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Afghan Panel Says Prison Torture Not Systematic
February 11, 2013 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
An Afghan government panel confirms it has found evidence of torture of detainees, but it denied systematic abuse of prisoners.
The panel was tasked by Afghan President Hamid Karzai last month to investigate UN claims that prisoners in government custody were being tortured and sexually abused.
The panel said on February 11 that almost half the inmates it interviewed claimed being tortured.
Sixty-six percent of the inmates said they don't have access to legal services.
The panel said it spoke to some 140 inmates in Kabul, Kandahar, and Herat jails.
In a report issued in January, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said that "torture persists and remains a serious concern in numerous detention facilities across Afghanistan."
The report said such practices continue despite efforts by the United Nations and international forces.
Based on reporting by AP and dpa
18 Taliban rebels surrender in E. Afghanistan
ASADABAD, Afghanistan, Feb. 11 (Xinhua) -- Up to 18 Taliban rebels renounced violence and surrendered in eastern Afghan province of Kunar on Monday, authorities said.
"An 18-member group of Taliban including their commander named Heydari laid down their arms and joined the government-initiated peace and reintegration process in Kunar earlier Monday," the provincial governor Seyyed Fazlullah Wahidi told Xinhua.
With the former insurgents' surrender, peace and stability would be further strengthened in several parts of the province with Asadabad city as its capital 185 km east of Kabul, Wahidi added.
The Afghan government set up a 70-member High Peace Council in the summer 2010 to encourage Taliban to disarm and give up militancy against the government.
Taliban militants fighting Afghan and NATO-led troops have not made any comment yet.
Roadside bomb strikes Afghan army van, kills 1, wounds 1
JALALABAD, Afghanistan, Feb. 11 (Xinhua)-- Roadside bomb hit a vehicle of Afghan army in the eastern Nangarhar province 120 km east of Kabul on Monday, leaving one person dead and injuring another, a local official said.
"A mine planted by militants on a road in Khogyani district, struck a vehicle of national army in Mimla village at around 10:00 a.m. local time today killing a soldier and injuring another," a security official Hazrat Hussain Mashriqiwal told Xinhua.
Meantime, Zabihullah Mujahid who claims to speak for the Taliban outfit in talks with media via telephone from unknown location claimed of responsibility, stressing three soldiers were killed in the blast.
Rural Afghanistan force with shady reputation may grow
The U.S. plans to extend a financial lifeline from the Pentagon to the Afghan Local Police, implicated in human rights abuses, for at least five more years.
Los Angeles Times By David S. Cloud and Shashank Bengali February 10, 2013
WASHINGTON - In an effort to fight the insurgency after U.S. troops leave Afghanistan by the end of next year, officials in Washington and Kabul are planning to dramatically expand a 3-year-old rural police force that has been implicated in human rights abuses and criminal activity.
The plan by the U.S. Special Operations Command would extend a financial lifeline from the Pentagon to the Afghan Local Police for at least five more years, providing $1.2 billion to train, arm and pay 45,000 fighters, up from a current force of 19,600, according to senior U.S. officials and planning documents.
Despite heavy casualties so far, and a worrisome reputation for corruption and brutality, the paramilitary force would serve as the first line of defense against the Taliban in rural areas beyond the reach of regular Afghan army and police units.
White House officials are still debating the long-term military aid package for Afghanistan and how many U.S. troops will stay behind after 2014. President Obama is expected to outline the drawdown in his State of the Union address Tuesday.
Expanding the controversial Afghan force has won preliminary approval from senior U.S. commanders. They say only a small number of special operations troops based in Kabul would be needed to help the Afghan Interior Ministry run the program, a major selling point with the White House seeking to limit the U.S. military contingent.
The proposal has also won at least tentative support from Afghan government officials. They are increasingly nervous that the insurgency will gain strength after U.S. troops leave, and appear willing to back the effort as long as Washington pays for it.
The expansion "is according to requests from officials in the central government, the provinces and the district level," said Ali Shah Ahmadzai, the Interior Ministry official who oversees the local police.
When the American-backed units were first organized in 2010, Gen. David H. Petraeus, then the top commander in Afghanistan, described them as a temporary, lightly armed guard force that could fight insurgents in remote areas until enough Afghan army and police units could be trained to take over.
Since then, U.S. commanders have come to view the village fighters as a cheaper alternative to regular Afghan security forces. Lt. Col. Tom Bryant, a spokesman for the U.S. Special Operations Command in Kabul, said they had provided Afghan officials with studies showing how much money they could save by shrinking the army and police and replacing them with rural guard units.
The village guards resemble militias more than conventional police. Fighters are selected by tribal councils, given three weeks' training, plus small arms, uniforms and pickup trucks. They have no arrest powers, and are not supposed to investigate crimes.
Their mission is to defend their villages from insurgents, and they have borne significant casualties. Officials say 6.2% of the home guard fighters have been wounded or killed, compared with less than 3% of Afghan army and police troops.
Ahmadzai said the force is deployed in 100 of the country's roughly 400 districts, and 44 more districts will be added in coming months.
But operating in often remote areas, many local units and their commanders receive little supervision by Afghan authorities, and in some cases their loyalties are far from clear.
"Once the NATO forces leave, these [fighters] will turn to the Taliban side," warned Atiqullah Amarkhail, an independent military analyst who was a senior military officer in Afghanistan's pre-Taliban government.
So far, defenders say the village guards have helped improve security in some of Afghanistan's most troubled areas.
In Ghazni, a strategic province south of Kabul, officials say the local units will be expanded in three districts this year to help support a popular anti-Taliban uprising that began last summer.
"The Afghan government sees this as their own program now," said Maj. Gen. Tony Thomas, who commands U.S. special operations troops in Afghanistan. "It has its naysayers out there, but ultimately we hope it will be funded out to the mid-2020s to give them breathing space" against the insurgency.
Ghulam Mujtaba Patang, the minister of Interior and a former critic, recently endorsed enlarging the force and maintaining it until 2025, according to planning documents. In December, Patang acknowledged misconduct by some rural guards, and said he was reviewing the program.
"Presence of the local police has been effective for providing security at some cases, and has negatively affected areas in some other cases," Patang was quoted as telling the Afghan parliament.
Some Afghan officials regard the home guard as an erratic and dangerous force whose members are more loyal to their commanders than to the national government.
They warn that giving weapons and training to local tribesmen is a recipe for criminality and warlordism, and will undermine confidence in the Afghan government and the regular army. Expanding the village-based force will only make problems worse, they say.
"I don't support increasing the number" of local guards, said Sher Aziz Kamawal, the head of security affairs in parliament. Washington "should invest that money in training, equipping and increasing the numbers of the Afghan army."
In some cases, the home guard units prey on villagers rather than protect them.
At least 77 local police have been investigated for criminal activity, including murder, rape, extortion and bribe-taking. They include Hakeem Shujayee, a local commander in Oruzgan who was arrested last summer after being accused of involvement in dozens of killings and rapes. Despite the allegations, he was later released and is now a fugitive.
"Since his removal from his Afghan Local Police leadership position in the June 2012 time frame, U.S. special operations forces have not had any type of relationship with Mr. Shujayee," said Bryant, the spokesman for the command in Kabul.
A report last month by the United Nations mission in Afghanistan found that 10 of 12 prisoners interviewed by investigators in the provinces of Kunduz, Kandahar, Faryab and Oruzgan had been beaten or otherwise abused by local police units.
Ahmadzai, the Interior Ministry official who oversees the local police, shrugged off concerns about abuses by some units. "No one can escape from the law, so anyone who commits a crime will face justice," he said.
david.cloud@latimes.com
shashank.bengali@latimes.com
Cloud reported from Washington and Bengali from Kabul.
Outgoing general predicts an Afghanistan liberated from foreign intrigue
The remarks from Gen. John Allen came at a change-of-command ceremony. American Gen. Joseph Dunford now leads NATO's mission in Afghanistan.
Reuters By David Alexander February 10, 2013
Kabul, Afghanistan - The US Marine Corps general who will oversee the withdrawal of most foreign troops from Afghanistan and wind down America's longest war took command of NATO-led forces on Sunday at a change-of-command ceremony that emphasized Afghan sovereignty.
