments might be made as events in Iraq unfold.
The cautious approach taken by General Petraeus and his successor, Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, reflects concern about a variety of uncertainties ahead in Iraq following the departure this summer of the last of the five brigades deployed as part of Mr. Bush’s troop reinforcement plan. Those concerns include what might happen if provincial elections are held as expected late this year or early next year; the fate of tens of thousands of Sunni volunteers who as Awakening Councils have volunteered for neighborhood watch groups; tensions between Kurds and Arabs over Kirkuk; and the possibility that Shiite militias and Sunni insurgents might step up their attacks.
Another concern of American commanders is the reduction in allied troops. Two thousand Georgian troops left unexpectedly during the recent clash between Russia and Georgia, and 800 Polish troops are scheduled to leave by October. There are still some 4,000 British troops near the southern city of Basra, but American officials are uncertain how active a role they will play and how long they might be in Iraq. That has added to the responsibilities of American forces south of Baghdad.
If provincial elections are held in December, as the Bush administration hopes, the United States and its coalition partners would have tens of thousands fewer troops than they did during the 2005 elections in Iraq. On the other hand, the number of Iraqi soldiers and police officers has more than doubled since the end of 2005.
The recommendations signaled that American commanders weighing troop levels in Iraq are focusing more closely on political milestones like elections and security developments than on the calendar. That approach could have bearing on the continuing political debate over the wisdom of setting strict timetables for troop withdrawals, an issue in the American election campaigns. Iraq and the United States have been negotiating an agreement that calls for the departure of American combat forces by the end of 2011 depending on security conditions — or as a draft of the accord puts it, subject to the review of a joint American and Iraqi commission.
According to the recommendation, the reductions in American forces in Iraq would be made as follows: a Marine battalion that is scheduled to leave Anbar Province this fall would not be replaced. (A Marine battalion that had been earmarked to replace it would be sent to Afghanistan instead.)
In addition, the United States would withdraw several aviation units and some military police companies from Iraq, among other units. In the early weeks of 2009, the United States would redirect to Afghanistan an Army combat brigade that had been preparing to go to Iraq, which would have the effect of reducing the number of American brigades in Iraq by February.
“All of these moves are not set in stone,” said a senior Defense Department official who asked not to be named because he was discussing confidential deliberations. “There will be a continuous assessment of the conditions on the ground, and we will have the flexibility to adjust as required.”
The proposed increases in American troop levels for Afghanistan go part of the way toward satisfying the requests from American commanders there. There are about 15,000 American troops in Afghanistan assigned to the NATO-led stabilization mission, which has 45,000 troops in all. Another 19,000 American troops are in Afghanistan carrying out combat, training, counterterrorism and detainee operations.
Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon spokesman, confirmed that Mr. Gates and Admiral Mullen had provided their recommendation to Mr. Bush and had also shared the views of General Petraeus, the Joint Chiefs and Lt. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the acting head of the Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East and which General Petraeus will soon head.
“Without getting into what specifically they advised the president, I can tell you that all these leaders are fundamentally in agreement on how we should proceed in Iraq,” Mr. Morrell said.
He said that the recommendation followed “serious and lengthy discussions” about the security gains and threats in Iraq. “Based on all that they collectively decided on what they believed to be the best approach going forward, of course now it is up to the commander in chief to decide the way ahead.”
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FACTBOX-Security developments in Afghanistan, Sept 5
05 Sep 2008 14:08:31 GMT
Sept 5 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1400 GMT on Friday:
HERAT - U.S.-led coalition troops backed by air support killed two civilians and six militants after their patrol was ambushed in western Farah province, the U.S. military said in a statement.
ZABUL - Afghan soldiers and coalition forces killed 20 militants in southern Zabul province on Tuesday during a patrol in Naw Bahar district, the U.S. military said.
KAPISA - Coalition troops killed several militants in an operation in Kapisa province, northeast of the capital, Kabul, the U.S. military said.
PAKTIKA - Coalition forces killed several militants during an operation targeting a militant in the Barmal district of southeastern Paktika province, the U.S. military said. (Compiled by Jonathon Burch; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Afghan al-Qaida figure warns of attacks on West
By KATARINA KRATOVAC
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Al-Qaida's top commander in Afghanistan warned of more attacks against the West in a video posted on the Web that paid tribute to a suicide bomber said to have carried out the June bombing of the Danish Embassy in Pakistan.
The blast killed six, including one Danish citizen, and caused widespread destruction in the Islamabad neighborhood. Al-Qaida quickly claimed responsibility soon after the attack, saying it was carrying out Osama bin Laden's promise to exact revenge over the publishing of a cartoon of Islam's Prophet Muhammad in Danish papers.
