[Afghan News] February 4, 2013

[یاسمینه]

Afghan, Pakistani Leaders Meet in UK
VOA News February 4, 2013
British Prime Minister David Cameron is hosting talks between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari in London Monday.

It is the third meeting of the three leaders since they started a series of summits last July in Kabul, followed by New York in September. But, the London summit is the first to involve senior military and intelligence officials of Afghanistan and Pakistan in addition to the political leaders.

Britain wants the two neighbors to work together to promote regional stability as it prepares to withdraw thousands of troops from Afghanistan by the end of next year. The British troops have been fighting a years-long Taliban insurgency as part of a NATO mission aimed at helping Afghan security forces take security control of their country.

Afghan President Karzai told British media Sunday that security in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province was better before the arrival of British and U.S. troops in 2006, and questioned whether international forces are fighting in the wrong place. He says that Afghans just want to rebuild their country and are not concerned with whether the West considers its mission there a success or failure.

Afghan presidential spokesman Aimal Faizi told VOA that the Afghan and Pakistani military and intelligence officials met informally on Sunday ahead of the summit. Faizi says summit participants will discuss how to promote a fledgling Afghan peace process in which President Karzai has proposed holding talks with Taliban militants to end the insurgency.

Faizi says Afghanistan wants to ensure that Pakistan plays a constructive role in the peace process. Kabul has long accused Islamabad of providing a safe haven to Taliban fighters who cross into Afghanistan to carry out attacks. Pakistan denies the charge.

Pakistan freed about 20 Taliban prisoners in recent months to enable them to represent the Islamist group in negotiations. An Afghan High Peace Council created by Mr. Karzai had requested the prisoner releases. But, the whereabouts of some of those former prisoners is unknown.

The Taliban has been trying to set up an office in Qatar to provide an address from which to conduct peace talks. Mr. Karzai's spokesman said Afghanistan will not deal with such an office if the Taliban uses it for anything other than negotiations, or if it comes under the influence of "any other country." He said any groups involved in peace talks with the Afghan government also must respect the Afghan constitution.


Hamid Karzai: security in Afghanistan was better before British troops arrived
Afghan president Hamid Karzai has said that security was better in southern Helmand before the arrival of British troops and questioned whether international forces had been fighting in the right part of the country for the past 10 years.
Telegraph.co.uk 03 Feb 2013
Mr Karzai, who has led the country since 2001, also said he was not sure if western forces were pulling out because they had realised the mission was a mistake, or if they believed they had successfully broken up the country's terrorist groups.

"They feel fulfilled with regard to the objective of fighting terrorism and weakening al-Qaeda, or they feel that they were fighting in the wrong place in the first place, so they should discontinue doing that and leave," Mr Karzai said in an interview with the Guardian and ITN before a summit with David Cameron and the Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari.

Mr Karzai said he felt Helmand had been more peaceful before the arrival of British and US troops in 2006, but that he did not blame the international forces for the security problems. He said Afghans were not concerned about whether the west believed their mission had failed and just wanted to rebuild their country after three decades of unrest.

"Whatever happened was the past and now we are looking forward," he said.

He is expected to use the summit hosted by Mr Cameron to press Pakistan to release more Taliban prisoners, including a former second in command, to encourage a peace deal.

The Afghan president dined last night with Asif Ali Zardari, his Pakistani counterpart, at Chequers, the Prime Minister's country residence, before talks today.

Britain hopes that closer ties between them will help the search for a settlement with the Taliban, as Nato combat troops prepare to leave Afghanistan next year.

The Taliban's high command is based in Pakistan and factions of that country's security forces are accused of supporting the insurgency in Afghanistan. Relations between Kabul and Islamabad have thawed in recent months, but a peace process remains elusive.

Afghan sources said their delegation would again demand that Pakistan release high-ranking Taliban prisoners who Kabul believes are willing to help foster talks. Top of the list is Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was second in command of the Taliban until 2010, when he is believed to have been arrested by Pakistan for secret overtures to Kabul.


Afghan, Pakistani leaders vow to reach Afghan settlement within six months
LONDON, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari promised here on Monday to exert efforts to reach a settlement for Afghanistan within six months.

All sides concerned should "take all necessary measures to achieve the goal of a peace settlement (on Afghanistan) over the next six months," said a statement released by British Prime Minister David Cameron's office following a trilateral meeting hosted by Britain.


Afghan Police Arrest Six Suspected Suicide Bombers
By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan February 4, 2013
Afghan police say they have arrested six men whom they accuse of planning to carry out suicide bombing attacks.

The Kabul deputy police chief, General Mohammad Daoud Amin, told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan that police seized six vests that could be used for suicide bombings, as well as some 50 grenades and guns, when the suspects were arrested in a raid in the capital Kabul on February 3.

Amin said investigators have not yet learned what targets the suspects may have been planning to attack.

An investigation has been launched into the identities of the men.


Hamid Karzai to press Pakistan to release more Taliban
Hamid Karzai will use a summit hosted by David Cameron to press Pakistan to release more Taliban prisoners – including the former second in command – and encourage influential clerics to back a peace settlement with the insurgents.
Telegraph.co.uk By Ben Farmer 03 Feb 2013
Kabul - The Afghan president is due to hold a day of talks with Asif Ali Zardari, his Pakistani counterpart, at Chequers on Monday.

Britain is pushing the meeting in the hope closer ties between the neighbours will help the search for a settlement with the Taliban, as Nato combat troops prepare to leave Afghanistan next year.

The Taliban's high command is based in Pakistan and factions of its security forces are accused of supporting the insurgency in Afghanistan.

Relations between Kabul and Islamabad have thawed in recent months, but a peace process remains elusive.

Afghan sources told The Daily Telegraph their delegation would again demand Pakistan release high-ranking Taliban prisoners who Kabul believes are willing to help foster talks.

Top of their list is Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was second in command of the Taliban until 2010, when Western and Afghan officials say he was he was arrested by Pakistan for making secret overtures to Kabul.

Several dozen prisoners are believed to have been freed since November, but they have since disappeared and have yet to join any peace process.

"We want closer monitoring of those who have been released so that they can play a constructive role and we can get in touch with them," said one Afghan official.

Kabul also wants Pakistan to revive stalled plans for a joint conference of Islamic religious leaders where clerics would declare backing for peace and underline their opposition to suicide bombing.

Afghan officials hope such backing would stem the flow of Taliban recruits from madrassas and villages in Pakistan's tribal belt. They claim mullahs in Pakistan incite holy war against the Afghan government and its Nato supporters.

The two countries agreed in November to hold the conference, but the plan has since stalled as the neighbours have differed on which clerics to invite.

Kabul will also accuse Islamabad of failing to honour a trade agreement and depriving Afghan merchants of free access to the port at Karachi and to India.

Police in Kabul meanwhile arrested six men and seized suicide vests, assault rifles and more than 50 hand grenades during a raid on a building in the capital.

Taliban bombs meanwhile killed five civilians, including a family of four, and two police officers over the weekend.

