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With Panetta in Afghanistan, Karzai condemns new airstrike
By William Wan and Kevin Sieff, The Washington Post June 7
KABUL — Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday publicly condemned a U.S. airstrike a day earlier that Afghan officials said had killed 18 civilians — a blunt reproach that coincided with a visit to the Afghan capital by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta.
“NATO operations that inflict human and material losses to civilians can in no way be justifiable, acceptable and tolerable,” Karzai said in a statement. He had returned early from a trip to China to further address the incident, which occurred in Logar province, about 50 miles from Kabul.
The backlash comes at critical moment in U.S.-Afghan relations, just weeks after the signing of a bilateral strategic partnership agreement and as leaders of both countries attempt to outline the specifics of American military involvement here beyond 2014.
Panetta and Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak were speaking to journalists in Kabul when Karzai released his statement condemning the Wednesday attack. Both men emphasized joint progress made in the fight against the Taliban but expressed frustration about what they described as a continuing undisturbed haven for insurgents in Pakistan.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here,” Panetta said. “And for that reason, it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven.”
Later Thursday, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Sherry Rehman, criticized Panetta’s comment, saying that it would make it harder for the two countries to narrow their differences, the Reuters news agency reported.
“It adds an unhelpful twist to the process and leaves little oxygen for those of us seeking to break a stalemate,” Rehman said in a statement.
Nine children and four women were among those killed in the Logar airstrike, provincial spokesman Mirwais Mirzakwal said. Officials described the operation as a joint effort between coalition and Afghan forces.
Karzai called a relative of the victims from China, where he was participating in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit, and pledged a thorough investigation of what happened. NATO officials said they are investigating as well.
The coalition “is taking the allegations seriously,” said Martyn Crighton, a spokesman for NATO forces. “As a part of that process, the commander has dispatched a team to gather facts, meet with Afghan officials and try to determine what happened.”
Hours after the airstrike, two suicide bombers attacked a Kandahar market, killing at least 22 civilians. The two incidents made Wednesday one of the bloodiest days for Afghans in the history of the war.
Panetta called Wednesday’s suicide attack “much more organized than we’ve seen before.” According to witnesses, the first bomber on a motorcycle attacked a parking lot often used by NATO supply vehicles in southern Kandahar; a second bomber detonated explosives as others tried to help the wounded.
Panetta came to Afghanistan to confer with military leaders on plans to withdraw troops and deal with rising violence. He noted that despite the increase in bloodshed in recent weeks, overall violence was lower than in previous years.
“We have a tough fight on our hands,” Panetta said. He reaffirmed the United States’ long-term commitment to Afghanistan and said he believed it would help thwart the Taliban’s goals.
In comments before his arrival, Panetta said the purpose of his visit was “to get a sense of just exactly what are the Taliban doing” and to hear an assessment from U.S. commanders of how NATO will deal with the Taliban and the Haqqani network operating from Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“I think it’s important to make sure we are aware of the kind of attacks they’re going to engage in as we go through the rest of the summer,” he said.
Panetta began the four-hour stopover by meeting with U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and the U.S. commander of NATO-led forces, Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, who must withdraw 23,000 U.S. troops by the end of September, leaving 68,000 in the country.
According to the Obama administration’s plan, the vacancies left by those departures will be filled by Afghan forces and U.S. advisory teams whose performance will determine how commanders proceed with continued withdrawals until the end of 2014.
Special correspondent Sayed Salahuddin contributed to this report.
Karzai Cuts Short China Visit Following Afghan Violence
June 7, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has cut short an official visit to China following reports of civilian deaths in a NATO air strike in eastern Afghanistan.
Karzai said 18 civilians were killed in the strike in Logar Province on June 6, adding that civilian casualties in such operations are "unacceptable."
Karzai's statement came as U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived in Afghanistan for a previously unannounced visit.
Panetta said it will be difficult to achieve stability in Afghanistan so long as militants continue to receive shelter in Pakistan's tribal areas.
"We've made very clear that it is difficult to achieve a secure Afghanistan as long as there is a safe haven for terrorists in Pakistan, from which they can conduct attacks on our forces," Panetta said.
He said the United States is "reaching the limits of its patience" with Pakistan's failure to take decisive action against militants.
"We are reaching the limits of our patience here, and for that reason it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven from taking place and from allowing terrorists to use their country as a safety net in order to conduct their attacks on our forces," Panetta said.
The June 6 violence in Afghanistan included at least 22 people killed in a series of suicide bombings in Kandahar Province.
Panetta, speaking at a news conference in Kabul, said Pakistan has to take action to root out the Haqqani militant group blamed for some of the deadliest crossborder attacks during the 10-year war.
"We have made that clear, time and time again, we will continue to make that clear that it is an intolerable situation to have those attacking our people, our forces , have the convenience of being able to return to a safe haven in Pakistan," Panetta said.
U.S. officials have long pushed Pakistan to do more to combat militants using its soil to organize and launch attacks on international troops in Afghanistan.
Already tense U.S.-Pakistani relations have been further strained by continued NATO drone strikes targeting militants in northwest Pakistan, as well as Pakistan's decision to close NATO supply routes to Afghanistan through Pakistani territory after a NATO air strike killed 24 Pakistani six months ago.
Panetta was meeting U.S. military commanders to get an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan as the United States prepares to withdraw some 23,000 troops from Afghanistan by the end of September.
Panetta acknowledged earlier on June 7 that there has been an upsurge in insurgent violence recently, and that some recent attacks have been "more organized" than earlier ones.
With reporting by Reuters, AP, and dpa
Panetta Visits Afghanistan Amid Mounting Violence
By ALISSA J. RUBIN The New York Times June 7, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta arrived in Afghanistan on Thursday after the deadliest day for civilians this year, caused in part by a NATO airstrike the day before in which Afghan officials say 18 women and children were killed.
President Hamid Karzai condemned the strike in the strongest terms and decided the episode was serious enough to cut short his trip to China, where he was participating in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit meeting.
“NATO cannot justify any airstrike which causes harm to the lives and property of civilians,” Mr. Karzai said in a statement released by his office, adding that all the people killed in the strike, in the eastern province of Logar, were civilians.
The United Nations criticized the strike as well, blaming both the Taliban and international forces for continuing airstrikes near civilian areas, though it had not completed an investigation to report a complete toll.
A joint investigation by the Afghan government and NATO has begun, according to a NATO spokesman. Initial reporting by NATO, however, said that no civilians had been killed.
Mr. Panetta, who said that he wanted an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan from the senior allied commander, Gen. John R. Allen, used a news conference to speak out strongly about the havens in Pakistan where Taliban and other extremists take refuge between attacks on coalition and Afghan forces.
“It is an increasing concern that the safe havens exist and that the Haqqanis are using it to attack our forces,” Mr. Panetta said as he stood next to the Afghan defense minister, Abdul Rahim Wardak. He was referring to the Haqqani network, Islamic militants operating from Pakistan.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here, and for that reason it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven,” he said.
Mr. Panetta said that the Haqqanis most recently had been involved in an attack on Camp Salerno in Khost Province and that it was “an intolerable situation.”
In Washington on Thursday, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, echoed Mr. Panetta’s comments from Kabul, acknowledging during a news conference that “there are friction points in our relationship with Pakistan.”
General Dempsey cited the growing influence — and recurring violence — of the Haqqani network in the cross-border area as one area of disappointment. “The Haqqani network is as big a threat to Pakistan as it is to Afghanistan and to us, but we haven’t been able to find common ground on that point,” he said.
General Dempsey added: “We just have to keep at it, because Pakistan’s an important partner.”
Mr. Panetta arrived a day after a suicide attack in Kandahar City that killed 23 Afghan civilians and a suicide bombing in Faryab in the north of the country, in addition to the NATO airstrike in Logar.
On Wednesday, he was in New Delhi, where he brushed aside concerns that drone strikes against Qaeda leaders in Pakistan violated that country’s sovereignty.
“We have made clear to the Pakistanis that the United States of America is going to defend ourselves against those who attack us,” Mr. Panetta said. “This is not just about protecting the United States. It’s also about protecting Pakistan. And we have made it very clear that we are going to continue to defend ourselves.”
On Monday, a C.I.A. drone strike in Pakistan’s tribal belt killed Al Qaeda’s deputy leader, Abu Yahya al-Libi, American officials said. Such strikes have infuriated Pakistani officials, who have demanded that they end. But the Obama administration considers them a highly effective tool in the battle against Al Qaeda.
Reporting was contributed by Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan; Habib Zahori and Sangar Rahimi from Kabul; employees of The New York Times from Mazar-i-Sharif and Khost; and Gardiner Harris from New Delhi.
