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Suicide bomber kills 25 Afghan policemen
Nasrat Shoib February 2, 2009
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) – A suicide bomber in police uniform killed 25 policemen and wounded several others Monday after infiltrating their morning exercises in southern Afghanistan, authorities said.
Gates to brief Obama on shifting troops to Afghanistan
By Barbara Starr CNN Pentagon Correspondent
(CNN) -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates will brief President Obama on Monday afternoon about specific plans for adding 15,000 troops to Afghanistan.
'Bilal case' arouses anti-US passions in Afghanistan
Mon Feb 2, 1:11 AM
KHOST, Afghanistan (AFP) - In mid-December US Special Forces killed three family members in a late-night raid on a doctor's home near Khost, believing they were linked to the Al-Qaeda terror network.
NATO urges Kyrgyz to keep Afghan supply base open
Mon Feb 2, 2009 7:21pm IST By Olga Dzyubenko
BISHKEK (Reuters) - A senior NATO official urged Kyrgyzstan on Monday to keep open a U.S. military airbase in the Central Asian state that the alliance says plays a key role in supplying coalition troops in nearby Afghanistan.
The shift in Afghan transit trade
Dawn (Pakistan) By Mohammad Ali Khan 2 February 2009
THE opening up of a new road, linking Afghanistan with Iranian port of Chahbahar, poses a challenge to Pakistan's ambition to become the sole transit hub to the landlocked country and Central Asia,
Further drops likely in Afghan opium production: survey
by Bronwen Roberts – Sun Feb 1, 3:35 pm ET
KABUL (AFP) – Opium production in Afghanistan is expected to drop for a second year in 2009, in part because of falling prices in a saturated market, a UN and Afghan government survey said Sunday.
Audits: Afghan aid lacks accountability
By Ken Dilanian, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — After seven years of work in Afghanistan, the U.S. government's premier development agency continues to pay hundreds of millions of dollars annually to private contractors that frequently fail to demonstrate results
Appointment of Richard Holbrooke unnerves South Asia
The new envoy, a veteran diplomat nicknamed 'the Bulldozer,' called the Afghan government a failure and put pressure on Pakistan to battle extremists.
Los Angeles Times, CA By Paul Richter February 2, 2009
Washington - President Obama has taken painstaking care in the first days of his administration to calm the waters of international relations with promises of cooperation and respect for other nations.
West Point aids Afghan counterpart New academy has 1st grads
By Alexa James Times Herald-Record February 02, 2009
From a makeshift compound in Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul, professor Bruce Keith watched as thousands of young men from every corner of the war-torn country showed up to take a test.
Winter crisis averted in north?
KABUL, 2 February 2009 (IRIN) - Prompt distribution of food aid, improved coordination among aid agencies and a relatively mild winter have prevented mass displacements in the drought-stricken northern provinces of Afghanistan
Japanese party seeks peace in Afghanistan
TOKYO, Feb. 1 (UPI) -- The Democratic Party of Japan says if it gains power it wants to help broker a cease-fire in Afghanistan between U.S.-led forces and Taliban militants.
U. S. could survive defeat in Afghanistan, NATO will not
By ERICMARGOLIS, SUN MEDIA The Sault Star - Feb 02 4:14 AM
Britain's security minister, Lord West, just dropped a bombshell by declaring his nation's military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan had fuelled global radicalism against Britain and the U. S.
Two Afghan Children Killed in NATO-Taliban Firefight in Helmand
By Jay Shankar
Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- NATO-led troops in Afghanistan opened fire during military actions, killing two children and an Afghan tribal leader in separate incidents, the coalition said.
Russian humanitarian aid to reach Afghanistan on Feb. 5
02/ 02/ 2009
KABUL, February 2 (RIA Novosti) - Russia expects to complete a shipment of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan on February 5, an official with the Russian embassy in Kabul told RIA Novosti on Monday.
Pakistan: 43 civilians die in Taliban crossfire
By CNN's Zein Basravi
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- At least 43 civilians were killed Sunday when they were caught in the crossfire between Pakistani forces and Taliban militants, a Pakistani military official said.
Illinois National Guard members in Afghanistan enjoy pizzas during Super Bowl
Treats traveled all the way from Chicago and were taken by plane and convoy to soldiers, contractors
Chicago Tribune - Mon Feb 2, 2:23 am EST
CAMP BLACKHORSE, Afghanistan — The soldiers weren't necessarily hungry, as most looked half-asleep. But just after 4 a.m. Monday, they dug into Chicago pizzas that took almost 10 days, at least four flights
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Suicide bomber kills 25 Afghan policemen
Nasrat Shoib February 2, 2009
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) – A suicide bomber in police uniform killed 25 policemen and wounded several others Monday after infiltrating their morning exercises in southern Afghanistan, authorities said.
The powerful blast, claimed by the insurgent Taliban, was the deadliest in Afghanistan this year and caused a scene of bloody carnage that an ambulance driver likened to a butcher's shop.
The bomber walked into the station in the town of Tirin Kot, capital of the southern province of Uruzgan, at 9:30 am (0500 GMT) and detonated explosives strapped to his body, authorities said.
Many were killed instantly and several of the wounded died later in hospital, taking the death toll to 25, provincial public health director Khan Agha Miakhail told AFP.
"We had 22 bodies here (in hospital) and just now three of the wounded died... taking the total figure of those killed to 25," he said.
Some of the wounded were in a critical condition and about eight were transferred to a hospital in a NATO-led military base in town, he said.
