[Afghan News] May 1, 2012

[یاسمینه]

Obama makes surprise trip to Afghanistan to sign key pact, mark bin Laden raid
By Kevin Sieff and Scott Wilson The Washington Post
KABUL — President Obama outlined his plan to end America’s longest foreign war during a visit here Tuesday colored by election-year politics and economic uncertainty, declaring that “this time of war began in Afghanistan, and this is where it will end.”
“We have traveled through more than a decade under the dark cloud of war,” the president said at a U.S. military base. “In the pre-dawn darkness of Afghanistan, we can see the light of a new day on the horizon.”
Obama delivered his address at the end of an unannounced visit here to sign a long-term partnership agreement with the Afghan government and to mark, alongside American troops at Bagram air base outside this capital city, the first anniversary of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.
The trip came amid criticism at home that Obama is using the raid to advance his reelection prospects by featuring his decision to launch the mission in campaign videos and other political settings. As Republican critics have called his leadership abroad weak, Obama has held up the bin Laden operation as evidence that he is willing to make risky decisions to protect U.S. interests.
His arrival here was timed to make the “strategic partnership agreement” official before an important NATO summit this month — and, in the words of one senior administration official traveling with Obama, to take advantage of “a resonant day for both our countries on the anniversary of the death of bin Laden.”
Obama used his time with the troops to emphasize the sacrifices they and their families have made over more than a decade of conflict, saying that in doing so they made the bin Laden mission successful and put the long war on a path to its conclusion.
The hours-long visit was directed almost entirely toward an American audience, unfolding while most Afghans slept. It also served as a detente after some of the tensest months in U.S.-Afghan relations.
Since February, American service members have inadvertently burned Korans at a U.S. military base, Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales allegedly murdered 17 civilians in Kandahar province, and at least 18 NATO troops have been killed by their Afghan counterparts. In addition to straining ties and infuriating Afghans, the incidents have contributed to rising war fatigue at home.
Opinion polls show most Americans no longer believe the war is worth fighting. But the strategic agreement and the troop withdrawal schedule allow Obama to say that he has ended the war in Iraq and is winding down the one in Afghanistan, a position even a majority of Republicans favor.
“The Iraq war is over. The number of our troops in harm’s way has been cut in half, and more will be coming home soon,” Obama said Tuesday. “We have a clear path to fulfill our mission in Afghanistan while delivering justice to al-Qaeda.”
Obama campaigned in 2008 on a pledge to end the Iraq war, something he did in December, and to strengthen the U.S. effort in Afghanistan at a time when the Taliban appeared resurgent and al-Qaeda was active in the regions along the Pakistani border.
With opposition to the Afghanistan war building within his party, Obama announced the beginning of the end of the U.S. mission last year by adopting a withdrawal timeline more rapid than some of his commanders recommended.
The decision drew criticism from some of his GOP rivals, including the presumptive presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, that Obama was calibrating his war strategy to the election calendar. Romney, who on Tuesday gave Obama a share of the credit for bin Laden’s killing, has said the U.S. goal should be to defeat the Taliban on the battlefield.
But Obama on Tuesday laid out a different ambition.
“Our goal is not to build a country in America’s image or to eradicate every vestige of the Taliban,” he said. “These objectives would require many more years, many more dollars and many more American lives. Our goal is to destroy al-Qaeda, and we are on a path to do exactly that.”
The last of the 33,000 troops Obama dispatched to Afghanistan in 2009 will head home at the end of September. Senior administration officials said Tuesday that, though no specific future troop levels have been determined, a “steady reduction” will follow over the next two years.
Obama’s timeline calls on Afghan security forces to take the lead in combat operations by the end of next year. All U.S. troops are scheduled to leave by the end of 2014, except for trainers who will assist Afghan forces and a small contingent of troops with a specific mission to combat al-Qaeda through counterterrorism operations.
In his remarks, Obama emphasized that the United States will not seek permanent military bases in Afghanistan, a country that for centuries has fiercely opposed foreign interlopers.
Those U.S. trainers and Special Operations troops that remain beyond 2014 will live on Afghan bases. Senior administration officials said the agreement is meant to send a signal to the Taliban that they cannot “wait out” the international presence, which is supporting a fragile Afghan government.
“The goal I set to defeat al-Qaeda and deny it a chance to rebuild is now within reach,” Obama said.
Traveling overnight and landing in darkness, Obama arrived at Bagram air base, 35 miles north of Kabul, at 10:20 p.m. local time and boarded a helicopter for a flight into the capital. He arrived at the presidential palace just after 11 p.m. for a meeting with President Hamid Karzai, who has had a contentious relationship with Obama over the years.
“I’m here to affirm the bond between our two countries and to thank Americans and Afghans who have sacrificed so much over these last 10 years,” Obama said. “Neither Americans nor the Afghan people asked for this war, yet for a decade we’ve stood together.”
In signing the agreement after 20 months of difficult negotiations, Obama said that “the Afghan people and the world should know that Afghanistan has a partner in the United States.”
Karzai has long requested reassurance from Obama that U.S. support would not wane after 2014. The agreement commits Obama to ask Congress for money to support Afghanistan through 2024, but it does not specify the amount of annual aid.
The accord is designed to promote the training of Afghan forces, a reconciliation and reintegration process for Taliban fighters who leave the battlefield, and regional stability with a focus on improving relations with Pakistan. A second senior administration official, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity, called it “a crucial component to bring the war to an end responsibly.”
In speaking with troops after the signing ceremony, Obama sounded notes of praise and hope.
“I know the battle is not yet over; some of your buddies are going to get injured, some of your buddies may get killed. And there’s going to be heartbreak and pain ahead,” he said. “But there is a light on the horizon because of the sacrifices you made.”
Karzai has had a tempestuous relationship with American leaders in recent years, making demands that U.S. officials have seen as unrealistic and maligning Washington as trying to strong-arm reconciliation efforts with the Taliban.
At the heart of Karzai’s discontent were two issues that appeared to have the potential to obstruct a long-term partnership: night operations and a U.S. military prison at Bagram.
This year, at Karzai’s behest, the United States agreed to cede control of the night raids and the detention center to Afghan security forces — concessions that paved the way for the long-term partnership agreement.
But beyond the substantive reforms that Karzai has demanded, Afghan officials say their president has also longed for more access to Washington — a wish that Obama’s rare visit to Kabul may have sought to satisfy.
Administration officials said Obama wanted to sign the deal in Kabul to highlight Afghan sovereignty and the changing nature of the U.S.-Afghan relationship.
“Today, with the signing of the strategic partnership agreement, we look forward to a future of peace,” he said after signing the pact.
Americans have not outlined what the U.S. troop presence will look like beyond 2014, and NATO has yet to specify its long-term financial commitment to the Afghan security forces. That topic will be a focal point of the NATO summit in Chicago this month.
U.S. military officials say they have been impressed with the improvement of the Afghan forces — an assessment echoed Tuesday by administration officials traveling with Obama.
But the Taliban remains strong in the south and the east, penetrating key security barriers in Kabul and Kandahar — the country’s most important cities — within the past month. In a coordinated assault on April 15, more than 35 militants staged simultaneous attacks on high-profile targets in several cities across eastern Afghanistan, including the capital.
“Let us finish the work at hand,” Obama said Tuesday, “and forge a just and lasting peace.”
Wilson reported from Washington. Staff writers Karen DeYoung and Ed O’Keefe in Washington contributed to this report.

