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Parliament Criticises Faizi Over 'Aimless' Nato Comment
Wednesday, 20 March 2013 17:10 Written by Rafi Sediqi tolonews.com
Afghan lawmakers Wednesday criticised presidential spokesman Aimal Faizi for calling the Nato mission in Afghanistan "illogical and aimless", warning that such comments threaten the stability of the country.
The lawmakers said that the views coming from President Hamid Karzai's representative should be clarified as a personal idea of Karzai and not the views of the Afghan people.
"Such speeches will cause chaos in the country," MP Mohammad Naeem Lalai Ahmadzai said in Wednesday's parliamentary session. "The president is trying to remain in power by such statements. It is his personal idea, not the people's."
Fatima Aziz, an MP from northern Kunduz province, suggested the statement was too late considering Nato had been in Afghanistan more than a decade.
"Why didn't the government say ten years ago that the Nato mission is illogical and aimless? The Nato mission was not a secret," she said. "The comment will damage Afghanistan."
Lawmakers said they believed that Afghanistan needed the cooperation of the US and the presence of the foreign forces.
"Afghanistan's war is being planned by neighboring countries especially in Pakistan. And the country [Afghanistan] has serious need for international cooperation and the presence of foreign forces because the war has not ended in the country," member of the parliamentary international committee Noor Akbari said.
MPs said that main cause of war in Afghanistan is the intervention of the regional countries especially Pakistan where insurgents are being funded and equipped to be insurgents, creating more security challenges and thereby the need for foreign forces to assist until the Afghan forces can defend the country.
Faizi said Tuesday that the Nato-led military operation was "illogical and aimless", the latest public criticism of the foreign forces after Karzai's recent broadsides against the US.
His statement came after Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen rejected Karzai's recent allegations of US collusion with the Taliban.
"The people of Afghanistan ask Nato to define the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror.... (They) consider this war as aimless and illogical to continue," Faizi said.
Afghan govt hits back at NATO chief, says war aimless
Reuters By Jeremy Laurence March 19, 2013
KABUL - The Afghan government has hit back at remarks by the head of NATO who said Kabul must recognise the sacrifices made by other states, calling the alliance's war on terrorism in Afghanistan "aimless and unwise".
In the latest outburst of vitriol from the Afghan leadership deriding its Western allies, the spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the people of Afghanistan "ask NATO to define the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror".
"As they question why after a decade, this war in their country has failed to achieve its stated goals, but rather has resulted in the loss of thousands of innocent lives and destruction of their homes", Aimal Faizi said in a statement.
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on Monday he was concerned about the increasingly harsh rhetoric between Karzai and the United States, which contributes the largest contingent to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.
He told a news conference in Brussels that "we would also expect acknowledgement from the Afghan side that we have ... invested a lot in blood and treasure in helping President Karzai's country to move forward".
More than 3,000 foreign troops from 50 countries have been killed in Afghanistan since the U.S.-led military intervention began in 2001. Some estimates put the cost to the United States alone of the Afghan war in the hundreds of billions of dollars.
Speaking to the state news agency, BIA, Faizi said: "The people of Afghanistan ask NATO Secretary-General that while it is clearly known to NATO that terrorism sanctuaries are outside Afghanistan, why this war then continues in their homes and villages unproductively?"
"Therefore, the Afghan people consider this war as aimless and unwise to continue," he said.
WAR OF WORDS
Karzai marred a debut visit to Afghanistan by the new U.S. defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, last week by accusing Washington and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed beyond 2014, when NATO is set to wrap up its combat mission and most foreign troops are to withdraw.
Washington denies the accusation, and found support from Rasmussen who said the allegation was "absolutely ridiculous".
Karzai's remarks further strained already fraught ties between the president and the Western allies who are fighting to protect his government from insurgents.
The United States still has 66,000 troops in Afghanistan, down from almost 100,000 two years ago at the height of a surge ordered by President Barack Obama. Washington intends to withdraw most of them by the end of next year but wants to negotiate a continued, smaller presence.
Karzai has been increasingly assertive towards the United States. Last month, he ordered U.S. special forces to leave Wardak province after residents complained that they, and Afghans working with them, were torturing and killing civilians, an allegation denied by the Americans.
Opposition politicians saw Karzai's order as a political move to bolster his party's support base ahead of a presidential election next year. Karzai is not allowed to stand again.
