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In Afghanistan, embers of fear for new civil war
Associated Press By Amir Shah and Deb Riechmann 07/10/2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - Nobody wants a repeat of the bloody ethnic fighting that followed the Soviet exit from Afghanistan in the 1990s -- least of all 32-year-old Wahidullah, who was crippled in that war by a bullet that pierced his spine.
Yet as the Afghan war began its 12th year on Sunday, Oct. 7, fears loom that the country will again fracture along ethnic lines once international combat forces leave by the end of 2014.
"It was a very bad situation," said Wahidullah, who was a teenager when he was wounded in the 1992-96 civil war. "All these streets around here were full of bullet shells, burned tanks and vehicles," he added, squinting into a setting sun that cast a golden glow on the bombed-out Darulaman Palace still standing in west Kabul not far from where he was wounded.
"People could not find bread or water, but rockets were everywhere," said Wahidullah, who now hobbles around on red-handled crutches. He goes by one name only, as do many Afghans.
The dilapidated palace is a reminder of the horror of the civil war when rival factions -- who had joined forces against Soviet fighters before they left in early 1989 -- turned their guns on each other. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed.
Fed up with the bloodletting, the Afghan people longed for someone -- anyone -- who would restore peace and order. The Taliban did so.
But once in power, they imposed harsh Islamic laws that repressed women and they publicly executed, stoned and lashed people for alleged crimes and sexual misconduct. The Taliban also gave sanctuary to al-Qaida in the run-up to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S. When the Taliban refused to give up the al-Qaida leaders who orchestrated 9/11, the U.S. invaded on Oct. 7, 2001.
Eleven years later, Afghanistan remains divided and ethnic tension still simmers.
The Taliban, dominated by the ethnic Pashtun majority, have strongholds in the south. Minorities such as Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks live predominantly in central and northern Afghanistan. The fear is that when international forces leave, those groups will take up arms to prevent another Taliban takeover, and Afghan security force members could walk off the government force and fight their ethnic leaders.
Anxiety and confusion about what will happen after the foreign forces leave permeates every aspect of society. Political debate about an Afghanistan post-2014 is getting more vocal. Some political leaders threaten to take up arms while others preach progress, development and peace. Young Afghans with money and connections are trying to flee the country before 2014.
There also is mounting uncertainty about the upcoming transfer of power. At the same time foreign troops are scheduled to complete their withdrawal in 2014, Afghans will go to the polls to elect a successor to President Hamid Karzai, who is barred by the constitution from running for a third term.
The Afghan people already view their government as weak and corrupt, and those doubtful of a peaceful future say that if the upcoming presidential election is rigged and yields an illegitimate leader, civil war could erupt between ethnic groups backed by neighboring countries trying to influence Afghanistan's future.
"Unfortunately in Afghanistan, we do not have any political unity," said Gen. Sayed Hussain Anwari, a former governor of Kabul and Herat provinces who led fighters during the civil war.
Speaking in emotional, rapid-fire sentences at his home in Kabul, Anwari says that the Taliban have a right to participate in the political process.
"But if the scenario changes and they come to power by force, there will be groups that won't go with the Taliban and the fighting will continue," he said.
Ghairat Baheer offers an even gloomier prediction. He is a representative and son-in-law of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a key civil war leader in the 1990s whose fighters attack foreign troops today. He warns that the current Afghan government will collapse with the international troop withdrawal and says civil war is likely without a peace agreement.
"The realties are that the government is not sustainable," he said in a telephone interview. "Anti-Americanism and anti-western sentiment (are) increasing daily in Afghanistan and the resistance is spreading day-by-day across the country."
Fahim Dashti was with Ahmad Shah Massoud, the charismatic Tajik leader who commanded the Northern Alliance of minority groups, when he was fatally wounded by two terrorists posing as journalists two days before the Sept. 11 attacks. Dashti's face and hands were burned when one of the journalists blew himself up as the interview began. Even now, Dashti's hands are not strong enough to twist the cap off a bottle of water.
Despite his experience, Dashti, who now directs the National Journalists' Union in Afghanistan, doesn't think his country is headed toward a civil war.
"I do share the concerns of the people, no doubt. ... "There is no one-man solution," he said, adding that a team of leaders from all ethnic factions needs to be assembled to lead the nation forward.
Gen. Majid Rouzi, who also commanded fighters in the civil war and is now an adviser at the Afghan Interior Ministry, agrees.
"Nobody has any justification for rearming," he said, sitting cross-legged on a rug in his home in Kabul. "The Taliban coming again? It is not possible. A factional war is not coming."
However, Gen. Sahki Dad Ghafel, who led 1,500 troops fighting under Hazara commander Abdul Ali Mazari during the civil war, says civil strife is inevitable unless a peace can be reached with the Taliban before 2014. And he's not optimistic that the Taliban will renounce violence, moderate their hardline ways and participate in the political process.
"Maybe if there is a deal between America, Pakistan and the Taliban, the Taliban might come with the tie instead of the turban," Ghafel, a round-faced military man with a small black mustache, said snacking on green grapes and melon in his office. "If the foreign troops leave, there will not be a good result. I am not confident about the future. I'm not optimistic."
Karzai has called for national unity and has tried to reassure his people that Afghanistan will not collapse when the troops leave.
"If the foreigners are not here, we are nothing?" he asked sarcastically at a news conference last week: "We were not a nation before NATO and the Americans came?"
Karzai claims there has been a decline in violence in areas where Afghan troops are taking over from U.S. and NATO forces and that Afghan policemen and soldiers will be strong enough to provide security in the future. He blames the media for scaring Afghans into thinking they have no future once the international coalition leaves. Those who share Karzai's optimism argue that despite reports of drug use and unprofessionalism, Afghan security forces -- now 352,000 strong -- will be capable of securing the nation by international troops leave.
Coalition officials claim they have battered the Taliban and that while they are capable of staging suicide bombings and insider attacks, the insurgents cannot defeat the Afghan forces on the battlefield. They contend that keeping up the pressure on insurgents will push Taliban leaders to the negotiating table and that the international community's pledge to bankroll the Afghan army and police force in coming years will support the Afghan government as it works to provide better governance.
The more pessimistic view is that the Afghan forces won't be up to the task.
The joint international and Afghan force is fighting a losing battle, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement marking the 11th anniversary of the start of the war. Mujahid claims the Taliban have infiltrated the Afghan forces and are responsible for the rash of insider attacks that have left more than 50 U.S. and NATO forces dead at the hands of their would-be Afghan partners so far this year.
"Right now, the foreigners are in a position where they are just trying to escape," Mujahid said.
Afghanistan war, 11 years on: What more can and should the US military do?
Though the work of US troops has become increasingly deadly in the Afghanistan war, many analysts warn that it has not been increasingly effective.
Christian Science Monitor By Anna Mulrine, Staff writer October 7, 2012
It is officially the longest-running war in American history, and its end is in sight: President Obama has promised to pull all US combat troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
That date, however, is two years away, and in the meantime, some analysts wonder what more the US military can and should do in the country.
Incidents of “green on blue” insider attacks, by Afghan security forces against the US and NATO soldiers training them, now account for more than 20 percent of those killed in action.
Indeed, the pace of deaths for US troops has accelerated since the surge of 33,000 forces that Mr. Obama ordered into Afghanistan began in 2010.
In particular, it took nine years of fighting in Afghanistan before 1,000 US troops were killed. But the second 1,000 US troop deaths have come in the past two years. Last month in the Afghanistan war, America reached the grim 2,000-US-troops-killed-in-action milestone. On Saturday, two more US troops were killed by insurgents in eastern Afghanistan.
Though the work of US troops has become increasingly deadly, many analysts warn that it has not been increasingly effective.
Pentagon officials point to the 300,000-plus Afghan security forces that have been trained as a result of NATO efforts. But the attrition rates remain high, and these soldiers and police continue to struggle against the network of an estimated 30,000 to 35,000 insurgents – despite the fact that they outnumber them roughly 10 to 1.
Some 5,000 Afghans are now enrolled in the national “reintegration” program that provides job training and cash to former Taliban fighters who have agreed to put down their arms. Though it has “potential,” this program “is not yet a game-changer,” Lt. Gen. Adrian Bradshaw, the No. 2 commander in Afghanistan, acknowledges.
In the meantime, the 68,000 US troops that remain in Afghanistan continue to do much of the heavy lifting, in the form of patrols and even the logistics systems that feed, equip, and maintain the Afghan forces.
In roughly half of the war, the focus has ostensibly been on training these Afghan forces. But with the spate of insider attacks, US troops have been forced to implement “guardian angel” programs.
Bradshaw emphasizes that these programs are discreet. “You know, whoever's got the responsibility to keep an eye on their mates while they're taking exercise or playing sport or relaxing in between operations, whoever has that task just tactfully stays on one side,” he says. “Clearly they have a weapon and they're ready to use it if necessary, but they're not constantly in people's faces. It's done in a tactful and sensible manner.”
Still, the insider attacks, casualties, and persistent corruption throughout the Afghan government after a decade-plus of war make some wonder whether the war effort continues to be worth the cost.