Get U.S. troops out of Afghanistan
By Keith Ellison, Special to CNN May 1, 2012
Editor's note: Keith Ellison is a Democratic member of Congress from Minnesota's 5th District and co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
(CNN) -- One year ago, the enemy that had haunted America for nearly a decade met his end in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Osama bin Laden is no longer a threat to the United States because of President Obama's leadership and strong national security policies. Good intelligence practices and surgical counterterrorism operations enabled us to kill 20 of al Qaeda's top 30 leaders, including bin Laden. This is an accomplishment by any measure.
We have diminished al Qaeda's strength, so for the sake of our economic and national security, we should decrease our military presence and bring our troops home from Afghanistan as soon as is safely possible.
The American people agree. According to the latest New York Times/CBS poll, more than two-thirds of Americans think that the United States should no longer be at war in Afghanistan.
The president's plan started by withdrawing 10,000 U.S. troops from Afghanistan between June and December 2011. The 33,000 "surge" troops assigned in 2009 are scheduled to leave Afghanistan by this summer. We will continue the troop drawdown until 2014 when, if all goes according to plan, a strengthened Afghan force and NATO troops will maintain peace.
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But with our core mission of decimating al Qaeda in Afghanistan accomplished, is the continuing military presence until 2014 worth the cost? More than 1,900 Americans have died in Afghanistan, and more than 15,000 have been wounded. Attacks with improvised explosive devices increased last year and have caused a surge in double amputees. A recent study found that one in four Afghanistan and Iraq veterans were diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder between 2004 and 2009.
Unlike the United States' adversaries of the 20th century, al Qaeda is a mobile force that is not confined by borders. According to CIA reports, in 2010 there were fewer than 100 al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan. Clearly this small number does not warrant our large-scale troop presence there, which peaked at 100,000 last year.
The justification that we should stay in Afghanistan to prevent al Qaeda's return is unconvincing. Al Qaeda operates in lawless states, such as Yemen and Somalia, with relative ease. But it makes no sense to put tens of thousands of boots on the ground in those countries. Since our enemy is not limited by borders, why do we continue to put the lives of our brave troops at risk and spend billions of taxpayer dollars to secure one country?
Communities nationwide feel the financial effects of keeping our troops in Afghanistan. Republicans are demanding drastic domestic spending cuts that are hurting people here at home. At the same time, the proposed budget for the war in Afghanistan for 2013 is $88 billion. The annual cost to support one U.S. soldier in Afghanistan is more than $1 million, according to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. That figure would employ about 35 Americans here at home through federal infrastructure spending.
Instead of spending billions on a war that is not making us safer, we could better advance U.S. national security by providing greater support to people in Middle Eastern countries fighting for freedom and democracy.
Supporting their democratic aspirations and protecting their human rights, not just with words but also through bold actions, is the surest way to turn back anti-Americanism and terrorism in the region.
Congress should support President Obama in making these changes.
The opinions in this commentary are solely those of Keith Ellison.

Indian, Afghan Officials Discuss Reconstruction Efforts
VOA News May 1, 2012
Indian efforts to deepen investment in Afghanistan's reconstruction are the topic of the first session of an Afghan-Indian partnership council.
Afghanistan Foreign Minister Zalmai Rassoul and his Indian counterpart S.M. Krishna met in New Delhi – the first step in a strategic partnership agreement the countries signed last October. It was Afghanistan's first such deal with any country.
Krishna says India will help Afghanistan mobilize private capital to fund its reconstruction efforts. He said he will soon hold a meeting of regional investors interested in Afghanistan.
Afghan foreign minister Rassoul said India is already helping his country's forces prepare themselves to prevent a resurgence of the Taliban after the U.S.-led coalition leaves the country. He said the two countries are discussing training and equipping security forces.
India donates billions of dollars to humanitarian causes such as hospitals and education in Afghanistan. Reconstruction efforts have taken on a greater note of urgency with the planned completion of the withdrawal of U.S.-led forces from Afghanistan in 2014.

Night Raid Kills Two Afghans
VOA News May 1, 2012
NATO says a Taliban leader and another insurgent have been killed in a night raid in eastern Afghanistan – a claim being disputed by local residents.
The coalition says Tuesday's Afghan-led and NATO-supported operation in Laghman province targeted a Taliban leader who coordinated roadside bombings against security forces throughout the province.
But local residents say Afghan and NATO troops raided the home of innocent civilians, killing two men, including a member of a local district council.
The incident comes just weeks after the U.S. and Afghan governments signed a deal putting Afghans in charge of special operations, including controversial night raids on Afghan homes.
On Monday, NATO and Afghan officials said at least three children were killed in a crossfire between insurgents and American soldiers in the southern Zabul Province.
Afghan officials say the gunfight began when insurgents attacked a meeting of local community leaders and U.S. forces in the Shajoe District.

