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Afghanistan bans YouTube to block anti-Muslim film
By Miriam Arghandiwal | Reuters – Wed, Sep 12, 2012
KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan banned the YouTube website on Wednesday to stop Afghans watching a U.S.-made film insulting the Prophet Mohammad that sparked protests in North Africa and the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya.
"We have been told to shut down YouTube to the Afghan public until the video is taken down," Aimal Marjan, general director of Information Technology at the Ministry of Communications, told Reuters.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the film, in which Mohammad is portrayed as a philanderer and a religious fake, saying its makers had done a "devilish act" and that insulting Islam was not allowed by freedom of speech.
U.S. pastor Terry Jones, whose plans to burn the Koran triggered deadly riots in Afghanistan in 2010, said he had promoted the film, called "Innocence of Muslims".
The U.S. ambassador to Libya and three embassy staff were killed as they rushed away from a consulate building in Benghazi, stormed by al Qaeda-linked gunmen. Another assault was mounted on the U.S. embassy in Cairo.
Marjan declined to say if the order to close YouTube in Afghanistan was to prevent violence or to protect his countrymen from being offended.
The accidental burning of Korans at a U.S. base near Kabul in February drew thousands of protesters to the streets across Afghanistan for weeks and dozens of people were killed.
(Writing by Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
Afghans still yearn for peace after downfall of Taliban
By Jawid Omid, Chen Xin
KABUL, Sept. 12 (Xinhua) -- Eleven years after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States and the downfall of the al-Qaida- backed Taliban regime in Afghanistan, war-weary Afghans are still longing for a durable peace in their country.
"As you know, 11 years after the invasion of Afghanistan by the NATO and U.S. forces in their so-called war on terror, we still see bloodshed and killings in our country," Wahidullh, a 22-year- old man, who goes by one name, told Xinhua in an interview.
Wahidullh said that insecurity, suicide bombings,roadside bomb attacks and corruption remained unabated in the country and over 9 million Afghans still live below the poverty line.
After the bloody 9/11 attacks, the U.S. government invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 and ousted Taliban regime within weeks.
The government of then U.S. President George W. Bush has pinpointed the Taliban as having harbored al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden, the alleged mastermind in the attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon. "The Americans and their NATO allies have come here to eliminate the terrorists but more than a decade later their goal has not been achieved," Wahidullh said.
The ouster of the Taliban by the U.S.-led coalition forces in late 2001 had buoyed the hopes of the war-weary Afghans for the final return of peace to their country. In fact, some 5 million Afghan refugees have decided to return home within five years after the ouster of the Taliban, hoping to regain their long-lost freedom and live in peace. But that was not what had happened.
Although the United States has eliminated Bin Laden, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar is still at large and continue to lead his fighters against over 130,000-strong NATO forces, with nearly 90,000 of them Americans stationed in Afghanistan.
According to a United Nations report released here in August, aside from casualties in the coalition forces and the militants, up to 1,145 civilians had been killed in conflicts only in the first six months of 2012.
Although there is no official figure of civilians killed in the past decade, it is said that more than 13,000 non-combatants have lost their lives during that period.
The war on terror has also proved costly for the United States.
In addition to spending billions of U.S. dollars on war on terror in this central Asian state, iCasualties, a website tracking U.S.-led coalition forces casualties in the war on terror, said that 3,177 coalition combatants, 2,114 of them Americans, have been killed.
In the latest violent incident, a suicide bombing killed five people, including a police official and four civilians, in western Herat province Tuesday.
The incident came a day after a suicide attacker killed 15 people including seven civilians in northern Kunduz province.
Faizullah Jalal, a professor of law in Kabul University, told Xinhua that while it is true that there have been gains in the war on terror, these gains can be easily reversed"if the Afghan National Security Forces will be left alone after the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces the end of 2014."
Report Says Taliban Raised $400 Million Last Year
September 11, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
A new UN report says the Taliban raised $400 million last year through taxes, donations, and extorting money from enterprises and aid projects in Afghanistan.
According to the report released this week by UN sanctions experts to the Security Council, about $275 million of that money reached Taliban leadership and the rest was spent or misappropriated at the local level.
The estimates cover the financial year ended in March 2012.
The UN report says local taxes imposed by the Taliban include a 10 percent tax on harvest – the main source of income -- and a 2.5 percent tax on wealth.
Services such as water and electricity supplies are also taxed.
"In some areas they collect a 10 percent tax from local shopkeepers and other small businesses," the report says, adding that the militia acts much like a local administration.
The UN experts say donations are another "major" source of funding which also go to militia leaders.
Afghanistan has long been the world's leading supplier of opium.
According to Afghan estimates, the Islamist group raised some $100 million in 2011-2012 from the opium poppy industry -- a relatively small amout considering that the annual value of the drug crop is estimated at up to $4 billion.
The report says this source of revenue provides enough to finance much of the insurgency in the main poppy growing provinces of Helmand, Kandahar, and Oruzgan.
However, “the money raised from the drug trade is insufficient to meet the cost of insurgent activity elsewhere," it says.
The UN report says the Taliban has also taken hundreds of millions of dollars from the billions pumped into Afghanistan for development projects.
The report reads: "Estimates of Taliban income from contracts funded by the United States and other overseas donors range from 10 percent to 20 percent of the total, usually by the Taliban agreeing protection money with the contractor or demanding a cut."
The report quotes estimates by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) that the Taliban raised $360 million over three years from a $2.16 billion contract awarded to an Afghan trucking company by the U.S. military.
"This example shows how the Taliban are able to raise money from an Afghan economy distorted by and unable to absorb the huge amounts of money that have flowed into the country since 2001,” the report says.
The UN experts say the ISAF estimates that up to $155 million of the Taliban's income was spent mounting attacks in 2011, while the rest maintained the insurgency.
"Since 2006 the Taliban have managed to finance an ever-increasing number of attacks, reflecting a year-on-year increase in income," the UN report says.
Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP
A Pointless Blacklisting
New York Times By ALEX STRICK van LINSCHOTEN and FELIX KUEHN Op-Ed Contributors September 11, 2012
LAST week, the United States designated the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network a “foreign terrorist organization,” placing it alongside Hamas and Al Qaeda. But to what end?
America and its allies have learned a lot over the past decade in Afghanistan. But some fundamentals have remained elusive and shrouded in stereotypes.
To brand a group a foreign terrorist organization is not only a firm declaration that it is an enemy; it also limits America’s future political options. Although it’s possible to be delisted, groups on such lists find it difficult to get off them. Moreover, labeling the Haqqanis terrorists dislodges them from the wider Taliban insurgency, making a comprehensive settlement harder to achieve.
The decisions we make today will shape and constrain our future policies. Between 2002 and 2004, for example, some senior Taliban leaders sought reconciliation and cooperation with the Afghan government and the international community. The negative responses they received left little room but to pursue the path of resistance. Likewise, listing the Haqqanis as an F.T.O. now will deter them from coming to the negotiating table. It will also be seen as a sign of American insincerity by the Taliban and thus play into the hands of those opposed to a conciliatory approach.
The Haqqanis are cast as calculating players in the continuing business of “global jihad” and have gained notoriety for their spectacularly violent attacks in Afghanistan, many targeting American troops. Being enmeshed in a universe of groups and individuals along the Afghan-Pakistani border, some of whom have sought to carry out attacks in and against foreign countries, doesn’t help their image. But the view that they are an irreconcilable, rigidly ideological enemy should be questioned.
The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Michael T. Flynn, said in 2010 that the group’s leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani, was “absolutely salvageable” and open to reconciliation. Graeme Lamb, a former commander of Britain’s Special Air Service, has characterized Mr. Haqqani as being a pragmatist “tied to the probability of outcomes” and called Afghanistan “the land of the deal.”
In recent years, the Haqqanis and people close to them have made contact with Afghan, American and other Western officials. Ibrahim Omari (sometimes called Ibrahim Haqqani), a younger brother of Mr. Haqqani, met with American officials in 2011 in Dubai. Another more recent meeting seems to have taken place (without Americans) in Saudi Arabia.
To suggest that they are implacable foes also ignores the long history of pragmatism and political calculations that have informed the Haqqani leaders’ actions for 40 years. Mr. Omari worked together with the Afghan government in 2002, although his efforts to broker discussions eventually led to his being arrested and allegedly tortured. Since the Taliban were ousted in 2001, American policy has often rested on an overestimation of the West’s ability to understand the situation in Afghanistan, leading to poor decisions and ineffective initiatives that have frequently been self-defeating.
The current war effort relies heavily on drones and night raids in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but these tactics often increase radicalization and enmity. And the industrial-scale targeting of midlevel Taliban commanders in Afghanistan has led to the rise of a younger, more uncompromising generation of leaders. The designation of the Haqqanis as an F.T.O. will only erode America’s relationship with Pakistan and decrease the likelihood of Pakistan’s playing a constructive role in facilitating (or not spoiling) any reconciliation process.
And the F.T.O. listing doesn’t matter much for the Haqqanis’ operations. After all, there can be no winner in the current stalemate. The military argument that the Taliban have lost momentum is a nonstarter. This is as true for the Haqqanis as it is for the whole insurgency. Many Afghans living in places like Kandahar don’t believe the relative calm of the past two years will last. Even in heavily secured cities like Kabul, attacks continue to be carried out.
Most of the senior Haqqani commanders and family members are already on international blacklists. They are involved in the Afghan conflict to secure for themselves a future political role. Only a political process that engages them, rather than systematically sidelining them, will help end the war. One possible starting point for such a process would be some form of cease-fire. Indeed, Britain’s Royal United Services Institute recently outlined the potential for such a general cease-fire agreement.
President Obama claims he has refocused America’s effort in Afghanistan on those who attacked us: Al Qaeda. But the misguided ideology of the war on terror is still dictating passions and policies in the United States. And Washington’s move to blacklist and marginalize the Haqqanis gravely threatens the prospects for a political settlement, which is the only way out of the Afghan conflict.
Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn are the authors of “An Enemy We Created: The Myth of the Taliban-Al Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan.”
A circle of childhood friends broken with a bomb in Kabul
An argument with a teenager culminated in calamity for children who sold trinkets outside Nato headquarters in Afghanistan
Guardian.co.uk By Emma Graham-Harrison Tuesday 11 September 2012
Kabul - Nawab had been crowned the best skateboarder in Afghanistan, a joker and unofficial leader of the unruly gang. Mohammad Esa was perhaps the cleverest of his friends, always studying or lost in dreams of the day he would become a doctor. Khorshid was an uncompromising teenager whose name meant sunshine but whose character was steel, always ready to show the boys she could do anything they could, despite growing up in a country that is not kind to women.
They sold scarves and bracelets to the foreign soldiers, journalists, diplomats and aid workers who filtered in and out of Nato's heavily guarded Kabul headquarters.
Customers saw a group of scruffy children who should have been in school, racing to close a deal; but the competing hustlers were a close-knit group of friends who shared earnings as well as jokes, and often skateboarded or studied together when they were not chasing business.
The boys had helped Khorshid's family throw up their modest mud-walled home by night, to avoid police fines for building on public land. On a recent holiday they walked several miles to a reservoir out of town, to swim and picnic, before walking all the way back again to work in the afternoon. In a country splintered by bitter ethnic divisions, they were an unusual mix of Pashtuns and Tajiks.
But on Saturday a teenage boy in a white shalwar kameez walked onto their patch, and when some of the boys told him to leave, an argument broke out. It escalated into shouting, then blows, and then ended abruptly when the stranger pressed a hidden trigger and detonated a suicide bomb, according to 14-year-old Reza, who survived because he had wandered off to buy a snack, watching the dispute from a distance.
Police said the bomber was probably aiming for the nearby Nato or US embassy gates. He may have panicked when the children blocked his way, or perhaps given up hope of getting past them when the fighting began. One survivor does not even remember a fight, which raises the possibility the children were the target.
The blast was relatively small by the brutal standards of Afghanistan's decade-long war; eight people killed and perhaps a similar number wounded. But it has ripped apart the circle of friends. Nawab, Mohammad Esa, Khorshid, her sister Parwana and young brother-in-law Asad are dead, and two others from the group in hospital with serious injuries.
