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NATO commitment to Afghanistan focus of talks
By DAVID RISING, Associated Press Writer
BERLIN – A high-powered U.S. delegation headed by Vice President Joe Biden will join a prestigious weekend conference in Germany likely to focus on Iran's nuclear program and NATO troop commitments to Afghanistan.
Holbrooke adds India to Afghanistan, Pakistan trip
Wed Feb 4, 4:15 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Special envoy Richard Holbrooke will add a stop in India to his south Asia tour next week as part of efforts to stabilize Afghanistan, an Obama administration priority, US officials said Wednesday.
Clinton Tries to Reassure a State Dept. in Transition
By MARK LANDLER The New York Times February 4, 2009
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton sought Wednesday to assuage concern within the State Department that the appointment of two high-profile special emissaries would elbow aside the department’s professional diplomats.
Afghan mobile phone firm tops 3 million users
By Golnar Motevalli
KABUL, Feb 5 (Reuters) - Mobile banking and tapping younger markets have boosted one of Afghanistan's largest telecoms firm's customers by more than 1 million people in the last six months alone, the company said on Thursday.
Taliban Strategy Aims To Cut NATO Logistics, Undermine Elections
By Ron Synovitz Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty February 05, 2009
It has become a rite of spring during the last three decades in Afghanistan. After months of cold weather, the spring thaw makes it possible for militants to leave their winter shelters and travel off road along remote mountain paths to carry out guerrilla attacks.
Russia Rightly Pushing U.S. to Leave Afghanistan
By MIDDLE EAST TIMES February 05, 2009
U.S. President Barack Obama's welcome peace policies in the Middle East were not intended to extend to Afghanistan, but now the leaders of Russia and Kyrgyzstan are forcing him to reassess that message.
Taliban claim responsibility for torching NATO supply trucks
ISLAMABAD, Feb. 5 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani Taliban Thursday claimed responsibility for torching 12 NATO supply containers and blowing up a bridge in the Khyber tribal region to suspend supplies to foreign troops in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan Facing Crucial Year, UN Chief Tells Karzai in Kabul
By Michael Heath
Feb. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Afghanistan faces a “crucial year” as it prepares to hold presidential elections and tries to turn the tide of the Taliban insurgency, United Nations Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon said during a visit to Kabul.
Afghan Finance Minister Resigns To Run For President
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP)--Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday accepted the resignation of his finance minister, who announced that he would run in the August presidential election, the president's office said.
'Finish the job' in Afghanistan? Where do we begin?
Obama faces a complex, perilous situation in which it's no longer clear what the 'job' is, or what it will take to 'finish' it.
Los Angeles Times, CA Rosa Brooks February 5, 2009
In October 2002, Barack Obama -- then a relatively obscure Illinois state senator -- made a speech against the Iraq war. "I don't oppose all wars," he told a Chicago crowd in words that soon became famous.
Roadside bombing kills 3, injures 2 policemen in S Afghanistan
February 05, 2009
One vehicle belonging to Uruzgan police forces in south Afghanistan was struck by roadside mines Thursday on the Uruzgan-Kandahar highway, leaving at least three policemen dead and two more wounded, a police official said.
Suicide Blast Targets Foreign Troop Convoy In Afghanistan
Jalalabad, AFGHANISTAN (AFP)--A suicide car bomb struck a foreign troop convoy in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday, officials said.
Blast Kills Six Bodyguards Of Afghanistan Provincial Governor
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP)--A bomb blast killed six bodyguards belonging to a controversial Afghan governor in violent southern Helmand province, officials said Thursday.
Italy Will Contribute More in Afghanistan, U.S. Ambassador Says
By Steve Scherer
Feb. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Ronald Spogli, the outgoing U.S. ambassador to Italy, said that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi probably is willing to increase the country’s role in Afghanistan.
NI soldiers on way to Afghanistan
Wednesday, 4 February 2009 BBC News
A group of soldiers based in Northern Ireland is preparing for its first ever deployment in Afghanistan.
NATO commander tones down drug lord orders
AFP 5 February 2009
BRUSSELS - NATO's top commander has accepted suggestions from two generals to tone down orders for tackling drug lords and laboratories in Afghanistan, an alliance spokesman said Wednesday.
Afghanistan's presidential contenders
GlobalPost By Jean MacKenzie February 4, 2009
Afghanistan will elect a new president in August 2009. The Afghan Constitution states that the president:
Taliban burns 10 trucks on Afghanistan-Pakistan supply route
The attack follows the destruction of a crucial bridge, creating transport concerns for U.S. and NATO forces.
By Zulfiqar Ali and Laura King Los Angeles Times February 5, 2009
Reporting from Istanbul, Turkey, and Peshawar, Pakistan -- A day after blowing up a crucial land bridge, Taliban militants torched 10 supply trucks returning from Afghanistan to Pakistan on Wednesday
War on Words
Why Obama may be abandoning Bush's favorite phrase
Newsweek Feb 4, 2009
In another effort to undo the legacy of George W. Bush's presidency, the Obama administration is searching for alternatives to the term "war on terror."
Police Destroys Drug Processing Factory
Written by www.quqnoos.com Wednesday, 04 February 2009
Counter-Narcotics police destroyed one drug processing factory and arrested six suspected smugglers
High hopes for Afghan cricket team
Thursday, 5 February 2009 BBC News
The Afghan cricket team has managed to get into the final qualifying round for the Cricket World Cup finals in 2011. Former BBC Afghanistan correspondent, William Reeve, was beside the pitch to cheer the team on at their latest victory in Buenos Aires.
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NATO commitment to Afghanistan focus of talks
By DAVID RISING, Associated Press Writer
BERLIN – A high-powered U.S. delegation headed by Vice President Joe Biden will join a prestigious weekend conference in Germany likely to focus on Iran's nuclear program and NATO troop commitments to Afghanistan.
The Munich Security Conference gathers a dozen world leaders and 50 top diplomats and defense officials and comes amid high expectations that it could also presage a thaw in relations between Washington and Moscow. Ties have been strained over U.S. plans to install a missile defense system in Eastern Europe.
"I see signals that the U.S. as well as Russia are interested in a new beginning," Wolfgang Ischinger, the conference chairman and a former German ambassador to London and Washington, told Bonn's General-Anzeiger newspaper this week.
"The fact that the new American administration has decided to make their first appearance in foreign and security issues outside the United States, represented by their vice president in Munich, speaks for itself," Ischinger said. "I consider this a significant signal."
Biden, a former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and deeply versed in U.S. policy abroad, is expected to push allies at the conference for a greater share of the diplomatic, military and economic burdens confronting the new administration of President Barack Obama.
At the top of the list is keeping pressure on Europe to commit more troops to Afghanistan, and also to contribute more money to finance the Afghan army.
The U.S. delegation includes Obama's national security adviser, Gen. David Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq, and Richard Holbrooke, Obama's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Germany, one of the major European troop contributors, has repeatedly said its military is too stretched to commit any more personnel, but German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman said that did not mean the door to such discussions was closed.
"In Munich there's not only the possibility to discuss the expectations and the recommendations of the new (American) administration, but also an important opportunity for the main European actors to present their own suggestions and develop conceptional ideas," spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm said.