Ambulance driver Ahmad Shah, who helped evacuate the casualties, described the scene as similar to a "butcher's shop".
"There are body parts, pools of blood, police hats and boots scattered around the compound in a mixture of blood, and the smell of explosives," he told AFP by telephone from inside the station.
"All I can see is blood, pieces of uniform and body parts here. Around 18 bodies are piled in a corner and you can even see body parts of the suicide attacker outside the huge compound," Shah said.
It was the deadliest attack this year in war-ravaged Afghanistan where suicide bombings are frequently claimed by the extremist Taliban, who were in government between 1996 and 2001 and are now waging a growing insurgency.
The fledgling police force is one of the main targets of attacks by the Taliban. Officials say this is because police are easier to target than the heavily protected Afghan and international military forces.
Interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary said the policemen were conducting their routine morning exercises when they were hit.
The ministry, which is in charge of police, denounced the blast as "barbaric". UN Special Representative Kai Eid and the European Union mission training Afghan police also condemned the attack.
Provincial police chief Juma Gul Hemat said the attacker was not a policeman but had acquired a police uniform which helped him blend into the crowd. An investigation was underway to see how this had been possible, he added.
A spokesman for the Taliban, Yousuf Ahmadi, told AFP by telephone that his organisation was responsible.
Uruzgan is one of four provinces in southern Afghanistan badly hit by the increasingly deadly insurgency.
Some of up to 30,000 extra US soldiers expected to deploy to southern Afghanistan this year could be headed to the area, NATO officers have said.
The interior ministry said separately that four civilians were shot dead in Tirin Kot on Sunday for "alleged links and cooperation with the government".
It blamed the attack on "enemies of peace and stability", a reference to Taliban-led insurgents who have killed dozens of people for "spying" -- apparently to intimidate locals into rejecting the Western-backed government.
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Gates to brief Obama on shifting troops to Afghanistan
By Barbara Starr CNN Pentagon Correspondent
(CNN) -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates will brief President Obama on Monday afternoon about specific plans for adding 15,000 troops to Afghanistan.
Three U.S. military sources have confirmed to CNN that Gates will present the plan when he meets with Obama and Vice President Joe Biden on Monday.
On Friday, Gates received the military's plans for sending three additional brigades to the war zone, but deferred signing off on the plan until he could brief the new president.
The plan calls for ultimately sending two additional combat brigades -- most likely one Army and one Marine Corps unit -- and a brigade of trainers for Afghan security forces.
Military sources emphasize they do not expect Obama to get involved in the minute details of deployment orders, but said that since this is the first major decision of his presidency about troop deployment, Gates wanted to brief him personally.
Monday's meeting follows a visit to the Pentagon by Obama last week for what was described as an "unvarnished" give-and-take on how to move forward in America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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'Bilal case' arouses anti-US passions in Afghanistan
Mon Feb 2, 1:11 AM
KHOST, Afghanistan (AFP) - In mid-December US Special Forces killed three family members in a late-night raid on a doctor's home near Khost, believing they were linked to the Al-Qaeda terror network.
Anger aroused by the raid in southeastern Afghanistan was fanned by a visit of commiseration by President Hamid Karzai, whom some suggest had an eye on looming elections.
"The Americans entered without warning. They first killed one of my nephews, Amin, who was 14 years old, who was sleeping next to a rifle," says Bilal Hassan, who works for the provincial department of health.
The family was woken with a shock by the 11:00 pm raid on their home at the foot of the snowy mountains.
"My brother went out with a gun. He was shot down, like his wife who followed him," he says.
A sister-in-law was hit in the spinal cord and paralysed.
"Then they released their dogs," the doctor remembers. The dogs attacked the bodies and bit off some of the fingers, he says. Then they bit the wounded woman and a child of five.
"Everyone was screaming, crying," Hassan says.
The search lasted close to five hours. "The Americans searched our women themselves," he says. The local Pashtun culture considers it a crime for women to be touched by men who are not their family.
"They took our savings, all our guns, used for self-defence, and even papers for some of our properties.... Why did they do all that?"
Several days later the US military released a statement saying the operation had been intended to "disrupt the Al-Qaeda terrorist network" and that three "militants" were killed when they tried to shoot the soldiers.
Five suspects were arrested, including the target of the raid, who was a believed to be "in direct contact with Al-Qaeda leaders, outside of Afghanistan", the statement said.
But in Khost several people, including expatriates who have looked into the incident -- which has become known as the "Bilal case" -- corroborate the version of Hassan, the doctor.
And a month and a half later all but one of those "Al-Qaeda network suspects" have been released.
Hassan said the US military, perhaps partially admitting to a blunder, had given him 225,000 afghani (4,500 dollars) in compensation for the raid.
But they have not returned confiscated items and still hold Hassan's nephew, Ahmed Noor, who was visiting the family while on his holidays from Dubai, where he works as a driver.
The 25-year-old Noor "like all of us, has never been a Taliban," Hassan said.
He presented a letter from the driver's employer, a producer of bottled water in the United Arab Emirates, saying Noor had been given leave. An official in the Dubai office confirmed that Noor worked there.
Hassan wants the US military to at least admit it was wrong.
He believes the attack was manipulated by his "communist" rivals -- those who supported the Soviet invasion of the 1980s -- whom, he said, were now in the police force.
"I have a land dispute with them and it was they who denounced me," he said.
An international official in the province said, on condition of anonymity, that police had alleged "Bilal was linked to insurgents."
The affair took a political turn when Karzai visited Khost on December 23 to pray for the dead with Hassan's family.