Gen. Joseph Dunford took charge of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, who ended a 19-month tour that was arguably one of the most difficult periods in the war, now in its 11th year.
"Today is not about change, it's about continuity. What has not changed is the will of this coalition.... What has not changed is the inevitability of our success," General Dunford told a crowd of foreign and Afghan officials in an aging gymnasium at the barricaded ISAF headquarters.
Senior military officials, including Dunford and General Allen, sat on a dais covered with an Afghan rug as a band played the US and Afghan national anthems and a color guard presented the flags. Several hundred guests were seated in chairs on the floor of the old basketball court.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai was absent from the ceremony despite receiving an invitation from ISAF. A spokesman for President Karzai declined to comment. Gen. Martin Dempsey, the highest-ranking US military officer, said later he thought the level of Afghan representation at the ceremony was appropriate.
Allen, who directed ISAF's transfer of most security across the country to the Afghan army and police, gave an emotional speech stressing the nation's sovereignty, an issue that has been a thorn in Karzai's relationship with his Western backers.
Located between Iran, Pakistan, and Central Asia, Afghanistan has been subject to invasions since the ancient Greeks, through to the 19th-century "Great Game" – the scramble for power between Britain and Russia – and the last three decades of conflict.
Citing international support for a transformative decade in Afghanistan, Allen said: "I believe that in 10 years, Afghanistan will never again be a place between empires, caught in the grindstone of international politics." Afghans take the lead
Dunford assumes control of ISAF at a time when the 350,000-strong Afghan military and police forces have taken over the lead role for security across most of the country, and are due to be fully in the lead everywhere within a few months. ISAF's primary role will be to assist, advise, and train Afghan forces.
Allen and General Dempsey, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the challenge for Dunford through the end of 2014 would be to balance the withdrawal of international forces with the continuing need to assist and train Afghan troops, all while pressuring Al Qaeda.
"Closing bases, moving equipment – if you're not careful, that can become the mission," Dempsey said. "So he's got to keep all those things in equilibrium." Allen: 'This is victory'
Allen said the Afghan army and police were becoming ever more capable.
"Afghan forces defending Afghan people and enabling the government of this country to serve its citizens. This is victory. This is what winning looks like," Allen said.
Officials said that, while the insurgency remains a challenge, dealing with government corruption increasingly poses the biggest threat to Afghanistan's long-term viability.
"The strategic long-term enduring threat, it's not the insurgency. It is the degree of corruption and criminality that exists within the government," a senior ISAF official said on condition of anonymity. "If you can deal [with that] ... then you can start ... pulling the carpet out from underneath the insurgency."
Allen told reporters he thought Karzai had put in place the mechanisms to deal with corruption, but added: "We've reached a point now where rhetoric, while it was encouraging, isn't enough any more....
"The rhetoric has to be accompanied by real and meaningful reform, reform that reduces the capacity of the criminal patronage networks to grip and weaken institutions of state."
Allen also said education was helping to turn the tide of public opinion in Afghanistan against Taliban insurgents, who banned girls from most schools. He earlier told Reuters that advancing women's rights was key to preventing the Islamist group regaining support.
The White House said last month it would nominate Allen as NATO's supreme allied commander in Europe, after the Pentagon cleared him of professional misconduct over emails to a Florida socialite linked to a scandal that led his predecessor, David Petraeus, to resign as director of the CIA.
Afghans flock to India for infertility treatment
New Delhi already has a sizeable Afghan community, but over the past five years a steady trickle of visitors seeking healthcare has grown into a flood. Hospitals have been quick to respond.
Christian Science Monitor By Aarti Betigeri, Correspondent February 10, 2013
New Delhi - New Delhi’s Press Enclave Road represents the city’s complex mix of communities like no other: One side boasts an enormous modern shopping mall featuring the Hard Rock Cafe and Zara; the other, a string of eateries advertising Afghan rice dishes and chemist signs in Dari, one of Afghanistan’s main languages.
It is a sign of the impact of the city’s newest migrant community one block away from one of Delhi’s largest private hospitals, Max. The hospital, like others in the capital, is finding a new market in medical tourism from the war-torn neighbor.
The city already has a sizeable Afghan community – long-term residents, refugees, students – but over the past five years a steady trickle of visitors seeking healthcare has grown into a flood. Now, some large hospitals catering to foreign patients are finding that up to a third of them are from Afghanistan.
Some are catering almost exclusively to Afghans, while others are working to make their services more accessible to the community. The colossal Apollo Hospital in the city’s southwest has translators on staff, a website in Dari, and even a separate payment desk for Afghans.
"All the good doctors in Afghanistan have migrated, nobody wants to invest there," says Dheerendra Singh Tomar, an Indian who runs a private hospital in Delhi catering to patients from Afghanistan and other developing countries. "Medical tourism from Afghanistan is bringing a lot of money to India.”
There are no firm figures on the numbers of Afghans travelling to India for medical treatment, but the Afghan Embassy in New Delhi estimates that up to 100 Afghans arrive in New Delhi each day during the winter high season for treatment: Mostly to treat infertility issues or cancer.
One of these is Ziyarmal Arass, who came to the city a year ago for in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment along with his wife, and stayed on for the recent birth of his baby girl. “India is a good place for this, it’s not as expensive as other countries and Pakistan’s health care is not good,” says the 25-year-old Kabul businessman.
“I was nervous about coming to Delhi but when I arrived I found many other Afghans in my neighborhood, good food and weather.”
With the cost of IVF treatment in an upscale hospital costing as much as $3,000, it is clearly only a real option for Afghanistan’s upper income earners. The per capital GDP in Afghanistan is $589 compared with India’s $1,514.
Still, four airlines now provide four or five flights daily between Afghanistan and the Indian capital, up from zero a decade ago. The Afghan embassy says that while most Afghans still travel to Pakistan for their health needs, India is becoming increasingly attractive for those who can afford it.
"India is close by, you can fly from Kabul in just over an hour," says Mr. Tomar. There are other countries offering low-cost medical care, such as Thailand, but India offers some degree of relate-ability for Afghans: There are similarities when it comes to food, clothing, and appearance.
Despite being one of the richest cities in South Asia, New Delhi is still an affordable option for Afghans. In Lajpat Nagar, a ramshackle neighborhood popular with Afghan refugees, a visitor and his family can rent a room for 900 rupees per day, or almost $17. And although Afghanistan is no Saudi Arabia, some here have high hopes for the industry.
"This has only just begun, this industry is going to grow by 20 percent each year," says Tomar. "That's huge."
With New Control, General to Focus on Withdrawal in Afghanistan
New York Times By ALISSA J. RUBIN February 10, 2013
KABUL, Afghanistan - Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr. took command of both the American and the international military missions in Afghanistan in a traditional handoff ceremony on Sunday, becoming the 15th general to lead the international command here — and he is expected to be its last.
It falls to General Dunford, who led the Fifth Marine Regiment at the start of the Iraq war, to manage the withdrawal of nearly 100,000 troops, about 68,000 of them American, and a vast amount of equipment and cargo from a landlocked country still at war with the Taliban.
He will also oversee the final transfer of lead responsibility for security to Afghan troops, including in the most volatile districts in the south and east where the Taliban have maintained influence if not outright control.
He takes over from Gen. John R. Allen, whose 19-month tenure as supreme commander in Afghanistan was marked by urgent diplomacy to repair a damaged relationship with the Afghan government and public, and who oversaw the beginning in earnest of the security transfer that General Dunford is to complete.
In a sweeping speech at the ceremony on Sunday, General Allen was at turns thoughtful and filled with emotion as he spoke about the price of the war for American and foreign troops, the persistence of the Taliban and their allies, and his growing belief since his arrival in July 2011 that Afghanistan could succeed in defending itself and its fledgling democracy.