US Losing Patience with Pakistan, Panetta Says
VOA News June 7, 2012 Sharon Behn
ISLAMABAD - During a surprise visit to Afghanistan Thursday, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that Washington is running out of patience with neighboring Pakistan, where Taliban, al-Qaida and Haqqani militants have safe havens.
The defense secretary’s language towards Pakistan was unusually blunt.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here,” he declared.
Relations between the Washington and Islamabad have been strained for the last six months. The United States feels Pakistan could do a lot more to shut down insurgent networks that use its territory to plan, direct and conduct cross-border attacks in Afghanistan, killing Afghan and U.S. troops.
Panetta’s strong words came barely two weeks after the latest attack against a U.S. base called Salerno, in Afghanistan's Khost province, near the Pakistan border. Panetta blamed members of the Pakistan-based Haqqani network for the assault.
“It’s an intolerable situation, to have those attacking our forces have the convenience of being able to return to a safe haven in Pakistan,” said Panetta.
Speaking at a joint news conference at with Afghan Defense Minister General Abdul Rahim Wardak, Panetta said it was extremely important that Pakistan take action against the militants.
Pakistan’s government did not immediately react to Panetta’s statements.
The secretary made his unannounced trip to Afghanistan Thursday to take stock of the conflict as international forces prepare to start withdrawing troops. But he said peace in Afghanistan would in part depend on Pakistan. “We’ve made it very clear that it’s difficult to secure Afghanistan as long as there is a safe haven for terrorists in Pakistan,” he said.
U.S. officials say a recent drone strike in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region killed al-Qaida’s number two leader, who was hiding there. Pakistan summoned U.S. diplomats to protest the ongoing campaign of drone strikes, saying they violate the country’s sovereignty.
Relations between the two countries have been tense since a U.S. airstrike last year killed 24 Pakistani soldiers stationed along the Afghan border. In protest, Pakistan demanded an apology and shut down NATO supply routes through its territory. Foreign troops in Afghanistan now rely more on an exit route through Central Asia in the north of Afghanistan, but it is much more costly.
Millions of Dollars of U.S. Gear to Combat IEDs Wasted in Pakistan
By MARK MOONEY | ABC News
Millions of dollars of U.S. gear meant to combat the threat of roadside bombs is being wasted in Pakistan which refuses to let the equipment leave its customs warehouses.
The U.S. procured 110 IED jammers for the Pakistani military at a cost of nearly $23 million in 2009 in an effort to ease the threat of the improvised explosive devices that have been the main cause of U.S. casualties in neighboring Afghanistan and taken a toll on Pakistan authorities as well.
So far, not one of the jammers has been put to use, according to a report released Wednesday by the Government Accountability Office.
The GAO report found that "55 jammers were still in Karachi awaiting release from Pakistani customs, and the remaining 55 jammers were being kept in storage in the United States until the initial 55 were released."
Leaving the unused jammers in a Pakistani warehouse also raises the cost of the shipment since the U.S. must pay the storage fees, a GAO spokesman told ABCNews.com.
The U.S. has had difficulty getting Pakistan to accept additional gear meant to help Pakistan reduce the IED threat.
"Other U.S. procured counter-IED equipment under review and still in U.S. storage includes kits for use by combined explosive exploitation cells, explosive ordnance disposal items, and portable trace explosive detectors," the report states.
Despite the frustrations of getting Pakistan to accept the equipment, the U.S. is buying more remote-controlled IED jammers for Pakistan at a cost of $12.1 million, as well as $64 million worth of route clearance vehicles, according to the GAO.
Combating the construction and detonation of IEDs is a major concern for the U.S. military in Afghanistan. In 2011, 16,500 IEDs were discovered or detonated against U.S. forces in Afghanistan. More than 80 percent of those bombs were made from calcium ammonium nitrate, known as CAN, a fertilizer that is made in Pakistan and smuggled into Afghanistan.
"Pakistan's ability to stem the flow of CAN and other IED precursors is a life and death issue for U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan," the GAO report said.
Nevertheless, the two countries' ability to cooperate on the issue has actually worsened since the U.S. assassination of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
"U.S. agencies have encountered some challenges to providing assistance to Pakistan to counter IEDs, and events over the past 6 months have strained this important bilateral relationship," the GAO concluded.
Central Asia group admits Afghanistan as observer
By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN | Associated Press – Thu, Jun 7, 2012
BEIJING (AP) — China, Russia and four Central Asian states granted Afghanistan observer status in their regional group Thursday, moving to consolidate ties with the impoverished, war-torn nation before most foreign combat troops depart by the end of 2014.
Chinese President Hu Jintao announced the plan at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization's annual summit in Beijing.
Russia and China have long seen the six-nation group as a way to counter U.S. influence in Central Asia, and hope to play a significant role in Afghanistan's future development, especially in economic reconstruction. Granting Afghanistan observer status will strengthen their contacts, something Beijing and Moscow hope will dilute U.S. influence and more closely align Kabul's policies with their own aims.
The SCO also recommitted itself to closer security and economic ties and to combating drug trafficking, extremism and terrorism.
"All the member states should implement the agreement on striking the three forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism," Hu told other leaders at a morning session. "We should establish and improve a system of cooperation in security and take coordinative actions to narrow the space of activities of the three forces, get rid of drug deals and other organized cross-border criminal activities."
Afghanistan, whose president, Hamid Karzai, attended the summit, joins India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan as SCO observer states. The group also admitted Turkey as one of its three dialogue partners.
Granting observer status aims to strengthen "political, economic and civilian cooperation between the SCO states and Afghanistan," Vice Foreign Minister Cheng Guoping told reporters.
Underscoring China's growing economic dominance in Central Asia, Hu opened the summit by saying China would offer a $10 billion loan to support economic development and cooperation among SCO member states. No details were immediately given on how the money would be used.
Despite the warming political ties, the SCO has yet to declare a unified strategy on Afghanistan and shows little sign of filling the void left by the withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign forces.
Already, Russia and fellow SCO member nations Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan are doing their part to ensure an orderly NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, having agreed to allow the reverse transport of alliance equipment after Pakistan shut down southern supply routes six months ago.
The fourth Central Asian member of the SCO is Tajikistan.
The NATO pullout will also prompt the end of military operations out of Kyrgyzstan's Manas air base, fulfilling China and Russia's oft-stated opposition to a permanent U.S. presence in Central Asia.
While the SCO's security plans in Afghanistan remain unclear, economic outreach looks set to lead the way.
Firms from China — the world's second-largest economy — already have moved into Afghanistan, where officials hope that vast untapped mineral deposits will help offset the loss of foreign aid once foreign troops withdraw. China shares a small stretch of border with Afghanistan.
The U.S. Defense Department has estimated the value of Afghanistan's mineral reserves at $1 trillion. Other estimates have pegged it at $3 trillion or more.
In December, China's state-owned National Petroleum Corp. signed a deal allowing it to become the first foreign company to exploit Afghanistan's oil and natural gas reserves. That comes three years after the China Metallurgical Construction Co. signed a contract to develop the Aynak copper mine in Logar province. Beijing's $3.5 billion stake in the mine is the largest foreign investment in Afghanistan.
China's government has also helped train and equip some security units and government offices, invested in infrastructure, healthcare and education, and offered scholarships to Afghan students.
Russia, which lost nearly 15,000 troops in its disastrous 1979-1989 invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, appears keen to recover some of its lost influence there. A key concern for Moscow is stemming the flow of heroin into Russia, to be met by increased intelligence work in the country and bolstered border security in surrounding states.
Moscow also has offered generous assistance to rehabilitate Soviet-era dams and power stations and is exploring natural gas exploitation and infrastructure contracts — putting it on a potential collision course with China.
Russia and China eye role in Afghanistan and Pakistan
BBC Online By AHMED RASHID 6 June 2012
With the United States and Nato set to leave Afghanistan over the next two years, power is the region is shifting. Writer Ahmed Rashid reports on Russia and China's attempts to capitalise on the decline of American influence in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
As United States troops prepare to leave Afghanistan in 2014, a major regional shift is underway.
With the prospect of a decline in US influence in the region in sight, Russia and China are reaching out to Pakistan and Afghanistan in a bid to improve economic ties and to secure their southern borders against the spread of Islamic fundamentalism.
The presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari, are in Beijing this week for the summit meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which is led by China and Russia.
With the US set to leave Afghanistan and bad relations between Islamabad and Washington DC continuing to fester, the SCO has taken on a new lease of life.
