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February 17, 2009 

Obama sending additional US troops to Afghanistan
By ANNE GEARAN and LARA JAKES, Associated Press Writers
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama says he's sending additional U.S. troops into Afghanistan to battle insurgent threats and crumbling security along the Pakistan border.

Obama: Diplomacy key part of Afghanistan strategy
AP via Yahoo! News - Feb 17 10:40 AM
WASHINGTON – In advance of his first foreign trip, President Barack Obama told a Canadian news organization Tuesday that the United States will seek a more comprehensive, diplomatic approach to Afghanistan, where the U.S. has been engaged in war since 2001.

U.N. Says Afghan Civilian Deaths Increase by 40 Percent
By ALAN COWELL The New York Times February 18, 2009
PARIS — A United Nations report said on Tuesday that civilian casualties in Afghanistan rose by 40 percent last year, more than half of them resulting from suicide and roadside bomb attacks by militants,

Bottom-up approach needed in Afghanistan: report
By Paul Eckert, Asia Correspondent – Tue Feb 17, 12:23 am ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The drive to stabilize Afghanistan must focus on cultivating local leaders, better training of Afghan troops and police, and pressing Kabul to fight corruption, a report by a U.S. think tank said on Tuesday.

Holbrooke visit reduced tensions: Kabul
Tue Feb 17, 9:46 am ET
KABUL (AFP) – Kabul said Tuesday that tensions with Washington over the US-led "war on terror" had eased with the visit of envoy Richard Holbrooke, who is reviewing US strategy in the fight against extremists.

U.S.-Led Forces Kill Militant Leader in Afghanistan
By Jay Shankar
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- An air strike by U.S.-led coalition forces in western Afghanistan’s Herat province killed a militant commander affiliated to an Islamic group headed by former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the military said.

Canada wants "frank" talks on NATO in Afghanistan
By Luke Baker – Mon Feb 16, 3:12 pm ET
LONDON (Reuters) – The struggling effort to defeat the Taliban and bring security to Afghanistan means it is time for a "frank discussion" about the future of NATO, Canada's defense minister said on Monday.

Kabul Filmmaker Brings Afghanistan to the Silver Screen
By Aryn Baker time.com Kabul Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2009
It takes a certain skill to lose money on an opium field in Afghanistan. Afghan filmmaker Siddiq Barmak lost about $97,000 on his. For the making of his latest film, Opium War, which is set in a poppy field,

Bombs Kill a Taliban Commander
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and TAIMOOR SHAH The New York Times February 16, 2009
KABUL, Afghanistan — Before he was killed over the weekend, it was not always easy to track the ways that Maulavi Ghulam Dastagir had become an acute shame to the Afghan government.

Pakistan Praises Taliban Truce; U.S. Warns of Threat (Update2)
By Ed Johnson and Khalid Qayum
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan’s prime minister welcomed a peace accord with Taliban militants that will see Islamic law declared in a former tourist destination northwest of Islamabad, as the U.S. warned of the growing threat from extremists.

Talks with Taliban via Afghan govt only: Kabul
KABUL, Feb 17, 2009 (AFP) - Talks with Taliban insurgents must only take place through Afghan government channels, President Hamid Karzai's office warned Tuesday after reports surfaced of dialogue led by Danish soldiers.

Obama Says Afghanistan Can’t Be Solved by Military Means Alone
By Theophilos Argitis
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said the conflict in Afghanistan can’t be won by military means alone, and a solution needs to be “comprehensive.”

FACTBOX-Security developments in Afghanistan
Feb 17 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1600 GMT on Tuesday.

Pervez Musharraf was playing 'double game' with US
Catherine Philp, Diplomatic Editor The Times (UK) February 17, 2009
Washington sent Special Forces into Pakistan last summer after intercepting a call by the Pakistani army chief referring to a notorious Taleban leader as a “strategic asset,” a new book has claimed.

Afghanistan: Taliban forces students out of schools into madrasas
LASHKARGAH, 17 February 2009 (IRIN) - The closure of schools and continuing attacks on students in the southern Helmand Province forced Abdul Wakil's parents to send him to a madrasa (Islamic school) in neighbouring Pakistan.

Italy Said to Be Open to Increase in Afghanistan Troop Levels
By Steve Scherer
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government is willing to add a few hundred troops to its force in Afghanistan through Aug. 20 presidential and provincial elections should it be asked to do so, a person briefed by a Cabinet member said.

Afghan TV set to unveil model contest
Tue Feb 17, 2009 2:24pm GMT Sayed Salahuddin
KABUL (Reuters) - Weary of Afghanistan's image as a country in chronic conflict with a history of repressing women, Arash Shenasa plans to launch a modeling contest to show "the hidden beauties" of his central Asian nation.

Holbrooke Visits Troops in Kandahar
Written by www.quqnoos.com Monday, 16 February 2009
We had a good talk about the overall security situation in the South, said Major General Mart De Kruif
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Obama sending additional US troops to Afghanistan
By ANNE GEARAN and LARA JAKES, Associated Press Writers
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama says he's sending additional U.S. troops into Afghanistan to battle insurgent threats and crumbling security along the Pakistan border.

Obama has approved a Pentagon request to deploy Marines and Army troops to the region. Congressional officials say an estimated 17,000 troops will go in the coming months.

In a statement Tuesday, Obama called sending armed forces into harm's way one of a president's most solemn duties.