A mother, father and two daughters aged eight and nine – died along with their driver in Helmand province's Khan Neshin district when their vehicle hit a bomb on Saturday.

Two police officers were killed on the same day in a similar bomb as they were on patrol in Helmand's Musa Qala district.


Roadside bombings kill 6 Afghan civilians in 2 days
KABUL, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- The ongoing militancy and violent incidents which happened in the shape of roadside bombings have claimed the lives of six non-combatants in Taliban former stronghold the southern Kandahar and Helmand provinces since Saturday, officials confirmed.

In the latest violent incident, one civilian was killed and six others sustained injuries as a roadside bomb struck a civilian car in Taliban birthplace and former fiefdom, Kandahar province 450 km south of Kabul on Sunday, a local official confirmed Monday.

"A mine planted by anti-government militants on a road in Khakriz district struck a civilian car Sunday afternoon killing the driver and injuring six others, all women," district governor Abdul Hamid told Xinhua.

He said the gruesome incident took place when the women were going to attend a wedding party of their relative.

No group or individual has claimed responsibility for organizing the deadly roadside bombing. However, Hamid put the attack on the enemies of peace, a term used against Taliban militants.

A similar incident in Khanshin district of the neighboring Helmand province 555 km south of Afghan capital Kabul a day earlier on Saturday claimed the lives of five civilians, a local official asserted.

"Anti-government rebels organized a roadside bomb on a road in Khanshin district of Helmand province on Saturday evening which hit a vehicle killing five civilians including a woman, her husband, two children and the driver," district governor Shah Mahmoud Mir told Xinhua.

The official, however, blamed the enemies of peace, a reference to Taliban militants for organizing the attack. However, the outfit fighting the government largely relying on suicide and roadside bombings is yet to comment.

In conflict-ridden Afghanistan, civilians have mostly borne the brunt of conflict over the past three decades of instability.

More than 3,400 civilians lost their lives in conflicts in 2012 in Afghanistan, according to Afghan officials, while up to 3,021 civilians had been killed in 2011 in the militancy-plagued central Asian country, according to a report by United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).


Afghan author Partaw Naderi’s “Karzai-Najafi” story erupts rage
By Meena Haseeb - 04 Feb 2013, 11:38 am Khaama Press
Afghan attorney general officials confirmed they have issued arrest warrant for the Afghan author Partaw Naderi to Afghan security forces.

The officials further added the arrest warrant was issued after Partaw Naderi in one of his articles accused Afghanistan transportation and aviation minister in a political conspiracy.

A spokesman for the Afghan attorney general Basir Azizi told Radio Free Europe (RFE) transportation and aviation minister Daud Ali Najafi complained regarding the author’s article.

Mr. Azizi further added Partaw Naderi refused to clarify attorney general officials regarding his article about transportation and aviation minister and Afghan president Hamid Karzai, and denied the verbal requests of attorney general office.

Partaw Naderi published an article in a non-governmental newspaper around 7 months back under the title of “President Karzai’s talks and the story of Najafi”.

In the meantime Afghanistan transportation and aviation ministry spokesman Nangialai Qalatwal said Partaw Naderi in his article stated that Karzai was elected as Afghan president by Daud Ali Najafi.

Mr. Qalatwal further added that Mr. Najafi has called on attorney general to provide evidence and documents to prove his claims published in the article.

He said, “Is there any documents or evidence in this regard with Partaw Naderi or not and the minister has demanded to provide the documents to the concerned departments if there is any or such illegal remarks should be prevented if the author does not have any evidence. We have sent further letters to ministry of information and culture and other judiciary institutions in this regard.”

The author has not commented in this regard so far however the latest action by the attorney general has created concerns among the journalists rights activists in the country.


Pentagon Expects U.S. to Retain Presence in Afghanistan
New York Times By THOM SHANKER February 3, 2013
WASHINGTON - The Pentagon’s top civilian and military officials on Sunday expressed an expectation, even a desire, that American troops would remain in Afghanistan after the NATO mission ends in December 2014, although they emphasized that no decision had been made.

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta and Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the United States would sustain a strategic partnership with Afghanistan, and they cited a decision by the NATO heads of state during a summit meeting last year in President Obama’s hometown, Chicago, that long-term support for Kabul would include military assistance.

“In Chicago, we also said that we’re committing to an enduring presence,” Mr. Panetta said. “And I believe that the president of the United States is going to do everything possible to implement the Chicago agreements.”

During joint appearances on the NBC News program “Meet the Press” and the CNN program “State of the Union,” Mr. Panetta and General Dempsey sought to define and defend an 11-year-old mission in Afghanistan whose objectives have become fuzzy in the minds of many Americans. Mr. Obama is weighing how rapidly to withdraw the remaining troops and considering how many to propose leaving there after 2014.

In advance of the Washington visit last month by President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, some White House officials said one option would be to leave no troops behind, though some viewed those comments as a negotiating tactic. Kabul and Washington must agree on any American military presence after the conclusion of the NATO mandate.

Some sticking points remain, including a Defense Department demand that American service personnel receive immunity from prosecution in Afghanistan, with any misconduct to be adjudicated under the Pentagon’s Uniform Code of Military Justice, not Afghan law. The Departments of Defense and State also sought, but failed to secure, a similar agreement to leave a sizable training and advisory force in Iraq after the end of combat there.

“No one has ever suggested zero to me,” General Dempsey said, referring to the number of postwar troops in Afghanistan, although he stressed that “the decision on numbers hasn’t been made yet.”

Pressed to define the mission in Afghanistan, General Dempsey said it was “to establish a secure and capable Afghanistan that can govern itself and ensure that Al Qaeda never again establishes a safe haven in that country.” He argued that coalition forces have diminished the Taliban’s capabilities. “Violence has gone down,” he said. “We’re also developing an Afghan Army that has increased its operational skill to provide security.”

Mr. Panetta expressed confidence that President Obama’s choice to succeed him, former Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, would be a strong defense secretary, despite a bitterly partisan confirmation hearing last week in which Mr. Hagel stumbled over some answers. General Dempsey noted that several important security issues — like Afghanistan, where 66,000 American troops are at war — were nearly absent during a full day of Senate questioning of Mr. Hagel.

Mr. Panetta criticized the agenda pursued by some senators in their questioning of Mr. Hagel. He said, for example, that not enough attention had been paid to the Pentagon budget and what would happen if automatic budget cuts, called sequestration, go into effect as scheduled on March 1.

He said that if a fiscal deal was not reached to stop those cuts, the armed forces would be weakened and less able to respond to global crises.

“There are members up on the Capitol Hill that are saying, ‘Oh no, we’re going to stand back and let sequester happen,’ ” Mr. Panetta said. “Let me tell you, if sequester happens, it is going to badly damage the readiness of the United States of America.”

He said the cuts required under sequestration would “go right at readiness, right at maintenance, right at training.”

“We are gonna weaken the United States and make it much more difficult for us to respond to the crises in the world,” he said.