Afghan leaders should raise their game - EU ambassador
Reuters By Rob Taylor and Michael Georgy Tue May 1, 2012
KABUL - Just after news broke that U.S. special forces had killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, the top EU diplomat in neighbouring Afghanistan received a flood of emails from jubilant Afghans.
The death of the al Qaeda leader a year ago raised hopes in Kabul, Brussels, Washington and elsewhere that a devastating blow had been dealt to Islamist militancy in one of the most unstable regions in the world.
On the eve of the first anniversary of Bin Laden's killing, Vygaudas Usackas, the European Union's ambassador to Kabul, reflected on how that optimism had faded.
The Afghan Taliban, whom Washington accused of sheltering bin Laden before U.S. troops helped Afghan forces remove the group from power, have suspended reconciliation talks with the United States. And discussions with the Afghan government are limited.
"Immediately I got dozens, if not hundreds, of emails from different ordinary Afghans in a very celebratory mood, expressing their satisfaction that it may provide a game-changer in terms of the future reconciliation," Usackas told Reuters in an interview.
"Unfortunately, as we all know, the peace process is not as easy as one may have expected a year ago after bin Laden's death. That will require long-term commitment from both sides."
Two years into his posting, lack of commitment in Afghanistan seems to be the most troubling issue for Usackas.
Western nations have poured billions of dollars into aid and reconstruction yet, he says, President Hamid Karzai's administration has not kept up its end of the bargain -- to improve governance and transparency.
While the European Union has no intention of abandoning Afghanistan after most foreign troops withdraw in 2014, some countries will have to justify further heavy spending. Taxpayers squeezed by hard economic times may ask tougher questions if there are no tangible signs of improvement, said Usackas, a former Lithuanian diplomat.
SHARING THE BLAME
"President Karzai personally, and the political establishment of Afghanistan, are fully aware that the future development aid for the country will certainly be influenced by greater and genuine steps to improve governance, dealing with corruption and moving towards elections which will be credible for Afghan people," he said.
The international community must shoulder a large part of the blame for failing to ensure proper accountability and oversight of aid spending, Usackas acknowledged.
The end result is economic and political stability are elusive despite the presence of 130,000 NATO-led foreign troops and over $57 billion (35 billion pounds) already spent in aid.
Karzai's unpopular government remains fragile, struggling to deliver basic services to most of the 30 million population outside major cities -- support that is vital to preventing Afghans from joining militant groups.
And with Karzai considering bringing 2014 presidential elections forward by a year to avoid overloading the country with security challenges as most foreign combat troops exit, the world should not expect a perfect election process, Usackas said.
"There will still be shortfalls," he said. "But it's important that they are being organised in a way that people would perceive them in Afghanistan as credible."
Karzai is barred by Afghanistan's constitution from seeking a third five-year term, although Kabul is rife with rumour that he could seek to extend his term through political manoeuvring, or look to install an ally and rule by proxy.
Usackas said that while it was up to Afghans to decide on the timing of the vote, any hint of political manipulation could demolish already shaky voter confidence in the government.
"I think it's very important that 2014 produces a peaceful transfer of power in a way which is organised in more inclusive, transparent and credible free and fair elections," said Usackas in the garden of his Kabul residence.
With NATO leaders gathering in Chicago in late May for a meeting on future backing for the 352,000-strong Afghan security forces, expected to cost around $4.1 billion a year to sustain, Usackas said the gravest error the world could make would be to turn its back on Kabul after 2014.
"I'm afraid this country may turn not only to internal war, but also a source of regional conflict," he said.
Afghanistan's stability may ultimately hinge on policy decisions in Pakistan, which critics accuse of backing insurgent groups fighting NATO and Afghan forces.
Islamabad denies the allegations.
Usackas said Pakistan seemed genuinely interested in helping bring peace to Afghanistan, and he said there were signs other regional powers would work for stability.
But the same militant groups that bin Laden inspired are still dug in along Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan, and pose a major security threat to both countries.
Afghanistan's government doesn't seem to grasp the magnitude of major challenges just two years ahead of the pullout, said Usackas, admitting it keeps him awake at night sometimes.
"The Afghans have to be in the driving seat...," he said.
"Probably we made them complacent."
(Editing by Nick Macfie)

Afghan Protesters Accuse NATO Of Killing Four Children During Taliban Clash
May 1, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Hundreds of protesters have gathered in southern Afghanistan, chanting anti-American slogans and carrying the bodies of four children they said were killed by NATO forces during a clash with the Taliban.
Mohammad Jan Rasoulyar, the deputy provincial governor in southern Zabul Province, said the children, aged 8 to 12, died during a gun battle between Taliban insurgents and NATO and Afghan security forces in the district of Shahjoy.
Rasoulyar said some witnesses claimed it was the insurgents, and not foreign forces, who were responsible for the deaths.
NATO says it is investigating the incident.
U.S.-led forces have been blamed for numerous civilian casualties in Afghanistan, including an incident in March when U.S. soldier, Robert Bales, reportedly killed 17 people, including nine children, in a shooting rampage.
Based on reporting by AFP and dpa