But he said deteriorating security in Afghanistan made it necessary, adding that the country has not received the strategic attention or resources it needs.

Obama also said he is withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. He said that will give the Pentagon more flexibility in shifting troops to Afghanistan.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama has approved adding about 17,000 U.S. troops for the flagging war in Afghanistan, administration, defense and congressional officials said Tuesday.

The Obama administration is expected to announce on Tuesday that it will send one additional Army brigade and an unknown number of Marines to Afghanistan this spring and summer. Officials spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the official announcement.

About 8,000 Marines are expected to go in first, followed by about 9,000 Army troops.

The new forces represent the first installment on a larger influx of U.S. forces widely expected this year. Obama's decision would get several thousand troops in place in time for the increase in fighting that usually comes with warmer weather and ahead of national elections in August.

The additional forces partly answer a standing request from the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, who has sought as many as 30,000 additional U.S. forces to counter the resurgence of the Taliban militants and protect Afghan civilians.

The United States has slightly more than 30,000 troops in Afghanistan now.

The new units are a Marine Expeditionary Brigade unit from Camp Lejeune, N.C., and an Army Stryker brigade from Fort Lewis in Washington state.

Ahead of his first foreign trip, Obama told a Canadian news organization that the United States will seek a more comprehensive, diplomatic approach to Afghanistan, where the U.S. has been engaged in war since 2001.

"I am absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region solely through military means," the president said in a White House interview with Toronto-based Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

Obama is scheduled to make a quick day trip to Ottawa on Thursday.
____

Associated Press writers Jennifer Loven, Lolita C. Baldor, Pamela Hess, Anne Flaherty and Lara Jakes contributed to this report.
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Obama: Diplomacy key part of Afghanistan strategy
AP via Yahoo! News - Feb 17 10:40 AM
WASHINGTON – In advance of his first foreign trip, President Barack Obama told a Canadian news organization Tuesday that the United States will seek a more comprehensive, diplomatic approach to Afghanistan, where the U.S. has been engaged in war since 2001.

"I am absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region solely through military means," the president said in a White House interview with Toronto-based Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

Obama's comments came as he prepares for a quick day trip to Ottawa on Thursday, primarily for talks with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Beyond war, Obama's agenda is likely to be dominated by the economy, trade, energy and the environment.

Yet the Afghanistan conflict is a deeply sensitive matter on both sides of the border. The United States is poised to send more troops to Afghanistan to quell rising violence; Canada is planning to pull its forces out of the country's volatile south by 2011, with diminishing support among its people to remain.

Under Obama, the U.S. is considering sending up to 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan. There are about 34,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, including 17,000 in the NATO-led coalition and another 17,000 fighting insurgents and training Afghan forces.

The Canadian government plans to withdraw its 2,500 combat troops, after the loss of more than 100 troops killed in Afghanistan since 2001.

"The Canadian contribution has been extraordinary," Obama said in the interview.

Obama said the U.S. is in the midst of a strategic review of its Afghan strategy and will "very soon" reveal details of its planned military approach.

"We're going to have to use diplomacy," Obama said of the crisis in Afghanistan. "We're going to have to use development. And my hope is that in conversations I have with Prime Minister Harper, that he and I end up seeing the importance of a comprehensive strategy, and one that ultimately the people of Canada can support, as well as that the American people can support."

Obama said the situation in Afghanistan "actually appears to be deteriorating at this point."

The Bush administration emphasized civilian reconstruction efforts and development work to improve the daily life of the Afghan people. Yet progress has been overshadowed by the resurgence of al Qaida-linked militants and the Taliban after initial defeats in the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.
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U.N. Says Afghan Civilian Deaths Increase by 40 Percent
By ALAN COWELL The New York Times February 18, 2009
PARIS — A United Nations report said on Tuesday that civilian casualties in Afghanistan rose by 40 percent last year, more than half of them resulting from suicide and roadside bomb attacks by militants, but many ascribed to air strikes and other actions by NATO and American forces battling the resurgent Taliban.

The level of civilian casualties was the highest since the American-led invasion in late 2001 that dislodged the Taliban government, the report said.

The findings , published in Kabul and Geneva, deepened worries about civilians trapped between the combatants in an intensifying war that looms as one of the main foreign policy challenges facing the Obama administration. Richard C. Holbrooke, the special U.S. envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, has just completed a tour of the region.

President Obama is already weighing whether to double the American troop deployment in Afghanistan to about 60,000. But Afghan officials, including President Hamid Karzai, have voiced mounting concerns about civilian casualties, arguing that more troops could lead to more fatalities.

The most glaring recent example of civilian casualties came last week when five children were killed in predawn fighting between Australian special operations troops and Taliban guerrillas in south-central Afghanistan. Such episodes have reduced support among the Afghans for foreign troops on their soil.

But ,the latest report suggested, civilians have more to fear from the insurgents. A joint statement Tuesday from the Afghan Interior Ministry and the U.S. Command in Kabul said a roadside bomb on Monday killed five civilians near Kandahar and coalition forces who went to investigate came under small arms fire.

The United Nations report, compiled by a human rights unit, said the death toll among civilians rose from 1,523 in 2007 to 2,118 in 2008, most of them in the south of the country where fighting is generally at its most intense.

The insurgents were blamed for 1,160 deaths — an increase of 65 per cent over similar attacks in 2007, the report said.

“2008 saw a distinct pattern of attacks by the armed opposition in crowded residential and other such areas with apparent disregard for the extensive damage they can cause to civilians,” a summary of the report said.