It was the deadliest strike against Denmark since the reprinting of the cartoon earlier this year.
In the 55-minute video posted late Thursday, al-Qaida's commander in Afghanistan commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed warned "once more the Crusader states that insult, mock and defame our Prophet ... that we will exact revenge at the appropriate time and place."
Abu al-Yazeed, an Egyptian as Abu Saeed al-Masri, said the embassy attack in Islamabad was "but the beginning" and called on Muslim youth in the West to "retaliate" against the "enemies of Islam and Muslims in whose midst they live."
The video's authenticity could not be independently verified. It was posted on an Islamic militant Web forum commonly used by al-Qaida to issue videos and bore the logo of the terror group's Al-Sahab media arm.
The video also showed the last testament of the Saudi bomber purportedly behind the embassy attack, known by his nomme de guerre Abu Ghareeb al-Makki. His real name was given as Kamal Saleem Atiyyah al-Fudli al-Hathli.
Al-Makki is shown wearing an explosives vest and head scarf as he recounts his plan. He then gets into a car, followed by a computer-animated segment that reconstructs the attack.
The unusually elaborate and lengthy video was made as a documentary and included segments from statements by Danish, Dutch and U.S. officials, as well as Saudi and Jordanian royals, incorporated with remarks by various al-Qaida figures.
"As for my final message to the worshippers of the cross in Denmark, I tell them, Allah permitting, this isn't the first nor the last retaliation," al-Makki says. "We will wipe you from the face of the earth."
In August, Pakistani officials said they were trying to confirm whether a suspected militant killed in fighting in the tribal Bajur area was Abu al-Yazeed, but there has been no confirmation since. Thursday's video did not indicated when the footage of Abu al-Yazeed was filmed.
Officials in Denmark did not immediately comment the new threats.
But the Danish intelligence service PET warned last month that the country faces the worst terror threat in many years with a possible attack happening at any time. It said the 2006 publication of 12 drawings of Prophet Muhammad that sparked riots across the Muslim world, and Denmark's military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan have helped focus extremists' attention on the small Nordic country.
The cartoons angered Muslims because they depicted Muhammad as violent and licentious. Also, Islamic law bans any depiction of the prophet, even favorable, for fear it could lead to idolatry.
Associated Press Writers Maamoun Youssef in Cairo, Egypt and Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, contributed to this report.
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Pakistani FM invites Afghan counterpart to visit
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-05 23:16:49
ISLAMABAD, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi has invited his Afghan counterpart Rangin Dadfar Spanta to visit Pakistan, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday.
The invitation was conveyed through a letter, and it was a follow-up step on the agreement reached between Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani and Afghan President Hamid Karzai in their meeting held in Colombo, Sri Lanka on the sidelines of south Asian regional summit in July, the statement said.
The two officials agreed that Foreign Ministers of both countries "will meet to prepare grounds for a framework for close and constructive engagement between the two countries to build confidence and develop a common strategy at the political, military and intelligence levels," according to News Network International news agency.
Editor: Mu Xuequan
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Afghanistan's war has a new battlefield
By Syed Saleem Shahzad Asia Times Sep 6, 2008
KARACHI - In anticipation of a new era in Pakistani politics under president-in-waiting Asif Ali Zardari, the first volleys have been fired in a renewed joint Pakistan-North Atlantic Treaty Organization venture to fight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda beyond Afghanistan's borders.
Barely a week after a meeting on the US aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Indian Ocean between the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, and the chief of the Pakistani Army Staff, General Ashfaq Pervez Kiani, to discuss infiltration points for militants going from Pakistan to Afghanistan and to pin-point al-Qaeda training camps, American special forces carried out two attacks inside Pakistan.
On Wednesday morning, US special forces entered Angorada in the South Waziristan tribal area where members of al-Qaeda's shura (council), Arabs and Uzbeks were believed to be operating. The rugged mountainous area is also a known launching pad for militants staging attacks on a US military post in the Birmal area in Paktika province in Afghanistan.
The special forces, who flew in by helicopter to a small village, soon realized that they did not have the numbers or air cover to conduct effective search operations. Firing broke out and about 20 civilians are believed to have been killed before the forces withdrew.
Twenty-four hours later, four militants were killed in North Waziristan, reportedly by US special forces. The dead did not include any of the senior al-Qaeda or militant leaders who were said to have been in the area.
Contacts in Pakistan's strategic quarters told Asia Times Online that more cross-border attacks were likely as Pakistani intelligence was sharing information with the US on militant activities.
The idea of NATO or US forces stationed in Afghanistan staging raids into Pakistan was conceived in 2007 to eliminate top Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders and their safe sanctuaries. (See US homes in on militants in Pakistan Asia Times Online, January 30, 2008.)