“The administration’s strategy at this point is that they are relying on a negotiated settlement, and what the fighting is doing is determining the terms of that settlement,” says Stephen Biddle, professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University.
Some might argue that “the right thing to do is sticking it out and suffering the casualties we will suffer until 2014,” he adds.
But whether that is indeed the right thing to do, he says, hinges on, “how much can you shift the terms of a prospective settlement in your favor while you continue to fight?”
Right now, it’s increasingly hard to answer that question. “We’re doing a variety of things that even as we continue to fight are moving the settlement terms in the wrong direction,” Dr. Biddle says.
The ability to sustain any settlement will be another key indicator of the success of the war – and it is dependent on Afghan government reform, he adds.
That’s because any settlement is likely to legalize the Taliban as a political party. If Afghan leaders continue to allow what Biddle calls “an increasingly predatory government,” then the Taliban’s foothold in the government will grow.
Busy with fighting and training, the US has “significantly reduced” its government reform efforts. In fact, the insider attacks that US forces are enduring could be “the tip of a larger iceberg” related to this corruption, Biddle argues.
While the US military has painted the attacks as largely rooted in cultural conflict and has vowed to redouble cultural training efforts for US troops, a more effective means of addressing the problem is government reform, Biddle says.
Afghan fighters see that their commanders do not have their best interests at heart, he argues, because many of them are political appointees – given their job by higher-ups in government, often with a wink and a nod, to protect large payoff networks that are often making the government officials, as well as the commanders, rich.
Afghan troops see this and lose their will to fight. In turn, US troops are “disdainful” of this lack of will to fight. “All of these American 19-year-olds have been taught that the one thing that is least praiseworthy and least respectable is lack of courage under fire – and they are training and living with people who they believe lack that,” Biddle explains.
“The result is that there’s a serious danger that what you get is systematic disrespect,” he says. “There’s reason to believe that lots of Afghans feel they are seriously disrespected, and I think you end up in a situation where mutual disdain builds.”
Bomb Kills 2 At Afghan Intelligence Office
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Police say a car bomb has killed at least two Afghan intelligence officers in the south of the country.
Helmand Province police spokesman Fareed Ahmed said the explosives had been hidden in a vehicle parked outside an office of the National Directorate of Security in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah.
Ahmed said the bomb went off after noon on October 8, wounding another three intelligence officers and four civilians.
Helmand, considered a Taliban stronghold, was the site of major NATO and Afghan military operations in 2009 and 2010.
Based on reporting by AP and AFP
Afghanistan Deadline Awaits Next U.S. President
NPR By Tom Bowman October 7, 2012
How does a president bring the war in Afghanistan to an end? There are 68,000 American troops serving in the country as the war enters its 12th year.
The war hasn't been a major issue in the presidential campaign, and polls show American voters are tiring of the war. But the next commander in chief will find the Afghan war among the most difficult of many foreign policy challenges.
Both President Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney appear to agree on a date: the last day of December 2014. That's when the Afghan security forces are scheduled to takeover.
"As our coalition agreed, by the end of 2014, the Afghans will be fully responsible for the security of their country," Obama said at an American base in Afghanistan back in May.
That's what the NATO coalition approved. Romney picked up on that when he addressed the National Guard Association in September.
"Or goal should be to complete a successful transition to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014," he said.
It's All In The Wording
But there's a subtle difference in the candidates' messages. Obama, like fellow NATO leaders, sounds definitive. He says the Afghans "will be fully responsible" by the end of 2014. Romney says it's a "goal" to turn over security to Afghan forces by that time.
Romney says he wants to listen to American military commanders in Afghanistan first, and then determine the way ahead.
"We should evaluate conditions on the ground and solicit the best advice of our military commanders," he said at the National Guard convention. "We can all agree that our men and women in the field deserve a clear mission, that they deserved the resources and resolute leadership they need to complete that mission, and that they deserve a country that will provide for their needs when they come home."
Romney's campaign website offers a little more information. The governor says he will "review the transition to the Afghan military." That assessment, plus conditions on the ground, Romney says, will determine the level of troops and money needed to "secure our gains and to train Afghan forces."
Which brings up another challenge for the candidates: How many American troops will remain after 2014?
'We're Not Going Anyplace'
Obama says that while the U.S. combat mission will end in December 2014, not all American troops will be coming home. The president signed a 10-year strategic partnership agreement with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in May, which says the U.S. will help target al-Qaida and train Afghan troops.
In his speech in Afghanistan in May, Obama described that agreement.
"We'll work with the Afghans to determine what support they need to accomplish two narrow security missions beyond 2014: counterterrorism and continued training," he said.
Right after the agreement was signed, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said, "The most important point is that we're not going anyplace."
"We have an enduring presence that will be in Afghanistan. We'll continue to work with them on counterterrorism," Panetta said. "We'll continue to provide training assistance and guidance, we'll continue to provide support."
Romney advisers say the governor also wants an "enduring presence" in Afghanistan, but he hasn't been as specific about what that presence will look like. Military commanders, for their part, are considering 10,000 or more troops.
Whoever becomes president will have to resolve how many U.S. troops will be needed in Afghanistan for the training and counterterror mission well into the future.
NZ mulling help for Afghan interpreters after withdrawal
WELLINGTON, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- The New Zealand government is considering how it can help Afghan interpreters who have been working with New Zealand troops as the country prepares to pull out of Afghanistan, Radio New Zealand reported Monday.
Radio New Zealand's correspondent in Afghanistan reported that about two dozen translators were worried about their safety when the New Zealand soldiers with the Provincial Reconstruction Team withdraw from Bamyan province next year.
They feared they could be in danger of execution if captured by the Taliban because of their work supporting foreign troops, said the report.
Prime Minister John Key said the government was seeking advice on what risks they would face if they remained in Afghanistan.
"They've worked for New Zealand with New Zealand's best interests at heart, and it's at least feasible that there is some risk to them if they remain in Afghanistan. Now we need to tease and test all of that out -- I can at least understand the case they're making," the report quoted Key as saying.
Key said the government was getting advice on the option of assistance with settlement in New Zealand.
Key's comments followed a call from the main opposition Labour Party to offer the interpreters a chance to resettle in New Zealand.
Labour foreign affairs spokesperson Phil Goff said New Zealand had an ethical and moral obligation to look after the interpreters and their families.
"They have been integral to our operation in Afghanistan. We can't use them and then abandon them," Goff said in the statement.
"It's worth noting that Canada is running a special program offering Afghani interpreters who have worked with their soldiers and diplomats a new home in Canada in recognition of their service, " he said.
"I call on our government to follow that example," said Goff.
New Zealand forces are scheduled to leave Afghanistan in April next year.
Report: Afghanistan Headed For Crisis
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
A new report is warning that Afghanistan is moving toward a potentially devastating political crisis as NATO-led combat forces withdraw and the Afghan government prepares to take control of security responsibilities in 2014.
The report -- titled “Afghanistan: The Long, Hard Road to the 2014 Transition” -- was prepared by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG), which describes itself as an independent nongovernmental organization committed to preventing deadly conflicts.
Candace Rondeaux, senior Afghanistan analyst for the organization, is quoted as saying there is “a real risk” that the U.S.-backed Afghan government “could collapse upon NATO's withdrawal in 2014.”
Rondeaux added: “The Afghan army and police are overwhelmed and underprepared for the transition.”
The report says Afghan stability is further threatened by the government’s failure so far to prepare for fair elections in the future.
The report was released on the 11th anniversary of the start of the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban regime.
The Taliban on October 7 marked the anniversary by ridiculing U.S. and NATO-led forces and vowing that foreign troops will leave Afghanistan in defeat.
In a statement, the militia said foreign forces "are fleeing Afghanistan with such humiliation and disgrace that they are struggling to provide an explanation."
The United States started its campaign in Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, ousting the Taliban from power as it hunted for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who was accused of masterminding the September 11, 2001 attacks in America that killed nearly 3,000 people.
Credibility Suffered
U.S.-led coalition officials say that while Taliban insurgents remain capable of mounting suicide bombings and other attacks, the militants will not have the strength to defeat Western-trained Afghan forces once foreign troops withdraw by the end of 2014.
Coalition officials argue that continued international funding and support for Afghan forces and the Afghan government will eventually compel the Taliban to enter negotiations on a settlement of the conflict.
It its report, the International Crisis Group says that in addition to Afghan security shortcomings, the Afghan government’s credibility has not recovered since what it described as the “fraudulent and chaotic” presidential and parliamentary polls of 2009 and 2010.
The report contains harsh criticism of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
Analyst Rondeaux is quoted: “Karzai seems more interested in perpetuating his own power by any means rather than ensuring credibility of the political system and long-term stability in the country.”
The report warns that if Afghanistan’s next elections are marred by fraud allegations, the credibility of the authorities will be cast into even deeper doubt, and more Afghans will look for alternatives.
The report urges Afghan officials to set a date for the next presidential election as soon as possible and to resolve questions on which commissions and courts have authority over the polls.
It warns that unless a clear map for political transition is put forward, there is a risk that Karzai and other leading members of the elite could enter a political competition that could turn increasingly violent after NATO troops withdraw.