"When I go to bed, my friends are all waiting for me, asking me to come swimming," said 14-year-old Omid, one of the group who was travelling in to work when the bomber struck. "I see their faces, and I can't sleep."
Several of the dead were also the main breadwinners for their families; one father disabled, another a drug addict, with many younger brothers and sisters to feed. Their killings bring more than just the agonising loss of a sibling or child to grieving families.
They are the latest children to suffer in a war that damages hundreds of young lives each year. "1,756 children were killed or seriously injured as a result of the conflict in 2011, which equates to nearly five children a day," said Unicef spokesman Alistair Gretarsson.
In Nawab's home, packed with dozens of mourners, his family remembered a quiet 16-year-old, who liked eggs for breakfast when he could afford them and ignored their pleas to stop working near Nato. "He was a very serious person, busy from morning to evening with his business," said his mother, Anisa, her face bruised and scratched from where she had battered it in mourning. "After God, he was the person who fed the family."
Nawab was different with his friends, says Omid, he was a joker and a natural leader, who looked out for the younger kids. He won the "Go Skateboarding" competition this year, and worked as a volunteer skateboarding teacher.
He is buried nearby in a new graveyard that is marching up a hill, coffin by coffin, testament to the steady toll of the war and poverty in Afghanistan. There is a spectacular view of the city from his burial mound, where Omid stared at the dust and swore revenge. "I have to find the people who killed my friend," he said. "I want to become a pilot in the army."
Khorshid, 14, and Parwana, 12, are buried a few miles away, in a sprawling graveyard overlooked by their family home, where 16-year-old Nilofar is mourning two sisters and a husband she had married only 20 days before his death.
Khorshid too had loved skateboarding, fearless on the board as she was in life, taking to the streets in a country where women who do any kind of work, even in well-protected offices, are regularly harassed both outside and inside their homes.
She worked as a skating instructor for the charity Skateistan, which, in an online tribute, quoted her saying: "If you are scared you end up doing nothing and without doing you cannot achieve anything. But if you do things, all that can happen is you succeed or fail."
Her six-year-old sister Mersal survived the blast because she was playing down the street, but saw both her sisters' bodies. "Khorshid was broken," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "Do you have any pictures of my daughters?" their mother, Jemila, asked a visiting journalist. The family was too poor to have a single print of their children.
The families of those who survived have banned them from working outside Nato, and are filled with relief. "We have told him to stop working and just concentrate on school," said Reza's older brother Mustafa. But the children themselves are haunted by their own escape, in a country where only a tiny minority have access to counselling services.
"I looked down at myself and saw I was covered with blood, then I passed out," said Naved, 15, stranded in Kabul's emergency hospital with a shattered hand and shrapnel wounds to his shoulder, leg and side. "When I woke up, I saw the bodies of my friends lying on the ground and tried to go closer, but the police stopped me."
He survived the bomb because of a chance thirst; he had walked a few metres down the street to a handpump a minute before the bomber detonated.
Three years ago another bomb killed a group of street children just a few metres down the road, but many in the group have the recklessness of kids around the world, made many times more dangerous by their surroundings. "I never thought it might be dangerous," Naved said of working near the heart of the western military mission.
Elias, in hospital with serious injuries to his legs, ignored his parents' warnings that the national holiday might attract attacks and went into town with Nawab. "I think I was closest to the bomber, but God saved me. I don't know why." He doesn't know what he will do when he gets out of hospital. "I have no feelings now, except sadness for my friends who are dead."
NATO Copter Destroyed by Taliban at Base
New York Times By GRAHAM BOWLEY September 11, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - A coalition heavy-transport helicopter parked inside the sprawling Bagram Air Base was hit and destroyed by insurgent fire late Monday, killing three Afghan service members who were on board, NATO said Tuesday.
NATO service members also on the helicopter, a Chinook CH-47, at the time of the attack were wounded, but there were no other fatalities, said Lt. Col. Hagen Messer, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.
“We can confirm that an ISAF helicopter was destroyed by indirect fire,” he said, describing in general terms the use of either mortar or rocket fire, though he said it was not clear precisely what weapon was used. “The helicopter caught fire after it was hit.”
Colonel Messer said the service members were part of a crew conducting routine nighttime maintenance when the attack struck, around 10:30 p.m. Monday. But Roshna Khalid, the spokeswoman for the governor of Parwan Province, which includes Bagram, said the helicopter had been hit by rocket attack as it came in to land. She identified the three dead Afghans as belonging to the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan’s intelligence agency.
In a statement, the Taliban claimed responsibility.
Indiscriminate attacks involving mortar shells or rockets fired by insurgents hiding outside the heavily fortified Bagram Air Base, one of the biggest American military bases in Afghanistan, occur frequently, but they rarely result in such serious damage.
Last month, insurgents fired a pair of rockets that damaged the parked C-17 transport plane used by Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who was visiting Afghanistan.
General Dempsey was asleep at the time, and not near the plane, American officials said, but the damage to the C-17 was enough to force General Dempsey to leave Afghanistan a few hours later than planned on another aircraft.
Bagram Air Base sits in the Shomali Plain, an important strategic link between the north and south. A main road passing north through Bagram and the Salang Tunnel, and eventually into Uzbekistan, is an important resupply corridor. But in the past few years, some recent security gains in the province have deteriorated.
In the western province of Herat, a suicide bomber killed a commander for the Afghan Local Police, his two guards and seven civilians. The attack on the commander, Arbab Abdul Hakim, happened in a store in the Keshk-e-Kohna district.
An employee of The New York Times contributed reporting from Bagram, Afghanistan.
Marking 9/11, Romney makes point of citing war in Afghanistan
Reuters By Sam Youngman Tue Sep 11, 2012
RENO, Nevada - U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney used the anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001, to do some repair work.
Still under fire from Democrats for not mentioning the war in Afghanistan during his nomination acceptance speech at the Republican convention on August 30, Romney spoke at length on Tuesday about the war during an address to the National Guard Association.
Romney said he was taking the day off from politics and focusing instead on remembering the nearly 3,000 people killed 11 years ago, while offering thanks to the emergency crews that responded to the attacks and service members who went to war afterward.
In a campaign that has been dominated by debate over the struggling economy, Romney discussed America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the kind of detail he typically avoids.
"While the war in Iraq is over, nearly 70,000 American troops will still remain in Afghanistan at the end of the month," Romney said. "Our goal should be to complete the successful transition to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014."
Romney has long criticized Democratic President Barack Obama, his opponent in the November 6 election, for announcing a target date of 2014 for withdrawing from Afghanistan, where U.S. troops have been fighting the Taliban since about a month after the 9/11 attacks.
Romney has joined other Republicans in saying that Obama's setting of a date for the U.S. withdrawal has encouraged the Taliban and al Qaeda simply to wait out the American forces, then try to reclaim control of key parts of the country.
"We should evaluate the conditions on the ground and solicit the best advice of our military commanders," Romney said on Tuesday. "We can all agree that our men and women in the field deserve a clear mission; that they deserve the resources and the resolute leadership they need to complete that mission."
Despite the Romney campaign's pledge to refrain from politics on a solemn day, the Republican candidate appeared to take a shot at Obama over the issue of proposed defense cuts.
Romney has increasingly made the 2011 "sequestration" agreement between the White House and House Republicans as evidence that Obama wants to weaken the nation's military.
Under the agreement, supported in Congress by Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, the Pentagon would be subject to about half the $109 billion in automatic spending cuts that would be triggered in January if the White House and Congress cannot agree on a plan to curb government spending.
"Of course, the return of our troops cannot and must not be used as an excuse to hollow out our military through devastating defense budget cuts," Romney said to applause.
PRAISING MILITARY, NOT OBAMA
After the speech, an adviser to Romney said the Republican was merely "reaffirming his principles" and not stepping back into campaign mode.
"With less than two months to go before Election Day, I would normally speak to a gathering like this about the differences between my and my opponent's plans for our military and for our national security," Romney said. "There is a time and a place for that, but this day is not that day."
Romney also recounted his own experience on September 11, 2001, recalling the carnage as he drove past the Pentagon.
In that day's attacks, passenger jets hijacked by al Qaeda operatives were flown into the Pentagon and the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York. A fourth hijacked jet crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers rebelled against the hijackers and stormed the cockpit.
Romney praised the U.S. military's killing of Osama bin Laden last year without mentioning Obama's role in approving the mission, and warned that the United States continued to face threats from militants.
"I wish I could say the world is less dangerous now, that it is less chaotic," Romney said. "But on September 10, 2001, we had no idea that America would be at war in Afghanistan."
(Editing by David Lindsey and Peter Cooney)
Afghan Lawmakers Delay Confirmation Vote On Top Security Posts
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan September 11, 2012
KABUL -- Afghanistan's parliament has delayed a confirmation vote for four top security posts -- the ministers of defense, interior, and border and tribal affairs, as well as the director of the national intelligence agency.
Lawmakers want Afghan President Hamid Karzai to send one of his deputies to introduce the nominees to parliament on September 12, insisting Karzai must follow standard rules of parliamentary order.
On September 2, Karzai nominated former Interior and Defense Minister Bismillah Mohammadi as the new defense minister and Ghulam Mujtaba Patang as the new interior minister.
Former Kandahar Province Governor Asadullah Khalid was nominated to head the Afghan intelligence agency.
Haji Azizullah Din Mohammad, a former governor of both Kabul and Nangarhar provinces, was nominated as the new minister of border and tribal affairs.
With reporting by Pajhwok.com
Western and Afghan Officials Split Over Karzai Nomination for Spy Chief
New York Times By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. September 11, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - President Hamid Karzai’s determination to make a close aide, Asadullah Khalid, his next intelligence chief has divided Western officials here, some of whom say they are troubled by allegations of torture and drug trafficking against Mr. Khalid and worry that in such a powerful role he would be a step back for the country.
With a charismatic style and a record of fighting the Taliban, as well as close ties to the C.I.A. and differing Afghan factions, Mr. Khalid could become a powerful political proxy and security enforcer for Mr. Karzai, Western officials say. If he is confirmed this week as chief of the Afghan spy agency, the National Directorate of Security, he would be in a unique position to help Mr. Karzai stay in influence after term limits require him to step down in 2014.
Since the assassination of the president’s half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, last year, Mr. Khalid has become almost a surrogate family member — an ethnic Pashtun with deft political skills who has proved himself fiercely loyal, and a bridge to some former Northern Alliance leaders who remain important to Mr. Karzai’s support but are wary of presidential aides too sympathetic to Pakistan.
By contrast, Mr. Khalid is seen as a foe of Pakistan. Amrullah Saleh, a former Northern Alliance official and former Afghan intelligence director now in opposition to the Karzai government, called Mr. Khalid “a good man” known for his courage and unusually strong ties to different factions. “He knows leaders in the North and leaders in the South, so he can connect the two.”
But his nomination was troubling for human rights officials and some other Western and Afghan officials who have focused on persistent allegations that Mr. Khalid oversaw a torture prison while governor of Kandahar Province several years ago. Those officials, among more than 20 interviewed who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that if he wields the security agency as a weapon of repression, he could undermine a decade spent moving the country toward Western-style human rights.
“If Afghan security organizations are able to use the most egregious methods to combat the insurgency in the name of greater security, then we are sacrificing elements of the rule of law and accountability that are at the heart of the success of the transition,” one Western diplomat said.
Mr. Khalid did not respond to an interview request. But he has denied human rights and corruption allegations. His allies have said that in many cases the accusations were politically motivated, or that he never did anything worse than other senior officials.
As Mr. Karzai’s legal span in office — and, with it, the NATO mission in Afghanistan — expires in two years, speculation about the president’s next moves has been a favorite parlor game: He could engineer a Russian-style Putin-Medvedev arrangement with a trusted successor. He could try to repeal term limits. Or he could throw support behind his brother Qayum. (Mr. Karzai has told some diplomats he intends to step down and do nothing to taint the process, one official said.)