General Dempsey said that sequestration cuts would be only part of the limits on military spending. He noted that the Defense Department is now operating under a continuing resolution on its spending, and he estimated that total cuts in the last half of the fiscal year could reach $52 billion.


Pakistan army battles legacy of mistrust in Taliban heartland
Reuters 03/02/2013
CHAGMALAI - In a Pakistan army base high in the mountains on the Afghan frontier, a general explains a strategy for fighting the Taliban he calls simply “WHAM”.

The name has a distinctly bellicose ring. But the soldiers are learning to fight a new kind of war in a region US President Barack Obama has called the most dangerous on Earth.

“WHAM – winning hearts and minds,” explains the straight-talking General Nazir Butt, in charge of converting the army’s gains on the battlefield into durable security. “The plan is to turn militant sanctuaries into safe havens for the people.”

The term WHAM has been used before, but the focus this time is South Waziristan, an enclave on the Afghan border once the epicentre of a spreading Pakistan Taliban insurgency that shocked the country with its challenge to the authority of the state.

According to the army narrative, the campaign includes winning over the region’s ethnic Pashtun tribes through dialogue, creating commercial opportunities and providing education in new schools and colleges.

During a three-day trip with the army, Reuters got a rare glimpse not just into the scale of the army’s state-building project in South Waziristan, but also the challenges that lurk in the inhospitable territory.

However well-meaning the new approach, there are problems that won’t go away – threats of retaliation by the al Qaeda-linked militants, a lack of effective civilian administration and endemic corruption.

And the campaign to win hearts and minds has an ignoble track record in other conflict zones which serve as a reality check for even the most optimistic Pakistani officials.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, Western nations poured in millions of dollars to rebuild militant strongholds and win affection.

Results have been limited: many residents view the armies as occupiers and militants remain a danger.

The goal won’t be any easier in South Waziristan. The area forms one-fifth of Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas which are roughly the size of Belgium and governed under a system inherited from British colonialists.

Government-appointed political agents rule through the Pashtun tribes and collect and distribute revenue with little oversight. The people have limited rights.

While the Pakistani army backed the Taliban in Afghanistan in the 1990s, and supported militants fighting Indian rule in the Kashmir region, in South Waziristan it found itself under attack.

Decades of resentment felt by the population and the US bombing campaign on the Afghan border following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States spawned a generation of Pakistani militants who used South Waziristan to launch assaults against the Pakistani state and US-led forces in Afghanistan.

A DONKEY AND A HIGHWAY

Unsure how to respond, Pakistan see-sawed between brief military campaigns and appeasing the militants with short-lived peace deals. Then, in 2009, Pakistan’s army chief ordered the biggest offensive yet, pouring 40,000 troops into South Waziristan in a bid to tip the balance.

The 2009 offensive displaced almost half a million people as homes, schools and hospitals were turned into hideouts by militants and meagre civic amenities were destroyed.

Today, a combination of the offensive and US drones has helped drive the Pakistan Taliban leadership out of South Waziristan and the army is looking for ways to convince people it is safe for them to return.

But after having spent close to three years in camps, only 41,000 refugees have come back.

“The people can only feel fully secure if there is social and economic uplift,” said a brigadier who commands a cliff-side compound near Wana, the main town in South Waziristan. “It took some time but we know now that 1,000 bullets can’t do the work of one school.”

Many of the refugees have resettled in Chagmalai, a village close to Jandola, where the army is headquartered in a fort built by the British in the 19th century – a reminder of a centuries-old policy of ruling the area through a mix of intimidation and armed intervention.

A small, colourful marketplace was inaugurated last year and the green-and-white Pakistani flag was painted on the shutters of shops given to traders for a nominal fee. In a courtyard next door, army officers and government officials teach people how to raise poultry and set up bee farms.

But despite the development, Chagmalai still resembles a ghost town, a collection of ruined houses and abandoned clinics and schools with falling plaster and bullet-pocked walls. The army says it wants to turn the secluded landscape into a new home for those who have found the courage to return.

Ashraf Khan is a recently widowed farmer who has just returned from the Jandola fort where he asked the commanding officer for a loan.

“My wife used to gather firewood and collect water,” he said. “Now I need to buy a donkey. I’m hoping the soldiers will keep their promise to help.”

A few kilometres away, construction workers and army engineers have dug through rugged terrain to build a road, which will connect the isolated region with the northwest city of Peshawar, the nearest economic hub. The US government has contributed $170 million for the 287-km (180-mile) road.

Agricultural land and poultry farms line the sides of the highway, which zips through a breathtaking chasm of mountains and cliffs, its dual-lanes in better shape than many of those in Pakistani cities.

“The road has made it so much easier to move flocks, feed and medicines,” said Hamid Jan who runs a poultry farm. “I’ve never earned this much money before.”

“ASK ME ABOUT MY BOOKS”

The army believes it can create goodwill by encouraging commerce and, more importantly, education. Officers say 33 schools have been restored and 4,000 students enrolled, 200 of them girls, but verifying such data is difficult.

The Taliban oppose girls’ education and in October shot a 15-year-old Pakistani girl, Malala Yousafzai, for advocating schooling for girls.

But the army says it will power on. Having previously served in the disputed border region between Pakistan and India, Colonel Asim Iqbal now shows off a flagship technical institute and cadet college built as part of the WHAM initiative.

Seventy-five students graduated from the 11-million-rupee Waziristan Institute of Technical Education in December with diplomas in auto-mechanics, carpentry and IT. Nearby, a cadet college has been built at a cost of 500 million rupees.

In the college computer lab, Shamsullah, 15, learnt word-processing. A poor teenager whose uncle was a militant commander killed in a US drone strike, Shamsullah could have been a ready Taliban recruit. Instead, he just wants to study.

“I have nothing to do with militancy,” he said. “Ask me about my books.”

But for all the high hopes, enthusiastic students, freshly plastered classrooms and tarmac roads, there is little sign of a credible civilian administration taking root.

The highest political officer in the area, the political agent, does not even live in South Waziristan out of fear of being killed by the Taliban, who have murdered hundreds of leaders in the tribal belt in recent years.

Pashtun elders said official records showed that school teachers absent for months were still drawing salaries while the administration took no action.

But political agent Shahidullah Khan said he was doing the best he could. “There is only so much I can do when I can’t even travel outside the army camp,” he said by phone from Tank, a town to the east of South Waziristan.

Only on Saturday, more than 30 people were killed in an attack on a military checkpost next to South Waziristan which the Taliban said was revenge for a drone strike that killed two commanders in North Waziristan last month.

Many of the boys playing cricket close to the market declined to answer when asked about army assurances of a better life. But referring to militants and the military, one said: “They’re all the same.”

Some army officers accept such criticism as valid, admitting to the state’s decades-old heavy-handedness in the region.

“The budget for my brigade alone could take care of the education of all of South Waziristan,” said General Butt. “We have made many mistakes. And we don’t deny it any more.”