With reporting by AP and dpa
Outgoing ICRC Chief Says Conflict For Afghan Civilians Is At Worst
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
The outgoing head of the delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Afghanistan, Reto Stocker, has said the conflict in the country has taken a turn for the worse for ordinary Afghans.
Stocker said in a statement that during his seven-year work in that country, local armed groups have proliferated and civilians have been caught in multiple front lines.
"It has become increasingly difficult for ordinary Afghans to obtain health care," Stocker said.
The ICRC has been working in Afghanistan since 1979.
The country is the site of the organization's largest humanitarian operation, with more than 1,800 staff members.
The ICRC statement follows a report by the International Crisis Group on October 7 warning that Afghanistan is moving toward a potentially devastating political crisis as NATO-led combat forces withdraw and the Afghan government prepares to take control of security responsibilities in 2014.
With reporting by dpa and RFE/RL
Afghan cleric offers cash for death of film producer
AFP 08/10/2012
KABUL - An Afghan cleric has offered rewards totalling $400,000 for anyone killing the producer of a US-made anti-Islam film and a French cartoonist who drew caricatures of the Muslim prophet Mohammed (PBUH).
“I have offered $300,000 to anyone who kills the anti-Islam film producer and $100,000 for killing the French cartoonist,” Mir Faroq Husaini, a prominent cleric in the western province of Herat, told AFP Sunday.
Husaini said he had first announced the reward during a sermon on Friday in a large mosque in the city.
“I will sell all my properties, including my lands in Herat, to collect the money,” he said.
Afghanistan is a devoutly Muslim nation and perceived insults to religion are taken seriously, often with violent consequences.
The “Innocence of Muslims”, a crudely made film that mocks Islam, triggered violent protests in at least 20 countries including Afghanistan after excerpts were posted online last month.
Immediately after the film gained notoriety, French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo published cartoons caricaturing the Muslim prophet Mohammad (PBUH).
A Pakistani government minister last month placed a $100,000 bounty on the head of the maker of the film.
NATO resumes training of Afghan police recruits
The Washington Times By Kristina Wong Sunday, October 7, 2012
Special operations forces in Afghanistan have resumed training Afghan Local Police recruits after a suspension last month in response to two insider attacks by recruits on their international coalition trainers in August, U.S. officials say.
So far, more than half of the 16,000-member police force has been re-vetted and less than 1 percent have been removed, a special operations spokesman said.
Between now and mid-November, 14 villages will be added to the 70-plus that are guarded by the elite police forces that provide security for their own villages.
U.S. officials at first praised the Afghan Local Police training program for insulation from insider attacks, but training was suspended Sept. 2 after five special operators were killed in two such attacks. In one attack, a local police officer invited three Marines to his home for dinner and shot them at point-blank range.
Since then, coalition reports indicate, detection of the infiltrators is improving.
When a man showed up at a local police site in early September, other members identified him as a Taliban insurgent, the spokesman said.
Under questioning, the man revealed he was sent by a local Taliban leader to kill the local police commander and any coalition forces. He admitted that he tried to infiltrate a nearby site but found it too difficult.
Within the past month, coalition forces have arrested at least three Taliban insurgents and killed at least one seeking to infiltrate or plan more attacks — a promising sign that the U.S.-led coalition is learning how to reduce these attacks.
“It is too early to say that we are seeing a turning point,” said Army Maj. Adam Wojack, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). “Clearly, ISAF is focused on preventing insider attacks and have made it a higher priority in light of recent events. This may explain some of our recent success in stopping or preventing some potential attacks.”
Coalition troops have stepped up efforts to prevent and track down infiltrators, including the use of an eight-step vetting process, additional cultural awareness training, close-quarter and active-shooter training, the creation of safe zones on Afghan security force compounds, and having “guardian angel” troops keep watch for attempted attacks. NATO is updating a tactical directive issued in March, Maj. Wojack said.
U.S. officials have gone from describing insider attacks as isolated incidents that resulted from personal grievances to acknowledging that as many as a quarter of the attacks were carried out by Taliban insurgents or sympathizers.
Afghan officials always have thought that the majority of these attacks were because of Taliban infiltration, Afghan Deputy Foreign Minister H. E. Ludin told reporters during a visit to Washington last week.
“This is really in the last two to three years when we had to go out and do a very large-scale recruitment because we had to really meet the targets, the recruitment targets set for us by the transition process,” he said.
“I suppose what happened in that process is that we perhaps overlooked some of the crucial screening requirements and, as a result, the enemy used that as an opportunity to infiltrate.”
About 70 percent of all coalition and Afghan troop deaths from insider attacks since 2007 have occurred in the past two years, according to ISAF statistics obtained by The Washington Times.
The nation’s top officer, Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, recently visited Afghanistan in an unannounced trip for the second time in two months to address the topic with his Afghan counterparts.
“I can tell you without hesitation they are taking this as seriously as we are and taking active measures to help us and them defeat this threat,” Gen. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters on the day after he returned. “So I came back with a renewed sense that we can lower the risk of the insider threat.”
Afghan officials have appointed a top-level army officer to reduce insider attacks, increased the number of counterintelligence agents, directed cultural and religious officers to help NATO train Afghan troops, set up a threat-mitigation team with NATO, and undertaken a “wholesale review of all recruitments” in recent years.
In addition, the Afghan government has allowed NATO personnel working on the presidential compound in Kabul to arm themselves — one example of the Afghan commitment in helping to stem these attacks, a coalition spokesman said.
However, the move also indicates that coalition personnel are not safe anywhere, even in the most secure of compounds in one of the most secure cities in Afghanistan.
The international coalition aims to remove all combat troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, when Afghan forces will assume full responsibility for the security of their country.
Interview: Trade Can Cure Afghan Opium Addiction
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Afghanistan's drug business poses a threat to the entire Central Asian region. But more regional trade, not just tighter borders, could help solve the problem. UN Office of Drug Control (UNODC) Executive Director Yury Fedotov tells why in an interview with RFE/RL correspondent Charles Recknagel.
RFE/RL: Your agency says Afghan farmers are planting more opium poppy because prices are particularly high after plant diseases wiped out much of the opium crop in 2012. This suggests that rolling back drug production in Afghanistan is not just a question of eradicating poppy fields, but that it also is necessary to give famers incentives to plant alternative crops. You believe that one such incentive would be to boost regional trade, so farmers would have a bigger market for their agricultural products. How so?
Yury Fedotov: One of the most important and topical [objectives] is not only to continue this campaign of eradication, which by the way is quite successful. The Ministry of Counternarcotics and the counternarcotics police of Afghanistan succeeded in eradicating 11,000 hectares this year, which is a huge increase, a 173 percent increase, compared to the previous year. But, of course, that is still less than 10 percent of the overall area under the cultivation of opium poppies in Afghanistan.
But that is not enough. These programs have to be supported by alternative livelihood projects which would give the farmers of Afghanistan more predictable licit activities. That is possible only through more broad international and regional cooperation including trade, exchanges, programs which basically would lead to generating more jobs, more markets for the realization of products produced by farmers in Afghanistan.
RFE/RL: Are Afghan farmers, in fact, seeking such opportunities?
Fedotov: When I travel to the region, when I meet with leaders in Afghanistan, not only government officials in Kabul but also governors in different provinces in Afghanistan, they are very interested in opening more border crossings with neighboring countries to ensure that their famers could export their production, vegetables, including dry fruits but also wheat, and be involved in this trade and economic cooperation in the region more visibly. And that would help at least to develop alternative livelihoods in the neighboring provinces of Afghanistan.
An important part of the GDP of Afghanistan is being generated by illicit drug money, laundered money from illicit drug trafficking, and that would be from 10 to 30 percent of GDP. Otherwise, the country lives on support and economic assistance, financial assistance, from the international community. So, this has to be changed, of course. And that is why these alternative livelihood projects are important not only from the point of view of counternarcotics but also for establishing the foundation for the sustainable economic and social development of Afghanistan.
RFE/RL: At this moment, neighboring states appear more focused on trying to close their borders to drug trafficking than opening them for regional trade. Do neighboring states -- which worry so much about the drug trade increasing after foreign troops leave Afghanistan in 2014 -- view regional trade as a way to help Afghan farmers out of the drug business?
Fedotov: The current level of understanding is not enough and we need to develop this sense of shared responsibility within the region.
RFE/RL: What are the stakes for Central Asia if more effective ways to reduce the drug business in Afghanistan are not found?
Fedotov: The drug trafficking generates instability, insecurity, feeds crime, corruption, all sorts of violations of law, and may have a negative impact on the stability in the whole region of Central Asia. And the health issue is not one of the last concerns. It is true, and it has been proven true in many regions, including in this region, when not only the country of origin like Afghanistan but also Iran and Pakistan, which are countries of transit, are affected by a high level of drug dependency. There are more and more drug users, heroin and opium, in Central Asia.
To some extent, the governments of these countries were more or less relaxed. They believed that, of course, there are drug-dependent people but they are not in such proportions that it could shake the foundations of the society. But now this is being changed and we have requests from some governments in Central Asia to increase our support, support provided from UNODC in terms of drug prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation. They are concerned that they, too, may be affected by this danger of drug dependency which is spread out from Afghanistan to other countries.