What is sure is that Mr. Khalid, if confirmed, would be a crucial help in any of those situations. In the 2009 election, when he was minister of border and tribal affairs, Mr. Khalid “helped Karzai significantly,” and there were some allegations that he used “most of his ministry’s budget to do so,” according to an American diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks.
And it is hard to overstate how much power and trust Mr. Karzai has assigned to Mr. Khalid in the past year, officials say.
After Ahmed Wali Karzai’s death, the president gave Mr. Khalid his late brother’s security portfolio in southern Afghanistan and charged him with securing the family’s prosperous enterprises in Kandahar.
“He is absolutely on the cusp of family,” said another Western diplomat, noting that Mr. Khalid was trusted enough that after Ahmed Wali Karzai’s death, he was sent to Kandahar “to ensure that Karzai’s interests were protected.”
Mr. Karzai’s paternal view of Mr. Khalid was made clear to one former Western diplomat during a conversation with the president. “He was like a father with a son who he was really hoping would do well,” the former diplomat said. Assessing Mr. Khalid’s appointment, the diplomat added: “If 80 percent of the job is getting a grip on security, you want this guy. But if 80 percent is about making institutions more accountable and improving rule of law, he’s probably not the best choice.”
Mr. Khalid worked for Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf, a religiously conservative Sunni close to Saudi Arabia and one of the warlords who tore Kabul apart in the 1992-96 civil war. Mr. Sayyaf remains a patron and pressured Mr. Karzai to award him crucial jobs. He also helped secure Mr. Khalid’s first governorship, in Ghazni Province in spring 2002.
Then, “he was an inexperienced boy,” one Ghazni official said. But he matured quickly and led raids on Taliban hide-outs, said the official, who described him as Ghazni’s best post-Taliban governor.
In 2005 Mr. Khalid was transferred to Kandahar, the heart of Karzai family intrigue and home turf for Ahmed Wali Karzai. The president told his brother not to interfere with Mr. Khalid, people close to the brother said.
As his stature rose, Mr. Khalid’s tightest family relationship was with Qayum Karzai, according to some officials, who took Mr. Khalid to Saudi Arabia four years ago to meet with officials about Taliban negotiations.
But in Kandahar he proved controversial. He won support from NATO Special Operations troops for his tactics, but he angered some diplomats by alienating much of the populace with highhanded measures, two former Western officials said.
And while he can charm Westerners, his style sometimes offended traditional Pashtuns. A high-ranking Afghan said that Mr. Khalid would rudely throw his feet on the table during meetings with elders. In 2006 a senior Afghan official complained to diplomats that he angered tribal leaders because he “does not have respect for the local conservative traditions.”
Mr. Khalid was dismissed from Kandahar in 2008. According to one leaked diplomatic cable, President Karzai was “unimpressed by Khalid’s stewardship of his home province.” In another cable a year later, American diplomats were scathing when assessing him as a cabinet choice, calling him “exceptionally corrupt and incompetent.”
Then, at a 2009 Canadian parliamentary hearing, some of the most serious charges imaginable were leveled against Mr. Khalid by Richard Colvin, a former high-ranking Canadian diplomat in Afghanistan. He described Mr. Khalid as a narcotics trafficker who, while governor, tortured people in a Kandahar dungeon. At that time, Canadian forces were responsible for the region’s security. “He had people killed who got in his way,” Mr. Colvin said.
Returning to Kandahar last year, Mr. Khalid may have moved too fast to replace officials with his allies. The governor, Tooryalai Wesa, complained to Mr. Karzai, who told Mr. Khalid to back off, a Kandahar official said.
But in short order he also had every National Directorate of Security office in the South reporting to him, another diplomat said. He is also now serving as Mr. Karzai’s eyes, ears and dispenser of money for anti-Taliban uprising movements in Ghazni. That has bolstered relations with some members of Hezb-i-Islami, a party that, unlike Mr. Khalid, has strong ties to Pakistan.
Whatever his past, Mr. Khalid is astute enough to heed warnings from officials worried about the implications of his actions, one American official said. “We’re going to encourage him to go in the right direction,” the official said. “Asadullah Khalid is someone we have been able to work with.”
“This is sovereignty,” the official added. “It can be messy.”
Graham Bowley contributed reporting.
Asylum seekers risk all for new life outside Afghanistan
CNN By Anna Coren September 12, 2012
Kabul, Afghanistan - In the suburbs of Afghanistan's capital on the third floor of a modest apartment building live newlyweds Mushtaq and Haleema Changezi.
They tied the knot in a traditional ceremony just four months ago, yet their families are wondering why they haven't started a family.
"This is supposed to be a new chapter in our lives -- we should be excited," explained 27-year-old Haleema. "But there is no future for us here in Afghanistan, so how can we possibly start a family?"
Haleema has a double masters degree in economics and accounting. She has applied for dozens of jobs in Kabul but can't get one interview. Her 30-year-old husband works for a production house in multimedia design -- his salary is just enough to support them. They are both Hazaras -- Persian-speaking ethnic Afghans who over the years have been persecuted and discriminated against.
The couple feels this is still the case and the reason why so many Hazaras have left their homeland for foreign shores. "In our country there are NATO forces, the aid of foreign countries and yet we don't feel we have a life or a future. What's going to happen when the foreign forces leave in 2014? There is no future for us in Afghanistan," she said.
This is a familiar story, not just among the Hazara community but also across the Afghan community in general -- many are fearful of what will happen to their country once coalition forces leave in two years time.
Despite assurances from ISAF -- the International Security Assistance Force -- that includes U.S. and NATO forces, there has been an increase in violence across the country. Analysts say the Taliban are no longer based only in their Helmand province heartland in the country's south and along the eastern border with Pakistan.
They are now spread out across all 34 provinces using suicide attacks and IEDs -- Improvised Explosive Devices -- to target coalition and Afghan forces, as well as innocent Afghan civilians.
This resurgence has frightened many Afghanis, including Haji Ali Mohammad. He decided to send his two sons and nephew to Australia to escape the war-ravaged nation.
"They were going to Australia for work, to make a better life, a good and peaceful life, away from the Taliban. Our life is dangerous here -- we don't feel secure," he said.
His sons, 19-year-old Akbar and 22-year-old Javid, joined their cousin, 20-year-old Hashim, on their 11,000-kilometer journey. Organized by people smugglers they flew to Dubai and then to Thailand where they picked up visas. From there, they caught a plane to Malaysia where the trio traveled by boat to Indonesia. The three eventually boarded a leaky wooden fishing vessel bound for Australia's Christmas Island.
"The last time I spoke to them, they said we're leaving tonight. The next time we call you we'll be in our new home -- Australia," said Mohammad.
A few days later, he received a call.
On the phone was another passenger from the fishing vessel. He said within a few hours of leaving shore the boat began to sink. Of the 18 men on board, only 10 survived. Among the dead were Mohammad's sons and nephew.
"The people who survived, held onto broken pieces of ship until the rescue boats arrived. My boys knew how to swim but not in that much water for hours on end," Mohammad said.
The father of 11 children then broke down in tears. "A bright day turned into a dark night. The anniversary of their deaths is approaching. I miss them constantly."
Thousands of Afghan asylum seekers attempt the long and treacherous journey to Australia every year. Frustrated with waiting for political asylum though the official channels, they pay smugglers up to US$20,000 per person -- and there's no guarantee, just the promise of a brighter future.
For Mushtaq and Haleema Changazi they are trying the legal route and for good reason. Haleema's 28-year-old brother, Ishaq, set off earlier this year because he didn't want to wait any longer. "The last time we spoke he was on the boat in Jakarta and he was saying that maybe in two to three hours, there would be no signal and this was his last call," she said.
"After that there was no news from him and we haven't heard from him for the last 3 months."
With tears rolling down her face, Haleema says while her family pray they will hear from him soon, she knows there's little hope. "I hear the reports about the boats sinking. I know what's happening. I know they're all prepared to die for a better life in Australia -- including my brother."
The Two Nations of Afghanistan: Economic Issues Post-Coalition Withdrawal
Foreign Policy Journal By Dr. Godfrey Garner September 12, 2012
As I leaned in, brow furrowed with concentration at the rhythmic Farsi-tinted English, I remembered the words of a two-star General I had spoken with in Kabul six months before; “If you really want to know, ask an Afghan.”
“You know, friend,” (young Afghans refer to all westerners as ‘friend’) the young man continued in the singsong narrative, pronouncing each word perfectly as though his mouth held precious jewels, “Tajik’s love Americans.”
He waived his arms in wide strokes taking in the hundreds of local Afghans scrambling past, bent on their appointed daily tasks, “All of us in Afghanistan love Americans.”
I smiled as he reached out and gently clasped my arm. His voice took on a quiet urgency. “We need Americans.”
He released my arm and continued, “I have hopes that one day my children will be able to get an education and make a decent living right here,” he pointed at the ground beneath his feet, “in Northern Afghanistan. America bred that hope into me when you came here more than ten years ago.”
“Yeah,” I responded casually having heard this entreaty many times, from many of the young, mostly westernized Afghans, “but they hate us down south.”
“Screw them,” came the immediate retort, complete with the associated gesture which he subconsciously pointed in the general direction of Kandahar, the former Taliban stronghold and home to most of the countries Pashto population.
I laughed as much at his accent as at the idea that he would actually say that. His frustration at the Southern Afghanistan mindset was obvious. The Pashtun mentality of the south had been an anchor on the country and any progress the country could have made for generations.
Northern Afghans often view their Southern counterparts as an embarrassing younger sibling you are forced to take with you on a date with a girl you really want to impress.
The north and south are separate countries in many ways. The south, populated predominantly by Sunni Pashtuns who cling tightly to their Pashtunwali rules and regulations stands in sharp contrast to their more secular Tajik, Uzbek and Hazarra neighbors in the north. In the north, a peek under the robes and burkas will often reveal Elvis t-shirts and blue jeans worn mostly by the younger generation who envy their Pakistani counterparts, who are allowed to openly wear tight jeans.
Though Bollywood movies and Hindi soap operas are not unheard of in Kandahar, they are prevalent in Mazer e Sharif, Afghanistan’s most densely populated city to the north.
The average income in Afghanistan is around $1000 US per year and most of that is made from agricultural farming. The unemployment rate nationally hovers around 40-50% while Mazer e Sharif and surrounding Balkh Province’s unemployment is somewhere below 35%.
Mazar-e Sharif also serves as the primary trading center for northern Afghanistan, and is the only city to connect itself by rail with a neighboring country. The rail service which began in 2011 is expected to rapidly boost the economy and further reduce the unemployment rate.
Northern Afghanistan also differs from the southern part of the country in its general attitude toward women’s rights. Women in the north have begun operating their own shops and selling handicrafts, cosmetics, and clothing. The unmistakable prevailing attitude of Afghans in the north is one that encourages progress through capitalism and the people clearly understand that this cannot be accomplished by limiting or inhibiting the entrepreneurial spirit of women.
Afghans are innovative and motivated, especially in the north. Younger Afghans are also energetic and excited about learning. They, given the opportunity soak up knowledge like a dry sponge and their thirst for new technology is second to none.
In 2006 there were an estimated 3 million cell phones in use in Afghanistan, mostly in the north and internet usage grew sharply from 2002 to 2006 with almost 600,000 registered users by then, again predominantly in the north.
Another obvious and extremely important distinction between the north and the south is the propensity for fighting. Afghans culturally have for generations inclined toward settling disputes, local or national, with the use of violence, but that mindset has always been more pronounced among the southern Pashtuns. Security today in Afghanistan ranges from highly unstable in Kandahar in the south, to paranoid and skittish in Kabul, and on to somewhat carefree and unconcerned in the north. As a matter of fact, Mazer e Sharif is and always has been somewhere between Chicago (on the down side) and Phoenix when it comes to street violence, and the risk of kidnapping or assault.