The report also took issues with “an intimidation campaign that includes the summary execution of individuals perceived to be associated with, or supportive of the government and its allies.”

The report said 828 deaths — or 39 percent of the total — were caused by pro-government forces, an increase of almost a third over the 2007 level.

“Air strikes remain responsible for the largest percentage of civilian deaths attributed to pro-government forces,” the report said, killing 552 civilians in 2008, two-thirds of the total number of civilians killed by pro-government forces.
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Bottom-up approach needed in Afghanistan: report
By Paul Eckert, Asia Correspondent – Tue Feb 17, 12:23 am ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The drive to stabilize Afghanistan must focus on cultivating local leaders, better training of Afghan troops and police, and pressing Kabul to fight corruption, a report by a U.S. think tank said on Tuesday.

Security in Afghanistan should be rethought to address failures in the seven years since the ousting of the Islamist Taliban after the September 11 attacks, the report published by the U.S. Institute of Peace says.

The top-down approach at nation-building that is focused on the central government in Kabul has not worked well because it ignores Afghanistan's decentralized history, said the U.S. Congress-funded institute's report, titled "Securing Afghanistan."

"The weak nature of the Afghan state, the inadequate level of international forces, and the local nature of the insurgency require building a bottom-up capacity to complement national forces," it said.

The international community should work with local leaders and tribal councils to give them legitimacy, provide services and connect them to the central government, said the report.

This approach would also be more likely to reconcile Afghan tribes, sub-tribes, and clans and help them turn against the Taliban, wrote report authors Christine Fair and Seth Jones of the RAND Corporation.

CONFRONT KARZAI ON CORRUPTION

The report argues that the United States and NATO will be unlikely to defeat the Taliban and other insurgent groups on their own because their mission stokes nationalistic reactions to what is perceived as foreign occupation.

"More U.S. forces in Afghanistan may be helpful, but only if they are used to build Afghan capacity," said the report. Washington, which is planning to nearly double the 37,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, should use more of them to mentor senior officers of Afghanistan's police and army, it said.

NATO should involve Afghans more directly in campaign planning and operations, and integrate Afghan military and intelligence personnel into joint operations centers, the report added.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Sunday that U.S. President Barack Obama had accepted his proposal that Kabul join an inter-agency review of Washington's policy on Afghanistan and Pakistan.

To fight corruption, the United States needs to work with the Afghan government and press upon Kabul that "corrupt government officials, including those involved in the drug trade, need to be prosecuted and removed from office."

Opium traffickers have paid off hundreds of police chiefs, judges and other Afghan officials, the study said, citing U.S. intelligence reports.

Anti-corruption efforts should start at the Ministry of Interior, where corruption has hindered police reform, counter-narcotics efforts and border security, it said.

The United States will have to directly confront Karzai with intelligence on officials in his government involved in the narcotics trade and try to overcome his reluctance to clamp down on those officials during an election year, the report recommended.
(Editing by Philip Barbara)
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Holbrooke visit reduced tensions: Kabul
Tue Feb 17, 9:46 am ET
KABUL (AFP) – Kabul said Tuesday that tensions with Washington over the US-led "war on terror" had eased with the visit of envoy Richard Holbrooke, who is reviewing US strategy in the fight against extremists.

The US envoy held talks on Saturday with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, conveying an assurance from President Barack Obama's new administration that Kabul could take part in the strategy review.

The visit "was a big step... towards the improvement and strengthening of relations," Karzai's spokesman Homayun Hamidzada told reporters.

"With the appointment of Mr. Holbrooke and his visit of the region, issues have largely resolved and we are moving forwards towards reviewing the struggle against terrorism," he said.

Holbrooke started his trip in Pakistan, where extremists are hunkered down in the northwest, and headed to India after three days of talks in Afghanistan.

He will report back to Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. An Afghan team is expected to head to Washington this month to take part in the review.

Earlier this month, Karzai admitted to "light wrestling" with Afghanistan's closest ally, mainly over the number of civilians being killed and wounded in anti-insurgent operations.

There are about 37,000 US troops in Afghanistan and an almost similar number of soldiers from other countries helping Karzai's government fight a mounting Taliban-led insurgency.

A UN report released Tuesday said that of 2,118 civilians deaths it recorded as a result of the insurgency last year, about 39 percent were by Afghan and international security forces -- most of them in air strikes.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force rejected the figure, saying only 237 civilians were killed by its troops and those from a US-led coalition.

Karzai and others have warned that deaths at the hands of security forces risk damaging public support for the government and its international allies.

Washington, which launched its "war on terror" with the ouster of Afghanistan's 1996-2001 Taliban regime, is expected to announce an increase in its force numbers in Afghanistan shortly.

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U.S.-Led Forces Kill Militant Leader in Afghanistan
By Jay Shankar
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- An air strike by U.S.-led coalition forces in western Afghanistan’s Herat province killed a militant commander affiliated to an Islamic group headed by former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the military said.

The coalition got information that the commander and militants were hiding in the Gozara district, 20 kilometers (12 miles) east of Herat city, the U.S. military said in an e-mailed statement today.

Aircraft carried out a “precision strike” on the hideout, destroying two vehicles and killing the group inside the compound, it said.

The commander, who wasn’t identified by the military, was linked to the Hezb-e-Islam Gulbuddin group and some Taliban leaders, and was responsible for violence in Herat. He was behind attacks on the United Nations compound in May and June last year and against the city’s airport last May, according to the statement.