The president used the occasion to again condemn night-time raids by US soldiers, a speech that was welcomed by a population that does not hide its exasperation, even hatred, of the GIs and their "blunders."
A Western observer in Khost province believed Karzai would never have visited the family if he were not standing for re-election on August 20, when he is likely to face a strong political challenge, having been weakened by the unrest gripping his nation.
Karzai's visit annoyed the Americans.
"Why doesn't Mr Karzai do the same thing when the Taliban kill innocents?" asked Patrick Seiber, one of the US military spokesmen at Khost.
He was referring to a suicide attack in December that killed 14 children in the same town but was not followed by a visit by Karzai.
"We regret the victims, but from our perspective the operation was justified," Seiber said.
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NATO urges Kyrgyz to keep Afghan supply base open
Mon Feb 2, 2009 7:21pm IST By Olga Dzyubenko
BISHKEK (Reuters) - A senior NATO official urged Kyrgyzstan on Monday to keep open a U.S. military airbase in the Central Asian state that the alliance says plays a key role in supplying coalition troops in nearby Afghanistan.
A source close to President Kurmanbek Bakiyev's office told Reuters last month that Kyrgyzstan had decided to close the base and was preparing to make an official statement on this.
Analysts say Russia, which operates its own military airbase in Kyrgyzstan, has stepped up pressure on the tiny impoverished republic to shut down the rival U.S. military facility ahead of Bakiyev's planned visit to Moscow this week.
NATO Secretary General's Special Representative Robert Simmons, in Kyrgyzstan on a visit on Monday, said any decision to close U.S. Manas airbase, home to more than 1,000 military personnel, would be regrettable.
"The presence of the airbase is a large contribution to NATO operations," said Simmons, according to the official Russian translation of his comments.
"If the Kyrgyz government decides to close the Manas airbase, we would regret that decision since it is a vital link in our fight against international terrorism."
Washington set up the base in 2001 after the start of the U.S.-led military campaign in Afghanistan. But its role has been heightened as the United States seeks to reinforce supply routes to Afghanistan that bypass Pakistan, where supply convoys face security risks.
Kyrgyzstan's official position unclear. It had rejected calls to evict U.S. troops in the past but has not officially commented on the matter ahead of Bakiyev's visit to Russia.
Bakiyev arrives in Moscow on Tuesday aiming to clinch financial aid including more than $600 million in loans, debt write-offs and grants as well as a $1.7 billion investment into a new hydroelectric power plant project.
Many Kyrgyz have had mixed feelings about the presence of U.S. troops in their homeland since 2006 when a U.S. airman shot dead a Kyrgyz man in an incident at the base.
Separately on Monday, a group of Kyrgyz members of parliament urged Bakiyev to clarify his stance on the future of the airbase and urged the assembly to hold a special parliament session this month to debate the issue.
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The shift in Afghan transit trade
Dawn (Pakistan) By Mohammad Ali Khan 2 February 2009
THE opening up of a new road, linking Afghanistan with Iranian port of Chahbahar, poses a challenge to Pakistan's ambition to become the sole transit hub to the landlocked country and Central Asia, as traders believe a major portion of the transit business will be lost to Iran and India.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee opened the 220-km road in the Nimroz province of Afghanistan, which is the major part of a $1.1 billion Indian reconstruction effort in Afghanistan. Constructed at a cost of $150 million provided by India, the road runs from Delaram in Nimroz to Zaranj on the Iranian border, connecting Afghanistan to the Iranian port of Chahbahar. It opens up an alternative route into Afghanistan, which now relies mostly on Pakistan for its transit trade.
Iran is planning to use Chabahar for transshipment to Afghanistan and Central Asia while reserving the port of Bandar Abbas as a major hub for its trade with Russia and Europe.
The opening of this new route is the beginning of a partnership reached among India, Iran and Afghanistan in 2003 to give Indian goods, bound for Central Asia and Afghanistan, preferential treatment and tariff reductions at Chabahar.
Muhammad Ishaq, vice-president Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI), believes that the new route will hurt Pakistan's transit business significantly because authorities have failed to respond timely to the growing volume of transit business and build necessary infrastructure.
“We have been demanding upgrading of infrastructure to efficiently facilitate the transit trade taking place in the region, but to no avail,” says Mr Ishaq, adding “Impediments to the transit business had shattered the confidence of Afghan importers to use Pakistan's land route as a viable option.”
Afghanistan had signed its first transit trade agreement with Pakistan in 1965. Pakistan's two main ports, Karachi Port and Port Qasim, are currently clearing goods in transit to Afghanistan (GITA), which are transported to Afghanistan via land route from Chaman and Torkham.
Pakistan earns revenue worth billions of rupees through this transshipment and inland transportation, as according to official statistics, goods worth Rs85 billion were transported to Afghanistan last year. Pakistan railways alone generates one billion rupees annually through its freight business from Karachi port to Peshawar.
The opening of the new route by Iran, said Mr Ishaq, would greatly affect Pakistan's revenue in this potential business. Also, he believes, the tripartite partnership has given India a chance to use this transit route as Pakistan is not allowing India access to Afghan markets via its land route.
But many believe that the damage to Pakistan position as a potential hub will not be to the level as feared.
Manzoor Elahi, an exporter to Central Asian States, says the new route of Afghanistan will affect 30 to 40 per cent of transit business.
The Iranian port of Chahbahar has the advantage for the southern and eastern parts, whereas for rest of Afghanistan, Pakistan is still the only viable option for cost-effective transportation of goods, he argues.
