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Afghan quake survivors struggling without aid
By Rafiq Sherzad
MIR GADKHEL, April 18 (Reuters) - Survivors of a strong quake in a remote corner of eastern Afghanistan say they spent a freezing night in the rain outside the collapsed remains of their homes because promised government help did not reach them.
US Envoy Outlines Need to Stabilize Pakistan and Afghanistan
Voice of America By Jason Strother Tokyo 18 April 2009
An international donors' conference in Japan has raised $5 billion to help Pakistan rebuild its economy and confront militant groups.
U.S. says not playing favourites in Afghan poll
Reuters April 18, 2009
TOKYO - The United States has no preferred candidate in the presidential election in Afghanistan this year, a top U.S. envoy said on Saturday, stressing the importance of a fair and open poll.
Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan (Hekmatyar) contacts US for troops pullout
[ANI] - Peshawar, Apr. 18 : The United States based Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan (HIA) (Hekmatyar) stalwart Daud Abidi has confirmed holding meetings with high-ranking American officials and handing
A New Year For Afghanistan's Traditional Carpets
By Philippa Scott Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty April 18, 2009
Emerging after decades of conflict, Afghanistan's carpet-weaving industry is seeking to reestablish itself and its centuries of tradition on the international market.
U.S. seeks to prevent Taliban use of radio, web-WSJ
Reuters Sat Apr 18, 2009
WASHINGTON - The United States has started a broad effort in Pakistan and Afghanistan to prevent the Taliban from using radio stations and websites to intimidate civilians and plan attacks, the Wall Street Journal
5 suspected militants killed in Afghanistan
By Fisnik Abrashi Associated Press Sat Apr 18, 8:47 am ET
KABUL – NATO-led forces and Afghan troops killed three suspected militants during a raid Saturday in central Afghanistan, where insurgent attacks have spiked this year, officials said. At least two other suspected militants died in an airstrike in the south.
Security developments in Afghanistan
April 18, 2009
(Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan reported as of 0600 GMT on Saturday:
Banking On Afghanistan
Madalina Iacob Forbes April 18, 2009
Amid the chaos, some see opportunity.
Sitting in a half-empty Airbus 32S heading to Kabul in February, Ravinder Yadav comforted his wife Anita. They'd just packed up their house in Delhi for a new life in Afghanistan
Taliban militants raid, burn down district headquarters in E Afghanistan
Xinhua April 17, 2009
A number of Taliban insurgents Friday early morning launched attacks on government headquarters in Musakhil district of Khost province in eastern Afghanistan, burning down the office building, an official said.
Afghanistan's turbulent cleric
Asif Mohseni, the cleric behind a controversial family law, is complex and ambitious – in other words, an Afghan politician
Nushin Arbabzadah The Guardian (UK) April 18, 2009
A new Shia family law has divided Afghanistan, revealing a nation struggling to come to terms with a common yet complex problem: how to reconcile traditional, religious values with the demands of the 21st century
Divisions Arose on Rough Tactics for Qaeda Figure
New York Times By SCOTT SHANE April 17, 2009
WASHINGTON - The first use of waterboarding and other rough treatment against a prisoner from Al Qaeda was ordered by senior Central Intelligence Agency officials despite the belief of interrogators that the prisoner
State Dept. reviewing contractor in Afghanistan
after employee death due to possible overdose
MATTHEW LEE Associated Press Writer April 17, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — The State Department is investigating DynCorp International, which conducts police training in Afghanistan, over its handling of an employee who died of a possible drug overdose and has ordered the major U.S.
Bring on Australia and Pakistan, say Afghanistan
April 17, 2009
JOHANNESBURG (AFP) — The Afghanistan cricket dreamers are at it again. Not satisfied with a meteoric rise from fifth-division non-entities to the verge of World Cup qualification within one year
Pakistani Taliban Keen to Fight in Afghanistan
Written by www.quqnoos.com Saturday, 18 April 2009
A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban said they would assist militants in Afghanistan if they are asked for reinforcement
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Afghan quake survivors struggling without aid
By Rafiq Sherzad
MIR GADKHEL, April 18 (Reuters) - Survivors of a strong quake in a remote corner of eastern Afghanistan say they spent a freezing night in the rain outside the collapsed remains of their homes because promised government help did not reach them.
Two strong quakes shook an area several dozen kilometres (miles) west of the city of Jalalabad on Thursday night, killing at least 19 and injuring dozens more. The local government said it had sent over 200 tents and around 600 blankets to the quake zone, and other assistance was on its way. But residents said they had seen no sign of the help, and spent a frightening night outside, with 7 or 8 aftershocks.
"There are hundreds of families who spent the night outside and it was very cold and raining, our children have become sick, and we haven't received any assistance from the government or others so far," said Del Agha who had lost two children.
The U.S. Geological Survey said a 5.5 magnitude quake hit the area just before 2 a.m. on Friday (2130 GMT on Thursday), followed by a 5.1 magnitude aftershock two hours later that tumbled some buildings that survived the first shock.
Villagers were still digging through the remains of their houses by hand on Saturday, though mostly looking for livestock.
By midday a Reuters witness said there was no sign of first aid or other help arriving in the village of Mir Gadkhel.
The official death toll from the government in Kabul was 19. But Mohammad Tahir Zahir, deputy head of the provincial council of Nangarhar province, said he had attended funerals for, or been personally informed about, at least 40 deaths.