"As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the country and businessmen leave," Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.
He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes. (Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Jon Hemming)
US military, Afghan government reach deal for partial troop pullout from contentious province
By Kimberly Dozier, The Associated Press
KABUL - The U.S. military and the Afghan government reached a deal Wednesday on the pullout of American special operations forces and their Afghan counterparts from a strategic eastern province after complaints that they were involved in human rights abuses.
American military officials have steadfastly denied the Afghan abuse allegations, which led President Hamid Karzai to demand the withdrawal of the U.S. commandos from Wardak province despite fears the decision could leave the area and the neighbouring capital of Kabul more vulnerable to al-Qaida and other insurgents.
The agreement calls for the U.S.-led coalition to pull the special operations forces from Wardak's Nirkh district, the area where the abuses allegedly occurred, along with the Afghan forces who work with them, as they are replaced by Afghan army or national police. The rest of the province would "transition over time," according to a statement.
It was a symbolic victory for Karzai, who has long complained the U.S. special operations forces and their Afghan partners were outside his control. It will also speed the handover of security in the troubled province, faster than U.S. officials and some members of Karzai's own government had recommended or planned.
Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman Gen. Zahir Azimi said Afghan forces were ready to fill the gap.
"The international forces are ready to withdraw the special forces from Nirkh district of Maidan Wardak province, and Afghan army units are going to replace them in the coming days," Azimi said at a news conference in Kabul.
He said there are no other U.S. commando units elsewhere in the province.
A U.S. military official confirmed that, saying a small, mostly U.S. Army special operations team and the Afghan troops working with them would withdraw from Nirkh.
The deal took more than three weeks for U.S. and Afghan security officials to craft, more than a week after the expiration of the deadline for the U.S. pullout initially set by Karzai.
"The pace...is really driven by a requirement to have effective security, not just for us, it's for the Afghans as well," Dunford said in an interview with The Associated Press on Monday.
Speaking ahead of the announcement of the deal, Karzai's spokesman Aimal Faizi said Afghan security forces would take control of the province eventually, so the gradual transfer "can be a testing period."
Faizi insisted earlier this week that an Afghan-American man working for the U.S. special operations forces was filmed abusing a suspect, on U.S. orders. The spokesman said the video was obtained during an Afghan defence ministry investigation, which was completed over the weekend.
Dunford rejected the abuse charge in Monday's interview. He said a recently completed U.S. investigation found the interpreter in question was not working with U.S. forces at the time of the incident.
"We've investigated this three times, so I'm confident," Dunford said. "There were no U.S. forces in or around that incident, and the interpreter was not in our employ at the time of the incident."
It was not clear what the agreement would mean for dozens of small U.S. special operations outposts throughout Afghanistan, and the Afghans units partnered with them.
The posts are intended to help extend security and Afghan government influence to more remote, Taliban strongholds that are beyond the geographic range of the Afghan army or police. American commandos partner with small bands of Afghan Local Police or "ALP," a force that was created by the U.S., and later incorporated into the Afghan Interior Ministry. While the units work with Americans, they answer to the local district police chief, according to an Afghan security official who spoke on condition of anonymity as a condition of discussing the sometimes controversial program.
To join the local police, the members, all drawn from the local villages, must be vouched for by local elders, then vetted by the Interior Ministry, including a background check by Afghan intelligence to rule out prior participation with the Taliban. If approved, they get rudimentary training on weapons safety and basic police skills and military tactics.
Afghan and coalition officials say the back-country policemen have so eroded militant influence that they've become a top target for the Taliban. Bounties for individual policemen are $6,000, compared to $4,000 for regular policemen and $2,000 for Afghan soldiers, one Afghan official said.
But Karzai's national security council has delayed an interior ministry request to recruit and train another 45,000 local police. Karzai believes the units are "outside his control," Faizi said, adding that some members have been caught preying on locals with impromptu checkpoints, or abusing the civilians under their care.
U.S. and Afghan officials point out the Afghan Interior Ministry handed over five local police accused of rape last year for prosecution last year. The men were given lengthy jail sentences. But the United Nations mission to Afghanistan says accountability among the units is uneven, varying from province to province.
"As with any program, there have been challenges," said Washington-based Rand Corp. analyst Seth Jones, who was on the original team that helped set up the program. "Some (units) are better than others. One key question over the long run is: How effective will the Afghan Ministry of Interior and Afghan forces be in running the ALP program without U.S. forces assisting in villages? It's unclear at this point."