With Pakistan's Zardari expected to be chosen as president on Saturday, and with the US presidential election campaign ripe for a dramatic turn in the "war on terror", Pakistan is poised to become an international battlefield.
Key to this is "Iron Man" Zardari, leader of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), the dominant party in the ruling coalition in Islamabad.
Although he is presently holed up in the premier's residence for fear of his safety from militant attacks, he has the security apparatus largely in check to force it to abandon its reservations about the "war on terror". Once president, he will be supreme commander of the armed forces and head of the National Security Council.
A man of many compromises
Zardari, widower of assassinated former premier Benazir Bhutto, has shown his ability to make political compromises to achieve his goals. For instance, the architect of the anti-Bhutto campaign in the 1988 elections, Husain Haqqani, who later dubbed Zardari "Mr 10%", was appointed by Zardari as Pakistan's ambassador to Washington. Haqqani, with good offices in the White House and among the neo-conservatives in Washington, lobbied successfully for the US to back the ouster this year of former president Pervez Musharraf.
Another example involves Pakistan's politically influential and financially strong media group run by the Haroon family, traditional opponents of the PPP. (Mehmood Haroon, then minister of the interior, in 1979 signed the execution order for Zulfikar Ali Bhutto on a murder charge. Zulfikar, father of Benazir, was a former president, premier and founder of the PPP.)
All the same, Zardari stunned the political community by appointing the eldest son of the family, Abdullah Hussain Haroon, as Pakistan's permanent representative to the United Nations and is looking to use the Haroon family's international connections for his benefit.
Zardari has also allied with many former Musharraf supporters, as well as with the influential religious group Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam led by the fiery Fazlur Rahman.
With his fingers firmly on the levers of power, and with strong American backing, Zardari will lead Pakistan into a new and potentially extremely bloody chapter of which the US special forces' raids into the country are just the beginning.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
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Afghan gov't condemns killing and injuring int'l soldiers
www.chinaview.cn 2008-09-04 17:05:21
KABUL, Sept. 4 (Xinhua) -- The Afghan Foreign Ministry on Thursday described attacks on international soldiers as "coward" act of terrorists and condemned it.
The attacks which targeted Canadian and Australian forces in Afghanistan's troubled southern region on Wednesday claimed the lives of three Canadian soldiers and wounded nine Australians respectively in Kandahar and Uruzgan provinces.
"Afghanistan's Foreign Ministry strongly condemns the attack of terrorists on Canadian troops which claimed the lives of three soldiers," a statement of foreign ministry released here said.
In the statement, the foreign ministry also expressed its sympathy with the victims' families as well as with the people and the government of Canada.
The Afghan Foreign Ministry in a similar statement denounced the attack on Australian troops that left nine soldiers wounded and noted that such attacks could not undermine Australian support to Afghanistan.
The Afghan Foreign Ministry, besides thanking both Canada and Australia for their contribution towards rebuilding Afghanistan, stressed that "terrorism is a threat to the region and the world, and winning the war on terror requires destroying terrorists' resources outside Afghanistan."
However, it did not elaborate.
The Afghan government often accuses Pakistan of supporting Taliban insurgents, a claim rejected by Islamabad as baseless.
Editor: Bi Mingxin
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Afghan women's strength on display in gyms
Jason Motlagh, The Washington Times Friday, September 5, 2008
KABUL, Afghanistan-On a recent morning at the Iron Men gym, it was the Afghan women who did the heavy lifting. A crowd of beefy men looked on as a dozen female competitors in red tracksuits and floral head scarves bench-pressed, dead-lifted and arm-wrestled for respect in this war-torn country's first women's powerlifting contest.
These days, homemade billboards of one-time Mr. Universe Arnold Schwarzenegger are a fixture in Kabul, where more than 190 gyms are thriving. But in this deeply conservative Islamic society, women had stayed at the margins of the male-dominated muscle craze.
No longer.
"I can normally lift 60 kilos, but today it was harder with all the attention," said Kobra Dastagerzada, 36, a mother of four who took first place in the bench press. "The next competition, I will do even better."
Shyness at the start of the event quickly waned. A couple of rivalries turned up, as well as some hard stares.
Nadia Sadeghi, a 17-year-old soccer enthusiast, won the top overall honors despite being many pounds lighter than many of the competitors.
Asked whether she expected more young women would embrace the sport, she coolly replied: "Why not?"
Organizer Bawar Khan Hotak, the de facto ambassador of Afghan bodybuilding, opened his first gym under the strict Taliban regime, which once imprisoned him for wearing shorts. Flat broke, he and a few friends fashioned weight machines out of derelict Soviet tank parts.