There were 71 wounded survivors, 34 of them in critical condition, he added.
The villages are located between Jalalabad and the capital Kabul, in Nangarhar, a province that sees sporadic attacks by Taliban insurgents. But there were no reports by Saturday of security incidents near the quake zone. (Writing by Emma Graham-Harrison; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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US Envoy Outlines Need to Stabilize Pakistan and Afghanistan
Voice of America By Jason Strother Tokyo 18 April 2009
An international donors' conference in Japan has raised $5 billion to help Pakistan rebuild its economy and confront militant groups.
The United States and Japan each pledged $1 billion, but Washington's special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke, says large donations from the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Iran send a clear message that stabilizing Pakistan is a global concern.
"It demonstrates the international support that Pakistan is now receiving. And I hope that the people of Pakistan understand the huge significance of such a outpouring of support of countries of such diversity," he said.
Holbrooke underscored the dangers that a resurgent Taliban and terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, who have a stronghold in western Pakistan, pose to the international community.
"These are the men who committed the atrocities of 9/11 in the United States, who attacked Mumbai, who planned the attacks in Spain and Britain, who killed Benazir Bhutto, and who have attacked inside Pakistan," he said. "I have no doubt whatsoever that they are planning attacks as we sit here in Tokyo on other capitols and other opportunities around the world."
The envoy says what happens in Pakistan also has a direct impact on the ongoing war in Afghanistan. Militants continue to launch attacks on U.S. and coalition forces using the frontier region as their base.
And this issue is of special interest to many in Japan. During the administration of former U.S. president George W. Bush, Washington asked Tokyo to commit ground forces in addition to the naval support it had already dispatched.
Holbrooke says he will not press Japan on this matter.
" I'm not going to tell Japan what to do with its self defense forces, that's for them to decide and I would never come to Japan and tell them to send troops unless they wish to. There are many other ways to assist. I think the naval deployment in the Indian Ocean is very important, particularly with the new piracy problems," he said.
Holbrooke adds that Japan has been a key partner in Afghanistan's agricultural development.
In August, Afghanistan will hold its second presidential election since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001. Holbrooke says Washington is neither supporting nor opposing any candidate who chooses to run.
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U.S. says not playing favourites in Afghan poll
Reuters April 18, 2009
TOKYO - The United States has no preferred candidate in the presidential election in Afghanistan this year, a top U.S. envoy said on Saturday, stressing the importance of a fair and open poll.
About half a dozen politicians have expressed their intention to stand in the Aug. 20 election against President Hamid Karzai.
Western leaders have grown increasingly impatient with Karzai who has ruled Afghanistan since 2002, saying his failure to crack down on rampant corruption and the drugs trade and to govern effectively is fueling the Taliban insurgency
"It's no secret that perhaps the international community had its favourites in the previous elections, but we are neither supporting nor opposing any candidate this time round, and that includes the president of Afghanistan, if he chooses to run for re-election, as seems very probable," Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, told a news conference.
"It is a major event for Afghanistan and all of us in the international community and all of us in Afghanistan are focused on helping Afghanistan hold a free, and fair and open election on a level playing field."
The election is seen as the defining test of progress this year in Afghanistan, where violence is surging dispute the presence of 70,000 foreign forces, expected to rise to some 90,000 by the time the poll is held.
Holbrooke was speaking to reporters in Tokyo where donors agreed to provide more than $5 billion in fresh aid to Pakistan seen as the central front in the war in Afghanistan. [nSP396470]
(Reporting by Linda Sieg; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan (Hekmatyar) contacts US for troops pullout
[ANI] - Peshawar, Apr. 18 : The United States based Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan (HIA) (Hekmatyar) stalwart Daud Abidi has confirmed holding meetings with high-ranking American officials and handing over a letter of Engineer Hekmatyar addressed to US President Barack Obama.
"Yes, I held three meetings with high ranking US authorities," Daud Abidi remarked in a telephonic conversation with The Nation on Friday. He said that all such meetings were held on behalf of Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan headed by Engineer Gulbadin Hekmatyar.
Through his talks and Engineer Hekmatyar's letter, the Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan is insisting on (1) early pullout of foreign troops from Afghanistan, (2) establishment of a neutral interim govt and (3) holding of impartial, free and fair elections.
"So far I am satisfied with such talks," Daud Abidi remarked. However, he was reluctant to give further details in this respect.
He said that at the moment, the Hizbe Islami stalwarts were engaged in dialogues and contacts with all those countries, which were having some influence on the affairs of Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, Gulbadin Hekmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan has initiated efforts for mustering support from internal and external circles in favour of its nominee, Qutab-Ud-Din Hilal, for the slot of the President in the upcoming elections.
Belonging to Pakteya province of Afghanistan, Qutab-Ud-Din Hilal, a soft-spoken person, is very popular among the people of Afghanistan.
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A New Year For Afghanistan's Traditional Carpets
By Philippa Scott Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty April 18, 2009
Emerging after decades of conflict, Afghanistan's carpet-weaving industry is seeking to reestablish itself and its centuries of tradition on the international market.
In the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif, the Union of Afghan Carpet Producers and Exporters held an exhibition to celebrate the Islamic New Year , Norouz. Its title and intention were "How to Find International Markets for Afghan Carpets."