But while Butt insists that the militants are no longer a force to be reckoned with in South Waziristan, many people are less optimistic.

“The army has blocked them for now but the Taliban can return,” said a shop-keeper.

A tribal elder whose family has moved away and is too afraid to return, asked: “If the Taliban are really gone for good, why doesn’t the army also leave?”


Should we still fear al Qaeda?
CNN By Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst February 3, 2013
Washington - Editor's note: Peter Bergen is CNN's national security analyst, the author of "Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for bin Laden -- From 9/11 to Abbottabad", and a director at the New America Foundation.

The attack in January on a gas facility in Algeria by an al Qaeda-linked group that resulted in at least 37 dead hostages has sparked an outpouring of dire warnings from leading Western politicians.

British Prime Minister David Cameron described a "large and existential threat" emanating from North Africa. Tony Blair, his predecessor as prime minister, agreed saying, "David Cameron is right to warn that this is a battle for our values and way of life which will take years, even decades."

Hang on chaps! Before we all get our knickers in a tremendous twist: How exactly does an attack on an undefended gas facility in the remotest depths of the Algerian desert become an "existential threat" to our "way of life"?

Across the Atlantic, American politicians also got into sky-is-falling mode. Republican Congressman Mike Rogers, who heads the House Intelligence Committee, fulminated, "This is going to get worse. You cannot allow this to become a national security issue for the United States. And I argue it's already crossed that threshold."

Previous real U.S. national security threats and their manifestations include 9/11, the doctrine of mutually assured destruction (from the potential use of nuclear weapons) with the Soviets, Pearl Harbor and Hitler's armies taking over much of Europe.

A ragtag group of jihadists roaming the North African deserts is orders of magnitude less significant than those genuine threats to the West and is more comparable to the threats posed by the bands of pirates who continue to harass shipping off the coast of Somalia. They are surely a problem, but a localized and containable one.

Western politicians and commentators who claim that the al Qaeda linked groups in North Africa are a serious threat to the West unnecessarily alarm their publics and also feed the self-image of these terrorists who aspire to attack the West, but don't have the capacity to do so. Terrorism doesn't work if folks aren't terrorized.

North African group hasn't attacked in the West

Much has been written, for instance, in recent weeks about al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), al Qaeda's North African affiliate, a splinter group of which carried out the attack on the Algerian gas facility. But according to Camille Tawil, who has authoritatively covered Islamist militant groups over the past two decades for the leading Arabic daily Al-Hayat and has written three books about al Qaeda, AQIM doesn't threaten the West: "To my knowledge no known attacks or aborted attacks in the West have been linked directly to AQIM."

AQIM was formed seven years ago so the group has had more than enough time to plot and carry out an attack in the West. By way of comparison, it took two years of serious plotting for al Qaeda to plan the 9/11 attacks.

So, what is the real level of threat now posed by al Qaeda and allied groups?

Let's start with "core al Qaeda" which attacked the United States on 9/11 and that is headquartered in Pakistan. This group hasn't, of course, been able to pull off an attack in the United States in twelve years. Nor has it been able to mount an attack anywhere in the West since the attacks on London's transportation system eight years ago.

Core al Qaeda on way to extinction

Osama bin Laden, the group's founder and charismatic leader, was buried at sea a year and half ago and despite concerns that his "martyrdom" would provoke a rash of attacks in the West or against Western interests in the Muslim world there has instead been.... nothing.

Meanwhile, CIA drone strikes in Pakistan during President Obama's tenure alone have killed 38 of al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan, according to a count by the New America Foundation.

Those drone strikes were so effective that shortly before bin Laden died he was contemplating ordering what remained of al Qaeda to move to Kunar Province in the remote, heavily forested mountains of eastern Afghanistan, according to documents that were discovered following the SEAL assault on the compound where bin Laden was hiding in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

Core al Qaeda is going the way of the dodo.

Affiliates are no better off

And a number of the affiliates of core al Qaeda are in just as bad shape as the mother ship.

Jemaah Islamiah (JI), the virulent Southeast Asian al Qaeda affiliate that killed hundreds in the years after 9/11 is largely out of business. Why so? JI killed mostly Westerners in its first attacks on the tourist island of Bali in 2002, but the subsequent Bali attack three years later killed mostly Indonesians. So too did JI's attacks on the Marriott hotel in the capital Jakarta in 2003 and the Australian embassy in 2004. As a result, JI lost any shred of popular support it had once enjoyed.

At the same time the Indonesian government, which at one point had denied that JI even existed, mounted a sophisticated campaign to dismantle the group, capturing many of its leaders and putting them on trial.

In the Philippines, the Abu Sayyaf Group, a number of whose leaders had trained in Afghanistan in al Qaeda's camps, and which specialized in kidnapping Westerners in the years after 9/11, was effectively dismantled by the Philippine army working in tandem with a small contingent of U.S. Special Operations Forces.

In Pakistan, the Pakistani Taliban in 2009 took over the once-tranquil mountainous vacation destination of Swat, and destroyed some 180 schools and beheaded 70 policemen there. Suddenly, they were only 70 miles from the capital Islamabad and some warned that the Pakistani state was in danger. Today, the Pakistani Taliban have been rolled back to their bases along the Afghan border and 16 of their leaders have been killed by CIA drones since President Obama took office.

Al Qaeda militants based in Saudi Arabia mounted a terrorist campaign beginning in 2003 that killed dozens of Saudis, and they also attacked a number of the oil workers and oil facilities that lie at the heart of the Saudi economy. This prompted the Saudi government to mount such an effective crackdown that the few remaining al Qaeda leaders who were not killed or captured have in recent years fled south to Yemen where the remnants of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) are now based.

From its new headquarters in Yemen AQAP has made serious efforts to attack the United States, sending the "underwear bomber" to blow up Northwest Flight 253 over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009 and also smuggling bombs on to U.S.-bound cargo shipments in October 2010.

None of these attempts were successful.

Yemen militants decimated

As a result of the threat posed by AQAP, the United States has mounted a devastating campaign against the group over the past three years. There was one American drone strike in Yemen in 2009. In 2012 there were 46. That drone campaign has killed 28 prominent members of the group, according to a count by the New America Foundation. Among them was the No. 2 in AQAP, Said al-Shihri, who was confirmed to be dead last week.

In the chaos of the multiple civil wars that gripped Yemen in 2011, AQAP seized a number of towns in southern Yemen. But AQAP has now been pushed out of those towns because of effective joint operations between U.S. Special Operations Forces, the CIA and the Yemeni government.

The Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, even went to the United Nations General Assembly in September where he publicly endorsed the use of CIA drones in his country, something of a first.

A couple of years ago, al Qaeda's Somali affiliate, Al- Shabaab ("the youth" in Arabic) controlled much of southern Somalia including key cities such as the capital Mogadishu.

Once in a position of power, Shaabab inflicted Taliban-like rule on a reluctant Somali population, which eroded its popular legitimacy. Shabaab was also the target of effective military operations by the military of neighboring Kenya, troops of the African Union and U.S. Special Operation Forces.