The big three who can help save Afghanistan
As its forces withdraw, Nato should not be afraid to seek help from Russia, India and Iran, says Shashank Joshi
Telegraph.co.uk By Shashank Joshi 08 Oct 2012
Exactly 11 years ago, with the wounds of 9/11 still fresh, the United States and Britain invaded Afghanistan. They arrived in anger, collected allies along the way, and grew in ambition. Today that anger has faded, those allies depleted, and their ambition exhausted. The campaign is already the longest in American history, far surpassing the Revolutionary and Vietnam wars.
Though combat forces are not due to depart for another two years, there is a palpable sense of counting down the clock. Last month, for instance, Nato stopped training Afghan Local Police and abandoned routine joint patrols below battalion level. Why? Because it is hard enough to face a decade-long trickle of casualties at the hands of a shadowy enemy with safe havens in Pakistan, but it’s particularly dispiriting to be shot by your own side.
So far this year, 51 Nato troops have been killed at the hands of their Afghan allies, in so-called “green on blue” attacks (compared to 35 last year). A quarter of Britain’s casualties and more than a tenth of Nato’s have come in this way over the past 10 months. The evaporation of trust in Afghan colleagues cuts at the heart of the war strategy, which was to turn the Afghan National Security Forces into a bulwark against the Taliban.
There is plenty of blame to go round, although the Afghan government must take the greatest share of responsibility. Some of its officials appear to have preferred to stuff their pockets rather than reform. Around $8 billion in cash was smuggled out of the country last year. When Western diplomats talk about Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, the language often resembles that surrounding earlier generations of feckless and ill-fated American clients, such as Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam or Chiang Kai-shek of the Chinese Nationalists. Diplomats whisper that Karzai is paranoid and impulsive. But even when he goes, as he must in 2014, the state he bequeaths to his successor will be a predatory and over-centralised mess.
Afghanistan’s army will cost around $8 billion annually, but where will this money come from? Sixty-nine per cent of Americans surveyed in March thought the United States should not be at war in Afghanistan at all. Another poll this month showed that 49 per cent wanted immediate withdrawal. European states are mired in their own economic troubles.
There is no easy solution, but Nato should not be afraid to ask for help. In the Nineties, as the Taliban tore through Afghanistan, a trio of regional powers – India, Iran and Russia – backed the Taliban’s adversaries, the Northern Alliance. This is an admittedly curious set of countries. For years, Washington tried to dissuade India from getting involved for fear of provoking Pakistan. Iran, despite its antipathy to the Taliban, was alleged to have provided rockets and training to the insurgents. Nato ties with Russia are also strained, despite Barack Obama’s attempted “reset” with Moscow. And yet, this trio ultimately has a fundamental interest in a stable Afghanistan and weakened Taliban.
India has a $2 billion aid programme in Afghanistan. Last year, Delhi and Kabul also signed a strategic partnership: Afghan officers are training in India and there are plans for the transfer of military equipment. That’s the sort of assistance that war-weary Britain should welcome.
Iran might seem a bizarre ally. But in 2001, members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps – the same outfit abetting the Syrian regime’s repression – worked with the CIA and American special forces against the Taliban. Remarkably, Iranian officials were even open to working under US command to train Afghans. As for Russia, it has 6,000 soldiers next door in Tajikistan, and played a key role in allowing Nato forces to fuel and arm themselves after Pakistan shut off supply routes last year. Moscow has no wish to see the resurgence of fundamentalist forces on its southern flank.
Working with these countries should not diminish our commitment to talking to the Taliban about a political settlement. We should also strive to give Afghan provinces more freedom from Kabul’s interference. Meanwhile, it is important than the Afghan army does not collapse. If we don’t co-operate with like-minded countries, they will opt to work with their favourite ethnic and factional militias, which would worsen Afghanistan’s own divisions.
The war in Afghanistan may not be lost, but it is certainly not being won. In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev lamented that “a million of our soldiers went through Afghanistan, and we will not be able to explain to our people why we did not complete it. We suffered such heavy losses! And what for?” The Soviet Union lost nearly five times as many men as Nato, in a shorter period. Yet Gorbachev’s sense of disillusion is recognisable today.
Privately, British officials are thinking about pulling out British forces much more quickly than planned. But shock therapy is not the answer. The stability of Afghanistan still matters, not just for the sake of Afghans but also because a renewed civil war would catalyse extremism in the region. Nato can no longer be choosy about its allies. Damage limitation is the order of the day.
Former film-maker helps drug addicts rejoin Afghan society
by Farid Behbud, Chen Xin
KABUL, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- Laila Haidari, a former Afghan film- maker, never thought that she would end up helping drug addicts rejoin society in the world's largest producer of opium.
"Originally I was a film-maker and I came to Kabul to take part in a film festival one year ago but as I saw several dozens of young drug-addicts disheveled and physically too weak to walk, I changed my mind and I decided to stay here and help them out," Haidari, an Iranian-born Afghan woman, said in an interview with Xinhua.
Despite lack of resources, Haidari set up a rehabilitation center and a restaurant to support it in west part of Kabul in autumn 2011.
"My first idea was to find resources to rent a house as a rehabilitation center for addicts but it was not an easy task since no one wanted his house to be used for drug users' treatment, but finally, I succeeded in establishing the center," she said.
Haidari recounted that with the help of a friend, she was able to provide accommodation and food for the addicts.
"Months later, with the income from my restaurant, we became self-reliant," Haidari said, adding that she never received any funding from government or aid agencies up to now.
The center that she named "Mother Camp" is located in Dasht-i- Barchi neighborhood, a populated area in Kabul.
More than one million Afghans aged 15 to 64 are drug dependents throughout the country, according to officials.
Studies show that drug addiction in Afghanistan is often the result of poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, trauma from continuing conflicts, migration, and illusions about the calming effects of drugs.
"It was the maternal instinct that encouraged me to help those drug dependents that I saw living miserable lives under the bridge of a small river known as Pul-i-Sokhta in western Kabul," Haidari said.
She said that the addicts have been rejected by everyone in society and have been treated as outcasts.
Afghanistan, which is being ravaged by Taliban-led insurgency, produces about 90 percent of the world's opium, the raw material used in manufacturing heroin, according to officials.
"As soon as the center was ready, I quickly took some addicts and gave them food and shelter. It was a heartbreaking scene for me because some of the addicts never thought that a woman like me could help them," Haidari said.
She said up to 400 drug dependents have been treated at her center over the past year.
"Right now, there are 27 men, four women and four children who are drug dependents receiving medical treatment in the camp," Haidari said.
"They are not physically disabled. If we provide them with medical care, help them stop using drugs and give them jobs, they could rejoin society," she added.
"I never thought that one day I would be able to stop my dependence on drugs or even become financially self-reliant after that," Ali, 36, told Xinhua.
Ali gratefully thanked Haidari for her extraordinary efforts and compassion to save the lives of hundreds of people who were facing a slow death because of drug addiction.
Officials said that it is hard to stop the spread of addictive drugs because revenues from drugs are being channeled to fund the operations of insurgents in the country.
Despite steadfast international and domestic efforts to curb drug production, the campaign has so far failed to achieve concrete results.
Senators Seek Action on Death Row Afghans in Iran
TOLOnews.com By Saleha Soadat Sunday, 07 October 2012
Afghanistan's senators on Sunday criticised the government for not doing enough to monitor the situation of 2,000 Afghan prisoners sentenced to death in Iran.
The senators were shown documents that Iranian courts have sentenced nearly 2,000 Afghan citizens to death, accused of various crimes particularly drug trafficking.
"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should review this clearly and find out the reasons for the Afghan executions. The foreign relations commission of the Senate should also follow this up," head of the Senate Fazel Hadi Muslimyar said.
"According to this list, there are 5,000 Afghan prisoners in Iran, 2,000 of whom are sentenced to death. The Afghan government should prevent them from being executed," Senator Saleha Mirzad said.
According to several other senators including Senator Dawood Asas, Iran had issued a warning prior to the approval of the Afghanistan-US strategic pact that it would execute all the Afghan prisoners on death row if the deal was approved by the Afghan parliament.
"I was present at the meeting between the Afghan head of Senate and former Iranian ambassador to Afghanistan where he [Iranian Ambassador] warned that his country would hang all the prisoners sentenced to death," Asas said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs deputy spokesman Faramarz Tamana said he was aware of the report shown to the Senate but had not seen it himself.
He said that the Iranian government should coordinate with Afghan government in all its actions against any Afghan citizens.
"We haven't received such a report yet, but we want the Iranian government to consider its laws and actions against all the Afghan refugees in close collaboration with Afghan government," Tamana said.
This comes after a different report was recently released by an Iranian justice non-government organisation accusing government officials of abusing Afghan refugees.
"Afghans are limited to living in only a few provinces: if they go to other parts of Iran, their living permit will be illegal," CEO of Justice for Iran Shadi Sadr said.