Economic help
China and Afghanistan will sign a strategic agreement at the SCO, elevating their relationship as China shops for raw material and oil exploration contracts in mineral-rich Afghanistan. China has already secured some oil and copper mining concessions.
Until now, China has carried out few development projects in Afghanistan and is unlikely to help fund the country's army and police, as the US would like.
But all that could change once the Americans leave. Xu Feihong, China's ambassador to Kabul says that ''China is the most reliable friend of Afghanistan".
Likewise Russia, both through the SCO and bilaterally, is willing to offer major help to Afghanistan such as improving the Salang Tunnel highway, the critical link road between Kabul and the north which the Soviets built in the 1970s.
After years of poor relations, Russia has also taken a major initiative with Pakistan.
Moscow sent its special representative and long-time regional expert Zamir Kabulov to Islamabad to suss out what the Pakistanis want and offer economic help, such as refurbishing Pakistan's one and only steel mill, built with Russian help in the 1970s.
China is already Pakistan's closest and most reliable ally.
In early June, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi visited Islamabad and pledged to stand by Pakistan in its tensions with the Americans.
He pleased the government by echoing Pakistan's refrain that the world should recognize Pakistan's ''huge sacrifices'' in the war on terror and help safeguard its sovereignty, rather than question Pakistan's intentions as the US has done recently.
If Pakistan can take steps against home grown extremism it will do much to convince Russia and China that it deserves help to move out of the American orbit.
Moreover, China is hoping to exploit Afghanistan's mineral resources once the war is over and knows that Pakistan could play a crucial role. It could well hire Pakistani companies as junior partners in its mineral explorations.
Until now, Mr Zardari has been looking to China to help bail him out of Pakistan's severe economic mess but China never gives cash, loans, budgetary support, development funds or humanitarian funds to other countries like Western governments do.
Instead, it carries out major projects that help the recipient but provide strategic spin offs for China too.
Despite his words of support, officials say Mr Yang also warned Pakistan's leaders not to break with the US and to avoid taking hardline positions regarding the US and Nato in Afghanistan.
For the past seven months, Pakistan has refused to reopen the main route for Nato supplies that runs from Karachi to the Afghan border. Talks with the US on the issue have so far failed.
Fearing fundamentalists
Both China and Russia will be happy to see US troops leave Afghanistan, but they are equally worried about the Taliban and other extremist groups penetrating Xinjiang province in southern China and the Central Asian republics, whose national security is very much in the hands of Russia.
China is deeply concerned by the long-running crisis in Pakistan, fearing that it may lead to a strengthening of Islamic fundamentalism.
Beijing is worried that any threat to Pakistan from internal insurgency or secessionist movements would only bolster its regional rival India.
So, for the first time ever China has held high-level discussions with US officials that have focused on the crisis in Pakistan and how both countries could nudge Pakistani leaders to do the right thing.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai (L) and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari are being courted by Russia and China
The US is also asking the Chinese help persuade the Pakistani military to be more helpful in Afghanistan and end the sanctuaries the Taliban enjoy.
Both the Chinese and Russians are worried about the threat posed by the Taliban and al-Qaeda themselves.
In an unprecedented move, over the past six months Chinese officials issued three strong statements rebuking Pakistan for not reining in Uighur extremists who are training with Pakistani extremist groups and fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Uighurs are Chinese Muslims from Xinjiang province and some are involved in an independence struggle against China.
'Tectonic shift'
Pakistan's military rushed to try and detain the Uighur militants. According to diplomats at the United Nations, China has been quietly telling the Pakistan military that it must end havens for all militant groups on its soil - a message that has been publicly taken up by Nato.
Russia also makes no bones about the fact that it sees Pakistan as harbouring Central Asian militant groups such as the Islamic Movement for Uzbekistan and Islamic Jihad.
These groups - which have been based in Pakistan's tribal areas - are now trying to enter Tajikistan and Uzbekistan from their new bases in northern Afghanistan. Diplomats at the UN say they are being aided and abetted by militant Pakistani groups based, including Lashkar e-Toiba.
Russia's envoy Zamir Kabulov, who has long experience with the Pakistani military's backing of Islamic fundamentalist groups (he served in the Soviet embassy in Kabul in the 1980s), raised this issue with the Pakistani government.
Russia sees itself as the guardian of the Central Asian republics and although it is anxious to see an end to US bases in that region, its resumption of the sole security role in Central Asia will depend on how Pakistan deals with such extremist groups.
If Pakistan can take steps against home-grown extremism, it will do much to convince Russia and China that it deserves help to move out of the American orbit.
But with the long-running political and economic meltdown in Pakistan, there is little chance that the government can act soon. Nevertheless, a shift in the tectonic plates in the region is taking place. Pakistan and Afghanistan can either take quick advantage of these changes or revert back into chaos.
Taliban Shadow Governor Detained as Poisoning Arrests Rise to 15
TOLOnews.com Wednesday, 06 June 2012
Fifteen people, including a deputy shadow Taliban governor and school teachers, were arrested by Afghanistan security officials in connection with the recent spate of school poisonings, officials said on Wednesday.
Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security (NDS) spokesman Lutfullah Mashal said that the NDS has proven documents that Taliban insurgents were working in cooperation with members of Pakistan's intelligence agency to poison school students in the northern Takhar province.
"Fifteen people including Taliban's shadowed deputy provincial governor, teachers, students and education department personnel were arrested by the NDS officials," Mashal said at a press conference.
Mashal accused Jandullah and Mahazulla fronts and the Taliban for the poisonings, saying that the real motivators behind these terrorist groups to commit such "inhuman acts" were the regional spy agencies.
"Because Taliban will have less credibility in the face of society, they don't claim responsibility, but we have proven documents showing this is the job of the insurgents. Jandullah and Mahazullah fronts and Taliban group are behind these poisonings," Mashal told reporters in a press conference today.
"Their aim is to promote fear among the people of Afghanistan; their main motivators are regional spy agencies."
The Taliban released an official statement on Wednesday responding to the claims, saying they were not responsible. It is the second statement the group has made in as many weeks. They threatened to punish any of their people found poisoning school students.
According to Mashal, two school girls are also among those arrested. He claimed one of them received 50,000 Afs from the Taliban to poison the water in her school.
Officials at the Ministry of Education said that they will not surrender to the aims of the insurgents and will continue their efforts to provide quality education for girls all over the country, particularly Takhar.
"The enemies of this country are trying to lead this country into darkness. We will take the candle of education in our hands and carry it all over the country," one official said.
Takhar schools have reported at least six cases of poisonings affecting hundreds of students since the middle of April. Two other cases have been reported in Ghazni and Khost provinces.
Pakistan and Taliban acused of poisoning Afghan schoolchildren
Afghan intelligence on Wednesday accused Pakistani spies of poisoning schoolgirls as authorities battle to halt a string of alleged attacks that have sown panic in parts of the north.
Telegraph.co.uk 06 June 2012
At least 15 suspects have been detained over mysterious illnesses, which usually include mass fainting episodes, that have struck scores of schoolgirls in Takhar province almost daily for the past two weeks.
"The regional spy agencies, namely ISI, are behind it. They are trying to sabotage the Shanghai Conference and the success of Afghan education," National Directorate of Security spokesman Lutfullah Mashal told reporters.
Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency is widely reviled in Afghanistan, where it is accused of fomenting the Taliban insurgency due to its historic links to the Islamist Afghan militia that ruled from 1996 to 2001.
President Hamid Karzai called for an investigation and Mr Mashal said the intelligence service discovered a conspiracy by militants to try to scare families from sending their children to school.
"They want to create terror and fear among students, especially in the education sector and also in the health sector, which are two of the major achievements of the 10 years of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan," said Mashal.
He said 15 people have been arrested in connection with the school poisonings. Those being held include 12 identified Taliban insurgents, a teacher and a school treasurer and his wife, he said.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid denied any involvement in the poisonings.
"The poisoning of innocent children is against Islamic law. The mujahedeen are not involved in the poisoning of schoolchildren. It is a crime," Mujahid said.
A teacher and three female students are among those arrested and all 15 have confessed to being involved in poisoning, Mashal said.
But the ISI dismissed the Afghan accusations as "absurd and senseless".
"This is an attempt to strain ties between the two countries. Pakistan wants peace and stability in Afghanistan. A peaceful and stable Afghanistan is in our interest," a Pakistani intelligence official told AFP.
Afghan officials regularly accuse Taliban insurgents, who banned schooling for girls while in power from 1996 to 2001, of poisoning school wells or using "gas" or "toxic powder" against the girls.
None have died, however, and no traces of poison have been found in blood samples, officials say.