The conference, now in its 45th year, starts Friday, with Munich's upscale Bayerischer Hof hotel providing an intimate setting for frank exchanges on policy. Police are expecting more than 5,000 protesters at the conference, and will have 3,700 officers on duty to keep them away from the hotel.
Past years have produced fireworks, like 2007 when then-Russian President Vladimir Putin lashed out against American foreign policy, accusing Washington of inciting other countries to seek nuclear weapons to defend themselves from an "almost uncontained use of military force" by the U.S.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates responded that "one Cold War is enough."
Neither men are scheduled to be in Munich this year, but Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov is due to attend.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in an opinion piece printed Wednesday in Munich's Sueddeutsche Zeitung, said it was a "positive sign" that Moscow last month said it would only go ahead with deploying missiles near the Polish border if the U.S. pushed forward with a European missile shield based in Eastern Europe.
He said now "all sides" should talk over the plans together, preferably in the NATO-Russia Council.
"When it is about a common threat, common answers are possible," wrote Steinmeier, who is attending the conference.
Other delegates include: German Chancellor Angela Merkel; French President Nicholas Sarkozy; Afghan President Hamid Karzai; Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk; and Mohammed ElBaradei, the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki and Iranian parliament speaker, Ali Larijani have also said they will attend.
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Holbrooke adds India to Afghanistan, Pakistan trip
Wed Feb 4, 4:15 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Special envoy Richard Holbrooke will add a stop in India to his south Asia tour next week as part of efforts to stabilize Afghanistan, an Obama administration priority, US officials said Wednesday.
In addition to visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan, Holbrooke will travel to India to hear ideas about how to stabilize Afghanistan, but he will not try to mediate the conflict in Kashmir, State Department officials said.
"His portfolio is to deal with Afghanistan-Pakistan, and he's going to India because India is an important player in that region," department spokesman Robert Wood told reporters. "Kashmir was never part of his portfolio."
US media had reported Indian fears that Holbrooke would pressure India to resolve the conflict -- over which two wars with Pakistan have been fought -- in order to free Pakistan up to stabilize its border with Afghanistan.
"India is an important country in the region and has interest in Afghanistan," Wood said.
"And he wants to hear from the Indian government in terms of how we can all better contribute to peace and stability in Afghanistan," he added.
"In essence this is an orientation trip," said Wood after Holbrooke briefed him on his plans.
"He's not carrying any messages to any of these governments from either the secretary or the president. And he's not going there to lecture, he's going there to listen," he added.
He added that Holbrooke will "report back" to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama, who appointed him just two days after Obama's inauguration on January 20.
Wood did not say whether Holbrooke would pursue US efforts to encourage Pakistan to cooperate more with the probe into the November attacks on Mumbai, India's financial capital, in which 10 gunmen killed 165 people.
India has handed the Pakistan government what it said was evidence linking "elements" in Pakistan to the militants.
Wood said Holbrooke is traveling first to the Munich Conference on Security Policy, which begins Friday and ends at the weekend, but he gave no dates for his south Asia tour except to say he will visit Afghanistan, Pakistan and India in that order.
In Munich, Holbrooke will join Vice President Joseph Biden.
Afghanistan is likely to feature prominently at the conference this year, with the Obama administration expected to ask European allies to join the United States in sending more troops to the war, given deteriorating security conditions.
Holbrooke, 68, has a reputation as a hard-nosed diplomat best known for brokering the 1995 peace agreement that ended three years of war in Bosnia.
Clinton said she discussed with Holbrooke efforts to better determine how US development funds sent to Afghanistan were being spent amid allegations of widespread corruption.
"So our goal is not to spend money for the sake of spending it but to do so in order to produce a tangible result that will benefit the people of Afghanistan," Clinton told a meeting in the State Department.
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Clinton Tries to Reassure a State Dept. in Transition
By MARK LANDLER The New York Times February 4, 2009
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton sought Wednesday to assuage concern within the State Department that the appointment of two high-profile special emissaries would elbow aside the department’s professional diplomats.
Mrs. Clinton said the envoys would consult with senior officials in Washington and ambassadors overseas. Acknowledging that these appointments have caused angst within the Foreign Service, she told employees at a public meeting, “I invite people to let us know what we can do to make this work better.”
Mrs. Clinton addressed two other issues that had roiled the State Department, saying that she would seek financing for more people to fill hazardous posts like Baghdad and that she would try to reduce the department’s reliance on private security firms like Blackwater Worldwide, which was denied a license by Iraq after its guards were involved in deadly shootings of civilians.
But in neither case was she able to offer more than a modicum of comfort. Mrs. Clinton said that budget constraints and the continuing demand for a large staff in Iraq made it hard to predict how much the pressure to serve there and in other hardship posts would diminish. She also said that it was difficult to imagine that the State Department could do without any outside contractors to supply security.
The town hall format in which Mrs. Clinton appeared clearly played to her political strengths. There were moments when the gathering felt like a more decorous version of the town hall meetings that she attended as a presidential candidate.
Mrs. Clinton said the emissaries — George J. Mitchell, the former senator who is the envoy to the Middle East, and Richard C. Holbrooke, the special representative to Pakistan and Afghanistan — were already busy. Mr. Mitchell, who just returned from a trip to Egypt, Israel, Jordan and other countries, met Wednesday with President Obama and Mrs. Clinton, and State Department officials said he was eager to set up an office in the region.
Mr. Holbrooke leaves Wednesday for Europe, and then will go to Pakistan, Afghanistan and India on what the State Department called an orientation trip.
“The advantage of special envoys is you get off to a fast start,” Mrs. Clinton said, noting that they do not require Senate confirmation. “Contrast that, to be very clear about this, with all the people still waiting to be confirmed.”
Answering one of the few blunt questions she received from a friendly audience of State Department employees, Mrs. Clinton said the department was likely to continue using contractors to provide security to diplomats in Afghanistan and Iraq, despite the outcry over Blackwater.
“I certainly am of the mind that we should, insofar as possible, reduce our dependence on private security contractors,” she said. “Whether we can go all the way to banning, under current circumstances, seems unlikely.”
Mrs. Clinton said the size of the American diplomatic presence in Iraq would depend largely on the demands of the Iraqis. She said that while the State Department was eager to take back some of the functions that had migrated to the Pentagon — as the defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, has advocated — money would be a limiting factor.
Condoleezza Rice provoked a furor in the department as secretary of state in late 2007 when she threatened to make Iraq tours compulsory to fill vacancies. In the end, the department found enough volunteers, but the issue continues to touch a raw nerve among diplomats, who are paid extra for going but cannot take their families.
Still enjoying a honeymoon with employees, Mrs. Clinton seemed at ease in her new job, though she complained about having to make the same sacrifice as her boss, Mr. Obama: restricting use of her BlackBerry. “At least during the day,” she added, without elaboration.
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Afghan mobile phone firm tops 3 million users
By Golnar Motevalli
KABUL, Feb 5 (Reuters) - Mobile banking and tapping younger markets have boosted one of Afghanistan's largest telecoms firm's customers by more than 1 million people in the last six months alone, the company said on Thursday.
Landline cover is almost non-existent in Afghanistan, a result of three decades of war.
"Afghanistan is one of the highest priorities in terms of investment ... people are still looking to invest and telecoms is really the only success story we have right now," Altaf Ladak, Chief Operating Officer of Roshan, told Reuters.