The exhibition included a display organized by the Afghan Women Traders' Union in Mazar-e Sharif, whose chairwoman, Noria Azizi, explains that she and her union did not know how to access international markets. She knew that Afghan carpets were famous in the United States, but contacts had been broken and lost, and the export trade severely damaged.
And where, one must wonder, does the all-important raw material, wool, come from to supply this war-torn country?
"If the Afghan government wants to develop the carpet industry in Afghanistan, they must stop illegal carpet exporting, and help to provide good-quality material for carpet production," says Syad Taher Roshanzadh, chairman of the Chamber of Trade in Mazar-e Sharif, one of the sponsors of the recent carpet exhibition.
"The government should also encourage Afghan carpet producers and provide opportunities for promotion," he adds.
Looking To The Past
For carpet weaving, the quality of wool is all-important; it must be hard-wearing, strong, and resilient. Roshanzadh's plea is surely a heart-breaking sign of the times, for carpets -- before the disruptions of the Taliban and subsequent and ongoing strife -- of its own manufacture and those of neighboring Central Asian tribes, were among Afghanistan's most important trade and export goods.
Caravans transported goods, including rugs, from Central Asia, and the routes passed through Afghanistan, into the Indian subcontinent, and to the trading posts on the Indian Ocean. These ancient routes through inhospitable terrain, dipping down into and through modern-day Pakistan, are still used by traders and smugglers.
Both in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, in the camps set up for Afghan refugees from the Russian, Taliban, and subsequent troubles, Afghan weavers continued to weave their histories into rugs, producing designs that combine traditional colors and motifs with helicopters, Kalashnikovs, tanks, and other military motifs. Such rugs are avidly collected by foreigners stationed in or passing through Afghanistan, and in recent years there have been several exhibitions of them.
For most Western nonspecialists, "Afghan" and "Turkoman" denote a wide range of rugs with repeating geometric patterns laid out in a grid, whose dominant color is a rich dark red, with dark brown, black, camel, and touches of dark and light indigo that can veer toward sea green. Occasionally a rug has tiny highlights of bright silk, a touch of mauve or amber, pinkish-ruby, or pistachio.
Their intense colors glowed inside nomadic yurts, and when exported to the West, they enhanced traditional and antique furnishings as well as very modern homes. In the 1960s there was a great fashion for "Golden Afghans," which were traditional carpets imported and then treated in the West with a chemical wash that bleached the red dye, leaving an amber carpet that still displayed its traditional pattern.
These rugs were traditionally woven by nomadic tribes, or semi-nomads living near towns that were trading centers, although towards the latter part of the 20th century demand for this type of carpet was so strong that ateliers, or factories, were established, within which the weavers worked on permanent looms, rather than the portable frames used by nomads.
Traditional Craftwork
Even if factory-produced, the rugs were still hand-knotted, and hand-woven. Knots per inch is not an important factor in tribal rugs, their textures vary, from a soft, floppy rug that can be folded, to one with tight knots and stiff texture that can only be folded. It depends which function the rug was made to serve.
Rugs woven for export tend to have a firm weave in order to survive the traffic of shod feet. Modern silk rugs are judged by knots per square inch or centimeter, but silk rugs are not an Afghan specialty, although in Pakistan and Kashmir Afghan and Turkoman patterns are copied in silk or a combination of silk and wool. These are then marketed as "Royal Bokhara" or some similarly optimistic term.
Carpet weaving requires an ample supply of raw material, and the nomads used goat hair and wool from their own hardy flocks. Over thousands of years, they developed their own intricate patterns, which are a form of heraldry and tribal history, denoting the tribes and their affiliations, occasional intertribal marriages, even the annihilation of one tribe by another, or the political forces which rose, ruled and fell.
Many patterns evolved in the pre-Islamic era, and hark back to shamanistic origins. Some have designs from Chinese or Mongol sources (cloud bands, dragons, lotus palmettes) and tribal jewelry, flowers, animals, birds, and stick person appear as minor motifs -- coffee pots and water ewers, pomegranates, signifying fertility, trees, the ancient symbol for life and regeneration, and others whose original intention is long lost.
Some rugs even mimic silk ikats. But the overall pattern is always geometric, natural to the square grid created by intersecting warp and weft of weaving, and within a strict color palette. Pile carpets are knotted onto warp threads, secured by the horizontal wefts, which are firmly banged down on each pass, and the resulting looped surface is sheared to give the typical fur-mimicking surface.
As with the patterns, the colors are distinctive to their tribal origins. The size, shape, and pattern also indicate the rug's original purpose; prayer rugs, with their directional design, are easy to identify, as are the cruciform-patterned rugs intended to cover an entrance. The subject is a mine field of complexities, and a field of endless fascination -- fascination leading easily into obsession.
Philippa Scott is the author of "The Book of Silk" and "Turkish Delights," both published by Thames and Hudson.
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U.S. seeks to prevent Taliban use of radio, web-WSJ
Reuters Sat Apr 18, 2009
WASHINGTON - The United States has started a broad effort in Pakistan and Afghanistan to prevent the Taliban from using radio stations and websites to intimidate civilians and plan attacks, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday, citing unnamed senior U.S. officials.
U.S. military and intelligence personnel are attempting to jam unlicensed radio stations in parts of Pakistan near the Afghan border used by Taliban fighters, the report said.
