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Suicide bombers kill 7 after Muslim holiday prayers in northern Afghanistan province
By Associated Press, November 6
KABUL, Afghanistan — Two suicide bombers targeted worshippers on a key Muslim festival in northern Afghanistan, killing seven, including two local police commanders, officials said Sunday.
The bombers struck as Muslims were leaving a mosque on the outskirts of Old Baghlan City after prayers at the start of the Eid al-Adha, the Feast of the Sacrifice.
At least 18 other people were taken to hospitals with injuries from the attack in Hassin Tal, about 6 miles (10 kilometers) east of the city.
One bomber blew himself up and the second was captured before he could set off his explosives, said Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai, spokesman for the regional police commander in the north.
The bombings raise questions about Afghan forces’ ability to tackle the insurgency head-on without their NATO partners. NATO is working to handing over full security responsibilities to Afghan forces before the end of 2014, when the coalition plans to withdraw its combat troops.
NATO officials say attacks such as Sunday’s bombing do little more than grab headlines and have little impact on the balance of strength between the government and the insurgents.
Kamen Khan, the police chief in Old Baghlan City, said one of the two dead local police commanders was a well-known local leader named Abdul who, like many Afghans, goes only by one name.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the Taliban, against whom NATO has waged a decade-long war, routinely target Afghan officials and security forces as well as international forces.
In his Eid message two days ago, Taliban leader Mullah Omar said his fighters must protect Afghan civilians, who are dying in rising numbers, so the insurgency can maintain good relations with the population.
U.S. Marine Gen. John Allen, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, condemned the bombing and challenged Omar to do so, too.
“If Mullah Omar is serious about his call upon the Taliban to eliminate acts against civilians, he too should condemn this publicly,” Allen said.
Separately, NATO said that two of its service members were killed, raising to 495 the number of coalition troops killed in the country so far this year. One was killed in an insurgent attack in the south on Saturday, and one died in another attack by militants Sunday in the west. NATO provided no other details.
As the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan partners have focused their operations on Taliban strongholds in the south and east, the insurgency has carried out an increasing number of attacks in the north and west.
Shortly before the morning attack, Karzai greeted Afghans on the holiday. Breaking with past speeches marking the occasion, he made no mention of reconciliation with the Taliban and did not call on its leaders to break from the insurgency.
Ethnic minorities, who reside outside southern Afghanistan, where the Taliban are at their strongest, are the most resistant to efforts to reconcile with the insurgents.
Minorities worry that Karzai, a Pashtun, will make too many concessions to the Taliban to shore up his Pashtun base in crafting a peace deal to end the war. Assassinations of prominent northerners are likely to erode their already minimal appetite for a peace settlement.
Five leaders affiliated with the Northern Alliance, a coalition mostly composed of non-Pashtun minorities which has fought the Taliban since 1996, have been killed in a little more than a year.
Later Sunday, Karzai met with Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who made an unannounced trip to the country.
Gillard’s trip comes after an Afghan National Army soldier opened fire during a parade at a base in southern Kandahar province on Oct. 29, killing three Australian soldiers and wounding seven others. Australia has about 1,500 troops in Afghanistan. The attack brought Australia’s death toll from the conflict to 32.
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Associated Press writers Tarek El-Tablawy and Deb Riechmann contributed.
Australian PM meets Karzai in Afghanistan
AFP News
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has visited Afghanistan, her office said Monday, days after three of her nation's troops were shot dead by a rogue Afghan soldier who fired on a parade.
Gillard made the unannounced stopover in the war-torn Central Asian nation, where she met President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, on her way back from the G20 leaders' meeting in Cannes, France.
Addressing soldiers on Sunday in the restive southern province of Uruzgan, where most of Australia's 1,550 troops are stationed, Gillard acknowledged the loss of three of their colleagues on October 29.
Seven other soldiers were wounded in the incident, which was Australia's worst since three commandos were killed in a helicopter crash in 2010.
"When I started planning this trip I didn't realise that it would be in the shadow of very deep sadness," Gillard said in comments quoted in The Australian newspaper.
"I know the way you feel that sense of loss is with a spirit of determination about your mission."
But she said Canberra was determined to continue its engagement in Afghanistan, where so far 32 Australian soldiers have been killed.
"We are determined, as you are, to see this mission through. And we know that in order to see the mission through we've got to combat, from time to time, fear," Gillard said.
The prime minister also travelled to Kabul where she met Karzai and opened Australia's new embassy.
"We came to Afghanistan and we have found some tremendous days of sorrow, but we have also found a great friendship," Gillard said in opening the new mission which she added was a symbol of Australia's commitment, ABC reported.
"We do intend to stay engaged here with you, in a spirit of friendship, for the long term."
Australian troops were first deployed to Afghanistan in late 2001 before being pulled out in 2002. Australians were redeployed to the war in 2005 and have been training Afghan soldiers in Uruzgan.
Afghans: Obama wasting time talking to terrorists
The Washington Times By Ashish Kumar Sen Saturday, November 5, 2011
A group of senior Afghan lawmakers says the Obama administration is wasting its time in trying to make peace with the Haqqani Network, a Pakistan-based terrorist group U.S. officials have accused of killing Americans and attacking the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan.
Washington should instead increase pressure on Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency to cut its ties to the Haqqanis, withhold millions of dollars of aid to Islamabad and attack the militants in their safe havens, the lawmakers told The Washington Times this week.
The Haqqani Network, which is led by Sirajuddin Haqqani and operates from Pakistan’s North Waziristan province, is supported by the ISI, according to Afghan and Western officials. Pakistani officials deny these accusations.
The Afghan lawmakers said the United States should use a combination of sanctions and travel bans against top ISI officers and the Pakistani military to break their support for the Haqqani Network.
The group of 10 lawmakers is in Washington for meetings at the Pentagon and State Department and on Capitol Hill.
U.S. officials met with representatives of the Haqqani Network over the summer.
In congressional testimony late last month, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton defended the Obama administration’s strategy of “fight, talk and build” while dealing with the terrorists. She said part of the reason for the administration’s approach is to test whether the terrorist groups “have any willingness to negotiate in good faith.”