Active subscribers increased to about 3.1 million, from 2 million, between June and December 2008, Ladak said, driven by the introduction of mobile banking, discounted friends and family packages and tariffs which target the younger end of the market.
Roshan, which has coverage in more than 226 cities and a 46 percent share of the market, reached a "tipping point" of fast growth whereby the "entry barriers have come down to a point where it's very easy for people to buy a sim card," Ladak added.
Roshan is part owned by France's Monaco Telecom International, a subsidiary of Cable & Wireless (CW.L), and Swedish-Finnish TeliaSonera (TLSN.ST), while the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development owns a 51 percent stake, investing all its profits in development projects across Afghanistan.
THRIVING SECTOR
Billions of dollars of aid are pumped into Afghanistan each year to rebuild the country's crumbling infrastructure and while private enterprise is encouraged by the government, the country ranks very low on the World Bank's "doing business" index.
The telecoms sector has flourished since the 2001 fall of the Taliban and big regional players such as the United Arab Emirates' Etisalat ETEL.AD have recently entered the market.
"They have deep pockets and have spent quite a bit of money over the past two to three years," Ladak said, adding that Roshan, which is Afghanistan's largest tax payer, still had room on its balance sheet last year to invest $85 million in network infrastructure, despite the financial crisis.
Ladak said the only anticipated knock-on affect of the credit crunch on Roshan's business would come from a decrease in money repatriated to Afghanistan from Afghans living abroad, which will impact how much money people can spend locally.
Ladak said Roshan's last publicly available financial statement showed a $200 million annual profit and he was upbeat about growth, anticipating "a strong market" in the next two years at least. (Editing by Jeremy Laurence)
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Taliban Strategy Aims To Cut NATO Logistics, Undermine Elections
By Ron Synovitz Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty February 05, 2009
It has become a rite of spring during the last three decades in Afghanistan. After months of cold weather, the spring thaw makes it possible for militants to leave their winter shelters and travel off road along remote mountain paths to carry out guerrilla attacks.
In recent years, NATO and U.S. military officials have referred to the increase of militant violence that comes with the warmer weather as a "Taliban spring offensive."
But the spring fighting has never been an offensive in the conventional military sense of the word. Rather, it has been a surge in guerrilla violence -- waves of suicide attacks, roadside bombings, and even assassinations of Kabul-appointed judges or local administrators.
Tim Ripley, a military analyst and correspondent for "Jane's Defense Weekly," said that past spring offensives have meant increased mobility for Taliban fighters to move supplies and fighters across the border from Pakistan. That allows fighters based in Afghanistan to re-arm and intensify their operations against NATO, U.S., and Afghan government forces.
Although NATO officials are no longer referring to a "spring offensive," Ripley says the intensification of fighting in the region has already begun, with attacks on NATO supply routes that link Pakistan's port city of Karachi with bases in Afghanistan. Those attacks, he said, are "linked to the movement of the insurgency and intensification of the insurgency in [Pakistan's] North West Frontier Province."
Within Afghanistan, Ripley said, "the political situation is becoming increasingly unstable as we approach the election. The Taliban see this as the moment to apply maximum pressure -- to push more and more provinces and more districts away from the [Kabul] government and undermine the control of the government."
Ripley tells RFE/RL that a clear Taliban strategy for 2009 already is apparent.
"I wouldn't call it a spring strategy. I think it's a strategy for the year," he said. "The elections are scheduled for the summer or early autumn.... They are preparing the ground for that -- to deliver what could be the coup de grace to the Karzai government."
Taliban Tactics
Alongside the spring surge in violence, villagers who cooperate with Afghan government troops or international forces are often faced with an upsurge in threats from militants. Taliban loyalists are known for leaving threatening "night letters" posted on the mud brick walls of village compounds.
Ripley says another way the Taliban is trying to undermine stability is to set up shadow administrations that challenge the authority of the local officials who have been appointed by the central government in Kabul.
"In every district where they have a presence, they set up a shadow administration, a shadow mayor, a shadow provincial chief or shadow judges and courts," Ripley said. "Depending on the level of insurgent presence in a province, that shadow organization either remains undercover or overtly comes out into the open."
Those shadow authorities have made their presence known in the provinces of Helmand, Kandahar, and Oruzgan, and along the Pakistani border, Ripley said.
In 2006, a resurgent Taliban could be seen concentrating fighters for attacks on the forward operations bases of foreign troops or on isolated Afghan police posts. But that tactic exposed militants to NATO air strikes and led to high numbers of Taliban casualties.
Recent analysis by Tundra Strategic Security Solutions -- a Canadian-owned private security consulting firm -- suggests that militants carried out concentrated ground attacks less frequently during 2008 -- despite a handful of high-profile skirmishes.
Instead, there was a marked increase in roadside bomb attacks -- like those seen in Iraq -- many using a home-made armor piercing device known as an "explosively-formed projectile."
As Seen In Iraq
Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak says it is no accident that the weaponry and fighting tactics of Iraqi insurgents are increasingly being seen in Afghanistan.
"Since last year, as a result of the success of the surge in Iraq, there has been a flow of foreign terrorists into Afghanistan," Wardak said. In some conflicts in 2008, "actually 60 percent of the total force which we have encountered were foreign fighters," he said.
U.S. President Barack Obama's plan for Afghanistan calls for as many as 30,000 more U.S. troops to be deployed there -- a task that could be made more difficult by the attacks on NATO supply routes in Pakistan, and by Kyrgyzstan's intention to evict U.S. troops from a strategic logistical base at Manas International Airport near Bishkek.
Meanwhile, calls by NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer for more troop contributions for the Afghan mission by NATO countries have failed to garner the numbers that military planners say are now necessary.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on February 4 said that some members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization -- comprised of seven former Soviet republics -- could help by deploying troops to Afghanistan.
"The Russian Federation and other CSTO member states, countries of Central Asia, are ready for full-fledged, comprehensive cooperation with the United States of America and other countries of the coalition in combating terrorism in the region," Medvedev said.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon insists on an international strategy that combines economic development with the continuing military mission of the UN-mandated and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.
"The plan we have focuses on investment in key sectors: agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and on making aid more effective. Where there is stability, we must invest in development. Where stability is tenuous, we must focus on restoring the confidence of Afghanistan," Ban said.
Defense Minister Wardak agrees that there is not a purely military solution to Afghanistan's security conundrum. But he concedes that as long as the Afghan government and its international supporters fail to provide security for all of the Afghan population, the situation will continue to be exploited by the Taliban.
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Russia Rightly Pushing U.S. to Leave Afghanistan
By MIDDLE EAST TIMES February 05, 2009
U.S. President Barack Obama's welcome peace policies in the Middle East were not intended to extend to Afghanistan, but now the leaders of Russia and Kyrgyzstan are forcing him to reassess that message.
Obama vowed in his election campaign to pump 30,000 more U.S. troops into Afghanistan to reverse the collapse in credibility of President Hamid Karzai's government there.
But this week, Russia and Kyrgyzstan showed Obama in no uncertain way how tenuous the supply lines to Afghanistan for the United States and its NATO allies really are.
Russia, despite facing potentially the worst financial crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union, revealed Wednesday that it has concluded a huge $2 billion aid deal to the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia and on Tuesday the Kyrgyz government announced that it was evicting the United States from the Manas air base near the Kyrgyzstan capital Bishkek.