Also Wednesday, police in southern Afghanistan opened fire on a crowd protesting the alleged desecration of the Muslim holy book, the Qur’an, by a member of the local police force, the provincial governor's spokesman Ahmad Zarak said, adding that four civilians were killed.
He said the police were responding to fire from a militant who was hiding in the crowd in the Musa Quala district of Helmand province.
Obaidullah Jan, one of the protesters, told the AP that the demonstrators did not fire at all but the police opened fire when the crowd reached 100 metres (yards) from their position.
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Associated Press writers Rahim Faiez in Kabul and Mirwais Khan in Kandahar, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.
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Dozier can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/KimberlyDozier.
Interview: Afghan opposition leader to president: trust Taliban at your peril
Reuters By Mirwais Harooni and Jeremy Laurence Tue Mar 19, 2013
KABUL - Afghan President Hamid Karzai could face the same grisly fate as the last Soviet-backed communist ruler by trusting the Taliban as he scrambles to secure a peace deal before NATO troops withdraw, Afghanistan's main opposition leader said on Tuesday.
"President Karzai is repeating the same mistake and he thinks that Taliban will show him mercy because of his ethnicity," Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.
"But Taliban has already announced that the way the president is going, he will end in Ariana Square."
The former president, Mohammad Najibullah, oversaw the withdrawal of occupying Soviet forces in 1989 before he himself was overthrown by the mujahideen opposition guerrillas.
In 1996, when the Taliban took Kabul, Najibullah was dragged behind a truck and publicly hanged in Ariana Square.
Like Najibullah, Karzai is an ethnic Pashtun, as are most of the Taliban, who were toppled in 2001 after the September 11 attacks on the United States.
Karzai has reached out to the Taliban, whom he calls brothers, trying to lure them to the negotiating table by offering them a role in politics as the country prepares for the withdrawal of foreign combat troops by the end of next year.
A presidential election is also due next year and a parliamentary poll the following year.
Exploratory talks between the United States and the Taliban began clandestinely in Germany in late 2010, but the insurgents abandoned the process last March, blaming "shaky, erratic and vague" U.S. statements.
Afghan government officials have failed in efforts to secure direct talks with the Taliban. The insurgents refuse to discuss reconciliation with Karzai, calling him a "stooge of the invaders".
Massoud, an ethnic Tajik and a former vice-president, said the Taliban had no intention of brokering peace and would be emboldened to boost their insurgency as foreign troops withdraw.
He said the Taliban's fighting ability was helped by their trade in drugs and extortion which raised $400 million annually.
"We are at a threshold of collapse ... there is no sign of political stability and security in Afghanistan after 2014," he said, calling on the president to resign and the appointment of an interim government to oversee an early election.
"BAD YEAR"
Government officials fear the militants will infiltrate the capital from hideouts, some only 40 minutes drive away, as the warm-weather fighting season gets underway as the snow melts on mountain passes.
Last week, intelligence officials defused an eight-tonne truck bomb in Kabul.
"The Taliban as an enemy are just next to us ... this year will be a very bad year," Massoud said.
Massoud is the younger brother of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud, a hero of the war against Soviet forces in the 1980s, and leader of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban in the 1990s. He was assassinated days before the September 11 attacks.
Karzai has become increasingly vitriolic against the United States, even accusing Washington of colluding with the Taliban.
The United States denies Karzai's assertion. Massoud warned that the president's accusations were eroding the relationship.
"As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the county and businessmen leave," said Massoud.
He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes.
He said his coalition of ethnic Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek and Pashtun groups would hold a series of meetings very soon to choose a presidential candidate, and he did not rule being a contender.
(Editing by Robert Birsel)
Afghan supporters rally for renewal of UN mission
Xinhua By William M. Reilly March 19, 2013
UNITED NATIONS - The UN Security Council on Tuesday unanimously renewed for another year the mandate of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) while dozens of nations voiced support for Kabul taking responsibility in 2014 for most of its own security, governance and development.
Most of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force ( ISAF) troops were expected to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of next year.
Nonetheless, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon pledged that the UN must continue its strong support to the Afghan government, now led by President Hamid Karzai, even after it resumes its own responsibility.