Experts suggest that a phenomenon known as mass hysteria - against a background of conflict - could be responsible.
The Taliban has denied any involvement and said any culprits would be punished "according to the Islamic Law".
Can India ‘Fix’ Afghanistan?
New York Times (blog) By HEATHER TIMMONS June 7, 2012
As the United States winds down its military engagement in Afghanistan, optimism is growing about the role India can play to stabilize and develop the country.
This week, visiting United States Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta encouraged Indian leaders to take a more active role in Afghanistan, involvement once considered by the United States as merely an opportunistic way for India to antagonize Pakistan.
The United States’ encouragement is hardly needed. India plans to “intensify” its already “high level political engagement and broad-based development assistance in a wide range of sectors,” India’s minister for external affairs, S.M. Krishna, told Afghanistan’s visiting foreign minister, Zalmai Rassoul, in a speech in New Delhi last month. With assistance from Europe and the United States expected to drop substantially, India may be left as one of Afghanistan’s most prominent aid partners.
Here on India Ink, we have been asking: Does this make any sense? On first glance, at least, India seems an unlikely provider of development assistance because of the serious issues troubling it at home. Many of the same things that Afghanistan needs, from infrastructure to education, India is having troubles providing for many citizens, even without the regular threat of attacks from the Taliban.
India’s state-run power industry struggles to get enough fuel thanks to mismanagement and bureaucracy, even its brightest youth can’t land a spot at a good university and about third of its citizens live in destitute poverty, with hundreds of millions malnourished. The current central government is grappling with a growing deficit, shrinking economic growth and an increasingly dissatisfied voter base.
It’s no surprise that India’s Afghanistan plans have been greeted with some skepticism.
“In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,” said Rajeev Malik, an economist at CLSA, a research and brokerage house, who has been a sharp critic of India’s fiscal policy and government. “India has not managed to fix these issues itself,” he said, but added that the country “probably has more experience than Afghanistan.”
India’s on-the-ground aid record, though limited, has been decent.
India has committed some $2 billion in aid to Afghanistan, of which $1 billion has been spent, according to the Ministry of External Affairs. Indian public and private companies have built a highway to Iran, put up transmission lines to bring power to Kabul, are constructing a new Parliament building and working on a hydro-electric project in western Afghanistan.
India sent one million tons of high-protein biscuits to Afghanistan, and plans to follow that with an additional 250,000 tons this year. There are 1,000 Afghan students on scholarships in Indian universities right now.
More ambitious plans are in place. In October of last year, when Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, visited India, the two countries signed a strategic agreement that said India would train and equip Afghan security forces. This month, India is holding meetings for regional investors interested in Afghanistan in New Delhi.
Invitees include Turkey, China and Pakistan. Over a dinner in May in New Delhi, Mr. Rassoul told Indian government advisers Afghanistan would like India to concentrate on building up governance, law courts and health care.
“We don’t want a fundamentalist Afghanistan, just like everyone else,” explained Syed Akbaruddin, spokesman for India’s Ministry of External Affairs, in a recent interview. “We don’t want an Afghanistan that slides backward.”
The two countries share ties cemented long ago, he said, citing the well-known Rabindranath Tagore story “Kabuliwala,” about an Afghan fruit seller who befriends an Indian girl. India has a limited physical presence on the ground in Afghanistan, he said, which should quell concerns that India is focused on containing or antagonizing Pakistan. “What do we have in Afghanistan that is a threat to Pakistan?,” he asked rhetorically.
India’s aid to Afghanistan comes without any conditions, unlike aid to India from foreign countries in the past, he said. India is not pressuring the Afghanistan government to improve, say, education for girls, or rights for women, but is focusing on infrastructure and other concrete projects, he said.
India’s projects in Afghanistan are “replicas of what India has been able to successfully implement in some part of India or the other,” said Mr. Akbaruddin. “They have been incubated in some part of India.”
Staunch supporters of India’s involvement say sheer practicality of the alliance makes it work.
“Today the average Afghan knows that for many of the things that would lead to an improved quality of life, India offers the most viable option,” said C. Uday Bhaskar, a security analyst based in New Delhi.
To explain, he offered an example: The quality of higher education in Britain or the United States or Australia might be better than in India, he said, but most Afghans can’t afford Western universities, and if even they could, they probably wouldn’t get a visa to go anyway.
Much of what is on Afghanistan’s “wish list” can be “enabled in a considerable degree by India,” Mr. Bhaskar said. President Karzai himself attended an Indian university, doing his postgraduate studies at Himachal Pradesh University, in Shimla.
Others note that the “aid” relationship is not new. “People forget this has been going on quietly for a long time,” said K. Shankar Bajpai, a former ambassador to China, Pakistan and the United States, who is now an analyst with Delhi Policy Group. For six decades, India was “very much engaged” in Afghanistan, working on everything from building tunnels through the mountains of the Hindu Kush to education and health programs.
Recently, the two countries have built up a “friendly relationship without some of the imperial hang-ups that spoiled Delhi and Kabul’s relationship in the past,” he said. In a sign of this friendliness, in March, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called Mr. Karzai to congratulate him on the birth of his daughter.
Another factor to consider is that while India’s development problems weigh heavily on the country’s poor and middle class, facilities for the wealthy in India are often world class. Many of Afghanistan’s wealthy are already beneficiaries, and these upper-class industries and ties are only expected to grow.
Take health care: India’s private hospitals, and especially those in New Delhi, serve as de facto doctors’ offices for wealthy Afghans, who are just a two-hour flight away. Hospitals like Max Healthcare’s giant facility in Saket have special facilitators for Afghan patients who come for everything from in vitro fertilization treatments to heart trouble, doctors say. Often, their Afghan patients pay in crisp United States dollar bills.
On the other end of the economic spectrum, at least one Indian charity has also been successful in Afghanistan.
The Self Employed Women’s Association(SEWA), which starts women’s self-help groups, has been running vocational training programs in Afghanistan since 2008, teaching women to make jam and sew clothing, among other skills. The group said it has trained 3,000 Afghan women so far, despite two fatal terrorist attacks on the team in Kabul. The women, who are often orphans or widows, use the training to earn an income outside their home.
Whether the ambitious plans in industries like mining and manufacturing will work out remains to be seen. In November, a consortium of public and private Indian companies, led by the state-owned Steel Authority of India, won a bid to mine in three states in Afghanistan, which includes the construction of a six million-ton steel plant, an 800-megawatt power plant and 200 kilometers each of road, rail and transmission lines – as well as a pledge to set aside one percent of profits for establishing educational and medical facilities.
“We are very bullish about this,” the chairman of SAIL said when the deal was announced. Total investment by the Indian companies is pegged at $10.8 billion.
The big numbers, heavy-duty infrastructure plans and optimistic outlook are a stark contrast to SAIL’s India performance. In February, SAIL said quarterly profits fell by more than 40 percent from the same period the year before, thanks in part to higher raw material costs and SAIL’s inability to get coal from another state-owned company.
Pakistan to Release Afghan School Books Delayed by Nato Dispute
TOLOnews.com Wednesday, 06 June 2012
Pakistan will release the transport containers carrying thousands of school books for Afghanistan after they were stopped with the other Nato supplies from crossing the border.
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari told the Afghan President Hamid Karzai of the decision to release the school books during a meeting on Wednesday at the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Beijing, China.
Zardari told Karzai that Pakistan "sincerely wanted to help the Afghan brothers facilitating them in all possible manners in their journey towards socio-economic development and progress," according to statement from the Pakistan Embassy.
"He said that keeping in view the importance of education for the children, the containers carrying books for Afghan children were being released," the statement said.
It is not clear how long the school books have been delayed in Pakistan, but the supply route into Afghanistan has been closed since November 26 when a US airstrike mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani soldiers near the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Pakistan had claimed that the educational books were transported by a Nato-related transport company and that was why the trucks were blocked, according to Afghan officials last week.
Zaradari also said in his meeting with Karzai that Pakistan looks forward to the visit of new chairman of the Afghan High Peace Council Salahuddin Rabbani, saying that "Pakistan firmly believes that permanent peace and stability can only be ensured following an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned reconciliation process in the country".
The statement comes a fortnight after Pakistan pledged $20 million towards supporting the Afghan National Security Forces.
Zardari added that Pakistan was prepared to consider any additional requirements, as indicated by Afghanistan, for the purpose of strengthening and capacity building of its security forces.
The Pakistani Embassy said the pair also discussed issues related to prisoners and detainees, facilitating visa processes for Pakistani businesses and investors to work in Afghanistan, and the need for economic development along the border regions to help reverse "tendencies towards extremism".
