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Afghan Foreign Minister to Visit Qatar for Taliban Talks
TOLOnews.com Monday, 02 April 2012
The Afghan Foreign Minister Zalmay Rassoul on Monday will go to Qatar to meet with the Qatari authorities to discuss reconciliation with the Taliban.
The Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Mr Rassoul will discusses with officials in Qatar about the opening a political office for the Taliban there.
It's the first time that a senior Afghan government official is paying a visit to Qatar since the Taliban agreed to open an office in the Gulf state.
It comes as the Washington has signaled a willingness to accept less-stringent controls on Taliban leaders who could be transferred to Qatar as a confident-building measure to convince the Taliban to come to the negotiation table, Reuters has reported.
The US government has said that it would transfer five Taliban leaders to Qatar on condition that Doha provides assurances the leaders would not be allowed to leave the Gulf state, the officials said.
The US authorities had initially discussed with the Qataris on tighter restrictions such as imprisonment, house arrest or continuous monitoring by security forces - conditions the Qataris refused to accept.
The Taliban two weeks earlier, suspended peace talks with US, saying Washington didn't prove to show serious interest in peace talks.
Afghan and Pakistani officials had said that the peace process would have its ups and downs.
The United States hopes to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table so Afghanistan can be stabilised before foreign combat troops head home at the end of 2014.
Afghan Authorities Appeal For Help In Acid Attack
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan April 2, 2012
GHAZNI, Afghanistan -- Afghan authorities have appealed to citizens to provide information to help solve the case of two dead children whose bodies were found with signs that they had been attacked with acid.
The bodies of the girl and boy, who are believed to have been aged 12 to 15, were discovered on March 30 in eastern Ghazni Province.
Provincial Governor Musa Khan Akbarzada said the identities of the victims and the possible motive for the killings were still unknown.
Akbarzada also said no one had yet come forward to claim the two bodies.
Chaman Shah Etemadi, a lawmaker from Ghazni, said investigators were probing whether Taliban militants carried out the attack to warn against school attendance, or whether a family vendetta may have played a role.
At Least 23 Wounded in Afghan Blast
VOA NewsmApril 2, 2012
Officials in northern Afghanistan say twin bomb blasts have injured at least 23 people, including at least seven security personnel.
Authorities say the explosions tore through a market Monday in Baghlan province.
The French news agency says the second explosion happened after security forces arrived to investigate the initial blast and that half of those wounded were children.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and AFP.
1 Afghan soldier killed in bicycle bomb blast in Kandahar
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, April 2 (Xinhua) -- An Afghan army soldier was killed and three other soldiers injured when a bicycle bomb targeted their vehicle Monday in Kandahar city, capital of southern Kandahar province, police said.
"A bomb attached to a bicycle went off at about 1:00 p.m. local time in Kandahar city when a vehicle of Afghan National Army (ANA) passed by leaving one soldier dead and three other soldiers injured," provincial police chief General Abdul Raziq told Xinhua.
The blast scene was cordoned off by police shortly after the explosion and the injured were admitted to a hospital in the city, some 450 km south of Afghan capital Kabul.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Afghan and NATO-led troops have intensified cleanup operations against Taliban and other militant groups throughout the country recently as spring and summer, known as "fighting season", are drawing near.
Kandahar, the birthplace of Taliban, has seen increasing militancy despite continued military operations there.
Afghans Fear For Future After NATO Withdrawal
RFE/RL By Frud Bezhan April 01, 2012
KABUL - Afghans are preparing to close the book on years of foreign occupation, as international troops prepare to leave and domestic forces assume control of security.
That leaves it up to the Afghan National Army and police force to play a much greater, and possibly total, role in maintaining security and thwarting the resurgence of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
The stakes are high and the clock is ticking -- support for the Afghan war is at an all-time low in the United States, and calls for foreign troops to leave grow louder in Afghanistan following the recent Koran burnings and the killings of Afghan civilians.
Many Afghans, however, are divided on whether Afghan security forces are up to the task, according to an informal poll conducted around the country by RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan.
Ill-Equipped And Under-Trained
Some are confident that Afghan forces are more than capable of securing the country; others insist they are ill-equipped, under-trained, and too small in number to take control of security when the majority of the 130,000-strong NATO force pulls out in 2014.
Abdullah is a farmer from southern Helmand Province, which has long been at the center of the Taliban insurgency and opium trade in Afghanistan.
He warns that Afghan security forces -- which currently number 173,000 soldiers and 130,000 police -- will be overwhelmed by militants as support from NATO decreases.
"I don't think the Afghan forces can defend us because they are financially weak and their numbers are still relatively small. They do not have the right weapons so they are not ready on any count," Abdullah said.
"Now we see that the Taliban is being stopped by the air power of the foreign forces. If that threat is removed, the Taliban will reassert their control across Afghanistan very soon."
In neighboring Kandahar Province, where 17 villagers were recently killed during a nighttime attack allegedly carried out by a lone U.S. soldier, opinions are more weighted against the presence of foreign troops.
Locals there say they are better off without them and insist Afghan forces, who already control the main city, can uphold security.
Gul Bibi, an elderly woman living in Kandahar, agrees.
"We do not want the Americans to remain in our county any more. We have our own way of life. We now have an army and we can rebuild our country," Bibi said.
"Our soldiers can protect us. America is not our true friend. They are not here to be our friends. The Taliban are all Afghans and they can live with us and our military in peace."
In eastern Afghanistan, along the border with Pakistan, many locals feel that without the support of Western powers, the country will once again descend into anarchy.
Humera, a young woman from eastern Konar Province, which has long been a hotbed for insurgent activity, says Afghan forces will be unable to protect local residents.
She, like others in the area, is bracing herself for the return of the Taliban, which she fears will deny her an education and the opportunity to work.
"If the foreign forces leave our province, the Afghan forces will not be able to protect Afghanistan on their own. This is because our military lacks the resources the foreigners have. They do not have the necessary firepower," Humera said.
"They should be given tanks and other [heavy] weapons. And this way they will be able to better protect our homeland. The Taliban are just waiting for the international forces to leave. And when they return they will stop girls from going to schools and our sisters who now work will also be banned from taking their jobs."
Build-Up Strategy
A cornerstone of NATO's strategy in Afghanistan has been to increase the size and effectiveness of the Afghan security forces.
The Afghan forces, which have long been dogged by absenteeism, corruption, and drug abuse, have improved in recent years and become a more professional, competent fighting force.
As of this year, the Afghan government says roughly 50 percent of the country's population is in the hands of Afghan security forces.
In areas under the control of Afghan troops, many locals say they are cautiously optimistic about the ability of the Afghan army and police force to maintain order and security.
Abdullah Himat lives in Khost Province, in southeast Afghanistan, where Afghan forces control several strategically key areas.
"I can tell you about Khost that we now delegate our security responsibilities to the Afghan forces," Himat said.
"People here now know that they should support their military forces completely. This makes me confident to claim that the Afghan forces could take the responsibility of securing their country next year, in 2013."
Afghans in the country's relatively peaceful north, where many provinces are under government control, say Afghan forces are gradually earning their trust.
Abdul Wali Aresh, from Mazar-e-Sharif in Balkh Province, says Afghan forces have made many inroads but insists there is still a long way to go.
"Approaching 2014, Afghan forces have a lot to do before they can take control of the country. In areas where they have taken control, they still don't have full control and the backing from the people," Aresh said.
Written by Frud Bezhan; based on interviews conducted by Radio Free Afghanistan; translations by Abubakar Siddique.
Secret Australian war efforts in Uruzgan revealed by US adviser
Sydney Morning Herald April 02, 2012
THE Taliban radio operator was watching in the tiny Afghan village of Sar Marghab.
''The dinner is ready,'' he transmitted as the Australian-led convoy entered the dusty hamlet, and then the road blew up in front of their vehicles.
For hours, a battle raged against a force of about 50 Taliban until the convoy, backed by Australian special forces, had to withdraw, leaving the village to the insurgents.
Just another day in the often secret war Australians have been fighting in Uruzgan province, as detailed in a new book on Afghanistan, The Valley's Edge, by a former US State Department adviser and scholar, Dan Green.
The navy reservist spent a period in 2005 and 2006 working in Uruzgan as a political adviser for a US provincial reconstruction team, some of the time alongside Australian troops whose early operations involving special forces and the 1st Reconstruction Task Force have mostly been shrouded in secrecy.
His book, which is yet to be released in Australia, gives an unfiltered account of the conflict, revealing how the province was considered of little importance to the US, and how the Taliban became a deadly fighting force and even had a top-level spy embedded at a special forces base used by the Australians.
Uruzgan was ''not a priority'' for the US, Green writes, and adds that one US diplomat told him that ''our interests stopped at Uruzgan's borders''. This, he says, ''is the story of the province. The Soviets didn't consider it strategic and neither did the Taliban, at least in the 1990s''.
Green, who has a master's degree in international relations and was posted back to Afghanistan in 2010, notes the province has since shown some signs of improvement but he is concerned at the current US administration's decision to pull troops out of Afghanistan by 2014 - which ''didn't augur well for Afghanistan or the United States''.
The book details how Yassim, a Taliban spy, infiltrated a US base which the Herald has confirmed was used by Australian special forces as a staging area. Yassim rose to head the security detail for the base, known as Cobra, and led US Green Berets into ambushes before being exposed and jailed.
The Australian Defence Force last week said it had no record of any of Australian operations being compromised by the spy.
Green also reveals how the Taliban graduated from an ineffective militia to a deadly force which used foreign-trained snipers and special camouflage with devastating effect.
He describes the new provincial police chief, Matiullah Khan, whom the Australians rely on for security, as the ''black prince'', and says he has been suspected of involvement in political assassination and corruption but appears to be trying to change.
Last week the ADF said Mr Matiullah was one of the many influential figures with whom Australians had engaged and the ADF expected that as Uruzgan's police chief he would act in an ''impartial and professional manner and [continue] to be a positive influence for security in the province''.
Another chapter deals with a well-organised Taliban ambush in 2006 against an American patrol led by an Australian captain in the then little-known village of Sar Marghab - which Green appears not to realise has since become linked to one of the blackest days of Australian special forces operations. In 2009, a commando raid killed five children and led to an unsuccessful attempt to court-martial some of the troops involved.
During the ambush, Green's Humvee was narrowly missed by a Taliban mortar and he saw two Taliban shot dead as they ''low-crawled'' along a wall to attack.
He says the only warning was when a Taliban scout was heard to announce over their radio that ''the dinner is ready''. The patrol had to withdraw because the sun was setting, he said. ''In an initial battle damage assessment, the Australians reported they found 28 Taliban bodies,'' he says.
He says the patrol, rescued by Australian and Dutch forces, was later described as pointless by some US troops involved.
The ADF yesterday said the incident was probably related to a large offensive operation just north of the provincial capital, Tarin Kowt, when a special forces task group co-ordinated and participated in a planned raid against an important Taliban leader.
''The Australian commandos and Australian CH-47 helicopters ultimately played a pivotal role in ensuring the mission did not end in complete disaster, which at one stage appeared likely,'' an ADF spokesperson said.