"Let us work as hard as possible to ensure that this transition leads to the stable, prosperous and safe future that the country's people deserve," he said. "We should continue providing good offices, including support for elections. We should maintain our work for reconciliation and regional cooperation. We must stand firm for human rights. And we must advance development."
Humanitarian action was also necessary in the world organization's future role, considering Afghanistan's "chronic vulnerability" and the impact of transition as ISAF and others withdraw most of the troops, he told the council.
The secretary-general said that since Afghanistan politics would be dominated by the 2014 elections, broad participation was essential in a credible process, leading to a widely accepted leadership transition. He also expressed concern over a UN report last month of about 20 percent increase in civilian casualties among women and girls last year.
He noted two statements from the Taliban perhaps indicating a willingness to engage and encouraged a meaningful dialogue to reduce an intolerable, continuing death toll.
"In just two days, the Afghan New Year will begin, a year in which transition to full Afghan responsibility is central to our efforts, a year that will take us to the next elections, a year to bring an end to war and a year of building confidence and resilience," said Ambassador Zahir Tanin of Afghanistan.
"Since the adoption of UNAMA's mandate last year, Afghanistan and the international community undertook a new focus on the needs of the transition period, which involves strengthening peace and security and the realization of national priorities," he said. " With the international community, we developed the parameters of future cooperation to ensure building a peaceful, stable, prosperous Afghanistan that is able to stand on its own feet."
"More will need to be done to crystallize all aspects of cooperation between Afghanistan and the international community, including the shaping of our relations with the region," Tanin said.
Ambassador Masood Khan, of Pakistan, Afghanistan's neighbor to the east, said Islamabad's "commitment to this process stems from our strong conviction that peace and stability in Afghanistan are essential for peace and stability in the entire region. Afghanistan is on the cusp of three concurrent security, political and economic transitions up to 2014 and into the Decade of Transformation."
"If these transitions are managed responsibly and skillfully, Afghanistan will see a dawn of security and stability; and so would the region," he said. "We are glad that this time there would be no precipitous disengagement of the international forces from Afghanistan. The drawdown is phased and well-planned; and bilateral and regional mechanisms will be in place to help with the transition."
China, another neighbor to the east, was represented by Ambassador Li Baodong, who said, "A stable and prosperous Afghanistan where all ethnic groups live together harmoniously requires long-standing efforts on the part of Afghan government and people as well as sustained support and assistance by the international community."
"China is in favor of providing adequate resources to the mission to implement its mandate," he said. "During the transitional period, Afghan national institution-building and capacity for self-governing will keep increasing. China hopes that UNAMA will continue to engage in full consultations with the Afghan government on implementation of the Security Council mandate."
"China has always been committed to good, neighborly relations with Afghanistan," Li said. "We will continue to provide assistance to Afghanistan within our capacity and play a constructive role for the early realization of peace, stability and development of Afghanistan."
China and Pakistan were the only two of Afghanistan's six neighbors to speak at the meeting.
Foreign Minister Bob Carr of Australia, sponsor of the resolution, said, "This year's UNAMA mandate will cover a crucial period."
He urged the Afghan government to "work to address the economic and fiscal impact of transition; intensify its preparations for the presidential election in 2014; lead progress in the reconciliation process; and take lead responsibility for security. "
"Afghanistan, through the leadership of its government, determination of its people and support of the international community, has come a long way," said Carr. "Large parts of the country have been made significantly safer. Afghan people now live much longer. Nearly 8 million people are enrolled in schools today, including more than 2.7 million girls. Around 85 percent of the population has access to health care. The Afghan economy is growing at over 8 percent a year."
Gains in security "have ensured that Afghanistan will never again be a safe haven for international terrorism," he said. " Development and governance gains have helped ensure the international community has a stable partner. I am confident that the years ahead will see the Afghan government protect these gains. "
U.N.'s Ban disturbed by Afghan impunity on violence against women
Reuters By Michelle Nichols 19/03/2013
UNITED NATIONS - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday that there was a deeply disturbing "pervasive climate of impunity" in Afghanistan for the abusers of women and girls and he called on Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government to take action.
Despite a fall in civilian casualties in Afghanistan for the first time in several years, the United Nations said last month more than 300 women and girls were killed and more than 560 injured in 2012, a 20 percent increase from 2011.
Activists and some lawmakers have blamed the rise in violence against women on what they say is the Karzai administration's waning interest in women's rights, a claim Karzai denies.