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
By William Wan and Kevin Sieff, The Washington Post June 7
KABUL — Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday publicly condemned a U.S. airstrike a day earlier that Afghan officials said had killed 18 civilians — a blunt reproach that coincided with a visit to the Afghan capital by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta.
“NATO operations that inflict human and material losses to civilians can in no way be justifiable, acceptable and tolerable,” Karzai said in a statement. He had returned early from a trip to China to further address the incident, which occurred in Logar province, about 50 miles from Kabul.
The backlash comes at critical moment in U.S.-Afghan relations, just weeks after the signing of a bilateral strategic partnership agreement and as leaders of both countries attempt to outline the specifics of American military involvement here beyond 2014.
Panetta and Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak were speaking to journalists in Kabul when Karzai released his statement condemning the Wednesday attack. Both men emphasized joint progress made in the fight against the Taliban but expressed frustration about what they described as a continuing undisturbed haven for insurgents in Pakistan.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here,” Panetta said. “And for that reason, it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven.”
Later Thursday, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Sherry Rehman, criticized Panetta’s comment, saying that it would make it harder for the two countries to narrow their differences, the Reuters news agency reported.
“It adds an unhelpful twist to the process and leaves little oxygen for those of us seeking to break a stalemate,” Rehman said in a statement.
Nine children and four women were among those killed in the Logar airstrike, provincial spokesman Mirwais Mirzakwal said. Officials described the operation as a joint effort between coalition and Afghan forces.
Karzai called a relative of the victims from China, where he was participating in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit, and pledged a thorough investigation of what happened. NATO officials said they are investigating as well.
The coalition “is taking the allegations seriously,” said Martyn Crighton, a spokesman for NATO forces. “As a part of that process, the commander has dispatched a team to gather facts, meet with Afghan officials and try to determine what happened.”
Hours after the airstrike, two suicide bombers attacked a Kandahar market, killing at least 22 civilians. The two incidents made Wednesday one of the bloodiest days for Afghans in the history of the war.
Panetta called Wednesday’s suicide attack “much more organized than we’ve seen before.” According to witnesses, the first bomber on a motorcycle attacked a parking lot often used by NATO supply vehicles in southern Kandahar; a second bomber detonated explosives as others tried to help the wounded.
Panetta came to Afghanistan to confer with military leaders on plans to withdraw troops and deal with rising violence. He noted that despite the increase in bloodshed in recent weeks, overall violence was lower than in previous years.
“We have a tough fight on our hands,” Panetta said. He reaffirmed the United States’ long-term commitment to Afghanistan and said he believed it would help thwart the Taliban’s goals.
In comments before his arrival, Panetta said the purpose of his visit was “to get a sense of just exactly what are the Taliban doing” and to hear an assessment from U.S. commanders of how NATO will deal with the Taliban and the Haqqani network operating from Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“I think it’s important to make sure we are aware of the kind of attacks they’re going to engage in as we go through the rest of the summer,” he said.
Panetta began the four-hour stopover by meeting with U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and the U.S. commander of NATO-led forces, Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, who must withdraw 23,000 U.S. troops by the end of September, leaving 68,000 in the country.
According to the Obama administration’s plan, the vacancies left by those departures will be filled by Afghan forces and U.S. advisory teams whose performance will determine how commanders proceed with continued withdrawals until the end of 2014.
Special correspondent Sayed Salahuddin contributed to this report.
Karzai Cuts Short China Visit Following Afghan Violence
June 7, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has cut short an official visit to China following reports of civilian deaths in a NATO air strike in eastern Afghanistan.
Karzai said 18 civilians were killed in the strike in Logar Province on June 6, adding that civilian casualties in such operations are "unacceptable."
Karzai's statement came as U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived in Afghanistan for a previously unannounced visit.
Panetta said it will be difficult to achieve stability in Afghanistan so long as militants continue to receive shelter in Pakistan's tribal areas.
"We've made very clear that it is difficult to achieve a secure Afghanistan as long as there is a safe haven for terrorists in Pakistan, from which they can conduct attacks on our forces," Panetta said.
He said the United States is "reaching the limits of its patience" with Pakistan's failure to take decisive action against militants.
"We are reaching the limits of our patience here, and for that reason it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven from taking place and from allowing terrorists to use their country as a safety net in order to conduct their attacks on our forces," Panetta said.
The June 6 violence in Afghanistan included at least 22 people killed in a series of suicide bombings in Kandahar Province.
Panetta, speaking at a news conference in Kabul, said Pakistan has to take action to root out the Haqqani militant group blamed for some of the deadliest crossborder attacks during the 10-year war.
"We have made that clear, time and time again, we will continue to make that clear that it is an intolerable situation to have those attacking our people, our forces , have the convenience of being able to return to a safe haven in Pakistan," Panetta said.
U.S. officials have long pushed Pakistan to do more to combat militants using its soil to organize and launch attacks on international troops in Afghanistan.
Already tense U.S.-Pakistani relations have been further strained by continued NATO drone strikes targeting militants in northwest Pakistan, as well as Pakistan's decision to close NATO supply routes to Afghanistan through Pakistani territory after a NATO air strike killed 24 Pakistani six months ago.
Panetta was meeting U.S. military commanders to get an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan as the United States prepares to withdraw some 23,000 troops from Afghanistan by the end of September.
Panetta acknowledged earlier on June 7 that there has been an upsurge in insurgent violence recently, and that some recent attacks have been "more organized" than earlier ones.
With reporting by Reuters, AP, and dpa
Panetta Visits Afghanistan Amid Mounting Violence
By ALISSA J. RUBIN The New York Times June 7, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta arrived in Afghanistan on Thursday after the deadliest day for civilians this year, caused in part by a NATO airstrike the day before in which Afghan officials say 18 women and children were killed.
President Hamid Karzai condemned the strike in the strongest terms and decided the episode was serious enough to cut short his trip to China, where he was participating in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit meeting.
“NATO cannot justify any airstrike which causes harm to the lives and property of civilians,” Mr. Karzai said in a statement released by his office, adding that all the people killed in the strike, in the eastern province of Logar, were civilians.
The United Nations criticized the strike as well, blaming both the Taliban and international forces for continuing airstrikes near civilian areas, though it had not completed an investigation to report a complete toll.
A joint investigation by the Afghan government and NATO has begun, according to a NATO spokesman. Initial reporting by NATO, however, said that no civilians had been killed.
Mr. Panetta, who said that he wanted an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan from the senior allied commander, Gen. John R. Allen, used a news conference to speak out strongly about the havens in Pakistan where Taliban and other extremists take refuge between attacks on coalition and Afghan forces.
“It is an increasing concern that the safe havens exist and that the Haqqanis are using it to attack our forces,” Mr. Panetta said as he stood next to the Afghan defense minister, Abdul Rahim Wardak. He was referring to the Haqqani network, Islamic militants operating from Pakistan.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here, and for that reason it is extremely important that Pakistan take action to prevent this kind of safe haven,” he said.
Mr. Panetta said that the Haqqanis most recently had been involved in an attack on Camp Salerno in Khost Province and that it was “an intolerable situation.”
In Washington on Thursday, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, echoed Mr. Panetta’s comments from Kabul, acknowledging during a news conference that “there are friction points in our relationship with Pakistan.”
General Dempsey cited the growing influence — and recurring violence — of the Haqqani network in the cross-border area as one area of disappointment. “The Haqqani network is as big a threat to Pakistan as it is to Afghanistan and to us, but we haven’t been able to find common ground on that point,” he said.
General Dempsey added: “We just have to keep at it, because Pakistan’s an important partner.”
Mr. Panetta arrived a day after a suicide attack in Kandahar City that killed 23 Afghan civilians and a suicide bombing in Faryab in the north of the country, in addition to the NATO airstrike in Logar.
On Wednesday, he was in New Delhi, where he brushed aside concerns that drone strikes against Qaeda leaders in Pakistan violated that country’s sovereignty.
“We have made clear to the Pakistanis that the United States of America is going to defend ourselves against those who attack us,” Mr. Panetta said. “This is not just about protecting the United States. It’s also about protecting Pakistan. And we have made it very clear that we are going to continue to defend ourselves.”
On Monday, a C.I.A. drone strike in Pakistan’s tribal belt killed Al Qaeda’s deputy leader, Abu Yahya al-Libi, American officials said. Such strikes have infuriated Pakistani officials, who have demanded that they end. But the Obama administration considers them a highly effective tool in the battle against Al Qaeda.
Reporting was contributed by Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan; Habib Zahori and Sangar Rahimi from Kabul; employees of The New York Times from Mazar-i-Sharif and Khost; and Gardiner Harris from New Delhi.