Reflecting the emphasis his command gave to Afghan civilians, he introduced two Afghan students from a nearby high school, a girl and a boy, whom he had invited to the ceremony and had seated in the first row — saying, in essence, that they were the future that Western and Afghan troops were fighting for. And he expressed that, despite the concerns he had as he took up command, he was leaving with “an optimism and a very real sense of knowing that we will be victorious.”
“I believe that in 10 years, Afghanistan will never again be the place between empires caught in the grindstone of international politics,” he said, referring to the country’s neighbors who at different times have fought each other or fought proxy wars on Afghan soil.
And he added, in a nod to concerns that Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups could return to Afghanistan in numbers after the American withdrawal, “I believe that Afghanistan will never again be a safe haven to terrorists.”
He became emotional discussing the toll of the long war, twice mentioning the numbers of dead that the United States and its allies had borne. He described how every Sunday his leadership gathered to read the names of those who had been killed the week before, noting that “560 sons and daughters have given their lives” and that 5,500 had been wounded just during the months of his command.
In recent months, the numbers of Afghan soldiers and police who have died fighting the insurgency had been mounting. “There can be no doubt that Afghanistan is investing in its future,” he said.
Still, he did not promise that the Taliban would be vanquished any time soon, saying that victory “may never be marked on a calendar.”
“Afghan forces defending Afghan people and enabling the government of this country to serve its citizens. This is victory. This is what winning looks like,” General Allen said.
When it was General Dunford’s turn to speak, he kept his remarks brief and blunt, talking for barely three minutes. He promised “continuity” in all respects including the International Security Assistance Force’s “commitment to accomplish the mission.”
General Dunford, a native of Boston, has served in a number of senior posts including, most recently, assistant commandant of the Marine Corps. He spent his first several days in Afghanistan sitting at General Allen’s elbow in meetings, saying little as he learned his new job, said Western officials who attended meetings with him. They described him as more of a “regular Joe” than General Allen, but similarly focused and flexible.
He has a master’s degree in government from Georgetown University and a master’s in international relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.
Much of the focus of his job will become clearer in coming days, with President Obama expected to announce the pace of the American military withdrawal over the next year, and perhaps propose troop levels as a negotiating point for the extent of a lasting military assistance force to stay in Afghanistan past 2014.
One of the hardest parts of General Dunford’s new job, said Maj. Gen. Charles M. Gurganus, the Marine Corps commander over a stretch of southern and southwestern Afghanistan that includes the Taliban heartland, will be trying to help the Afghan security forces become self-sustaining. The goal is for them to be able to do their own recruiting, training and equipment supply over many years. For now, they still rely on American troops for medical evacuation, intelligence and logistics assistance.
President Hamid Karzai, who was invited, did not attend the ceremony, but Bismillah Khan Mohammadi, the defense minister, and Rangin Dadfar Spanta, the national security adviser, were both there.
James Dao contributed reporting.
Afghanistan's growing number of child drug addicts
The Star online Monday February 11, 2013
JALALABAD, Afghanistan - They play badminton, kick a ball around and huddle over computer games just like normal children. Except that they are recovering drug addicts aged around three to 12, representing a growing proportion of drug users in war-torn Afghanistan.
In response, increasing numbers of rehabilitation centres are weaning such children off their addiction and giving them a new appetite for life in a country that produces 90 percent of the world's opium used to make heroin.
While there are no statistics for kids, the rate of relapse is high for their parents, experts say. For now two young girls, dressed in a blue uniform and playing badminton, and a group of boys playing football are all active and healthy - the total opposite of when they arrived.
"When I see them for the first time, the kids are depressed, unhappy. They don't play actively, they don't care about hygiene," said care assistant Massouma Khatima.
"They're like ghosts," added one of her colleagues.
The centre, run by Afghan charity Wadan, which is partly funded by the United Nations, offers 25 children and 35 women the chance to get clean.
Those who suffer from diarrhea, constipation or headaches as a side effect from addiction are given medical treatment. More hardened addicts among the adults are treated with hydrotherapy - in this case mostly cold showers.
Marwa, 10, is one of the girls who has recently recovered. Now she dares to dream of becoming an engineer, a fairly remote prospect for a girl from a poor community where few women are educated.
"I've been taking sleeping pills since I was a baby... I was drowsy and feeling asleep. I always had headaches. I couldn't learn. My friends were learning faster. They were also laughing at me, calling me 'sleepy'," she says.
"Now, I feel better, but not completely OK. I feel I can learn to play," she adds.
Fazalwahid Tahiri, the centre's administrator, says that in the eastern province of Nangarhar, sleeping pills can be mixed with milk for kids. But children are more commonly given a highly addictive broth made from opium, doled out as a remedy for flu and stomach aches.
"Since opium is easily available, some don't even think of it as drug addiction. They use it as a pain killer," he said.
In Afghanistan, most children become addicts as a result of their parents - passively inhaling their fathers' opium smoke in the house, says Zarbadshah Jabarkhail, a doctor with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Or they are deliberately fed opium, for example by mothers who keep their children sedated while weaving carpets or harvesting opium crops, he says.
The root cause is poverty. "It's very usual. The majority of the families don't know about the side-effects of opium. They don't understand that if they give drugs to their children, they are also killing them at the same time," he said.
"The proportion of children addicted has increased because we have more drug users and they are certainly affecting their children," said Jabarkhail.
The latest US State Department survey on drug use in Afghanistan says the number of adult drug users could exceed 1.3 million, out of an estimated population of up to 30 million, with nearly 300,000 children affected.
According to the UNODC, the number of drug users in Afghanistan grew by 53 percent from 2005 to 2010.
UN officials say there are just over 90 drug treatment centres across the country, treating 16,000 individuals, up from 40 centres in 2009, and that just over a third of the centres are for women and children.
Around 60 percent of the Afghan population are under 25 and 52 percent of the population is under 18 years old.
"We are ignoring these people if we don't take care of them. These children are the future of their country. If they use drugs, they won't be useful to their country," said Jabarkhail.
Baspari, 28, and her five children aged from 10 months to 10 years old, are addicts.
She and her husband grow opium on their land, and she talks about the effect it can have: "Sometimes they dance, sometimes they sleep for three days in a row.
"I was given the same drugs when I was little. But when you're running out of money, and your kids need medicine, you don't have the choice," she said.
But from now on, she says, things will be different.
"The doctors told me not to do it, so I won't use it again." -AFP
Afghan corruption imperils future success: Column
USA TODAY By Frank Vogl February 10, 2013
U.S. reconstruction aid has been wasted. Reforms are needed before we leave.
Dramatic changes lie ahead for Afghanistan — none of them encouraging. President Obama has confirmed that U.S. military presence in the country will wind down over the next 18 months. Responsibility for the country's governance, security and economy will rest on Afghan shoulders. The tragedy is that the government of Hamid Karzai is a cesspool of corruption, and much of the looting has been of the tens of billions of dollars from U.S. taxpayers.
Yet, there was not a single question about these issues during Chuck Hagel's confirmation hearings to be secretary of Defense. There should have been because our efforts to rebuild Afghanistan, managed by the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Pentagon, are riddled with problems.
The U.S. has spent more on reconstruction in Afghanistan than in any other foreign country, says John Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction. Sopko says the U.S. is spending about $28 million a day on reconstruction projects, which has amounted to close to $100 billion over the past decade.
Benefits to women
Some of this money has been well spent. Education and health care projects have brought benefits to ordinary Afghans, says Ann Vaughan, senior policy adviser at Mercy Corps, an international humanitarian organization. Indeed, under U.S. pressure, the Afghan Constitution spells out the rights of women, and many efforts have been made to give women opportunities to obtain an education and find good jobs.
But much of the reconstruction effort has been wasted because of mismanagement and corruption. Recently, Sopko said that his agency's job is to protect U.S. funds from fraud, mismanagement and abuse. Then he noted a series of abuses where buildings collapsed, where contractors disappeared with funds, and where projects were funded in areas that could never be monitored for security reasons. He admitted, "We are at risk of wasting billions of dollars."
Dependence on U.S.
The Afghan economy has been dependent on U.S. security and military assistance. As the U.S. reduces its commitments, Afghanistan's economy will suffer, too. The Afghan government has failed to create an environment that encourages new investment and economic growth. In fact, the country's economy could become even more dependent on its major export crop — opium.