A soldier belonging to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force died from his wounds yesterday in southern Afghanistan, the alliance said in an e-mailed statement today. The soldier was British, Agence France-Presse reported, citing the Ministry of Defence in London.

He was the eighth member of the British military to die in Afghanistan this year and the U.K.’s 145th fatality since operations began in 2001, according to AFP.

American Soldiers

U.S. General David McKiernan, commander of the ISAF, has asked for as many as 30,000 more American soldiers during the next year to beat back a renewed Taliban insurgency.

Afghan soldiers and U.S.-led forces killed five militants in western Farah province, according to an e-mailed statement issued today. The five were killed in three separate buildings in Qala Ga district during a search operation.

The soldiers discovered weapons, ammunition and other military equipment, including automatic rifles, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenade launchers and night vision goggles.

NATO and Afghan soldiers captured two insurgents behind an attack in eastern Khost province on Feb. 10, which killed two U.S. soldiers, according to an e-mailed statement from the alliance. Both the militants surrendered to the soldiers.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jay Shankar in Bangalore at jshankar1@bloomberg.net
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Canada wants "frank" talks on NATO in Afghanistan
By Luke Baker – Mon Feb 16, 3:12 pm ET
LONDON (Reuters) – The struggling effort to defeat the Taliban and bring security to Afghanistan means it is time for a "frank discussion" about the future of NATO, Canada's defense minister said on Monday.

In comments that are likely to aggravate some NATO partners, Peter MacKay told an audience in London that all alliance members needed to pull their weight otherwise the 60-year-old security pact faced an existential crisis.

"We need to have a frank discussion about the future of NATO," MacKay told the Royal Institute of International Affairs, known as Chatham House, while underlining that Canada, a founder member, remained committed to the organization.

"The U.S. re-emphasis on the mission in Afghanistan -- with the commitment of more troops, more development, more diplomacy -- has brought a predictable sigh of relief from some around the alliance," he said, suggesting some members saw it as a chance to sit back and say 'it's okay, the Americans will handle it'.

"As the United States says, its contribution is designed to reinforce, not to replace ... We all need to maintain our collective effort so that we maximize the official contribution from the United States," he said.

NATO defense ministers are due to meet in Krakow, Poland, for informal meetings on February 19-20. MacKay said he would use the meeting to hammer home the importance of all 26 members fulfilling their obligations to the organization.

In the past, criticism like MacKay's has been a veiled reference to the need for Germany, France and other major NATO states to step up contributions, bringing them into line with those made by Britain, Italy, Canada and the United States.

AFGHANISTAN TESTS NATO
MacKay did not name names, however, merely saying that unless there was a more unified, coordinated response across the alliance, the 8-year operation in Afghanistan risked failure.

"Afghanistan tests the ability of the alliance to execute its most basic mission in the 21st century and in a global context," he said.

"If NATO cannot deter or defeat the real physical threat facing alliance members, and indeed contribute to the building of security for the larger international community, then we have to ask ourselves, what is NATO for?"

Addressing specific problems, MacKay said that as well as forces on the ground -- Canada contributes 2,800 soldiers to the 70,000-strong international force -- NATO allies needed to train more Afghan security forces, engage Pakistan and regional players such as Iran, and urge the Afghan government to pull its weight in combating corruption, among other goals.

Afghanistan is due to hold a presidential election in August, when President Hamid Karzai's faltering popularity -- both among Afghans and internationally -- will be tested.

MacKay said he expected the elections to be free and fair, but said that did not mean Afghanistan was suddenly a democracy.

"I predict with confidence that we will have more successful elections," he said. "But what we are not going to have is a Westminster-style democracy in Afghanistan," he said, referring to the British parliament.
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Kabul Filmmaker Brings Afghanistan to the Silver Screen
By Aryn Baker time.com Kabul Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2009
It takes a certain skill to lose money on an opium field in Afghanistan. Afghan filmmaker Siddiq Barmak lost about $97,000 on his. For the making of his latest film, Opium War, which is set in a poppy field, Barmak had found the perfect site — a lonely hilltop in central Afghanistan, framed by the snow-covered peaks of nearby mountains. With the stunning vision of pink poppies swaying against the slopes of the Hindu Kush in mind, he finally obtained permission from the government to plant the illegal crop.

At the first spring rain Barmak and his crew planted the poppy seeds and started filming. Poppy-eradication teams tried to eliminate his set. Twice. Then the rains stopped. Poppies need water, and Barmak's hilltop had none. He dug a well. He brought in water tankers from 20 miles (30 km) away. Still, the crop failed, producing only a handful of limp blooms. Then the dog, specially trained for a key role in the movie, fell off a roof and died. (Read "Is the Taliban Stockpiling Opium?")

Opium War, Afghanistan's entry for Best Foreign Language Film at this year's Oscars and the follow-up to Barmak's Osama, which won a Golden Globe in 2004, is a black comedy. Barmak wasn't expecting the making-of story to be one, too. Still, he is sanguine. "All these disasters, this struggle and search, that's what making a film is all about," says the 46-year-old director. "It's the perfect parable for Afghanistan: nothing ever works the way you think it will."