There are around 2.4 m Afghan refugees living in some parts of Iran under restricted movement, according to the Justice for Iran group.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
Associated Press By Amir Shah and Deb Riechmann 07/10/2012
KABUL, Afghanistan - Nobody wants a repeat of the bloody ethnic fighting that followed the Soviet exit from Afghanistan in the 1990s -- least of all 32-year-old Wahidullah, who was crippled in that war by a bullet that pierced his spine.
Yet as the Afghan war began its 12th year on Sunday, Oct. 7, fears loom that the country will again fracture along ethnic lines once international combat forces leave by the end of 2014.
"It was a very bad situation," said Wahidullah, who was a teenager when he was wounded in the 1992-96 civil war. "All these streets around here were full of bullet shells, burned tanks and vehicles," he added, squinting into a setting sun that cast a golden glow on the bombed-out Darulaman Palace still standing in west Kabul not far from where he was wounded.
"People could not find bread or water, but rockets were everywhere," said Wahidullah, who now hobbles around on red-handled crutches. He goes by one name only, as do many Afghans.
The dilapidated palace is a reminder of the horror of the civil war when rival factions -- who had joined forces against Soviet fighters before they left in early 1989 -- turned their guns on each other. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed.
Fed up with the bloodletting, the Afghan people longed for someone -- anyone -- who would restore peace and order. The Taliban did so.
But once in power, they imposed harsh Islamic laws that repressed women and they publicly executed, stoned and lashed people for alleged crimes and sexual misconduct. The Taliban also gave sanctuary to al-Qaida in the run-up to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S. When the Taliban refused to give up the al-Qaida leaders who orchestrated 9/11, the U.S. invaded on Oct. 7, 2001.
Eleven years later, Afghanistan remains divided and ethnic tension still simmers.
The Taliban, dominated by the ethnic Pashtun majority, have strongholds in the south. Minorities such as Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks live predominantly in central and northern Afghanistan. The fear is that when international forces leave, those groups will take up arms to prevent another Taliban takeover, and Afghan security force members could walk off the government force and fight their ethnic leaders.
Anxiety and confusion about what will happen after the foreign forces leave permeates every aspect of society. Political debate about an Afghanistan post-2014 is getting more vocal. Some political leaders threaten to take up arms while others preach progress, development and peace. Young Afghans with money and connections are trying to flee the country before 2014.
There also is mounting uncertainty about the upcoming transfer of power. At the same time foreign troops are scheduled to complete their withdrawal in 2014, Afghans will go to the polls to elect a successor to President Hamid Karzai, who is barred by the constitution from running for a third term.
The Afghan people already view their government as weak and corrupt, and those doubtful of a peaceful future say that if the upcoming presidential election is rigged and yields an illegitimate leader, civil war could erupt between ethnic groups backed by neighboring countries trying to influence Afghanistan's future.
"Unfortunately in Afghanistan, we do not have any political unity," said Gen. Sayed Hussain Anwari, a former governor of Kabul and Herat provinces who led fighters during the civil war.
Speaking in emotional, rapid-fire sentences at his home in Kabul, Anwari says that the Taliban have a right to participate in the political process.
"But if the scenario changes and they come to power by force, there will be groups that won't go with the Taliban and the fighting will continue," he said.
Ghairat Baheer offers an even gloomier prediction. He is a representative and son-in-law of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a key civil war leader in the 1990s whose fighters attack foreign troops today. He warns that the current Afghan government will collapse with the international troop withdrawal and says civil war is likely without a peace agreement.
"The realties are that the government is not sustainable," he said in a telephone interview. "Anti-Americanism and anti-western sentiment (are) increasing daily in Afghanistan and the resistance is spreading day-by-day across the country."
Fahim Dashti was with Ahmad Shah Massoud, the charismatic Tajik leader who commanded the Northern Alliance of minority groups, when he was fatally wounded by two terrorists posing as journalists two days before the Sept. 11 attacks. Dashti's face and hands were burned when one of the journalists blew himself up as the interview began. Even now, Dashti's hands are not strong enough to twist the cap off a bottle of water.
Despite his experience, Dashti, who now directs the National Journalists' Union in Afghanistan, doesn't think his country is headed toward a civil war.
"I do share the concerns of the people, no doubt. ... "There is no one-man solution," he said, adding that a team of leaders from all ethnic factions needs to be assembled to lead the nation forward.
Gen. Majid Rouzi, who also commanded fighters in the civil war and is now an adviser at the Afghan Interior Ministry, agrees.
"Nobody has any justification for rearming," he said, sitting cross-legged on a rug in his home in Kabul. "The Taliban coming again? It is not possible. A factional war is not coming."
However, Gen. Sahki Dad Ghafel, who led 1,500 troops fighting under Hazara commander Abdul Ali Mazari during the civil war, says civil strife is inevitable unless a peace can be reached with the Taliban before 2014. And he's not optimistic that the Taliban will renounce violence, moderate their hardline ways and participate in the political process.
"Maybe if there is a deal between America, Pakistan and the Taliban, the Taliban might come with the tie instead of the turban," Ghafel, a round-faced military man with a small black mustache, said snacking on green grapes and melon in his office. "If the foreign troops leave, there will not be a good result. I am not confident about the future. I'm not optimistic."
Karzai has called for national unity and has tried to reassure his people that Afghanistan will not collapse when the troops leave.
"If the foreigners are not here, we are nothing?" he asked sarcastically at a news conference last week: "We were not a nation before NATO and the Americans came?"
Karzai claims there has been a decline in violence in areas where Afghan troops are taking over from U.S. and NATO forces and that Afghan policemen and soldiers will be strong enough to provide security in the future. He blames the media for scaring Afghans into thinking they have no future once the international coalition leaves. Those who share Karzai's optimism argue that despite reports of drug use and unprofessionalism, Afghan security forces -- now 352,000 strong -- will be capable of securing the nation by international troops leave.
Coalition officials claim they have battered the Taliban and that while they are capable of staging suicide bombings and insider attacks, the insurgents cannot defeat the Afghan forces on the battlefield. They contend that keeping up the pressure on insurgents will push Taliban leaders to the negotiating table and that the international community's pledge to bankroll the Afghan army and police force in coming years will support the Afghan government as it works to provide better governance.
The more pessimistic view is that the Afghan forces won't be up to the task.
The joint international and Afghan force is fighting a losing battle, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement marking the 11th anniversary of the start of the war. Mujahid claims the Taliban have infiltrated the Afghan forces and are responsible for the rash of insider attacks that have left more than 50 U.S. and NATO forces dead at the hands of their would-be Afghan partners so far this year.
"Right now, the foreigners are in a position where they are just trying to escape," Mujahid said.
Afghanistan war, 11 years on: What more can and should the US military do?
Though the work of US troops has become increasingly deadly in the Afghanistan war, many analysts warn that it has not been increasingly effective.
Christian Science Monitor By Anna Mulrine, Staff writer October 7, 2012
It is officially the longest-running war in American history, and its end is in sight: President Obama has promised to pull all US combat troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
That date, however, is two years away, and in the meantime, some analysts wonder what more the US military can and should do in the country.
Incidents of “green on blue” insider attacks, by Afghan security forces against the US and NATO soldiers training them, now account for more than 20 percent of those killed in action.
Indeed, the pace of deaths for US troops has accelerated since the surge of 33,000 forces that Mr. Obama ordered into Afghanistan began in 2010.
In particular, it took nine years of fighting in Afghanistan before 1,000 US troops were killed. But the second 1,000 US troop deaths have come in the past two years. Last month in the Afghanistan war, America reached the grim 2,000-US-troops-killed-in-action milestone. On Saturday, two more US troops were killed by insurgents in eastern Afghanistan.
Though the work of US troops has become increasingly deadly, many analysts warn that it has not been increasingly effective.
Pentagon officials point to the 300,000-plus Afghan security forces that have been trained as a result of NATO efforts. But the attrition rates remain high, and these soldiers and police continue to struggle against the network of an estimated 30,000 to 35,000 insurgents – despite the fact that they outnumber them roughly 10 to 1.
Some 5,000 Afghans are now enrolled in the national “reintegration” program that provides job training and cash to former Taliban fighters who have agreed to put down their arms. Though it has “potential,” this program “is not yet a game-changer,” Lt. Gen. Adrian Bradshaw, the No. 2 commander in Afghanistan, acknowledges.
In the meantime, the 68,000 US troops that remain in Afghanistan continue to do much of the heavy lifting, in the form of patrols and even the logistics systems that feed, equip, and maintain the Afghan forces.
In roughly half of the war, the focus has ostensibly been on training these Afghan forces. But with the spate of insider attacks, US troops have been forced to implement “guardian angel” programs.
Bradshaw emphasizes that these programs are discreet. “You know, whoever's got the responsibility to keep an eye on their mates while they're taking exercise or playing sport or relaxing in between operations, whoever has that task just tactfully stays on one side,” he says. “Clearly they have a weapon and they're ready to use it if necessary, but they're not constantly in people's faces. It's done in a tactful and sensible manner.”
Still, the insider attacks, casualties, and persistent corruption throughout the Afghan government after a decade-plus of war make some wonder whether the war effort continues to be worth the cost.