US Losing Patience with Pakistan, Panetta Says
VOA News June 7, 2012 Sharon Behn
ISLAMABAD - During a surprise visit to Afghanistan Thursday, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that Washington is running out of patience with neighboring Pakistan, where Taliban, al-Qaida and Haqqani militants have safe havens.
The defense secretary’s language towards Pakistan was unusually blunt.
“We are reaching the limits of our patience here,” he declared.
Relations between the Washington and Islamabad have been strained for the last six months. The United States feels Pakistan could do a lot more to shut down insurgent networks that use its territory to plan, direct and conduct cross-border attacks in Afghanistan, killing Afghan and U.S. troops.
Panetta’s strong words came barely two weeks after the latest attack against a U.S. base called Salerno, in Afghanistan's Khost province, near the Pakistan border. Panetta blamed members of the Pakistan-based Haqqani network for the assault.
“It’s an intolerable situation, to have those attacking our forces have the convenience of being able to return to a safe haven in Pakistan,” said Panetta.
Speaking at a joint news conference at with Afghan Defense Minister General Abdul Rahim Wardak, Panetta said it was extremely important that Pakistan take action against the militants.
Pakistan’s government did not immediately react to Panetta’s statements.
The secretary made his unannounced trip to Afghanistan Thursday to take stock of the conflict as international forces prepare to start withdrawing troops. But he said peace in Afghanistan would in part depend on Pakistan. “We’ve made it very clear that it’s difficult to secure Afghanistan as long as there is a safe haven for terrorists in Pakistan,” he said.
U.S. officials say a recent drone strike in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region killed al-Qaida’s number two leader, who was hiding there. Pakistan summoned U.S. diplomats to protest the ongoing campaign of drone strikes, saying they violate the country’s sovereignty.
Relations between the two countries have been tense since a U.S. airstrike last year killed 24 Pakistani soldiers stationed along the Afghan border. In protest, Pakistan demanded an apology and shut down NATO supply routes through its territory. Foreign troops in Afghanistan now rely more on an exit route through Central Asia in the north of Afghanistan, but it is much more costly.
Millions of Dollars of U.S. Gear to Combat IEDs Wasted in Pakistan
By MARK MOONEY | ABC News
Millions of dollars of U.S. gear meant to combat the threat of roadside bombs is being wasted in Pakistan which refuses to let the equipment leave its customs warehouses.
The U.S. procured 110 IED jammers for the Pakistani military at a cost of nearly $23 million in 2009 in an effort to ease the threat of the improvised explosive devices that have been the main cause of U.S. casualties in neighboring Afghanistan and taken a toll on Pakistan authorities as well.
So far, not one of the jammers has been put to use, according to a report released Wednesday by the Government Accountability Office.
The GAO report found that "55 jammers were still in Karachi awaiting release from Pakistani customs, and the remaining 55 jammers were being kept in storage in the United States until the initial 55 were released."
Leaving the unused jammers in a Pakistani warehouse also raises the cost of the shipment since the U.S. must pay the storage fees, a GAO spokesman told ABCNews.com.
The U.S. has had difficulty getting Pakistan to accept additional gear meant to help Pakistan reduce the IED threat.
"Other U.S. procured counter-IED equipment under review and still in U.S. storage includes kits for use by combined explosive exploitation cells, explosive ordnance disposal items, and portable trace explosive detectors," the report states.
Despite the frustrations of getting Pakistan to accept the equipment, the U.S. is buying more remote-controlled IED jammers for Pakistan at a cost of $12.1 million, as well as $64 million worth of route clearance vehicles, according to the GAO.
Combating the construction and detonation of IEDs is a major concern for the U.S. military in Afghanistan. In 2011, 16,500 IEDs were discovered or detonated against U.S. forces in Afghanistan. More than 80 percent of those bombs were made from calcium ammonium nitrate, known as CAN, a fertilizer that is made in Pakistan and smuggled into Afghanistan.
"Pakistan's ability to stem the flow of CAN and other IED precursors is a life and death issue for U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan," the GAO report said.
Nevertheless, the two countries' ability to cooperate on the issue has actually worsened since the U.S. assassination of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
"U.S. agencies have encountered some challenges to providing assistance to Pakistan to counter IEDs, and events over the past 6 months have strained this important bilateral relationship," the GAO concluded.
Central Asia group admits Afghanistan as observer
By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN | Associated Press – Thu, Jun 7, 2012
BEIJING (AP) — China, Russia and four Central Asian states granted Afghanistan observer status in their regional group Thursday, moving to consolidate ties with the impoverished, war-torn nation before most foreign combat troops depart by the end of 2014.
Chinese President Hu Jintao announced the plan at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization's annual summit in Beijing.
Russia and China have long seen the six-nation group as a way to counter U.S. influence in Central Asia, and hope to play a significant role in Afghanistan's future development, especially in economic reconstruction. Granting Afghanistan observer status will strengthen their contacts, something Beijing and Moscow hope will dilute U.S. influence and more closely align Kabul's policies with their own aims.
The SCO also recommitted itself to closer security and economic ties and to combating drug trafficking, extremism and terrorism.
"All the member states should implement the agreement on striking the three forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism," Hu told other leaders at a morning session. "We should establish and improve a system of cooperation in security and take coordinative actions to narrow the space of activities of the three forces, get rid of drug deals and other organized cross-border criminal activities."
Afghanistan, whose president, Hamid Karzai, attended the summit, joins India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan as SCO observer states. The group also admitted Turkey as one of its three dialogue partners.
Granting observer status aims to strengthen "political, economic and civilian cooperation between the SCO states and Afghanistan," Vice Foreign Minister Cheng Guoping told reporters.
Underscoring China's growing economic dominance in Central Asia, Hu opened the summit by saying China would offer a $10 billion loan to support economic development and cooperation among SCO member states. No details were immediately given on how the money would be used.
Despite the warming political ties, the SCO has yet to declare a unified strategy on Afghanistan and shows little sign of filling the void left by the withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign forces.
Already, Russia and fellow SCO member nations Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan are doing their part to ensure an orderly NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, having agreed to allow the reverse transport of alliance equipment after Pakistan shut down southern supply routes six months ago.
The fourth Central Asian member of the SCO is Tajikistan.
The NATO pullout will also prompt the end of military operations out of Kyrgyzstan's Manas air base, fulfilling China and Russia's oft-stated opposition to a permanent U.S. presence in Central Asia.
While the SCO's security plans in Afghanistan remain unclear, economic outreach looks set to lead the way.
Firms from China — the world's second-largest economy — already have moved into Afghanistan, where officials hope that vast untapped mineral deposits will help offset the loss of foreign aid once foreign troops withdraw. China shares a small stretch of border with Afghanistan.
The U.S. Defense Department has estimated the value of Afghanistan's mineral reserves at $1 trillion. Other estimates have pegged it at $3 trillion or more.
In December, China's state-owned National Petroleum Corp. signed a deal allowing it to become the first foreign company to exploit Afghanistan's oil and natural gas reserves. That comes three years after the China Metallurgical Construction Co. signed a contract to develop the Aynak copper mine in Logar province. Beijing's $3.5 billion stake in the mine is the largest foreign investment in Afghanistan.
China's government has also helped train and equip some security units and government offices, invested in infrastructure, healthcare and education, and offered scholarships to Afghan students.
Russia, which lost nearly 15,000 troops in its disastrous 1979-1989 invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, appears keen to recover some of its lost influence there. A key concern for Moscow is stemming the flow of heroin into Russia, to be met by increased intelligence work in the country and bolstered border security in surrounding states.
Moscow also has offered generous assistance to rehabilitate Soviet-era dams and power stations and is exploring natural gas exploitation and infrastructure contracts — putting it on a potential collision course with China.
Russia and China eye role in Afghanistan and Pakistan
BBC Online By AHMED RASHID 6 June 2012
With the United States and Nato set to leave Afghanistan over the next two years, power is the region is shifting. Writer Ahmed Rashid reports on Russia and China's attempts to capitalise on the decline of American influence in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
As United States troops prepare to leave Afghanistan in 2014, a major regional shift is underway.
With the prospect of a decline in US influence in the region in sight, Russia and China are reaching out to Pakistan and Afghanistan in a bid to improve economic ties and to secure their southern borders against the spread of Islamic fundamentalism.
The presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari, are in Beijing this week for the summit meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which is led by China and Russia.
With the US set to leave Afghanistan and bad relations between Islamabad and Washington DC continuing to fester, the SCO has taken on a new lease of life.