The Herald was seeking further information from the ADF. Green is on his fourth Afghan tour.
New armed forces body promises review of Afghan conflict
Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach, head of the new 30,000-strong Joint Forces Command said his aim was to 'bring lessons more quickly from current operations into future operations'
The Guardian By Nick Hopkins Monday 2 April 2012
One of the armed forces' most senior officers is to oversee a wholesale review of the decade-long campaign in Afghanistan to help prepare the military for future conflicts. Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach will look at tactics and strategy – good and bad – as part of his role as the head of the new 30,000-strong Joint Forces Command (JFC), which "stands up" on Monday.
The formation of the JFC marks one of the most significant structural changes in the British military since the second world war. The new department will be at the core of intelligence gathering and contingency planning for any future campaigns.
It is thought the JFC, which was a key proposal in Lord Levene's report on defence reforms, is already helping the chief of the defence staff, Sir David Richards, consider how the UK might be affected by, and potentially contribute to, any conflict between the west and Iran.
Inevitably, much of the work undertaken by the JFC will be top secret.
In an interview with the Guardian, Peach, 55, said the JFC would "be the glue that helps bind together" the navy, airforce and army. It will also ensure that lessons from campaigns such as Afghanistan are learned quickly.
It will also oversee the development of weapons for cyberwarfare, and recommend new "smart" equipment that might make the difference in future campaigns.
"One of key ways to exploit this new command is to make sure that lessons are applied into education and training, so that our soldiers, sailors and airmen are better prepared. We want to build on the way we have prepared forces for current operations."
On Afghanistan, he said: "All campaigns evolve over time. The threat has evolved into these improvised explosive devices. We have a very important role in understanding countermeasures and techniques to defeat those devices. It is one of the key lessons we have identified."
Peach said his aim was to "bring lessons more quickly from current operations into future operations" – which could entail new training, as well as changes in tactics and procedures.
Peach said he didn't want to "imply it was all rubbish before", but said the JFC would bring proper focus to certain areas that needed to be championed to give the best possible advantage to troops fighting in the front line.
He also denied the JFC was, in effect, a fourth service. "No, it's definitely not a fourth service. We are not creating new uniforms or anything of that sort. We are complementary to three single services. We have a close relationship."
Nevertheless, the remit of the JFC is huge, and Peach is now one of the most significant players in the British military. His command includes responsibility for counterterrorist training teams, the directorate of special forces, defence intelligence, the surgeon general's headquarters, and the defence cyber-operations group.
With a core staff of 150 to support him, Peach also sits over the Permanent Joint Headquarters in Northwood, Middlesex, which has operational control for campaigns abroad, including Afghanistan, and last year in Libya.
"The JFC is not about ships, aircraft and tanks. It is about command, control, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and cyber. They are vital in current operations but you cannot reach out and touch them. Sometimes they can lose priority in a resource constrained world. We are the champions of the things you cannot see."
He added: "We are joining up that which we have learned, sometimes the hard way, with that which we need to provide in both equipment and support we are about joining up the dots."
Peach said the JFC would be looking to experiment with "new and small capabilities", as well as building up a better picture of potential threats through surveillance and reconnaissance.
The US military used to have a JFC, but it has been disbanded to cut costs, raising questions about whether the UK really needs one of its own.
Peach says the British JFC cannot be compared to the American model because they are undertaking different roles. He also insisted the army, navy and air force were behind the new body, even though Lord Levene's report made clear the three services were riven by parochial self-interest, and were highly suspicious of each other – particularly at senior levels.
"Actually we have a generation of young men and women (who) understand that we need to work together. They understand the army, navy and airforce are better together than apart. There is a hunger to enable joint operations to provide foundation capabilities we are better together. It's not just a question of a slogan of working together."
Peach would not be drawn on the kinds of cyber-capabilities the UK will be looking to develop, and said the UK needed to better understand the threat.
"We need a single point of authority within defence to provide appropriate focus. That focus is within Joint Forces Command. There is lots of speculation about threat, and obviously [we are] trying to understand the threat and what we do about it. The threat is real. Defining it, codifying it, and understanding it are important."
Peach said the JFC would be a success "when the young men and women on operations realise that those operations are more effective because of what we have done".
Though he also admitted that looking ahead could also be an inexact science. "All predictions of the future are invariably wrong," he said.
Pakistan Cross-Border Attack Kills 17
VOA News April 2, 2012
Pakistani officials say dozens of militants launched an attack on a paramilitary checkpoint, killing at least three soldiers.
The Frontier Corps said at least 14 insurgents were killed when troops responded to the attack Monday in the Mohmand tribal area, near the Afghan border.
The identity of the militants was not immediately clear, but Afghan and Pakistani Taliban have strongholds on both sides of the porous border.
Pakistan has been under pressure to do more to destroy militant sanctuaries since a U.S. military raid last year killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and AFP.
Soldiers risking death because kit ordered two years ago never arrived
British troops in Afghanistan are being forced to carry out dangerous supply operations because an “urgent” request for vital kit has not been fulfilled more than two years after commanders asked for it, leaked documents have revealed.
Telegraph.co.uk By James Kirkup, Deputy Political Editor 01 Apr 2012
The Ministry of Defence’s delays in delivering a new system to resupply remote bases in Afghanistan have led to accusations that troops’ lives are being put at unnecessary risk.
Cuts in the defence budget have been blamed for the delay, with reports that the MoD lost several of the expert staff involved in the overdue “Urgent Operational Requirement”.
The kit requested by commanders would allow the RAF to carry out precision air drops of supplies to forward operating bases in remote parts of Afghanistan.
Without the ability to drop supplies from the air, some supplies have to be delivered by road, exposing supply convoys to the risk of attack and roadside bombs.
At least four British personnel have died on such resupply missions in Afghanistan.
Defence chiefs made an “urgent” request for a “Joint Precision Aerial Delivery System” in December 2009.
The Daily Telegraph has seen a Ministry of Defence document showing the demand was approved as an “Urgent Operational Requirement” with a delivery deadline of January 2011.
The UOR system is meant to allow military commanders to fastrack vital kit through the notoriously bureaucratic defence procurement regime. The MoD says UORS “provide the fast equipment solutions that ever-changing operations demand”.
The MoD document, marked “Restricted” and dated 24 May 2010, is headed “Approval note for UOR AO1527 – Joint Precision Aerial Delivery System”
It shows that the Treasury had given the go-ahead for the urgent purchase of an airdrop system at an annual cost of £9.8 million
The document also shows that the technology was expected to be in operational use by January 2011.
However, the system is still not in place, leading to warnings that troops are being exposed to additional risk as a result.
The delay was discovered by Stephen Barclay, a Conservative member of the Commons Public Accounts Committee and former soldier.
“It is a matter of great concern that this capability has not yet been delivered. Troops’ lives are at risk on resupplied convoys, so this is not just about pounds, shillings and pence. The MoD needs to provide a proper explanation of this delay.”
In 2009, two British soldiers were killed and seventeen injured when the vehicles they were travelling in as part of a resupply convoy were blown up by IEDs planted on road. Two soldiers also died in 2007 on a resupply mission.
It is also understood that a significant number of service personnel have suffered serious injuries – including some who lost limbs – on supply convoys.
In evidence to the committee, the MoD admitted that the airdrop programme has been delayed, but denied that the loss of skilled personnel had been a factor.
The MoD said: “The reason why there has been a delay with the programme has not been because of manpower, but because the route for trying to obtain this capability was initially going to be by buying the capability commercially.
“It was concluded in the end that we would not be able to get it into service quickly enough through the process of trials, and so a different route has been gone down, obtaining it by a different methodology.”
Jobs for Ex-Militants Feed Distrust of Afghan State
Wall Street Journal By YAROSLAV TROFIMOV April 1, 2012
HERAT, Afghanistan - Three months ago, Commander Abdullah, who is known locally by the name Charsi, or hashish smoker, was one of the most feared insurgent leaders in western Afghanistan.
Now, the 45-year-old with a dyed-black beard and gemstone rings is spending his days at Afghan Border Police headquarters here. Having officially renounced the insurgency, he hopes to be rewarded with a plum job: battalion commander in charge of some 470 border police.
Reintegration of insurgent fighters like Mr. Abdullah, who carried out scores of attacks on Afghan troops and villagers who support the government, is a crucial strategy of the U.S.-led coalition in its war against the Taliban. Some 3,900 insurgents have abandoned the battlefield since the reintegration program, which provides amnesty and a small payment to the militants, was launched in late 2010, according to coalition statistics.
The program's goal is to weaken the insurgency as coalition forces pull out. But steps to forgive insurgent chieftains with blood on their hands—let alone to put them in positions of power—also are inflaming some Afghans' sense of injustice. The risk is that the program will turn these ordinary Afghans against the government—or worse, make them Taliban sympathizers.
Agha Karim, a 50-year-old tribal elder from the Pashtun Zarghun district east of Herat city, was kidnapped by Mr. Abdullah's men in January, one of the commander's last actions before switching sides. Mr. Karim was severely beaten, he says, then released after relatives sold most of his land to raise a $20,000 ransom.
"If Charsi gets a government job, then the people of our entire district will lose trust in the government," he says. "They will themselves go to the mountains."
Hajji Ibrahim Adel, another elder from Pashtun Zarghun, agrees. "What lesson is this teaching to our young people?" the saffron farmer asks. "That if you go kill and rob, you'll be rewarded with a good job and drive around in a police Ford Ranger?"
In a recent interview at border police headquarters, Mr. Abdullah offered no apologies for killing government troops and supporters and for kidnapping Mr. Karim. "In war, there are casualties, and there are fatalities," he said.
He said a key reason he decided to switch sides is that coalition forces in January transferred to Afghan control most of his home province of Herat, part of coalition plans to put Afghan troops in the lead across the whole country in 2014. "Once the Afghans became responsible for security, we did not want to be killing our brothers," he said. "As the foreigners leave the country, there will be more commanders acting like me."
The story of Mr. Abdullah's decision to abandon the insurgency and the ensuing fallout shows the delicate task faced by President Hamid Karzai's government and its Western backers as they try to persuade their enemies to give up the fight—without alienating their supporters.
Officially, the reintegration program provides the militants with three $120 monthly payments but doesn't guarantee them jobs. In practice, however, Afghan officials sometimes dole out attractive positions as they try to woo insurgent commanders.
British Maj. Gen. David Hook, who heads the coalition's reintegration efforts across Afghanistan, said that he was aware of reintegrated fighters joining Afghan security forces, even though the coalition didn't keep statistics on how frequently that happens.
"The design of the program is to bring them back to be a normal member of Afghan society," he said. "After that, everything is open to them. Any of these individuals can apply to be a member of the Afghan national security forces. They just have to pass a further vetting process."
Four-fifths of militants who have reintegrated so far come from the nation's northern and western provinces, including Herat. The Taliban have never had deep roots in those regions, where the insurgency often is confined to pockets of ethnic Pashtun population. Anti-Taliban former warlords already are reasserting themselves across the country's north and west in preparation for the post-2014 era, when foreign forces are scheduled to be gone and Mr. Karzai's final term will be concluded.