The Afghan lawmakers were pessimistic about the prospects of such an approach.
“U.S. officials should stop talking to the Haqqani Network. It is the ISI that is important,” said Abdul Rahim Ayoubi, a member of defense committee in the Afghan National Assembly.
“It is the ISI that controls and supports the Haqqani terrorists, and it is Pakistani doctors that treat them when they are injured fighting in Afghanistan,” he said.
“The Haqqani Network is just a name. It is really an ISI and Pakistani military network,” he added.
The meeting between U.S. officials and representatives of the Haqqani Network took place before attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and a NATO base in Wardak province south of the capital in September. U.S. officials blame both attacks on the Haqqanis. Seventy-seven U.S. troops were injured in the attack on the base.
Ali Akbar Jamshidi, deputy chairman of the Afghan Senate’s defense commission, said the administrations in Kabul and Washington are not on the same page when it comes to talking to the terrorists.
“This lack of coordination is evident from the fact that while the U.S. is reaching out to the Taliban and the Haqqanis, [Afghan] President [Hamid] Karzai has said he is not in favor of such talks,” he said.
“The U.S. must first take our government on board and coordinate with us before negotiating with terrorists,” he added.
Mr. Karzai has ruled out a resumption of talks with the Taliban, saying he prefers to talk directly with the leaders of Pakistan.
Dawood Asas, a senator and member of the parliamentary security and defense committee, said the Karzai government will also never negotiate with the Haqqanis.
“There is no use talking directly to the Haqqani Network,” he said.
In September, the then-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, told a congressional hearing that the Haqqani Network is a “veritable arm of the ISI.”
Mohammad Naeem Lali Hamidzai, chairman of the Afghan parliamentary committee on internal-security affairs, endorsed Adm. Mullen’s comments.
“We have seen a lot of solid evidence that Pakistan is behind the Haqqani Network. We have caught many people with ties to the ISI,” he said.
In their meetings in Washington, they urged U.S. officials to launch military action against the Haqqani Network’s safe havens in Pakistan.
“Until now, we haven’t seen any change in Pakistan’s support for the Haqqani Network. And, if Pakistan doesn’t change its behavior, U.S. troops should go after the Haqqani Network in Pakistan,” Mr. Hamidzai said.
He added that in addition to supporting terrorists, Pakistani troops are shelling Afghan civilians in the eastern provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar and the city of Jalalabad.
Lt. Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, a top-ranking U.S. commander in Afghanistan, told reporters late last month that Pakistan’s military appeared to be in “collaboration, or at a minimum, looking the other way when insurgents conducted rocket or mortar fire in what we believe to be visual sight of one of their posts.”
U.S. and Afghan military operations have targeted the Haqqani Network’s fighters in Afghanistan. Mrs. Clinton said 100 terrorists had been killed late last month.
Pakistani officials have warned that it will treat any infiltration of its border by U.S. troops as a violation of its sovereignty. A covert Predator drone program, run by the U.S. with unacknowledged support from Pakistan, has eliminated several terrorist suspects in Pakistan.
Pakistan has been reluctant to use military force against the Haqqanis; however, a senior U.S. official said it can take other action to squeeze the network.
These actions could include ensuring that “intelligence doesn’t go to the Haqqani Network , that they don’t benefit from financial resources or flow of finances, that we deal specifically with areas where we know the Haqqani Network and the Taliban are based, including kind of key cities along the border,” the official told reporters last week.
Afghan officials say Pakistan has played the role of spoiler in the Karzai government’s now-suspended effort to make peace with the Taliban, the former rulers of Afghanistan who opened a guerrilla campaign after U.S. forces toppled them in 2001. They claim Pakistan was linked to the assassination in September of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, who was leading peace efforts with the Taliban.
“The reconciliation effort died with Rabbani,” said Mr. Hamidzai.
U.S. troops leave border base to Afghans
Washington Post By Joshua Partlow Sunday, November 6, 2011
COMBAT OUTPOST WAZA KHWAH, AFGHANISTAN - The last of the American soldiers packed up their gear, lowered their flag and flew away on Chinook helicopters Thursday, handing this small base to the 250 Afghan policemen left in the swirling dust below.
Just 25 miles from the Pakistani border, in one of Afghanistan’s most volatile provinces, the hand-over marked the beginning of an experiment to see whether Afghan security forces are ready to fight the Taliban as U.S. troops begin to withdraw.
“Is there a risk it could all fall apart? Probably a small risk,” said Col. Edward T. Bohnemann, the brigade commander in Paktika, where the base is located. “I look at it, honestly, as a huge win, saying, ‘Hey, we’ve demonstrated the Afghan security forces are capable of taking this.’ ”
The decision to leave Waza Khwah — the largest base yet to be handed over to Afghan forces — represents the type of calculation that will become more common, and more difficult, as 33,000 U.S. troops begin to withdraw later this year amid a resilient Taliban insurgency. American commanders have accelerated the plan to transfer security responsibility to Afghan troops between now and 2014.
The Afghan battalion’s performance in the coming months will be watched closely, and more such hand-overs are likely, Bohnemann said. “I think it’s going to be replicated, duplicated across [eastern Afghanistan] at a much faster rate than people expected,” he said.
Taliban action expected
Southern Paktika is the calmest part of the province. But even here, U.S. officers expect that with the Americans gone, the Taliban will try to test the Afghan border police battalion by attacking with greater intensity. They also said the Taliban might attempt to divert more fighters from Pakistan up through this southern entry into the province to avoid the more hotly contested eastern border.
“I do think they’ll try to prod and poke at Waza Khwah,” Maj. Eric Butler, the brigade’s intelligence officer, said of the Taliban. “I don’t think there’s going to be a massive attack.”
The American soldiers who work with this battalion say they believe it can handle the threat. The officers in the Afghan border police unit have shown “they now outmatch the insurgency by a significant-enough margin that we can change our relationship,” said Lt. Col. Curtis D. Taylor, the battalion commander in this part of Paktika province.