Which, in a way, is what Opium War is all about. The film follows the story of two American soldiers who barely survive a helicopter crash behind enemy lines, only to land in a far more dangerous situation — the convoluted and toxic dramas of a refugee family forced to rely on poppy to survive. As the soldiers and the Afghans warily circle each other misunderstandings abound. The refugees have taken shelter under abandoned Soviet army tanks, which the soldiers mistake for a Taliban encampment. They open fire, setting the stage for anger and frustration. The Afghans fear the soldiers are after their opium crop, or, when one of the soldiers tries to make friends with a toddler, that the foreigners want to take their children.

For Barmak, it's a thinly veiled criticism of how the U.S. has conducted its war in Afghanistan. There has been too much of a focus on the fight, he says, and not enough on development. "I wanted to show the conflict between ordinary Afghans and the foreign soldiers who don't know how to listen."

Even if the message is heavy, his touch is light, a tactic to make the criticism easier to swallow. In one scene the soldiers fantasize about having multiple wives, while the refugee-clan patriarch, who has three, drowns his sorrows in opium smoke. Each wife has her own abandoned tank — call it a postapocalyptic, polygamous, Afghan trailer park — but the patriarch spends most of his nights banished outdoors. Every character is trapped in his or her own hell, says Barmak. "If only they could understand each other, maybe they could escape their fates."

At age 5, Barmak was transfixed by a showing of Lawrence of Arabia at his hometown cinema in Kabul. He haunted movie theaters after that, taping together remnants of filmstrips to make his own films, which he would then show to his friends in tiny, makeshift movie halls fashioned from cardboard. When the Soviet Union invaded in 1979, he joined the mujahedin guerrillas, eventually forming the documentary-film unit for rebel commander Ahmed Shah Massoud. (Massoud, also a film buff, introduced Barmak to Casablanca, Spartacus and Platoon.)

These days Barmak spends more time courting financiers than dodging rockets. Making movies in Afghanistan is expensive, and there is no local market to speak of. Instead he relies on foreign distribution — Opium War will be screening in some 15 cities across Asia and Europe this spring, largely based on his success last fall at the Rome International Film Festival, where the film won the critics' award for best film. And if it all doesn't pan out, he does have a new career fallback. "If I can't make it as a director," he says, "at least I now know how to grow opium."
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Bombs Kill a Taliban Commander
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and TAIMOOR SHAH The New York Times February 16, 2009
KABUL, Afghanistan — Before he was killed over the weekend, it was not always easy to track the ways that Maulavi Ghulam Dastagir had become an acute shame to the Afghan government.

He was a Taliban commander who had helped upend what was once a relatively peaceful area in the northwest, near Turkmenistan — helping give the lie to the idea that the Taliban controlled only the south and east.

Three months ago, he pulled off one of his most audacious raids, destroying an Afghan Army convoy and killing at least 13 men in a battle that ended only when helicopter gunships arrived to reinforce the 200 Afghan soldiers and police officers.

But it was not the ambush in and of itself that made Mr. Dastagir famous across Afghanistan.

Two months earlier, Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, had intervened to release Mr. Dastagir from jail, where he was being held on charges of conspiring with the Taliban.

To many Afghans, the ambush seemed to vividly confirm one of the most biting complaints here: that the corrupt and the criminal often find a way to get out of jail. And it did it in a way that seemed to implicate the highest authority in the land.

The president’s aides protested that Mr. Dastagir had been pardoned only because tribal elders begged for his release and vouched for his future conduct.

That explanation did little to quell the hue and cry. Nor did Mr. Dastagir quietly count his blessings and slink back into hiding.

“I am a jihadist, I will continue my jihad,” he said in a telephone interview soon after the November ambush. Reveling in his good luck, he laughed and added, “My morale is very high.”

But in the wilds of Afghanistan, fortunes can change in an instant. On Sunday night, five bombs fell on a compound in Badghis Province near the Turkmenistan border, where Mr. Dastagir and a half-dozen fellow Taliban commanders were meeting, one of his other commanders said Monday in a telephone interview.

His men rushed to the scene about 10:30 p.m. But all they found were mangled bodies — “martyrs,” the commander said — buried beneath rubble.

Stunned that the bombs had found their once-indestructible leader, the men started looking for an informer. “The Taliban have launched a search for whoever was behind this attack,” said the Taliban commander, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

A statement by the American military command in Kabul did little to discourage the notion that Mr. Dastagir had been betrayed by someone close, explaining that he had been pinpointed by “intelligence sources.”

Mr. Karzai’s biggest mistake may have been failing to discover that some of the tribal elders who sought Mr. Dastagir’s release had been threatened and forced by the Taliban to seek the pardon, as some later admitted.

A Karzai spokesman could not be reached on Monday to discuss Mr. Dastagir’s demise.

Richard A. Oppel Jr. reported from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan.

Richard A. Oppel Jr. reported from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan.
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Pakistan Praises Taliban Truce; U.S. Warns of Threat (Update2)
By Ed Johnson and Khalid Qayum
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan’s prime minister welcomed a peace accord with Taliban militants that will see Islamic law declared in a former tourist destination northwest of Islamabad, as the U.S. warned of the growing threat from extremists.

The agreement, which aims to end 20 months of fighting in the Swat Valley, will be “beneficial for the country,” Yousuf Raza Gilani told reporters in the capital yesterday, the official Associated Press of Pakistan reported.

Militants loyal to cleric Maulana Fazlullah have waged a violent campaign to impose Islamic law in Swat, which lies 250 kilometers (155 miles) northwest of Islamabad. Extremists have extended their grip on the area since a peace accord collapsed in July, destroying more than 180 schools, banning education for girls and beheading local government officials.