As a result, today the group controls only some rural areas and for the first time in two decades the United States has formally recognized a Somali government.

Mali conflict shows weakness of jihadist militant groups

Similarly, groups with an al Qaeda-like agenda captured most of northern Mali last year, a vast desert region the size of France. Once in power they imposed Taliban-like strictures on the population, banning smoking and music and enforcing their interpretation of Sharia law with the amputation of hands. The militants also destroyed tombs in the ancient city of Timbuktu, a UNESCO World Heritage site, on the grounds that the tombs promoted "idol worship."

None of these measures endeared the jihadist militants to the population of Mali. In the past weeks, as a relatively small force of some 2,000 French soldiers has rolled through Mali putting the militants on the run, the French have been cheered on by dancing and singing Malians.

When French soldiers are greeted as an army of liberation in an area of the world that in the past century was part of a vast French empire, you can get a sense of how much the jihadist militants had alienated the locals.

Last week the French military took the city of Timbuktu. The defeat of the al Qaeda-linked groups as effective insurgent forces in Mali is now almost complete.

What has just happened in Mali gets to the central problem that jihadist militant groups invariably have. Wherever they begin to control territory and population they create self-styled Islamic "emirates" where they then rule like the Taliban.

Over time this doesn't go down too well with the locals, who usually practice a far less austere version of Islam, and they eventually rise up against the militants, or, if they are too weak to do so themselves, they will cheer on an outside intervention to turf out the militants.

The classical example of this happened in Iraq where al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) controlled Anbar Province, about a third of the country in 2006. AQI cadres ruled with an iron fist and imposed their ultrafundamentalist rule on their fellow Sunnis, who they killed if they felt they were deviating from their supposedly purist Islamic precepts.

This provoked the "Sunni Awakening" of Iraqi tribes that rose up against AQI. These tribes then allied with the U.S. military and by the end of 2007 AQI went from an insurgent group that controlled vast territories to a terrorist group that controlled little but was still able to pull off occasional spectacular terrorist attacks in Baghdad.

Jihadist violence still a threat

The collapse of core al Qaeda and a number of its key affiliates does not, of course, mean that jihadist violence is over. Such religiously motivated mayhem has been a feature of the Muslim world for many centuries. Recall the Assassins, a Shia sect that from its base in what is now Iran dispatched cutthroats armed with daggers to kill its enemies around the Middle East during the 12th and 13th centuries. In so doing the sect gave the world the useful noun "assassin."

And so while core al Qaeda and several of its affiliates and like-minded groups are in terrible shape, there are certainly groups with links to al Qaeda or animated by its ideology that are today enjoying something of a resurgence.

Most of these groups do not call themselves al Qaeda, which is a smart tactic, as even bin Laden himself was advising his Somali affiliate, Al Shabaab, not to use the al Qaeda name as it would turn off fundraisers because the shine had long gone off the al Qaeda brand, according to documents recovered at bin Laden's Abbottabad compound.

One such militant group is the Nigerian Boko Haram, which bombed the United Nations headquarters in Nigeria in 2011 and has also attacked a wide range of Christian targets in the country. However, the group has shown "no capability to attack the West and also has no known members outside of West Africa," according to Virginia Comolli of the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies who tracks the group.

Ansar al-Sharia, "Supporters of Sharia," is the name taken by the militant group in Libya that carried out the attack against the U.S. consulate in Benghazi in September in which four Americans were killed. Similarly, in Yemen militants that are aligned with al Qaeda have labeled themselves Ansar al-Sharia.

But this new branding hasn't done the militants much good in either country. In Libya, shortly after the attack on the U.S. consulate, an enraged mob stormed and took over Ansar al Sharia's headquarters in Benghazi. And, as we have seen, in Yemen the jihadists have now been forced out of the towns in the south that they had once held.

One strong foothold in Syria

The one country where jihadist militants have a serious foothold and are likely to play an important role for some period in the future is in Syria. That is because of a perfect storm there that favors them. The Sunni militants in Syria are fighting the regime of Bashir al Assad, a secular dictator who is also an Alawite, which many Muslims believe to be a heretical branch of Shiism.

For the jihadists, Assad's secularism makes him an apostate and his Alawi roots also make him a heretic, while his brutal tactics make him an international pariah. This trifecta makes funding the Sunni insurgency highly attractive for donors in the Gulf.

And for the Arabs who form the heart of al Qaeda the fight against Assad is in the heart of the Arab world, a contest that happens to border also on the hated state of Israel. Also Syria was for much of the past decade the entry point for many hundreds of foreign fighters who poured into Iraq to join Al Qaeda in Iraq following the American invasion of the country. As a result, al Qaeda has long had an infrastructure both in Syria and, of course, in neighboring Iraq.

The Al Nusra Front is the name of arguably the most effective fighting force in Syria. In December the State Department publicly said that Al Nusra, which is estimated to number in the low thousands and about 10% of the fighters arrayed against Assad, was a front for Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).

Al Nusra certainly seems to have learned from AQI's mistakes. For starters, it doesn't call itself al Qaeda. Secondly, it hasn't launched a campaign to crack down on social issues such as smoking or listening to music and so has not alienated the local Sunni population as AQI did in Iraq.

Barak Barfi, a journalist and fellow at the New America Foundation who has spent several months on the ground in Aleppo in northwestern Syria reporting on the opposition to Assad, says Nusra fighters stand out for their bravery and discipline: "They are winning over the hearts and minds of Aleppo residents who see them as straight shooters. There is a regimented recruiting process that weeds out the chaff. Their bases are highly organized with each person given specific responsibilities."

Arab Spring countries seen as an opportunity

The chaotic conditions of several of the countries of the "Arab Spring" are certainly something al Qaeda views as an opportunity. Ayman al-Zawahiri the leader of the group, has issued 27 audio and video statements since the death of bin Laden, 10 of which have focused on the Arab countries that have experienced the revolutions of the past two years.

But if history is a guide, the jihadist militants, whether in Syria or elsewhere, are likely to repeat the mistakes and failures that their fellow militants have experienced during the past decade in countries as disparate as Somalia, the Philippines, Yemen, Iraq, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and now, Mali.

That's because encoded in the DNA of al Qaeda and like-minded groups are the seeds of their own destruction because in power they rule like the Taliban, and they also attack fellow Muslims who don't follow their dictates to the letter. This doesn't mesh very well with these organizations' claims that they are the defenders of Muslims.

These groups also have no real plans for the multiple political and economic problems that beset much of the Islamic world. And they won't engage in normal politics such as elections believing them to be "un-Islamic."

This is invariably a recipe for irrelevance or defeat. In not one nation in the Muslim world since 9/11 has a jihadist militant group seized control of a country. And al Qaeda and its allies' record of effective attacks in the West has been non-existent since 2005.

With threats like these we can all sleep soundly at night.