That unit, the 7th battalion of the Afghan border police, is considered one of the best in the province. Over the past couple of years, the unit’s American partners have dwindled from a several-hundred-strong battalion down to an artillery battery of about 80 soldiers who have rarely fired a shot in the four months they’ve been deployed at Waza Khwah. Those soldiers are moving to a base farther north in the province, where Taliban and Haqqani network fighters pose more-lethal problems.
The 7th battalion has gathered intelligence and conducted its own operations independent of U.S. troops. It is patrolling more often, with more men, and has come under fire about once a week, said Lt. Col. Chris Niesen, the lead American adviser with the border police at Waza Khwah.
“You are safe to about a 15-kilometer radius. After that it gets fun,” Niesen said. But the “security situation has been maintained mostly, in the last three months, by the Afghans.”
“They’re doing it all by themselves,” he said.
Afghan officials were generally optimistic about the prospects that border police could secure the area. The provincial governor, Mohibullah Samim, called the hand-over a “big steppingstone” in the war and said, “We are not worried about any problems, because we’re sure the police will be able to take care of themselves.”
One of the regional police officers, Col. Zahir Gul, said taking over the base brought a “great deal of responsibility.” He told the police officers assembled for the ceremony, “I want you to be very careful with this.”
Tricky logistics
Decisions about where to transfer U.S. and NATO responsibility to Afghan security forces are taking place all over the country. The first seven areas for such transition were chosen this year, and President Hamid Karzai’s government is finalizing a second batch.
The first areas to be transferred were some of the country’s safest. But as the process accelerates, coalition and Afghan commanders will face more-difficult choices about giving Afghan security forces the lead role in violent terrain. So far, the transition has rarely involved American troops pulling out of a base entirely, though that will become more common.
The trickiest aspects of such hand-overs are often less about fighting than about mundane logistical matters. The border police at Waza Khwah cannot call in their own medevac helicopters or supplies by air the way the U.S. unit could. The urgency of a hand-over deadline has forced the battalion to confront issues such as paying salaries and repairing vehicles and generators.
Without that deadline, “I think they would have more or less stagnated with some level of dependency on U.S. forces,” Taylor said. “That propelled the growth for the unit forward.”
American soldiers will keep a locked compound on the base, known as the Alamo, that they will visit periodically to advise the battalion. They plan to fly Apache attack helicopters overhead as an occasional show of force and deliver some supplies as needed. Taylor said U.S. medevac helicopters will be available to the border police at their request.
“We’re not cutting ties completely,” he said.
Afghan border police officers were undaunted by the task ahead.
“We will destroy the enemy,” said Capt. Khalil Ahmadi, commander of the 7th battalion. “We will control the border.”
Haqqani leader captured in east Afghanistan: NATO
KABUL, Nov. 6 (Xinhua) -- Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in east Afghanistan captured Bari Ali, a mid-level Taliban leader, during a cordon and search operation on Thursday, an ISAF press release said on Sunday.
The Afghan National Army (ANA) used loudspeakers and a pre- written script to call out Ali in an effort to have him surrender to coalition forces willingly in Laghman Province, some 260 km east of Afghan capital Kabul.
Ali and two other individuals, one of which was identified as his brother, Roshan Zilmai, surrendered to coalition forces without incident. "The three were detained by Coalition forces and transported to a nearby facility for further questioning," said the statement from ISAF Regional Command-East.
"Ali is known to command Taliban fighters in conflicts with Coalition forces. The capture of Ali is expected to sever the lines of communication between senior level Taliban and low-level insurgents," ISAF believes.
The ANA confiscated weapons, hand grenades, tactical fighting gear and multiple cell phones during the search.
"The operation ended with no injuries or casualties to Coalition forces and civilians and no damage to equipment. Ali remains in the custody of Coalition forces," the press statement claims.
Also on Thursday in Laghman Province, another Haqqani leader Rashid Ahmad Arshad at a traffic control point was captured, as a Saturday ISAF press release said.
The detained Arshad "aided Haqqani by moving weapons and contraband throughout eastern Afghanistan ... Combined forces set- up the traffic control point after receiving information of insurgent movement in the area in Laghman Province."
The ISAF has intensified its operations targeting Haqqani Network, which, loyal to Afghan Taliban, is comparatively active in southeastern Afghanistan and Kabul, after the Network was blamed for the Sept. 13 around-20-hour raid against the U.S. embassy and the ISAF headquarters in Afghan capital Kabul.
Ordinary Afghans Voicing Increasing Distrust Of Pakistan's Intentions
November 6, 2011 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty By Abubakar Siddique
Afghans are putting their anger over Pakistani policies regarding their country on full display.
Protests have been staged by Afghan youths objecting to statements made by Pakistani public figures. And Afghanistan's media and civil society have moved to the forefront to resist perceived efforts by their eastern neighbor to fill the vacuum as the West looks to exit their country.
Combined, they help capture the public mood and uneasiness about Pakistani intentions on their soil, even as the two countries' presidents -- Afghanistan's Hamid Karzai and Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari -- cite progress in restoring trust, as they did during a face-to-face meeting in Istanbul on November 1.
In the eastern city of Jalalabad, located about 50 kilometers from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, hundreds of youth activists gathered on October 30 to protest recent statements made by former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and pro-Taliban Islamist leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman.
Musharraf, who was ousted from the presidency in 2008 and now lives in exile in London, made his controversial remarks before a think-tank audience in Washington on October 26.
"Afghanistan always has been anti-Pakistan because the Soviet Union and India have very close relations in Afghanistan," he said. "So we must not allow this to continue because then one must not [be]grudge if Pakistan orders the ISI [the country's Inter-Services Intelligence agency] to take countermeasures to protect its own interests."
Promoted Violence
Statements made in Peshawar on October 23 by Rehman, the leader of Pakistan's conservative Jamiat Ulama-e Islam party, came under fire because he promoted violence in Afghanistan by the Afghan Taliban, even as he denounced violence in Pakistan by the Pakistani Taliban.
For their statements, Musharraf and Rehman were characterized as hypocrites and accused of fanning conflict in Afghanistan and of looking out only for Pakistani interests.
Saifur Rehman Abid, a local leader, received strong backing as he read out a unanimous resolution the gathering adopted during the October 30 gathering.