Manas is a crucial link on the U.S.-NATO air supply route to Afghanistan. All other supply routes go either through or over dangerously unpredictable and unstable Pakistan. The Kyrgyz decision, made at the obvious prompting of the Kremlin, at a stroke threatens to render Obama's tough Afghan policy useless.
In fact the Russians and the Kyrgyz would be doing Obama and the United States a favor by forcing them out of Afghanistan.
Whatever else one can say to criticize U.S. policy in Iraq, starting with the disastrous determination of President George W. Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to invade Iraq and topple its long-time President Saddam Hussein, at least in realpolitik terms, Iraq was a strategic prize of the first order as it sits on probably the second largest treasure trove of easily extractable high grade petroleum in the world.
Afghanistan, by contrast, sits on nothing. It is in one of the most inhospitable, impoverished and remote neighborhoods in the world.
The only serious interest the United States has in Afghanistan is in preventing it from ever again being used as a base or safe haven for terror groups like al-Qaida to attack the United States, as al-Qaida did on Sept. 11, 2001.
No nation in the world has ever succeeded in occupying Afghanistan or reconstructing its government and society. When the British Empire tried to do it in 1840-41, it lost an entire army of 15,000 men and dependents. Literally only one of them survived the final massacre and made it back to neighboring India.
When the Soviet Union tried to occupy and remake Afghanistan at the height of its power, it lost 15,000 dead in a long eight-year guerrilla war before pulling out.
Now Obama is following Bush in making the same mistake.
The Russians and the Kyrgyz do not want the United States to remain in Afghanistan, which is why they pulled the plug on the Manas base.
But the United States should not be in Afghanistan anyway. Obama should apply the same sound principles in Afghanistan that he already plans to do in Iraq and end his predecessor's Central Asian folly as quickly as possible.
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Taliban claim responsibility for torching NATO supply trucks
ISLAMABAD, Feb. 5 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani Taliban Thursday claimed responsibility for torching 12 NATO supply containers and blowing up a bridge in the Khyber tribal region to suspend supplies to foreign troops in Afghanistan.
The private NNI news agency quoted local Taliban commander Hazrat Ali as saying that Taliban were responsible for the three incidents Wednesday night, in which 12 containers were torched and three bombs planted at two schools and a bridge.
Hazrat Ali said that the attacks on the U.S. supplies to Afghanistan and on schools would continue until the supplies were completely stopped, adding that the main bridge at Ali Masjid was targeted to halt the U.S. supply to Afghanistan.
He also threatened the transporters not to carry the U.S. goods into Afghanistan otherwise they would face serious consequences.
Meanwhile, the local political administration has started reconstruction on the damaged bridge of Ali Masjid with full swing. Flow of passengers' coaches and U.S. supply are still continuing on an alternate diversion road, according to local press reports. The administration urged locals to get hand-in-hand with law-enforcers to eliminate outlaws and criminals from the area.
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Afghanistan Facing Crucial Year, UN Chief Tells Karzai in Kabul
By Michael Heath
Feb. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Afghanistan faces a “crucial year” as it prepares to hold presidential elections and tries to turn the tide of the Taliban insurgency, United Nations Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon said during a visit to Kabul.
The Afghan government must concentrate on “addressing security challenges and also establishing fuller democracy” in the nation, Ban told President Hamid Karzai, according to a statement on the UN’s Web site.
Western officials have criticized Karzai, who plans to seek re-election, for allowing corruption in his administration and failing to control the drugs trade that helps finance the insurgency. Poor governance has cost his administration popular support and undermined the fight against the Taliban, they say.
Ban said U.S. and NATO-led forces fighting insurgents in Afghanistan are important to helping stabilize the country. He said he backed Karzai’s efforts to reach out to the Taliban and try to arrange peace talks aimed at ending the conflict.
There is a “need to balance political and military means to stability in Afghanistan, including through an Afghan-led political solution based on the constitution,” Ban said.
Karzai, whose government is trying to rebuild a country shattered by almost 30 years of conflict, last year called on Taliban leaders including Mullah Mohammad Omar to return home. The Taliban sheltered al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden before being ousted by U.S.-led forces in 2001.
Troop ‘Surge’
President Barack Obama plans to boost U.S. forces in Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban under a strategy similar to the troop “surge” ordered by former President George W. Bush that helped quell the insurgency in Iraq.
Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak said yesterday the success of the surge in Iraq resulted in “a flow of foreign terrorists into Afghanistan,” Agence France-Presse reported. He said there were battles last year where 60 percent of insurgents fighting against the Afghan army were “foreign,” AFP reported.
Ban visited Kabul before traveling to Pakistan, where thousands of al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters sought shelter in the country’s tribal regions after U.S.-led forces toppled the Islamist regime in Afghanistan.
The secretary-general said at a news conference with Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani that the international community must demonstrate a concerted commitment to combating terrorism, according to the official Associated Press of Pakistan.
Mumbai Probe
Ban also called on Pakistan to fully cooperate with India in the investigation of the Mumbai terrorist attacks.
Gilani said earlier this month his government has reviewed information provided by India on the events in Mumbai last November and will respond shortly.
India blames Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba for the Nov. 26-29 siege that killed 164 people. It presented Gilani’s government with a dossier of evidence last month that it said proved the involvement of Pakistani nationals.
The government in New Delhi ordered a “pause” in the five-year peace process with Pakistan after the Mumbai attacks. The nuclear-armed neighbors have fought three wars since independence in 1947, two of them over Kashmir, a Himalayan region divided between them and claimed in full by both.
Ban called for a resumption of the so-called composite dialogue between Pakistan and India to resolve all issues, including the Kashmir dispute.
“Cooperative and friendly relations between India and Pakistan are not only beneficial for the two countries, but also desirable for peace and stability in the subcontinent,” he said.
Bhutto Inquiry
Ban also said the UN would establish a commission of inquiry into the death of Benazir Bhutto, APP reported. He made the announcement at a dinner hosted by President Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto’s widow.
Bhutto’s assassination on Dec. 27, 2007, triggered nationwide riots in Pakistan and prompted the then-government to postpone parliamentary elections by six weeks. Her death helped swing the public against former President Pervez Musharraf and his allies were defeated at the ballot, allowing Bhutto’s party, led by Zardari, to form a coalition government.
No autopsy was performed on Bhutto’s body and the crime scene was cleaned shortly after her death, prompting suspicions of a cover up and Zardari’s demand for the UN investigation.
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Afghan Finance Minister Resigns To Run For President
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP)--Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday accepted the resignation of his finance minister, who announced that he would run in the August presidential election, the president's office said.
Anwar ul-Haq Ahadi, finance minister for several years, announced Wednesday that he would stand in the elections, only the second-ever presidential vote in the war-torn country's history.
Ahadi "sent his resignation to the president after he announced his candidacy for the elections," a statement from Karzai's office said.
"The president accepted the resignation of...Anwar Ul-Haq Ahadi, appreciating his services and wished his success," it added.
Ahadi has become the first high-profile candidate to officially throw his hat into the ring for the presidency. Karzai has vowed to run for a second term but is considered weakened by rising unrest and government corruption.
Former Afghan Interior Minister Ali Ahmadi Jalali and Ahadi's predecessor as finance minister, Ashraf Ghani, are tipped as the main challengers to Karzai but have yet to officially announced their candidacy.