Bin Laden: Seized documents show delusional leader and micromanager
CNN By Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst May 1, 2012
Editor's note: Peter Bergen is CNN's national security analyst and the author of "Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for Bin Laden From 9/11 to Abbottabad," from which this essay is adapted.
There is no better way for historians to assess Osama bin Laden's thinking and the real state of al Qaeda as it was understood by its leaders in the years after 9/11 than the "treasure trove" of more than 6,000 documents that were recovered by the U.S. Navy SEALs who raided bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a year ago.
In those documents we hear bin Laden speak in his own voice, unaware, of course, that one day his most private musings would end up in the hands of the CIA.
The documents paint a portrait of a man who was simultaneously an inveterate micromanager but was also someone almost delusional in his belief that his organization could still force a change in American foreign policies in the Muslim world if only he could get another big attack organized inside the United States -- something some of his subordinates were quite skeptical about given al Qaeda's diminished capabilities.
In the course of reporting a new book about the 10-year search for bin Laden after 9/11, senior U.S. administration officials allowed me to review hundreds of pages of declassified -- but as yet unpublished -- memos from the Abbottabad "treasure trove." I examined a variety of memos that were written by bin Laden himself and also memos that his subordinates had written to him, or to others.
The memos paint a picture of an organization that understood it was in deep danger from the American drone shrikes in Pakistan's tribal regions that had been decimating its leadership since summer 2008.
They show bin Laden hatching improbable schemes to attack the United States, while he was deeply involved in the minutia of the internal affairs of both al Qaeda's core group in Pakistan and its regional affiliates in the Middle East and Africa. And they also show that bin Laden well understood that al Qaeda's brand name was in deep trouble, in particular, because the group and its affiliates had killed so many civilians.
On August 7, 2010, bin Laden wrote to Mukhtar Abu al-Zubair, the leader of the brutal Al-Shabaab militia in Somalia, telling him that Al-Shabaab ("the Youth") would be better off if it did not declare itself publicly to be part of al Qaeda. Bin Laden advised, "If asked, it would be better to say there is a relationship with al Qaeda, which is simply a brotherly Islamic connection, and nothing more."
Bin Laden explained to the Shabaab leader that al Qaeda's affiliate in Iraq had attracted many enemies by adopting the al Qaeda name. He also pointed out that it would be better for fundraising purposes if Shabaab didn't identify itself as being part of al Qaeda, because businessmen in the Arab world "who are willing to help the brothers in Somalia" would be more likely to do so if they thought they were not supporting al Qaeda directly.
Al Qaeda, "the base" in Arabic, was the name that the group had given itself when it was founded in Pakistan by bin Laden in 1988. Now the leader of al Qaeda was advising his followers to steer away from using the term.
Bin Laden also advised members of Shabaab to try to avoid killing civilians, as they were then doing in battles in and around Mogadishu's key Bakara market, and rather to focus their attacks on African Union troops as they arrived or departed at the Mogadishu airport. Given bin Laden's own record when it came to ordering the deaths of civilians, this solicitude for the citizens of Mogadishu is somewhat ironic.
So badly tarnished had the al Qaeda brand become that bin Laden noodled with changing the name of his group. In an internal memo, bin Laden pointed out that "[President] Obama [says] that our war is not on Islam or the Muslim people, but rather our war is on the al Qaeda organization. So if the word al Qaeda was derived from or had strong ties to the word 'Islam' or 'Muslims,' or if it had the name 'Islamic party' it would be difficult for Obama to say that."
Bin Laden went on to nominate some possible new names for al Qaeda. "These are some suggestions: Monotheism and Jihad group, Monotheism and Defending Islam Group, Restoration of the Caliphate Group ... Muslim Unity group." None of these suggestions were exactly catchy and the group did not rename itself.
Bin Laden's principal conduit to his organization was Atiyah Abdul Rahman, a Libyan militant of about 40. Viewed by officials in the West as no more than a mid-tier terrorist, Rahman was actually bin Laden's chief of staff. In a 48-page memo to Rahman written in October 2010, bin Laden told him that al Qaeda's longtime sanctuary in Pakistan's tribal areas was now too dangerous because of the campaign of American drone strikes there. The CIA had launched a record number of strikes into the tribal regions during 2010. Bin Laden wrote, "I am leaning toward getting most of our brothers out of the area."
Bin Laden advised his followers not to move around the tribal regions except on overcast days when America's all-seeing satellites and drones would not have as good visibility of the area. He complained that, "the Americans have great accumulated expertise of photography of the region due to the fact they have been doing it for so many years. They can even distinguish between houses that are frequented by male visitors at a higher rate than is normal."
Bin Laden urged his followers to depart for the remote Afghan province of Kunar where he himself had hid after escaping from U.S. forces at the Battle of Tora Bora in eastern Afghanistan in December 2001, explaining that "due to its rough terrain and many mountains, rivers, trees, it can accommodate hundreds of the brothers without them being spotted by the enemy."
He was constantly urging holy war to his followers, but when it came to his own family bin Laden was privately advocating something quite different. He advised that his 20-year-old son Hamza should leave the drone-infested Pakistani tribal regions to further his religious training in the Persian Gulf kingdom of Qatar, which happens to be, per capita, the richest country in the world. Bin Laden added that if two of his other sons, Othman and Mohamed, should ever leave Iran, where they were living in exile, he would also advise them to steer clear of Pakistan's tribal areas. (Bin Laden noted that one of his sons, Ladin, had already been allowed to exit Iran to travel to Syria).
According to the documents recovered in the Abbottabad compound, the spectacular set of self-inflicted mistakes by al Qaeda's affiliate in Iraq played heavily on the minds of bin Laden and his top advisers. They complained internally that al Qaeda's campaign of attacks against Iraqi Christians had not been sanctioned by bin Laden.
To the leaders of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula based in Yemen, bin Laden urged that they not kill members of the local tribes, a tactic that al Qaeda had frequently employed in western Iraq, which had provoked a tribal uprising against al Qaeda that began in 2006 and had dealt a large blow to the group's fortunes in Iraq. "Learn from their mistakes," bin Laden admonished.
Al Qaeda's leaders wrote to Hakimullah Mehsud, the leader of the Pakistan Taliban on December 3, 2010, to warn him to suspend his campaign of attacks against Pakistani mosques and markets, which had killed hundreds of Pakistani civilians.
Although the Pakistani Taliban is an independent conglomeration of Taliban groups, al Qaeda was seeking to control their tactics and stop their counterproductive killing of Pakistani civilians. That isn't to say that al Qaeda's leaders had suddenly morphed into humanitarians. At one point in the letter to Mehsud, they wrote, "We're sending the attached short list on what is acceptable and unacceptable on the subject of kidnapping and receiving money. We hope that you and the Mujahedeen in Pakistan will approve it."
In his isolated final years, bin Laden became a micromanager, admonishing his Yemeni group that its members should always gas up and eat heartily before they embarked on road trips so that they wouldn't have to stop at gas stations and restaurants monitored by government spies. And he advised al Qaeda's North African wing to plant trees so they could later use them as cover for their operations:
"Trees would give shade and freedom to move around especially if the enemy spies from the air." It's safe to assume that this arboreal advice was simply ignored. At one point bin Laden even told his chief of staff that he preferred that any money sent to him be in Euros.
Bin Laden had long been disciplined, secretive and paranoid and he warned his lieutenants to be careful with any contacts with journalists. "Keep in mind that journalists may be involuntarily monitored in a way that they do not know about either on ground or by satellite. Especially Ahmad Zaidan of Al-Jazeera [the Al Jazeera bureau chief in Pakistan]. It's possible that a tracking device could be put in one of their personal effects before coming to a meeting."
Bin Laden sometimes gave guidance to his deputies so bizarre that they must have read it while scratching their turbans in bemusement. He complained that Faizal Shahzad, the American citizen of Pakistani heritage who had tried to blow up an SUV in Times Square on May 1, 2010, had broken the oath of allegiance he had sworn to the United States, and tut-tutted that "We do not want the Mujahedeen to be accused of breaking an oath." Bin Laden kept pressing his lieutenants for more attacks on America, but now they couldn't recruit naturalized U.S. citizens to carry out those missions. Huh?
Until the end, Bin Laden remained fixated on attacking the United States, writing to the leader of his affiliate in Yemen, "We need to extend and develop our operations in America and not keep it limited to only blowing up airplanes."
He urged that Yemenis who had visas for the United States be recruited for operations there. And he reminded his Yemeni followers that killing Americans was the priority rather than killing Yemeni soldiers or policeman, so the United States would be forced "finally to withdraw from our countries and stop supporting the Jews." He also warned his group not to get overly ambitious. "The people of Yemen are not really ready for a government formed by al Qaeda."
Bin Laden told his deputies that killing President Obama was a high priority as well as then-commandier in Afghanistan Gen. David Petraeus, but not to bother with plots against Vice President Joe Biden, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates, or then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen.
As the 10th anniversary of 9/11 approached, bin Laden, always very conscious of his own media image, got down in the weeds with his media team about how best to exploit the impending coverage of the anniversary. He suggested reaching out to Abdel Barri Atwan, a leading Palestinian journalist based in London, as well as the veteran Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk of the British Independent newspaper, both of whom had done interviews with bin Laden in the past. He also mused about doing a TV interview with CBS, which he regarded as the "least biased" of the American TV channels.
In response, an al Qaeda member, likely the American recruit Adam Gadahn, wrote bin Laden a critique of the various American news channels that is worth quoting at some length: "As for the neutrality of CNN in English it seems to be in cooperation with the government more than the others, except Fox News of course ... I used to think that MSNBC channel might be good and neutral, but it has lately fired two of the most famous journalists, Keith Olbermann and Octavia Nasr, [who, in fact, left CNN] ... ABC Channel is all right, actually it could be one of the best channels as far as we're concerned. It's interested in al Qaeda issues, particularly the journalist Brian Ross, who specializes in terrorism. The channel is still proud of its interview with the Sheikh [bin Laden in 1998]."
A June 2009 letter sheds light on the murky question of what kind of relationship al Qaeda has enjoyed with the Iranian government since the fall of the Taliban. For many years one of bin Laden's wives and a number of his children lived in Iran under some form of house arrest as well as some leaders of al Qaeda, such as the military commander Saif al-Adel.
A bin Laden lieutenant wrote to bin Laden "With regards to the Iranian relationship and the problem with our detained brothers, we bring good news. They released a new group of brothers in the last month."
The writer goes on to name several men the Iranian government had recently released.
The writer alludes to al Qaeda having abducted Heshmatollah Attarzadeh-Niyaki, an Iranian diplomat, in late 2008 near his home in the western Pakistani city of Peshawar. After holding the diplomat for more than a year, the militants quietly released him back to Iran in the spring of 2010.
Pakistani intelligence officials believe this was part of a deal that finally allowed some of bin Laden's family to end their years of house arrest in Iran.
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Afghan War Poses ‘Acute Challenges,’ Pentagon Report Says
Bloomberg By Tony Capaccio and Viola Gienger May 1, 2012
The U.S.-led effort in Afghanistan faces “long-term and acute challenges” from militant sanctuaries in neighboring Pakistan and “widespread corruption” in the Afghan government, the Defense Department said.
“The insurgency remains a resilient and determined enemy and will likely attempt to regain lost ground and influence this spring and summer,” the department wrote in a semi-annual report sent to Congress yesterday and planned for release in Washington today. “Additionally, the Afghan government continues to face widespread corruption that limits its effectiveness and legitimacy.”
The findings contradict accounts of progress U.S. and other coalition officials say will let them withdraw most of their combined 128,000 personnel by the end of 2014. That drawdown leaves Afghan security forces and governing authorities increasingly in charge as the U.S. struggles to mend frayed relations with Pakistan over drone strikes that are critical to stemming the insurgency.
The report cited “pervasive mistrust” as hindering U.S.- Pakistan relations and said that the Pakistan-based Haqqani network threatens a “stable political solution” in Afghanistan.
The report, covering the six months ended March 31, recounted “significant shocks” to relations between the NATO- led coalition and the Afghan government. They included video of U.S. Marines urinating on Taliban fighters’ corpses, news that American troops inadvertently burned copies of the Koran, attacks by Afghan security personnel on coalition forces and the March killing of 17 Afghan civilians allegedly committed by a U.S. soldier. Green-on-Blue Assaults
In a section on so-called “Green-on-Blue” assaults by Afghan troops on U.S. personnel, the department said such attacks, while “high-profile,” are “rare,” with 52 occurring between May 2007 and March 31 -- killing 86 personnel and wounding 115.
“While statistically small in number,” the report said, “Green-on-Blue attacks have significant negative operational and strategic impact on the coalition mission,” such as a brief February suspension of U.S. military mentoring for the Ministry of Interior.
The incidents undermine a key element of the U.S. plan for ending the war: close work with Afghans to ensure they are trained to take over. Still, the report’s authors defended the overall administration strategy on Afghanistan as “sound.” ‘Diplomatic Rift’
“These attacks have not yet caused a major diplomatic rift nor have they significantly hurt relations” between Afghan and NATO forces, officials said in the report.
Post-attack investigations determined that a large number of assaults stem from “isolated personal grievances” against coalition personnel, not insurgent infiltration, the department reported. “There is no indication these attacks are part of a deliberate effort by insurgents, nor were they coordinated with each other,” the department said.
The U.S. reports only deaths resulting from such insider incidents, not injuries or cases in which the attacker misses the coalition target, the Associated Press reported.
The Pentagon report strikes a pessimistic tone on improving U.S.-Pakistan relations, which suffered a major setback in November when 24 Pakistani troops were accidentally killed in U.S. airstrikes during a cross-border attack. Pakistan cut off land-based supply routes in Afghanistan, and none have been reopened. Supply Routes
The supply routes to and from Afghanistan via Pakistan will become even more important as the U.S. exits from the war and removes billions of dollars of equipment. While coalition troops have been able to receive supplies via northern routes, such as one using an air base in Kyrgyzstan, those alternatives largely rely on goodwill with Russia, a relationship set to become more strained with the return of Vladimir Putin to that country’s presidency.
The report outlined several attempts at meetings between U.S. and Pakistani officials to improve relations, concluding that the two nations have “divergent strategic interests” that “continue to make genuine cooperation difficult.”
A missile strike that is suspected to have come from a U.S. drone killed two people and injured three in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region this weekend, two days after the latest round of talks. Pakistan told the Obama administration in March it would no longer let U.S. drones use its airspace to attack militants or to collect intelligence on al-Qaeda or other groups, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the drone program is classified. Stable Solution
Taliban and allied Haqqani network attacks from northwest Pakistan “continue to threaten the emergence of a durable and stable political solution,” the Pentagon says.
Last year, then-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen said the Haqqani militant group essentially had become a proxy for Pakistan’s intelligence services.
Pakistani leaders have allowed an insurgent sanctuary in North Waziristan “due to their concerns that Pakistan will be left alone to confront an unstable, an unfriendly or an Indian- influenced Afghanistan on its borders,” according to the new report.
The havens threaten areas of Afghanistan, such as Kandahar, that the report’s authors described as “among the most contested provinces in Afghanistan, due in part to insurgent safe havens and freedom of movement across the border in Pakistan’s Balochistan province.” Fatal Injury
The Pentagon yesterday announced the death of another U.S. soldier deployed to Kandahar Province, Private First Class Christian Sannicolas, 20, of Anaheim, California. He died April 28 of injuries sustained when his vehicle hit a roadside bomb. He was part of 1st Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division in Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
Overall, the level of attacks initiated by militants in Afghanistan dropped last year for the first time in five years, according to the report. Still, the decrease was limited to 8 percent during the six months ended March 31.
Such enemy attacks rose 3 percent in eastern Afghanistan, where the Haqqani network is most active. The region accounted for 34 percent of attacks initiated by militants nationwide.
Insurgents probably will step up assassinations, high- profile attacks and the use of roadside bombs this year to regain lost territory and influence, the department said. The capital, Kabul, and three other cities saw such incidents in an 18-hour period two weeks ago, attacks that Pentagon officials ultimately said were the responsibility of the Haqqani group.
“The capital continues to face persistent threats, many of which are planned in and controlled from Pakistan,” according to the report. Al-Qaeda Status
Al-Qaeda, one year after the death of its founder Osama Bin Laden, continued to suffer “major setbacks” that have “constrained” its role in Afghanistan, the report said. Bin Laden planned the September 11, 2001 attacks from there.
The terrorist group has been “degraded” and become “reliant on a shrinking cadre of experienced leaders primarily inside a Haqqani-facilitated safe haven in North Waziristan,” it said.
Al-Qaeda has a small presence in Kunar and Nuristan provinces and views continued involved in Afghanistan as “integral to its global image and relevance,” the Pentagon1 said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Tony Capaccio in Washington at acapaccio@bloomberg.net; Viola Gienger in Washington at vgienger@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: John Walcott at jwalcott9@bloomberg.net