Pakistan, the U.S. and India “all face an enemy which poses direct threats to our leadership, our capitals and our people,” U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke told reporters yesterday in New Delhi, adding Taliban fighters have seized broader swaths of Pakistani territory. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said today in Tokyo she is looking at the intention of the accord.

President Barack Obama is pressing Pakistan to root out militants and sent Holbrooke to the region to review U.S. strategy for combating the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan.

Pakistan says it’s doing all it can against the guerrillas and is trying to combat extremism through political and economic development of the North West Frontier Province and other tribal areas, as well as the controlled use of military force.

Tribal Areas

The Bush administration was critical of previous peace accords in tribal areas, saying they led to a rise in cross- border attacks on international forces in Afghanistan.

Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said in an interview broadcast at the weekend that militants had exploited the weakness of the army and that the country was “in denial” about the threat posed by the Taliban.

The Islamist group has a presence in “huge amounts of land” in Pakistan, Zardari said in an interview on CBS television’s “60 Minutes” show. “Everyone was in denial that they’re weak and they won’t be able to take over, they won’t be able to give us a challenge.”

‘Domestic Insurgency’

Pakistan’s army “is not really equipped to fight a domestic insurgency,” said Samina Yasmeen, a South Asia specialist at the University of Western Australia. Even though it has received counterterrorism training and support from the U.S., “it is still essentially designed to fight on the borders with India,” she added.

“Pakistan’s government is definitely weak at the moment,” Yasmeen said by telephone. “Everything points to the fact that it is not able to control the militants.”

The introduction of Shariah law is in line with Pakistan’s Constitution and doesn’t represent the government surrendering to Taliban demands, Ameer Haider Khan Hoti, chief minister of the North West Frontier Province, which governs the valley, said yesterday, APP reported.

The regulation is intended to provide quick and inexpensive justice and won’t see the strict interpretation of Islamic law that was practiced by the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in the 1990s, he added, according to the report.

The move “represents a big step backward” for the government which had “pledged to roll back” such regulations in Pakistan, said Parag Khanna, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation, a Washington-based public policy institute.

To contact the reporters on this story: Ed Johnson in Sydney at ejohnson28@bloomberg.net; To contact the reporter on this story: Khalid Qayum in Islamabad at kqayum@bloomberg.net
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Talks with Taliban via Afghan govt only: Kabul
KABUL, Feb 17, 2009 (AFP) - Talks with Taliban insurgents must only take place through Afghan government channels, President Hamid Karzai's office warned Tuesday after reports surfaced of dialogue led by Danish soldiers.

Presidential spokesman Homayun Hamidzada told reporters he was unaware of a report in the Jyllands-Posten daily, which cited a Danish officer saying that Taliban were represented at soldiers' talks with local chiefs.

"We must intensify the dialogue and the negotiations with the Taliban if we want to have peace in Afghanistan, because we cannot eliminate the enemy," the lieutenant colonel was quoted as saying on Monday after a six-month mission.

Asked about the report, Hamidzada said he had not seen it.

"But the policy of the Afghanistan government is: any talks or dialogue should take place through government, not by the friendly countries who have a presence in Afghanistan," he said.

The aide recalled the "bitter experiences" of December 2007 when the Afghan government expelled an Irish and a British diplomat for contacts with the Taliban in the southern province of Helmand, an insurgent stronghold.

Karzai has for years called on Taliban insurgents who are not allied with Al-Qaeda to lay down arms in exchange for amnesty.

Denmark has about 700 soldiers in the 55,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, which works alongside a separate US-led coalition and the Afghan forces to fight a Taliban-led insurgency.

Many of the Danish troops are in Helmand.

In the seven years since the Taliban regime was ousted in a US-led invasion, the insurgency has only worsened leading to mounting calls for a non-military solution.
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Obama Says Afghanistan Can’t Be Solved by Military Means Alone
By Theophilos Argitis
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said the conflict in Afghanistan can’t be won by military means alone, and a solution needs to be “comprehensive.”

“I’m absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region solely through military means,” Obama said in an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. “We’re going to have to use diplomacy, we’re going to have to use development.”

CBC, Canada’s state-owned broadcaster, is slated to show the full interview today at 9 p.m. New York time.
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FACTBOX-Security developments in Afghanistan
Feb 17 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Afghanistan at 1600 GMT on Tuesday.

HELMAND - A British soldier serving with NATO-led forces died from wounds as a result of "enemy fire" in Nawa district, some 555 km (345) miles south of Kabul on Monday, the British Ministry of Defence and NATO forces said.

FARAH - U.S.-led coalition and Afghan troops killed five militants in an operation targeting an arms supplier in the Qala Gah district, some 635 km (395) miles southwest of Kabul, the U.S. said.

HERAT - U.S.-led coalition forces killed a militant commander of the Hezb-e Islami insurgent group of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in the Gozara district, 665 km (413) miles west of Kabul, a U.S. military said.

KANDAHAR - NATO-led troops shot dead two Afghan civilians in a vehicle which sped towards a foot patrol and failed to stop after warning shots were fired in Maiwand district, 400 km (250 miles) southwest of Kabul, the NATO-led force said.