They are also trying to block Pakistani chat rooms and websites that frequently contain videos of attacks and inflammatory religious material that attempt to justify violent acts, it said.
The push takes the administration deeper into "psychological operations," which try to influence how the United States, its allies and enemies are seen, the report said, noting that officials involved with the new program say such operations are a necessary part of halting the deterioration of stability in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The Journal said the Pentagon, Joint Chiefs of Staff and Central Intelligence Agency all declined to comment. (Writing by Patricia Zengerle, editing by Alison Williams)
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5 suspected militants killed in Afghanistan
By Fisnik Abrashi Associated Press Sat Apr 18, 8:47 am ET
KABUL – NATO-led forces and Afghan troops killed three suspected militants during a raid Saturday in central Afghanistan, where insurgent attacks have spiked this year, officials said. At least two other suspected militants died in an airstrike in the south.
The joint force was targeting insurgent commanders in a village in Logar province. The three suspected militants were killed in a gunfight following a call for them to surrender, a NATO statement said.
About 3,000 U.S. troops serving under the NATO-led command have been deployed in Logar and Wardak provinces in an attempt to clear the two major insurgent strongholds, which border Kabul.
President Barack Obama also has ordered 21,000 new American troops to join the fight in southern Afghanistan, which is the center of the Taliban's revival since its initial defeat in a U.S.-led invasion in late 2001.
There are some 70,000 international forces in Afghanistan, including a record 38,000 Americans.
Violence in Logar has risen this year as more new U.S. troops have been sent to the province, according to an assessment from the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office, a Kabul-based group funded by Western donors that advises relief groups on security.
In the first two weeks of April, Logar accounted for 80 percent of the insurgent attacks in central Afghanistan, the group said in its biweekly report.
"Ultimately, the arrival of further forces has proven to be a destabilizing influence and has had a negative impact on the local population, primarily a result of methods utilized," the report said. It did not elaborate, but international troops have been harshly criticized by Afghanistan's government for killing civilians in raids and airstrikes in remote areas of the country.
Airstrikes have been a major cause of civilian casualties over the past year, despite repeated assertions by the U.S. military that they make every effort to target specific insurgents and avoid civilian deaths.
"We take as much precision as absolutely possible, to the point of calling off attacks if we do not believe we have the exact information required," said Air Force Lt. Gen. Gary L. North, the air component commander for U.S. Central Command.
Speaking to reporters at the U.S. base at Bagram, North said they use intelligence from multiple sources, such as video surveillance, reconnaissance patrols and electronic intercepts, to follow a target for weeks or months until they have enough information to act.
"Mistakes in combat have been made and we know that we have been responsible for some noncombatant casualties. We regret these incidents. We try very hard every day to prevent them from happening," North said.
An airstrike on an underground bunker in the southern Kandahar province killed at least two suspected militants Saturday, a U.S. forces statement said.
U.S. troops attacked multiple compounds in Kandahar's Maywand district "to locate and capture a militant closely associated with the anti-Afghan forces leadership in Pakistan," the statement said.
It was not clear whether the target of the raid was among those killed.
Afghan and Western officials insist that the insurgency in Afghanistan is run and supported by Taliban leaders who now live in Pakistan, a charge denied by Pakistani authorities.
Separately, a roadside bomb targeting a police vehicle in Kandahar city killed a woman and wounded five other people including three civilians, said Abdullah Khan, the provincial deputy police chief.
The bomb was placed on a bicycle close to the city's main hospital. Two police officers were wounded, and one of the injured civilians was being held as a suspect in the attack, Khan said.
Taliban militants regularly use roadside bombs in attacks on Afghan and foreign troops in the country, but most of the victims have been civilians.
___
Associated Press writer Heidi Vogt in Bagram contributed to this report.
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Security developments in Afghanistan
April 18, 2009
(Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan reported as of 0600 GMT on Saturday:
LOGAR - NATO-led and Afghan troops killed three militants in Logar province just a few dozen kilometres (miles) southwest of Kabul on Saturday, the alliance said.
KANDAHAR - Afghan and NATO-led forces killed an unknown number of militants when they blew up a bunker on Saturday morning during a mission to capture a senior Taliban commander in Maywand district, 400 km (250 miles) southwest of Kabul.
The troops fired on several militants hiding in an underground bunker, and after they refused to comply, air support was called in to bomb their hideout.
Afterwards troops searched nearby compounds and detained one suspected militant.
KANDAHAR - Explosives planted on a bicycle were detonated remotely when a police vehicle was passing by, killing one woman and wounding two police officers, two children and one man, in Kandahar city, 450 km (280 miles) southwest of Kabul, on Friday, according to police officer Ahmadullah Khan.
KHOST - NATO and Afghan forces killed one militant and detained two others when they were spotted placing an improvised explosive device (IED) on a road in Khost province, 150 km (95 miles) southeast of Kabul, on Friday.
Three militants were spotted by an unmanned spy plane, and attacked as they placed the IED. One was killed but forces tracked two wounded men to a nearby house where they detained them and found equipment for constructing home-made bombs.
NANGARHAR - Afghan commandos on Friday detained a militant in Nangarhar Province, 120 km (75 miles) east of Kabul, after a tip-off from locals that a housing compound belonged to someone suspected of facilitating insurgent activities in the area.