Kabul now hosts annual Mr. Kabul and Mr. Afghanistan contests to packed houses. Muscle-bound men come from as far as Helmand and Kandahar provinces - hotbeds of the insurgency - to compete, sporting fake tans and waxed chests.
Winners have traveled to Korea and Singapore to compete in Asian championships.
While women's bodybuilding is out of the question, it was just a matter of time before they started weightlifting, said Mr. Hotak, who hopes to hold another contest in two months.
"The Afghan woman is strong," he said. "We are not showing the body. We are showing the power."
With a war welling in the provinces, government funding for sports development is minimal. Mr. Hotak and some of his friends said they paid out of pocket to host the women's contest, which included uniforms for all competitors and golden trophies for winners.
The shortage of resources, though, has not stopped Afghan athletes from standing out.
Rohullah Nikpai won the country's first Olympic medal, a bronze in taekwondo, at the Beijing games. The country's previous best finish was a fifth place in wrestling in 1964.
Last week, he returned home to a hero's welcome with more than 4,000 people cheering in the streets - and bonuses: $20,000 from a leading mobile phone company, $10,000 from the national Olympic Committee, and a new house from President Hamid Karzai.
The vice president of the committee, Sayed Mahmood Dasthi, seated in the front row at the women's contest, said the government wants to use the momentum to expand support women athletes.
"This is just the beginning," he said.
Not satisfied, Mr. Hotak wants to reach beyond the limits of Kabul to find the strongest Afghanistan has to offer.
Mashda Kamel, one of his weightlifting proteges, agreed.
"Our most powerful women are in the villages," said the 20-year-old, a trophy cradled in her arm. "But we have war now, and it is difficult to visit them."
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Inside the Taliban's deadly ambush
Using heaviest weapons in their arsenal, a specially recruited squad lay in wait for Canadians near site of fearsome 2006 battle
The Globe and Mail GRAEME SMITH September 5, 2008
KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN-The ambush that killed three Canadians this week was a carefully planned trap, using an elite team of Taliban fighters and the insurgents' most powerful weapon to strike in a symbolic location near the scene of Canada's bloodiest battles of the mission.
This detailed account of the attack, from a well-informed Afghan government official in Kandahar with strong Taliban contacts, suggests the insurgents were frighteningly organized for the Sept. 3 ambush.
While some parts of his story were confirmed by military sources, other information could not be checked.
The official said the attack was planned by Mullah Mohibullah, an insurgent leader who also serves as chief judge for the parallel Taliban legal system in a cluster of villages known as Nalgham, about 35 kilometres west of Kandahar city.
It is not known whether any senior insurgents ordered Mr. Mohibullah to organize the attack, but he is a long-time friend of Mullah Obaidullah, the former defence minister for the Taliban regime, who has been repeatedly arrested by Pakistan but who is now believed to be living freely in the borderlands and is one of the Taliban's leading figures in the southern insurgency.
Instead of relying on his own men for the attack, Mr. Mohibullah apparently circulated a request among Taliban groups in the region, asking each of them to donate two or three of their best fighters and equip them for a dangerous mission.
"He asked for only the strongest fighters, for a big attack on a convoy," the official said. "In total, he got about 45 fighters with good weapons, like 82-millimetre guns, rocket launchers and heavy machine guns."
The Canadians have refused to say where the attack happened, but four sources said the insurgents set their trap near Chaman Bazaar, on the north side of the Arghandab River.
Located in an area known as Pashmul about 15 kilometres west of Kandahar city, the dilapidated shops have been largely abandoned because of fighting that has racked the area for years, especially around a ruined school that has previously served as a hideout for insurgents. The white-walled school, pockmarked with bullet holes, became infamous among Canadian troops on Aug. 3, 2006, when four soldiers were killed nearby, and four more died advancing toward the school on Sept. 3, 2006, during the early stages of Operation Medusa.
Canadian troops have spent the following two years trying to keep hold of Pashmul, building a paved road though the grape fields, setting up small outposts and mentoring Afghan security forces on patrol. But the Afghan official said that did not stop the Taliban fighters from staging a large ambush, positioning gunmen on a hill overlooking the road and planting a bomb nearby.
"First they exploded a land mine and afterwards they attacked the convoy," the official said. "It was a big convoy. The fighting lasted a long time."
Canadian military officials say the soldiers were not killed by a bomb, and the Taliban did not attack with any new weapon that was previously unknown in their arsenal. That points toward the 82-millimetre recoilless rifle as the likely cause of the worst casualties. The heavy anti-tank weapon is capable of punching a hole through Canadian armoured vehicles, but it is cumbersome and not often used by the insurgents as they rely on speed to get away after their usual hit-and-run attacks.