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'Finish the job' in Afghanistan? Where do we begin?
Obama faces a complex, perilous situation in which it's no longer clear what the 'job' is, or what it will take to 'finish' it.
Los Angeles Times, CA Rosa Brooks February 5, 2009
In October 2002, Barack Obama -- then a relatively obscure Illinois state senator -- made a speech against the Iraq war. "I don't oppose all wars," he told a Chicago crowd in words that soon became famous. "What I am opposed to is a dumb war. ... You want a fight, President Bush? Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Qaeda."
As Obama moved to the U.S. Senate in 2005, and then on to the presidential campaign trail, the pledge to "finish the job" in Afghanistan became a central part of his foreign policy platform.
As politics, it was effective. But as policy, it no longer looks like such a no-brainer.
That's not because Obama is wrong when he insists that we ignore Afghanistan at our peril. If Afghanistan implodes and becomes a haven for Al Qaeda again, U.S. and global security will be threatened.
And if the violence in Afghanistan continues to spill over into nuclear-armed Pakistan and triggers the collapse of that country's fragile civilian government, the dangers are even greater.
The problem with "finishing the job" in Afghanistan is that it's no longer entirely clear what the "job" is, or what it would mean to "finish" it.
As the Bush administration rushed to war in Iraq, Afghanistan became America's orphaned war. U.S. troops in Afghanistan struggled to get resources, equipment and the attention of policymakers. Planned reconstruction projects languished, and early military gains began to erode. Afghan civilian support slipped. With too few ground troops, the U.S.-led coalition began to rely more and more on close air support (in 2005, there were 7,421 close air support missions; in 2008, there were 19,603). But the increase in aerial bombing dramatically increased unintended civilian deaths (bombs don't discriminate between terrorists and children). Civilian support eroded further.
As NATO redoubled its efforts to drive the Taliban and Al Qaeda from the Afghan mountains, militants operating in Afghanistan took refuge in neighboring Pakistan's ungoverned border regions. From there, they increasingly staged cross-border raids into Afghanistan, disrupted NATO supply lines between Pakistan and Afghanistan and carried out attacks on targets linked to the unpopular Pakistani government.
As a result, the U.S. war in Afghanistan gradually bled over into Pakistan. The U.S. has responded to militant attacks from within Pakistan with intermittent airstrikes against targets in Pakistani territory, but these have also caused unintended civilian deaths, increasingly radicalizing the Pakistani population and further jeopardizing the future of Pakistan's shaky secular civilian government.
So at this point, how we "finish the job" in Afghanistan isn't clear anymore.
Send more troops to Afghanistan, as President Obama intends to do? With more and more of Afghanistan falling back under the control of the Taliban, additional troops are clearly necessary in the short term just to protect major population centers from Taliban predation. More ground troops will also reduce the need for close air support, which will help minimize civilian casualties.
But without a broader strategy, extra troops alone won't help in the long run. Eradicating the Taliban and Al Qaeda from Afghanistan does the United States little good if Pakistan (with its nuclear prizes) solidifies as the new staging area for regional and global terrorism. But the U.S. can't add a full-scale war in Pakistan to the two wars we've already got.
In the longer run, a better strategy would be to deny the militants the popular support they need to survive, by helping both the Afghans and the Pakistani people get the roads, schools and economic and governance infrastructure they need. But there's a chicken-and-egg problem: A military solution won't work without substantial investment in the civilian sector, but civilian reconstruction projects can't get done in the midst of terrible insecurity.
In 2002, "finishing the job" in Afghanistan would have been a (relatively) feasible plan. Today, just keeping Afghanistan and Pakistan from sliding jointly into chaos will require a comprehensive approach, melding military and development strategies and addressing the broader regional dynamics at play. (Pakistan's long-simmering tensions with India reduce its willingness to put serious resources into counter- terrorism, for instance, while U.S. tensions with Russia and Iran reduce opportunities for regional cooperation.)
But that doesn't mean the administration won't be able to make progress in Afghanistan. Obama is doing what he should in these first weeks, calling for a comprehensive strategy review and listening to experts whose views differ.
Meanwhile, probably the best thing his team can do is finish off the "finish the job" metaphor. We're nowhere close to finishing, and there's no single "job." Restoring stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan will be a long, multifaceted process involving many players in addition to the U.S. -- and that process is just getting started.
rbrooks@latimescolumnists.com
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Roadside bombing kills 3, injures 2 policemen in S Afghanistan
February 05, 2009
One vehicle belonging to Uruzgan police forces in south Afghanistan was struck by roadside mines Thursday on the Uruzgan-Kandahar highway, leaving at least three policemen dead and two more wounded, a police official said.
Juma Gul Humat, the provincial police chief of Uruzgan, told Xinhua that it occurred around Thursday noon when the police vehicle patrolling along the Uruzgan-Kandahar high way hit IEDs (Improvised Explosive Device).
"The incident happened near Shawali Kot district of Kandahar province and Uruzgan police forces has sent a team to the spot for investigation," the police official added.
The southern Afghanistan has seen escalating violence and attacks against interests of government and international troops during past week as another roadside bombing Wednesday afternoon targeting district chief of Musa Qala district in southern Afghan province of Helmand killed at least six guards aboard.
Conflicts and Taliban-linked insurgency had left over 5,000 people, with some 2,000 civilians dead, in 2008 while the violence is predicted to go up in 2009 in the post-Taliban central Asian state.
Source:Xinhua
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Suicide Blast Targets Foreign Troop Convoy In Afghanistan
Jalalabad, AFGHANISTAN (AFP)--A suicide car bomb struck a foreign troop convoy in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday, officials said.
The suicide bomber detonated a vehicle laden with explosives near a convoy of international soldiers outside Jalalabad, the capital of Nangarahr province, said Zemarai Bashary, Afghan interior ministry spokesman.
"There has been a suicide car bomb attack against international forces but at this stage we have no information if it caused any casualties to the troops," the spokesman told AFP.
Bashary said the blast caused no civilian casualties - a common feature of most insurgent attacks against Afghan and foreign forces.
The area was cordoned off by Afghan police and foreign military personnel, and media weren't allowed access to the blast site, an AFP reporter said.
Bashary didn't specify if the targeted troops were from NATO or a U.S.-led coalition, but locals said they were American forces.
The U.S. military said it was checking the reports.
Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said the attack targeted U.S. soldiers who were returning from an Afghan army base.
He said there were no casualties among the military.
Taliban militants, ousted from power by the 2001 US-led invasion, frequently target security forces with suicide and roadside bombings, mainly in southern and eastern parts of Afghanistan.
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Blast Kills Six Bodyguards Of Afghanistan Provincial Governor
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP)--A bomb blast killed six bodyguards belonging to a controversial Afghan governor in violent southern Helmand province, officials said Thursday.
A roadside bomb ripped through the bodyguards' vehicle in the district of Musa Qala late Wednesday, killing everyone inside, said Daud Ahmadi, a spokesman for provincial governor Mullah Abdul Salam, a former Taliban commander.
"A bomb blast killed six bodyguards of the Musa Qala district governor yesterday," the spokesman said, adding that Salam wasn't present at the time of the blast.
Musa Qala, a key drugs producing center, was a Taliban stronghold until Afghan, U.K. and U.S. soldiers retook control in December 2007 after an offensive lasting several days.