In 2003, while a team member with a Special Forces ODA in Mazer-e Sharif, or Mez, (our abbreviated affectionate moniker), walking the streets in semi-secure military gear one day, I was accosted by a gentleman of light complexion in full Kamiz Shalwar, traditional Afghan men’s wear. With his eight year old son in tow, he introduced himself as a physician from Detroit. He and his wife and children had lived in Mazer-e Sharif for two years and were as comfortable as they had ever been in Detroit. I must say I felt a little embarrassed walking around like a member of The Knights of the Round Table.
In short, Afghanistan and particularly Northern Afghanistan is fertile ground for economic growth and has subtly, over the past decade become a virtual Garden of Eden for the entrepreneurial spirit. While the rest of the country is scrambling to predict a post-coalition Afghanistan, in Mazer-e Sharif there is a sense of excitement and optimistic anticipation about the future.
The average Afghan in the north has tasted democracy, is aware of the responsibility of living in a democratic society, and has a clear vision of his future in a democratic, prosperous, violence-free Northern Afghanistan, and he sees America more as an economic partner than a liberator.
The Afghan in the North sees a transition to a more economically viable society after the Americans and their allies have withdrawn, and they look forward with anticipation to the trip. Regardless of the veracity of their vision, they see this transition with America as a partner, as a ‘trip that will be fun’ and prosperous for all.
America must now concentrate on becoming that partner rather than a liberator or mentor. The partnership will be a profitable one but one that requires a total shift in mindset. We can no longer live behind walls. We can no longer separate ourselves from Afghanistan and from the Afghan, with up-armored vehicles and bullet-proof vests, and most important, we cannot tell the Afghan what course to take on their journey to economic prosperity.
Afghans are resistant to partnering with countries that attempt to mold them. A huge mistake we have made in the past and one that other countries continue to make is attempting to push Afghans toward what we see as their best course of action. Afghans, and particularly Afghans in the North, know where they need to go; they need nothing more than partners who are willing to share in the risk and the reward.
Mazar-e Sharif and the surrounding region is one of the most stable places in Afghanistan, and this stability enables visitors to ignore, for the most part, the reality that much of the country is at war. In downtown Mazer-e Sharif, where soldiers are seldom seen, it is easy to forget that Afghanistan is still occupied by 71,000 foreign troops spread over the entire country.
Walking around the city, mingling and shopping are no more a problem than visiting most highly congested areas in most of the busiest cities in America. Shops offer crafted wood, woolen hats, colorful hand-woven Uzbek tapestries, and a huge array of hand-made carpets, some of which depict moments of historical significance for Afghanistan such as the end of the Soviet occupation in 1989, the World Trade Center attacks on 9/11, and the arrival of the U.S.-led coalition forces in 2001.
The changes that have come to Mazar-e Sharif, Afghanistan’s fourth largest city are so great that in some cases, returning refugees who left during the war, struggle to find not only their bearings, but the streets and houses where they once lived.
Modern glass and concrete buildings have sprung up next to the traditional earthen houses. Many of the roads have been paved and local businesses which fund the construction are allowed to erect plaques, signs and structures in the center to advertise.
The city is in a flux. Signs of Western influence abound—new schools, wells, roads all bear plaques attesting to French, Japanese, and Swedish sponsorship. Billboards along the new roads betray a newfound consumerism: Young, confident professional-looking men and women smile out at passersby while conversing on sleek new mobile phones.
Afghans in the north have always seen America and Europeans as friends and allies rather than occupying superiors. That feeling has grown and has developed into a relationship that lends itself to partnering, economically. In Southern Afghanistan, the more prevalent Pashtun view of America and Europeans is generally that of, subservient and master, though this was never intended. The perception of separation in status generally breeds resentment over time.
Northern Afghans generally welcome the sort of relationship with Americans that can easily grow from an economic standpoint. Though other nations are invested and are investing heavily in the north, the Afghans harbor a greater trust and affinity for Americans. America’s philosophy of fairness and openness fosters more of a positive perception as an economic partner. The young Northern Afghanistan professional sees a bright future for this part of the country and as far as they are concerned, the sky is the limit for them.
America doesn’t have to vociferously compete with other nations for an opportunity to do business in Afghanistan. All we have to do is show up and signal our willingness to take part in the risk and share equally in the rewards.
The Sunni Muslim Tajik and Uzbek Afghans in the north have signaled a willingness to embrace their Shiite Muslim Hazara brothers, in the interest of building an economically sound and exciting future for them and their children in Northern Afghanistan. Everyone recognizes the economic possibilities and all have grown weary of the constant conflict and turmoil that has held the part of the world back for generations. A recent conversation with my friend Sayed Ahmadullah Asghary brought this home for me.
Sayed, or Ahmed as his American friends call him, has been deeply involved with North Afghanistan’s many changes politically, economically, and socially for most of his adult life.
“Formal education and the process of formerly educating our young men and women in Afghanistan are still in their conceptual infancies,” he paused and sipped at a steaming cup of tea as he introduced this profound thought.
“Afghanistan’s youth are like baby birds chirping wildly, mouths open to any tidbits of knowledge we choose to drop. The problem here is,” he shrugged somewhat solemnly, “there are too many chirping birds and not enough teachers. The young potential ‘Massoud s’ (referring to the Ahmed Shah Massoud, Lion of Panjshir and charismatic natural leader of men) are likely never to be recognized, and Afghanistan will lose these treasures if they are not found and polished.”
Sayed is one of many Northern Afghans who have committed themselves to providing a future for these young students and in turn retaining this gift of knowledge for his country. His intent is to launch a group of special schools where young men and women can be given more individualized instruction, but his resources are limited.
“Our future is dependent on the youth and we can’t allow this opportunity to slip away,” he concluded waiving his open palm past his head, as the Afghan will do signifying something that exists no longer.
The Northern Afghanistan entrepreneurial spirit offers a clear way forward for this country; not to simply survive but to prosper. America has a window of opportunity to be involved in this prosperity and to form the basis for a lasting friendship in this part of the world. In this part of Afghanistan, widespread prosperity will generate a more secure democracy that will in turn trump violence, and we can and should embrace and support it.
Iran Ready to Help Afghanistan after Foreign Troops Pullout
Fars News Agency September 12, 2012
TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi voiced Tehran's preparedness to extend more aid and assistance to its eastern neighbor Afghanistan, once the western troops withdraw from the war-torn country.
Addressing the opening of the jubilee session and IV meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the CICA member states in Astana on Wednesday, Salehi said, "Iran is also ready to take part in the construction of infrastructure projects in the country."
A jubilee session and IV Meeting of CICA Foreign Ministers have started at the Palace of Independence in Astana today.
Salehi stressed the relevance and necessity of such organizations, which are aimed at restoring and maintaining stability and confidence in the Asian continent.
In his speech, he also emphasized that there are many threats and challenges requiring common solutions and measures in the region today.
Speaking about the situation in Syria, he said that it is necessary to hold the negotiations on the peaceful settlement of the situation between the government and the opposition.
Salehi said that it is necessary to make a common decision to avoid misuse of the nuclear technology, while underlining all nations' right to develop a nuclear program for peaceful purposes.
Afghanistan After 9/11: A Mission Unaccomplished
The legacy of the war in Afghanistan will be about much more than the attacks of 9/11 and the defeat of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda
TIME By Ishaan Tharoor | @ishaantharoor September 11, 2012
Long gone is that smoke-‘em-out-of-their-caves bravado. 11 years after the horrors of 9/11, the U.S. war to punish al-Qaeda has turned into a global headache. With no decisive military victory in sight in Afghanistan, the Americans and their allies are rushing, albeit as discreetly as possible, for the exit. The official date of withdrawal—by the end of 2014—hangs like an oversized albatross around the neck of policymakers in Washington, Brussels and Kabul. Yes, Osama bin Laden is dead and his jihadist enterprise in retreat. But the legacy of the longest conflict in American history and the future of war-ravaged Afghanistan are both shrouded with dark uncertainties.
Two events yesterday highlighted the shadowy world 9/11 wrought. On Sept. 10, the U.S. military confirmed that an unnamed inmate in Guantanamo Bay died while in detention from unknown causes. This was the ninth such death since the facility opened in 2002. An extraterritorial, extrajudicial site for those swept up in Afghanistan and Pakistan amid the U.S.’s quest to root out al-Qaeda and its proxies, Guantanamo became a metaphor for the darker practices of the war on terror. This extraordinary renditioning of supposed American values was illustrated most recently by revelations published by Human Rights Watch alleging the CIA once colluded with the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to torture suspected Islamist extremists. Some of those detained in Guantanamo have been found to have had little connection to bin Laden’s jihad; near 170 prisoners remain in a legal and moral limbo.
The journey to Gitmo often wound its way through the vast American facility at Afghanistan’s Bagram Air Base. Also on Sept. 10, the U.S. officially transferred the operation of the detention center — and the over 3,000 prisoners in custody there — to local authorities. Reuters quoted a top Afghan official making this unintentionally bleak statement:
“Today is a historical and glorious day for Afghanistan where Afghans are able to take the charge of the prison themselves,” acting Defence Minister Enayatullah Nazari told a large crowd including U.S. military officials.
That the Afghan government is slowly reassuming direct control over stretches of the country — and, indeed, a notorious prison — is a metric of progress. But, according to a report issued this past week by the Open Society, a George Soros-funded pro-democracy group, with Bagram, the Afghans are inheriting an internment system where detainees were kept arbitrarily by the U.S. and often without trial, something that may be in contravention of Afghanistan’s own constitution. And there’s every indication the Afghans will simply pick up where the Americans left off. “If Afghanistan truly wants to bring legitimacy to national security detentions, creating their own unlawful internment regime is a bad way to start,” says Rachel Reid, an Afghanistan specialist for the Open Society.
While the U.S. has spent at least half a trillion dollars on the war and lost more than 2,000 of its soldiers, the gains made — the liberation of much of the country from tyrannical Taliban orthodoxy — could yet be reversed. Moreover, a decade of U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan, while not unpopular back home, has possibly sewn the seeds of greater discord to come. Earlier this year, Robert Grenier, a former CIA counterterrorism chief under George W. Bush, warned of the human cost of a wayward and at times indiscriminate campaign of drone strikes on both sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. “We have gone a long way down the road of creating a situation where we are creating more enemies than we are removing from the battlefield,” he said.
Given the resilience of the Taliban, it’s become all too clear that a negotiated truce and political settlement must be forged sooner rather than later. An important, somewhat encouraging report put out recently by the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think-tank, suggests the Taliban are ready for ceasefire talks and compromise as well—though it’s a solution that few Washington hawks could have countenanced 11 years ago.
The report, based on a number of interviews with senior Taliban figures (though their identities remain anonymous) conducted by four British and American South and Central Asia experts, makes a number of significant claims: the Taliban leadership—known as the Quetta shuraafter the Pakistani city where top leaders like Mullah Mohammad Omar are thought to have found safe haven—profoundly regrets its dealings with al-Qaeda and is prepared to renounce any ties to international terrorist outfits; despite certain bullish public utterances, the Taliban are willing to commit to parliamentary democracy, allow for modern education in schools and for girls to attend them; they are even willing to accept a U.S. military presence in the country beyond 2014, though insist for an end to drone strikes.
Of course, even if these Taliban assurances are true, there are major stumbling blocks. The most glaring one is the Taliban refusal to cooperate with the supposedly corrupt government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a politico who, despite his growing unpopularity at home and in the West, will not disappear quietly from the public stage. Moreover, the role of Pakistan and the jihadist-sympathizers in its military remains pivotal, and there’s no sign yet of a clear break between the Afghan Taliban and their bases of support in Islamabad. At the same time, regional powers in India and Iran will be bent on preventing the Taliban from making their way back into power. A messy geopolitical conflagration looms, with Afghanistan yet again at risk of becoming the site of regional proxy wars.
The one reassuring conclusion of the RUSI report is that, unlike in the 1990s, the Taliban know they don’t have the resources to pull off a complete military victory in the country they once ruled through the backs of their Toyota pickups. Yet even for the world’s only superpower, the prospect of a decisive victory in Afghanistan has long dimmed. For all its initial zeal — and the blood and treasure spent — the U.S. won’t be able to author a happy ending in a part of the world it sought to remake 11 years ago.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
By Miriam Arghandiwal | Reuters – Wed, Sep 12, 2012
KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan banned the YouTube website on Wednesday to stop Afghans watching a U.S.-made film insulting the Prophet Mohammad that sparked protests in North Africa and the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya.