Top U.S. diplomats and generals have repeatedly voiced support for governance reforms, but these have been ignored by Afghan leaders. The corruption and security issues are closely related. As our top general in Afghanistan, John Allen, told a Senate committee last year: "We know that corruption still robs Afghan citizens of their faith in the government, and that poor governance itself often advances insurgent messages."
Unless the Obama administration and Karzai government can secure dramatic changes, a year or two from now Afghanistan's economy and governance will look far worse. Inevitably, some critics will blame Obama for rushing the U.S. withdrawal. Indeed, we should have been tougher on governance issues, and more vigilant in preventing mismanagement in the reconstruction programs.
But overwhelmingly, the blame should fall on those Afghans who have held positions in government of public trust, who abused that trust and robbed their fellow citizens.
Frank Vogl is the author of Waging War on Corruption: Inside the Movement Fighting the Abuse of Power.
In addition to its own editorials, USA TODAY publishes diverse opinions from outside writers, including our Board of Contributors.
Farnood Lawyer Slams Kabul Bank Tribunal
TOLOnews.com By Saleha Soadat Sunday, 10 February 2013
The lawyer for former Kabul Bank chairman Shir Khan Farnood claimed on Sunday that the investigation into the collapse of the bank by a special tribunal has not been done fairly.
Just days away from the tribunal releasing its findings, Farnood's lawyer Sabghatullah Tamim said that the available documents show that Mahmoud Karzai, brother of President Hamid Karzai, and Mohammad Hassin Fahim, the brother of Vice President Marshal Mohammad Kasim Fahim, have not repaid their loans from the defunct bank and they have abused their power and influence in the government.
Farnood was investigated by the court along with former Kabul Bank chief executive Khalil Ferozi for their role in the bank's collapse, but Tamim said the court ignored both Karzai and Fahim for fear of their connections in the government.
"Previously, they had accounted for Hassin Fahim's $121 million loan for the Gas Group – they [Fahim's company] admitted it. They marked their fingerprints and admitted at the Receivership Department that they would pay the loan back, I mean both Khalil Ferozi and Hassin Fahim. But they referred it to the commission of financial lawsuits, which reviewed the matter, and they took the conclusion from the commission. This is against the banking law of Article 84 that says 'No case is revisable'," Tamim said.
"They even made a joke about it and described it like a metaphor – that they had acted like Prophet Mohammad's companions doing a work [accepting money] as an oblation," Tamim added.
However both shareholders Mahmoud Karzai and Hassin Fahim deny they have paid any outstanding loans from Kabul Bank.
"I have paid all my loans and I do not owe even one cent to Gas Group and now Mr Ferozi has got all the responsibilities of Gas Group," Fahim said Sunday in a telephone interview with TOLOnews.
Mahmoud told TOLOnews last week that any reports of him owing money were false. He made the statement after the special tribunal chief Shams Rahman Shams stated that he and Fahim still owed money to the bank.
Tamim also claimed on Sunday that the special tribunal had failed to investigate counterfeiting overseen by Mahmoud Karzai.
"Mahmoud Karzi himself made more than 10 forged trading licenses – it still exists in the files – and he received loans on the basis of that. So then, why is he not now investigated by the judicial bodies? " Tamim asked.
Mahmoud Karzai retaliated, telling TOLOnews Sunday in a telephone interview that Farnood is the most guilty party, referring to the $400 million he allegedly stashed in offshore accounts.
"Here [Afghanistan] is a good place for thieves because you do whatever you want, then talk freely and without responsibility. First [Farnood] should bring that $400 million and give it back to the Afghan nation, then wash out his mouth, and then he should talk," Mahmood Karzai said.
The special tribunal on Kabul Bank is expected to deliver its verdict this week on its investigation into at least 22 people said to be involved in the bank's collapse in 2010.
No Pakistan Strategic Pact Unless Conditions Met: Rassoul
TOLOnews.com By Haseeb Maudoodi Sunday, 10 February 2013
The Afghan government will not sign a strategic pact with Islamabad unless it is clear that Pakistan poses no threat to Afghanistan, foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul said Sunday.
A week after meeting Pakistani government and security officials in London, Rassoul said that the government will ensure that Afghanistan's conditions are very clear for the peace deal proposed at the trilateral summit between Britain, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
"The agreement was addressed at the London conference. However, as long as Pakistan shows no sign of honest cooperation to provide peace and sustainability, and there is no trust gained from our people, there will be no such agreement signed," he told TOLOnews.
"But, of course, we assure there will be no danger of Afghanistan posing a threat to Pakistan," he added.
This comes as reports that the Assembly of Islamic Clerics (Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam) sent the general secretary and president, Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman, to Qatar on Saturday for talks with the Taliban – a visit taken seemingly at the behest of the Taliban.
The government of Pakistan has not yet confirmed whether these reports are correct.
Rassoul dismissed the significance of such reports saying it did not matter whether Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman has travelled to Qatar or not.
"The Qatar office is only for direct talks with Taliban and it will not be a political office [of government] for them. It is not important which Maulana has travelled to Qatar. The office has not opened yet, but we are in dialogues with government of Qatar to open the office," he said.
Neighbouring Pakistan has long been accused of allowing insurgents safe-havens in the country's west – near the border with Afghanistan. So its role in the peace process is important.
Ahmadinejad says he will talk with US if West stops pressuring Iran
Associated Press February 10, 2013
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Sunday that he is ready to have talks with United States if the West stops pressuring his country, the latest in a series of hints from leaders in both Washington and Tehran about the prospect of direct bilateral negotiations over the Islamic Republic's controversial nuclear program.
However, Washington is highly unlikely to relax sanctions on Iran -- and Tehran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say on key state decisions, says that his country won't negotiate under threat. This makes it hard to envision how talks could take place.
Ahmadinejad is in his final months of his term of office and his followers are weakened by a feud with the Islamic Republic's clerical establishment. His latest statement, which implies that he is an equal player with Khamenei in foreign policy matters, may simply be an attempt to appear as though he is still politically relevant.
"You pull away the gun from the face of the Iranian nation, and I myself will enter the talks with you," Ahmadinejad said at a ceremony marking the 34th anniversary of the 1979 revolution that toppled a Western-backed monarch and ushered in the Islamic Republic.
He said the West had recently taken a "better" tone toward Iran -- a nod to statements made by Vice President Joe Biden last week, in which he said the United States was prepared talk directly to Iran. But the Iranian president said this was not enough.
The West claims Iran's nuclear activities are aimed at developing weapons. Iran denies it seeks atomic arms, saying its nuclear fuel is only for energy-producing reactors and medical applications, and insists that its operations will continue.
"The Iranian nation will not give up one iota of its rights," Ahmadinejad said. "Your efforts had aimed at preventing us from become nuclear, but we did."
However Ahmadinejad admitted that sanctions have taken a bite. "Today, because of dishonorable pressure by enemies, people are under pressure. The government is concerned about the uneasy situation of a big portion of the country."
Ahmadinejad also said Iran will soon send a satellite into geostationary orbit.
"God willing, soon Iran's satellite will be located at an orbit at (an altitude of) 36,000 kilometers (22,000 miles) next to others from four or five advanced powers and it will relay a message of peace and fidelity to all world," said Ahmadinejad.
Iran regularly announces technological breakthroughs, most of which are impossible to verify independently. Iran says it has launched small satellites to low orbits of up to 450 kilometers (280 miles). In January, Iran claims it sent a monkey into suborbital space and recovered the animal safely. It says it hopes to send astronauts to orbit by 2018.
Iran displayed a model of the Pishgam rocket, which the country says it used to send the monkey into space, in a corner of Tehran's Azadi Square where demonstrators gathered to listen to the president.
The West fears that technology Iran's space program can be used to develop long-range missiles.
State TV meanwhile broadcast rallies throughout the country to mark the anniversary. Many demonstrators chanted "Down with the U.S." and "Death to Israel," slogans traditionally used to denounce the Islamic Republic's arch-enemies.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
February 11, 2013 Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
An Afghan government panel confirms it has found evidence of torture of detainees, but it denied systematic abuse of prisoners.