FARAH - Afghan and coalition forces killed two militants in Farah province, around 650 km (400 miles) southwest of Kabul, when they came under fire while conducting a combat reconnaissance patrol on Friday.
(Compiled by Emma Graham-Harrison; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Banking On Afghanistan
Madalina Iacob Forbes April 18, 2009
Amid the chaos, some see opportunity.
Sitting in a half-empty Airbus 32S heading to Kabul in February, Ravinder Yadav comforted his wife Anita. They'd just packed up their house in Delhi for a new life in Afghanistan, where Yadav was about to become chief operating officer at Ghazanfar Bank, which opened its doors on March 1.
With brand new offices, lacquered wooden doors and red Afghan carpets in front of glass-covered teller stations, the bank has attracted more than 1,000 customers so far. Not bad for a country on the brink, with tens of thousands of U.S. troops on their way in to quell a resurgent Taliban.
"There is a lot of money in Afghanistan," says Yadav, a tall, rugged man in his 50s with a brush-like mustache. "While banks are closing around the world we are opening them here."
Seventeen banks with branches around the country are now operating in Afghanistan, generating 5,000 jobs since 2003, when the Afghan Central Bank resumed licensing. Fueled by an infusion of international aid, the Afghan economy has been growing steadily in the past five years. The U.S. alone spent $31 billion on military and civilian aid to Afghanistan since 2002. Real gross domestic product growth exceeded 7% in 2008, according to CIA data.
"Since 2002 we had double-digit economic growth rates until this year, when agriculture production declined because of the drought," says Tom Engle, economic counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.
According to the Central Bank, the 17 banks had deposits of $2 billion in January 2009, up 69% from the previous year, and total outstanding loans of $1 billion, up 37% year to year. The total assets of the banking system were $2.4 billion this year, up 66% from 2008. "In Afghanistan there is a great need for commercial banks that can provide capital for the private sector," Farid Maqsudi, the founder of the Afghan International Bank, said. "Any bank with the right management and good corporate governance will do great here."
Banking supervision by the Central Bank is improving but still faces institutional weakness, according to an official at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. U.S. Treasury provides technical assistance to the Central Bank to root out illicit finance and anti-money laundering, while USAID supports financial sector development by providing funds to microfinance institutions for on-lending to productive Afghan enterprises. Two of the biggest, Pashtany Bank and Bank-e-Milli are in the hands of the government, which remains concerned about private commercial banks recklessly investing depositors' funds in risky real estate and other ventures in the Gulf.
Most of the banks are owned by foreign regional investors or Afghan business people, with only one bank owned by a Western institution, Britain's Standard Chartered, which set up shop in Kabul in January 2004.
Standard Chartered's profits before taxes here increased by 1027% in 2005. Profit margins have slimmed since then to 20% growth in 2008, according to Standard Chartered's finance manager for Afghanistan, Touray Saihou. Transactions remain limited to cash management, deposits, investments in government Treasury bills and interbank placing because the upper house of the Afghan Parliament is still debating on how to regulate lending. Saihou is confident that the law will pass by this September and that borrowers will arrive. A mortgage law was recently passed.
"Despite all the challenges, banking is a profitable venture in Afghanistan," says Saihou.
And there are a lot of challenges. Nearly eight years after the fall of the Taliban, poor infrastructure and the lack of electricity have forced many branches to run on generators. Transporting money is costly and time consuming, as banks have to hire private security companies. And an informal gray market for transferring or exchanging money still dominates financial services in the country.
"They are all over, younger kids holding bundles of cash and currencies," says Gary Novis of the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs at the U.S. State Department. "Sometimes it is cheaper to use informal mechanisms to transfer money."
For the Ghazanfars, potential profits outweigh the risks. The oil-rich Afghan family invested $10 million in the enterprise, the minimum capital requirement set by the Afghan Central Bank. "We plan to make a profit after one year," Yadav says.
Relying on 30 years of experience at the Indian Bank Canara and two years of consulting for the profitable Trade Bank of Iraq, Yadav hopes to mimic the Iraqi success in Afghanistan. The bank will lend money at a rate of 15% to 16%, pay 6% the most on deposits and earn a net-interest margin of 10%. "We are going to be conservative and won't lend to anyone without assets," Yadav said. Wall Street, take note.
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Taliban militants raid, burn down district headquarters in E Afghanistan
Xinhua April 17, 2009
A number of Taliban insurgents Friday early morning launched attacks on government headquarters in Musakhil district of Khost province in eastern Afghanistan, burning down the office building, an official said.
Zahir Gul, the director of Musakhil district, told Xinhua that at 1:30 a.m. local time (2130 GMT), some 250 armed Taliban rebels raided the district headquarters. They broke in and set fire after killing one police guard and capturing two others.
"Those Taliban militants made their good escape while the government building was completely destroyed," Gul added.
Meantime, the purported Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed confirmed the night assault and said the outfits killed all three policemen guarding the government building.
Taliban militants have vowed to intensify activities against interests of government and international troops stationed in Afghanistan as U.S. has announced reinforcement of troops to the war-torn country.