"The elected federation of the youth and the Nangarhar Youth Shura [council] strongly condemns the latest statements of former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Maulana Fazlur Rehman about Afghanistan," Abid said. "Afghanistan is an independent country and has a right to sign strategic pacts with any country to preserve its national interests."
'Interfering Openly'
The Afghan media have been quick to criticize such comments, as well.
Kandahar-based analyst Mohammad Omar Sathey says opinion makers and tribal leaders now consider Pakistani interference a key factor for instability in their country since the Soviet invasion in 1979.
"Our civil society, intellectuals, and the public knows that Pakistan is interfering openly," Sathey said. "They think that instability and war in Afghanistan is a source of income for Pakistan because it attracts international help in the name of fighting the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. It also has convinced the international community that its influence inside Afghanistan is the key to resolving the problem there."
Such perceptions are further strengthened by what Afghans see, hear, and read in the Pakistani media about their country.
Aqeel Yousafzai, a Peshawar-based columnist, says that during the past two decades Pakistani media have created a perception that Kabul needs to toe Islamabad's line. Few Pakistani journalists ever report from Afghanistan, despite the fact that Afghan issues often dominate Pakistani news bulletins.
"Overall, the media's role has remained negative," Yousafzai said. "The print and electronic media, the magazines, and the books published in Pakistan still treat Afghanistan as Pakistan's fifth province. Their coverage creates an impression that Afghanistan needs to follow on whatever Pakistan wants it to do."
Afghan politician and popular TV presenter Daud Sultanzoi says that Afghan perceptions of Pakistan can only change if they see a genuine transformation of Islamabad's outlook about their country.
"Pakistan should accept the fact that Afghanistan is not its puppet state," Sultanzoi said. "Another important prerequisite is that a civilian government in Pakistan controls its strategic direction, including control over its military and intelligence services."
RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan contributed to this report
India upbeat after Istanbul conference on Afghanistan
Indrani BagchiIndrani Bagchi, The Times of India - Sun Nov 6, 6:17 pm ET
NEW DELHI: The Istanbul conference on Afghanistan may not have set the Bosporus on fire, but gave India a fair degree of satisfaction, high level sources in the government said.
For all of Pakistan's tantrums about its indispensability in the resolution of the conflict in Afghanistan, the Turkey-sponsored meeting was the first time all regional countries were included, specially India and Iran. Pakistan played up the trilateral Pakistan-Afghanistan-Turkey summit preceding the conference, but the very presence of all the other countries is certain to reduce the toxic effect Pakistan has on promoting terrorism in Afghanistan.
India had been kept out of the January 2010 Istanbul conference on Afghanistan at Pakistan's behest. But sustained diplomacy brought New Delhi back to the forefront of discussions on Afghanistan's future. In fact, the new international approach appears to be to surround Pakistan with other, stronger players in the region so as to offset the dangerous moves that Pakistan has been engaging in Afghanistan. Burak Akcapar, Turkey's new ambassador to India, told TOI, "The Istanbul conference has built a modern infrastructure of a regional cooperation process. It is now up to the nations to make use of it."
The principle of non-interference in Afghanistan's affairs, as held up by the conference, may be difficult to implement on the ground, but certainly, with a group of 12 countries getting into the act, some critical checks and balances will be maintained. The conference, participants said, also had a greater political content than previous exercises which skirted around the real political issues, while concentrating on trade and transit.
The red lines set out on the reconciliation process -- being Afghan-led etc -- found top mention in the outcome document, officials said. The need to eliminate safe havens for terrorists was a clear point to Pakistan's activities which have successfully destabilized Afghanistan and the US-led war for the past decade. "The conference document emphasized the importance of adhering to the red lines, ie abjuring violence, cutting links with terrorist groups and respecting the Afghan constitution," sources said.
India derived greatest confidence from the statement by Afghan President Hamid Karzai at the conference, despite all that he has been reported to have said about supporting Pakistan in case of attacks from others, Karzai held up the India relationship as a model. Sources said that in contrast to Pakistan and China, India was referred to as a constructive partner. Karzai said, "Our deepening friendship with India and Turkey is a model for how we seek to shape out future relationships with some of the key regional partners."
The Istanbul conference is to be followed by a broader international gathering in Bonn, Germany, on December 5, and by a NATO summit meeting in Chicago in May.
India playing great game in Afghanistan: Pervez Musharraf
By Arun Kumar New Kerala
Washington, Nov 6 - Accusing India of trying to gain influence in Kabul after the planned US withdrawal by 2014, former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf has also hit out at Afghan president Hamid Karzai for "going along" with it.
"India is certainly, certainly doing that. And, unfortunately, Afghan government is going along," Musharraf told CNN Sunday in an interview when asked if he saw a new great game beginning where Pakistan and India are struggling for influence in Afghanistan.
"I mean, I know that diplomats, intelligence personnel, military men, security people, go to India for training," Musharraf said, suggesting that similar offers from Pakistan were rebuffed.
"I have been bending backwards, asking President Karzai to send people to Pakistan instead of India," he said. "We've opened up all our training institutions free of cost. Come to Pakistan and we'll train you. Not one has come."
"What is his game?" Musharraf asked, suggesting that the planned pullout of US troops from Afghanistan due to be completed by 2014 had pushed Karzai closer to India.
Musharraf said he did "not at all" trust Karzai, but thanked him for once making a pro-Pakistan statement though he dismissed as "preposterous" a suggestion that the US may attack Pakistan.
Asked about Karzai's recent statement that Kabul would back Pakistan if the United States were to attack Pakistan, he said: "I think it's totally preposterous to imagine this kind of thing."
"And then I thank him that this is the first time he's made a pro-Pakistan statement."
Musharraf believed Karzai would not be able to hold on to power as the Americans draw down. "I think it's going to be very difficult. Very difficult. Very, very difficult. He is not liked by the majority of Pashtuns because of what he is doing."
Musharraf also dismissed suggestions in an article in The Atlantic magazine about the dangers to Pakistan's nuclear assets as over the last few years there have been six attacks by militants on sites that are generally known to be Pakistani nuclear sites.