Similarly, he claims the Chahbahar port is not viable for trade with Central Asia. The Iranian route covers a distance of more than 3,500 kilometres, whereas the Torkhum route involves 2,700 kilometres.
The distance of the two routes makes Torkhum a better route to Central Asia, but the concessions given at Chahbahar are enough to minimise its disadvantages.
Afghan exporters will use the port with a 90 per cent discount on port fees, a 50 per cent discount on warehousing charges, and Afghan vehicles will be allowed full transit rights on the Iranian road system. To be competitive, Pakistan nay have to reduce some of its customs duties at Karachi port, opines Mr Ishaq.
Mr Elahi is also not worried about the growing influence of Indian products in Afghanistan, with the opening of the new route. He says 70 per cent of the Indian products destined for Afghanistan are coming to Pakistan, which hurts local industry.
“I am in favour of curtailing Afghan transit trade because this facility is being greatly misused,” opines Mr Elahi.
Mr Elahi says “challenges bring opportunity and the opportunity now is to upgrade our logistics , which will make Pakistan as the viable transit hub for trade with Afghanistan and beyond.”
The impediments to the transit trade range from lack of capacity of the service providers to poor conditions of road network and security of the goods because of the unsurgency in the tribal belt.
Official estimates that the country's inadequate and inefficient transport system is causing a loss of 4-6 per cent of the GDP which retards the economic growth, reduces export competitiveness and hinders social uplift.
Problems in swift movement of transit goods begin from Karachi seaport, where high port costs and delays in unloading of goods and at the customs, are some of the contributing factors.
According to traders, the daily requirement of railway wagons ranges from 40-50 for transportation of goods from Karachi to Peshawar, whereas actual availability is far less. Consequently one has to opt for costly National Logistic Cell, among others, which charges many times higher than the railway freight.
The required level of services is not available because of poor highway conditions and its management. About 44 per cent of the roads on the main trade corridor are in poor conditions, making the journey as slow as around 25 km per hour.
The growing volume of this cross-border trade requires a dry port equipped with modern facilities at Peshawar, which is a gateway to Afghanistan and beyond.
“If we upgrade our infrastructure, we can still secure a major portion of the transit business with Afghanistan and beyond,” opines Mr Elahi, adding “the government should provide infrastructural facilities for the transit trade, if it wants the country to be a major transit hub.”
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Further drops likely in Afghan opium production: survey
by Bronwen Roberts – Sun Feb 1, 3:35 pm ET
KABUL (AFP) – Opium production in Afghanistan is expected to drop for a second year in 2009, in part because of falling prices in a saturated market, a UN and Afghan government survey said Sunday.
But the lucrative crop could bounce back if deteriorating security is not checked, said the annual report released at a press conference.
"Following the 19 percent reduction in opium cultivation in 2008, the 2009 Opium Winter Rapid Assessment anticipates a further decrease in opium cultivation," the report said.
Afghanistan produces 90 percent of the world's opium.
Production last year was 157,000 hectares (387,950 acres), most of it in the volatile southern and southwestern areas of the rugged nation, where Taliban extremists have a strong presence.
The report, based on surveys of 484 villages -- around 1.6 percent of the total -- gave no figures for the anticipated decline, but said none of the 34 provinces was expected to increase cultivation.
The number of provinces that could be declared free of opium poppies may rise from 18 to 22 if the government properly carries out programmes to eradicate illegal crops, it said.
Most Afghan opium is turned into heroin inside the impoverished country before being smuggled to Central Asia, Europe and the Middle East.
The trade puts millions of dollars in the hands of extremist insurgents every year and feeds rampant government corruption.
Wiping out the crop has been a key component of international efforts to stabilise Afghanistan -- called a "narco state" by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton this month -- since the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001.
Afghanistan's counternarcotics minister, General Khoidad, said he was particularly pleased that "for the first time in the past five years we see decrease in the south."
This area, most notably the volatile province of Helmand, would still account for about 90 percent of cultivation, the survey said.
The declines in the south were due largely to higher prices of wheat, low opium prices and severe drought, UN Office on Drugs and Crime executive director Antonio Maria Costa said in the report.
The fall in prices "can be attributed to the massive glut on the opium market due to major overproduction during the past three years," he said.
Average prices for dry opium have plunged about 25 percent over the year from about 113 dollars a kilogramme in 2008 to about 85 dollars a kilogramme this year, the report said.
Wheat, the staple food in Afghanistan, was meanwhile up to 60 cents/kg, an increase of 49 percent from last year, it said.
The report warned, however, that in the south, "Farmers may bounce back with high opium cultivation if opium prices rise and the current insecurity situation prevails."
Declines in cultivation in northern and eastern areas were due to government pressure against production and the presence of legitimate governance, it said.
Khoidad, the minister, reiterated calls for soldiers deployed to Afghanistan
in a NATO-led force to play a greater role in fighting opium trafficking.
International troops "must take part in interdiction, must hit the labs... because drug dealers, drug traffickers, terrorism, Al-Qaeda they are the same, they are the enemy of the people of Afghanistan," he said.
NATO's International Security Assistance Force of about 55,000 troops has signalled its intention to play a stronger role in fighting drugs, including targeting key players who use the crop to fund the insurgency.
UN Special Representative to Afghanistan Kai Eide said the expected decline must be used by the government and its donors to make further progress in the fight.
He called for backing for programmes that reward areas recording a decline with development projects, support for farmers and the mobilisation of religious and community leaders to speak out against drugs.