Coalition officials estimate that in Herat province, the country's main business center after Kabul and a key transit route to Iran and Turkmenistan, as many as one-third of local insurgent fighters have reintegrated over the past year.
"We have taken away the freedom of action and movement that they used to enjoy," says Italian Army Brig. Gen. Luciano Portolano, who served until this weekend as coalition forces commander for western Afghanistan. The looming end of the Karzai era, he adds, "could give the insurgents and the criminals an opportunity to reintegrate into society before things possibly take a different course with the next elections."
Ismail Khan, one of the country's leading commanders during the anti-Soviet jihad in the 1980s, still wields considerable power in Herat and the rest of western Afghanistan. In 2004, he was removed by Mr. Karzai as Herat's governor, and he now serves as Afghanistan's minister of water and electricity.
Mr. Abdullah, the reintegrated insurgent commander, started out as a teenage fighter in Mr. Khan's mujahedeen group in the 1980s. He says he fell out with the new Herat authorities after Mr. Khan was removed as governor. He assembled a band of fighters and headed to the hills.
As Mr. Abdullah began attacking government troops and supporters, his home district of Pashtun Zarghun, with its mountainous terrain and large ethnic Pashtun population, became one of the most dangerous in western Afghanistan.
Mr. Abdullah insists that his true allegiance is to Mr. Khan, not the Taliban, and that he became an insurgent only because he feared for his personal safety in Herat. "I didn't have any connection with the Taliban," he says. "We were independent."
A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, also says Mr. Abdullah had no connection with the movement—something the Taliban routinely say to discredit turncoat fighters.
Gen. Portolano, however, describes Mr. Abdullah as "one of the main Taliban and insurgent commanders in the western region," and someone who received significant logistical and military support from the Taliban leadership. Afghan officials share that assessment.
Several villagers from the area say Mr. Abdullah, in the sermons he used to deliver in Pashtun Zarghun's mosques, usually spoke on behalf of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan—the name the Taliban use to describe their shadow government.
Mr. Karim, the tribal elder, said in a recent interview in Herat that he was kidnapped by Mr. Abdullah's men because he was a district council member and, therefore, was considered a government supporter. The insurgents videotaped a "confession" in which Mr. Karim described cooperating with Afghan officials, and distributed it while he was still missing.
While being held captive at Mr. Abdullah's mountain refuge, Mr. Karim says, he saw a group of Taliban fighters from the southern province of Helmand teaching local insurgents how to assemble roadside bombs. The insurgents then used them to blow up an Afghan police truck, he says.
One day, Mr. Karim says, he overheard Mr. Abdullah call the Taliban command on a Thuraya satellite phone after a skirmish, falsely reporting that his men had destroyed five foreign fighting vehicles.
After being interrogated, Mr. Karim says, he was tied to a tree, whipped with branches, thrown into an icy irrigation canal, then left in a distant village after he became unconscious. The villagers there, Mr. Karim says, had been warned that Mr. Abdullah would kill five local men if he was allowed to return home before a ransom was paid.
Mr. Karim's brother says he had to sell the family's sheep, car and most of its wheat fields to raise the ransom. Mr. Karim says he spent 32 days in a Herat hospital being treated for broken bones and damage to his liver and kidneys.
Mr. Abdullah says he has no regrets about kidnapping Mr. Karim because the elder was "a spy for the foreigners," but he denies receiving any ransom money. "We should have killed him for his crime," he says. "But we did not punish him severely, and released him after we warned him not to repeat such an act."
Mr. Karim says that he never cooperated with any foreign or Afghan security forces, and that he made the video confession at gunpoint, reciting words prepared for him by Mr. Abdullah's men.
Ghulam Nabi Azizi, Pashtun Zarghun's district chief, says Mr. Karim was beaten so badly that the villagers had to carry him in a blanket for miles. Mr. Azizi says that although Mr. Abdullah frequently seized villagers for ransom, he doesn't know whether the insurgent demanded money for Mr. Karim's release.
"He's a troublemaker," Mr. Azizi says of Mr. Abdullah. "He's committed all kinds of crimes, kidnapping hundreds of people in Pashtun Zarghun, meting out punishment and then releasing them for money."
In December, shortly before Mr. Karim was kidnapped, 650 Afghan army and police troops, backed by more than 100 Italian coalition troops, pushed into Pashtun Zarghun and neighboring districts of Herat. Another senior Taliban commander, known as Dr. Abdulrahman, fled to the city of Herat, where he was captured by Afghan intelligence agents.
Coalition commanders and Afghan officials say Mr. Abdullah, whose militant group numbered about 100, decided to reintegrate because the government offensive left him few alternatives.
Mr. Abdullah denies that. "The Afghan army and police did not have any achievements. All they did was to destroy houses and kill people, but they couldn't take a single village from us," he says. "They were only fighting for their salaries. People in Pashtun Zarghun were with me. Otherwise, how could we have survived?"
He changed his mind, he says, for another reason. A former comrade-in-arms from Mr. Khan's mujahedeen group, Afghan Border Police Brig. Gen. Shir Ahmad Maldani, was transferred to Herat in January to serve as regional commander for western Afghanistan. The border police weren't directly involved in the government offensive against the militants.
Gen. Maldani says that one of his first moves after coming to Herat was to call Mr. Abdullah. "We were friends during the jihad against the Russians," he says. "As soon as I came here, I told the commander, 'Come join the peace process.'"
Mr. Abdullah says he had ignored such calls from other Afghan officials because he feared being lured into a trap. But Gen. Maldani "is like a brother to me," he says.
After the two men talked by phone, Gen. Maldani contacted Kabul and got preliminary agreement from the interior ministry to enroll the insurgent commander into the border police, along with members of his militant group who fit enlistment criteria.
Days later, Mr. Abdullah came out of the mountains with his three sons, 26 other fighters and 28 weapons. Their reintegration ceremony on Jan. 30 was attended by Herat's governor, provincial legislators, security officials and Western representatives.
Mr. Abdullah's brother Abdulrazzak and a cadre of fighters remained behind. According to Mr. Azizi, Pashtun Zarghun's district chief, when Mr. Abdullah joined the government, his brother kept most of the group's ammunition and heavy weapons, including three PKMS machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and four antitank recoilless rifles. Mr. Abdullah's fleet of motorcycles also stayed in the mountains.
Villagers in the district said in interviews that militants under Mr. Abdulrazzak's command have been prowling the area in recent weeks. Mr. Abdullah claims his brother is outside the country.
The process of enrolling Mr. Abdullah and his men in the border police is under way. Gen. Maldani says the former insurgent leader is under consideration for command of a battalion or a more junior post of company commander. Mr. Abdullah says he will take whichever position is offered him.
Drug trafficking has long been an important source of income for the Taliban and other insurgent groups, coalition officials say. The key drug-smuggling route into Iran and Europe runs through western Afghanistan. A previous border police regional commander, Brig. Gen. Malham Khan, was convicted in 2010 for using police vehicles to traffic opiates, one of several border-police officers nabbed for drug links.
If Mr. Abdullah's reintegration proves successful, coalition officials in Herat say, they expect the rest of his militant group to switch sides, possibly also by joining the border police.
That prospect angers some of the Afghan security personnel who fought him. "He was a terrorist and the head of a terrorist network," says Brig. Gen. Sayed Agha Saqeb, Herat provincial commander of the Afghan National Police, which lost several men in combat with Mr. Abdullah's insurgents. "The government may forgive his crimes, but the people will never accept him."
Herat Gov. Daud Saba says he shares that frustration. But keeping Mr. Abdullah and other insurgents out in the cold, he contends, would be worse.
"It would create more blood, which we don't want," Gov. Saba says. "Coming to peace is not an easy process, but we have no other choice. Revenge cannot go on forever." —Ziaulhaq Sultani contributed to this article.
Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at yaroslav.trofimov@wsj.com
Afghanistan: our modern opium war
Washington justified this occupation by the 'war on terror'. But it makes more sense as another theatre of the failed 'war on drugs'
Guardian.co.uk By Pratap Chatterjee Sunday 1 April 2012
Parween, the opium farmer in Badakhsan province, who supported her ageing husband. Haji Barat, the opium merchant in the provincial capital of Fayzabad, who built a health clinic with 50 beds with his profits. Images one does not expect from war-torn Afghanistan, a country which makes headlines now only when Korans and burnt or another massacre takes place.
The stories of Opium Nation, a new book about Afghanistan by Fariba Nawa, an Afghan American who was born in Herat but grew up in northern California after her family fled the Soviets, offer a rare and contradictory glimpse into the drug trade that is the economic life blood of Afghanistan. This is the actual narrative that the media and politicians should be grappling with.
The author takes the reader on a seven-year journey through many provinces, in her search for the story behind Darya, a 12-year-old opium bride, who was sold by her father to pay off a debt. As Nawa nears her goal of following the young girl-turned-woman whom she meets in the opening pages, she starts to understand the complexities of the drug trade.
She discovers, for example, that not all those involved in this transnational business are simply victims or villains. Some of the farmers and traders are small-town heroes whose tales are seldom heard because they don't fit the picture we want to hear.
Nawa also discovers that the same is true of the country of her birth. She writes:
"The western media propagates an image of a romantic Afghanistan, one that cannot be conquered or tamed. Its people are unruly natives unwelcoming to modern society. Others believe that it's the white man's burden to save it from ignorance and tribalism."
When she started this odyssey in 2000, during the time of the Taliban, Nawa says that she, too, believed these myths and believed that it was her mission to save Darya. At the end, having traveled to opium bazaars and rehabilitation clinics, visited the beautiful homes of warlords and attended the Blackwater-run police training sessions to destroy the trade, she discovers that the good solutions are much harder to come by than one might hope. She concludes:
"Darya is no longer a mystery or a victim I must liberate. The Afghan women who live there are not the weak, voiceless victims they are so often made out to be in the western media."
Instead of trying to just save the victims and punish the villains of the drug trade in Afghanistan, she argues that the west needs to understand that it has taken Afghanistan 30 years to build a strong opium trade and it is unlikely to take less time to dismantle what has become the cornerstone of the national economy. "There are no short cuts, quick fixes, or shock-and-awe solutions," says Nawa. It is a lesson that would be well noted by those in power in Washington, if they are contemplating embarking on the even more ambitious project of introducing "democracy" to the struggling masses in Central Asia.
Bringing peace and prosperity to war-torn Afghanistan was a first and major mission of Barack Obama's foreign policy. Today, with the fresh new images of burnt Qur'ans and the innocent victims of the alleged rampage by a US soldier, the question of the endgame of this conflict has been pushed back to the front pages of the daily newspapers yet again. "When Koran Burnings Incite Riots and a Mass Murder Doesn't" was the headline of a New York Times article, puzzling over the eternal mystery of the unruly native.
Every day on TV network news, we hear the grave voices of experts on the "war on terror" speaking to us from Washington. Sometimes, it is Peter Bergen at the New America Foundation, who met Osama bin Laden; on other occasions, it is Lisa Curtis at the Heritage Foundation, who worked at the CIA.