In fact, it appears the insurgents did have trouble escaping after their initial strike; the Afghan official described other insurgent groups in the district arriving shortly afterward to rescue their comrades from the Canadians' fierce counterattack. Canadian military officials have described how the surviving soldiers, even the wounded, returned fire against the ambushers.
"When essentially the shit hit the fan yesterday, we had three casualties and five others [injured]," said Lieutenant-Colonel Dave Corbould, commander of the Canadian battle group. "The platoon quickly grabbed the initiative, immediately won the firefight, took care of its casualties, got them evacuated to a proper medical facility, all as they'd been trained."
Three of the injured Canadians were flown to a military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, for further treatment yesterday. Another injured soldier, Private Glen Kirkland, was rolled onto the tarmac at Kandahar Air Field in a wheelchair for a sunset ceremony as the three caskets of his slain colleagues were carried into the back of a transport plane for return to Canada.
Pte. Kirkland, with red wounds on his face and neck, lifted himself out of his wheelchair to salute the caskets as they passed, and later hobbled up the ramp of the waiting plane for a last goodbye to his friends.
The battle group's chaplain, Captain Darren Persaud, said members of the platoon share a prayer before and after each of their missions.
He read aloud from one of their favourite verses, Psalm 91: "You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day," he said, speaking to hundreds of sombre soldiers who attended the ceremony. " A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand, but no evil shall come near to you."
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Afghan mission too costly for Canadians, survey finds
Toronto Sun By MURRAY BREWSTER THE CANADIAN PRESS Fri, September 5, 2008
OTTAWA - A new poll suggests a majority of Canadians believe the country is paying too high a price in blood and treasure for its involvement in Afghanistan.
The Canadian Press-Harris Decima survey also shows an overwhelming number of respondents were uncertain about whether the Kandahar mission has been a success.
"The mission in Afghanistan has been a source of controversy and pain for many Canadians for a long time now," Harris-Decima president Bruce Anderson said yesterday.
'LIMITED' APPETITE
The results show that the public understands there is a global terrorism threat and it's centred in Afghanistan, but "the Canadian appetite for further direct involvement in this war is very limited."
The telephone survey of 1,000 people was conducted before the latest attack on Wednesday, in which three soldiers died.
To date, 96 Canadian soldiers, one diplomat and two aid workers have died in Afghanistan. The Conservative government has set aside $1.9 billion for aid and reconstruction in the war-torn country.
The survey found that 61% of respondents believed the cost of the country's mission in lives and money has been unacceptable, while only one in three -- 32% -- said it was acceptable.
When asked overall, whether they would say the mission in Afghanistan has been a success, a failure or that it is too soon to tell, a majority of respondents, roughly 48%, took the wait-and-see answer.
NO EXTENSION
At least 30% were prepared to categorically declare the mission a success.
It also appears that Canadians are resigned to carrying out the country's duty in Kandahar until 2011, but would oppose any extension.
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Collateral Tragedies
Thursday, Sep. 04, 2008 By MARK THOMPSON/WASHINGTON time.com
There is no fog of war at 20,000 ft. above Afghanistan. For nearly three years, as U.S. warplanes and drones hit targets spread across the country's corrugated, dun-colored mountains and green poppy-growing valleys, every mission detailed by the Air Force in its daily "airpower summary" has been deemed a success. In July, B-1 bombers began striking Afghan targets with 500-lb. bombs guided to their prey by a new targeting pod slung under the plane's belly. Known as the Sniper, the pod sends long-range, high-resolution video--it can tell whether an Afghan on the ground is armed--right into the cockpit. Such weapons systems allow the U.S. military to rain steel on the Taliban from on high, even when troops aren't in the area. The Pentagon doesn't release statistics of the insurgents killed, but the military regards air strikes as the smart strategy in Afghanistan.
On the ground, the picture is much less clear; for all their precision, American bombs sometimes take out the wrong targets. As U.S. air strikes doubled from 2006 to 2007, the number of accidental civilian deaths soared, from 116 to 321, according to Marc Garlasco, a former Pentagon targeting chief who tabulates civilian casualties for Human Rights Watch (HRW), an independent research group. By his count, the death toll among civilians so far this year is approaching 200.
The military dismisses such tallies as exaggerated, and their provenance is often murky. In no case is it murkier than in the Aug. 22 strike on the western Afghan village of Azizabad. What is not in dispute is that U.S. special forces on the ground ordered an AC-130 gunship to attack at least two houses after they and their Afghan allies came under fire. The result of the attack, however, is far from certain. The Pentagon concluded that up to 35 insurgents and as many as seven civilians were killed. But the Afghan government, backed by a United Nations inquiry, puts the toll at 76 to 90 civilians, including 60 children. That would make it the deadliest strike since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001. (The U.S. military plans to join the Afghan government and the U.N. in a probe to resolve the conflicting reports.)