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Audits: Afghan aid lacks accountability
By Ken Dilanian, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — After seven years of work in Afghanistan, the U.S. government's premier development agency continues to pay hundreds of millions of dollars annually to private contractors that frequently fail to demonstrate results, according to aid workers, former diplomats and audits by the agency's inspector general.
President Obama said last week he was "committed to refocusing attention and resources on Afghanistan and Pakistan." He named special envoy Richard Holbrooke to oversee aid and diplomacy in those countries. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said she wants the U.S. Agency for International Development to assume development tasks ceded to the Pentagon.
Yet USAID's multibillion-dollar Afghanistan reconstruction effort continues to struggle. Of six different audits conducted in the last year by the agency's inspector general, only one found a program working largely as it was supposed to.
• A $219 million contract for technical and management advice to government ministries and other institutions produced "a lack of evidence" of results after the agency and the contractor "spent an inordinate amount of time attempting to define the program's activities and priorities."
• The success of a $37 million contract to help small businesses could not be measured because "the contractor's performance data … were not reliable."
• A $102 million contract to promote agriculture led to defective buildings, the spraying of pesticides without studying their impact and the failure to implement a major farm program in time for last summer's planting season.
"As a result, the mission may not be able to provide planned jobs to local Afghans, and sales from crop harvests may not materialize," the August 2008 audit said.
The new Special Inspector General for Afghanistan said in a report released Friday that the broader reconstruction effort, which includes the Defense Department and other entities, has "major weaknesses."
In a phone interview from Kabul, Michael Yates, USAID's Afghanistan mission director, said the $7.9 billion his agency has spent in Afghanistan since 2002 has produced "remarkably powerful impacts" in health, education, agriculture and more.
"The audits have identified areas of weakness, but we then take concrete steps to address those areas," he said.
Yet critics such as Ann Jones, who wrote a 2006 book about her four years as an aid worker in Afghanistan, say the effort has been bedeviled by waste and mismanagement.
More than half of the assistance money goes to overhead and profits for private U.S. contractors who hire Afghans to perform the work, Jones says. "It's hard to overstate the magnitude of the failure of American reconstruction in Afghanistan," she said.
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Appointment of Richard Holbrooke unnerves South Asia
The new envoy, a veteran diplomat nicknamed 'the Bulldozer,' called the Afghan government a failure and put pressure on Pakistan to battle extremists.
Los Angeles Times, CA By Paul Richter February 2, 2009
Washington - President Obama has taken painstaking care in the first days of his administration to calm the waters of international relations with promises of cooperation and respect for other nations.
But his new envoy to South Asia has landed with a splash.
Officials in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India have reacted uneasily to the appointment of Richard Holbrooke, a veteran diplomat nicknamed "the Bulldozer."
Holbrooke, who embarks on his first official visit this week, has declared in recent months that the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a longtime American ally, has failed. In opinion columns, he has pointed to "massive, officially sanctioned corruption," along with drugs, as the country's most severe problems.
Holbrooke has also called for vigorous action to deal with extremist sanctuaries in Pakistan. He charged that Pakistan has the power to destabilize its neighbor Afghanistan, "and has."
He has even taken a shot at the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, William Wood, saying that because of his support for using herbicides on opium poppies, he's known in Kabul as "Chemical Bill." The nickname is a reference to Ali Hassan Majid, Saddam Hussein's cousin, who became notorious for ordering poison gas attacks on Iraqi Kurds and was given the name "Chemical Ali."
To Afghans, Holbrooke's appointment reinforces tough talk by Vice President Joe Biden, who signaled in a visit last month that the United States could scale back its support for Karzai unless he changes his ways.
But the U.S. message "has been met with a groan in Kabul," said Daniel Markey, a South Asia expert at the Council on Foreign Relations who worked in the State Department under the Bush administration.
Pakistani officials are trying to decide what to make of Holbrooke's appointment.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari wrote a column last week praising and welcoming Holbrooke. But Zardari also included a warning seemingly intended to keep Holbrooke from complaining about Pakistani inaction against extremists in the border areas.
"With all due respect, we need no lectures on our commitment. This is our war," Zardari wrote in the Washington Post.
Indian officials expressed approval after Holbrooke's mission was reshaped at the last moment to exclude the territorial dispute over Kashmir, which has divided India and Pakistan for decades.
U.S. officials later clarified that although Kashmir is not officially part of the job, Holbrooke will try to draw New Delhi into the conversation because India-Pakistan tensions affect stability in the region.
U.S. officials, concerned about public perceptions in a region that has grown increasingly unhappy with the foreign presence, have been soft-pedaling Holbrooke's role, saying he would function solely as a "coordinator."
Yet those who know him have no doubt that Holbrooke will have far-reaching influence.
The envoy, 67, is best known as the architect of the Dayton peace accord of 1995 that ended the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. He was former President Clinton's favorite diplomatic trouble-shooter and a U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. He has been nominated seven times for the Nobel Peace Prize.
"Holbrooke is good dealing with tough guys; he's had a lot of experience with corrupt governments, which here will be important as well," said Kenneth Bacon, a former Pentagon official who knows Holbrooke from the Bosnian war era and is now president of Refugees International, which is involved in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Holbrooke was Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's chief foreign policy advisor during the 2008 presidential primary campaign, before switching over to advise Obama in the general election campaign. Holbrooke was perennially mentioned as a potential secretary of State.
Yet in the week since he was appointed, some of the challenges of this job have already become apparent.
This job will require a different set of skills from the ones he used in the Balkans, when he pressured Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic with the threat of NATO bombing and promise of possible membership in the European Union.