AP EXCLUSIVE: US not reporting all Afghan attacks
By ROBERT BURNS, AP National Security Writer April 30, 2012
WASHINGTON - The military is under-reporting the number of times that Afghan soldiers and police open fire on American and other foreign troops.
The U.S.-led coalition routinely reports each time an American or foreign solider is killed by an Afghan in uniform. But The Associated Press has learned it does not report insider attacks in which the Afghan wounds - or misses - his U.S. or allied target. It also doesn't report the wounding of troops who were attacked alongside those who were killed.
Such attacks reveal a level of mistrust and ill will between the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan counterparts in an increasingly unpopular war. The U.S. and its military partners are working more closely with Afghan troops in preparation for handing off security responsibility to them by the end of 2014.
In recent weeks an Afghan soldier opened fire on a group of American soldiers but missed the group entirely. The Americans quickly shot him to death. Not a word about this was reported by the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, as the coalition is formally known. It was disclosed to the AP by a U.S. official who was granted anonymity in order to give a fuller picture of the "insider" problem.
ISAF also said nothing about last week's attack in which two Afghan policemen in Kandahar province fired on U.S. soldiers, wounding two. Reporters learned of it from Afghan officials and from U.S. officials in Washington. The two Afghan policemen were shot to death by the Americans present.
Just last Wednesday, an attack that killed a U.S. Army special forces soldier, Staff Sgt. Andrew T. Brittonmihalo, 25, of Simi Valley, Calif., also wounded three other American soldiers. The death was reported by ISAF as an insider attack, but it made no mention of the wounded - or that an Afghan civilian also was killed.
The attacker was an Afghan special forces soldier who opened fire with a machine gun at a base in Kandahar province. He was killed by return fire.
That attack apparently was the first by a member of the Afghan special forces, who are more closely vetted than conventional Afghan forces and are often described by American officials as the most effective and reliable in the Afghan military.
Coalition officials do not dispute that such non-fatal attacks happen, but they have not provided a full accounting.
The insider threat has existed for years but has grown more deadly. Last year there were 21 fatal attacks that killed 35 coalition service members, according to ISAF figures. That compares with 11 fatal attacks and 20 deaths the previous year. In 2007 and 2008 there were a combined total of four attacks and four deaths.
ISAF has released brief descriptions of each of the fatal attacks for 2012 but says similar information for fatal attacks in 2011 is considered classified and therefore cannot be released.
Mark Jacobson, an international affairs expert at the German Marshall Fund in Washington and a former deputy NATO senior civilian representative in Afghanistan, said attacks of all types are cause for worry.
"You have to build up trust when working with partners, and years of trust can be destroyed in just a minute," Jacobson said. No matter what the motivation of the Afghan attacker, "it threatens the partnership."
Until now there has been little public notice of non-fatal insider attacks, even though they would appear to reflect the same deadly intent as that of Afghans who manage to succeed in killing their foreign partners.
Jamie Graybeal, an ISAF spokesman in Kabul, disclosed Monday in response to repeated AP requests that in addition to 10 fatal insider attacks so far this year, there have been two others that resulted in no deaths or injuries, plus one attack that resulted in wounded, for a total of 13 attacks. The three non-fatal attacks had not previously been reported.
Graybeal also disclosed that in most of the 10 fatal attacks a number of other ISAF troops were wounded. By policy, the fact that the attacks resulted in wounded as well as a fatality is not reported, he said.
Asked to explain why non-fatal insider attacks are not reported, Graybeal said the coalition does not disclose them because it does not have consent from all coalition governments to do so.
"All releases must be consistent with the national policies of troop contributing nations," Graybeal said.
Graybeal said a new review of this year's data showed that the 10 fatal attacks resulted in the deaths of 19 ISAF service members. His office had previously said the death total was 18. Most of those killed this year have been Americans but France, Britain and other coalition member countries also have suffered fatalities.
Graybeal said each attack in 2012 and 2011 was "an isolated incident and has its own underlying circumstances and motives." Just last May, however, an unclassified internal ISAF study, called "A Crisis of Trust and Cultural Incompatibility," concluded, "Such fratricide-murder incidents are no longer isolated; they reflect a growing systemic threat." It said many attacks stemmed from Afghan grievances related to cultural and other conflicts with U.S. troops.
Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, spokesman for the Afghan Defense Ministry, said the army has tightened its monitoring of soldiers' activities recently and, in some cases, taken action to stop insider attacks.
For example, "a number of soldiers" have been arrested for activity that might suggest a plot, such as providing information on army activities to people outside the military, he said. Some have been dismissed from the Army, but he did not provide figures.
U.S. officials say that in most cases the Afghans who turn their guns on their supposed allies are motivated not by sympathy for the Taliban or on orders from insurgents but rather act as a result of personal grievances against the coalition.
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Associated Press writer Heidi Vogt in Kabul contributed to this report.
Robert Burns can be followed on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/robertburnsAP
The Associated Press