“The administration’s strategy at this point is that they are relying on a negotiated settlement, and what the fighting is doing is determining the terms of that settlement,” says Stephen Biddle, professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University.
Some might argue that “the right thing to do is sticking it out and suffering the casualties we will suffer until 2014,” he adds.
But whether that is indeed the right thing to do, he says, hinges on, “how much can you shift the terms of a prospective settlement in your favor while you continue to fight?”
Right now, it’s increasingly hard to answer that question. “We’re doing a variety of things that even as we continue to fight are moving the settlement terms in the wrong direction,” Dr. Biddle says.
The ability to sustain any settlement will be another key indicator of the success of the war – and it is dependent on Afghan government reform, he adds.
That’s because any settlement is likely to legalize the Taliban as a political party. If Afghan leaders continue to allow what Biddle calls “an increasingly predatory government,” then the Taliban’s foothold in the government will grow.
Busy with fighting and training, the US has “significantly reduced” its government reform efforts. In fact, the insider attacks that US forces are enduring could be “the tip of a larger iceberg” related to this corruption, Biddle argues.
While the US military has painted the attacks as largely rooted in cultural conflict and has vowed to redouble cultural training efforts for US troops, a more effective means of addressing the problem is government reform, Biddle says.
Afghan fighters see that their commanders do not have their best interests at heart, he argues, because many of them are political appointees – given their job by higher-ups in government, often with a wink and a nod, to protect large payoff networks that are often making the government officials, as well as the commanders, rich.
Afghan troops see this and lose their will to fight. In turn, US troops are “disdainful” of this lack of will to fight. “All of these American 19-year-olds have been taught that the one thing that is least praiseworthy and least respectable is lack of courage under fire – and they are training and living with people who they believe lack that,” Biddle explains.
“The result is that there’s a serious danger that what you get is systematic disrespect,” he says. “There’s reason to believe that lots of Afghans feel they are seriously disrespected, and I think you end up in a situation where mutual disdain builds.”
Bomb Kills 2 At Afghan Intelligence Office
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Police say a car bomb has killed at least two Afghan intelligence officers in the south of the country.
Helmand Province police spokesman Fareed Ahmed said the explosives had been hidden in a vehicle parked outside an office of the National Directorate of Security in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah.
Ahmed said the bomb went off after noon on October 8, wounding another three intelligence officers and four civilians.
Helmand, considered a Taliban stronghold, was the site of major NATO and Afghan military operations in 2009 and 2010.
Based on reporting by AP and AFP
Afghanistan Deadline Awaits Next U.S. President
NPR By Tom Bowman October 7, 2012
How does a president bring the war in Afghanistan to an end? There are 68,000 American troops serving in the country as the war enters its 12th year.
The war hasn't been a major issue in the presidential campaign, and polls show American voters are tiring of the war. But the next commander in chief will find the Afghan war among the most difficult of many foreign policy challenges.
Both President Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney appear to agree on a date: the last day of December 2014. That's when the Afghan security forces are scheduled to takeover.
"As our coalition agreed, by the end of 2014, the Afghans will be fully responsible for the security of their country," Obama said at an American base in Afghanistan back in May.
That's what the NATO coalition approved. Romney picked up on that when he addressed the National Guard Association in September.
"Or goal should be to complete a successful transition to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014," he said.
It's All In The Wording
But there's a subtle difference in the candidates' messages. Obama, like fellow NATO leaders, sounds definitive. He says the Afghans "will be fully responsible" by the end of 2014. Romney says it's a "goal" to turn over security to Afghan forces by that time.
Romney says he wants to listen to American military commanders in Afghanistan first, and then determine the way ahead.
"We should evaluate conditions on the ground and solicit the best advice of our military commanders," he said at the National Guard convention. "We can all agree that our men and women in the field deserve a clear mission, that they deserved the resources and resolute leadership they need to complete that mission, and that they deserve a country that will provide for their needs when they come home."
Romney's campaign website offers a little more information. The governor says he will "review the transition to the Afghan military." That assessment, plus conditions on the ground, Romney says, will determine the level of troops and money needed to "secure our gains and to train Afghan forces."
Which brings up another challenge for the candidates: How many American troops will remain after 2014?
'We're Not Going Anyplace'
Obama says that while the U.S. combat mission will end in December 2014, not all American troops will be coming home. The president signed a 10-year strategic partnership agreement with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in May, which says the U.S. will help target al-Qaida and train Afghan troops.
In his speech in Afghanistan in May, Obama described that agreement.
"We'll work with the Afghans to determine what support they need to accomplish two narrow security missions beyond 2014: counterterrorism and continued training," he said.
Right after the agreement was signed, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said, "The most important point is that we're not going anyplace."
"We have an enduring presence that will be in Afghanistan. We'll continue to work with them on counterterrorism," Panetta said. "We'll continue to provide training assistance and guidance, we'll continue to provide support."
Romney advisers say the governor also wants an "enduring presence" in Afghanistan, but he hasn't been as specific about what that presence will look like. Military commanders, for their part, are considering 10,000 or more troops.
Whoever becomes president will have to resolve how many U.S. troops will be needed in Afghanistan for the training and counterterror mission well into the future.
NZ mulling help for Afghan interpreters after withdrawal
WELLINGTON, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- The New Zealand government is considering how it can help Afghan interpreters who have been working with New Zealand troops as the country prepares to pull out of Afghanistan, Radio New Zealand reported Monday.
Radio New Zealand's correspondent in Afghanistan reported that about two dozen translators were worried about their safety when the New Zealand soldiers with the Provincial Reconstruction Team withdraw from Bamyan province next year.
They feared they could be in danger of execution if captured by the Taliban because of their work supporting foreign troops, said the report.
Prime Minister John Key said the government was seeking advice on what risks they would face if they remained in Afghanistan.
"They've worked for New Zealand with New Zealand's best interests at heart, and it's at least feasible that there is some risk to them if they remain in Afghanistan. Now we need to tease and test all of that out -- I can at least understand the case they're making," the report quoted Key as saying.
Key said the government was getting advice on the option of assistance with settlement in New Zealand.
Key's comments followed a call from the main opposition Labour Party to offer the interpreters a chance to resettle in New Zealand.
Labour foreign affairs spokesperson Phil Goff said New Zealand had an ethical and moral obligation to look after the interpreters and their families.
"They have been integral to our operation in Afghanistan. We can't use them and then abandon them," Goff said in the statement.
"It's worth noting that Canada is running a special program offering Afghani interpreters who have worked with their soldiers and diplomats a new home in Canada in recognition of their service, " he said.
"I call on our government to follow that example," said Goff.
New Zealand forces are scheduled to leave Afghanistan in April next year.
Report: Afghanistan Headed For Crisis
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
A new report is warning that Afghanistan is moving toward a potentially devastating political crisis as NATO-led combat forces withdraw and the Afghan government prepares to take control of security responsibilities in 2014.
The report -- titled “Afghanistan: The Long, Hard Road to the 2014 Transition” -- was prepared by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG), which describes itself as an independent nongovernmental organization committed to preventing deadly conflicts.
Candace Rondeaux, senior Afghanistan analyst for the organization, is quoted as saying there is “a real risk” that the U.S.-backed Afghan government “could collapse upon NATO's withdrawal in 2014.”
Rondeaux added: “The Afghan army and police are overwhelmed and underprepared for the transition.”
The report says Afghan stability is further threatened by the government’s failure so far to prepare for fair elections in the future.
The report was released on the 11th anniversary of the start of the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban regime.
The Taliban on October 7 marked the anniversary by ridiculing U.S. and NATO-led forces and vowing that foreign troops will leave Afghanistan in defeat.
In a statement, the militia said foreign forces "are fleeing Afghanistan with such humiliation and disgrace that they are struggling to provide an explanation."
The United States started its campaign in Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, ousting the Taliban from power as it hunted for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who was accused of masterminding the September 11, 2001 attacks in America that killed nearly 3,000 people.
Credibility Suffered
U.S.-led coalition officials say that while Taliban insurgents remain capable of mounting suicide bombings and other attacks, the militants will not have the strength to defeat Western-trained Afghan forces once foreign troops withdraw by the end of 2014.
Coalition officials argue that continued international funding and support for Afghan forces and the Afghan government will eventually compel the Taliban to enter negotiations on a settlement of the conflict.
It its report, the International Crisis Group says that in addition to Afghan security shortcomings, the Afghan government’s credibility has not recovered since what it described as the “fraudulent and chaotic” presidential and parliamentary polls of 2009 and 2010.
The report contains harsh criticism of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
Analyst Rondeaux is quoted: “Karzai seems more interested in perpetuating his own power by any means rather than ensuring credibility of the political system and long-term stability in the country.”
The report warns that if Afghanistan’s next elections are marred by fraud allegations, the credibility of the authorities will be cast into even deeper doubt, and more Afghans will look for alternatives.
The report urges Afghan officials to set a date for the next presidential election as soon as possible and to resolve questions on which commissions and courts have authority over the polls.
It warns that unless a clear map for political transition is put forward, there is a risk that Karzai and other leading members of the elite could enter a political competition that could turn increasingly violent after NATO troops withdraw.