The panel was tasked by Afghan President Hamid Karzai last month to investigate UN claims that prisoners in government custody were being tortured and sexually abused.
The panel said on February 11 that almost half the inmates it interviewed claimed being tortured.
Sixty-six percent of the inmates said they don't have access to legal services.
The panel said it spoke to some 140 inmates in Kabul, Kandahar, and Herat jails.
In a report issued in January, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said that "torture persists and remains a serious concern in numerous detention facilities across Afghanistan."
The report said such practices continue despite efforts by the United Nations and international forces.
Based on reporting by AP and dpa
18 Taliban rebels surrender in E. Afghanistan
ASADABAD, Afghanistan, Feb. 11 (Xinhua) -- Up to 18 Taliban rebels renounced violence and surrendered in eastern Afghan province of Kunar on Monday, authorities said.
"An 18-member group of Taliban including their commander named Heydari laid down their arms and joined the government-initiated peace and reintegration process in Kunar earlier Monday," the provincial governor Seyyed Fazlullah Wahidi told Xinhua.
With the former insurgents' surrender, peace and stability would be further strengthened in several parts of the province with Asadabad city as its capital 185 km east of Kabul, Wahidi added.
The Afghan government set up a 70-member High Peace Council in the summer 2010 to encourage Taliban to disarm and give up militancy against the government.
Taliban militants fighting Afghan and NATO-led troops have not made any comment yet.
Roadside bomb strikes Afghan army van, kills 1, wounds 1
JALALABAD, Afghanistan, Feb. 11 (Xinhua)-- Roadside bomb hit a vehicle of Afghan army in the eastern Nangarhar province 120 km east of Kabul on Monday, leaving one person dead and injuring another, a local official said.
"A mine planted by militants on a road in Khogyani district, struck a vehicle of national army in Mimla village at around 10:00 a.m. local time today killing a soldier and injuring another," a security official Hazrat Hussain Mashriqiwal told Xinhua.
Meantime, Zabihullah Mujahid who claims to speak for the Taliban outfit in talks with media via telephone from unknown location claimed of responsibility, stressing three soldiers were killed in the blast.
Rural Afghanistan force with shady reputation may grow
The U.S. plans to extend a financial lifeline from the Pentagon to the Afghan Local Police, implicated in human rights abuses, for at least five more years.
Los Angeles Times By David S. Cloud and Shashank Bengali February 10, 2013
WASHINGTON - In an effort to fight the insurgency after U.S. troops leave Afghanistan by the end of next year, officials in Washington and Kabul are planning to dramatically expand a 3-year-old rural police force that has been implicated in human rights abuses and criminal activity.
The plan by the U.S. Special Operations Command would extend a financial lifeline from the Pentagon to the Afghan Local Police for at least five more years, providing $1.2 billion to train, arm and pay 45,000 fighters, up from a current force of 19,600, according to senior U.S. officials and planning documents.
Despite heavy casualties so far, and a worrisome reputation for corruption and brutality, the paramilitary force would serve as the first line of defense against the Taliban in rural areas beyond the reach of regular Afghan army and police units.
White House officials are still debating the long-term military aid package for Afghanistan and how many U.S. troops will stay behind after 2014. President Obama is expected to outline the drawdown in his State of the Union address Tuesday.
Expanding the controversial Afghan force has won preliminary approval from senior U.S. commanders. They say only a small number of special operations troops based in Kabul would be needed to help the Afghan Interior Ministry run the program, a major selling point with the White House seeking to limit the U.S. military contingent.
The proposal has also won at least tentative support from Afghan government officials. They are increasingly nervous that the insurgency will gain strength after U.S. troops leave, and appear willing to back the effort as long as Washington pays for it.
The expansion "is according to requests from officials in the central government, the provinces and the district level," said Ali Shah Ahmadzai, the Interior Ministry official who oversees the local police.
When the American-backed units were first organized in 2010, Gen. David H. Petraeus, then the top commander in Afghanistan, described them as a temporary, lightly armed guard force that could fight insurgents in remote areas until enough Afghan army and police units could be trained to take over.
Since then, U.S. commanders have come to view the village fighters as a cheaper alternative to regular Afghan security forces. Lt. Col. Tom Bryant, a spokesman for the U.S. Special Operations Command in Kabul, said they had provided Afghan officials with studies showing how much money they could save by shrinking the army and police and replacing them with rural guard units.
The village guards resemble militias more than conventional police. Fighters are selected by tribal councils, given three weeks' training, plus small arms, uniforms and pickup trucks. They have no arrest powers, and are not supposed to investigate crimes.
Their mission is to defend their villages from insurgents, and they have borne significant casualties. Officials say 6.2% of the home guard fighters have been wounded or killed, compared with less than 3% of Afghan army and police troops.
Ahmadzai said the force is deployed in 100 of the country's roughly 400 districts, and 44 more districts will be added in coming months.
But operating in often remote areas, many local units and their commanders receive little supervision by Afghan authorities, and in some cases their loyalties are far from clear.
"Once the NATO forces leave, these [fighters] will turn to the Taliban side," warned Atiqullah Amarkhail, an independent military analyst who was a senior military officer in Afghanistan's pre-Taliban government.
So far, defenders say the village guards have helped improve security in some of Afghanistan's most troubled areas.
In Ghazni, a strategic province south of Kabul, officials say the local units will be expanded in three districts this year to help support a popular anti-Taliban uprising that began last summer.
"The Afghan government sees this as their own program now," said Maj. Gen. Tony Thomas, who commands U.S. special operations troops in Afghanistan. "It has its naysayers out there, but ultimately we hope it will be funded out to the mid-2020s to give them breathing space" against the insurgency.
Ghulam Mujtaba Patang, the minister of Interior and a former critic, recently endorsed enlarging the force and maintaining it until 2025, according to planning documents. In December, Patang acknowledged misconduct by some rural guards, and said he was reviewing the program.
"Presence of the local police has been effective for providing security at some cases, and has negatively affected areas in some other cases," Patang was quoted as telling the Afghan parliament.
Some Afghan officials regard the home guard as an erratic and dangerous force whose members are more loyal to their commanders than to the national government.
They warn that giving weapons and training to local tribesmen is a recipe for criminality and warlordism, and will undermine confidence in the Afghan government and the regular army. Expanding the village-based force will only make problems worse, they say.
"I don't support increasing the number" of local guards, said Sher Aziz Kamawal, the head of security affairs in parliament. Washington "should invest that money in training, equipping and increasing the numbers of the Afghan army."
In some cases, the home guard units prey on villagers rather than protect them.
At least 77 local police have been investigated for criminal activity, including murder, rape, extortion and bribe-taking. They include Hakeem Shujayee, a local commander in Oruzgan who was arrested last summer after being accused of involvement in dozens of killings and rapes. Despite the allegations, he was later released and is now a fugitive.
"Since his removal from his Afghan Local Police leadership position in the June 2012 time frame, U.S. special operations forces have not had any type of relationship with Mr. Shujayee," said Bryant, the spokesman for the command in Kabul.
A report last month by the United Nations mission in Afghanistan found that 10 of 12 prisoners interviewed by investigators in the provinces of Kunduz, Kandahar, Faryab and Oruzgan had been beaten or otherwise abused by local police units.
Ahmadzai, the Interior Ministry official who oversees the local police, shrugged off concerns about abuses by some units. "No one can escape from the law, so anyone who commits a crime will face justice," he said.
david.cloud@latimes.com
shashank.bengali@latimes.com
Cloud reported from Washington and Bengali from Kabul.
Outgoing general predicts an Afghanistan liberated from foreign intrigue
The remarks from Gen. John Allen came at a change-of-command ceremony. American Gen. Joseph Dunford now leads NATO's mission in Afghanistan.
Reuters By David Alexander February 10, 2013
Kabul, Afghanistan - The US Marine Corps general who will oversee the withdrawal of most foreign troops from Afghanistan and wind down America's longest war took command of NATO-led forces on Sunday at a change-of-command ceremony that emphasized Afghan sovereignty.