"Well, no. I don't think so. Our nuclear assets are very well dispersed, they are - and strongly held and in - placed in very, very reinforced areas which cannot be - which are not accessible," he said.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
By Associated Press, November 6
KABUL, Afghanistan — Two suicide bombers targeted worshippers on a key Muslim festival in northern Afghanistan, killing seven, including two local police commanders, officials said Sunday.
The bombers struck as Muslims were leaving a mosque on the outskirts of Old Baghlan City after prayers at the start of the Eid al-Adha, the Feast of the Sacrifice.
At least 18 other people were taken to hospitals with injuries from the attack in Hassin Tal, about 6 miles (10 kilometers) east of the city.
One bomber blew himself up and the second was captured before he could set off his explosives, said Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai, spokesman for the regional police commander in the north.
The bombings raise questions about Afghan forces’ ability to tackle the insurgency head-on without their NATO partners. NATO is working to handing over full security responsibilities to Afghan forces before the end of 2014, when the coalition plans to withdraw its combat troops.
NATO officials say attacks such as Sunday’s bombing do little more than grab headlines and have little impact on the balance of strength between the government and the insurgents.
Kamen Khan, the police chief in Old Baghlan City, said one of the two dead local police commanders was a well-known local leader named Abdul who, like many Afghans, goes only by one name.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but the Taliban, against whom NATO has waged a decade-long war, routinely target Afghan officials and security forces as well as international forces.
In his Eid message two days ago, Taliban leader Mullah Omar said his fighters must protect Afghan civilians, who are dying in rising numbers, so the insurgency can maintain good relations with the population.
U.S. Marine Gen. John Allen, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, condemned the bombing and challenged Omar to do so, too.
“If Mullah Omar is serious about his call upon the Taliban to eliminate acts against civilians, he too should condemn this publicly,” Allen said.
Separately, NATO said that two of its service members were killed, raising to 495 the number of coalition troops killed in the country so far this year. One was killed in an insurgent attack in the south on Saturday, and one died in another attack by militants Sunday in the west. NATO provided no other details.
As the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan partners have focused their operations on Taliban strongholds in the south and east, the insurgency has carried out an increasing number of attacks in the north and west.
Shortly before the morning attack, Karzai greeted Afghans on the holiday. Breaking with past speeches marking the occasion, he made no mention of reconciliation with the Taliban and did not call on its leaders to break from the insurgency.
Ethnic minorities, who reside outside southern Afghanistan, where the Taliban are at their strongest, are the most resistant to efforts to reconcile with the insurgents.
Minorities worry that Karzai, a Pashtun, will make too many concessions to the Taliban to shore up his Pashtun base in crafting a peace deal to end the war. Assassinations of prominent northerners are likely to erode their already minimal appetite for a peace settlement.
Five leaders affiliated with the Northern Alliance, a coalition mostly composed of non-Pashtun minorities which has fought the Taliban since 1996, have been killed in a little more than a year.
Later Sunday, Karzai met with Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who made an unannounced trip to the country.
Gillard’s trip comes after an Afghan National Army soldier opened fire during a parade at a base in southern Kandahar province on Oct. 29, killing three Australian soldiers and wounding seven others. Australia has about 1,500 troops in Afghanistan. The attack brought Australia’s death toll from the conflict to 32.
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Associated Press writers Tarek El-Tablawy and Deb Riechmann contributed.
Australian PM meets Karzai in Afghanistan
AFP News
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has visited Afghanistan, her office said Monday, days after three of her nation's troops were shot dead by a rogue Afghan soldier who fired on a parade.
Gillard made the unannounced stopover in the war-torn Central Asian nation, where she met President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, on her way back from the G20 leaders' meeting in Cannes, France.
Addressing soldiers on Sunday in the restive southern province of Uruzgan, where most of Australia's 1,550 troops are stationed, Gillard acknowledged the loss of three of their colleagues on October 29.
Seven other soldiers were wounded in the incident, which was Australia's worst since three commandos were killed in a helicopter crash in 2010.
"When I started planning this trip I didn't realise that it would be in the shadow of very deep sadness," Gillard said in comments quoted in The Australian newspaper.
"I know the way you feel that sense of loss is with a spirit of determination about your mission."
But she said Canberra was determined to continue its engagement in Afghanistan, where so far 32 Australian soldiers have been killed.
"We are determined, as you are, to see this mission through. And we know that in order to see the mission through we've got to combat, from time to time, fear," Gillard said.
The prime minister also travelled to Kabul where she met Karzai and opened Australia's new embassy.
"We came to Afghanistan and we have found some tremendous days of sorrow, but we have also found a great friendship," Gillard said in opening the new mission which she added was a symbol of Australia's commitment, ABC reported.
"We do intend to stay engaged here with you, in a spirit of friendship, for the long term."
Australian troops were first deployed to Afghanistan in late 2001 before being pulled out in 2002. Australians were redeployed to the war in 2005 and have been training Afghan soldiers in Uruzgan.
Afghans: Obama wasting time talking to terrorists
The Washington Times By Ashish Kumar Sen Saturday, November 5, 2011
A group of senior Afghan lawmakers says the Obama administration is wasting its time in trying to make peace with the Haqqani Network, a Pakistan-based terrorist group U.S. officials have accused of killing Americans and attacking the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan.
Washington should instead increase pressure on Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency to cut its ties to the Haqqanis, withhold millions of dollars of aid to Islamabad and attack the militants in their safe havens, the lawmakers told The Washington Times this week.
The Haqqani Network, which is led by Sirajuddin Haqqani and operates from Pakistan’s North Waziristan province, is supported by the ISI, according to Afghan and Western officials. Pakistani officials deny these accusations.
The Afghan lawmakers said the United States should use a combination of sanctions and travel bans against top ISI officers and the Pakistani military to break their support for the Haqqani Network.
The group of 10 lawmakers is in Washington for meetings at the Pentagon and State Department and on Capitol Hill.
U.S. officials met with representatives of the Haqqani Network over the summer.
In congressional testimony late last month, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton defended the Obama administration’s strategy of “fight, talk and build” while dealing with the terrorists. She said part of the reason for the administration’s approach is to test whether the terrorist groups “have any willingness to negotiate in good faith.”
The Afghan lawmakers were pessimistic about the prospects of such an approach.