Time and again, the media tell us that Washington is consulting books galore on how to "solve" Afghanistan. "The struggle to set the future course of the Afghan war is becoming a battle of two books – both suddenly popular among White House," declared the Wall Street Journal in 2009. Which would it be? Lessons in Disaster or A Better War, both of which are chronicles of Vietnam. Yet, with more than half the income of Afghanistan derived from the opium trade, it would a mistake to imagine that the war in Afghanistan has anything in common with fighting the Viet Cong or even Communism.
Opium Nation reminds us that Afghanistan is not just a war, but a country of many ordinary yet unique people, kind and cruel, rich and poor. Not least of all, Nawa points out the obvious, inescapable fact: the solution to the opium trade – and the war – lies not in bullets or military strategy, but in addressing the root cause, which is the demand for the drug in the west.
Pakistan Convicts bin Laden’s Widows
VOA News April 2, 2012
A Pakistani court has convicted the three widows of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and two of his daughters on charges of illegally residing in the country and has sentenced them to 45 days detention. The court has also ordered their deportation.
The lawyer for the five women says they were each fined $110 and have paid the fees. He said the “Secretary of the Interior has been instructed to make arrangements for their deportation after that.” The attorney said the women were in good health.
The widows, two Saudis and one Yemeni, and several of the bin' Laden's children have been in Pakistani custody since the al-Qaida leader was killed by U.S. Navy Seals at his compound in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad on May 2, 2011.
The women were formally arrested on March 3 and will receive credit for time already served, shortening their sentence to two weeks.
Security was tight during Monday's legal proceedings, which took place in the house where the women have been living and where they will serve out their sentences.
The United States conducted the raid on bin Laden deep in Pakistani territory, about an hour outside the capital, Islamabad, without Pakistan's knowledge or cooperation.
While the operation was hailed as a success in the United States, it plunged the two countries' relationship to one of its lowest points, with Islamabad criticizing the raid as a serious violation of its sovereignty.
Osama bin Laden's youngest wife told Pakistani police the al-Qaida leader spent nearly 10 years on the run in Pakistan following the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States. She said the family moved to different safe houses around the country.
Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, a 30-year old Yemeni, said she gave birth to four of bin Laden's children while in Pakistan, two of them born in government hospitals.
In Afghanistan, Learning to Use Facebook to Protest
TIME By John Wendle Sunday, Apr. 01, 2012
Kabul - The image is striking and heartbreaking. It captures a young teenage boy at the height of his grief. A tear streaks his cheek, his mouth drawn into a grimace and his eyes are swollen from crying. "Thank you USA And World For Killing My Complete Fmily and Helping My Tears to Shed [sic]," is the message written across the image in bright yellow letters. The internet meme of Afghan youth mourning the loss of family and neighbors after 17 Afghan civilians were murdered in Panjwai district on March 11 — allegedly by U.S. Army Staff Sgt Robert Bales — spread rapidly on social media networks among Afghans in and out of the country. It encapsulated the frustration of a generation that has grown up during the 10 year war that is finding its voice — albeit, on the internet.
"For me, as an Afghan, I was really angry. I could have done anything if I had seen an American soldier that day. But I knew how to use Facebook and I did. People were posting angry comments about what had happened, about the children being killed and about the Koran burnings," an Afghan graphic designer from Kabul, who spoke on condition of anonymity, tells TIME. "This is the new way. This is the peaceful way. Not just going out and killing each other like happened during the Koran protests. Online social media can be used the same way here as it was during the Arab Spring. I think Afghanistan is becoming something like that. People are commenting on posts by friends and acquaintances. It's connecting people," the graphic designer says.
The killings and the meme generated a level of emotional connection and angry reaction — on Facebook in particular — that far surpassed anything seen by this correspondent in two and a half years in Afghanistan. Unlike the Koran burnings — which sparked violent street protests across the country that left around 30 dead — protests over the killings in Panjwai district were almost solely on the Internet, involving few public demonstrations.
"The killings in Panjwai were no different from other mass civilian killings — like with misguided airstrikes," says an Afghan in Kandahar who spoke on condition of anonymity. The conventional perception among the majority of Afghan civilians is that NATO routinely kills civilians — either intentionally or accidentally — and so the deaths in Kandahar were nothing out of the ordinary. On the other hand, the burning of the Koran was the defamation of a sacred book held in high esteem in Afghanistan. Swept up by religious fervor or the mob, protests over the Koran burning were carried out by mostly poor and illiterate people. The online reaction to the Kandahar massacre however points to a interesting divide: social media is the protest sites of choice for a relatively affluent, urban segment of society that has access to the Internet and information.
"There is a big divide in education and between the literate and the illiterate. Generally there's a large divide in terms of information flow. You can see this if you look at what kind of stuff people discuss and are interested in," says Jes Kaliebe Petersen, the director of business development at Paywast, a mobile phone-based social networking service that is Afghanistan's largest social network. "Literacy makes it much easier for people to access facts and get balanced information. That's partially why you're seeing what you're seeing."
Right now, Petersen says only 3% to 4% of people have Internet in Afghanistan, while 50% have mobile phones. The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology claims that Internet penetration grew from 0.25% in 2005 to 10% in 2009 while the usage of mobile phones grew from 3% to 16% over the same period. Most likely, Paywast's numbers are closer to the truth. The U.S. government estimates a current population of around 30.4 million Afghans.
Petersen says people use Paywast in the same way they use Facebook — voicing thoughts and opinions. "When something like this happens they talk about it in the same way they talk about things on Facebook," Petersen says. But, if Facebook is any indication, anger ran higher about the Kandahar massacre among urban, educated Afghans — the very segment of the population it seems would be most supportive of NATO — since many are employed by the government or non-governmental organizations or by NATO itself.
Another meme drew a similar deluge of angry comments on Facebook. This one showed the same youth next to an image of President Barack Obama over images of children killed in Panjwai. Written in English, the text read, "You! Killed Usama, removed Mulla Omar from black list, started negotiation with Taliban and handed over Bagram jail... Tell me WHAT WAS MY SIN??? Your whole United States can't compensate my complete family loss... Thanks to your civilization, democracy and Human Rights for gifting me such..." The image garnered 885 likes, 510 shares and 340 comments with the most recent comment on Monday, two weeks after the killings.
Some of the comments just showed straight anger and rage. One Afghan wrote, "Shame on you, America. Soon you will be destroyed, God willing." Another wrote, "I wonder if the F------ Americans are satisfied and happy with their army? God willing they will all burn in Hell!" Other comments were less incendiary - though no less angry. Some, though, called for action. "We have to do something, only talking aint gonna change anything," wrote one. Another wrote, "This is the time to unite," adding that Afghans should get together to have the issue brought before the UN and the international community. "So please unite. I am afraid we will lose everything. I swear, you cry in Kandahar and I cry in London." The posts are mostly in English or in Dari or Pashto written in English script.
But the Afghan graphic designer says that while the growth of Internet usage is mostly a good thing, he also sees some drawbacks. "It's a good thing, but there could be problems as well. It can be good for public awareness, but if I want to spread propaganda, most people won't think about whether it is true or not. If people use it for public awareness and to fight for their rights, then it will be a good thing, but if it is used for propaganda, it will be bad for society."
Regardless, as the 2014 date for the withdrawal of foreign troops looms along with possible Taliban rule, the Afghans TIME spoke with fear that the freedom of expression and the life they have created online may be constrained — as it is in China and Iran — or disappear altogether. "I think the Internet itself will remain as important as it is now, but it won't be as easy to find Internet connections. It will be controlled. In Iran, they have fast Internet connections, but people are not allowed to access too many outside websites," says the graphic designer.
An Afghan journalist, who also asked not to be named, is worried about the decline of social media. "If the Taliban come to power in 2014, they will not come in like they did ten years ago. They will come back and be a bit more moderate in their government. But for social media and the press, we are so worried because the Taliban, they have such radical thinking, they don't believe in press freedom, in the media."
But an Iranian media professional working in Kabul feels that, like life, the Internet will find a way. "People's ambition will not end, but their access to it might. I'm sure that Afghans will find a way to get around it. It's one of the only ways to state what you feel, to feel that you exist," she says. The sentiment is echoed by Petersen, who tells TIME, "Afghans are looking at what is going on everywhere in the world, 3G, Smartphones, etc, a lot of cool stuff; and if you take that away from people, its not going to be taken lightly. People would get very, very upset if you tried to take these things away from them."
But the graphic designer has a gloomier, and possibly more realistic outlook. "I believe if the Taliban comes back then it'll be like Iran. It will be an Islamic, Talib Internet."
Ron Paul: Most Americans agree with him on Afghanistan pullout
Ron Paul has yet to win a primary or caucus election, but on one thing he has the support of most Americans: The withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan sooner rather than later.
Christian Science Monitor By Brad Knickerbocker, Staff writer April 1, 2012
As Ron Paul falls farther and farther behind in the Republican race for the presidential nomination, there’s one area in which most of the American public increasingly is in full agreement with the congressman from Texas: the war in Afghanistan.
Rep. Paul may have failed to win any GOP primary elections or caucuses, and he may be way behind in accumulating delegates to the party convention in August (Mitt Romney has more than 10 times as many), but that hasn’t stopped the idealistic libertarian from speaking critically of his own party.
"The truth is, I'm trying to save the Republican Party from themselves because they want perpetual wars; they don't care about presidents who assassinate American citizens; they don't care about searching our houses without search warrants," Paul said on CBS News' "Face the Nation" Sunday.
The roar of Ron Paul: Five of his unorthodox views on the economy
In fact, many Americans also find troubling current government policy regarding warrantless searches and killing American citizens who have aligned themselves with terrorists bent on attacking the US.
But it is the war that’s gone on for more than 10 years in Afghanistan – a war that is not going particularly well and that has seen a series of incidents where supposed Afghan allies have killed US service personnel – where the public’s agreement with Paul seems most evident.
“Support for the war in Afghanistan has dropped sharply among both Republicans and Democrats,” the New York Times reported this past week.
The assertion is based on the latest New York Times/CBS poll, which finds that opposition to the war jumped from 53 percent four months ago to 69 percent today.
Weariness with the war crosses party lines. While Republicans are more inclined to support the war, 60 percent say the war is going very or somewhat badly, and only about 30 percent of Republicans surveyed said the US should stay in Afghanistan.
Other polls show similar tracking.
Last June, Americans were evenly split on US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to a Pew Research Center survey. Today, Pew finds the withdraw-stay split to be 57-35 percent.
Gallup finds Americans divided 2-to-1 regarding troop withdrawal. Half of those surveyed want an accelerated withdrawal while just 24 percent say the US should stick to its current 2014 timetable.
In a floor speech in the House of Representatives recently, Paul warned that if the US isn’t out of Afghanistan by the end of the year, “we’ll be there for another decade.”
“The American people are now with us,” he said, and on that point he’s increasingly correct.
On “Face the Nation” Sunday, Paul also spoke of what is widely seen as his cordial relationship with GOP front-runner Romney
“I like Mitt Romney as a person. I think he’s a dignified person," Paul said. "But I have no common ground on economics. He doesn’t worry about the Federal Reserve. He doesn’t worry about foreign policy. He doesn’t talk about civil liberties, so I would have a hard time to expect him to ever invite me to campaign with him.”