"We have been told to shut down YouTube to the Afghan public until the video is taken down," Aimal Marjan, general director of Information Technology at the Ministry of Communications, told Reuters.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the film, in which Mohammad is portrayed as a philanderer and a religious fake, saying its makers had done a "devilish act" and that insulting Islam was not allowed by freedom of speech.
U.S. pastor Terry Jones, whose plans to burn the Koran triggered deadly riots in Afghanistan in 2010, said he had promoted the film, called "Innocence of Muslims".
The U.S. ambassador to Libya and three embassy staff were killed as they rushed away from a consulate building in Benghazi, stormed by al Qaeda-linked gunmen. Another assault was mounted on the U.S. embassy in Cairo.
Marjan declined to say if the order to close YouTube in Afghanistan was to prevent violence or to protect his countrymen from being offended.
The accidental burning of Korans at a U.S. base near Kabul in February drew thousands of protesters to the streets across Afghanistan for weeks and dozens of people were killed.
(Writing by Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
Afghans still yearn for peace after downfall of Taliban
By Jawid Omid, Chen Xin
KABUL, Sept. 12 (Xinhua) -- Eleven years after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States and the downfall of the al-Qaida- backed Taliban regime in Afghanistan, war-weary Afghans are still longing for a durable peace in their country.
"As you know, 11 years after the invasion of Afghanistan by the NATO and U.S. forces in their so-called war on terror, we still see bloodshed and killings in our country," Wahidullh, a 22-year- old man, who goes by one name, told Xinhua in an interview.
Wahidullh said that insecurity, suicide bombings,roadside bomb attacks and corruption remained unabated in the country and over 9 million Afghans still live below the poverty line.
After the bloody 9/11 attacks, the U.S. government invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 and ousted Taliban regime within weeks.
The government of then U.S. President George W. Bush has pinpointed the Taliban as having harbored al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden, the alleged mastermind in the attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon. "The Americans and their NATO allies have come here to eliminate the terrorists but more than a decade later their goal has not been achieved," Wahidullh said.
The ouster of the Taliban by the U.S.-led coalition forces in late 2001 had buoyed the hopes of the war-weary Afghans for the final return of peace to their country. In fact, some 5 million Afghan refugees have decided to return home within five years after the ouster of the Taliban, hoping to regain their long-lost freedom and live in peace. But that was not what had happened.
Although the United States has eliminated Bin Laden, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar is still at large and continue to lead his fighters against over 130,000-strong NATO forces, with nearly 90,000 of them Americans stationed in Afghanistan.
According to a United Nations report released here in August, aside from casualties in the coalition forces and the militants, up to 1,145 civilians had been killed in conflicts only in the first six months of 2012.
Although there is no official figure of civilians killed in the past decade, it is said that more than 13,000 non-combatants have lost their lives during that period.
The war on terror has also proved costly for the United States.
In addition to spending billions of U.S. dollars on war on terror in this central Asian state, iCasualties, a website tracking U.S.-led coalition forces casualties in the war on terror, said that 3,177 coalition combatants, 2,114 of them Americans, have been killed.
In the latest violent incident, a suicide bombing killed five people, including a police official and four civilians, in western Herat province Tuesday.
The incident came a day after a suicide attacker killed 15 people including seven civilians in northern Kunduz province.
Faizullah Jalal, a professor of law in Kabul University, told Xinhua that while it is true that there have been gains in the war on terror, these gains can be easily reversed"if the Afghan National Security Forces will be left alone after the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces the end of 2014."
Report Says Taliban Raised $400 Million Last Year
September 11, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
A new UN report says the Taliban raised $400 million last year through taxes, donations, and extorting money from enterprises and aid projects in Afghanistan.
According to the report released this week by UN sanctions experts to the Security Council, about $275 million of that money reached Taliban leadership and the rest was spent or misappropriated at the local level.
The estimates cover the financial year ended in March 2012.
The UN report says local taxes imposed by the Taliban include a 10 percent tax on harvest – the main source of income -- and a 2.5 percent tax on wealth.
Services such as water and electricity supplies are also taxed.
"In some areas they collect a 10 percent tax from local shopkeepers and other small businesses," the report says, adding that the militia acts much like a local administration.
The UN experts say donations are another "major" source of funding which also go to militia leaders.
Afghanistan has long been the world's leading supplier of opium.
According to Afghan estimates, the Islamist group raised some $100 million in 2011-2012 from the opium poppy industry -- a relatively small amout considering that the annual value of the drug crop is estimated at up to $4 billion.
The report says this source of revenue provides enough to finance much of the insurgency in the main poppy growing provinces of Helmand, Kandahar, and Oruzgan.
However, “the money raised from the drug trade is insufficient to meet the cost of insurgent activity elsewhere," it says.
The UN report says the Taliban has also taken hundreds of millions of dollars from the billions pumped into Afghanistan for development projects.
The report reads: "Estimates of Taliban income from contracts funded by the United States and other overseas donors range from 10 percent to 20 percent of the total, usually by the Taliban agreeing protection money with the contractor or demanding a cut."
The report quotes estimates by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) that the Taliban raised $360 million over three years from a $2.16 billion contract awarded to an Afghan trucking company by the U.S. military.
"This example shows how the Taliban are able to raise money from an Afghan economy distorted by and unable to absorb the huge amounts of money that have flowed into the country since 2001,” the report says.
The UN experts say the ISAF estimates that up to $155 million of the Taliban's income was spent mounting attacks in 2011, while the rest maintained the insurgency.
"Since 2006 the Taliban have managed to finance an ever-increasing number of attacks, reflecting a year-on-year increase in income," the UN report says.
Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP
A Pointless Blacklisting
New York Times By ALEX STRICK van LINSCHOTEN and FELIX KUEHN Op-Ed Contributors September 11, 2012
LAST week, the United States designated the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network a “foreign terrorist organization,” placing it alongside Hamas and Al Qaeda. But to what end?
America and its allies have learned a lot over the past decade in Afghanistan. But some fundamentals have remained elusive and shrouded in stereotypes.
To brand a group a foreign terrorist organization is not only a firm declaration that it is an enemy; it also limits America’s future political options. Although it’s possible to be delisted, groups on such lists find it difficult to get off them. Moreover, labeling the Haqqanis terrorists dislodges them from the wider Taliban insurgency, making a comprehensive settlement harder to achieve.
The decisions we make today will shape and constrain our future policies. Between 2002 and 2004, for example, some senior Taliban leaders sought reconciliation and cooperation with the Afghan government and the international community. The negative responses they received left little room but to pursue the path of resistance. Likewise, listing the Haqqanis as an F.T.O. now will deter them from coming to the negotiating table. It will also be seen as a sign of American insincerity by the Taliban and thus play into the hands of those opposed to a conciliatory approach.
The Haqqanis are cast as calculating players in the continuing business of “global jihad” and have gained notoriety for their spectacularly violent attacks in Afghanistan, many targeting American troops. Being enmeshed in a universe of groups and individuals along the Afghan-Pakistani border, some of whom have sought to carry out attacks in and against foreign countries, doesn’t help their image. But the view that they are an irreconcilable, rigidly ideological enemy should be questioned.
The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Michael T. Flynn, said in 2010 that the group’s leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani, was “absolutely salvageable” and open to reconciliation. Graeme Lamb, a former commander of Britain’s Special Air Service, has characterized Mr. Haqqani as being a pragmatist “tied to the probability of outcomes” and called Afghanistan “the land of the deal.”
In recent years, the Haqqanis and people close to them have made contact with Afghan, American and other Western officials. Ibrahim Omari (sometimes called Ibrahim Haqqani), a younger brother of Mr. Haqqani, met with American officials in 2011 in Dubai. Another more recent meeting seems to have taken place (without Americans) in Saudi Arabia.
To suggest that they are implacable foes also ignores the long history of pragmatism and political calculations that have informed the Haqqani leaders’ actions for 40 years. Mr. Omari worked together with the Afghan government in 2002, although his efforts to broker discussions eventually led to his being arrested and allegedly tortured. Since the Taliban were ousted in 2001, American policy has often rested on an overestimation of the West’s ability to understand the situation in Afghanistan, leading to poor decisions and ineffective initiatives that have frequently been self-defeating.
The current war effort relies heavily on drones and night raids in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but these tactics often increase radicalization and enmity. And the industrial-scale targeting of midlevel Taliban commanders in Afghanistan has led to the rise of a younger, more uncompromising generation of leaders. The designation of the Haqqanis as an F.T.O. will only erode America’s relationship with Pakistan and decrease the likelihood of Pakistan’s playing a constructive role in facilitating (or not spoiling) any reconciliation process.
And the F.T.O. listing doesn’t matter much for the Haqqanis’ operations. After all, there can be no winner in the current stalemate. The military argument that the Taliban have lost momentum is a nonstarter. This is as true for the Haqqanis as it is for the whole insurgency. Many Afghans living in places like Kandahar don’t believe the relative calm of the past two years will last. Even in heavily secured cities like Kabul, attacks continue to be carried out.
Most of the senior Haqqani commanders and family members are already on international blacklists. They are involved in the Afghan conflict to secure for themselves a future political role. Only a political process that engages them, rather than systematically sidelining them, will help end the war. One possible starting point for such a process would be some form of cease-fire. Indeed, Britain’s Royal United Services Institute recently outlined the potential for such a general cease-fire agreement.
President Obama claims he has refocused America’s effort in Afghanistan on those who attacked us: Al Qaeda. But the misguided ideology of the war on terror is still dictating passions and policies in the United States. And Washington’s move to blacklist and marginalize the Haqqanis gravely threatens the prospects for a political settlement, which is the only way out of the Afghan conflict.
Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn are the authors of “An Enemy We Created: The Myth of the Taliban-Al Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan.”
A circle of childhood friends broken with a bomb in Kabul
An argument with a teenager culminated in calamity for children who sold trinkets outside Nato headquarters in Afghanistan
Guardian.co.uk By Emma Graham-Harrison Tuesday 11 September 2012
Kabul - Nawab had been crowned the best skateboarder in Afghanistan, a joker and unofficial leader of the unruly gang. Mohammad Esa was perhaps the cleverest of his friends, always studying or lost in dreams of the day he would become a doctor. Khorshid was an uncompromising teenager whose name meant sunshine but whose character was steel, always ready to show the boys she could do anything they could, despite growing up in a country that is not kind to women.
They sold scarves and bracelets to the foreign soldiers, journalists, diplomats and aid workers who filtered in and out of Nato's heavily guarded Kabul headquarters.
Customers saw a group of scruffy children who should have been in school, racing to close a deal; but the competing hustlers were a close-knit group of friends who shared earnings as well as jokes, and often skateboarded or studied together when they were not chasing business.
The boys had helped Khorshid's family throw up their modest mud-walled home by night, to avoid police fines for building on public land. On a recent holiday they walked several miles to a reservoir out of town, to swim and picnic, before walking all the way back again to work in the afternoon. In a country splintered by bitter ethnic divisions, they were an unusual mix of Pashtuns and Tajiks.
But on Saturday a teenage boy in a white shalwar kameez walked onto their patch, and when some of the boys told him to leave, an argument broke out. It escalated into shouting, then blows, and then ended abruptly when the stranger pressed a hidden trigger and detonated a suicide bomb, according to 14-year-old Reza, who survived because he had wandered off to buy a snack, watching the dispute from a distance.
Police said the bomber was probably aiming for the nearby Nato or US embassy gates. He may have panicked when the children blocked his way, or perhaps given up hope of getting past them when the fighting began. One survivor does not even remember a fight, which raises the possibility the children were the target.
The blast was relatively small by the brutal standards of Afghanistan's decade-long war; eight people killed and perhaps a similar number wounded. But it has ripped apart the circle of friends. Nawab, Mohammad Esa, Khorshid, her sister Parwana and young brother-in-law Asad are dead, and two others from the group in hospital with serious injuries.