With reporting by AP and dpa
Outgoing ICRC Chief Says Conflict For Afghan Civilians Is At Worst
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
The outgoing head of the delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Afghanistan, Reto Stocker, has said the conflict in the country has taken a turn for the worse for ordinary Afghans.
Stocker said in a statement that during his seven-year work in that country, local armed groups have proliferated and civilians have been caught in multiple front lines.
"It has become increasingly difficult for ordinary Afghans to obtain health care," Stocker said.
The ICRC has been working in Afghanistan since 1979.
The country is the site of the organization's largest humanitarian operation, with more than 1,800 staff members.
The ICRC statement follows a report by the International Crisis Group on October 7 warning that Afghanistan is moving toward a potentially devastating political crisis as NATO-led combat forces withdraw and the Afghan government prepares to take control of security responsibilities in 2014.
With reporting by dpa and RFE/RL
Afghan cleric offers cash for death of film producer
AFP 08/10/2012
KABUL - An Afghan cleric has offered rewards totalling $400,000 for anyone killing the producer of a US-made anti-Islam film and a French cartoonist who drew caricatures of the Muslim prophet Mohammed (PBUH).
“I have offered $300,000 to anyone who kills the anti-Islam film producer and $100,000 for killing the French cartoonist,” Mir Faroq Husaini, a prominent cleric in the western province of Herat, told AFP Sunday.
Husaini said he had first announced the reward during a sermon on Friday in a large mosque in the city.
“I will sell all my properties, including my lands in Herat, to collect the money,” he said.
Afghanistan is a devoutly Muslim nation and perceived insults to religion are taken seriously, often with violent consequences.
The “Innocence of Muslims”, a crudely made film that mocks Islam, triggered violent protests in at least 20 countries including Afghanistan after excerpts were posted online last month.
Immediately after the film gained notoriety, French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo published cartoons caricaturing the Muslim prophet Mohammad (PBUH).
A Pakistani government minister last month placed a $100,000 bounty on the head of the maker of the film.
NATO resumes training of Afghan police recruits
The Washington Times By Kristina Wong Sunday, October 7, 2012
Special operations forces in Afghanistan have resumed training Afghan Local Police recruits after a suspension last month in response to two insider attacks by recruits on their international coalition trainers in August, U.S. officials say.
So far, more than half of the 16,000-member police force has been re-vetted and less than 1 percent have been removed, a special operations spokesman said.
Between now and mid-November, 14 villages will be added to the 70-plus that are guarded by the elite police forces that provide security for their own villages.
U.S. officials at first praised the Afghan Local Police training program for insulation from insider attacks, but training was suspended Sept. 2 after five special operators were killed in two such attacks. In one attack, a local police officer invited three Marines to his home for dinner and shot them at point-blank range.
Since then, coalition reports indicate, detection of the infiltrators is improving.
When a man showed up at a local police site in early September, other members identified him as a Taliban insurgent, the spokesman said.
Under questioning, the man revealed he was sent by a local Taliban leader to kill the local police commander and any coalition forces. He admitted that he tried to infiltrate a nearby site but found it too difficult.
Within the past month, coalition forces have arrested at least three Taliban insurgents and killed at least one seeking to infiltrate or plan more attacks — a promising sign that the U.S.-led coalition is learning how to reduce these attacks.
“It is too early to say that we are seeing a turning point,” said Army Maj. Adam Wojack, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). “Clearly, ISAF is focused on preventing insider attacks and have made it a higher priority in light of recent events. This may explain some of our recent success in stopping or preventing some potential attacks.”
Coalition troops have stepped up efforts to prevent and track down infiltrators, including the use of an eight-step vetting process, additional cultural awareness training, close-quarter and active-shooter training, the creation of safe zones on Afghan security force compounds, and having “guardian angel” troops keep watch for attempted attacks. NATO is updating a tactical directive issued in March, Maj. Wojack said.
U.S. officials have gone from describing insider attacks as isolated incidents that resulted from personal grievances to acknowledging that as many as a quarter of the attacks were carried out by Taliban insurgents or sympathizers.
Afghan officials always have thought that the majority of these attacks were because of Taliban infiltration, Afghan Deputy Foreign Minister H. E. Ludin told reporters during a visit to Washington last week.
“This is really in the last two to three years when we had to go out and do a very large-scale recruitment because we had to really meet the targets, the recruitment targets set for us by the transition process,” he said.
“I suppose what happened in that process is that we perhaps overlooked some of the crucial screening requirements and, as a result, the enemy used that as an opportunity to infiltrate.”
About 70 percent of all coalition and Afghan troop deaths from insider attacks since 2007 have occurred in the past two years, according to ISAF statistics obtained by The Washington Times.
The nation’s top officer, Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, recently visited Afghanistan in an unannounced trip for the second time in two months to address the topic with his Afghan counterparts.
“I can tell you without hesitation they are taking this as seriously as we are and taking active measures to help us and them defeat this threat,” Gen. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters on the day after he returned. “So I came back with a renewed sense that we can lower the risk of the insider threat.”
Afghan officials have appointed a top-level army officer to reduce insider attacks, increased the number of counterintelligence agents, directed cultural and religious officers to help NATO train Afghan troops, set up a threat-mitigation team with NATO, and undertaken a “wholesale review of all recruitments” in recent years.
In addition, the Afghan government has allowed NATO personnel working on the presidential compound in Kabul to arm themselves — one example of the Afghan commitment in helping to stem these attacks, a coalition spokesman said.
However, the move also indicates that coalition personnel are not safe anywhere, even in the most secure of compounds in one of the most secure cities in Afghanistan.
The international coalition aims to remove all combat troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, when Afghan forces will assume full responsibility for the security of their country.
Interview: Trade Can Cure Afghan Opium Addiction
October 8, 2012 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Afghanistan's drug business poses a threat to the entire Central Asian region. But more regional trade, not just tighter borders, could help solve the problem. UN Office of Drug Control (UNODC) Executive Director Yury Fedotov tells why in an interview with RFE/RL correspondent Charles Recknagel.
RFE/RL: Your agency says Afghan farmers are planting more opium poppy because prices are particularly high after plant diseases wiped out much of the opium crop in 2012. This suggests that rolling back drug production in Afghanistan is not just a question of eradicating poppy fields, but that it also is necessary to give famers incentives to plant alternative crops. You believe that one such incentive would be to boost regional trade, so farmers would have a bigger market for their agricultural products. How so?
Yury Fedotov: One of the most important and topical [objectives] is not only to continue this campaign of eradication, which by the way is quite successful. The Ministry of Counternarcotics and the counternarcotics police of Afghanistan succeeded in eradicating 11,000 hectares this year, which is a huge increase, a 173 percent increase, compared to the previous year. But, of course, that is still less than 10 percent of the overall area under the cultivation of opium poppies in Afghanistan.
But that is not enough. These programs have to be supported by alternative livelihood projects which would give the farmers of Afghanistan more predictable licit activities. That is possible only through more broad international and regional cooperation including trade, exchanges, programs which basically would lead to generating more jobs, more markets for the realization of products produced by farmers in Afghanistan.
RFE/RL: Are Afghan farmers, in fact, seeking such opportunities?
Fedotov: When I travel to the region, when I meet with leaders in Afghanistan, not only government officials in Kabul but also governors in different provinces in Afghanistan, they are very interested in opening more border crossings with neighboring countries to ensure that their famers could export their production, vegetables, including dry fruits but also wheat, and be involved in this trade and economic cooperation in the region more visibly. And that would help at least to develop alternative livelihoods in the neighboring provinces of Afghanistan.
An important part of the GDP of Afghanistan is being generated by illicit drug money, laundered money from illicit drug trafficking, and that would be from 10 to 30 percent of GDP. Otherwise, the country lives on support and economic assistance, financial assistance, from the international community. So, this has to be changed, of course. And that is why these alternative livelihood projects are important not only from the point of view of counternarcotics but also for establishing the foundation for the sustainable economic and social development of Afghanistan.
RFE/RL: At this moment, neighboring states appear more focused on trying to close their borders to drug trafficking than opening them for regional trade. Do neighboring states -- which worry so much about the drug trade increasing after foreign troops leave Afghanistan in 2014 -- view regional trade as a way to help Afghan farmers out of the drug business?
Fedotov: The current level of understanding is not enough and we need to develop this sense of shared responsibility within the region.
RFE/RL: What are the stakes for Central Asia if more effective ways to reduce the drug business in Afghanistan are not found?
Fedotov: The drug trafficking generates instability, insecurity, feeds crime, corruption, all sorts of violations of law, and may have a negative impact on the stability in the whole region of Central Asia. And the health issue is not one of the last concerns. It is true, and it has been proven true in many regions, including in this region, when not only the country of origin like Afghanistan but also Iran and Pakistan, which are countries of transit, are affected by a high level of drug dependency. There are more and more drug users, heroin and opium, in Central Asia.
To some extent, the governments of these countries were more or less relaxed. They believed that, of course, there are drug-dependent people but they are not in such proportions that it could shake the foundations of the society. But now this is being changed and we have requests from some governments in Central Asia to increase our support, support provided from UNODC in terms of drug prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation. They are concerned that they, too, may be affected by this danger of drug dependency which is spread out from Afghanistan to other countries.