“U.S. officials should stop talking to the Haqqani Network. It is the ISI that is important,” said Abdul Rahim Ayoubi, a member of defense committee in the Afghan National Assembly.
“It is the ISI that controls and supports the Haqqani terrorists, and it is Pakistani doctors that treat them when they are injured fighting in Afghanistan,” he said.
“The Haqqani Network is just a name. It is really an ISI and Pakistani military network,” he added.
The meeting between U.S. officials and representatives of the Haqqani Network took place before attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and a NATO base in Wardak province south of the capital in September. U.S. officials blame both attacks on the Haqqanis. Seventy-seven U.S. troops were injured in the attack on the base.
Ali Akbar Jamshidi, deputy chairman of the Afghan Senate’s defense commission, said the administrations in Kabul and Washington are not on the same page when it comes to talking to the terrorists.
“This lack of coordination is evident from the fact that while the U.S. is reaching out to the Taliban and the Haqqanis, [Afghan] President [Hamid] Karzai has said he is not in favor of such talks,” he said.
“The U.S. must first take our government on board and coordinate with us before negotiating with terrorists,” he added.
Mr. Karzai has ruled out a resumption of talks with the Taliban, saying he prefers to talk directly with the leaders of Pakistan.
Dawood Asas, a senator and member of the parliamentary security and defense committee, said the Karzai government will also never negotiate with the Haqqanis.
“There is no use talking directly to the Haqqani Network,” he said.
In September, the then-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, told a congressional hearing that the Haqqani Network is a “veritable arm of the ISI.”
Mohammad Naeem Lali Hamidzai, chairman of the Afghan parliamentary committee on internal-security affairs, endorsed Adm. Mullen’s comments.
“We have seen a lot of solid evidence that Pakistan is behind the Haqqani Network. We have caught many people with ties to the ISI,” he said.
In their meetings in Washington, they urged U.S. officials to launch military action against the Haqqani Network’s safe havens in Pakistan.
“Until now, we haven’t seen any change in Pakistan’s support for the Haqqani Network. And, if Pakistan doesn’t change its behavior, U.S. troops should go after the Haqqani Network in Pakistan,” Mr. Hamidzai said.
He added that in addition to supporting terrorists, Pakistani troops are shelling Afghan civilians in the eastern provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar and the city of Jalalabad.
Lt. Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, a top-ranking U.S. commander in Afghanistan, told reporters late last month that Pakistan’s military appeared to be in “collaboration, or at a minimum, looking the other way when insurgents conducted rocket or mortar fire in what we believe to be visual sight of one of their posts.”
U.S. and Afghan military operations have targeted the Haqqani Network’s fighters in Afghanistan. Mrs. Clinton said 100 terrorists had been killed late last month.
Pakistani officials have warned that it will treat any infiltration of its border by U.S. troops as a violation of its sovereignty. A covert Predator drone program, run by the U.S. with unacknowledged support from Pakistan, has eliminated several terrorist suspects in Pakistan.
Pakistan has been reluctant to use military force against the Haqqanis; however, a senior U.S. official said it can take other action to squeeze the network.
These actions could include ensuring that “intelligence doesn’t go to the Haqqani Network , that they don’t benefit from financial resources or flow of finances, that we deal specifically with areas where we know the Haqqani Network and the Taliban are based, including kind of key cities along the border,” the official told reporters last week.
Afghan officials say Pakistan has played the role of spoiler in the Karzai government’s now-suspended effort to make peace with the Taliban, the former rulers of Afghanistan who opened a guerrilla campaign after U.S. forces toppled them in 2001. They claim Pakistan was linked to the assassination in September of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, who was leading peace efforts with the Taliban.
“The reconciliation effort died with Rabbani,” said Mr. Hamidzai.
U.S. troops leave border base to Afghans
Washington Post By Joshua Partlow Sunday, November 6, 2011
COMBAT OUTPOST WAZA KHWAH, AFGHANISTAN - The last of the American soldiers packed up their gear, lowered their flag and flew away on Chinook helicopters Thursday, handing this small base to the 250 Afghan policemen left in the swirling dust below.
Just 25 miles from the Pakistani border, in one of Afghanistan’s most volatile provinces, the hand-over marked the beginning of an experiment to see whether Afghan security forces are ready to fight the Taliban as U.S. troops begin to withdraw.
“Is there a risk it could all fall apart? Probably a small risk,” said Col. Edward T. Bohnemann, the brigade commander in Paktika, where the base is located. “I look at it, honestly, as a huge win, saying, ‘Hey, we’ve demonstrated the Afghan security forces are capable of taking this.’ ”
The decision to leave Waza Khwah — the largest base yet to be handed over to Afghan forces — represents the type of calculation that will become more common, and more difficult, as 33,000 U.S. troops begin to withdraw later this year amid a resilient Taliban insurgency. American commanders have accelerated the plan to transfer security responsibility to Afghan troops between now and 2014.
The Afghan battalion’s performance in the coming months will be watched closely, and more such hand-overs are likely, Bohnemann said. “I think it’s going to be replicated, duplicated across [eastern Afghanistan] at a much faster rate than people expected,” he said.
Taliban action expected
Southern Paktika is the calmest part of the province. But even here, U.S. officers expect that with the Americans gone, the Taliban will try to test the Afghan border police battalion by attacking with greater intensity. They also said the Taliban might attempt to divert more fighters from Pakistan up through this southern entry into the province to avoid the more hotly contested eastern border.
“I do think they’ll try to prod and poke at Waza Khwah,” Maj. Eric Butler, the brigade’s intelligence officer, said of the Taliban. “I don’t think there’s going to be a massive attack.”
The American soldiers who work with this battalion say they believe it can handle the threat. The officers in the Afghan border police unit have shown “they now outmatch the insurgency by a significant-enough margin that we can change our relationship,” said Lt. Col. Curtis D. Taylor, the battalion commander in this part of Paktika province.
That unit, the 7th battalion of the Afghan border police, is considered one of the best in the province. Over the past couple of years, the unit’s American partners have dwindled from a several-hundred-strong battalion down to an artillery battery of about 80 soldiers who have rarely fired a shot in the four months they’ve been deployed at Waza Khwah. Those soldiers are moving to a base farther north in the province, where Taliban and Haqqani network fighters pose more-lethal problems.