"When I go to bed, my friends are all waiting for me, asking me to come swimming," said 14-year-old Omid, one of the group who was travelling in to work when the bomber struck. "I see their faces, and I can't sleep."
Several of the dead were also the main breadwinners for their families; one father disabled, another a drug addict, with many younger brothers and sisters to feed. Their killings bring more than just the agonising loss of a sibling or child to grieving families.
They are the latest children to suffer in a war that damages hundreds of young lives each year. "1,756 children were killed or seriously injured as a result of the conflict in 2011, which equates to nearly five children a day," said Unicef spokesman Alistair Gretarsson.
In Nawab's home, packed with dozens of mourners, his family remembered a quiet 16-year-old, who liked eggs for breakfast when he could afford them and ignored their pleas to stop working near Nato. "He was a very serious person, busy from morning to evening with his business," said his mother, Anisa, her face bruised and scratched from where she had battered it in mourning. "After God, he was the person who fed the family."
Nawab was different with his friends, says Omid, he was a joker and a natural leader, who looked out for the younger kids. He won the "Go Skateboarding" competition this year, and worked as a volunteer skateboarding teacher.
He is buried nearby in a new graveyard that is marching up a hill, coffin by coffin, testament to the steady toll of the war and poverty in Afghanistan. There is a spectacular view of the city from his burial mound, where Omid stared at the dust and swore revenge. "I have to find the people who killed my friend," he said. "I want to become a pilot in the army."
Khorshid, 14, and Parwana, 12, are buried a few miles away, in a sprawling graveyard overlooked by their family home, where 16-year-old Nilofar is mourning two sisters and a husband she had married only 20 days before his death.
Khorshid too had loved skateboarding, fearless on the board as she was in life, taking to the streets in a country where women who do any kind of work, even in well-protected offices, are regularly harassed both outside and inside their homes.
She worked as a skating instructor for the charity Skateistan, which, in an online tribute, quoted her saying: "If you are scared you end up doing nothing and without doing you cannot achieve anything. But if you do things, all that can happen is you succeed or fail."
Her six-year-old sister Mersal survived the blast because she was playing down the street, but saw both her sisters' bodies. "Khorshid was broken," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "Do you have any pictures of my daughters?" their mother, Jemila, asked a visiting journalist. The family was too poor to have a single print of their children.
The families of those who survived have banned them from working outside Nato, and are filled with relief. "We have told him to stop working and just concentrate on school," said Reza's older brother Mustafa. But the children themselves are haunted by their own escape, in a country where only a tiny minority have access to counselling services.
"I looked down at myself and saw I was covered with blood, then I passed out," said Naved, 15, stranded in Kabul's emergency hospital with a shattered hand and shrapnel wounds to his shoulder, leg and side. "When I woke up, I saw the bodies of my friends lying on the ground and tried to go closer, but the police stopped me."
He survived the bomb because of a chance thirst; he had walked a few metres down the street to a handpump a minute before the bomber detonated.
Three years ago another bomb killed a group of street children just a few metres down the road, but many in the group have the recklessness of kids around the world, made many times more dangerous by their surroundings. "I never thought it might be dangerous," Naved said of working near the heart of the western military mission.
Elias, in hospital with serious injuries to his legs, ignored his parents' warnings that the national holiday might attract attacks and went into town with Nawab. "I think I was closest to the bomber, but God saved me. I don't know why." He doesn't know what he will do when he gets out of hospital. "I have no feelings now, except sadness for my friends who are dead."
NATO Copter Destroyed by Taliban at Base
New York Times By GRAHAM BOWLEY September 11, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - A coalition heavy-transport helicopter parked inside the sprawling Bagram Air Base was hit and destroyed by insurgent fire late Monday, killing three Afghan service members who were on board, NATO said Tuesday.
NATO service members also on the helicopter, a Chinook CH-47, at the time of the attack were wounded, but there were no other fatalities, said Lt. Col. Hagen Messer, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.
“We can confirm that an ISAF helicopter was destroyed by indirect fire,” he said, describing in general terms the use of either mortar or rocket fire, though he said it was not clear precisely what weapon was used. “The helicopter caught fire after it was hit.”
Colonel Messer said the service members were part of a crew conducting routine nighttime maintenance when the attack struck, around 10:30 p.m. Monday. But Roshna Khalid, the spokeswoman for the governor of Parwan Province, which includes Bagram, said the helicopter had been hit by rocket attack as it came in to land. She identified the three dead Afghans as belonging to the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan’s intelligence agency.
In a statement, the Taliban claimed responsibility.
Indiscriminate attacks involving mortar shells or rockets fired by insurgents hiding outside the heavily fortified Bagram Air Base, one of the biggest American military bases in Afghanistan, occur frequently, but they rarely result in such serious damage.
Last month, insurgents fired a pair of rockets that damaged the parked C-17 transport plane used by Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who was visiting Afghanistan.
General Dempsey was asleep at the time, and not near the plane, American officials said, but the damage to the C-17 was enough to force General Dempsey to leave Afghanistan a few hours later than planned on another aircraft.
Bagram Air Base sits in the Shomali Plain, an important strategic link between the north and south. A main road passing north through Bagram and the Salang Tunnel, and eventually into Uzbekistan, is an important resupply corridor. But in the past few years, some recent security gains in the province have deteriorated.
In the western province of Herat, a suicide bomber killed a commander for the Afghan Local Police, his two guards and seven civilians. The attack on the commander, Arbab Abdul Hakim, happened in a store in the Keshk-e-Kohna district.
An employee of The New York Times contributed reporting from Bagram, Afghanistan.
Marking 9/11, Romney makes point of citing war in Afghanistan
Reuters By Sam Youngman Tue Sep 11, 2012
RENO, Nevada - U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney used the anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001, to do some repair work.
Still under fire from Democrats for not mentioning the war in Afghanistan during his nomination acceptance speech at the Republican convention on August 30, Romney spoke at length on Tuesday about the war during an address to the National Guard Association.
Romney said he was taking the day off from politics and focusing instead on remembering the nearly 3,000 people killed 11 years ago, while offering thanks to the emergency crews that responded to the attacks and service members who went to war afterward.
In a campaign that has been dominated by debate over the struggling economy, Romney discussed America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the kind of detail he typically avoids.
"While the war in Iraq is over, nearly 70,000 American troops will still remain in Afghanistan at the end of the month," Romney said. "Our goal should be to complete the successful transition to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014."
Romney has long criticized Democratic President Barack Obama, his opponent in the November 6 election, for announcing a target date of 2014 for withdrawing from Afghanistan, where U.S. troops have been fighting the Taliban since about a month after the 9/11 attacks.
Romney has joined other Republicans in saying that Obama's setting of a date for the U.S. withdrawal has encouraged the Taliban and al Qaeda simply to wait out the American forces, then try to reclaim control of key parts of the country.
"We should evaluate the conditions on the ground and solicit the best advice of our military commanders," Romney said on Tuesday. "We can all agree that our men and women in the field deserve a clear mission; that they deserve the resources and the resolute leadership they need to complete that mission."
Despite the Romney campaign's pledge to refrain from politics on a solemn day, the Republican candidate appeared to take a shot at Obama over the issue of proposed defense cuts.
Romney has increasingly made the 2011 "sequestration" agreement between the White House and House Republicans as evidence that Obama wants to weaken the nation's military.
Under the agreement, supported in Congress by Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, the Pentagon would be subject to about half the $109 billion in automatic spending cuts that would be triggered in January if the White House and Congress cannot agree on a plan to curb government spending.
"Of course, the return of our troops cannot and must not be used as an excuse to hollow out our military through devastating defense budget cuts," Romney said to applause.
PRAISING MILITARY, NOT OBAMA
After the speech, an adviser to Romney said the Republican was merely "reaffirming his principles" and not stepping back into campaign mode.
"With less than two months to go before Election Day, I would normally speak to a gathering like this about the differences between my and my opponent's plans for our military and for our national security," Romney said. "There is a time and a place for that, but this day is not that day."
Romney also recounted his own experience on September 11, 2001, recalling the carnage as he drove past the Pentagon.
In that day's attacks, passenger jets hijacked by al Qaeda operatives were flown into the Pentagon and the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York. A fourth hijacked jet crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers rebelled against the hijackers and stormed the cockpit.
Romney praised the U.S. military's killing of Osama bin Laden last year without mentioning Obama's role in approving the mission, and warned that the United States continued to face threats from militants.
"I wish I could say the world is less dangerous now, that it is less chaotic," Romney said. "But on September 10, 2001, we had no idea that America would be at war in Afghanistan."
(Editing by David Lindsey and Peter Cooney)
Afghan Lawmakers Delay Confirmation Vote On Top Security Posts
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan September 11, 2012
KABUL -- Afghanistan's parliament has delayed a confirmation vote for four top security posts -- the ministers of defense, interior, and border and tribal affairs, as well as the director of the national intelligence agency.
Lawmakers want Afghan President Hamid Karzai to send one of his deputies to introduce the nominees to parliament on September 12, insisting Karzai must follow standard rules of parliamentary order.
On September 2, Karzai nominated former Interior and Defense Minister Bismillah Mohammadi as the new defense minister and Ghulam Mujtaba Patang as the new interior minister.
Former Kandahar Province Governor Asadullah Khalid was nominated to head the Afghan intelligence agency.
Haji Azizullah Din Mohammad, a former governor of both Kabul and Nangarhar provinces, was nominated as the new minister of border and tribal affairs.
With reporting by Pajhwok.com
Western and Afghan Officials Split Over Karzai Nomination for Spy Chief
New York Times By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. September 11, 2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - President Hamid Karzai’s determination to make a close aide, Asadullah Khalid, his next intelligence chief has divided Western officials here, some of whom say they are troubled by allegations of torture and drug trafficking against Mr. Khalid and worry that in such a powerful role he would be a step back for the country.
With a charismatic style and a record of fighting the Taliban, as well as close ties to the C.I.A. and differing Afghan factions, Mr. Khalid could become a powerful political proxy and security enforcer for Mr. Karzai, Western officials say. If he is confirmed this week as chief of the Afghan spy agency, the National Directorate of Security, he would be in a unique position to help Mr. Karzai stay in influence after term limits require him to step down in 2014.
Since the assassination of the president’s half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, last year, Mr. Khalid has become almost a surrogate family member — an ethnic Pashtun with deft political skills who has proved himself fiercely loyal, and a bridge to some former Northern Alliance leaders who remain important to Mr. Karzai’s support but are wary of presidential aides too sympathetic to Pakistan.
By contrast, Mr. Khalid is seen as a foe of Pakistan. Amrullah Saleh, a former Northern Alliance official and former Afghan intelligence director now in opposition to the Karzai government, called Mr. Khalid “a good man” known for his courage and unusually strong ties to different factions. “He knows leaders in the North and leaders in the South, so he can connect the two.”
But his nomination was troubling for human rights officials and some other Western and Afghan officials who have focused on persistent allegations that Mr. Khalid oversaw a torture prison while governor of Kandahar Province several years ago. Those officials, among more than 20 interviewed who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that if he wields the security agency as a weapon of repression, he could undermine a decade spent moving the country toward Western-style human rights.
“If Afghan security organizations are able to use the most egregious methods to combat the insurgency in the name of greater security, then we are sacrificing elements of the rule of law and accountability that are at the heart of the success of the transition,” one Western diplomat said.
Mr. Khalid did not respond to an interview request. But he has denied human rights and corruption allegations. His allies have said that in many cases the accusations were politically motivated, or that he never did anything worse than other senior officials.
As Mr. Karzai’s legal span in office — and, with it, the NATO mission in Afghanistan — expires in two years, speculation about the president’s next moves has been a favorite parlor game: He could engineer a Russian-style Putin-Medvedev arrangement with a trusted successor. He could try to repeal term limits. Or he could throw support behind his brother Qayum. (Mr. Karzai has told some diplomats he intends to step down and do nothing to taint the process, one official said.)