Afghan Security Official Says Senior Taliban Member Killed For Seeking Peace Talks
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan May 1, 2012
KABUL -- Afghanistan's security chief has announced that a top-ranking member of the Afghan Taliban has been captured and killed in Pakistan along with 25 other militia members for seeking to resume peace talks.
Radio Free Afghanistan reports that Rahmatullah Nabil, the head of Afghanistan's National Security Directorate, told the Afghan Senate on May 1 that Mullah Ismail, the deputy head of the Afghan Taliban's military council, had been killed.
Nabil suggested fellow Taliban members were to blame for the killings, which also targeted senior Taliban commander Ustad Yasir, among others.
"Mullah Ismail, together with 25 other people, including Yasir, were detained because they were on the way to the airport to fly and join talks on peace in Afghanistan and to say they want peace and don't want to fight," he said. "All of them have been killed, and it has been said that the Taliban killed them or that the Taliban might have killed them."
Nabil's statement before the upper house of the Afghan parliament appears to end days of speculation that Ismail had been killed.
Several Afghan officials had previously given off-the-record comments about Ismail's death, alternately suggesting that the Taliban or Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency was behind the killings.
On May 1, Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, dismissed reports that Ismail and his fellow militia members had been killed, saying it was propaganda spread by the group's rivals.
Mujahid said Ismail was alive and in good health.
Corruption Scandal
Ismail had been at the heart of a corruption scandal within the Taliban ranks.
He and several other high-ranking Taliban officials were arrested by militia leadership in April for reportedly accepting large amounts of cash and property from the Afghan government.
The payments were said to be in exchange for protecting NATO and Afghan convoys crossing the Afghan-Pakistan border.
A 2010 investigation by the U.S. Congress found that much of the $2 billion the Pentagon provided to support American troops in Afghanistan went toward paying Taliban commanders for protection.
But some reports have suggested Ismail was being paid to participate in peace talks with Afghan officials.
The Afghan Taliban in March broke off peace talks with U.S. and Afghan negotiators in Qatar, calling them "pointless."
Some observers have suggested Ismail's arrest and killing will make Taliban leaders even more wary of returning to talks out of fear they will appear to be colluding with the U.S. in exchange for money.
Afghan security chief Nabil urged Afghan Taliban leaders not to travel to Qatar or Dubai for peace talks but to negotiate directly with government officials inside Afghanistan.
With reporting by AFP and pajhwok.com