Gen. Joseph Dunford took charge of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, who ended a 19-month tour that was arguably one of the most difficult periods in the war, now in its 11th year.
"Today is not about change, it's about continuity. What has not changed is the will of this coalition.... What has not changed is the inevitability of our success," General Dunford told a crowd of foreign and Afghan officials in an aging gymnasium at the barricaded ISAF headquarters.
Senior military officials, including Dunford and General Allen, sat on a dais covered with an Afghan rug as a band played the US and Afghan national anthems and a color guard presented the flags. Several hundred guests were seated in chairs on the floor of the old basketball court.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai was absent from the ceremony despite receiving an invitation from ISAF. A spokesman for President Karzai declined to comment. Gen. Martin Dempsey, the highest-ranking US military officer, said later he thought the level of Afghan representation at the ceremony was appropriate.
Allen, who directed ISAF's transfer of most security across the country to the Afghan army and police, gave an emotional speech stressing the nation's sovereignty, an issue that has been a thorn in Karzai's relationship with his Western backers.
Located between Iran, Pakistan, and Central Asia, Afghanistan has been subject to invasions since the ancient Greeks, through to the 19th-century "Great Game" – the scramble for power between Britain and Russia – and the last three decades of conflict.
Citing international support for a transformative decade in Afghanistan, Allen said: "I believe that in 10 years, Afghanistan will never again be a place between empires, caught in the grindstone of international politics." Afghans take the lead
Dunford assumes control of ISAF at a time when the 350,000-strong Afghan military and police forces have taken over the lead role for security across most of the country, and are due to be fully in the lead everywhere within a few months. ISAF's primary role will be to assist, advise, and train Afghan forces.
Allen and General Dempsey, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the challenge for Dunford through the end of 2014 would be to balance the withdrawal of international forces with the continuing need to assist and train Afghan troops, all while pressuring Al Qaeda.
"Closing bases, moving equipment – if you're not careful, that can become the mission," Dempsey said. "So he's got to keep all those things in equilibrium." Allen: 'This is victory'
Allen said the Afghan army and police were becoming ever more capable.
"Afghan forces defending Afghan people and enabling the government of this country to serve its citizens. This is victory. This is what winning looks like," Allen said.
Officials said that, while the insurgency remains a challenge, dealing with government corruption increasingly poses the biggest threat to Afghanistan's long-term viability.
"The strategic long-term enduring threat, it's not the insurgency. It is the degree of corruption and criminality that exists within the government," a senior ISAF official said on condition of anonymity. "If you can deal [with that] ... then you can start ... pulling the carpet out from underneath the insurgency."
Allen told reporters he thought Karzai had put in place the mechanisms to deal with corruption, but added: "We've reached a point now where rhetoric, while it was encouraging, isn't enough any more....
"The rhetoric has to be accompanied by real and meaningful reform, reform that reduces the capacity of the criminal patronage networks to grip and weaken institutions of state."
Allen also said education was helping to turn the tide of public opinion in Afghanistan against Taliban insurgents, who banned girls from most schools. He earlier told Reuters that advancing women's rights was key to preventing the Islamist group regaining support.
The White House said last month it would nominate Allen as NATO's supreme allied commander in Europe, after the Pentagon cleared him of professional misconduct over emails to a Florida socialite linked to a scandal that led his predecessor, David Petraeus, to resign as director of the CIA.
Afghans flock to India for infertility treatment
New Delhi already has a sizeable Afghan community, but over the past five years a steady trickle of visitors seeking healthcare has grown into a flood. Hospitals have been quick to respond.
Christian Science Monitor By Aarti Betigeri, Correspondent February 10, 2013
New Delhi - New Delhi’s Press Enclave Road represents the city’s complex mix of communities like no other: One side boasts an enormous modern shopping mall featuring the Hard Rock Cafe and Zara; the other, a string of eateries advertising Afghan rice dishes and chemist signs in Dari, one of Afghanistan’s main languages.
It is a sign of the impact of the city’s newest migrant community one block away from one of Delhi’s largest private hospitals, Max. The hospital, like others in the capital, is finding a new market in medical tourism from the war-torn neighbor.
The city already has a sizeable Afghan community – long-term residents, refugees, students – but over the past five years a steady trickle of visitors seeking healthcare has grown into a flood. Now, some large hospitals catering to foreign patients are finding that up to a third of them are from Afghanistan.
Some are catering almost exclusively to Afghans, while others are working to make their services more accessible to the community. The colossal Apollo Hospital in the city’s southwest has translators on staff, a website in Dari, and even a separate payment desk for Afghans.
"All the good doctors in Afghanistan have migrated, nobody wants to invest there," says Dheerendra Singh Tomar, an Indian who runs a private hospital in Delhi catering to patients from Afghanistan and other developing countries. "Medical tourism from Afghanistan is bringing a lot of money to India.”
There are no firm figures on the numbers of Afghans travelling to India for medical treatment, but the Afghan Embassy in New Delhi estimates that up to 100 Afghans arrive in New Delhi each day during the winter high season for treatment: Mostly to treat infertility issues or cancer.
One of these is Ziyarmal Arass, who came to the city a year ago for in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment along with his wife, and stayed on for the recent birth of his baby girl. “India is a good place for this, it’s not as expensive as other countries and Pakistan’s health care is not good,” says the 25-year-old Kabul businessman.
“I was nervous about coming to Delhi but when I arrived I found many other Afghans in my neighborhood, good food and weather.”
With the cost of IVF treatment in an upscale hospital costing as much as $3,000, it is clearly only a real option for Afghanistan’s upper income earners. The per capital GDP in Afghanistan is $589 compared with India’s $1,514.
Still, four airlines now provide four or five flights daily between Afghanistan and the Indian capital, up from zero a decade ago. The Afghan embassy says that while most Afghans still travel to Pakistan for their health needs, India is becoming increasingly attractive for those who can afford it.
"India is close by, you can fly from Kabul in just over an hour," says Mr. Tomar. There are other countries offering low-cost medical care, such as Thailand, but India offers some degree of relate-ability for Afghans: There are similarities when it comes to food, clothing, and appearance.
Despite being one of the richest cities in South Asia, New Delhi is still an affordable option for Afghans. In Lajpat Nagar, a ramshackle neighborhood popular with Afghan refugees, a visitor and his family can rent a room for 900 rupees per day, or almost $17. And although Afghanistan is no Saudi Arabia, some here have high hopes for the industry.
"This has only just begun, this industry is going to grow by 20 percent each year," says Tomar. "That's huge."
With New Control, General to Focus on Withdrawal in Afghanistan
New York Times By ALISSA J. RUBIN February 10, 2013
KABUL, Afghanistan - Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr. took command of both the American and the international military missions in Afghanistan in a traditional handoff ceremony on Sunday, becoming the 15th general to lead the international command here — and he is expected to be its last.
It falls to General Dunford, who led the Fifth Marine Regiment at the start of the Iraq war, to manage the withdrawal of nearly 100,000 troops, about 68,000 of them American, and a vast amount of equipment and cargo from a landlocked country still at war with the Taliban.
He will also oversee the final transfer of lead responsibility for security to Afghan troops, including in the most volatile districts in the south and east where the Taliban have maintained influence if not outright control.
He takes over from Gen. John R. Allen, whose 19-month tenure as supreme commander in Afghanistan was marked by urgent diplomacy to repair a damaged relationship with the Afghan government and public, and who oversaw the beginning in earnest of the security transfer that General Dunford is to complete.
In a sweeping speech at the ceremony on Sunday, General Allen was at turns thoughtful and filled with emotion as he spoke about the price of the war for American and foreign troops, the persistence of the Taliban and their allies, and his growing belief since his arrival in July 2011 that Afghanistan could succeed in defending itself and its fledgling democracy.
Reflecting the emphasis his command gave to Afghan civilians, he introduced two Afghan students from a nearby high school, a girl and a boy, whom he had invited to the ceremony and had seated in the first row — saying, in essence, that they were the future that Western and Afghan troops were fighting for. And he expressed that, despite the concerns he had as he took up command, he was leaving with “an optimism and a very real sense of knowing that we will be victorious.”