Whatever the tally, officials both inside and outside the U.S. military say attacks that kill civilians occur with distressing regularity; they generate headlines only when dozens die. Afghans vividly recall the July 2002 bombing of a wedding party--celebratory gunfire led to retaliation by an AC-130--that killed up to 48 civilians and wounded 117 in Oruzgan province; many were women and children. This past July, 47 people were killed and nine wounded on their way to a wedding in eastern Afghanistan. Among the dead were 39 women and children, including the bride-to-be, Afghan authorities said.
Such attacks yield propaganda gold for the Taliban, which feeds on anti-American rage. "The more people turn against Americans, the more benefits the Taliban get," says Saifuddin Ahmadi, a 52-year-old Kabul cabdriver. In the Afghan capital, anger over civilian casualties is leavened by the knowledge that U.S. and NATO troops may be keeping Afghanistan from plunging into civil war. In the countryside, opinions are stronger. Haji Obaidulla, 65, who lives in Kapisa province, northeast of the capital, says he "would prefer civil war to being killed by American air strikes."
Afghan officials say sporadic civilian deaths are inevitable, but they are troubled by the frequency and persistence of attacks like the one at Azizabad. "You can't have casualties and no end in sight," President Hamid Karzai told TIME recently. Senior U.S. officials agree. When military operations claim civilian lives, "it really does set us back," Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters on Aug. 28 while discussing the Azizabad operation. "So we work exceptionally hard to make sure that doesn't happen."
To minimize mistakes, the Air Force routinely conducts "pattern of life" studies of Taliban leaders and other key targets, using camera-carrying drones to plot their travels for days or weeks. That enables U.S. planners to figure out when the targets can be attacked without jeopardizing innocent lives. But not all air strikes can be so meticulously planned; U.S. or allied units can call in sudden strikes when they find themselves in a firefight or stumble on a meeting of Taliban leaders. When civilians are detected, strikes are called off--and some insurgents capitalize on this. "Sometimes it's a conscious tactic of these people who meet to make sure there are kids playing in the compound so that they're seen, and that complicates your targeting methodology," General James Conway, commandant of the Marines, told reporters on Aug. 27. "This is a dirty game being played."
But the main reason for civilian casualties is that the revolution in precision-guided weapons hasn't been matched by the quality of intelligence needed to drop them in the right place. "Technology has leaped forward, but the ability to know precisely who's at your target hasn't," says HRW's Garlasco, who spent nearly seven years plotting targets for the Pentagon. The military sometimes launches air strikes based on tips from Afghan tribesmen, some of whom are not above using American firepower in their own feuds. For some observers, the surest way to improve the quality of intel is to put more Americans on the ground--to use more snipers instead of Snipers. But with the U.S. military stretched thin in Iraq--and NATO's allies reluctant to send more forces--it will be many months before more ground troops are in Afghanistan. And having American soldiers in a position to call in strikes is no guarantee that civilians won't be killed. That was made clear in a Sept. 3 cross-border raid into Pakistan, apparently by Afghan-based U.S. forces, that left as many as 15 dead, including women and children, local officials said.
The Pentagon recognizes that the mounting toll is making a hard job in Afghanistan even harder. In August, the Air Force stopped issuing the daily airpower summaries boasting only of U.S. successes. When asked why, the Air Force said in an official statement that there is a "need to review the way information is collected." But the sad reality is that so long as the war persists, Afghan civilians will be the ones paying the heaviest price.
With reporting by With Reporting by Aryn Baker/Kabul, Ali Safi/Kabul
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Slain Afghan judge had received death threats
Reuters via Stuff.co.nz, New Zealand Saturday, 06 September 2008
Afghanistan's top anti-drug judge had received phone calls and text messages before he was murdered warning him to acquit a suspected drug dealer or face death, a spokesman for the anti-drugs tribunal said on Friday.
Judge Alim Hanif, chief judge of the Central Narcotics Tribunal appeals court, was leading a campaign to bring influential drug traffickers to justice when he was shot dead on Thursday on his way to work in Kabul.
"The judge was receiving death threats on his phone from a brother of a drug suspect," Sareer Ahmad Barmak, a spokesman for the Criminal Justice Task Force, said. The last call, warning the judge not to issue a guilty verdict, came a day before he was killed.
Hanif, who had joined the tribunal four months ago, had cleared more than 100 drug-related cases, earning a rare reputation for integrity.
"He was an honest person. If he was corrupt, he wouldn't have been killed," Barmak said.
Afghanistan produced some 90 per cent of the world's supply of opium last year, mostly in the south where the Islamist Taliban are most active.
Security analysts say corruption has deterred efforts to combat the booming opium trade because the drug lords have close ties with high-ranking officials in the government.