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Afghanistan's turbulent cleric
Asif Mohseni, the cleric behind a controversial family law, is complex and ambitious – in other words, an Afghan politician
Nushin Arbabzadah The Guardian (UK) April 18, 2009
A new Shia family law has divided Afghanistan, revealing a nation struggling to come to terms with a common yet complex problem: how to reconcile traditional, religious values with the demands of the 21st century, which measures a nation's progress in terms of its treatment of women. The result is a cultural war between the traditionalists and the progressives. In between is a third group in whose view the controversy over the law is an unnecessary distraction from the country's more urgent problems. Why focus on a law whose sole function is to make legal what's already common practice when the country is facing the more serious problems of foreign occupation, extreme poverty and a corrupt central state perpetually on the verge of collapse? According to this third party, under such circumstances the focus on women's rights is simply misplaced, if not hypocritical. This is because the same western forces who oppose the law for its misogynist content are also the ones that create widows in Afghanistan when their air forces bomb the south and the east of the country in the war against terrorism.
This, in sum, is the situation as it appears on the surface. But digging a bit deeper under the surface, a more complex picture emerges. At the centre of this complex picture is Ayatollah Asif Mohseni, a Shia cleric and the architect of the new law. He's the owner of Tamadon (civilisation) TV, a privately owned television station with a visual outlook and religious content remarkably similar to Iranian state-run television channels. The night before the protest demonstration of 15 April, which ended in violence and made headlines around the world, the TV station repeatedly broadcast a message advising people to prevent family members attending the protest. In other words, the cleric had anticipated the protest and indirectly prepared the ground for the counter-protest, which resulted in broken windows and stones being pelted at demonstrators.
This, however, should not come as a surprise because Mohseni is far more than a prominent Shia cleric and TV station owner. He's a politician whose career has been far from uncontroversial. Mohseni, born in Kandahar in 1936, is the founder of the Islamic Movement of Afghanistan, a Shia anti-Soviet resistance movement combining various smaller group with numerous bases inside and outside the country. The party's foundation in the Iranian city of Qum in 1978 and the support Mohseni received from the Iranian state was criticised by some Iranian politicians who objected to Mohseni because he kept communication lines open with the rival Sunni resistance group based in Peshawar. According to his Iranian critics, as a leader of a Shia party, contact with rival Sunni groups meant a betrayal of the Shia political cause. They suspected Mohseni of secret deals with rival Sunni groups based in Pakistan despite receiving Iranian support. Later on, after the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan in February 1988, Mohseni managed to keep his options open, moving between Kabul, Qum and Islamabad where he multitasked as a teacher, politician and prolific writer of religious books, as well as a founder of Afghanistan's official Shia centre based in Kabul, Khatam-al Nabyeen, which was also the scene of the protest.
The secret to Mohseni's ability to move between the otherwise divided worlds of Iran and Pakistan, the Shias and the Sunnis, is his complex identity as a Qizilbash born in the pashtun region of Kandahar, which makes him a Shia with pashtun cultural roots. This is a remarkable combination and Mohseni has taken full advantage of it. An exploration of the realm of censor-free Afghan citizen blogging reveals him as a leader who's accused of believing in the principle of divide and rule. The present division in the Shia community, which is a direct result of Mohseni's proposed law, can be interpreted in this light. Mohseni's chief opponent, Muslim Fahimi, himself an insider in the Islamic Movement party, recently went even further, levelling serious accusations against the cleric on a private TV station. They included claims that he had made a deliberate attempt to fuel violence among the Shia Hazara community during the civil war years of the early 1990s; murdered a man who objected to Mohseni marrying his 14-year-old sister who had been entrusted to the cleric for religious education; and ordered the assassination of political rivals. As is typical in the largely unregulated media world of Afghanistan, none of the allegations were substantiated with evidence, even though the accuser claimed to posses such documentation.
However, the controversy surrounding Mohseni reveals that the cleric is a typical Afghan politician. He is an ambitious maverick who has his fingers in many pies, is venerated by his supporters and deeply reviled by his opponent. His complex identity, as a Shia leader born in Kandahar who speaks pashto, Mohseni has the potential to act as a unifying figure, bringing together the Shias and the Sunnis, the pashtuns and the Hazaras. This, in turn, may explain why President Hamid Karzai didn't hesitate to sign the law, presumably to secure Mohseni's support in the upcoming presidential election. But what both Mohseni and Karzai neglected to take into account was the growth of a small, yet vocal indigenous women's rights group with both local and western support. Their protest made headlines across the globe, raising strong emotions and serious objection to the new law.
Karzai is now left with the impossible task of appeasing the western donors who finance his government while reconciling the progressive and traditionalist forces of Afghan society. Judging by the president's record so far, in all likelihood he'll manage to achieve a half-baked solution and Afghanistan will carry on as usual, deeply divided and in conflict with itself and the world.
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Divisions Arose on Rough Tactics for Qaeda Figure
New York Times By SCOTT SHANE April 17, 2009
WASHINGTON - The first use of waterboarding and other rough treatment against a prisoner from Al Qaeda was ordered by senior Central Intelligence Agency officials despite the belief of interrogators that the prisoner had already told them all he knew, according to former intelligence officials and a footnote in a newly released legal memorandum.
The escalation to especially brutal interrogation tactics against the prisoner, Abu Zubaydah, including confining him in boxes and slamming him against the wall, was ordered by officials at C.I.A. headquarters based on a highly inflated assessment of his importance, interviews and a review of newly released documents show.