“I believe that in 10 years, Afghanistan will never again be the place between empires caught in the grindstone of international politics,” he said, referring to the country’s neighbors who at different times have fought each other or fought proxy wars on Afghan soil.
And he added, in a nod to concerns that Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups could return to Afghanistan in numbers after the American withdrawal, “I believe that Afghanistan will never again be a safe haven to terrorists.”
He became emotional discussing the toll of the long war, twice mentioning the numbers of dead that the United States and its allies had borne. He described how every Sunday his leadership gathered to read the names of those who had been killed the week before, noting that “560 sons and daughters have given their lives” and that 5,500 had been wounded just during the months of his command.
In recent months, the numbers of Afghan soldiers and police who have died fighting the insurgency had been mounting. “There can be no doubt that Afghanistan is investing in its future,” he said.
Still, he did not promise that the Taliban would be vanquished any time soon, saying that victory “may never be marked on a calendar.”
“Afghan forces defending Afghan people and enabling the government of this country to serve its citizens. This is victory. This is what winning looks like,” General Allen said.
When it was General Dunford’s turn to speak, he kept his remarks brief and blunt, talking for barely three minutes. He promised “continuity” in all respects including the International Security Assistance Force’s “commitment to accomplish the mission.”
General Dunford, a native of Boston, has served in a number of senior posts including, most recently, assistant commandant of the Marine Corps. He spent his first several days in Afghanistan sitting at General Allen’s elbow in meetings, saying little as he learned his new job, said Western officials who attended meetings with him. They described him as more of a “regular Joe” than General Allen, but similarly focused and flexible.
He has a master’s degree in government from Georgetown University and a master’s in international relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.
Much of the focus of his job will become clearer in coming days, with President Obama expected to announce the pace of the American military withdrawal over the next year, and perhaps propose troop levels as a negotiating point for the extent of a lasting military assistance force to stay in Afghanistan past 2014.
One of the hardest parts of General Dunford’s new job, said Maj. Gen. Charles M. Gurganus, the Marine Corps commander over a stretch of southern and southwestern Afghanistan that includes the Taliban heartland, will be trying to help the Afghan security forces become self-sustaining. The goal is for them to be able to do their own recruiting, training and equipment supply over many years. For now, they still rely on American troops for medical evacuation, intelligence and logistics assistance.
President Hamid Karzai, who was invited, did not attend the ceremony, but Bismillah Khan Mohammadi, the defense minister, and Rangin Dadfar Spanta, the national security adviser, were both there.
James Dao contributed reporting.
Afghanistan's growing number of child drug addicts
The Star online Monday February 11, 2013
JALALABAD, Afghanistan - They play badminton, kick a ball around and huddle over computer games just like normal children. Except that they are recovering drug addicts aged around three to 12, representing a growing proportion of drug users in war-torn Afghanistan.
In response, increasing numbers of rehabilitation centres are weaning such children off their addiction and giving them a new appetite for life in a country that produces 90 percent of the world's opium used to make heroin.
While there are no statistics for kids, the rate of relapse is high for their parents, experts say. For now two young girls, dressed in a blue uniform and playing badminton, and a group of boys playing football are all active and healthy - the total opposite of when they arrived.
"When I see them for the first time, the kids are depressed, unhappy. They don't play actively, they don't care about hygiene," said care assistant Massouma Khatima.
"They're like ghosts," added one of her colleagues.
The centre, run by Afghan charity Wadan, which is partly funded by the United Nations, offers 25 children and 35 women the chance to get clean.
Those who suffer from diarrhea, constipation or headaches as a side effect from addiction are given medical treatment. More hardened addicts among the adults are treated with hydrotherapy - in this case mostly cold showers.
Marwa, 10, is one of the girls who has recently recovered. Now she dares to dream of becoming an engineer, a fairly remote prospect for a girl from a poor community where few women are educated.
"I've been taking sleeping pills since I was a baby... I was drowsy and feeling asleep. I always had headaches. I couldn't learn. My friends were learning faster. They were also laughing at me, calling me 'sleepy'," she says.
"Now, I feel better, but not completely OK. I feel I can learn to play," she adds.
Fazalwahid Tahiri, the centre's administrator, says that in the eastern province of Nangarhar, sleeping pills can be mixed with milk for kids. But children are more commonly given a highly addictive broth made from opium, doled out as a remedy for flu and stomach aches.
"Since opium is easily available, some don't even think of it as drug addiction. They use it as a pain killer," he said.
In Afghanistan, most children become addicts as a result of their parents - passively inhaling their fathers' opium smoke in the house, says Zarbadshah Jabarkhail, a doctor with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Or they are deliberately fed opium, for example by mothers who keep their children sedated while weaving carpets or harvesting opium crops, he says.
The root cause is poverty. "It's very usual. The majority of the families don't know about the side-effects of opium. They don't understand that if they give drugs to their children, they are also killing them at the same time," he said.
"The proportion of children addicted has increased because we have more drug users and they are certainly affecting their children," said Jabarkhail.
The latest US State Department survey on drug use in Afghanistan says the number of adult drug users could exceed 1.3 million, out of an estimated population of up to 30 million, with nearly 300,000 children affected.
According to the UNODC, the number of drug users in Afghanistan grew by 53 percent from 2005 to 2010.
UN officials say there are just over 90 drug treatment centres across the country, treating 16,000 individuals, up from 40 centres in 2009, and that just over a third of the centres are for women and children.
Around 60 percent of the Afghan population are under 25 and 52 percent of the population is under 18 years old.
"We are ignoring these people if we don't take care of them. These children are the future of their country. If they use drugs, they won't be useful to their country," said Jabarkhail.
Baspari, 28, and her five children aged from 10 months to 10 years old, are addicts.
She and her husband grow opium on their land, and she talks about the effect it can have: "Sometimes they dance, sometimes they sleep for three days in a row.
"I was given the same drugs when I was little. But when you're running out of money, and your kids need medicine, you don't have the choice," she said.
But from now on, she says, things will be different.
"The doctors told me not to do it, so I won't use it again." -AFP
Afghan corruption imperils future success: Column
USA TODAY By Frank Vogl February 10, 2013
U.S. reconstruction aid has been wasted. Reforms are needed before we leave.
Dramatic changes lie ahead for Afghanistan — none of them encouraging. President Obama has confirmed that U.S. military presence in the country will wind down over the next 18 months. Responsibility for the country's governance, security and economy will rest on Afghan shoulders. The tragedy is that the government of Hamid Karzai is a cesspool of corruption, and much of the looting has been of the tens of billions of dollars from U.S. taxpayers.
Yet, there was not a single question about these issues during Chuck Hagel's confirmation hearings to be secretary of Defense. There should have been because our efforts to rebuild Afghanistan, managed by the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Pentagon, are riddled with problems.
The U.S. has spent more on reconstruction in Afghanistan than in any other foreign country, says John Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction. Sopko says the U.S. is spending about $28 million a day on reconstruction projects, which has amounted to close to $100 billion over the past decade.
Benefits to women
Some of this money has been well spent. Education and health care projects have brought benefits to ordinary Afghans, says Ann Vaughan, senior policy adviser at Mercy Corps, an international humanitarian organization. Indeed, under U.S. pressure, the Afghan Constitution spells out the rights of women, and many efforts have been made to give women opportunities to obtain an education and find good jobs.
But much of the reconstruction effort has been wasted because of mismanagement and corruption. Recently, Sopko said that his agency's job is to protect U.S. funds from fraud, mismanagement and abuse. Then he noted a series of abuses where buildings collapsed, where contractors disappeared with funds, and where projects were funded in areas that could never be monitored for security reasons. He admitted, "We are at risk of wasting billions of dollars."
Dependence on U.S.
The Afghan economy has been dependent on U.S. security and military assistance. As the U.S. reduces its commitments, Afghanistan's economy will suffer, too. The Afghan government has failed to create an environment that encourages new investment and economic growth. In fact, the country's economy could become even more dependent on its major export crop — opium.