The big three who can help save Afghanistan
As its forces withdraw, Nato should not be afraid to seek help from Russia, India and Iran, says Shashank Joshi
Telegraph.co.uk By Shashank Joshi 08 Oct 2012
Exactly 11 years ago, with the wounds of 9/11 still fresh, the United States and Britain invaded Afghanistan. They arrived in anger, collected allies along the way, and grew in ambition. Today that anger has faded, those allies depleted, and their ambition exhausted. The campaign is already the longest in American history, far surpassing the Revolutionary and Vietnam wars.
Though combat forces are not due to depart for another two years, there is a palpable sense of counting down the clock. Last month, for instance, Nato stopped training Afghan Local Police and abandoned routine joint patrols below battalion level. Why? Because it is hard enough to face a decade-long trickle of casualties at the hands of a shadowy enemy with safe havens in Pakistan, but it’s particularly dispiriting to be shot by your own side.
So far this year, 51 Nato troops have been killed at the hands of their Afghan allies, in so-called “green on blue” attacks (compared to 35 last year). A quarter of Britain’s casualties and more than a tenth of Nato’s have come in this way over the past 10 months. The evaporation of trust in Afghan colleagues cuts at the heart of the war strategy, which was to turn the Afghan National Security Forces into a bulwark against the Taliban.
There is plenty of blame to go round, although the Afghan government must take the greatest share of responsibility. Some of its officials appear to have preferred to stuff their pockets rather than reform. Around $8 billion in cash was smuggled out of the country last year. When Western diplomats talk about Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, the language often resembles that surrounding earlier generations of feckless and ill-fated American clients, such as Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam or Chiang Kai-shek of the Chinese Nationalists. Diplomats whisper that Karzai is paranoid and impulsive. But even when he goes, as he must in 2014, the state he bequeaths to his successor will be a predatory and over-centralised mess.
Afghanistan’s army will cost around $8 billion annually, but where will this money come from? Sixty-nine per cent of Americans surveyed in March thought the United States should not be at war in Afghanistan at all. Another poll this month showed that 49 per cent wanted immediate withdrawal. European states are mired in their own economic troubles.
There is no easy solution, but Nato should not be afraid to ask for help. In the Nineties, as the Taliban tore through Afghanistan, a trio of regional powers – India, Iran and Russia – backed the Taliban’s adversaries, the Northern Alliance. This is an admittedly curious set of countries. For years, Washington tried to dissuade India from getting involved for fear of provoking Pakistan. Iran, despite its antipathy to the Taliban, was alleged to have provided rockets and training to the insurgents. Nato ties with Russia are also strained, despite Barack Obama’s attempted “reset” with Moscow. And yet, this trio ultimately has a fundamental interest in a stable Afghanistan and weakened Taliban.
India has a $2 billion aid programme in Afghanistan. Last year, Delhi and Kabul also signed a strategic partnership: Afghan officers are training in India and there are plans for the transfer of military equipment. That’s the sort of assistance that war-weary Britain should welcome.
Iran might seem a bizarre ally. But in 2001, members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps – the same outfit abetting the Syrian regime’s repression – worked with the CIA and American special forces against the Taliban. Remarkably, Iranian officials were even open to working under US command to train Afghans. As for Russia, it has 6,000 soldiers next door in Tajikistan, and played a key role in allowing Nato forces to fuel and arm themselves after Pakistan shut off supply routes last year. Moscow has no wish to see the resurgence of fundamentalist forces on its southern flank.
Working with these countries should not diminish our commitment to talking to the Taliban about a political settlement. We should also strive to give Afghan provinces more freedom from Kabul’s interference. Meanwhile, it is important than the Afghan army does not collapse. If we don’t co-operate with like-minded countries, they will opt to work with their favourite ethnic and factional militias, which would worsen Afghanistan’s own divisions.
The war in Afghanistan may not be lost, but it is certainly not being won. In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev lamented that “a million of our soldiers went through Afghanistan, and we will not be able to explain to our people why we did not complete it. We suffered such heavy losses! And what for?” The Soviet Union lost nearly five times as many men as Nato, in a shorter period. Yet Gorbachev’s sense of disillusion is recognisable today.
Privately, British officials are thinking about pulling out British forces much more quickly than planned. But shock therapy is not the answer. The stability of Afghanistan still matters, not just for the sake of Afghans but also because a renewed civil war would catalyse extremism in the region. Nato can no longer be choosy about its allies. Damage limitation is the order of the day.
Former film-maker helps drug addicts rejoin Afghan society
by Farid Behbud, Chen Xin
KABUL, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- Laila Haidari, a former Afghan film- maker, never thought that she would end up helping drug addicts rejoin society in the world's largest producer of opium.
"Originally I was a film-maker and I came to Kabul to take part in a film festival one year ago but as I saw several dozens of young drug-addicts disheveled and physically too weak to walk, I changed my mind and I decided to stay here and help them out," Haidari, an Iranian-born Afghan woman, said in an interview with Xinhua.
Despite lack of resources, Haidari set up a rehabilitation center and a restaurant to support it in west part of Kabul in autumn 2011.
"My first idea was to find resources to rent a house as a rehabilitation center for addicts but it was not an easy task since no one wanted his house to be used for drug users' treatment, but finally, I succeeded in establishing the center," she said.
Haidari recounted that with the help of a friend, she was able to provide accommodation and food for the addicts.
"Months later, with the income from my restaurant, we became self-reliant," Haidari said, adding that she never received any funding from government or aid agencies up to now.
The center that she named "Mother Camp" is located in Dasht-i- Barchi neighborhood, a populated area in Kabul.
More than one million Afghans aged 15 to 64 are drug dependents throughout the country, according to officials.
Studies show that drug addiction in Afghanistan is often the result of poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, trauma from continuing conflicts, migration, and illusions about the calming effects of drugs.
"It was the maternal instinct that encouraged me to help those drug dependents that I saw living miserable lives under the bridge of a small river known as Pul-i-Sokhta in western Kabul," Haidari said.
She said that the addicts have been rejected by everyone in society and have been treated as outcasts.
Afghanistan, which is being ravaged by Taliban-led insurgency, produces about 90 percent of the world's opium, the raw material used in manufacturing heroin, according to officials.
"As soon as the center was ready, I quickly took some addicts and gave them food and shelter. It was a heartbreaking scene for me because some of the addicts never thought that a woman like me could help them," Haidari said.
She said up to 400 drug dependents have been treated at her center over the past year.
"Right now, there are 27 men, four women and four children who are drug dependents receiving medical treatment in the camp," Haidari said.
"They are not physically disabled. If we provide them with medical care, help them stop using drugs and give them jobs, they could rejoin society," she added.
"I never thought that one day I would be able to stop my dependence on drugs or even become financially self-reliant after that," Ali, 36, told Xinhua.
Ali gratefully thanked Haidari for her extraordinary efforts and compassion to save the lives of hundreds of people who were facing a slow death because of drug addiction.
Officials said that it is hard to stop the spread of addictive drugs because revenues from drugs are being channeled to fund the operations of insurgents in the country.
Despite steadfast international and domestic efforts to curb drug production, the campaign has so far failed to achieve concrete results.
Senators Seek Action on Death Row Afghans in Iran
TOLOnews.com By Saleha Soadat Sunday, 07 October 2012
Afghanistan's senators on Sunday criticised the government for not doing enough to monitor the situation of 2,000 Afghan prisoners sentenced to death in Iran.
The senators were shown documents that Iranian courts have sentenced nearly 2,000 Afghan citizens to death, accused of various crimes particularly drug trafficking.
"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should review this clearly and find out the reasons for the Afghan executions. The foreign relations commission of the Senate should also follow this up," head of the Senate Fazel Hadi Muslimyar said.
"According to this list, there are 5,000 Afghan prisoners in Iran, 2,000 of whom are sentenced to death. The Afghan government should prevent them from being executed," Senator Saleha Mirzad said.
According to several other senators including Senator Dawood Asas, Iran had issued a warning prior to the approval of the Afghanistan-US strategic pact that it would execute all the Afghan prisoners on death row if the deal was approved by the Afghan parliament.
"I was present at the meeting between the Afghan head of Senate and former Iranian ambassador to Afghanistan where he [Iranian Ambassador] warned that his country would hang all the prisoners sentenced to death," Asas said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs deputy spokesman Faramarz Tamana said he was aware of the report shown to the Senate but had not seen it himself.
He said that the Iranian government should coordinate with Afghan government in all its actions against any Afghan citizens.
"We haven't received such a report yet, but we want the Iranian government to consider its laws and actions against all the Afghan refugees in close collaboration with Afghan government," Tamana said.
This comes after a different report was recently released by an Iranian justice non-government organisation accusing government officials of abusing Afghan refugees.
"Afghans are limited to living in only a few provinces: if they go to other parts of Iran, their living permit will be illegal," CEO of Justice for Iran Shadi Sadr said.
There are around 2.4 m Afghan refugees living in some parts of Iran under restricted movement, according to the Justice for Iran group.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com