The 7th battalion has gathered intelligence and conducted its own operations independent of U.S. troops. It is patrolling more often, with more men, and has come under fire about once a week, said Lt. Col. Chris Niesen, the lead American adviser with the border police at Waza Khwah.
“You are safe to about a 15-kilometer radius. After that it gets fun,” Niesen said. But the “security situation has been maintained mostly, in the last three months, by the Afghans.”
“They’re doing it all by themselves,” he said.
Afghan officials were generally optimistic about the prospects that border police could secure the area. The provincial governor, Mohibullah Samim, called the hand-over a “big steppingstone” in the war and said, “We are not worried about any problems, because we’re sure the police will be able to take care of themselves.”
One of the regional police officers, Col. Zahir Gul, said taking over the base brought a “great deal of responsibility.” He told the police officers assembled for the ceremony, “I want you to be very careful with this.”
Tricky logistics
Decisions about where to transfer U.S. and NATO responsibility to Afghan security forces are taking place all over the country. The first seven areas for such transition were chosen this year, and President Hamid Karzai’s government is finalizing a second batch.
The first areas to be transferred were some of the country’s safest. But as the process accelerates, coalition and Afghan commanders will face more-difficult choices about giving Afghan security forces the lead role in violent terrain. So far, the transition has rarely involved American troops pulling out of a base entirely, though that will become more common.
The trickiest aspects of such hand-overs are often less about fighting than about mundane logistical matters. The border police at Waza Khwah cannot call in their own medevac helicopters or supplies by air the way the U.S. unit could. The urgency of a hand-over deadline has forced the battalion to confront issues such as paying salaries and repairing vehicles and generators.
Without that deadline, “I think they would have more or less stagnated with some level of dependency on U.S. forces,” Taylor said. “That propelled the growth for the unit forward.”
American soldiers will keep a locked compound on the base, known as the Alamo, that they will visit periodically to advise the battalion. They plan to fly Apache attack helicopters overhead as an occasional show of force and deliver some supplies as needed. Taylor said U.S. medevac helicopters will be available to the border police at their request.
“We’re not cutting ties completely,” he said.
Afghan border police officers were undaunted by the task ahead.
“We will destroy the enemy,” said Capt. Khalil Ahmadi, commander of the 7th battalion. “We will control the border.”
Haqqani leader captured in east Afghanistan: NATO
KABUL, Nov. 6 (Xinhua) -- Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in east Afghanistan captured Bari Ali, a mid-level Taliban leader, during a cordon and search operation on Thursday, an ISAF press release said on Sunday.
The Afghan National Army (ANA) used loudspeakers and a pre- written script to call out Ali in an effort to have him surrender to coalition forces willingly in Laghman Province, some 260 km east of Afghan capital Kabul.
Ali and two other individuals, one of which was identified as his brother, Roshan Zilmai, surrendered to coalition forces without incident. "The three were detained by Coalition forces and transported to a nearby facility for further questioning," said the statement from ISAF Regional Command-East.
"Ali is known to command Taliban fighters in conflicts with Coalition forces. The capture of Ali is expected to sever the lines of communication between senior level Taliban and low-level insurgents," ISAF believes.
The ANA confiscated weapons, hand grenades, tactical fighting gear and multiple cell phones during the search.
"The operation ended with no injuries or casualties to Coalition forces and civilians and no damage to equipment. Ali remains in the custody of Coalition forces," the press statement claims.
Also on Thursday in Laghman Province, another Haqqani leader Rashid Ahmad Arshad at a traffic control point was captured, as a Saturday ISAF press release said.
The detained Arshad "aided Haqqani by moving weapons and contraband throughout eastern Afghanistan ... Combined forces set- up the traffic control point after receiving information of insurgent movement in the area in Laghman Province."
The ISAF has intensified its operations targeting Haqqani Network, which, loyal to Afghan Taliban, is comparatively active in southeastern Afghanistan and Kabul, after the Network was blamed for the Sept. 13 around-20-hour raid against the U.S. embassy and the ISAF headquarters in Afghan capital Kabul.
Ordinary Afghans Voicing Increasing Distrust Of Pakistan's Intentions
November 6, 2011 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty By Abubakar Siddique
Afghans are putting their anger over Pakistani policies regarding their country on full display.
Protests have been staged by Afghan youths objecting to statements made by Pakistani public figures. And Afghanistan's media and civil society have moved to the forefront to resist perceived efforts by their eastern neighbor to fill the vacuum as the West looks to exit their country.
Combined, they help capture the public mood and uneasiness about Pakistani intentions on their soil, even as the two countries' presidents -- Afghanistan's Hamid Karzai and Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari -- cite progress in restoring trust, as they did during a face-to-face meeting in Istanbul on November 1.
In the eastern city of Jalalabad, located about 50 kilometers from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, hundreds of youth activists gathered on October 30 to protest recent statements made by former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and pro-Taliban Islamist leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman.
Musharraf, who was ousted from the presidency in 2008 and now lives in exile in London, made his controversial remarks before a think-tank audience in Washington on October 26.
"Afghanistan always has been anti-Pakistan because the Soviet Union and India have very close relations in Afghanistan," he said. "So we must not allow this to continue because then one must not [be]grudge if Pakistan orders the ISI [the country's Inter-Services Intelligence agency] to take countermeasures to protect its own interests."
Promoted Violence
Statements made in Peshawar on October 23 by Rehman, the leader of Pakistan's conservative Jamiat Ulama-e Islam party, came under fire because he promoted violence in Afghanistan by the Afghan Taliban, even as he denounced violence in Pakistan by the Pakistani Taliban.
For their statements, Musharraf and Rehman were characterized as hypocrites and accused of fanning conflict in Afghanistan and of looking out only for Pakistani interests.
Saifur Rehman Abid, a local leader, received strong backing as he read out a unanimous resolution the gathering adopted during the October 30 gathering.