Economic help
China and Afghanistan will sign a strategic agreement at the SCO, elevating their relationship as China shops for raw material and oil exploration contracts in mineral-rich Afghanistan. China has already secured some oil and copper mining concessions.
Until now, China has carried out few development projects in Afghanistan and is unlikely to help fund the country's army and police, as the US would like.
But all that could change once the Americans leave. Xu Feihong, China's ambassador to Kabul says that ''China is the most reliable friend of Afghanistan".
Likewise Russia, both through the SCO and bilaterally, is willing to offer major help to Afghanistan such as improving the Salang Tunnel highway, the critical link road between Kabul and the north which the Soviets built in the 1970s.
After years of poor relations, Russia has also taken a major initiative with Pakistan.
Moscow sent its special representative and long-time regional expert Zamir Kabulov to Islamabad to suss out what the Pakistanis want and offer economic help, such as refurbishing Pakistan's one and only steel mill, built with Russian help in the 1970s.
China is already Pakistan's closest and most reliable ally.
In early June, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi visited Islamabad and pledged to stand by Pakistan in its tensions with the Americans.
He pleased the government by echoing Pakistan's refrain that the world should recognize Pakistan's ''huge sacrifices'' in the war on terror and help safeguard its sovereignty, rather than question Pakistan's intentions as the US has done recently.
If Pakistan can take steps against home grown extremism it will do much to convince Russia and China that it deserves help to move out of the American orbit.
Moreover, China is hoping to exploit Afghanistan's mineral resources once the war is over and knows that Pakistan could play a crucial role. It could well hire Pakistani companies as junior partners in its mineral explorations.
Until now, Mr Zardari has been looking to China to help bail him out of Pakistan's severe economic mess but China never gives cash, loans, budgetary support, development funds or humanitarian funds to other countries like Western governments do.
Instead, it carries out major projects that help the recipient but provide strategic spin offs for China too.
Despite his words of support, officials say Mr Yang also warned Pakistan's leaders not to break with the US and to avoid taking hardline positions regarding the US and Nato in Afghanistan.
For the past seven months, Pakistan has refused to reopen the main route for Nato supplies that runs from Karachi to the Afghan border. Talks with the US on the issue have so far failed.
Fearing fundamentalists
Both China and Russia will be happy to see US troops leave Afghanistan, but they are equally worried about the Taliban and other extremist groups penetrating Xinjiang province in southern China and the Central Asian republics, whose national security is very much in the hands of Russia.
China is deeply concerned by the long-running crisis in Pakistan, fearing that it may lead to a strengthening of Islamic fundamentalism.
Beijing is worried that any threat to Pakistan from internal insurgency or secessionist movements would only bolster its regional rival India.
So, for the first time ever China has held high-level discussions with US officials that have focused on the crisis in Pakistan and how both countries could nudge Pakistani leaders to do the right thing.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai (L) and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari are being courted by Russia and China
The US is also asking the Chinese help persuade the Pakistani military to be more helpful in Afghanistan and end the sanctuaries the Taliban enjoy.
Both the Chinese and Russians are worried about the threat posed by the Taliban and al-Qaeda themselves.
In an unprecedented move, over the past six months Chinese officials issued three strong statements rebuking Pakistan for not reining in Uighur extremists who are training with Pakistani extremist groups and fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Uighurs are Chinese Muslims from Xinjiang province and some are involved in an independence struggle against China.
'Tectonic shift'
Pakistan's military rushed to try and detain the Uighur militants. According to diplomats at the United Nations, China has been quietly telling the Pakistan military that it must end havens for all militant groups on its soil - a message that has been publicly taken up by Nato.
Russia also makes no bones about the fact that it sees Pakistan as harbouring Central Asian militant groups such as the Islamic Movement for Uzbekistan and Islamic Jihad.
These groups - which have been based in Pakistan's tribal areas - are now trying to enter Tajikistan and Uzbekistan from their new bases in northern Afghanistan. Diplomats at the UN say they are being aided and abetted by militant Pakistani groups based, including Lashkar e-Toiba.
Russia's envoy Zamir Kabulov, who has long experience with the Pakistani military's backing of Islamic fundamentalist groups (he served in the Soviet embassy in Kabul in the 1980s), raised this issue with the Pakistani government.
Russia sees itself as the guardian of the Central Asian republics and although it is anxious to see an end to US bases in that region, its resumption of the sole security role in Central Asia will depend on how Pakistan deals with such extremist groups.
If Pakistan can take steps against home-grown extremism, it will do much to convince Russia and China that it deserves help to move out of the American orbit.
But with the long-running political and economic meltdown in Pakistan, there is little chance that the government can act soon. Nevertheless, a shift in the tectonic plates in the region is taking place. Pakistan and Afghanistan can either take quick advantage of these changes or revert back into chaos.
Taliban Shadow Governor Detained as Poisoning Arrests Rise to 15
TOLOnews.com Wednesday, 06 June 2012
Fifteen people, including a deputy shadow Taliban governor and school teachers, were arrested by Afghanistan security officials in connection with the recent spate of school poisonings, officials said on Wednesday.
Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security (NDS) spokesman Lutfullah Mashal said that the NDS has proven documents that Taliban insurgents were working in cooperation with members of Pakistan's intelligence agency to poison school students in the northern Takhar province.
"Fifteen people including Taliban's shadowed deputy provincial governor, teachers, students and education department personnel were arrested by the NDS officials," Mashal said at a press conference.
Mashal accused Jandullah and Mahazulla fronts and the Taliban for the poisonings, saying that the real motivators behind these terrorist groups to commit such "inhuman acts" were the regional spy agencies.
"Because Taliban will have less credibility in the face of society, they don't claim responsibility, but we have proven documents showing this is the job of the insurgents. Jandullah and Mahazullah fronts and Taliban group are behind these poisonings," Mashal told reporters in a press conference today.
"Their aim is to promote fear among the people of Afghanistan; their main motivators are regional spy agencies."
The Taliban released an official statement on Wednesday responding to the claims, saying they were not responsible. It is the second statement the group has made in as many weeks. They threatened to punish any of their people found poisoning school students.
According to Mashal, two school girls are also among those arrested. He claimed one of them received 50,000 Afs from the Taliban to poison the water in her school.
Officials at the Ministry of Education said that they will not surrender to the aims of the insurgents and will continue their efforts to provide quality education for girls all over the country, particularly Takhar.
"The enemies of this country are trying to lead this country into darkness. We will take the candle of education in our hands and carry it all over the country," one official said.
Takhar schools have reported at least six cases of poisonings affecting hundreds of students since the middle of April. Two other cases have been reported in Ghazni and Khost provinces.
Pakistan and Taliban acused of poisoning Afghan schoolchildren
Afghan intelligence on Wednesday accused Pakistani spies of poisoning schoolgirls as authorities battle to halt a string of alleged attacks that have sown panic in parts of the north.
Telegraph.co.uk 06 June 2012
At least 15 suspects have been detained over mysterious illnesses, which usually include mass fainting episodes, that have struck scores of schoolgirls in Takhar province almost daily for the past two weeks.
"The regional spy agencies, namely ISI, are behind it. They are trying to sabotage the Shanghai Conference and the success of Afghan education," National Directorate of Security spokesman Lutfullah Mashal told reporters.
Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency is widely reviled in Afghanistan, where it is accused of fomenting the Taliban insurgency due to its historic links to the Islamist Afghan militia that ruled from 1996 to 2001.
President Hamid Karzai called for an investigation and Mr Mashal said the intelligence service discovered a conspiracy by militants to try to scare families from sending their children to school.
"They want to create terror and fear among students, especially in the education sector and also in the health sector, which are two of the major achievements of the 10 years of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan," said Mashal.
He said 15 people have been arrested in connection with the school poisonings. Those being held include 12 identified Taliban insurgents, a teacher and a school treasurer and his wife, he said.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid denied any involvement in the poisonings.
"The poisoning of innocent children is against Islamic law. The mujahedeen are not involved in the poisoning of schoolchildren. It is a crime," Mujahid said.
A teacher and three female students are among those arrested and all 15 have confessed to being involved in poisoning, Mashal said.
But the ISI dismissed the Afghan accusations as "absurd and senseless".
"This is an attempt to strain ties between the two countries. Pakistan wants peace and stability in Afghanistan. A peaceful and stable Afghanistan is in our interest," a Pakistani intelligence official told AFP.
Afghan officials regularly accuse Taliban insurgents, who banned schooling for girls while in power from 1996 to 2001, of poisoning school wells or using "gas" or "toxic powder" against the girls.
None have died, however, and no traces of poison have been found in blood samples, officials say.