Paul also says he hasn’t decided whether he’d vote for Romney in the general election.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
TOLOnews.com Monday, 02 April 2012
The Afghan Foreign Minister Zalmay Rassoul on Monday will go to Qatar to meet with the Qatari authorities to discuss reconciliation with the Taliban.
The Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Mr Rassoul will discusses with officials in Qatar about the opening a political office for the Taliban there.
It's the first time that a senior Afghan government official is paying a visit to Qatar since the Taliban agreed to open an office in the Gulf state.
It comes as the Washington has signaled a willingness to accept less-stringent controls on Taliban leaders who could be transferred to Qatar as a confident-building measure to convince the Taliban to come to the negotiation table, Reuters has reported.
The US government has said that it would transfer five Taliban leaders to Qatar on condition that Doha provides assurances the leaders would not be allowed to leave the Gulf state, the officials said.
The US authorities had initially discussed with the Qataris on tighter restrictions such as imprisonment, house arrest or continuous monitoring by security forces - conditions the Qataris refused to accept.
The Taliban two weeks earlier, suspended peace talks with US, saying Washington didn't prove to show serious interest in peace talks.
Afghan and Pakistani officials had said that the peace process would have its ups and downs.
The United States hopes to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table so Afghanistan can be stabilised before foreign combat troops head home at the end of 2014.
Afghan Authorities Appeal For Help In Acid Attack
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan April 2, 2012
GHAZNI, Afghanistan -- Afghan authorities have appealed to citizens to provide information to help solve the case of two dead children whose bodies were found with signs that they had been attacked with acid.
The bodies of the girl and boy, who are believed to have been aged 12 to 15, were discovered on March 30 in eastern Ghazni Province.
Provincial Governor Musa Khan Akbarzada said the identities of the victims and the possible motive for the killings were still unknown.
Akbarzada also said no one had yet come forward to claim the two bodies.
Chaman Shah Etemadi, a lawmaker from Ghazni, said investigators were probing whether Taliban militants carried out the attack to warn against school attendance, or whether a family vendetta may have played a role.
At Least 23 Wounded in Afghan Blast
VOA NewsmApril 2, 2012
Officials in northern Afghanistan say twin bomb blasts have injured at least 23 people, including at least seven security personnel.
Authorities say the explosions tore through a market Monday in Baghlan province.
The French news agency says the second explosion happened after security forces arrived to investigate the initial blast and that half of those wounded were children.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and AFP.
1 Afghan soldier killed in bicycle bomb blast in Kandahar
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, April 2 (Xinhua) -- An Afghan army soldier was killed and three other soldiers injured when a bicycle bomb targeted their vehicle Monday in Kandahar city, capital of southern Kandahar province, police said.
"A bomb attached to a bicycle went off at about 1:00 p.m. local time in Kandahar city when a vehicle of Afghan National Army (ANA) passed by leaving one soldier dead and three other soldiers injured," provincial police chief General Abdul Raziq told Xinhua.
The blast scene was cordoned off by police shortly after the explosion and the injured were admitted to a hospital in the city, some 450 km south of Afghan capital Kabul.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Afghan and NATO-led troops have intensified cleanup operations against Taliban and other militant groups throughout the country recently as spring and summer, known as "fighting season", are drawing near.
Kandahar, the birthplace of Taliban, has seen increasing militancy despite continued military operations there.
Afghans Fear For Future After NATO Withdrawal
RFE/RL By Frud Bezhan April 01, 2012
KABUL - Afghans are preparing to close the book on years of foreign occupation, as international troops prepare to leave and domestic forces assume control of security.
That leaves it up to the Afghan National Army and police force to play a much greater, and possibly total, role in maintaining security and thwarting the resurgence of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
The stakes are high and the clock is ticking -- support for the Afghan war is at an all-time low in the United States, and calls for foreign troops to leave grow louder in Afghanistan following the recent Koran burnings and the killings of Afghan civilians.
Many Afghans, however, are divided on whether Afghan security forces are up to the task, according to an informal poll conducted around the country by RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan.
Ill-Equipped And Under-Trained
Some are confident that Afghan forces are more than capable of securing the country; others insist they are ill-equipped, under-trained, and too small in number to take control of security when the majority of the 130,000-strong NATO force pulls out in 2014.
Abdullah is a farmer from southern Helmand Province, which has long been at the center of the Taliban insurgency and opium trade in Afghanistan.
He warns that Afghan security forces -- which currently number 173,000 soldiers and 130,000 police -- will be overwhelmed by militants as support from NATO decreases.
"I don't think the Afghan forces can defend us because they are financially weak and their numbers are still relatively small. They do not have the right weapons so they are not ready on any count," Abdullah said.
"Now we see that the Taliban is being stopped by the air power of the foreign forces. If that threat is removed, the Taliban will reassert their control across Afghanistan very soon."
In neighboring Kandahar Province, where 17 villagers were recently killed during a nighttime attack allegedly carried out by a lone U.S. soldier, opinions are more weighted against the presence of foreign troops.
Locals there say they are better off without them and insist Afghan forces, who already control the main city, can uphold security.
Gul Bibi, an elderly woman living in Kandahar, agrees.
"We do not want the Americans to remain in our county any more. We have our own way of life. We now have an army and we can rebuild our country," Bibi said.
"Our soldiers can protect us. America is not our true friend. They are not here to be our friends. The Taliban are all Afghans and they can live with us and our military in peace."
In eastern Afghanistan, along the border with Pakistan, many locals feel that without the support of Western powers, the country will once again descend into anarchy.
Humera, a young woman from eastern Konar Province, which has long been a hotbed for insurgent activity, says Afghan forces will be unable to protect local residents.
She, like others in the area, is bracing herself for the return of the Taliban, which she fears will deny her an education and the opportunity to work.
"If the foreign forces leave our province, the Afghan forces will not be able to protect Afghanistan on their own. This is because our military lacks the resources the foreigners have. They do not have the necessary firepower," Humera said.
"They should be given tanks and other [heavy] weapons. And this way they will be able to better protect our homeland. The Taliban are just waiting for the international forces to leave. And when they return they will stop girls from going to schools and our sisters who now work will also be banned from taking their jobs."
Build-Up Strategy
A cornerstone of NATO's strategy in Afghanistan has been to increase the size and effectiveness of the Afghan security forces.
The Afghan forces, which have long been dogged by absenteeism, corruption, and drug abuse, have improved in recent years and become a more professional, competent fighting force.
As of this year, the Afghan government says roughly 50 percent of the country's population is in the hands of Afghan security forces.
In areas under the control of Afghan troops, many locals say they are cautiously optimistic about the ability of the Afghan army and police force to maintain order and security.
Abdullah Himat lives in Khost Province, in southeast Afghanistan, where Afghan forces control several strategically key areas.
"I can tell you about Khost that we now delegate our security responsibilities to the Afghan forces," Himat said.
"People here now know that they should support their military forces completely. This makes me confident to claim that the Afghan forces could take the responsibility of securing their country next year, in 2013."
Afghans in the country's relatively peaceful north, where many provinces are under government control, say Afghan forces are gradually earning their trust.
Abdul Wali Aresh, from Mazar-e-Sharif in Balkh Province, says Afghan forces have made many inroads but insists there is still a long way to go.
"Approaching 2014, Afghan forces have a lot to do before they can take control of the country. In areas where they have taken control, they still don't have full control and the backing from the people," Aresh said.
Written by Frud Bezhan; based on interviews conducted by Radio Free Afghanistan; translations by Abubakar Siddique.
Secret Australian war efforts in Uruzgan revealed by US adviser
Sydney Morning Herald April 02, 2012
THE Taliban radio operator was watching in the tiny Afghan village of Sar Marghab.
''The dinner is ready,'' he transmitted as the Australian-led convoy entered the dusty hamlet, and then the road blew up in front of their vehicles.
For hours, a battle raged against a force of about 50 Taliban until the convoy, backed by Australian special forces, had to withdraw, leaving the village to the insurgents.
Just another day in the often secret war Australians have been fighting in Uruzgan province, as detailed in a new book on Afghanistan, The Valley's Edge, by a former US State Department adviser and scholar, Dan Green.
The navy reservist spent a period in 2005 and 2006 working in Uruzgan as a political adviser for a US provincial reconstruction team, some of the time alongside Australian troops whose early operations involving special forces and the 1st Reconstruction Task Force have mostly been shrouded in secrecy.
His book, which is yet to be released in Australia, gives an unfiltered account of the conflict, revealing how the province was considered of little importance to the US, and how the Taliban became a deadly fighting force and even had a top-level spy embedded at a special forces base used by the Australians.
Uruzgan was ''not a priority'' for the US, Green writes, and adds that one US diplomat told him that ''our interests stopped at Uruzgan's borders''. This, he says, ''is the story of the province. The Soviets didn't consider it strategic and neither did the Taliban, at least in the 1990s''.
Green, who has a master's degree in international relations and was posted back to Afghanistan in 2010, notes the province has since shown some signs of improvement but he is concerned at the current US administration's decision to pull troops out of Afghanistan by 2014 - which ''didn't augur well for Afghanistan or the United States''.
The book details how Yassim, a Taliban spy, infiltrated a US base which the Herald has confirmed was used by Australian special forces as a staging area. Yassim rose to head the security detail for the base, known as Cobra, and led US Green Berets into ambushes before being exposed and jailed.
The Australian Defence Force last week said it had no record of any of Australian operations being compromised by the spy.
Green also reveals how the Taliban graduated from an ineffective militia to a deadly force which used foreign-trained snipers and special camouflage with devastating effect.
He describes the new provincial police chief, Matiullah Khan, whom the Australians rely on for security, as the ''black prince'', and says he has been suspected of involvement in political assassination and corruption but appears to be trying to change.
Last week the ADF said Mr Matiullah was one of the many influential figures with whom Australians had engaged and the ADF expected that as Uruzgan's police chief he would act in an ''impartial and professional manner and [continue] to be a positive influence for security in the province''.
Another chapter deals with a well-organised Taliban ambush in 2006 against an American patrol led by an Australian captain in the then little-known village of Sar Marghab - which Green appears not to realise has since become linked to one of the blackest days of Australian special forces operations. In 2009, a commando raid killed five children and led to an unsuccessful attempt to court-martial some of the troops involved.
During the ambush, Green's Humvee was narrowly missed by a Taliban mortar and he saw two Taliban shot dead as they ''low-crawled'' along a wall to attack.
He says the only warning was when a Taliban scout was heard to announce over their radio that ''the dinner is ready''. The patrol had to withdraw because the sun was setting, he said. ''In an initial battle damage assessment, the Australians reported they found 28 Taliban bodies,'' he says.
He says the patrol, rescued by Australian and Dutch forces, was later described as pointless by some US troops involved.
The ADF yesterday said the incident was probably related to a large offensive operation just north of the provincial capital, Tarin Kowt, when a special forces task group co-ordinated and participated in a planned raid against an important Taliban leader.
''The Australian commandos and Australian CH-47 helicopters ultimately played a pivotal role in ensuring the mission did not end in complete disaster, which at one stage appeared likely,'' an ADF spokesperson said.