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Feature: Afghan girl breaks traditional barriers by aspiring to become professional singer
by Abdul Haleem
KABUL, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- "I am requesting my countrymen to support me, to vote for me to become the new Afghan star so that I can sing for my people. I am very thankful for your support," Latifa Azizi told her audience after rendering her song which was broadcast by television station Tolo over the weekend.

But her joining the singing contest elicited mixed reactions from her countrymen.

Sitting cross-legged and drinking tea, the traditional Afghan drink, in a roadside hotel, some two dozen people were watching the live broadcast of program "Afghan Star."

"Latifa Azizi deserves to become an Afghan star," said Abdul Aziz, 43. However, his friend Qadir, slammed the program, saying women should stay at home and should not become a singer or entertainer.

In the program Afghan Star, a panel of judges composed of veteran musicians, announced their choice after the performance of each contestant.

"Latifa Azizi needs four years more to become Afghan Star. I give her four marks out of 10. However, I encourage her to work hard," Shila Zaland, the sole female judge, said after Azizi's performance.

Nevertheless, the three male judges awarded her 5, 6 and 9 marks respectively.

The 17-year-old Azizi has climbed her way among some 2,000 aspiring boys and girls and is now among the top six in the eighth season of the program that was opened months ago.

To win the competition and secure top position, she still has a long way to go.

Already, her female rival Bahar Aria had been voted out a week ago while five talented male competitors are still on the run and striving hard to become the new Afghan Star.

The winner, besides receiving a new car and cash as prize, will also sign a contract with some music companies here.

Similar to the British "Pop Idol" and initiated in 2005 by the private television channel Tolo, Afghan Star is a popular television show in Afghanistan that aims to discover young talented singers both boys and girls.

The program is unique since this is the first time that it allows women singers to join.

During the iron rule of the Taliban, women were not allowed to join such contests and even to go to school. This traditional attitude towards women has remained ingrained in some conservative Afghans such as Qadir.

In fact, there are some comments that for girls like Azizi to join the contest, they are risking their lives because not only the community but some members of their families would not welcome it.

Leema Sahar, who was in her 20s when she joined the Afghan Star in 2008 and won a third place, had reportedly been threatened and since then has not joined the contest.

Each week, the television audience is enjoined to use their cellular phones to vote for their favorite singers. The singer that gets the lowest vote will be eliminated. The winners, from the first to third place, would be selected based on the number of their votes they get from the audience.

The second and third placers would also get some consolation prizes.

A definite departure from the time when Afghanistan was ruled by the Taliban, the country has now a government-owned music academy which is managed by the Ministry of Education to promote the music industry.

This, and other social activities, were unthinkable during the rule of the Taliban that ended after they were driven out by the U. S.-led coalition of foreign forces in 2001.

However, remnants of the hard-core Taliban are still engaged in regular ambuscades, suicide bombings and other acts of violence in some parts of the country, including in the capital.


Pakistan Declares Afghan Containers Released from Karachi
TOLOnews.com By Zabihullah Jhanmal Sunday, 03 February 2013
The government of Pakistan has ordered the release of containers belonging to Afghan traders which were stalled at Karachi port for about three months, Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce and Industries (ACCI) said Sunday.

ACCI officials were skeptical it meant anything had been resolved, describing it as a "provisional and political game" timed with the London trilateral conference between Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Britain beginning today.

ACCI vice-chairman Jan Khan Alokozai described it as a token moved but Pakistan had yet to show any real effort to resolve the problems at its port.

"We don't know why the decision for loading the containers of Afghan traders was made so unexpectedly - and at the same time with the Pakistani president's visit to Britain," he told TOLOnews.

A number of Afghan traders have suggested Karzai needs to intervene and resolve the containers issue, while some economic experts criticised the Afghan government saying it does not follow up the commitments promised by the neighbouring countries.

"Unfortunately, our government does not show any seriousness at meetings and conferences and have no consideration towards their people," said Taj Mohammad Akbar, economics teacher at Kabul University.

The ACCI has urged Afghan traders quickly transport their goods from Karachi and are advising them to not use the port. It has also called on the Afghan government to convince Pakistan to pay compensation for the traders losses.

According to officials, Afghan traders were collectively charged about $1 million a day for the 3,700 containers stalled at the port.


As international troops draw down in Afghanistan, peace talks with Taliban flounder
Associated Press February 03, 2013
KABUL, Afghanistan - The Afghan peace effort is floundering, fraught with mistrust and confusion among key players even though the hard-line Taliban militants show signs of softening and their reclusive, one-eyed leader made a surprise offer to share power in a post-war Afghanistan.

The U.S. and its allies hope the peace process, which began nearly two years ago, will gain traction before most international forces withdraw from the country in fewer than 23 months. But although the Taliban appear more ready to talk than ever before, peace talks remain elusive because of infighting among a rising number of interlocutors — all trying to get some kind of negotiations started.

Members of the Taliban are in contact with representatives from 30 to 40 different countries, according to senior U.S., Afghan and other officials The Associated Press interviewed in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Moreover, the relationship among the key players — the U.S., Afghanistan and Pakistan — is marked by distrust that keeps tugging momentum away from the peace process.

Many of the officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the sensitive contacts with the Taliban.

Finding a path to the negotiating table will be a topic when Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistan President Asif Zardari hold a series of meetings beginning Monday with British Prime Minister David Cameron. The meetings in London come amid fresh tensions between Kabul and its western allies.

Karzai recently warned the West not to use peace talks as a lever against his government. As well, both Kabul and Washington are frustrated that Pakistan is not monitoring the whereabouts and activities of Taliban prisoners it released in recent months. Miffed by the criticism, Pakistan says it freed the prisoners at the request of the Afghan government and doesn't have the resources to keep tabs on them.

No one in either Pakistan or Afghanistan seems to know where the dozens of released prisoners have gone. Last week, the Taliban issued a statement by freed former Taliban Justice Minister Mullah Nooruddin Turabi on behalf of all the prisoners — an indication that at least some might have rejoined the ranks of the insurgency.

"There were no preconditions to their release and we are getting criticism from our own people inside Afghanistan about that and it is valid criticism," said Ismail Qasemyar, a senior member of the Afghan High Peace Council.

The peace council, which Karzai set up to carry out peace negotiations, handed Pakistan the list of prisoners, including Turabi, that it wanted freed. They have also asked for the release of the Taliban's former second in command, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, but Washington has urged Pakistan not to release him, U.S. and Afghan officials said.

For its part, the United States has tried to accelerate the peace process by working with Britain, Norway and Germany to reach out to the Taliban, said a senior Western diplomat familiar with the negotiations. Both France and Tokyo have hosted meetings that have been attended by Afghan officials, opposition leaders and the Taliban, although the Taliban insist their participation should not be misinterpreted as negotiations.

One senior U.S. official said the process is so nascent and egos so fragile that it's like negotiating a minefield. A European diplomat told the AP that there are so many backdoor talks going on that it's hard to keep track of who is talking to whom.