Experts suggest that a phenomenon known as mass hysteria - against a background of conflict - could be responsible.
The Taliban has denied any involvement and said any culprits would be punished "according to the Islamic Law".
Can India ‘Fix’ Afghanistan?
New York Times (blog) By HEATHER TIMMONS June 7, 2012
As the United States winds down its military engagement in Afghanistan, optimism is growing about the role India can play to stabilize and develop the country.
This week, visiting United States Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta encouraged Indian leaders to take a more active role in Afghanistan, involvement once considered by the United States as merely an opportunistic way for India to antagonize Pakistan.
The United States’ encouragement is hardly needed. India plans to “intensify” its already “high level political engagement and broad-based development assistance in a wide range of sectors,” India’s minister for external affairs, S.M. Krishna, told Afghanistan’s visiting foreign minister, Zalmai Rassoul, in a speech in New Delhi last month. With assistance from Europe and the United States expected to drop substantially, India may be left as one of Afghanistan’s most prominent aid partners.
Here on India Ink, we have been asking: Does this make any sense? On first glance, at least, India seems an unlikely provider of development assistance because of the serious issues troubling it at home. Many of the same things that Afghanistan needs, from infrastructure to education, India is having troubles providing for many citizens, even without the regular threat of attacks from the Taliban.
India’s state-run power industry struggles to get enough fuel thanks to mismanagement and bureaucracy, even its brightest youth can’t land a spot at a good university and about third of its citizens live in destitute poverty, with hundreds of millions malnourished. The current central government is grappling with a growing deficit, shrinking economic growth and an increasingly dissatisfied voter base.
It’s no surprise that India’s Afghanistan plans have been greeted with some skepticism.
“In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,” said Rajeev Malik, an economist at CLSA, a research and brokerage house, who has been a sharp critic of India’s fiscal policy and government. “India has not managed to fix these issues itself,” he said, but added that the country “probably has more experience than Afghanistan.”
India’s on-the-ground aid record, though limited, has been decent.
India has committed some $2 billion in aid to Afghanistan, of which $1 billion has been spent, according to the Ministry of External Affairs. Indian public and private companies have built a highway to Iran, put up transmission lines to bring power to Kabul, are constructing a new Parliament building and working on a hydro-electric project in western Afghanistan.
India sent one million tons of high-protein biscuits to Afghanistan, and plans to follow that with an additional 250,000 tons this year. There are 1,000 Afghan students on scholarships in Indian universities right now.
More ambitious plans are in place. In October of last year, when Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, visited India, the two countries signed a strategic agreement that said India would train and equip Afghan security forces. This month, India is holding meetings for regional investors interested in Afghanistan in New Delhi.
Invitees include Turkey, China and Pakistan. Over a dinner in May in New Delhi, Mr. Rassoul told Indian government advisers Afghanistan would like India to concentrate on building up governance, law courts and health care.
“We don’t want a fundamentalist Afghanistan, just like everyone else,” explained Syed Akbaruddin, spokesman for India’s Ministry of External Affairs, in a recent interview. “We don’t want an Afghanistan that slides backward.”
The two countries share ties cemented long ago, he said, citing the well-known Rabindranath Tagore story “Kabuliwala,” about an Afghan fruit seller who befriends an Indian girl. India has a limited physical presence on the ground in Afghanistan, he said, which should quell concerns that India is focused on containing or antagonizing Pakistan. “What do we have in Afghanistan that is a threat to Pakistan?,” he asked rhetorically.
India’s aid to Afghanistan comes without any conditions, unlike aid to India from foreign countries in the past, he said. India is not pressuring the Afghanistan government to improve, say, education for girls, or rights for women, but is focusing on infrastructure and other concrete projects, he said.
India’s projects in Afghanistan are “replicas of what India has been able to successfully implement in some part of India or the other,” said Mr. Akbaruddin. “They have been incubated in some part of India.”
Staunch supporters of India’s involvement say sheer practicality of the alliance makes it work.
“Today the average Afghan knows that for many of the things that would lead to an improved quality of life, India offers the most viable option,” said C. Uday Bhaskar, a security analyst based in New Delhi.
To explain, he offered an example: The quality of higher education in Britain or the United States or Australia might be better than in India, he said, but most Afghans can’t afford Western universities, and if even they could, they probably wouldn’t get a visa to go anyway.
Much of what is on Afghanistan’s “wish list” can be “enabled in a considerable degree by India,” Mr. Bhaskar said. President Karzai himself attended an Indian university, doing his postgraduate studies at Himachal Pradesh University, in Shimla.
Others note that the “aid” relationship is not new. “People forget this has been going on quietly for a long time,” said K. Shankar Bajpai, a former ambassador to China, Pakistan and the United States, who is now an analyst with Delhi Policy Group. For six decades, India was “very much engaged” in Afghanistan, working on everything from building tunnels through the mountains of the Hindu Kush to education and health programs.
Recently, the two countries have built up a “friendly relationship without some of the imperial hang-ups that spoiled Delhi and Kabul’s relationship in the past,” he said. In a sign of this friendliness, in March, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called Mr. Karzai to congratulate him on the birth of his daughter.
Another factor to consider is that while India’s development problems weigh heavily on the country’s poor and middle class, facilities for the wealthy in India are often world class. Many of Afghanistan’s wealthy are already beneficiaries, and these upper-class industries and ties are only expected to grow.
Take health care: India’s private hospitals, and especially those in New Delhi, serve as de facto doctors’ offices for wealthy Afghans, who are just a two-hour flight away. Hospitals like Max Healthcare’s giant facility in Saket have special facilitators for Afghan patients who come for everything from in vitro fertilization treatments to heart trouble, doctors say. Often, their Afghan patients pay in crisp United States dollar bills.
On the other end of the economic spectrum, at least one Indian charity has also been successful in Afghanistan.
The Self Employed Women’s Association(SEWA), which starts women’s self-help groups, has been running vocational training programs in Afghanistan since 2008, teaching women to make jam and sew clothing, among other skills. The group said it has trained 3,000 Afghan women so far, despite two fatal terrorist attacks on the team in Kabul. The women, who are often orphans or widows, use the training to earn an income outside their home.
Whether the ambitious plans in industries like mining and manufacturing will work out remains to be seen. In November, a consortium of public and private Indian companies, led by the state-owned Steel Authority of India, won a bid to mine in three states in Afghanistan, which includes the construction of a six million-ton steel plant, an 800-megawatt power plant and 200 kilometers each of road, rail and transmission lines – as well as a pledge to set aside one percent of profits for establishing educational and medical facilities.
“We are very bullish about this,” the chairman of SAIL said when the deal was announced. Total investment by the Indian companies is pegged at $10.8 billion.
The big numbers, heavy-duty infrastructure plans and optimistic outlook are a stark contrast to SAIL’s India performance. In February, SAIL said quarterly profits fell by more than 40 percent from the same period the year before, thanks in part to higher raw material costs and SAIL’s inability to get coal from another state-owned company.
Pakistan to Release Afghan School Books Delayed by Nato Dispute
TOLOnews.com Wednesday, 06 June 2012
Pakistan will release the transport containers carrying thousands of school books for Afghanistan after they were stopped with the other Nato supplies from crossing the border.
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari told the Afghan President Hamid Karzai of the decision to release the school books during a meeting on Wednesday at the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Beijing, China.
Zardari told Karzai that Pakistan "sincerely wanted to help the Afghan brothers facilitating them in all possible manners in their journey towards socio-economic development and progress," according to statement from the Pakistan Embassy.
"He said that keeping in view the importance of education for the children, the containers carrying books for Afghan children were being released," the statement said.
It is not clear how long the school books have been delayed in Pakistan, but the supply route into Afghanistan has been closed since November 26 when a US airstrike mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani soldiers near the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Pakistan had claimed that the educational books were transported by a Nato-related transport company and that was why the trucks were blocked, according to Afghan officials last week.
Zaradari also said in his meeting with Karzai that Pakistan looks forward to the visit of new chairman of the Afghan High Peace Council Salahuddin Rabbani, saying that "Pakistan firmly believes that permanent peace and stability can only be ensured following an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned reconciliation process in the country".
The statement comes a fortnight after Pakistan pledged $20 million towards supporting the Afghan National Security Forces.
Zardari added that Pakistan was prepared to consider any additional requirements, as indicated by Afghanistan, for the purpose of strengthening and capacity building of its security forces.
The Pakistani Embassy said the pair also discussed issues related to prisoners and detainees, facilitating visa processes for Pakistani businesses and investors to work in Afghanistan, and the need for economic development along the border regions to help reverse "tendencies towards extremism".
www.afghanistannewscenter.com