The Herald was seeking further information from the ADF. Green is on his fourth Afghan tour.
New armed forces body promises review of Afghan conflict
Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach, head of the new 30,000-strong Joint Forces Command said his aim was to 'bring lessons more quickly from current operations into future operations'
The Guardian By Nick Hopkins Monday 2 April 2012
One of the armed forces' most senior officers is to oversee a wholesale review of the decade-long campaign in Afghanistan to help prepare the military for future conflicts. Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach will look at tactics and strategy – good and bad – as part of his role as the head of the new 30,000-strong Joint Forces Command (JFC), which "stands up" on Monday.
The formation of the JFC marks one of the most significant structural changes in the British military since the second world war. The new department will be at the core of intelligence gathering and contingency planning for any future campaigns.
It is thought the JFC, which was a key proposal in Lord Levene's report on defence reforms, is already helping the chief of the defence staff, Sir David Richards, consider how the UK might be affected by, and potentially contribute to, any conflict between the west and Iran.
Inevitably, much of the work undertaken by the JFC will be top secret.
In an interview with the Guardian, Peach, 55, said the JFC would "be the glue that helps bind together" the navy, airforce and army. It will also ensure that lessons from campaigns such as Afghanistan are learned quickly.
It will also oversee the development of weapons for cyberwarfare, and recommend new "smart" equipment that might make the difference in future campaigns.
"One of key ways to exploit this new command is to make sure that lessons are applied into education and training, so that our soldiers, sailors and airmen are better prepared. We want to build on the way we have prepared forces for current operations."
On Afghanistan, he said: "All campaigns evolve over time. The threat has evolved into these improvised explosive devices. We have a very important role in understanding countermeasures and techniques to defeat those devices. It is one of the key lessons we have identified."
Peach said his aim was to "bring lessons more quickly from current operations into future operations" – which could entail new training, as well as changes in tactics and procedures.
Peach said he didn't want to "imply it was all rubbish before", but said the JFC would bring proper focus to certain areas that needed to be championed to give the best possible advantage to troops fighting in the front line.
He also denied the JFC was, in effect, a fourth service. "No, it's definitely not a fourth service. We are not creating new uniforms or anything of that sort. We are complementary to three single services. We have a close relationship."
Nevertheless, the remit of the JFC is huge, and Peach is now one of the most significant players in the British military. His command includes responsibility for counterterrorist training teams, the directorate of special forces, defence intelligence, the surgeon general's headquarters, and the defence cyber-operations group.
With a core staff of 150 to support him, Peach also sits over the Permanent Joint Headquarters in Northwood, Middlesex, which has operational control for campaigns abroad, including Afghanistan, and last year in Libya.
"The JFC is not about ships, aircraft and tanks. It is about command, control, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and cyber. They are vital in current operations but you cannot reach out and touch them. Sometimes they can lose priority in a resource constrained world. We are the champions of the things you cannot see."
He added: "We are joining up that which we have learned, sometimes the hard way, with that which we need to provide in both equipment and support we are about joining up the dots."
Peach said the JFC would be looking to experiment with "new and small capabilities", as well as building up a better picture of potential threats through surveillance and reconnaissance.
The US military used to have a JFC, but it has been disbanded to cut costs, raising questions about whether the UK really needs one of its own.
Peach says the British JFC cannot be compared to the American model because they are undertaking different roles. He also insisted the army, navy and air force were behind the new body, even though Lord Levene's report made clear the three services were riven by parochial self-interest, and were highly suspicious of each other – particularly at senior levels.
"Actually we have a generation of young men and women (who) understand that we need to work together. They understand the army, navy and airforce are better together than apart. There is a hunger to enable joint operations to provide foundation capabilities we are better together. It's not just a question of a slogan of working together."
Peach would not be drawn on the kinds of cyber-capabilities the UK will be looking to develop, and said the UK needed to better understand the threat.
"We need a single point of authority within defence to provide appropriate focus. That focus is within Joint Forces Command. There is lots of speculation about threat, and obviously [we are] trying to understand the threat and what we do about it. The threat is real. Defining it, codifying it, and understanding it are important."
Peach said the JFC would be a success "when the young men and women on operations realise that those operations are more effective because of what we have done".
Though he also admitted that looking ahead could also be an inexact science. "All predictions of the future are invariably wrong," he said.
Pakistan Cross-Border Attack Kills 17
VOA News April 2, 2012
Pakistani officials say dozens of militants launched an attack on a paramilitary checkpoint, killing at least three soldiers.
The Frontier Corps said at least 14 insurgents were killed when troops responded to the attack Monday in the Mohmand tribal area, near the Afghan border.
The identity of the militants was not immediately clear, but Afghan and Pakistani Taliban have strongholds on both sides of the porous border.
Pakistan has been under pressure to do more to destroy militant sanctuaries since a U.S. military raid last year killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and AFP.
Soldiers risking death because kit ordered two years ago never arrived
British troops in Afghanistan are being forced to carry out dangerous supply operations because an “urgent” request for vital kit has not been fulfilled more than two years after commanders asked for it, leaked documents have revealed.
Telegraph.co.uk By James Kirkup, Deputy Political Editor 01 Apr 2012
The Ministry of Defence’s delays in delivering a new system to resupply remote bases in Afghanistan have led to accusations that troops’ lives are being put at unnecessary risk.
Cuts in the defence budget have been blamed for the delay, with reports that the MoD lost several of the expert staff involved in the overdue “Urgent Operational Requirement”.
The kit requested by commanders would allow the RAF to carry out precision air drops of supplies to forward operating bases in remote parts of Afghanistan.
Without the ability to drop supplies from the air, some supplies have to be delivered by road, exposing supply convoys to the risk of attack and roadside bombs.
At least four British personnel have died on such resupply missions in Afghanistan.
Defence chiefs made an “urgent” request for a “Joint Precision Aerial Delivery System” in December 2009.
The Daily Telegraph has seen a Ministry of Defence document showing the demand was approved as an “Urgent Operational Requirement” with a delivery deadline of January 2011.
The UOR system is meant to allow military commanders to fastrack vital kit through the notoriously bureaucratic defence procurement regime. The MoD says UORS “provide the fast equipment solutions that ever-changing operations demand”.
The MoD document, marked “Restricted” and dated 24 May 2010, is headed “Approval note for UOR AO1527 – Joint Precision Aerial Delivery System”
It shows that the Treasury had given the go-ahead for the urgent purchase of an airdrop system at an annual cost of £9.8 million
The document also shows that the technology was expected to be in operational use by January 2011.
However, the system is still not in place, leading to warnings that troops are being exposed to additional risk as a result.
The delay was discovered by Stephen Barclay, a Conservative member of the Commons Public Accounts Committee and former soldier.
“It is a matter of great concern that this capability has not yet been delivered. Troops’ lives are at risk on resupplied convoys, so this is not just about pounds, shillings and pence. The MoD needs to provide a proper explanation of this delay.”
In 2009, two British soldiers were killed and seventeen injured when the vehicles they were travelling in as part of a resupply convoy were blown up by IEDs planted on road. Two soldiers also died in 2007 on a resupply mission.
It is also understood that a significant number of service personnel have suffered serious injuries – including some who lost limbs – on supply convoys.
In evidence to the committee, the MoD admitted that the airdrop programme has been delayed, but denied that the loss of skilled personnel had been a factor.
The MoD said: “The reason why there has been a delay with the programme has not been because of manpower, but because the route for trying to obtain this capability was initially going to be by buying the capability commercially.
“It was concluded in the end that we would not be able to get it into service quickly enough through the process of trials, and so a different route has been gone down, obtaining it by a different methodology.”
Jobs for Ex-Militants Feed Distrust of Afghan State
Wall Street Journal By YAROSLAV TROFIMOV April 1, 2012
HERAT, Afghanistan - Three months ago, Commander Abdullah, who is known locally by the name Charsi, or hashish smoker, was one of the most feared insurgent leaders in western Afghanistan.
Now, the 45-year-old with a dyed-black beard and gemstone rings is spending his days at Afghan Border Police headquarters here. Having officially renounced the insurgency, he hopes to be rewarded with a plum job: battalion commander in charge of some 470 border police.
Reintegration of insurgent fighters like Mr. Abdullah, who carried out scores of attacks on Afghan troops and villagers who support the government, is a crucial strategy of the U.S.-led coalition in its war against the Taliban. Some 3,900 insurgents have abandoned the battlefield since the reintegration program, which provides amnesty and a small payment to the militants, was launched in late 2010, according to coalition statistics.
The program's goal is to weaken the insurgency as coalition forces pull out. But steps to forgive insurgent chieftains with blood on their hands—let alone to put them in positions of power—also are inflaming some Afghans' sense of injustice. The risk is that the program will turn these ordinary Afghans against the government—or worse, make them Taliban sympathizers.
Agha Karim, a 50-year-old tribal elder from the Pashtun Zarghun district east of Herat city, was kidnapped by Mr. Abdullah's men in January, one of the commander's last actions before switching sides. Mr. Karim was severely beaten, he says, then released after relatives sold most of his land to raise a $20,000 ransom.
"If Charsi gets a government job, then the people of our entire district will lose trust in the government," he says. "They will themselves go to the mountains."
Hajji Ibrahim Adel, another elder from Pashtun Zarghun, agrees. "What lesson is this teaching to our young people?" the saffron farmer asks. "That if you go kill and rob, you'll be rewarded with a good job and drive around in a police Ford Ranger?"
In a recent interview at border police headquarters, Mr. Abdullah offered no apologies for killing government troops and supporters and for kidnapping Mr. Karim. "In war, there are casualties, and there are fatalities," he said.
He said a key reason he decided to switch sides is that coalition forces in January transferred to Afghan control most of his home province of Herat, part of coalition plans to put Afghan troops in the lead across the whole country in 2014. "Once the Afghans became responsible for security, we did not want to be killing our brothers," he said. "As the foreigners leave the country, there will be more commanders acting like me."
The story of Mr. Abdullah's decision to abandon the insurgency and the ensuing fallout shows the delicate task faced by President Hamid Karzai's government and its Western backers as they try to persuade their enemies to give up the fight—without alienating their supporters.
Officially, the reintegration program provides the militants with three $120 monthly payments but doesn't guarantee them jobs. In practice, however, Afghan officials sometimes dole out attractive positions as they try to woo insurgent commanders.
British Maj. Gen. David Hook, who heads the coalition's reintegration efforts across Afghanistan, said that he was aware of reintegrated fighters joining Afghan security forces, even though the coalition didn't keep statistics on how frequently that happens.
"The design of the program is to bring them back to be a normal member of Afghan society," he said. "After that, everything is open to them. Any of these individuals can apply to be a member of the Afghan national security forces. They just have to pass a further vetting process."
Four-fifths of militants who have reintegrated so far come from the nation's northern and western provinces, including Herat. The Taliban have never had deep roots in those regions, where the insurgency often is confined to pockets of ethnic Pashtun population. Anti-Taliban former warlords already are reasserting themselves across the country's north and west in preparation for the post-2014 era, when foreign forces are scheduled to be gone and Mr. Karzai's final term will be concluded.