Obama Calls Anniversary Of Bin Laden Death A Time For Reflection
April 30, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
U.S. President Barack Obama says the one-year anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s death at the hands of U.S. Special Forces is a time for “reflection” for all Americans.
"The American people rightly remember what we as a country accomplished in bringing to justice someone who killed over 3,000 of our citizens," Obama told reporters at a press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda.
He also rejected criticism that the White House was capitalizing on the milestone by participating in an NBC television news special featuring an interview in the White House Situation Room, where he and aides watched the raid on bin Laden's compound.
“For us to use that time for some reflection, to give thanks to those who participated, is entirely appropriate," Obama said.
Peace Hopes Fading, Says EU Envoy
Meanwhile, one year after the death of bin Laden raised hopes that the Islamist insurgency in Afghanistan could be defeated, the European Union ambassador to Kabul says early optimism about a resolution has faded.
Speaking to Reuters in Kabul, Vygaudas Usackas noted the recent suspension of peace talks between the United States and the Afghan Taliban, saying "the peace process is not as easy as one may have expected," and that any resolution would require "long-term commitment from both sides."
Usackas also criticized the administration of President Hamid Karzai for failing to improve government accountability and transparency, and said Western countries may be reluctant to continue providing billions of dollars in aid money into the country.
Based on reporting by Reuters, AP and dpa

Afghan police accused of stealing from rank and file
Reuters By Rob Taylor Mon Apr 30, 2012
KABUL - Dealing with bribe demands from petty officials and police is largely part of daily life in Afghanistan, but police are now being accused of stealing from each other.
Afghan authorities are investigating an alleged scheme to cheat thousands of police out of salaries worth nearly half a million dollars, with the governor of remote Nuristan province blaming senior officers and his predecessor of involvement.
Current Nuristan Governor Tamim Muhammad Nooristani said former police chief Shamul Rahman had been arrested and released pending investigations, while former governor Jamaluddin Badr-Jov was also being questioned over involvement in the scheme.
Both, Nooristani said, were believed to have benefited from a scheme run by a former police finance director in which salaries were siphoned off and records kept in a "black book" detailing money paid to around 200 police and officials to buy their silence.
Police corruption is a major grievance for many Afghans, eroding confidence in fledgling local security forces as most foreign troops look to leave the country by the end of 2014.
"The most on the list was the former governor, who had about 8 million Afghani ($163,000), and the former police chief had 5 million Afghani ($102,000)," Nooristani, who became governor eight months ago, told Reuters.
"The former chief of police is under arrest in Kabul. But still, although this is Afghanistan, I don't understand why the former governor is still going around and he is not yet arrested," he said.
Afghanistan's 149,000 police are in large part funded by international donors, with a policeman typically taking home $165 a month in a country where a third of the 30 million population live beneath the poverty line.
Donors have paid around $2.2 billion into a trust fund for police salaries that is administered by the U.N. Development Programme, with roughly one-third donated by the United States.
But eight in 10 Afghans do not believe their police force is ready to take charge of law and order, a United Nations survey found in January, underscoring worries about the pace of transition to fully Afghan security control of the country.
Many of the 7,000 Afghans surveyed saw police as drug-takers, corrupt or biased, with one in five saying they or a household member had been asked for a bribe by a police officer.
Colonel Ghulamullah Khan, the new police chief for Nuristan, which lies northeast of Kabul in the rugged foothills of the Hindu Kush range adjoining Pakistan, said hundreds of police had gone unpaid for three months in an area where security forces have struggled to repel Taliban insurgents.
"They will receive their salaries. The Interior Ministry is working on it," Khan said. "Nearly 10 people have been arrested in connection with this case."
Nooristani said most of the $449,000 missing had since been recovered, while investigations were still ongoing into the whereabouts of larger amounts.
"But these two big money (sums) from the police chief and former governor are still under investigation," he said. "It's been going on for I don't know how many years, but we just discovered it."
Badr-Jov, the former governor, rejected the allegations and said he had not been in charge of the province, once known as Kafiristan (Land of the Infidels) until local people converted en masse to Islam only a century ago, for close to 10 months.
"How is it possible for me to keep this much money for this long? Am I his banker?" he said, instead pointing the blame back at Nooristani.
He said he had already approached Parliament and declared openly that police were leaving Nuristan because they weren't being paid.
Nooristani said the reason the scheme had gone undiscovered for so long was because Nuristan was so remote.
"Now everything is getting better. But this system, the government here is Nuristan was totally broken down. It takes time to rebuild it back up again."
(Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Al-Qaida porn: Terror group hid plans in sex video, reports say
Senior Media Reporter By Dylan Stableford | The Lookout
Al-Qaida documents discovered by German cryptologists last year—which included planned future terror plots—were found inside a pornographic video carried by an alleged operative, CNN, citing Germany's Die Zeit newspaper, reported on Tuesday, the one-year anniversary of Osama bin Laden's killing.
The future plots—including a plan to seize a cruise ship, and another to carry out gun attacks similar to the Pakistani militant shootings that killed 164 in Mumbai in 2008—were found inside an adult film (called "Kick Ass") and in a file marked "Sexy Tanja" on memory cards hidden in a 22-year-old Austrian man's underwear last May. The man, Maqsood Lodin, was interrogated by police in Berlin after returning from Pakistan via Budapest, CNN said. His name was on a terror watch list when he was detained.
More than 100 al-Qaida documents, including PDFs of terror training manuals and files labeled "Future Works," were uncovered by German investigators several weeks later.
In one vague terror plot uncovered by investigators, cruise ship hijackers would put hostages in orange jumpsuits—like those worn by terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay—and videotape their executions.
Lodin and Yusuf Ocak, who was later arrested in Vienna, are on currently on trial in Berlin for alleged terror activity.
While the documents lack specific dates or names for terror targets, Die Zeit reporter Yassin Musharbash told CNN they show al-Qaida—long stymied by Western intelligence—is under significant pressure to carry out a major attack, in Europe or the United States.
It's not the first time al-Qaida and porn have been linked in headlines. In the fallout following bin Laden's death, it was revealed that the terror leader had a stash of pornography in his hideout near Islamabad, Pakistan, when Navy SEALs killed him.
U.S. officials told Reuters the pornography recovered in bin Laden's compound consisted "of modern, electronically recorded video" and was "fairly extensive."

More than 100 Schools Closed in Ghazni, MPs Say
TOLOnews.com Tuesday, 01 May 2012
Afghanistan's Ghanzi province parliamentary representatives claimed Monday that more than 100 schools in the province have closed in the face of escalating unrest and are concerned more will follow.
However, an official from the Ministry of Education refuted the claim, saying the schools did not close, but rather students have quit.
The Ghanzi parliamentarians said they have called on security forces to try to re-open the schools, but it was proving difficult.
"We have reports from people of Ghazni that more than 119 schools have been shut down, which has concerned us the most," provincial parliamentary representative Shah Gul Rezaie told TOLOnews.
"Insecurity could be one the reasons, but the schools should re-open as soon as possible."
Ghazni MP Mohammad Aref Rahmani said: "We can't blame the Ministry of Education. The security forces should secure the areas so as to provide the area safe enough to re-open the schools."
Ministry of Education's head of publication department Attahullah Wahedyar said that insurgent groups have been threatening violence against government entities and schools in the central-eastern province.
"But the schools are not closed," he told TOLOnews.
"Our reports show there are no closed schools in Ghazni. The threats are what have caused 20 percent to 25 percent of the school students to quit."
According to provincial officials, there are 633 schools in Ghazi, 40 percent of which are girls schools.
Hard-line Islamists in Afghanistan have previously issued violent threats against girls' schools and school teachers because they believe that Sharia law does not allow females to be given a school education.