This week, Karzai said he wanted an end to all these talks. Speaking at a water management conference in the Afghan capital, Karzai expressed suspicion that the peace process was being hijacked by the West to strengthen his opponents and undermine his government.

Karzai's spokesman, Aimal Faizi, told The AP in an interview on the sprawling palace grounds in Kabul that the president was frustrated by what he perceives are attempts by his political opponents and the West, including the United States, to use the peace process to lay the groundwork for a post-2014 Afghanistan led by those hand-picked by them.

This latest flap between Karzai and the West could halt or at least delay the official opening of a Taliban office in the Middle Eastern state of Qatar. The office is intended to give the Taliban an address from which they can conduct peace talks. Faizi said Karzai supports the office "in principle," with some conditions.

"This office should be used only as an address for talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban," Faizi said. "This office should not be used for any other purpose."

Faizi also said the president wants the Taliban to publicly announce that they will negotiate peace only with the Afghan High Peace Council. So far, the Taliban have resisted, although officials close to the president say privately that they appear to be softening their hard-line stance.

Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, seemed uncompromising when he spoke to The AP.

"There is no change in the policy of the Islamic Emirate of not talking to the Karzai government," he said "The Karzai regime is powerless and installed by others. Real parties to the conflict are those who have committed aggression."

But still the Taliban have shown signs of moderating their positions in recent months.

According to several Western officials, who are involved or knowledgeable about the process, the most telling sign of flexibility came in a statement issued late last year by Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar. In the statement marking the Islamic holy holiday of Eid al-Adha, Omar for the first time offered to share power. He also said he had no interest in starting a civil war.

"As to the future political destiny of the country, I would like to repeat that we are neither thinking of monopolizing power nor intend to spark off domestic war," he said.

While still firm on his demand for Sharia or Islamic law, in Afghanistan, the Taliban leader, who rarely speaks and has a $10 million bounty on his head, did seem to take a few steps back from the harsh and regressive edicts and interpretations of Islamic law that characterized the Taliban's five-year rule. Many of those edicts were directed at women, denying them education and the right to work. He also seemed to extend an olive branch to Afghanistan's other ethnic groups.

"We will guarantee rights of both male and female of the country, build economic structures and strengthen social foundations and facilities of education for all people of the country," he said.

But Omar's flexibility only went so far. He still insisted on an Islamic education system. While the West has been pressing for secular education, many of Afghanistan's current leaders support a Quran-based education system.

A senior member of the High Peace Council, who met with Taliban on the sidelines of the two conferences in France and Tokyo, said they also vowed to make child marriages illegal and outlaw a common practice among ethnic Pashtuns to use their daughters as barter to settle disputes.


Hamid Karzai: 'I have to be at the frontline of hardship and hard work'
In an exclusive interview with the Guardian in London, the president of Afghanistan explains why he still cannot take a holiday 12 years after taking power following the Taliban's fall
Guardian.co.uk By Emma Graham-Harrison Sunday 3 February 2013
It has been more than a decade since Hamid Karzai, whose job a US diplomat described as the most difficult in the world, took a holiday. But the man once hailed in the west as the suave, stylish embodiment of a new Afghanistan will be taking a long rest next year when he steps down as president of his fractured and impoverished country.

The Afghan constitution does not allow him to run in another election. Nato-led forces are also due to leave at the end of 2014, so the country will face the future without the leader and the foreign military presence that have defined much of the last decade.

"It is true that I haven't taken a holiday. I haven't noticed that I haven't taken a holiday," he told the Guardian and ITN in an exclusive interview in London, where he joked that the seven-hour flight to the UK was enough of a rest for now. "I'll be taking a long holiday a year from now.

"Of course I have felt the strain, of course one needs time off but it depends on whether one can afford it or not. I feel I cannot afford it, I feel I should continue to work for another year and then take a good leave and recuperate."

Karzai took power as a temporary leader after the fall of the Taliban in 2001, then won two successive presidential polls, in 2004 and 2009. Charming, clever, and fluent in Pashtu, Dari, English and Urdu, he made Esquire magazine's list of best-dressed men in 2004, and seemed at home anywhere from the remotest corners of Afghanistan to western capitals.

Tall and energetic, wrapped in a traditional Afghan chapan robe of woven blue, green and purple silk, and wearing a karakul cap of silver lamb's fleece, Karzai has a charisma and focus that cut through lingering jetlag and a cold. That personality has helped him build relationships with everyone from Prince Charles – whom he describes as a "very fine gentlemen" – to the senior council of Afghan clerics who recently ruled that women were "secondary" to men.

But there is a steely edge beneath the mannered exterior, and a strong nationalist sentiment, forged in part through years fighting the Soviets and then the Taliban, which brought him into conflict with western countries supporting his government financially and with troops.

He objected to much about the military presence as it escalated over the last decade, from night raids on Afghan homes to the creation of militia-like local police. Meanwhile, diplomats were also cooling on the relationship, and Karzai earned a reputation as erratic, emotional and prone to believing paranoid conspiracy theories, according to leaked US diplomatic cables.

Ties were perhaps irretrievably damaged during the 2009 presidential elections, which were marred by allegations of massive fraud, when Karzai felt western allies were trying to remove him from power. His critics now describe him as an obstructive protector of corrupt relatives and cronies, pointing to a brother in the southern city of Kandahar who, before he was assassinated, was alleged to have links to drug traffickers, and another who was a shareholder in a bank that nearly collapsed under $900m (£560m) of bad loans.

He is politically astute and has outmanoeuvred many of the western military commanders and ambassadors who traipsed through the imposing stone entrance of his palace fort over the last decade, helped perhaps by the fact that they came and went while he stayed put to watch many repeat their predecessors' mistakes.

Ryan Crocker, former US ambassador to Kabul, described Karzai's job as the most difficult in the world; it is certainly one of the most dangerous. All but one of the men who have ruled Afghanistan since the king was deposed in the 1970s has met an unnatural end. Several were killed by their successors.

Karzai has said he will not leave Afghanistan after he steps down, which means the question of who takes over could be one of life or death for him, although he says he is not worried. "I don't feel any danger at all, none. I am in my country, and safe and sound," he said.

The death toll from the years of war that have convulsed Afghanistan includes his father, his brother and many friends, colleagues and political allies and rivals. He has survived at least four assassination attempts since taking power, with security tightening each time.

Controls at the vast fortified palace where he lives are now so strict that visitors below ministerial rank are not even allowed to keep their pens, getting standard-issue ballpoints once they have checked in their belongings and passed several body searches.

Karzai rarely leaves the palace, and when he does he usually travels by aeroplane or helicopter, even across the capital. But he shrugged off the security constraints. "I have seen a lot more protection elsewhere," he said when asked about life as possibly the world's most heavily guarded head of state.

"That danger is always there in life. In Afghanistan it's there in one way, in the west in lots of other ways.

"Accidents are part of life. So no, I don't feel fear. Danger is there but I am not afraid of it."