KHOST - Afghan and NATO-led troops detained two insurgents in an operation in Tirzaye district, 150 km (95) miles east of Kabul. The suspects were involved in a suicide car bombing that killed two U.S. soldiers in Khost 0n Feb 10, a statement by NATO-led forces said. (Compiled by Hamid Shalizi, Editing by Jon Boyle)
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Pervez Musharraf was playing 'double game' with US
Catherine Philp, Diplomatic Editor The Times (UK) February 17, 2009
Washington sent Special Forces into Pakistan last summer after intercepting a call by the Pakistani army chief referring to a notorious Taleban leader as a “strategic asset,” a new book has claimed.

The intercept was ordered to confirm suspicions that the Pakistani military were still actively supporting the Taleban whilst taking millions of dollars in US military aid to fight them, according to the “The Inheritance,” by the New York Times correspondent David Sanger.

In a transcript passed to Mike McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence in May 2008, General Ashfaq Kayani, the military chief who replaced Pervez Musharraf, was overheard referring to Maulavi Jalaluddin Haqqani as “a strategic asset”. The remark was the first real evidence of the double game that Washington had long suspected President Musharraf was playing as he continued receiving US military aid while aiding the Taleban.

Mr Haqqani, a veteran of the anti-Soviet mujahidin wars of the nineties, commands a hardline Taleban group based in Waziristan and is credited with introducing suicide bombing into themilitants’ arsenal.

Washington later intercepted calls from Pakistani military units to Mr Haqqani, warning him of an impending military operation d esigned to prove to the US that Islamabad was tackling the militant threat.

“They must have dialled 1-800-HAQQANI” a source told Mr Sanger. “It was something like, ‘Hey, we’re going to hit your place in a few days, so if anyone important is there, you might want to tell them to scram’.”

The intercept was the clue that led the CIA to uncover evidence of collusion between the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) and Mr Haqqani in a plot to carry out a spectacular bombing in Afghanistan. Two weeks later, India’s Embassy in Kabul was bombed, killing fifty-four people and prompting a CIA mission to Islamabad to challenge the government with their evidence.

The first cross-border strike took place in early September without Islamabad’s knowledge after Washington concluded that no one could be trusted with the information.

General Kayani, a former ISI chief, became army chief when Mr Musharraf relinquished that post in 2007, a year before he was forced to quit as president. Worryingly for Washington, General Kayani remains Pakistan’s army chief.

Mr Musharraf reacted angrily to the book’s allegations of double-dealing, which appeared in the Pakistani press for the first time yesterday. “Get your facts correct, I have never double-dealt,” Mr Musharraf told Pakistani television stations.

“There is a big conspiracy being hatched against Pakistan, to weaken the Pakistan army and the ISI to weaken Pakistan.”

Mr Sanger’s book, detailing the foreign policy challenges inherited by the Obama Administration, was published in the US last month. In it, US intelligence officials also speak of their fears that Islamist militants might launch a spectacular attack on Indian soil in the hope of ramping up tensions on the subcontinent, leading Pakistan to deploy its nuclear weapons.
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Afghanistan: Taliban forces students out of schools into madrasas
LASHKARGAH, 17 February 2009 (IRIN) - The closure of schools and continuing attacks on students in the southern Helmand Province forced Abdul Wakil's parents to send him to a madrasa (Islamic school) in neighbouring Pakistan.

Almost two months later, Abdul Wakil [not his real name] quit the school outside Quetta, capital of Pakistan's Baluchistan Province, and returned home.

"In the madrasa we were taught to sacrifice ourselves for Jihad in Afghanistan and were told to do suicide attacks," the 14-year-old told IRIN in Lashkargah, centre of Afghanistan's insurgency-torn Helmand Province.

"I don't want to be a suicide attacker, because it's forbidden in Islam, so I secretly quit the madrasa and returned home," the teenager said.

Abdul's parents are happy to have their son safe but are extremely concerned about his security.

"If the Taliban find out about him, they will kill him," said his father, who requested anonymity. "We are also concerned about his education and his future," he said.

His concerns are not unique in the volatile south, where attacks by insurgent groups have closed more than 630 schools, depriving 300,000 students of an education, according to the Ministry of Education (MoE).

Poor literacy rates

More than two decades of war have severely damaged education in Afghanistan, resulting in very low literacy rates: 12.6 percent among females and 43.1 percent among males, an average of 28.1 percent nationwide, according to aid agencies.

The insurgents' anti-education activities - armed attacks, intimidation and negative propaganda - seek to shut down schools and deny students - girls and boys - a formal education that mixes modern scientific subjects with Islamic studies.

From January to October 2008, 256 school-related security incidents, with 30 deaths, were reported, against 213 incidents in the same period in 2007, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).

As a result, going to school has become increasingly dangerous for students and teachers.

However, the insurgents have tacitly encouraged parents to send their sons to religious schools in neighbouring Pakistan for Islamic studies.

"Pakistani madrasas brainwash students and teach them religious extremism, armed Jihad and hatred against the government in Afghanistan and the West," said Gulab Mangal, Helmand's governor.

Almost all Taliban leaders, including their reclusive leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, were trained in Pakistani madrasas.

Madrasas not only offer immunity from Taliban attacks but also provide free board and lodging to students and are thus more attractive to poor families than modern schools.

Tens of thousands of Afghan citizens are enrolled in Pakistani madrasas, MoE officials estimate.

Compromise efforts

The government has recently enhanced efforts to protect schools and schoolchildren from Taliban action.

Asif Nang, a spokesman for the MoE, told IRIN the government was ready to negotiate with the opposition over schools and would be willing to accommodate their religious reservations.