In South Asia, military threats have little value. And negotiations over key issues have filled "a graveyard of conflict mediators," Markey said.
"The problems of South Asia are not especially amenable to U.S. shuttle diplomacy," Markey wrote on Foreign Policy magazine's website. He said that "no amount of U.S. browbeating or inducement" would overcome divisions on issues such as Kashmir, and that greater U.S. involvement could backfire.
Another challenge will be sorting out who in the new administration will have the most influence in the region.
Although Holbrooke's skills as a bureaucratic infighter are legendary in government circles, other powerful figures will also want a piece of the action.
One is Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, who as chief of the Pentagon's huge Central Command oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East and Central Asia and has been the most important American official in the region.
Another potentially important figure will be the new U.S. envoy to Iran, who will pursue Obama's promise for a diplomatic opening to the Islamic Republic. Dennis Ross, the longtime Mideast peace negotiator and State Department official, has been under consideration for the job, according to U.S. officials.
Other top players will include Biden, who has long held an interest in the region. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and retired Marine Gen. James L. Jones Jr., the president's national security advisor, also will be involved.
"Petraeus has had a lot of the say to himself, but now somebody's got to give," said Leslie Gelb, former president of the Council on Foreign Relations and a veteran national security official. "Of course, people will be getting in each other's way. We'll know in a few months how they work it out."
paul.richter@latimes.com Times staff writer Julian E. Barnes contributed to this report.
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West Point aids Afghan counterpart New academy has 1st grads
By Alexa James Times Herald-Record February 02, 2009
From a makeshift compound in Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul, professor Bruce Keith watched as thousands of young men from every corner of the war-torn country showed up to take a test.
A high score on the entrance exam, similar to the SAT, could earn them a spot at the National Military Academy of Afghanistan, a fledgling officer-training program offering bachelor's degrees and commissions with the Afghan national army.
"It's an extraordinary opportunity for the kids who are selected," said Keith, who teaches sociology and serves as associate dean for academic affairs at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He volunteered, along with a rotating team of West Point colleagues, as a mentor at the new Afghan-run academy.
Keith is accustomed to the highly competitive application process at West Point, but he'd never seen anything like that entrance exam in Afghanistan.
On a sweltering outdoor field of concrete, proctors lined up more than 1,000 metal folding chairs.
Afghans arrived from every province and ethnic group. Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks — any unmarried man under the age of 24 could apply. They filled all the chairs.
"We had (applicants) walking several days to arrive at the military academy, just so they would have the opportunity to participate in this selection process," Keith said.
Each man got a tiny pencil, "like the size you get at a golf course. ... No desks. No breaks."
Candidates worked on their exams for hours, vying for only 270 spots and a small window to a future.
Four years later, on Jan. 25, 84 of those candidates graduated in the Afghan academy's first commencement. President Hamid Karzai presented an officer's saber to each of them. Now they owe 10 years apiece to the Afghan national army.
Every grad also carries a rare document — a college diploma — and with it, the hopes of a weary nation.
As the United States contemplates sending more divisions to Afghanistan, the country struggles to become a viable place. It needs a solid military, but also sophisticated academia. Decades of war with the Soviets, then the Taliban, destroyed the country's professional class. There's no one left to teach or trade, to build roads and bridges.
"An entire generation of engineers is missing," said Col. Stephen Ressler, a civil engineering professor at West Point who volunteered at the Afghan academy in 2007. He helped cobble together the few remaining Afghan instructors and build a new curriculum.
The men and women he worked with, Ressler said, "knocked my socks off with their enthusiasm." Though largely self-taught, their technical skills were good, and they'd learned English, under Taliban rule, by surreptitiously listening to BBC radio. Putting these professionals to work, Ressler said, will buffer a resurgent Taliban.
The Afghan academy's numbers have grown steadily since its inception in August 2003. More than 1,100 cadets will be enrolled by March, including 40 medical students and 10 women. By 2011, at least 10 percent of the student body should be female.
That's rapid progress. But against the backdrop of Afghanistan's many ills — a booming opium trade, deep tribal divisions and a U.S. presence in flux — is the academy's success just a dose of aspirin?
"I think people throughout the country see great value in the military academy," said Keith. "It's a huge cultural shift. You can't turn that over in a night."
The Army team insists the Afghans are in control and maintaining a body of students and faculty that reflects the country's ethnic makeup.
"What you have to do is put the onus of learning on the Afghans," Keith said. "It's going to be messy. It's going to have all kinds of problems, but the reality is, it's going to be better than what we brought over because it will be theirs."
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Winter crisis averted in north?
KABUL, 2 February 2009 (IRIN) - Prompt distribution of food aid, improved coordination among aid agencies and a relatively mild winter have prevented mass displacements in the drought-stricken northern provinces of Afghanistan, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said.
"This year there was, in general, much better coordination between relevant government bodies and UN agencies, particularly with WFP [UN World Food Programme] as a key player. The other factor that really matters is that people in the areas most affected by drought are not facing such a harsh winter as last year," Dusan Vukotic, an ICRC official in Kabul, told IRIN.
Previously the ICRC had warned about large-scale displacements in the north. "Hundreds of thousands of Afghans may have to leave their homes this winter because of drought, insecurity and rising food prices," it warned in a press release in October 2008.
However, the ICRC's latest assessments in the four northern provinces of Balkh, Faryab, Kunduz and Badghis indicate "no major displacement" has occurred thus far.
Millions are at risk of food insecurity due to crop failure resulting from severe drought and high food prices, aid agencies have said.