"The elected federation of the youth and the Nangarhar Youth Shura [council] strongly condemns the latest statements of former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Maulana Fazlur Rehman about Afghanistan," Abid said. "Afghanistan is an independent country and has a right to sign strategic pacts with any country to preserve its national interests."
'Interfering Openly'
The Afghan media have been quick to criticize such comments, as well.
Kandahar-based analyst Mohammad Omar Sathey says opinion makers and tribal leaders now consider Pakistani interference a key factor for instability in their country since the Soviet invasion in 1979.
"Our civil society, intellectuals, and the public knows that Pakistan is interfering openly," Sathey said. "They think that instability and war in Afghanistan is a source of income for Pakistan because it attracts international help in the name of fighting the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. It also has convinced the international community that its influence inside Afghanistan is the key to resolving the problem there."
Such perceptions are further strengthened by what Afghans see, hear, and read in the Pakistani media about their country.
Aqeel Yousafzai, a Peshawar-based columnist, says that during the past two decades Pakistani media have created a perception that Kabul needs to toe Islamabad's line. Few Pakistani journalists ever report from Afghanistan, despite the fact that Afghan issues often dominate Pakistani news bulletins.
"Overall, the media's role has remained negative," Yousafzai said. "The print and electronic media, the magazines, and the books published in Pakistan still treat Afghanistan as Pakistan's fifth province. Their coverage creates an impression that Afghanistan needs to follow on whatever Pakistan wants it to do."
Afghan politician and popular TV presenter Daud Sultanzoi says that Afghan perceptions of Pakistan can only change if they see a genuine transformation of Islamabad's outlook about their country.
"Pakistan should accept the fact that Afghanistan is not its puppet state," Sultanzoi said. "Another important prerequisite is that a civilian government in Pakistan controls its strategic direction, including control over its military and intelligence services."
RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan contributed to this report
India upbeat after Istanbul conference on Afghanistan
Indrani BagchiIndrani Bagchi, The Times of India - Sun Nov 6, 6:17 pm ET
NEW DELHI: The Istanbul conference on Afghanistan may not have set the Bosporus on fire, but gave India a fair degree of satisfaction, high level sources in the government said.
For all of Pakistan's tantrums about its indispensability in the resolution of the conflict in Afghanistan, the Turkey-sponsored meeting was the first time all regional countries were included, specially India and Iran. Pakistan played up the trilateral Pakistan-Afghanistan-Turkey summit preceding the conference, but the very presence of all the other countries is certain to reduce the toxic effect Pakistan has on promoting terrorism in Afghanistan.
India had been kept out of the January 2010 Istanbul conference on Afghanistan at Pakistan's behest. But sustained diplomacy brought New Delhi back to the forefront of discussions on Afghanistan's future. In fact, the new international approach appears to be to surround Pakistan with other, stronger players in the region so as to offset the dangerous moves that Pakistan has been engaging in Afghanistan. Burak Akcapar, Turkey's new ambassador to India, told TOI, "The Istanbul conference has built a modern infrastructure of a regional cooperation process. It is now up to the nations to make use of it."
The principle of non-interference in Afghanistan's affairs, as held up by the conference, may be difficult to implement on the ground, but certainly, with a group of 12 countries getting into the act, some critical checks and balances will be maintained. The conference, participants said, also had a greater political content than previous exercises which skirted around the real political issues, while concentrating on trade and transit.
The red lines set out on the reconciliation process -- being Afghan-led etc -- found top mention in the outcome document, officials said. The need to eliminate safe havens for terrorists was a clear point to Pakistan's activities which have successfully destabilized Afghanistan and the US-led war for the past decade. "The conference document emphasized the importance of adhering to the red lines, ie abjuring violence, cutting links with terrorist groups and respecting the Afghan constitution," sources said.
India derived greatest confidence from the statement by Afghan President Hamid Karzai at the conference, despite all that he has been reported to have said about supporting Pakistan in case of attacks from others, Karzai held up the India relationship as a model. Sources said that in contrast to Pakistan and China, India was referred to as a constructive partner. Karzai said, "Our deepening friendship with India and Turkey is a model for how we seek to shape out future relationships with some of the key regional partners."
The Istanbul conference is to be followed by a broader international gathering in Bonn, Germany, on December 5, and by a NATO summit meeting in Chicago in May.
India playing great game in Afghanistan: Pervez Musharraf
By Arun Kumar New Kerala
Washington, Nov 6 - Accusing India of trying to gain influence in Kabul after the planned US withdrawal by 2014, former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf has also hit out at Afghan president Hamid Karzai for "going along" with it.
"India is certainly, certainly doing that. And, unfortunately, Afghan government is going along," Musharraf told CNN Sunday in an interview when asked if he saw a new great game beginning where Pakistan and India are struggling for influence in Afghanistan.
"I mean, I know that diplomats, intelligence personnel, military men, security people, go to India for training," Musharraf said, suggesting that similar offers from Pakistan were rebuffed.
"I have been bending backwards, asking President Karzai to send people to Pakistan instead of India," he said. "We've opened up all our training institutions free of cost. Come to Pakistan and we'll train you. Not one has come."
"What is his game?" Musharraf asked, suggesting that the planned pullout of US troops from Afghanistan due to be completed by 2014 had pushed Karzai closer to India.
Musharraf said he did "not at all" trust Karzai, but thanked him for once making a pro-Pakistan statement though he dismissed as "preposterous" a suggestion that the US may attack Pakistan.
Asked about Karzai's recent statement that Kabul would back Pakistan if the United States were to attack Pakistan, he said: "I think it's totally preposterous to imagine this kind of thing."
"And then I thank him that this is the first time he's made a pro-Pakistan statement."
Musharraf believed Karzai would not be able to hold on to power as the Americans draw down. "I think it's going to be very difficult. Very difficult. Very, very difficult. He is not liked by the majority of Pashtuns because of what he is doing."
Musharraf also dismissed suggestions in an article in The Atlantic magazine about the dangers to Pakistan's nuclear assets as over the last few years there have been six attacks by militants on sites that are generally known to be Pakistani nuclear sites.
"Well, no. I don't think so. Our nuclear assets are very well dispersed, they are - and strongly held and in - placed in very, very reinforced areas which cannot be - which are not accessible," he said.
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