A UN official in July said many suspects had evaded justice by simply making a phone call to friends in high places.
The Afghan government said in July 463 drug cases had been completed over the previous three months in a stepped-up campaign against the menace.
Illegal drugs are estimated to be worth more than $US3 ($NZ4.56) billion a year to the Afghan economy. That money helps fuel official corruption and also helps the Taliban insurgency through a 10 per cent tax the militants impose on poppy farmers.
Barmak said the judge's killing, the first of a top anti-drug official since the establishment of the tribunal court three years ago, had created fear among the rest of the team. "If the judges do not have proper security protection, it might be difficult for them to work," he said.
Hanif did not have any bodyguards, despite the threats. Barmak said government security agencies had been told about the calls and text messages and they were working on the issue when the killing occurred.
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Tories lay out specifics of Afghan exit strategy on election eve
The Canadian Press
OTTAWA — The Tory government has laid out a few more details of its Afghanistan exit strategy just days before an expected federal election call.
But the so-called benchmarks for success in Kandahar - the things the country wants to accomplish before the military withdrawal in 2011 - appear to be mostly hazy expectations, not solid goals.
In June, the federal government announced a series of signature development projects meant to improve the lives of Afghans and demonstrate the success of the mission to Canadians.
The projects include the $50 million refurbishing of a dilapidated irrigation dam in the Arghandaub Valley, north of Kandahar.
One of the benchmarks sets out the specific aim of creating 10,000 seasonal jobs to support the Dalah dam restoration, an effort that could irrigate up 10,000 hectares for farming.
In addition to building 50 schools, Foreign Affairs Minister David Emerson says Canada hopes to training to up to 3,000 teachers, but the plan sets no specific targets for training police or Afghan National Army troops.
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Marble dealers warn of decline in stone trade
www.qoqnoos.com Written by Zabiullah Jhanmal Thursday, 04 September 2008
Price of marble will fall unless government stops cheap imports, traders say
EXPORTERS of marble and granite say trade in the two stones will decline if the government fails to reduce the amount of low-quality stone imported from neighbouring countries.
Exporters complain that cheap imported stones have raised the cost of marble and granite in Afghanistan, making it impossible for Afghan stone dealers to compete in the market.
They also say customs tax on exported stone is far too high and that the government frequently prevents them from exporting the stone.
Investors say that a processing factory for the stones would cost about $2 million.
Rahmatullah, a stone factory owner, said: "If we increase our production, then it will not be in our benefit because the price of marble is too high. The government does not co-operate with us to decrease the prices."
Fazal Khan, another stone factory owner, said: "Hundreds of trucks carrying poor stones cross the border from Pakistan to Afghanistan daily. We cannot compete with their prices."
A tonne of raw marble is sold for Afg400 to stone producers, who are able to produce about 20 square metres of high quality marble, according to the Ministry of Mines and Industries.
This is then sold for about Afg13,000 in the market.
The minister of mines, Ibrahim Adil, said: "These are small investors who cannot invest more than $100 million in the stone industry. They use inefficient saws and polishers, which produce a lot of waste during stone production.
"Our present price for the traders is reasonable and fair. We sell them the cheapest stones, which is not that much cheaper than in any other part of the world."
Afghanistan’s Export Development Department said Afghanistan exported more than $2 million worth of marble last year.
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First female police officers take up batons
www.quqnoos.com Written by M Reza Sher Mohammadi Thursday, 04 September 2008
Four months of intense training give women the chance to become officers
FEMALE police have been promoted to officers for the first time in the history of Afghanistan’s fledgling democracy.
Twenty-two female police officers, who received four and a half months of training to reach the position of officer, joined the ranks of the Afghan National Police (ANP) after taking their oaths on Wednesday.
Interior Minister Zarar Ahmad Muqbil handed out certificates to the female officers – the first in Herat in the history of the nation.
There are about 70 policewomen serving in the ANP in the western province but none have reached the rank of officer before Wednesday.
In June, Taliban militants killed the first female policewoman to die in Afghanistan.
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Kabul and a man’s fight against corruption
Dawn - International By Jason Burke September 05, 2008
KABUL-General Ali Shah Khan Paktiwal, the chief of the Kabul criminal investigation department, sits forward in his chair, stubs out a Marlboro Red and stabs the air with his finger. “Paktiwal knows no fear,” he says quietly. “Paktiwal does not even know the meaning of the word fear.”
In Kabul these days, Paktiwal is in a minority. For many are very scared. Not necessarily of the Taliban or the suicide bombings that regularly strew corpses across the potholed pavements – but of kidnap.