Abu Zubaydah had provided much valuable information under less severe treatment, and the harsher handling produced no breakthroughs, according to one former intelligence official with direct knowledge of the case. Instead, watching his torment caused great distress to his captors, the official said.
Even for those who believed that brutal treatment could produce results, the official said, “seeing these depths of human misery and degradation has a traumatic effect.”
C.I.A. officers adopted these techniques only after the Justice Department had given its official approval on Aug. 1, 2002, in one of four formerly secret legal memos on interrogation that were released Thursday.
A footnote to another of the memos described a rift between line officers questioning Abu Zubaydah at a secret C.I.A. prison in Thailand and their bosses at headquarters, and asserted that the brutal treatment may have been “unnecessary.”
Quoting a 2004 report on the interrogation program by the C.I.A. inspector general, the footnote says that “although the on-scene interrogation team judged Zubaydah to be compliant, elements within C.I.A. headquarters still believed he was withholding information.”
The debate over the significance of Abu Zubaydah's role in Al Qaeda and of what he told interrogators dates back almost to his capture, and has been described by Ron Suskind in his 2006 book, “The One Percent Doctrine,” a 2006 article in The New York Times and a March 29 article in The Washington Post asserting that his disclosures foiled no plots. (His real name is Zein al-Abideen Mohamed Hussein.)
But interviews with current and former government officials who have direct or indirect knowledge of the Abu Zubaydah interrogation suggest that the United States began the waterboarding, labeled as illegal torture by top Obama administration officials, based on a profound misunderstanding of its captive.
In March 2002, when Abu Zubaydah was captured in Pakistan after a gunfight with Pakistani security officers backed by F.B.I. and C.I.A. officers, Bush administration officials portrayed him as a Qaeda leader. That judgment was reflected in the Aug. 1, 2002, legal opinion signed by Jay S. Bybee, then head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel.
The memo summarizes the C.I.A.'s judgment that Abu Zubaydah, then 31, had risen rapidly to “third or fourth man in Al Qaeda” and had served as “senior lieutenant” to Osama bin Laden. It said he had “managed a network of training camps” and had been “involved in every major terrorist operation carried out by Al Qaeda.”
The memo reported the C.I.A.'s portrayal of “a highly self-directed individual who prizes his independence,” a deceptive narcissist, healthy and tough, who agency officers believed was the most senior terrorist caught since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
His interrogation, according to multiple accounts, began in Pakistan and continued at the secret C.I.A. site in Thailand, with a traditional, rapport-building approach led by two F.B.I. agents, who even helped care for him as his gunshot wounds healed.
Abu Zubaydah gave up perhaps his single most valuable piece of information early, naming Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, whom he knew as Mukhtar, as the main organizer of the 9/11 plot.
A C.I.A. interrogation team that arrived a week or two later, which included former military psychologists, did not change the approach to questioning, but began to keep him awake night and day with blasting rock music, have his clothes removed and keep his cell cold.
The legal basis for this treatment is uncertain, but lawyers at C.I.A. headquarters were in constant touch with interrogators, as well as with Mr. Bybee's subordinate in the Office of Legal Counsel, John C. Yoo, who was drafting memos on the legal limits of interrogation.
Through the summer of 2002, Abu Zubaydah continued to provide valuable information. Interrogators began to surmise that he was not a leader, but rather a helpful training camp personnel clerk who would arrange false documents and travel for jihadists, including Qaeda members.
He knew enough to give interrogators “a road map of Al Qaeda operatives,” an agency officer said. He also repeated talk he had heard about possible plots or targets in the United States, though when F.B.I. agents followed up, most of it turned out to be idle discussion or preliminary brainstorming.
At the time, former C.I.A. officials say, his tips were extremely useful, helping to track several other important terrorists, including Mr. Mohammed.
But senior agency officials, still persuaded, as they had told President George W. Bush and his staff, that he was an important Qaeda leader, insisted that he must know more.
“You get a ton of information, but headquarters says, ‘There must be more,' ” recalled one intelligence officer who was involved in the case. As described in the footnote to the memo, the use of repeated waterboarding against Abu Zubaydah was ordered “at the direction of C.I.A. headquarters,” and officials were dispatched from headquarters “to watch the last waterboard session.”
The memo, written in 2005 and signed by Steven G. Bradbury, who worked in the Office of Legal Counsel, concluded that the waterboarding was justified even if the prisoner turned out not to know as much as officials had thought.
And he did not, according to the former intelligence officer involved in the Abu Zubaydah case. “He pleaded for his life,” the official said. “But he gave up no new information. He had no more information to give.”
Abu Zubaydah's own account, given in 2006 to the International Committee of the Red Cross, corroborates that what he called “the real torturing,” including waterboarding, began only “about two and a half or three months” after he arrived at the secret site, according to the group's 2007 report.
Since 2002, the C.I.A. has downgraded its assessment of Abu Zubaydah's significance, while continuing to call his revelations important.
In an interview, an intelligence officer said that the current view was that Abu Zubaydah was “an important terrorist facilitator” who disclosed “essential raw material for successful counterterrorist action.”
His interrogation “made it possible for the United States to chip away at Al Qaeda, link by link, disrupting its operations and saving lives,” the intelligence officer said.
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State Dept. reviewing contractor in Afghanistan
after employee death due to possible overdose
MATTHEW LEE Associated Press Writer April 17, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — The State Department is investigating DynCorp International, which conducts police training in Afghanistan, over its handling of an employee who died of a possible drug overdose and has ordered the major U.S. contractor to replace its senior project managers.