In response, aid agencies and the government requested over US$400 million in a joint emergency appeal in July 2008 [http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=79162] aimed at providing a safety-net for over five million most vulnerable people. Thus far over 50 percent of the appeal has been met, according to WFP.
Susannah Nicol, a WFP spokeswoman in Kabul, told IRIN more than 740,000 of the targeted five million beneficiaries had received food aid and the programme would continue until August 2009.
Other relief projects
A "Winter Task Force" established by the German embassy in Kabul has disbursed over 2.6 million euros (about US$3.4 million) for emergency relief activities.
"The Federal Foreign Office's overall winter aid for Afghanistan totals 7.4 million euros [$9.6 million] this winter," the German government said in a press release on 27 January, specifying that some funds would go to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the ICRC.
Winter relief supplies have also been distributed by various NATO-led Provincial Reconstruction Teams.
"Our assistance package has been tailored to help families decrease their food gaps during critical winter months and to prevent displacement," said the ICRC's Vukotic, adding that some 50,000 households had received pre-winter ICRC food aid.
Gaps remain
Despite assurances by aid agencies, some people in drought-affected areas in the north said they had received little or no assistance.
"We have received no assistance in our village so far," said Noorullah, a farmer from Khoja Mosa District in Faryab Province, saying his agriculture land and livestock had been badly affected by drought.
"Where should we go in search of food… we cannot even afford to leave our homes," said a man from Chemtal District in Balkh Province.
Aid workers say their relief activities are designed to prevent crisis and deliver life-saving aid to the most vulnerable, implying that they cannot assist every poor farmer.
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Japanese party seeks peace in Afghanistan
TOKYO, Feb. 1 (UPI) -- The Democratic Party of Japan says if it gains power it wants to help broker a cease-fire in Afghanistan between U.S.-led forces and Taliban militants.
Kyodo reported Sunday that the party said it would press for the plan if it topples the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in the next election, which must be held by September.
A draft resolution says the DPJ would call on the United Nations to press for the withdrawal of U.S., NATO and Pakistani forces stationed in Afghanistan, and establish an international team of truce monitors, including Japan and several Arab countries not involved in the conflict.
''We will make it clear that this will be different from the past involvement of foreign troops,'' a party member said.
Kyodo said the plan also calls for a non-partisan group of lawmakers to be established so working-level talks between the Taliban and Afghan and Pakistani ministerial-level officials can be held.
Under the plan, Japan would host an international conference in Tokyo to find a path toward peace in Afghanistan and ultimately invite Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani President Asif Zardari to sign a peace agreement.
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U. S. could survive defeat in Afghanistan, NATO will not
By ERICMARGOLIS, SUN MEDIA The Sault Star - Feb 02 4:14 AM
Britain's security minister, Lord West, just dropped a bombshell by declaring his nation's military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan had fuelled global radicalism against Britain and the U. S.
West described as "bollocks" former PM Tony Blair's claims the so-called "war on terror" had nothing to do with growing Islamic radicalism. This comes soon after Britain's foreign secretary, David Miliband, called the term "war on terror," deceptive and damaging.
In an extraordinary move, cabinet minutes of Tony Blair's decision to invade Iraq may be made public shortly, raising the possibility of serious criminal charges -- even war crimes -- against senior British officials While glasnost sweeps London, in Washington, it's deja vu. President Barack Obama vows to plunge the U. S. ever deeper into the eight-year-old Afghan conflict begun by former president George W. Bush by doubling the number of U. S. troops and aircraft there.
Obama's unfortunate move demonstrates political inexperience. A change of administration in Washington, and departure of the reviled Bush, offered an ideal opportunity for Washington to declare a pause in the Afghan war and reassess its policies. It also offered an ideal chance to offer negotiations to the Taliban and its growing number of supporters.
The Afghan war will have to be ended by a political settlement that includes the Taliban-led nationalist alliance that represents over half of Afghanistan's population. There simply is no military solution to this grinding conflict --as even the secretary general of NATO admits.
But instead of diplomacy, the new administration has elected to stick its head ever deeper into the Afghan hornet's nest. The 20,000-30,000 more U. S. troops slated to go to Afghanistan will be standing on a smoking volcano: Pakistan.
The Afghan war is relentlessly seeping into Pakistan, enflaming its people against the NATO powers and, as Lord West rightly says, generating new jihadist forces.
Why are Obama and his advisers committed to expanding a war where there are no vital U. S. interests? Oil is certainly one reason. The proposed route for pipelines taking oil and gas from Central Asia to the Arabian Sea coast run right through Taliban-Pashtun territory.
But there is another important reason. Washington arm-twisted the reluctant NATO alliance -- Canada included -- into sending troops to Afghanistan.
The war is now going very badly for the U. S.-led forces as their vulnerable supply lines come increasingly under Taliban attack. Here in Europe, the majority of public opinion opposes the Afghanistan war as a brazen colonial adventure for oil.
The U. S. could survive a defeat in Afghanistan, as it did in Vietnam. But the NATO alliance might not.
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Two Afghan Children Killed in NATO-Taliban Firefight in Helmand
By Jay Shankar
Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- NATO-led troops in Afghanistan opened fire during military actions, killing two children and an Afghan tribal leader in separate incidents, the coalition said.
Militants armed with rocket-propelled grenades attacked an International Security Assistance Force patrol in the Nad Ali district of Helmand province yesterday, according to an e-mailed statement. Soldiers returned fire, killing the insurgents as well as two children and wounding three Afghans.
“The dead and the injured came from within the compound that the enemy forces used to launch their attack,” according to the statement. “It is thought that the civilians were detained inside the compound” by the militants.