"If they want to call schools 'madrasa' we will accept that, if they want to say Mullah to a teacher we have no problem with that. Whatever objections they [the Taliban] may have we are ready to talk to them," Nang said.

The MoE also emphasised that its curriculum was entirely in accordance with Islamic values and girls were required to comply with Islamic dressing codes (including wearing the hijab) to school.

Owing to this appeasing approach, the government has reopened 24 schools in Helmand, Ghazni and Kandahar provinces previously shut by insurgents.

"We aim to reopen all the schools which are closed because of insecurity," assured Farooq Wardak, the education minister, adding that hundreds of new schools would be built in 2009.

Girl students

However, none of the 16 schools reopened in Helmand over the past three months catered for girls, the MoE said, a severe blow for already low female literacy rates.

Of six million students, 35 percent are female, while more than 1.2 million school-age girls do not attend school, according to UNICEF and Care International.

In addition to insecurity, conservative traditions and other prevalent gender inequity norms, particularly in the south and south-east, impede girls' access to education.
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Italy Said to Be Open to Increase in Afghanistan Troop Levels
By Steve Scherer
Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government is willing to add a few hundred troops to its force in Afghanistan through Aug. 20 presidential and provincial elections should it be asked to do so, a person briefed by a Cabinet member said.

Italy also would consider increasing its role in training Afghan police, said the person, who asked not to be named as a matter of government policy. Italy now has 2,800 soldiers in northwestern Afghanistan as part of a NATO-led force.

Italy’s willingness to add troops contrasts with the reluctance of other European NATO members who have resisted requests by the Obama Administration to reinforce the mission there. A week ago, President Barack Obama said Afghanistan poses a “big challenge,” and U.S. Army General David Petraeus said on Feb. 8 that the security situation there has “deteriorated markedly” since 2007.

Afghanistan needs successful elections this year to renew the central government’s legitimacy and improve political stability as armed clashes with insurgents rise, United Nations peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy said on Feb. 9.

Italy hasn’t yet received official requests to raise Afghan troop levels, and is looking to other European Union members to share the burden in Afghanistan, the person said.

As part of a diplomatic push, Italy plans to host a conference on Afghanistan and Pakistan on the sidelines of a Group of Eight foreign ministers meeting in June.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, secretary-general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, said on Jan. 19 some European allies may be unable to send more forces to Afghanistan. EU voters oppose dispatching more troops, according to a Harris poll published by the Financial Times on Jan. 20 in Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Spain and the U.S.
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Afghan TV set to unveil model contest
Tue Feb 17, 2009 2:24pm GMT Sayed Salahuddin
KABUL (Reuters) - Weary of Afghanistan's image as a country in chronic conflict with a history of repressing women, Arash Shenasa plans to launch a modeling contest to show "the hidden beauties" of his central Asian nation.

Since announcing the plan a week ago, some 2,000 men and women have enrolled to take part in the "Afghan Model" competition run by Emrooz TV, a private channel.

Top companies operating in Afghanistan have offered to sponsor the program, the first of its kind in Afghanistan, Shenasa said.

These kinds of contests have become popular in many nations around the world. But it is an extraordinary development in Afghanistan, where more than seven years after the fall of the hardline Taliban, many women in the deeply conservative nation still wear the all-enveloping burqas.

"My main aim is to show the hidden beauties of Afghan youth, and through Emrooz TV, I am trying to show just that," says the 24-year-old, clean-shaven Shenasa.

The aspiring models will be selected through a series of contests by Afghan judges who themselves have no experience in modeling, said Shenasa, a university medical student who has worked in the media for the past several years.

The panel of judges includes a self-proclaimed body fitness champion, a fashion designer and a cinema artist.

TV ADS
The contestants will decide for themselves what they will wear, with clothing styles ranging from European, Asian, American or Afghan designs. Emrooz will choose the fashion ensembles in the final round of six contestants.

The final six will have a chance to appear in TV advertisements, which have mushroomed in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban, who had banned TV among their many other restrictions.

Twelve private stations and one state channel now broadcast in the capital, their content, however, monitored by government censors.

Contestants will be judged on looks, fitness and behavior, Shenasa said.

"The program of modeling makes youth pay attention to their bodies, for if you do not have a good body you cannot compete, and you can only have a good body if you exercise," said the fitness judge, Khawja Farid Ahmad Seddiqi.

"It is the best way of eradicating narcotics," he added.

Emrooz, owned by parliament member Najib Kabuli, shows mostly music and movies and has drawn harsh criticism for airing what is considered racy programing in Afghanistan.

"We accept the criticism," Kabuli said. "The other day some one in a shop told me that he was ashamed to watch songs aired on our TV at home before his family."

Currently Emrooz covers only 10 of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan but expects to launch a satellite service when "Afghan Model" is ready for broadcast.

(Editing by Bill Tarrant)
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Holbrooke Visits Troops in Kandahar
Written by www.quqnoos.com Monday, 16 February 2009
We had a good talk about the overall security situation in the South, said Major General Mart De Kruif

U.S. President Barack Obama's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, visited US troops in Southern Afghanistan Yesterday.

Holbrooke met with Major General Mart De Kruif, Commander of Regional Command South at Kandahar Airfield.

Considering the meeting a positive step for encouraging soldiers, Major General De Kruif said," We had a good talk about the overall security situation in the South, counter narcotics and the possible increase of troops”.

General David McKiernan, commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) accompanied the U.S. envoy in this trip.
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