The investigation, which is being handled by the State Department's inspector general, centers on DynCorp's 18-month, $317 million training contract, which involve allegations that the Falls Church, Va.-based company ignored signs of drug abuse among employees.
One of those employees was found dead in the company's housing in Kabul on March 17. The State Department said it was reviewing whether the employee might have obtained drugs on regular trips to Thailand that were known and condoned by his bosses despite the DynCorp's ban on drug use.
Investigators will also review whether that employee was previously arrested by Thai police for stealing a $14,000 watch, as well as allegations that four other employees had tested positive for drugs when the company conducted tests after the man's death.
"The State Department takes any allegations of contractor misconduct extremely seriously, expects all contractors to adhere to a zero tolerance policy for individual misconduct, and insists that management act accordingly when violations occur," State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid said late Friday.
The State Department ordered the removal of the senior managers in charge of the police contract to ensure accountability, and it will take additional appropriate action at the conclusion of the inspector general's investigation, Duguid said.
The Obama administration has been seeking to boost U.S. efforts in Afghanistan to repel the Taliban's bid for power.
DynCorp spokesman Douglas Ebner said he would not comment on personnel actions during an investigation. "We go to extraordinary efforts to instill upon all management, as well as all employees, our absolute priority of zero tolerance for all misconduct," Ebner told The Washington Post, which first reported the investigation on its Web site Friday night. "If they violate these standards, we will terminate."
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Bring on Australia and Pakistan, say Afghanistan
April 17, 2009
JOHANNESBURG (AFP) — The Afghanistan cricket dreamers are at it again. Not satisfied with a meteoric rise from fifth-division non-entities to the verge of World Cup qualification within one year, they have adjusted their sights to facing the likes of Australia and Pakistan at one-day level.
By finishing among the top six in the 2011 Cricket World Cup Qualifier Super 8, the sporting warriors from the war-torn country have earned ODI status for the next four years.
Manager Sayed Aminzai told AFP that a team used to overcoming obstacles face another with their new-found position: where to stage matches against the cream of the cricket crop.
Apart from safety worries, there is no international-standard pitch in Kabul and neighbouring Pakistan has become a cricket no-go area after losing the right to co-host the 2011 World Cup over security concerns.
Aminzai said the Afghanistan players, coaches and officials had fallen in love with South Africa, which offered world-class pitches, facilities and accommodation during the three-week Qualifier.
"Much though we would like to play in South Africa it is too far from home and I believe Afghanistan officials will seriously consider India as a temporary base," he said.
"Given a choice of opponents I would want Afghanistan to play Pakistan owing to all the help they gave us in developing as a cricket nation and Australia because they are the world champions," said Aminzai.
Reflecting on a qualifying journey that took Afghanistan from Jersey to South Africa via Tanzania and Argentina, the manager singled out captain Norooz Mangal, opener Karim Sadiq and medium-pace bowler Hamid Hassan.
"Norooz was a truly inspirational leader throughout our amazing journey, Karim scored the runs that mattered in so many games and Hamid took countless crucial wickets."
He said disappointment at missing out on the World Cup to be staged in Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka, quickly evaporated when they realised ODI status had been accomplished.
Not bad for a national team who played together for the first time eight years ago with many of them learning the game in Pakistani camps housing refugees from the Afghan violence.
Aminzai sees a bright future for Afghanistan cricket.
"We have learnt so much during the Qualifier. Mine is a happy team. We have come to so far so quickly that no one knows where we could end up."
Afghanistan face Scotland Sunday in Benoni east of Johannesburg to decide who finishes fifth while Ireland and Canada play-off for top spot, Kenya and Netherlands for third, and Namibia and United Arab Emirates for seventh.
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Pakistani Taliban Keen to Fight in Afghanistan
Written by www.quqnoos.com Saturday, 18 April 2009
A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban said they would assist militants in Afghanistan if they are asked for reinforcement
The spokesman for the Pakistani militants that recently agreed upon a ceasefire with the government of Pakistan said they would not ‘lay down' their weapons and eager to cooperate with the Afghan Taliban.
The anonymous spokesman warned the war against what they call ‘infidels' would not stop unless Afghan and Pakistani governments do not quit ‘Anti-Islamic' policies.
Meanwhile some Afghan Parliamentarians urged the international community to take more serious actions in the ‘war on terror' mission.
Terrorism is a global problem, MP Abas Nowyan said, adding, it would reach Europe and America if it's not confronted seriously.
Pakistani President, Asif Ali Zardari, had recently approved an agreement with the Taliban militants in Swat Valley which imposes Sharia Law in the restive Pakistani region in the North West Frontier Province.
Rahman Oghli, an Afghan Member of Parliament blamed Pakistan for taking terrorism painless over the past few years.
Previously, Afghan government officials had expressed concerns over any possible deal between the Pakistani government and the Taliban, that would ‘harm Afghanistan'.
“We will not allow any country to interfere in the internet affairs of Afghanitasn,” said President Hamid Karzai's spokesman, Humayun Hamidzada.
The content of the peace pact has yet remained unknown to media, but Pakistani authorities say the Taliban will avoid leading insurgency once the Shaira Law is imposed.
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