A civilian vehicle approaching an ISAF convoy didn’t follow an order to stop, prompting soldiers to fire a “single warning shot,” according to a separate statement. Both passengers were injured and one, a tribal leader of the eastern Paktika province, succumbed to his injuries at an ISAF hospital in the Orgun district yesterday.
The coalition takes every precaution to make its convoys “as visible as possible,” Richard Blanchette, ISAF spokesman, was quoted as saying in the statement.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has repeatedly criticized international troops for civilian deaths as U.S. and NATO-led forces battle Taliban insurgents trying to topple his government.
In the eight months to August last year, 1,445 civilians were killed in Afghanistan either by international and Afghan forces or by militants, an increase of 39 percent on the same period in 2007, when 1,040 died, according to the United Nations.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jay Shankar in Bangalore at jshankar1@bloomberg.net
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Russian humanitarian aid to reach Afghanistan on Feb. 5
02/ 02/ 2009
KABUL, February 2 (RIA Novosti) - Russia expects to complete a shipment of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan on February 5, an official with the Russian embassy in Kabul told RIA Novosti on Monday.
"As of February 1, Russia had loaded 72 rail carriages with wheat flour" Georgy Mishin, an advisor on economic and trade affairs, said. "The first 11 rail carriages... are currently on their way through the territory of Uzbekistan."
He said the delivery of 17.8 tons of flour would be completed on February 5.
The aid shipment follows a request from Afghani President Hamid Karzai.
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Pakistan: 43 civilians die in Taliban crossfire
By CNN's Zein Basravi
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- At least 43 civilians were killed Sunday when they were caught in the crossfire between Pakistani forces and Taliban militants, a Pakistani military official said.
The official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said the incident happened in Charbagh, a district of Swat Valley in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
The mountainous Swat Valley region used to be a popular destination for tourists and skiers, but today it is a Taliban stronghold.
The Pakistani government and the army have come under criticism in recent weeks for allowing the security situation in Swat to deteriorate in the past few months. Islamabad has said there are plans for a new strategy to fight the Taliban, but they have yet to offer details.
The Taliban are imposing their strict brand of Islamic law in the region -- banning music, forbidding men from shaving, and not allowing teenage girls to attend school.
Government officials say the Taliban have torched and destroyed more than 180 schools in the Swat region. Many families have fled the area, and have been followed by many Pakistani police officers who are too scared to take on Taliban forces, a Pakistani army spokesman told CNN last week.
The Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in 1996 -- harboring al Qaeda leaders, including Osama bin Laden -- and ruled it until they were ousted from power in 2001 after the September 11 attacks on the United States. Since then, the Taliban have regrouped and are currently battling U.S. and NATO-led forces.
U.S. President Barack Obama has called Afghanistan the "central front" in the war on terror and has promised to make fighting extremism there, and in neighboring Pakistan, a foreign policy priority. He is expected to send as many as 30,000 additional U.S. troops to battle Taliban forces.
Richard Holbrooke, the administration's new envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, is scheduled to make his first trip to the region this week.
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Illinois National Guard members in Afghanistan enjoy pizzas during Super Bowl
Treats traveled all the way from Chicago and were taken by plane and convoy to soldiers, contractors
Chicago Tribune - Mon Feb 2, 2:23 am EST
CAMP BLACKHORSE, Afghanistan — The soldiers weren't necessarily hungry, as most looked half-asleep. But just after 4 a.m. Monday, they dug into Chicago pizzas that took almost 10 days, at least four flights and three military convoys to make it to their mess hall.
The last part of the journey seemed like the longest—a 20-minute convoy of six boxes containing 42 frozen Lou Malnati's pizzas from Kabul through a desolate moonscape east to Camp Blackhorse, home to about 75 Illinois National Guard soldiers and other U.S. and NATO service members.
It felt like the Super Bowl—why else would any soldier get up so early to gorge on pizza and jalapeno poppers, the breakfast of caloric champions? Still, in some ways, it was almost like being back at home—Chicago pizza, sent by a suburban Chicago military-support group, being consumed by mostly Illinois National Guard soldiers.
Almost, except for one fact.
"Now all we need are some beers," said Spc. Paul Devore, 21, from Downstate Urbana, scooping up a slice of hot pizza as he and about 30 others gathered to watch the Pittsburgh Steelers take on the Arizona Cardinals. "Perfect."
The ban on alcohol in combat zones was lifted in Iraq for the Super Bowl, so soldiers could drink two beers each. Although some soldiers in Afghanistan grumbled about the inequity, others felt like two beers would only be a tease.
"The main reason I've lost 35 pounds is because I don't have Taco Bell and I don't have beer," said Capt. Michael Riha, 30, a Guard member from Troy, Mich. "It doesn't bother me at all."
The pizzas went everywhere in Afghanistan in what had to be a logistical challenge, especially considering that at least one base has a milk shortage because of supply-route problems. All told, 2,000 frozen Lou Malnati's pizzas and 6,000 bottles of Schlitz left Chicago on Jan. 23, courtesy of Pizzas 4 Patriots, a group founded by Elk Grove Village resident and retired Air Force Master Sgt. Mark Evans. They stopped in New York, then flew on to Iraq, where 1,000 pizzas and the beer were dropped off.
The other pizzas made two more stops before landing in Kabul. Then Mission Pizza started; the pies were pushed out by military convoys throughout Afghanistan, even to forward-operating bases with only a few dozen U.S. service members.
kbarker@tribune.com
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