A mild-mannered university doctor, convinced he is being followed, has come to Paktiwal to plead for protection. He dared to hint the police might be avoiding confrontation with the criminals. “Go to the morgue, count the bodies of those we shoot each day and then tell me if Paktiwal is not a man of action,” the general tells him.
But many allege that Paktiwal, or at least the police, or at the very least some elements within the security forces, are in league with the kidnappers. As evidence, they cite the frequency with which the criminals wear police uniforms, carry police identification and use police cars complete with sirens. And the failure to catch many of them.
Paktiwal denies any charge of complicity. “The police are not involved in any crime,” he said. “I am an optimist. Crime rates are going to drop.”
The general is backed by Saeed Ansari, a spokesman for the Afghan intelligence service. “In the last year we have investigated more than 100 cases of kidnapping and have found no involvement of police officers,” he says.
“The criminal gangs are linked to terrorists and militants who aim to destabilise Kabul and the provinces because kidnapping businessmen scares many into exile and damages the economy.”
Many important figures in the Afghanistan business community have relocated to the United Arab Emirates in recent months, taking tens of millions of dollars of much-needed investment capital with them. The slowing of the Afghan economy’s previously impressive growth rate this year is in part due to the exodus. Much-needed commercial experience and drive is bleeding away. And, despite the reassurances, few in the Kabul business community have much faith in those supposed to protect them.
“Business is very bad, not due to the insurgency but due to the mafia and the kidnapping,” said Hamidullah Farooqi, of the Kabul International Chamber of Commerce. “Of course the security forces are involved. At the very least there is collusion between the police and the criminals. At the worst the police are the kidnappers.”
Businessman Farzad Alam returned to Kabul in the aftermath of the war of 2001 but fled with his family to the UAE two months ago after narrowly escaping a kidnap attempt in his office, 100 metres from the interior ministry in central Kabul.
Alam was able to call Paktiwal, based a few hundred metres away, and then stall his attackers long enough for the police to arrive. He said the would-be kidnappers fled into a government compound.
“I’m one of the lucky ones,” he said by telephone from Dubai. “I escaped. But most are not so lucky and they have to pay up. The gangs are all connected to high-level people and unless you are connected, too, you are finished.”
Local businessmen were shocked by the murder of a moneylender carrying more than $1m in cash who was gunned down on the road to Kabul airport 200 metres from a police checkpoint in July. Corruption is acknowledged as a big problem at all administrative levels in the new Afghanistan and is one of the key reasons for the ease with which insurgents have established a parallel administration in large areas of the country.
President Hamid Karzai himself has frequently been accused of being soft on corruption. However, kidnapping is a new phenomenon. Senior western officials in Kabul describe the interior ministry as “particularly dysfunctional” among the new Afghan ministries.
Some reserve their harshest words for Paktiwal himself. But Kabul’s CID chief does not care about the allegations. With his personal bodyguards – known as Petrol, Glass Eater, Bulldozer, Livewire and Switch - posted in front of his office, he spends his days writing orders, drinking tea, signing off on petitions, interrogating suspects and deploying his 431 detectives around the city – as well as answering calls from ministers, journalists and the various supplicants who have managed to obtain his private numbers.
Those sitting on the sofas in his office one morning included a man wanting a new passport, a worried shopkeeper who has seen “suspicious characters” in the bazaar, a local employee of the US army seeking the release of some impounded fuel trucks, a crew from local Afghan TV, a police officer reporting the seizure of 12kg of cannabis resin, a pimp waiting to be questioned, a bewildered peasant farmer caught with an unlicensed handgun, a young man with a split lip complaining about gang violence in his Kabul suburb and two kidnappers caught on the Shomali plains, the agricultural valley north of Kabul.
Young, scared and accused of hiding a businessman in a pit after abducting him from Kabul, they stand trembling before Paktiwal, who barely slows the flow of orders, signatures and phone calls while he questions them.
“Who are you? Where did you hide him? You think killing someone is easy? You think asking for $300,000 was a good idea?” he barks. “Look, the victim is going to tell us what happened and then we’ll know everything. So tell us the truth and it will be better for you and you’ll be out of here in no time.”
One of the pair stammers: “All we did was hit him once.” Paktiwal laughs. “Look, you spend one single hour in our detention centre and there will be no need for you to be questioned by a prosecutor as you will have told us everything,” he says. The two suspects look close to tears as they are hustled away.
Half the general’s bodyguard file in to join him as an early lunch of rice and meat is served. Glass Eater remains standing, playing with the knuckleduster in his flak jacket. There is silence in the room. All eyes are on the television in the corner, where a Bollywood film award ceremony fills the screen. “I am optimistic about the crime rate,” says Paktiwal again, almost to himself. “It will come down. We are going to take action.”—Dawn/Guardian News Service
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