Helmand accounts for most of Afghanistan's opium and heroin production - a trade worth $4 billion a year, from which the Taliban profit.
Several attacks have targeted the governor, his guards and his residence in the past year.
Former rebel commander Salam fell in with the Western-backed government and made it possible for the Afghan and foreign soldiers to retake the district.
The Taliban were removed from government in the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, but have led an increasingly violent insurgency against the Afghan authorities and foreign forces.
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Italy Will Contribute More in Afghanistan, U.S. Ambassador Says
By Steve Scherer
Feb. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Ronald Spogli, the outgoing U.S. ambassador to Italy, said that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi probably is willing to increase the country’s role in Afghanistan.
“In my opinion, Italy is ready to contribute more,” Spogli told reporters today in Rome during his last day as ambassador. “It remains to be seen whether more troops will be offered” by Italy, Spogli said, suggesting that the government could offer more machinery, training personnel or humanitarian aid instead.
President Barack Obama is poised to deploy as many as 30,000 additional U.S. troops in Afghanistan, and he has made it clear that he is counting on America’s NATO allies to pitch in. Italy is increasing its troops in northwestern Afghanistan, in and around the city of Heart, to about 2,795 at the start of this year from around 2,500 at the end of 2008, Defense Minister Ignazio La Russa said in December.
Spogli today said there had been no “formal” request yet by the U.S. for the Italian government to do more. A new U.S. ambassador to Italy has yet to be named.
Vice President Joe Biden, White House National Security Adviser James Jones, the envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, and Army General David Petraeus will attend the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy that starts tomorrow and will end on Feb. 8. Italy’s La Russa will also be in attendance.
To contact the reporters on this story: Steve Scherer in Rome at scherer@bloomberg.net
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NI soldiers on way to Afghanistan
Wednesday, 4 February 2009 BBC News
A group of soldiers based in Northern Ireland is preparing for its first ever deployment in Afghanistan.
The 19 Light Brigade from Lisburn's Thiepval Barracks completed its final training session in England on Wednesday.
It will travel to the fledgling democracy in April.
"We're well aware of the dangers, but all the training we've had to date will leave us in good standing," said Private Isobel Taggart from Newry.
"It will be challenging and I'll have a five-year-old at home, however, I'll just have to keep focused."
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NATO commander tones down drug lord orders
AFP 5 February 2009
BRUSSELS - NATO's top commander has accepted suggestions from two generals to tone down orders for tackling drug lords and laboratories in Afghanistan, an alliance spokesman said Wednesday.
US General John Craddock came under fire after telling commanders that he wanted troops in the 50,000-strong NATO-led security force "to attack directly drug producers and facilities throughout Afghanistan."
His "guidance" -- a first step before issuing orders -- for handling such people was leaked to German news magazine Der Spiegel, and sparked an internal security probe at NATO.
"The discussion within the chain of command has now been completed," NATO spokesman James Appathurai told reporters at alliance headquarters.
He said that Egon Ramms, the German leader at NATO Command in the Netherlands, which is currently in charge of NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), and ISAF commander David McKiernan, had been consulted.
"The guidance provided up the chain from General Ramms and General McKiernan was accepted by General Craddock," he said.
"ISAF forces will be able to engage against narcotics facilities and facilitators where they provide material support to the insurgency."
Spiegel said that McKiernan's Kabul office had sent a letter claiming that Craddock had been trying to create a "new category" in the rules of engagement for dealing with opposing forces. Ramms too had been critical.
Craddock's mandate as Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) ends in June.
Appathurai insisted that "everything that will be done at ISAF will be done fully in compliance with international law, with the laws of armed conflict, as well as national laws."
The Taliban, ousted from power seven years ago by a US-led coalition, has been reaping close to 100 million dollars (77 million euros) a year from the opium trade and using the proceeds to fund its insurgency.
Afghanistan produces around 90 percent of the world's illegal opium, much of which is turned into heroin inside the country and exported to Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia.
The bulk of Afghanistan's opium production is centred in the south of the country, which is also the heart of the Taliban-led insurgency.
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Afghanistan's presidential contenders
GlobalPost By Jean MacKenzie February 4, 2009
Afghanistan will elect a new president in August 2009. The Afghan Constitution states that the president:
must be a citizen of Afghanistan, a Muslim and born of Afghan parents, and he or she should not have citizenship of another country; on the day of becoming a candidate, should not be younger than 40; and should not have been convicted of crimes against humanity, a criminal act, or deprivation of civil rights by a court.
The Main Contenders: Ali Ahmad Jalali, who served as Afghanistan's interior minister from 2003 to 2005, and now lectures at the U.S. Naval Defense University. Jalali, who quit the Interior Ministry in what many observers saw as a dispute over corruption and patronage, enjoys a reputation for strength and probity among Afghans. He even has a Facebook following. Born in 1940, he is the oldest of the major contenders, but this is not necessarily a drawback in a country that reveres its elders. Jalali lived and worked in the United States for more than two decades, returning to Afghanistan in 2003 to take up his position in the Interior Ministry. At present he is the front runner; one Western diplomat who has been very active in election preparations said, when pressed, “I think Jalali will win.”
Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, former finance minister, currently chancellor of Kabul University and an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University. Ashraf Ghani has been a prominent and highly respected figure in Afghan politics since his term as finance minister, 2002 to 2004, when he set up the country's monetary system. He was widely seen as a strong contender for the top position, both in Afghanistan and in international circles, but his battle with stomach cancer seemed to take him out of the running. In a recent interview with CNN, Ashraf Ghani said he was “seriously considering” running for president, and he looked fit and ready. His distinguished resume includes a Ph.D. from Columbia University, stints at the World Bank, and numerous publications, including “Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World,” which he wrote with close associate Clare Lockhart. Ashraf Ghani reportedly enjoys excellent relations with many in Washington's power elite, including Richard Holbrooke, President Ba
rack Obama's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. He, too, is listed on Facebook.
Zalmay Khalilzad, former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, to Iraq, and, most recently, to the United Nations. During his tenure in Kabul, Khalilzad was known as the “Viceroy” for the extraordinary degree of influence he held over the Afghan president. Afghans would joke that Khalilzad was the “real” president of Afghanistan. Khalilzad, an Afghan-American who was seen as a Rumsfeld protege at the Department of Defense, may be contemplating a return to his homeland. Rumors of his candidacy for Afghanistan's top spot have been circulating for months, and he has steadfastly denied them all, but with a degree of coyness that leaves room for doubt. Here's his Facebook group.
Hanif Atmar, Afghan minister of the interior, former minister of education and minister of rural rehabilitation and development. The British-educated Atmar has figured prominently in Afghan politics since 2002, when he took over MRRD. Born in 1968, Atmar barely makes the 40-year-old age cutoff for candidacy, but he has a reputation as a strong leader, and, according to insiders at the Interior Ministry, enjoys the firm support of the British. He also received a visit from then-Vice President-Elect Joe Biden in early January, giving rise to speculation that the United States may be throwing some influence his way.
Gul Agha Sherzai, governor of Nangahar, enjoys a reputation for ruthless efficiency, and is credited with cleaning out Nanagahr's poppy crop. But he cannot escape the tales of brutality and corruption that have dogged him since his first tour as governor of Kandahar in the early 1990s. Afghans and foreign observers alike were mystified when Obama sought him out during a brief visit to Afghanistan in July 2008, meeting with Sherzai even before seeing Karzai. Sherzai makes an unlikely presidential figure, but could parlay his influence into a major ministerial post, such as interior or security.