What is sure is that Mr. Khalid, if confirmed, would be a crucial help in any of those situations. In the 2009 election, when he was minister of border and tribal affairs, Mr. Khalid “helped Karzai significantly,” and there were some allegations that he used “most of his ministry’s budget to do so,” according to an American diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks.
And it is hard to overstate how much power and trust Mr. Karzai has assigned to Mr. Khalid in the past year, officials say.
After Ahmed Wali Karzai’s death, the president gave Mr. Khalid his late brother’s security portfolio in southern Afghanistan and charged him with securing the family’s prosperous enterprises in Kandahar.
“He is absolutely on the cusp of family,” said another Western diplomat, noting that Mr. Khalid was trusted enough that after Ahmed Wali Karzai’s death, he was sent to Kandahar “to ensure that Karzai’s interests were protected.”
Mr. Karzai’s paternal view of Mr. Khalid was made clear to one former Western diplomat during a conversation with the president. “He was like a father with a son who he was really hoping would do well,” the former diplomat said. Assessing Mr. Khalid’s appointment, the diplomat added: “If 80 percent of the job is getting a grip on security, you want this guy. But if 80 percent is about making institutions more accountable and improving rule of law, he’s probably not the best choice.”
Mr. Khalid worked for Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf, a religiously conservative Sunni close to Saudi Arabia and one of the warlords who tore Kabul apart in the 1992-96 civil war. Mr. Sayyaf remains a patron and pressured Mr. Karzai to award him crucial jobs. He also helped secure Mr. Khalid’s first governorship, in Ghazni Province in spring 2002.
Then, “he was an inexperienced boy,” one Ghazni official said. But he matured quickly and led raids on Taliban hide-outs, said the official, who described him as Ghazni’s best post-Taliban governor.
In 2005 Mr. Khalid was transferred to Kandahar, the heart of Karzai family intrigue and home turf for Ahmed Wali Karzai. The president told his brother not to interfere with Mr. Khalid, people close to the brother said.
As his stature rose, Mr. Khalid’s tightest family relationship was with Qayum Karzai, according to some officials, who took Mr. Khalid to Saudi Arabia four years ago to meet with officials about Taliban negotiations.
But in Kandahar he proved controversial. He won support from NATO Special Operations troops for his tactics, but he angered some diplomats by alienating much of the populace with highhanded measures, two former Western officials said.
And while he can charm Westerners, his style sometimes offended traditional Pashtuns. A high-ranking Afghan said that Mr. Khalid would rudely throw his feet on the table during meetings with elders. In 2006 a senior Afghan official complained to diplomats that he angered tribal leaders because he “does not have respect for the local conservative traditions.”
Mr. Khalid was dismissed from Kandahar in 2008. According to one leaked diplomatic cable, President Karzai was “unimpressed by Khalid’s stewardship of his home province.” In another cable a year later, American diplomats were scathing when assessing him as a cabinet choice, calling him “exceptionally corrupt and incompetent.”
Then, at a 2009 Canadian parliamentary hearing, some of the most serious charges imaginable were leveled against Mr. Khalid by Richard Colvin, a former high-ranking Canadian diplomat in Afghanistan. He described Mr. Khalid as a narcotics trafficker who, while governor, tortured people in a Kandahar dungeon. At that time, Canadian forces were responsible for the region’s security. “He had people killed who got in his way,” Mr. Colvin said.
Returning to Kandahar last year, Mr. Khalid may have moved too fast to replace officials with his allies. The governor, Tooryalai Wesa, complained to Mr. Karzai, who told Mr. Khalid to back off, a Kandahar official said.
But in short order he also had every National Directorate of Security office in the South reporting to him, another diplomat said. He is also now serving as Mr. Karzai’s eyes, ears and dispenser of money for anti-Taliban uprising movements in Ghazni. That has bolstered relations with some members of Hezb-i-Islami, a party that, unlike Mr. Khalid, has strong ties to Pakistan.
Whatever his past, Mr. Khalid is astute enough to heed warnings from officials worried about the implications of his actions, one American official said. “We’re going to encourage him to go in the right direction,” the official said. “Asadullah Khalid is someone we have been able to work with.”
“This is sovereignty,” the official added. “It can be messy.”
Graham Bowley contributed reporting.
Asylum seekers risk all for new life outside Afghanistan
CNN By Anna Coren September 12, 2012
Kabul, Afghanistan - In the suburbs of Afghanistan's capital on the third floor of a modest apartment building live newlyweds Mushtaq and Haleema Changezi.
They tied the knot in a traditional ceremony just four months ago, yet their families are wondering why they haven't started a family.
"This is supposed to be a new chapter in our lives -- we should be excited," explained 27-year-old Haleema. "But there is no future for us here in Afghanistan, so how can we possibly start a family?"
Haleema has a double masters degree in economics and accounting. She has applied for dozens of jobs in Kabul but can't get one interview. Her 30-year-old husband works for a production house in multimedia design -- his salary is just enough to support them. They are both Hazaras -- Persian-speaking ethnic Afghans who over the years have been persecuted and discriminated against.
The couple feels this is still the case and the reason why so many Hazaras have left their homeland for foreign shores. "In our country there are NATO forces, the aid of foreign countries and yet we don't feel we have a life or a future. What's going to happen when the foreign forces leave in 2014? There is no future for us in Afghanistan," she said.
This is a familiar story, not just among the Hazara community but also across the Afghan community in general -- many are fearful of what will happen to their country once coalition forces leave in two years time.
Despite assurances from ISAF -- the International Security Assistance Force -- that includes U.S. and NATO forces, there has been an increase in violence across the country. Analysts say the Taliban are no longer based only in their Helmand province heartland in the country's south and along the eastern border with Pakistan.
They are now spread out across all 34 provinces using suicide attacks and IEDs -- Improvised Explosive Devices -- to target coalition and Afghan forces, as well as innocent Afghan civilians.
This resurgence has frightened many Afghanis, including Haji Ali Mohammad. He decided to send his two sons and nephew to Australia to escape the war-ravaged nation.
"They were going to Australia for work, to make a better life, a good and peaceful life, away from the Taliban. Our life is dangerous here -- we don't feel secure," he said.
His sons, 19-year-old Akbar and 22-year-old Javid, joined their cousin, 20-year-old Hashim, on their 11,000-kilometer journey. Organized by people smugglers they flew to Dubai and then to Thailand where they picked up visas. From there, they caught a plane to Malaysia where the trio traveled by boat to Indonesia. The three eventually boarded a leaky wooden fishing vessel bound for Australia's Christmas Island.
"The last time I spoke to them, they said we're leaving tonight. The next time we call you we'll be in our new home -- Australia," said Mohammad.
A few days later, he received a call.
On the phone was another passenger from the fishing vessel. He said within a few hours of leaving shore the boat began to sink. Of the 18 men on board, only 10 survived. Among the dead were Mohammad's sons and nephew.
"The people who survived, held onto broken pieces of ship until the rescue boats arrived. My boys knew how to swim but not in that much water for hours on end," Mohammad said.
The father of 11 children then broke down in tears. "A bright day turned into a dark night. The anniversary of their deaths is approaching. I miss them constantly."
Thousands of Afghan asylum seekers attempt the long and treacherous journey to Australia every year. Frustrated with waiting for political asylum though the official channels, they pay smugglers up to US$20,000 per person -- and there's no guarantee, just the promise of a brighter future.
For Mushtaq and Haleema Changazi they are trying the legal route and for good reason. Haleema's 28-year-old brother, Ishaq, set off earlier this year because he didn't want to wait any longer. "The last time we spoke he was on the boat in Jakarta and he was saying that maybe in two to three hours, there would be no signal and this was his last call," she said.
"After that there was no news from him and we haven't heard from him for the last 3 months."
With tears rolling down her face, Haleema says while her family pray they will hear from him soon, she knows there's little hope. "I hear the reports about the boats sinking. I know what's happening. I know they're all prepared to die for a better life in Australia -- including my brother."
The Two Nations of Afghanistan: Economic Issues Post-Coalition Withdrawal
Foreign Policy Journal By Dr. Godfrey Garner September 12, 2012
As I leaned in, brow furrowed with concentration at the rhythmic Farsi-tinted English, I remembered the words of a two-star General I had spoken with in Kabul six months before; “If you really want to know, ask an Afghan.”
“You know, friend,” (young Afghans refer to all westerners as ‘friend’) the young man continued in the singsong narrative, pronouncing each word perfectly as though his mouth held precious jewels, “Tajik’s love Americans.”
He waived his arms in wide strokes taking in the hundreds of local Afghans scrambling past, bent on their appointed daily tasks, “All of us in Afghanistan love Americans.”
I smiled as he reached out and gently clasped my arm. His voice took on a quiet urgency. “We need Americans.”
He released my arm and continued, “I have hopes that one day my children will be able to get an education and make a decent living right here,” he pointed at the ground beneath his feet, “in Northern Afghanistan. America bred that hope into me when you came here more than ten years ago.”
“Yeah,” I responded casually having heard this entreaty many times, from many of the young, mostly westernized Afghans, “but they hate us down south.”
“Screw them,” came the immediate retort, complete with the associated gesture which he subconsciously pointed in the general direction of Kandahar, the former Taliban stronghold and home to most of the countries Pashto population.
I laughed as much at his accent as at the idea that he would actually say that. His frustration at the Southern Afghanistan mindset was obvious. The Pashtun mentality of the south had been an anchor on the country and any progress the country could have made for generations.
Northern Afghans often view their Southern counterparts as an embarrassing younger sibling you are forced to take with you on a date with a girl you really want to impress.
The north and south are separate countries in many ways. The south, populated predominantly by Sunni Pashtuns who cling tightly to their Pashtunwali rules and regulations stands in sharp contrast to their more secular Tajik, Uzbek and Hazarra neighbors in the north. In the north, a peek under the robes and burkas will often reveal Elvis t-shirts and blue jeans worn mostly by the younger generation who envy their Pakistani counterparts, who are allowed to openly wear tight jeans.
Though Bollywood movies and Hindi soap operas are not unheard of in Kandahar, they are prevalent in Mazer e Sharif, Afghanistan’s most densely populated city to the north.
The average income in Afghanistan is around $1000 US per year and most of that is made from agricultural farming. The unemployment rate nationally hovers around 40-50% while Mazer e Sharif and surrounding Balkh Province’s unemployment is somewhere below 35%.
Mazar-e Sharif also serves as the primary trading center for northern Afghanistan, and is the only city to connect itself by rail with a neighboring country. The rail service which began in 2011 is expected to rapidly boost the economy and further reduce the unemployment rate.
Northern Afghanistan also differs from the southern part of the country in its general attitude toward women’s rights. Women in the north have begun operating their own shops and selling handicrafts, cosmetics, and clothing. The unmistakable prevailing attitude of Afghans in the north is one that encourages progress through capitalism and the people clearly understand that this cannot be accomplished by limiting or inhibiting the entrepreneurial spirit of women.
Afghans are innovative and motivated, especially in the north. Younger Afghans are also energetic and excited about learning. They, given the opportunity soak up knowledge like a dry sponge and their thirst for new technology is second to none.
In 2006 there were an estimated 3 million cell phones in use in Afghanistan, mostly in the north and internet usage grew sharply from 2002 to 2006 with almost 600,000 registered users by then, again predominantly in the north.
Another obvious and extremely important distinction between the north and the south is the propensity for fighting. Afghans culturally have for generations inclined toward settling disputes, local or national, with the use of violence, but that mindset has always been more pronounced among the southern Pashtuns. Security today in Afghanistan ranges from highly unstable in Kandahar in the south, to paranoid and skittish in Kabul, and on to somewhat carefree and unconcerned in the north. As a matter of fact, Mazer e Sharif is and always has been somewhere between Chicago (on the down side) and Phoenix when it comes to street violence, and the risk of kidnapping or assault.