Top U.S. diplomats and generals have repeatedly voiced support for governance reforms, but these have been ignored by Afghan leaders. The corruption and security issues are closely related. As our top general in Afghanistan, John Allen, told a Senate committee last year: "We know that corruption still robs Afghan citizens of their faith in the government, and that poor governance itself often advances insurgent messages."
Unless the Obama administration and Karzai government can secure dramatic changes, a year or two from now Afghanistan's economy and governance will look far worse. Inevitably, some critics will blame Obama for rushing the U.S. withdrawal. Indeed, we should have been tougher on governance issues, and more vigilant in preventing mismanagement in the reconstruction programs.
But overwhelmingly, the blame should fall on those Afghans who have held positions in government of public trust, who abused that trust and robbed their fellow citizens.
Frank Vogl is the author of Waging War on Corruption: Inside the Movement Fighting the Abuse of Power.
In addition to its own editorials, USA TODAY publishes diverse opinions from outside writers, including our Board of Contributors.
Farnood Lawyer Slams Kabul Bank Tribunal
TOLOnews.com By Saleha Soadat Sunday, 10 February 2013
The lawyer for former Kabul Bank chairman Shir Khan Farnood claimed on Sunday that the investigation into the collapse of the bank by a special tribunal has not been done fairly.
Just days away from the tribunal releasing its findings, Farnood's lawyer Sabghatullah Tamim said that the available documents show that Mahmoud Karzai, brother of President Hamid Karzai, and Mohammad Hassin Fahim, the brother of Vice President Marshal Mohammad Kasim Fahim, have not repaid their loans from the defunct bank and they have abused their power and influence in the government.
Farnood was investigated by the court along with former Kabul Bank chief executive Khalil Ferozi for their role in the bank's collapse, but Tamim said the court ignored both Karzai and Fahim for fear of their connections in the government.
"Previously, they had accounted for Hassin Fahim's $121 million loan for the Gas Group – they [Fahim's company] admitted it. They marked their fingerprints and admitted at the Receivership Department that they would pay the loan back, I mean both Khalil Ferozi and Hassin Fahim. But they referred it to the commission of financial lawsuits, which reviewed the matter, and they took the conclusion from the commission. This is against the banking law of Article 84 that says 'No case is revisable'," Tamim said.
"They even made a joke about it and described it like a metaphor – that they had acted like Prophet Mohammad's companions doing a work [accepting money] as an oblation," Tamim added.
However both shareholders Mahmoud Karzai and Hassin Fahim deny they have paid any outstanding loans from Kabul Bank.
"I have paid all my loans and I do not owe even one cent to Gas Group and now Mr Ferozi has got all the responsibilities of Gas Group," Fahim said Sunday in a telephone interview with TOLOnews.
Mahmoud told TOLOnews last week that any reports of him owing money were false. He made the statement after the special tribunal chief Shams Rahman Shams stated that he and Fahim still owed money to the bank.
Tamim also claimed on Sunday that the special tribunal had failed to investigate counterfeiting overseen by Mahmoud Karzai.
"Mahmoud Karzi himself made more than 10 forged trading licenses – it still exists in the files – and he received loans on the basis of that. So then, why is he not now investigated by the judicial bodies? " Tamim asked.
Mahmoud Karzai retaliated, telling TOLOnews Sunday in a telephone interview that Farnood is the most guilty party, referring to the $400 million he allegedly stashed in offshore accounts.
"Here [Afghanistan] is a good place for thieves because you do whatever you want, then talk freely and without responsibility. First [Farnood] should bring that $400 million and give it back to the Afghan nation, then wash out his mouth, and then he should talk," Mahmood Karzai said.
The special tribunal on Kabul Bank is expected to deliver its verdict this week on its investigation into at least 22 people said to be involved in the bank's collapse in 2010.
No Pakistan Strategic Pact Unless Conditions Met: Rassoul
TOLOnews.com By Haseeb Maudoodi Sunday, 10 February 2013
The Afghan government will not sign a strategic pact with Islamabad unless it is clear that Pakistan poses no threat to Afghanistan, foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul said Sunday.
A week after meeting Pakistani government and security officials in London, Rassoul said that the government will ensure that Afghanistan's conditions are very clear for the peace deal proposed at the trilateral summit between Britain, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
"The agreement was addressed at the London conference. However, as long as Pakistan shows no sign of honest cooperation to provide peace and sustainability, and there is no trust gained from our people, there will be no such agreement signed," he told TOLOnews.
"But, of course, we assure there will be no danger of Afghanistan posing a threat to Pakistan," he added.
This comes as reports that the Assembly of Islamic Clerics (Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam) sent the general secretary and president, Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman, to Qatar on Saturday for talks with the Taliban – a visit taken seemingly at the behest of the Taliban.
The government of Pakistan has not yet confirmed whether these reports are correct.
Rassoul dismissed the significance of such reports saying it did not matter whether Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman has travelled to Qatar or not.
"The Qatar office is only for direct talks with Taliban and it will not be a political office [of government] for them. It is not important which Maulana has travelled to Qatar. The office has not opened yet, but we are in dialogues with government of Qatar to open the office," he said.
Neighbouring Pakistan has long been accused of allowing insurgents safe-havens in the country's west – near the border with Afghanistan. So its role in the peace process is important.
Ahmadinejad says he will talk with US if West stops pressuring Iran
Associated Press February 10, 2013
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Sunday that he is ready to have talks with United States if the West stops pressuring his country, the latest in a series of hints from leaders in both Washington and Tehran about the prospect of direct bilateral negotiations over the Islamic Republic's controversial nuclear program.
However, Washington is highly unlikely to relax sanctions on Iran -- and Tehran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say on key state decisions, says that his country won't negotiate under threat. This makes it hard to envision how talks could take place.
Ahmadinejad is in his final months of his term of office and his followers are weakened by a feud with the Islamic Republic's clerical establishment. His latest statement, which implies that he is an equal player with Khamenei in foreign policy matters, may simply be an attempt to appear as though he is still politically relevant.
"You pull away the gun from the face of the Iranian nation, and I myself will enter the talks with you," Ahmadinejad said at a ceremony marking the 34th anniversary of the 1979 revolution that toppled a Western-backed monarch and ushered in the Islamic Republic.
He said the West had recently taken a "better" tone toward Iran -- a nod to statements made by Vice President Joe Biden last week, in which he said the United States was prepared talk directly to Iran. But the Iranian president said this was not enough.
The West claims Iran's nuclear activities are aimed at developing weapons. Iran denies it seeks atomic arms, saying its nuclear fuel is only for energy-producing reactors and medical applications, and insists that its operations will continue.
"The Iranian nation will not give up one iota of its rights," Ahmadinejad said. "Your efforts had aimed at preventing us from become nuclear, but we did."
However Ahmadinejad admitted that sanctions have taken a bite. "Today, because of dishonorable pressure by enemies, people are under pressure. The government is concerned about the uneasy situation of a big portion of the country."
Ahmadinejad also said Iran will soon send a satellite into geostationary orbit.
"God willing, soon Iran's satellite will be located at an orbit at (an altitude of) 36,000 kilometers (22,000 miles) next to others from four or five advanced powers and it will relay a message of peace and fidelity to all world," said Ahmadinejad.
Iran regularly announces technological breakthroughs, most of which are impossible to verify independently. Iran says it has launched small satellites to low orbits of up to 450 kilometers (280 miles). In January, Iran claims it sent a monkey into suborbital space and recovered the animal safely. It says it hopes to send astronauts to orbit by 2018.
Iran displayed a model of the Pishgam rocket, which the country says it used to send the monkey into space, in a corner of Tehran's Azadi Square where demonstrators gathered to listen to the president.
The West fears that technology Iran's space program can be used to develop long-range missiles.
State TV meanwhile broadcast rallies throughout the country to mark the anniversary. Many demonstrators chanted "Down with the U.S." and "Death to Israel," slogans traditionally used to denounce the Islamic Republic's arch-enemies.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com