He has fiercely protected his family's privacy, perhaps for security or perhaps haunted by the memories of a previous ruler penalised for setting a liberal example by encouraging his wife to wear western clothes and uncover her head.

His wife, a doctor who once worked in tough refugee camps in Pakistan, has not made a public appearance for years. A picture that allegedly showed his young son playing with a tame deer was spread across Afghan Twitter and Facebook pages within hours by people fascinated by the possible glimpse of the first family.

Karzai set diplomatic circles in Kabul buzzing last year when he named his first daughter Malalai, a popular Afghan name but also that of a heroine of the 19th-century fight against the British, with whom his government has had a strained relationship.

He fought the Soviets and then the Taliban while brothers were running restaurants in the US, but unlike many of the commanders who have supported him and held senior positions in his governments – from army chief of staff, provincial governors and ministers to first vice-president – he has no military power base.

He says his decade-long efforts have not been for personal gain – he reportedly earns $525 a month – but for the good of the country. "It's my country, we have to build it. Look how long it took you to build Britain into the good country that it is today. Someone did a great work there in the past, someone sacrificed, perhaps millions of people did hard work for centuries to bring you to where you are."

Afghanistan has to do the same, he said. "Every citizen of Afghanistan has to work hard. And I, as the president of Afghanistan, have to be at the frontline of that hardship and hard work." Biography

1957 Born in Kandahar

1980s Works in Pakistan as fundraiser for the mujahideen in fight against Soviet occupation

July 1999 Father killed by Taliban

1999 Married obstetrician Zeenat Quraishi. They now have a son, six, and a daughter who is nearly one year old

Dec 2001 Afghan groups agree deal on interim government following US-led bombing of Taliban. Karzai sworn in as interim head of government

June 2002 The loya jirga (grand council) elects Karzai as interim head of state

Sept 2002 First of several assassination attempts against him

Jan 2004 Loya jirga adopts new constitution

Oct/Nov 2004 Elected president

Oct 2006 Nato takes responsibility for security across whole of Afghanistan

June 2008 Karzai warns that Afghanistan will send troops into Pakistan to fight militants

Aug 2009 Presidential and provincial elections marred by Taliban attacks and claims of fraud

Oct 2009 Declared president after rival Abdullah Abdullah pulls out before second round

July 2011 His half-brother, Kandahar power-broker Ahmad Wali Karzai, is killed by a member of his security team

July 2011 Security handover to Afghan forces begins in Bamiyan province

Spring 2012 US agrees to Karzai's demand for Afghan control of night raids and prisons

May 2012 Nato finalises plan to pull out combat troops by end of 2014

July 2012 US and Afghanistan sign strategic partnership agreement, giving a long-term framework for ties

April 2014 Presidential elections due. Constitution will prevent him standing again


New Land Registration System to Enhance Transparency in Afghanistan
By Sayed Jawad - 04 Feb 2013, 9:45 am Khaama Press
Land rights in Afghanistan are governed by overlapping and conflicting legal systems – informal systems, civil law, traditional practices, and municipal regulations. In many parts of the country, informal occupation of land brought about by conflict and displacement has further complicated the situation. The lack of a modern land management system has hindered private-sector investment, stunted economic growth, and fed instability.

With support from USAID, a new land administration system is being utilized by the Afghanistan Land Authority (MAIL/Arazi) to identify land parcel boundaries and improve land administration practices. By replacing antiquated paper files, this modern, computerized land tenure system helps protect land owners against wrongful claims, including confiscation by the government. It monitors commercial land leases, tracks the collection of rent, and facilitates market land transactions for the private sector.

For ordinary people, this means greater potential for formal ownership of land and protection of their rights; leading to greater confidence and investment. For business owners, it also means reduced opportunities for corruption, and greater business confidence, leading to greater investment and economic growth. For government, it means having a better understanding of the communities they service while supporting greater government revenues that can translate into improved public services. These improved services can translate into improved community confidence and increased stability.

Minister of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock, Mohammed Asif Rahimi said “with these new systems to formalize land registration, the Afghan government is improving its ability to effectively track land ownership, attract private sector investment, create revenue and job opportunities, and provide a valuable service to our citizens.” Two informal settlements in Jalalabad will be upgraded – property data will be entered in the land management system and proper infrastructure will be installed. The communities’ priorities are being addressed in a jointly drafted upgrade plan, which will also include a plan for future maintenance ofthe sites. The Afghan Government will also be implementing a complementary software system in Jalalabad and court makhzans (archives) to prevent tampering with land documents.

MAIL/Arazi is promoting a “one-stop-shop” to limit direct interaction with public land administration officials, thus minimizing backroom contact where rent seeking may take place. With support from the LARA project, the Afghan government has drafted amendments to the Land Management Law which now provides, for the first time, civil and criminal penalties for improprieties in the land clearance process.

USAID’s Land Reform in Afghanistan (LARA) project promotes legalization of property ownership, strengthens citizens’ land rights, and supports economic development through transparent ownership rights in partnership with Afghan institutions including MAIL/ Arazi, the Afghan Geodesy and Cartography Head Office, the Supreme Court, Independent Directorate of Local Governance (IDLG) General Directorate for Municipal Affairs (GDMA), and the Ministry of Urban Development Affairs.


Kabul Bank Special Court to Deliver Verdict Next Week
TOLOnews.com By Saleha Soadat Sunday, 03 February 2013
The special court on the Kabul Bank crisis will deliver its verdict at a public hearing next week, the head of the court said Sunday.

The final verdict will ultimately be delivered by the Supreme Court at a later date.

"The inspection of the cases of the all the accused will be finished by the end of this week, and if there are no other contraventions within the cases, the [special court's] final verdict will be issued at a public hearing," head of the special court Shamsurrahman Shams said.

Twenty-two people including former bank chiefs Shir Khan Farnood and Khalilullah Ferozi are charged with causing the bank's collapse through fraud and corruption. Five of the charged including former governor of Da Afghanistan Bank Abdul Qadeer Fitrat are fugitives, he added.

It was previously understood that a number of properties of the bank were put up for sale, however Shams says none of the properties have been put up for sale but they will all be sold by auction.

He said that everything else owned by the bank, apart from its properties, is priced at $17 million.

"A British company has priced all the bank's equipment at $17 million which will be sold soon," Shams said.

Meanwhile, the bank's Receivership Department said the process to sell all the bank's property inside and outside the country - except for the bank's armored vehicles - is being done transparently under the observation of a government panel.

"Kabul Bank has six armored vehicles in Kabul alone, and the Ministry of Interior will not permit them to be sold for some security reasons, and we haven't sold any of those vehicles so far. However all the other properties are being sold," said Receivership Department head Abdul Hameed Mohebbi.

Once the largest bank in Afghanistan by assets, Kabul Bank almost collapsed in 2010 after its officials transferred by both legal and illegal means abroad. Multiple loans were made to people without any guarantees. It eventually went bankrupt and faced a loss of about US$900 million.


www.afghanistannewscenter.com