In 2003, while a team member with a Special Forces ODA in Mazer-e Sharif, or Mez, (our abbreviated affectionate moniker), walking the streets in semi-secure military gear one day, I was accosted by a gentleman of light complexion in full Kamiz Shalwar, traditional Afghan men’s wear. With his eight year old son in tow, he introduced himself as a physician from Detroit. He and his wife and children had lived in Mazer-e Sharif for two years and were as comfortable as they had ever been in Detroit. I must say I felt a little embarrassed walking around like a member of The Knights of the Round Table.
In short, Afghanistan and particularly Northern Afghanistan is fertile ground for economic growth and has subtly, over the past decade become a virtual Garden of Eden for the entrepreneurial spirit. While the rest of the country is scrambling to predict a post-coalition Afghanistan, in Mazer-e Sharif there is a sense of excitement and optimistic anticipation about the future.
The average Afghan in the north has tasted democracy, is aware of the responsibility of living in a democratic society, and has a clear vision of his future in a democratic, prosperous, violence-free Northern Afghanistan, and he sees America more as an economic partner than a liberator.
The Afghan in the North sees a transition to a more economically viable society after the Americans and their allies have withdrawn, and they look forward with anticipation to the trip. Regardless of the veracity of their vision, they see this transition with America as a partner, as a ‘trip that will be fun’ and prosperous for all.
America must now concentrate on becoming that partner rather than a liberator or mentor. The partnership will be a profitable one but one that requires a total shift in mindset. We can no longer live behind walls. We can no longer separate ourselves from Afghanistan and from the Afghan, with up-armored vehicles and bullet-proof vests, and most important, we cannot tell the Afghan what course to take on their journey to economic prosperity.
Afghans are resistant to partnering with countries that attempt to mold them. A huge mistake we have made in the past and one that other countries continue to make is attempting to push Afghans toward what we see as their best course of action. Afghans, and particularly Afghans in the North, know where they need to go; they need nothing more than partners who are willing to share in the risk and the reward.
Mazar-e Sharif and the surrounding region is one of the most stable places in Afghanistan, and this stability enables visitors to ignore, for the most part, the reality that much of the country is at war. In downtown Mazer-e Sharif, where soldiers are seldom seen, it is easy to forget that Afghanistan is still occupied by 71,000 foreign troops spread over the entire country.
Walking around the city, mingling and shopping are no more a problem than visiting most highly congested areas in most of the busiest cities in America. Shops offer crafted wood, woolen hats, colorful hand-woven Uzbek tapestries, and a huge array of hand-made carpets, some of which depict moments of historical significance for Afghanistan such as the end of the Soviet occupation in 1989, the World Trade Center attacks on 9/11, and the arrival of the U.S.-led coalition forces in 2001.
The changes that have come to Mazar-e Sharif, Afghanistan’s fourth largest city are so great that in some cases, returning refugees who left during the war, struggle to find not only their bearings, but the streets and houses where they once lived.
Modern glass and concrete buildings have sprung up next to the traditional earthen houses. Many of the roads have been paved and local businesses which fund the construction are allowed to erect plaques, signs and structures in the center to advertise.
The city is in a flux. Signs of Western influence abound—new schools, wells, roads all bear plaques attesting to French, Japanese, and Swedish sponsorship. Billboards along the new roads betray a newfound consumerism: Young, confident professional-looking men and women smile out at passersby while conversing on sleek new mobile phones.
Afghans in the north have always seen America and Europeans as friends and allies rather than occupying superiors. That feeling has grown and has developed into a relationship that lends itself to partnering, economically. In Southern Afghanistan, the more prevalent Pashtun view of America and Europeans is generally that of, subservient and master, though this was never intended. The perception of separation in status generally breeds resentment over time.
Northern Afghans generally welcome the sort of relationship with Americans that can easily grow from an economic standpoint. Though other nations are invested and are investing heavily in the north, the Afghans harbor a greater trust and affinity for Americans. America’s philosophy of fairness and openness fosters more of a positive perception as an economic partner. The young Northern Afghanistan professional sees a bright future for this part of the country and as far as they are concerned, the sky is the limit for them.
America doesn’t have to vociferously compete with other nations for an opportunity to do business in Afghanistan. All we have to do is show up and signal our willingness to take part in the risk and share equally in the rewards.
The Sunni Muslim Tajik and Uzbek Afghans in the north have signaled a willingness to embrace their Shiite Muslim Hazara brothers, in the interest of building an economically sound and exciting future for them and their children in Northern Afghanistan. Everyone recognizes the economic possibilities and all have grown weary of the constant conflict and turmoil that has held the part of the world back for generations. A recent conversation with my friend Sayed Ahmadullah Asghary brought this home for me.
Sayed, or Ahmed as his American friends call him, has been deeply involved with North Afghanistan’s many changes politically, economically, and socially for most of his adult life.
“Formal education and the process of formerly educating our young men and women in Afghanistan are still in their conceptual infancies,” he paused and sipped at a steaming cup of tea as he introduced this profound thought.
“Afghanistan’s youth are like baby birds chirping wildly, mouths open to any tidbits of knowledge we choose to drop. The problem here is,” he shrugged somewhat solemnly, “there are too many chirping birds and not enough teachers. The young potential ‘Massoud s’ (referring to the Ahmed Shah Massoud, Lion of Panjshir and charismatic natural leader of men) are likely never to be recognized, and Afghanistan will lose these treasures if they are not found and polished.”
Sayed is one of many Northern Afghans who have committed themselves to providing a future for these young students and in turn retaining this gift of knowledge for his country. His intent is to launch a group of special schools where young men and women can be given more individualized instruction, but his resources are limited.
“Our future is dependent on the youth and we can’t allow this opportunity to slip away,” he concluded waiving his open palm past his head, as the Afghan will do signifying something that exists no longer.
The Northern Afghanistan entrepreneurial spirit offers a clear way forward for this country; not to simply survive but to prosper. America has a window of opportunity to be involved in this prosperity and to form the basis for a lasting friendship in this part of the world. In this part of Afghanistan, widespread prosperity will generate a more secure democracy that will in turn trump violence, and we can and should embrace and support it.
Iran Ready to Help Afghanistan after Foreign Troops Pullout
Fars News Agency September 12, 2012
TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi voiced Tehran's preparedness to extend more aid and assistance to its eastern neighbor Afghanistan, once the western troops withdraw from the war-torn country.
Addressing the opening of the jubilee session and IV meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the CICA member states in Astana on Wednesday, Salehi said, "Iran is also ready to take part in the construction of infrastructure projects in the country."
A jubilee session and IV Meeting of CICA Foreign Ministers have started at the Palace of Independence in Astana today.
Salehi stressed the relevance and necessity of such organizations, which are aimed at restoring and maintaining stability and confidence in the Asian continent.
In his speech, he also emphasized that there are many threats and challenges requiring common solutions and measures in the region today.
Speaking about the situation in Syria, he said that it is necessary to hold the negotiations on the peaceful settlement of the situation between the government and the opposition.
Salehi said that it is necessary to make a common decision to avoid misuse of the nuclear technology, while underlining all nations' right to develop a nuclear program for peaceful purposes.
Afghanistan After 9/11: A Mission Unaccomplished
The legacy of the war in Afghanistan will be about much more than the attacks of 9/11 and the defeat of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda
TIME By Ishaan Tharoor | @ishaantharoor September 11, 2012
Long gone is that smoke-‘em-out-of-their-caves bravado. 11 years after the horrors of 9/11, the U.S. war to punish al-Qaeda has turned into a global headache. With no decisive military victory in sight in Afghanistan, the Americans and their allies are rushing, albeit as discreetly as possible, for the exit. The official date of withdrawal—by the end of 2014—hangs like an oversized albatross around the neck of policymakers in Washington, Brussels and Kabul. Yes, Osama bin Laden is dead and his jihadist enterprise in retreat. But the legacy of the longest conflict in American history and the future of war-ravaged Afghanistan are both shrouded with dark uncertainties.
Two events yesterday highlighted the shadowy world 9/11 wrought. On Sept. 10, the U.S. military confirmed that an unnamed inmate in Guantanamo Bay died while in detention from unknown causes. This was the ninth such death since the facility opened in 2002. An extraterritorial, extrajudicial site for those swept up in Afghanistan and Pakistan amid the U.S.’s quest to root out al-Qaeda and its proxies, Guantanamo became a metaphor for the darker practices of the war on terror. This extraordinary renditioning of supposed American values was illustrated most recently by revelations published by Human Rights Watch alleging the CIA once colluded with the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to torture suspected Islamist extremists. Some of those detained in Guantanamo have been found to have had little connection to bin Laden’s jihad; near 170 prisoners remain in a legal and moral limbo.
The journey to Gitmo often wound its way through the vast American facility at Afghanistan’s Bagram Air Base. Also on Sept. 10, the U.S. officially transferred the operation of the detention center — and the over 3,000 prisoners in custody there — to local authorities. Reuters quoted a top Afghan official making this unintentionally bleak statement:
“Today is a historical and glorious day for Afghanistan where Afghans are able to take the charge of the prison themselves,” acting Defence Minister Enayatullah Nazari told a large crowd including U.S. military officials.
That the Afghan government is slowly reassuming direct control over stretches of the country — and, indeed, a notorious prison — is a metric of progress. But, according to a report issued this past week by the Open Society, a George Soros-funded pro-democracy group, with Bagram, the Afghans are inheriting an internment system where detainees were kept arbitrarily by the U.S. and often without trial, something that may be in contravention of Afghanistan’s own constitution. And there’s every indication the Afghans will simply pick up where the Americans left off. “If Afghanistan truly wants to bring legitimacy to national security detentions, creating their own unlawful internment regime is a bad way to start,” says Rachel Reid, an Afghanistan specialist for the Open Society.
While the U.S. has spent at least half a trillion dollars on the war and lost more than 2,000 of its soldiers, the gains made — the liberation of much of the country from tyrannical Taliban orthodoxy — could yet be reversed. Moreover, a decade of U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan, while not unpopular back home, has possibly sewn the seeds of greater discord to come. Earlier this year, Robert Grenier, a former CIA counterterrorism chief under George W. Bush, warned of the human cost of a wayward and at times indiscriminate campaign of drone strikes on both sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. “We have gone a long way down the road of creating a situation where we are creating more enemies than we are removing from the battlefield,” he said.
Given the resilience of the Taliban, it’s become all too clear that a negotiated truce and political settlement must be forged sooner rather than later. An important, somewhat encouraging report put out recently by the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think-tank, suggests the Taliban are ready for ceasefire talks and compromise as well—though it’s a solution that few Washington hawks could have countenanced 11 years ago.
The report, based on a number of interviews with senior Taliban figures (though their identities remain anonymous) conducted by four British and American South and Central Asia experts, makes a number of significant claims: the Taliban leadership—known as the Quetta shuraafter the Pakistani city where top leaders like Mullah Mohammad Omar are thought to have found safe haven—profoundly regrets its dealings with al-Qaeda and is prepared to renounce any ties to international terrorist outfits; despite certain bullish public utterances, the Taliban are willing to commit to parliamentary democracy, allow for modern education in schools and for girls to attend them; they are even willing to accept a U.S. military presence in the country beyond 2014, though insist for an end to drone strikes.
Of course, even if these Taliban assurances are true, there are major stumbling blocks. The most glaring one is the Taliban refusal to cooperate with the supposedly corrupt government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a politico who, despite his growing unpopularity at home and in the West, will not disappear quietly from the public stage. Moreover, the role of Pakistan and the jihadist-sympathizers in its military remains pivotal, and there’s no sign yet of a clear break between the Afghan Taliban and their bases of support in Islamabad. At the same time, regional powers in India and Iran will be bent on preventing the Taliban from making their way back into power. A messy geopolitical conflagration looms, with Afghanistan yet again at risk of becoming the site of regional proxy wars.
The one reassuring conclusion of the RUSI report is that, unlike in the 1990s, the Taliban know they don’t have the resources to pull off a complete military victory in the country they once ruled through the backs of their Toyota pickups. Yet even for the world’s only superpower, the prospect of a decisive victory in Afghanistan has long dimmed. For all its initial zeal — and the blood and treasure spent — the U.S. won’t be able to author a happy ending in a part of the world it sought to remake 11 years ago.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com