Abdullah Abdullah was Karzai's foreign minister from 2001 to 2006, and was a prominent figure in the Northern Alliance, the loose agglomeration of military commanders who battled the Taliban. He was close to the legendary Ahmad Shah Massoud, which alone would disqualify him in the eyes of many of the country's Pashtuns. While the international community has enthusiastically joined with the remnants of the Northern Alliance in elevating Massoud to hero status, many Pashtuns see the Tajik commander as little more than another of the country's warlords, who brought ruin upon the country.
Ramazan Bashar Dost, a fiery parliamentarian, has already begun handing out fliers advertising his candidacy. The former minister of planning is something of an eccentric, and ran his earlier presidential and parliamentary bids from a tent pitched in a central Kabul park. He has also made a career out of excoriating foreigners for inefficiency and corruption, which has endeared him to his fellow countrymen but has not earned him many friends abroad. A strong showing might elevate him from his current obscurity, but he is unlikely to become a major contender. He is from the Hazara minority, which could make it difficult for him to gather widespread support among the majority Pashtuns in a country where ethnic divisions all too often are mirrored in political groupings.
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Taliban burns 10 trucks on Afghanistan-Pakistan supply route
The attack follows the destruction of a crucial bridge, creating transport concerns for U.S. and NATO forces.
By Zulfiqar Ali and Laura King Los Angeles Times February 5, 2009
Reporting from Istanbul, Turkey, and Peshawar, Pakistan -- A day after blowing up a crucial land bridge, Taliban militants torched 10 supply trucks returning from Afghanistan to Pakistan on Wednesday, underscoring the insurgents' dominance of the main route used to transport supplies to Afghan-based U.S. and NATO troops.
Months of disruptions on the route from the Pakistani port of Karachi through the historic Khyber Pass have forced NATO and American military authorities to look for other transit options. About three-quarters of the supplies for Western forces in Afghanistan -- mainly food and fuel -- are ferried through Pakistan by contractors, usually poorly paid, semiliterate truckers. Many now refuse to drive the route because of the danger.
Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, head of the U.S. Central Command, said last month during a visit to the region that routes outside Pakistan had been found, but he provided no details and gave no timetable for their use. The supply question has taken on added urgency with the planned deployment of up to 30,000 more U.S. troops in the Afghan theater in the next 18 months.
The complications of moving supplies through Central Asia were also highlighted Tuesday when the government of Kyrgyzstan said it would close a U.S. air base important to the Afghan war effort. U.S. officials said talks were underway to keep the base open.
Kyrgyzstan's announcement could bode ill for American efforts to negotiate passage through countries bordering Afghanistan, such as Uzbekistan, particularly if it was clear that the U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization were over a barrel.
In response to dozens of Taliban attacks, the Pakistani military launched an offensive late last year in the Khyber tribal agency, which borders Afghanistan, and subsequently declared the Khyber Pass secure. But, as has happened before when the Pakistani army carried out short-term operations in the tribal areas, militant attacks resumed almost immediately after the troops left.
Initially, the Taliban hijacked vulnerable, slow-moving lines of heavy trucks. After Pakistani authorities beefed up their military presence on the roads, the insurgents took to attacking the truck stops in Peshawar, where hundreds of vehicles are backed up at any given time, waiting to cross the Khyber Pass. More than 100 trucks were burned in an attack last year.
Tuesday's bombing of a 100-foot-long bridge over a dry riverbed about 15 miles west of Peshawar stranded hundreds of truckers.
Pakistani and U.S. officials said the bridge was expected to be repaired soon and that some trucks had been able to cross via a makeshift road.
NATO and U.S. officials in Afghanistan have said the disruption to the supply lines is militarily insignificant so far. Weaponry is transported to Afghanistan by air, although dozens of Humvees have been lost in militant attacks on the supply routes in Pakistan. NATO says it keeps a 60-to-90-day supply of fuel and other goods, but shortages of everyday items, varying from raisins to razor blades, are being felt on bases throughout Afghanistan.
After the bridge attack, militants appeared to be trying to keep Pakistani forces off balance. A Pakistani soldier was wounded Tuesday night when suspected insurgents fired rockets at a base near Landi Kotal, along the Pakistani-Afghan border.
Elsewhere in Pakistan's volatile northwest, Taliban insurgents freed about 30 police officers and paramilitary troops who were captured after their base in the Swat Valley was overrun late Tuesday. The defenders surrendered when they ran out of ammunition.
The freed men said they had agreed to quit their jobs and expressed gratitude to the Taliban for setting them free rather than beheading them, often the fate of captured members of the security forces. A Taliban spokesman said the release was a "humanitarian gesture."
The freed captives also complained that the Pakistani army had failed to come to their rescue during a 24-hour siege of their remote outpost in the Shamozai district, despite pleas for help. Four officers died in the Taliban attack.
laura.king@latimes.com
Ali is a special correspondent.
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War on Words
Why Obama may be abandoning Bush's favorite phrase
Newsweek Feb 4, 2009
In another effort to undo the legacy of George W. Bush's presidency, the Obama administration is searching for alternatives to the term "war on terror."
In recent days, Obama's national-security officials have had brainstorming sessions to come up with different ways to describe the U.S. government's efforts to defeat Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, according to administration sources who asked not to be identified talking about private discussions.
What's being sought is a more precise phrase that can recast the U.S. government's counterterrorism fight in ideological as well as military terms. Obama publicly signaled the new approach this week. When asked about the "war on terror" phrase by CNN's Anderson Cooper, Obama said, "Well you know, I think it is very important for us to recognize that we have a battle or a war against some terrorist organizations Words matter in this situation because one of the ways we're going to win this struggle is through the battle of hearts and minds."
Although partly symbolic, the search for new terror terminology reflects an internal government debate that predates the new administration. Critics have long decried the use of the phrase "war on terror" on the grounds that terrorism is a tactic, not an identifiable enemy. Years ago, State and Defense Department officials tried to move away from the phrase "war on terror," proposing instead to call it a "Struggle Against Violent Extremism," or SAVE.
But when word of the suggested change leaked to the media, President Bush displayed his annoyance at the idea during meeting of National Security Council officials. "The president unleashed over this," said one participant in the meeting who asked not to be identified talking about an internal discussion. "He made it perfectly clear that the American public understood what the war on terror was. He was clearly irritated about this. That put an end to it."
Indeed, the "war on terror" was one of the signature phrases of the Bush presidency. It was formally declared in Bush's nationally televised speech to Congress on Sept. 20, 2001—his first after the 9/11 terror attacks—when the president cast the government's response in such sweeping terms that, according to critics, it ultimately opened the door for the invasion of Iraq. "Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists and every government that supports them," Bush said then. "Our war on terror begins with Al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated."
After that, Donald Rumsfeld's Defense Department officially adopted the terminology under the banner of "GWOT," or "Global War on Terror." The Pentagon used the GWOT acronym in official publications, strategy documents and memos. It even developed a GWOT "Expeditionary Medal" for soldiers dispatched to designated war zones. (Just last month, in the final days of the Bush administration, the Pentagon expanded eligibility for the GWOT Medal for troops deployed in Morocco and Burkina Faso.)