Herat Traders Fed Up With Extortion
Street sellers say they have to pay daily bribes to city officials if they want to continue working.
IWPR By Hamed Mehri 30 Apr 12
Afghanistan - About 2,000 roadside vendors ply their trade on Herat streets every day, selling everything from bananas to tools and clothing. It is hard work, and most make barely enough money to cover their expenses plus a little profit.
But the trade is a huge money-maker for scores of municipal employees who thrive by levying unofficial taxes on the traders and pocketing most of the cash. The extortion has been widely condemned, but is also allowed to flourish.
Municipal officers are hardly going to issue receipts, so the exact amount they charge cannot be determined. But research by the Institute for War & Peace Reporting indicates that the owners of hand carts have to pay an average of 40 afghanis a day, about 85 US cents. Based on that figure, officers from the Herat city market regulation unit could be collecting 2.4 million afghanis, or 51,000 dollars, every month.
No government agency has yet attempted to curb the illicit levies, meaning that thousands of dollars in potential legal taxes are lost every month.
Darb-e Malik, Darb-e Kandahar, Jada Lailami, and the road beside the palace are among dozens of crowded areas in Herat that are prime locations for the handcart traders. One-wheeled and four-wheeled carts cost between 2,000-7,000 afghanis to buy. Their owners, mostly aged between 15 and 45, sell vegetables, fruit, dishes, clothes and other items.
Cart owners and street sellers interviewed by IWPR in various areas of Herat city say they earn 150 to 250 afghanis a day. The most successful of them, who have paid for prime locations, may earn 700 afghanis a day, but they also have to pay bigger bribes.
These small traders lead difficult lives, working in the freezing cold and blistering heat, often 15 hours a day. At dawn or even before that, they push their carts to markets to purchase fruits or vegetables. After washing the merchandise, they arrange it on their carts. After a long day of selling, they return the carts to wherever they keep them overnight before returning home.
The sellers say that if they did not pay the market regulation unit officers, they would be told to stop selling because they are operating illegally, under road traffic laws that ban roadside businesses that obstruct vehicle and pedestrian traffic.
Nawab, 16, sells women’s clothes from a cart on Lailami Road. He said he has to give municipal officers 40 afghanis a day, and that the officers harass him even after he has paid. Nawab said four municipal employees work in shifts on Lailami Road, extorting money from cart owners and other street sellers.
High-ranking municipal officials, including the mayor or his deputies, occasionally appear on the streets to inspect the traffic and see how their subordinates are doing. At such times, the officers make a show of enforcing traffic regulations and tell the roadside traders to move, sometimes tipping their merchandise onto the street.
The extortion has become routine, with no apparent fear of punishment.
An IWPR reporter who spent the day with cart owners and street sellers on Lailami Road last July spotted three uniformed municipal workers gathering round a cart selling bananas. They assaulted the owner, and then accompanied him to an area near the Malaka Jalali School where the cart was left alongside others that had been confiscated.
When the reporter asked the vendor what was going on, he replied, “They were municipal workers who demanded money from me. As I didn’t pay them anything, they took me off the streets.”
Returning to Lailami Road, the reporter soon witnessed another incident. A municipal worker known to traders as Mohyeddin was sitting in a motorised rickshaw by the roadside, taking money from a banana seller. While he was counting the money, the reporter asked him why he had taken it. Noticing the reporter’s microphone, Mohyeddin became alarmed and the money slipped out of his hand onto the street.
A crowd of passers-by soon gathered around, demanding an explanation. Mohyeddin admitted that he had taken the money as a bribe.
“I ask the traders to come to me when they are passing, and to put the money in my hand without speaking to me,” he said, before quickly leaving the area.
After he had gone departure, the banana seller, who introduced himself as Mohammad Arif, said, “That guy Mohyeddin works for the municipality. He takes money from me every day, and in return, he allows me to trade on the street with my cart.”
The extortion is not limited to municipal officers. Traders allege that police officers sometimes remove their carts from the streets and physically assault them.
Nearly 20 handcart owners to whom IWPR spoke refused to be named or have their voices recorded, for fear that police or market officers would learn of the interviews and ban them from doing business.
Ghulam Nabi, a street vendor who sells women clothes, was among those where were prepared to speak. He said municipal officers took 50 afghanis from him every day. He said he had no other choice but to keep on paying bribes in order to carry on working, as he is supporting 12 family members.
He confirmed that municipal officers patrolling the streets ordered traders to pay kickbacks unobserved. “Municipal officers tell us to get away from the crowd when we see them, and to hand them the money without saying a word,” Nabi explained.
“Several days ago, municipal officers confiscated 120 pairs of girls’ trousers worth 6,000 afghanis and fined me 1,000 afghanis,” Nabi said. “When I went to the municipality to pay the fine, all the trousers had been plundered by municipal workers.”
Rasikh, manager of Herat municipality’s Market Regulation Unit, denied allegations of extortion, and said he would not accept that bribery was going on unless video evidence was provided.
“It’s true that my officers confiscate merchandise from street sellers, but we store it in large containers until it is claimed,” he said. “Most of the time, handcart owners don’t come after their confiscated merchandise for fear of our officers.” He did not elaborate on why they would be afraid.
Despite regulations governing the behaviour of city employees, street traders say that few, if any, are ever punished for preying on them. That emboldens them to ask for more. The traders say that since their own activities are not regulated by law, they are left exposed to extortion.
IWPR interviews with dozens of vendors revealed that some of the city officials have been in post for more than five years, currying favour with their superiors by giving them a substantial percentage of their illicit earnings.
None of the municipal workers on the street would talk. An IWPR reporter tried seven times to interview Herat mayor Mohammad Salim Taraki and other top city officials, but was turned down.
Rasikh, the manager of the Market Regulation Unit, said he thought the estimate of 2.4 million afghanis a month in illegal levies was too high.
“I’m not saying that corruption doesn’t exist in our office,” he said. “But the cart owners are lying. They are hostile to us. My officials can’t possibly collect that much money.”
Mohammad Rafiq Mojaddadi, the previous mayor of Herat, was sacked after prosecutors brought accusations of corruption and embezzlement against him, and was sentenced to five years in prison and fined 90,000 dollars.
At a press conference in April 2009, his successor Taraki acknowledged that embezzlement was widespread among municipal workers and that this was one of his gravest concerns.
Little seems to have been done since then to stop officials shaking down street traders.
On Herat’s streets, one city officials known as “the Fox” carries a club as he makes his rounds, and is much loathed by the hundreds of shopkeepers and handcart traders along the Lailami Road and near Kandahar Gate who give him money every day.
Many of them say that whenever they see him, they are reminded of Taleban rule. The difference is that the Taleban would whip traders to force them to go to the mosques and pray, whereas the “Fox” uses his club to extract bribes.
Hamed Mehri is an IWPR-trained reporter in Afghanistan.
This report was produced in November 2011 as part of the Afghan Investigative Journalism Fund project, and originally published on the Afghan Centre for Investigative Journalism website which IWPR has set up locally.

www.afghanistannewscenter.com