Coalition officials estimate that in Herat province, the country's main business center after Kabul and a key transit route to Iran and Turkmenistan, as many as one-third of local insurgent fighters have reintegrated over the past year.
"We have taken away the freedom of action and movement that they used to enjoy," says Italian Army Brig. Gen. Luciano Portolano, who served until this weekend as coalition forces commander for western Afghanistan. The looming end of the Karzai era, he adds, "could give the insurgents and the criminals an opportunity to reintegrate into society before things possibly take a different course with the next elections."
Ismail Khan, one of the country's leading commanders during the anti-Soviet jihad in the 1980s, still wields considerable power in Herat and the rest of western Afghanistan. In 2004, he was removed by Mr. Karzai as Herat's governor, and he now serves as Afghanistan's minister of water and electricity.
Mr. Abdullah, the reintegrated insurgent commander, started out as a teenage fighter in Mr. Khan's mujahedeen group in the 1980s. He says he fell out with the new Herat authorities after Mr. Khan was removed as governor. He assembled a band of fighters and headed to the hills.
As Mr. Abdullah began attacking government troops and supporters, his home district of Pashtun Zarghun, with its mountainous terrain and large ethnic Pashtun population, became one of the most dangerous in western Afghanistan.
Mr. Abdullah insists that his true allegiance is to Mr. Khan, not the Taliban, and that he became an insurgent only because he feared for his personal safety in Herat. "I didn't have any connection with the Taliban," he says. "We were independent."
A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, also says Mr. Abdullah had no connection with the movement—something the Taliban routinely say to discredit turncoat fighters.
Gen. Portolano, however, describes Mr. Abdullah as "one of the main Taliban and insurgent commanders in the western region," and someone who received significant logistical and military support from the Taliban leadership. Afghan officials share that assessment.
Several villagers from the area say Mr. Abdullah, in the sermons he used to deliver in Pashtun Zarghun's mosques, usually spoke on behalf of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan—the name the Taliban use to describe their shadow government.
Mr. Karim, the tribal elder, said in a recent interview in Herat that he was kidnapped by Mr. Abdullah's men because he was a district council member and, therefore, was considered a government supporter. The insurgents videotaped a "confession" in which Mr. Karim described cooperating with Afghan officials, and distributed it while he was still missing.
While being held captive at Mr. Abdullah's mountain refuge, Mr. Karim says, he saw a group of Taliban fighters from the southern province of Helmand teaching local insurgents how to assemble roadside bombs. The insurgents then used them to blow up an Afghan police truck, he says.
One day, Mr. Karim says, he overheard Mr. Abdullah call the Taliban command on a Thuraya satellite phone after a skirmish, falsely reporting that his men had destroyed five foreign fighting vehicles.
After being interrogated, Mr. Karim says, he was tied to a tree, whipped with branches, thrown into an icy irrigation canal, then left in a distant village after he became unconscious. The villagers there, Mr. Karim says, had been warned that Mr. Abdullah would kill five local men if he was allowed to return home before a ransom was paid.
Mr. Karim's brother says he had to sell the family's sheep, car and most of its wheat fields to raise the ransom. Mr. Karim says he spent 32 days in a Herat hospital being treated for broken bones and damage to his liver and kidneys.
Mr. Abdullah says he has no regrets about kidnapping Mr. Karim because the elder was "a spy for the foreigners," but he denies receiving any ransom money. "We should have killed him for his crime," he says. "But we did not punish him severely, and released him after we warned him not to repeat such an act."
Mr. Karim says that he never cooperated with any foreign or Afghan security forces, and that he made the video confession at gunpoint, reciting words prepared for him by Mr. Abdullah's men.
Ghulam Nabi Azizi, Pashtun Zarghun's district chief, says Mr. Karim was beaten so badly that the villagers had to carry him in a blanket for miles. Mr. Azizi says that although Mr. Abdullah frequently seized villagers for ransom, he doesn't know whether the insurgent demanded money for Mr. Karim's release.
"He's a troublemaker," Mr. Azizi says of Mr. Abdullah. "He's committed all kinds of crimes, kidnapping hundreds of people in Pashtun Zarghun, meting out punishment and then releasing them for money."
In December, shortly before Mr. Karim was kidnapped, 650 Afghan army and police troops, backed by more than 100 Italian coalition troops, pushed into Pashtun Zarghun and neighboring districts of Herat. Another senior Taliban commander, known as Dr. Abdulrahman, fled to the city of Herat, where he was captured by Afghan intelligence agents.
Coalition commanders and Afghan officials say Mr. Abdullah, whose militant group numbered about 100, decided to reintegrate because the government offensive left him few alternatives.
Mr. Abdullah denies that. "The Afghan army and police did not have any achievements. All they did was to destroy houses and kill people, but they couldn't take a single village from us," he says. "They were only fighting for their salaries. People in Pashtun Zarghun were with me. Otherwise, how could we have survived?"
He changed his mind, he says, for another reason. A former comrade-in-arms from Mr. Khan's mujahedeen group, Afghan Border Police Brig. Gen. Shir Ahmad Maldani, was transferred to Herat in January to serve as regional commander for western Afghanistan. The border police weren't directly involved in the government offensive against the militants.
Gen. Maldani says that one of his first moves after coming to Herat was to call Mr. Abdullah. "We were friends during the jihad against the Russians," he says. "As soon as I came here, I told the commander, 'Come join the peace process.'"
Mr. Abdullah says he had ignored such calls from other Afghan officials because he feared being lured into a trap. But Gen. Maldani "is like a brother to me," he says.
After the two men talked by phone, Gen. Maldani contacted Kabul and got preliminary agreement from the interior ministry to enroll the insurgent commander into the border police, along with members of his militant group who fit enlistment criteria.
Days later, Mr. Abdullah came out of the mountains with his three sons, 26 other fighters and 28 weapons. Their reintegration ceremony on Jan. 30 was attended by Herat's governor, provincial legislators, security officials and Western representatives.
Mr. Abdullah's brother Abdulrazzak and a cadre of fighters remained behind. According to Mr. Azizi, Pashtun Zarghun's district chief, when Mr. Abdullah joined the government, his brother kept most of the group's ammunition and heavy weapons, including three PKMS machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and four antitank recoilless rifles. Mr. Abdullah's fleet of motorcycles also stayed in the mountains.
Villagers in the district said in interviews that militants under Mr. Abdulrazzak's command have been prowling the area in recent weeks. Mr. Abdullah claims his brother is outside the country.
The process of enrolling Mr. Abdullah and his men in the border police is under way. Gen. Maldani says the former insurgent leader is under consideration for command of a battalion or a more junior post of company commander. Mr. Abdullah says he will take whichever position is offered him.
Drug trafficking has long been an important source of income for the Taliban and other insurgent groups, coalition officials say. The key drug-smuggling route into Iran and Europe runs through western Afghanistan. A previous border police regional commander, Brig. Gen. Malham Khan, was convicted in 2010 for using police vehicles to traffic opiates, one of several border-police officers nabbed for drug links.
If Mr. Abdullah's reintegration proves successful, coalition officials in Herat say, they expect the rest of his militant group to switch sides, possibly also by joining the border police.
That prospect angers some of the Afghan security personnel who fought him. "He was a terrorist and the head of a terrorist network," says Brig. Gen. Sayed Agha Saqeb, Herat provincial commander of the Afghan National Police, which lost several men in combat with Mr. Abdullah's insurgents. "The government may forgive his crimes, but the people will never accept him."
Herat Gov. Daud Saba says he shares that frustration. But keeping Mr. Abdullah and other insurgents out in the cold, he contends, would be worse.
"It would create more blood, which we don't want," Gov. Saba says. "Coming to peace is not an easy process, but we have no other choice. Revenge cannot go on forever." —Ziaulhaq Sultani contributed to this article.
Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at yaroslav.trofimov@wsj.com
Afghanistan: our modern opium war
Washington justified this occupation by the 'war on terror'. But it makes more sense as another theatre of the failed 'war on drugs'
Guardian.co.uk By Pratap Chatterjee Sunday 1 April 2012
Parween, the opium farmer in Badakhsan province, who supported her ageing husband. Haji Barat, the opium merchant in the provincial capital of Fayzabad, who built a health clinic with 50 beds with his profits. Images one does not expect from war-torn Afghanistan, a country which makes headlines now only when Korans and burnt or another massacre takes place.
The stories of Opium Nation, a new book about Afghanistan by Fariba Nawa, an Afghan American who was born in Herat but grew up in northern California after her family fled the Soviets, offer a rare and contradictory glimpse into the drug trade that is the economic life blood of Afghanistan. This is the actual narrative that the media and politicians should be grappling with.
The author takes the reader on a seven-year journey through many provinces, in her search for the story behind Darya, a 12-year-old opium bride, who was sold by her father to pay off a debt. As Nawa nears her goal of following the young girl-turned-woman whom she meets in the opening pages, she starts to understand the complexities of the drug trade.
She discovers, for example, that not all those involved in this transnational business are simply victims or villains. Some of the farmers and traders are small-town heroes whose tales are seldom heard because they don't fit the picture we want to hear.
Nawa also discovers that the same is true of the country of her birth. She writes:
"The western media propagates an image of a romantic Afghanistan, one that cannot be conquered or tamed. Its people are unruly natives unwelcoming to modern society. Others believe that it's the white man's burden to save it from ignorance and tribalism."
When she started this odyssey in 2000, during the time of the Taliban, Nawa says that she, too, believed these myths and believed that it was her mission to save Darya. At the end, having traveled to opium bazaars and rehabilitation clinics, visited the beautiful homes of warlords and attended the Blackwater-run police training sessions to destroy the trade, she discovers that the good solutions are much harder to come by than one might hope. She concludes:
"Darya is no longer a mystery or a victim I must liberate. The Afghan women who live there are not the weak, voiceless victims they are so often made out to be in the western media."
Instead of trying to just save the victims and punish the villains of the drug trade in Afghanistan, she argues that the west needs to understand that it has taken Afghanistan 30 years to build a strong opium trade and it is unlikely to take less time to dismantle what has become the cornerstone of the national economy. "There are no short cuts, quick fixes, or shock-and-awe solutions," says Nawa. It is a lesson that would be well noted by those in power in Washington, if they are contemplating embarking on the even more ambitious project of introducing "democracy" to the struggling masses in Central Asia.
Bringing peace and prosperity to war-torn Afghanistan was a first and major mission of Barack Obama's foreign policy. Today, with the fresh new images of burnt Qur'ans and the innocent victims of the alleged rampage by a US soldier, the question of the endgame of this conflict has been pushed back to the front pages of the daily newspapers yet again. "When Koran Burnings Incite Riots and a Mass Murder Doesn't" was the headline of a New York Times article, puzzling over the eternal mystery of the unruly native.
Every day on TV network news, we hear the grave voices of experts on the "war on terror" speaking to us from Washington. Sometimes, it is Peter Bergen at the New America Foundation, who met Osama bin Laden; on other occasions, it is Lisa Curtis at the Heritage Foundation, who worked at the CIA.