According to a story published last weekend by The Associated Press, since he took office last month Obama has shied away from the words "war on terror" since he took office. He has made references instead to the "enduring struggle against terrorism and extremism" and to an "ongoing struggle," pledging also to "go after" extremists and "win this fight." Only once since his inauguration has Obama used Bush's favorite locution, declaring in a speech at the State Department on Jan. 22 that the United States was "confronted by extraordinary, complex and interconnected global challenges: war on terror, sectarian division and the spread of deadly technology." "We're trying to come up with a phrase that better articulates a hopeful message," said one administration official involved in the discussions about terror terminology.
Despite Bush's insistence on sticking with "war on terror," members of his own Homeland Security Department continued to question its use. A year ago, Homeland's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties prepared a nine-page "official use only" memo, "Terminology to Define the Terrorists," which outlined how the government had solicited recommendations from a "wide variety" of American Muslim leaders and suggesting that U.S. officials be more careful in their use of language describing counterterrorism efforts. The memo did not directly advocate discontinuing the use of the term "war on terror" but rather declared that while the government "should convey the magnitude of the threat we face," it should also "avoid inflating the religious bases and glamorous appeal of the extremist's ideology."
One of the memo's suggestions: labeling Al Qaeda as a "death cult." The memo's authors explained their thinking: "'Cult' is both normative and accurate in that it suggests a pseudo-religious ideology that is outside the mainstream ... Referring to [Osama] bin Laden's movement as 'fringe' or 'outside the mainstream' may also be helpful." The document's contents were subsequently ridiculed by right-wing bloggers, who accused Homeland Security of excessive political correctness.
Juan Zarate, who until last month headed the counterterrorism office of Bush's National Security Council, tells NEWSWEEK that President Bush did start limiting his use of the "war on terror" term in recent years, referring at times to a "war against violent extremists." But Zarate—who used the "war on terror" phrase in a speech as recently as last year—cautioned against going too far in abandoning the old terminology. Doing so, he suggested, could diminish the dangers that U.S. troops face in places like Afghanistan and also send an unintended signal to terror groups that the new administration was going to throttle back antiterrorist efforts on the ground.
The notion of abandoning the "war on terror" label has also been debated among some of America's closest partners in counterterrorism operations. Two years ago, Hilary Benn, then Britain's international development secretary, declared that the term should be abandoned: "We do not use the phrase "war on terror' because we can't win by military means alone. And because this isn't us against one organized enemy with a clear identity and a coherent set of objectives." Britain's current foreign secretary, David Miliband, recently made similar remarks. A U.K. official said that overuse of the term may have "unintentionally" rallied extremist enemies of the United States and Britain to join forces against the West.
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Police Destroys Drug Processing Factory
Written by www.quqnoos.com Wednesday, 04 February 2009
Counter-Narcotics police destroyed one drug processing factory and arrested six suspected smugglers
The counter-narcotics along with local police destroyed one drug processing factory and arrested six suspected smugglers during an operation in Ganda Qol area of Kishim district of Badakhshan on Wednesday, February 04, 2009.
In this operation, police recovered and seized 600 liters of liquid opium, one heroin processing machine, one heroin producing machine, one generator, 18 empty barrels, three kgs of chemicals, seven kgs of opium seed and two kgs of heroin powder.
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High hopes for Afghan cricket team
Thursday, 5 February 2009 BBC News
The Afghan cricket team has managed to get into the final qualifying round for the Cricket World Cup finals in 2011. Former BBC Afghanistan correspondent, William Reeve, was beside the pitch to cheer the team on at their latest victory in Buenos Aires.
The sport of cricket is new to Afghanistan. Just over 10 years ago, while reporting for the BBC during Taleban rule, I was astounded one day to come across a game of cricket.
There in front of me in Kabul, on a wide open space, was a group of Afghans totally absorbed in having fun, at a time when there was so little other entertainment in the country.
Cinemas, television, music and so many other things had been banned by the Taleban but not, evidently, cricket.
Before long I was chatting away to the players, all dressed in traditional Afghan shalwar kameez, baggy cotton trousers under loose long shirts.
Welcome respite
They pointed out they had very little equipment. They used an old tennis ball wrapped in plastic tape. The stumps and bats were home-made and the pitch was dusty and rough.
They explained that they were practising for the first serious match ever to be played in Kabul.
Jokingly, one said he looked forward to playing against England one day and asked if I could report the next week's key match on the BBC. I said I would be delighted.
Then, as now, the BBC World Service has a large audience for its daily broadcasts to Afghanistan in the local languages of Pashto and Persian.
And when the day came for the match I had more fun writing about cricket than anything for a long while. It made a change from reporting on the endless fighting.
When the Afghans held their first tournament in Kabul not long afterwards, they played for what they called the BBC Cup.
Cricket mad
Fast forward to Buenos Aires on the other side of the world in South America. I would never have dreamed 10 years ago in Kabul that there I would be in the Argentine capital watching a most impressive national Afghan cricket team dominating the tournament, an important one too.
When Afghanistan played in its first two international tournaments last year, in Jersey and Tanzania, nobody expected them to win. But win they did.
For this latest tournament in Buenos Aires, the team was given special coaching in Lahore in Pakistan, as cricket is hard to play in the Afghan winter.
It was in cricket-mad Pakistan, after all, where members of the Afghan team first played the game. They were all refugees from fighting in Afghanistan, living in camps in Peshawar in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
When I arrived to watch Afghanistan's first match in Buenos Aires, with the summer sun beating down on an otherwise very English looking scene, Uganda were already batting.
Before too long, a colleague in the BBC Pashto Service in London, Emal, called me on my mobile phone to ask for the latest score.
"Could he phone me every 15 minutes or so," he asked.
"Fine, but why so often?" I replied.
Emal explained that masses of Afghans were bombarding the BBC Pashto Service with e-mails for the latest score. They are so keen on cricket in Afghanistan, he said, and they love their team.
Emal duly kept the Pashto Service website up to date for his large audience with all the twists and turns of what became a very exciting but exasperating match.
Desire to win
Uganda accumulated a large score, and the Afghan team - in smart red and blue colours - began its innings very badly, until Raees Ahmadzai, a former captain, came out to bat and almost turned the whole game around along with another resolute team mate, Samiullah.
Despite their efforts, Uganda finally won by just a few runs. But the downhearted Afghans gritted their teeth and proceeded during the week to beat all the other teams in the tournament, and so came out on top.
One of the strengths of the Afghans is their superb fielding, leaping and running for every ball with great agility. Almost all sport trimmed black beards. They are very fit indeed. As good Muslims, they do not drink alcohol or smoke, but above all they have a great desire to succeed.
After winning the tournament in Buenos Aires, team captain Naurooz Mangal, smiling and proud, said today is a very big day in the history of Afghan cricket.
Former captain Raees said that when he and his fellow team members started playing cricket, they hoped that one day they would play against the top nations. Now, he says, we are just one step away from all that.
In the final qualifying round in South Africa in April, four teams out of 12 will go through to play in the Cricket World Cup finals in South Asia in 2011 against the top 10 international teams, such as Pakistan, Australia and the West Indies.
Maybe Afghanistan, which only started playing cricket a decade ago, really will be playing against England before too long.
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