Time and again, the media tell us that Washington is consulting books galore on how to "solve" Afghanistan. "The struggle to set the future course of the Afghan war is becoming a battle of two books – both suddenly popular among White House," declared the Wall Street Journal in 2009. Which would it be? Lessons in Disaster or A Better War, both of which are chronicles of Vietnam. Yet, with more than half the income of Afghanistan derived from the opium trade, it would a mistake to imagine that the war in Afghanistan has anything in common with fighting the Viet Cong or even Communism.
Opium Nation reminds us that Afghanistan is not just a war, but a country of many ordinary yet unique people, kind and cruel, rich and poor. Not least of all, Nawa points out the obvious, inescapable fact: the solution to the opium trade – and the war – lies not in bullets or military strategy, but in addressing the root cause, which is the demand for the drug in the west.
Pakistan Convicts bin Laden’s Widows
VOA News April 2, 2012
A Pakistani court has convicted the three widows of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and two of his daughters on charges of illegally residing in the country and has sentenced them to 45 days detention. The court has also ordered their deportation.
The lawyer for the five women says they were each fined $110 and have paid the fees. He said the “Secretary of the Interior has been instructed to make arrangements for their deportation after that.” The attorney said the women were in good health.
The widows, two Saudis and one Yemeni, and several of the bin' Laden's children have been in Pakistani custody since the al-Qaida leader was killed by U.S. Navy Seals at his compound in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad on May 2, 2011.
The women were formally arrested on March 3 and will receive credit for time already served, shortening their sentence to two weeks.
Security was tight during Monday's legal proceedings, which took place in the house where the women have been living and where they will serve out their sentences.
The United States conducted the raid on bin Laden deep in Pakistani territory, about an hour outside the capital, Islamabad, without Pakistan's knowledge or cooperation.
While the operation was hailed as a success in the United States, it plunged the two countries' relationship to one of its lowest points, with Islamabad criticizing the raid as a serious violation of its sovereignty.
Osama bin Laden's youngest wife told Pakistani police the al-Qaida leader spent nearly 10 years on the run in Pakistan following the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States. She said the family moved to different safe houses around the country.
Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, a 30-year old Yemeni, said she gave birth to four of bin Laden's children while in Pakistan, two of them born in government hospitals.
In Afghanistan, Learning to Use Facebook to Protest
TIME By John Wendle Sunday, Apr. 01, 2012
Kabul - The image is striking and heartbreaking. It captures a young teenage boy at the height of his grief. A tear streaks his cheek, his mouth drawn into a grimace and his eyes are swollen from crying. "Thank you USA And World For Killing My Complete Fmily and Helping My Tears to Shed [sic]," is the message written across the image in bright yellow letters. The internet meme of Afghan youth mourning the loss of family and neighbors after 17 Afghan civilians were murdered in Panjwai district on March 11 — allegedly by U.S. Army Staff Sgt Robert Bales — spread rapidly on social media networks among Afghans in and out of the country. It encapsulated the frustration of a generation that has grown up during the 10 year war that is finding its voice — albeit, on the internet.
"For me, as an Afghan, I was really angry. I could have done anything if I had seen an American soldier that day. But I knew how to use Facebook and I did. People were posting angry comments about what had happened, about the children being killed and about the Koran burnings," an Afghan graphic designer from Kabul, who spoke on condition of anonymity, tells TIME. "This is the new way. This is the peaceful way. Not just going out and killing each other like happened during the Koran protests. Online social media can be used the same way here as it was during the Arab Spring. I think Afghanistan is becoming something like that. People are commenting on posts by friends and acquaintances. It's connecting people," the graphic designer says.
The killings and the meme generated a level of emotional connection and angry reaction — on Facebook in particular — that far surpassed anything seen by this correspondent in two and a half years in Afghanistan. Unlike the Koran burnings — which sparked violent street protests across the country that left around 30 dead — protests over the killings in Panjwai district were almost solely on the Internet, involving few public demonstrations.
"The killings in Panjwai were no different from other mass civilian killings — like with misguided airstrikes," says an Afghan in Kandahar who spoke on condition of anonymity. The conventional perception among the majority of Afghan civilians is that NATO routinely kills civilians — either intentionally or accidentally — and so the deaths in Kandahar were nothing out of the ordinary. On the other hand, the burning of the Koran was the defamation of a sacred book held in high esteem in Afghanistan. Swept up by religious fervor or the mob, protests over the Koran burning were carried out by mostly poor and illiterate people. The online reaction to the Kandahar massacre however points to a interesting divide: social media is the protest sites of choice for a relatively affluent, urban segment of society that has access to the Internet and information.
"There is a big divide in education and between the literate and the illiterate. Generally there's a large divide in terms of information flow. You can see this if you look at what kind of stuff people discuss and are interested in," says Jes Kaliebe Petersen, the director of business development at Paywast, a mobile phone-based social networking service that is Afghanistan's largest social network. "Literacy makes it much easier for people to access facts and get balanced information. That's partially why you're seeing what you're seeing."
Right now, Petersen says only 3% to 4% of people have Internet in Afghanistan, while 50% have mobile phones. The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology claims that Internet penetration grew from 0.25% in 2005 to 10% in 2009 while the usage of mobile phones grew from 3% to 16% over the same period. Most likely, Paywast's numbers are closer to the truth. The U.S. government estimates a current population of around 30.4 million Afghans.
Petersen says people use Paywast in the same way they use Facebook — voicing thoughts and opinions. "When something like this happens they talk about it in the same way they talk about things on Facebook," Petersen says. But, if Facebook is any indication, anger ran higher about the Kandahar massacre among urban, educated Afghans — the very segment of the population it seems would be most supportive of NATO — since many are employed by the government or non-governmental organizations or by NATO itself.
Another meme drew a similar deluge of angry comments on Facebook. This one showed the same youth next to an image of President Barack Obama over images of children killed in Panjwai. Written in English, the text read, "You! Killed Usama, removed Mulla Omar from black list, started negotiation with Taliban and handed over Bagram jail... Tell me WHAT WAS MY SIN??? Your whole United States can't compensate my complete family loss... Thanks to your civilization, democracy and Human Rights for gifting me such..." The image garnered 885 likes, 510 shares and 340 comments with the most recent comment on Monday, two weeks after the killings.
Some of the comments just showed straight anger and rage. One Afghan wrote, "Shame on you, America. Soon you will be destroyed, God willing." Another wrote, "I wonder if the F------ Americans are satisfied and happy with their army? God willing they will all burn in Hell!" Other comments were less incendiary - though no less angry. Some, though, called for action. "We have to do something, only talking aint gonna change anything," wrote one. Another wrote, "This is the time to unite," adding that Afghans should get together to have the issue brought before the UN and the international community. "So please unite. I am afraid we will lose everything. I swear, you cry in Kandahar and I cry in London." The posts are mostly in English or in Dari or Pashto written in English script.
But the Afghan graphic designer says that while the growth of Internet usage is mostly a good thing, he also sees some drawbacks. "It's a good thing, but there could be problems as well. It can be good for public awareness, but if I want to spread propaganda, most people won't think about whether it is true or not. If people use it for public awareness and to fight for their rights, then it will be a good thing, but if it is used for propaganda, it will be bad for society."
Regardless, as the 2014 date for the withdrawal of foreign troops looms along with possible Taliban rule, the Afghans TIME spoke with fear that the freedom of expression and the life they have created online may be constrained — as it is in China and Iran — or disappear altogether. "I think the Internet itself will remain as important as it is now, but it won't be as easy to find Internet connections. It will be controlled. In Iran, they have fast Internet connections, but people are not allowed to access too many outside websites," says the graphic designer.
An Afghan journalist, who also asked not to be named, is worried about the decline of social media. "If the Taliban come to power in 2014, they will not come in like they did ten years ago. They will come back and be a bit more moderate in their government. But for social media and the press, we are so worried because the Taliban, they have such radical thinking, they don't believe in press freedom, in the media."
But an Iranian media professional working in Kabul feels that, like life, the Internet will find a way. "People's ambition will not end, but their access to it might. I'm sure that Afghans will find a way to get around it. It's one of the only ways to state what you feel, to feel that you exist," she says. The sentiment is echoed by Petersen, who tells TIME, "Afghans are looking at what is going on everywhere in the world, 3G, Smartphones, etc, a lot of cool stuff; and if you take that away from people, its not going to be taken lightly. People would get very, very upset if you tried to take these things away from them."
But the graphic designer has a gloomier, and possibly more realistic outlook. "I believe if the Taliban comes back then it'll be like Iran. It will be an Islamic, Talib Internet."
Ron Paul: Most Americans agree with him on Afghanistan pullout
Ron Paul has yet to win a primary or caucus election, but on one thing he has the support of most Americans: The withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan sooner rather than later.
Christian Science Monitor By Brad Knickerbocker, Staff writer April 1, 2012
As Ron Paul falls farther and farther behind in the Republican race for the presidential nomination, there’s one area in which most of the American public increasingly is in full agreement with the congressman from Texas: the war in Afghanistan.
Rep. Paul may have failed to win any GOP primary elections or caucuses, and he may be way behind in accumulating delegates to the party convention in August (Mitt Romney has more than 10 times as many), but that hasn’t stopped the idealistic libertarian from speaking critically of his own party.
"The truth is, I'm trying to save the Republican Party from themselves because they want perpetual wars; they don't care about presidents who assassinate American citizens; they don't care about searching our houses without search warrants," Paul said on CBS News' "Face the Nation" Sunday.
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In fact, many Americans also find troubling current government policy regarding warrantless searches and killing American citizens who have aligned themselves with terrorists bent on attacking the US.
But it is the war that’s gone on for more than 10 years in Afghanistan – a war that is not going particularly well and that has seen a series of incidents where supposed Afghan allies have killed US service personnel – where the public’s agreement with Paul seems most evident.
“Support for the war in Afghanistan has dropped sharply among both Republicans and Democrats,” the New York Times reported this past week.
The assertion is based on the latest New York Times/CBS poll, which finds that opposition to the war jumped from 53 percent four months ago to 69 percent today.
Weariness with the war crosses party lines. While Republicans are more inclined to support the war, 60 percent say the war is going very or somewhat badly, and only about 30 percent of Republicans surveyed said the US should stay in Afghanistan.
Other polls show similar tracking.
Last June, Americans were evenly split on US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to a Pew Research Center survey. Today, Pew finds the withdraw-stay split to be 57-35 percent.
Gallup finds Americans divided 2-to-1 regarding troop withdrawal. Half of those surveyed want an accelerated withdrawal while just 24 percent say the US should stick to its current 2014 timetable.
In a floor speech in the House of Representatives recently, Paul warned that if the US isn’t out of Afghanistan by the end of the year, “we’ll be there for another decade.”
“The American people are now with us,” he said, and on that point he’s increasingly correct.
On “Face the Nation” Sunday, Paul also spoke of what is widely seen as his cordial relationship with GOP front-runner Romney
“I like Mitt Romney as a person. I think he’s a dignified person," Paul said. "But I have no common ground on economics. He doesn’t worry about the Federal Reserve. He doesn’t worry about foreign policy. He doesn’t talk about civil liberties, so I would have a hard time to expect him to ever invite me to campaign with him.”
Paul also says he hasn’t decided whether he’d vote for Romney in the general election.
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