"I remain deeply disturbed that despite some improvements in prosecuting cases of violence, there is still a pervasive climate of impunity in Afghanistan for abuses of women and girls," Ban told a U.N. Security Council debate on Afghanistan.
"They have an inviolable right to live free of fear or attacks. And women and girls are key to a better future for Afghanistan. Protecting them is central to peace, prosperity and stability for all people in the country," he said.
Ban called for the Afghan government to strictly implement a 2009 law on the elimination of violence against women, which made child marriage, forced marriage, rape and other violent acts criminal offenses.
The U.N. political mission in Afghanistan, led by special envoy Jan Kubis, said in December that Afghanistan still had a long way to go in implementing the law. Kubis said on Monday that violence linked to culture was the main reason for the rise in deaths and injuries of women girl last year.
Zahir Tanin, Afghanistan's ambassador to the United Nations, told the Security Council that Kabul was committed to upholding international commitments on human rights, including women's rights.
EMBRACE WOMEN
Afghanistan is a conservative Muslim country, where under Taliban rule between 1996 and 2001 women were forced to cover up and were banned from voting, most work and leaving their homes unless accompanied by a husband or male relative.
U.S.-backed Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in late 2001 for refusing to hand over al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
As foreign forces prepare to withdraw by the end of 2014, the United Nations and rights groups are concerned human rights in Afghanistan, particularly those of women, will further deteriorate.
Afghan women have won back basic rights in education, voting and employment since the Taliban were ousted from power in 2001, but fears are mounting that such freedoms could be traded away as Kabul seeks peace talks with the group.
"As Afghanistan builds a better future, the contributions, intrinsic worth and fundamental dignity of Afghan women must continue to be embraced," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice told the council.
The 15-member Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution on Tuesday to extend the U.N. political mission in Afghanistan for another year. The resolution also expressed concerns about civilian casualties and the rights of women and girls.
The resolution "recognizes that despite progress achieved on gender equality, enhanced efforts, including on measurable and action-oriented objectives, are necessary to secure the rights of women and girls and to ensure all women and girls in Afghanistan are protected from violence and abuse, enjoy equal protection under the law and equal access to justice."
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Stacey Joyce)
Kunduz victims demand justice three years on
DW 19/03/2013
After the 2009 Bundeswehr air raid in Kunduz, the victims' families are still waiting for justice. They demand higher damages be paid and that the colonel who ordered the strike be brought before a court.
Early on September 4, 2009, German Colonel Georg Klein ordered an airstrike in the north of Afghanistan on two hijacked fuel tankers near the German army base in Kunduz. The strike killed 91 Afghans and seriously injured 11. Most of the casualties were civilians, among them many children.
Four years have passed since the strike. Karimullah, a young man from the region, remembers the night. He told DW a number of people from his village had been at the trucks to siphon fuel. "And when the Bundeswehr struck, these people were killed."
Karimullah is one of the many family members of the victims. "It is a tragic case. We expect from the Germans and also the Afghan government that those responsible will be brought to justice." He said this is on the minds of many people who had family members killed in the strike.
Justice
The families have so far received 5,000 US dollars in damages for each victim. But for many of them, that is not enough. They are demanding justice. Two of the families will be present in Bonn for the first trial to demand higher compensation and that Klein be brought to justice on Wednesday, March 20.
Despite his poor judgment behind the airstrike, Klein has not been brought before a court. After the attack, the German Federal Prosecutor's Office investigated him on suspicion of a war crime. The investigation, however, was closed.
The attack became a controversial matter in German politics and eventually led to the resignation of Defense Minster Franz Josef Jung and the sacking of army chief Wolfgang Schneiderhan.
International legal significance
For Klein, on the other hand, things are looking up: Later this year, he will be promoted to brigadier-general. For the survivors, this is a slap in the face, said Karim Popal, lawyer for the families of the victims in Kunduz.
Popal has been involved with the Kunduz case from the beginning and represents the plaintiffs in court. He said the case has had great significance in international law but that Germany's Afghanistan policy has been a disappointment.
"The German government and people are in favor of international understanding and for rebuilding Afghanistan," Popal said. "But the way in which the government has been making policy in Afghanistan - ignoring the illegal trade in carpets and the lies of top politicians, concealing the information coming out of Afghanistan and last but not least, promoting someone who, in my view, is a war criminal - does not make the situation any better," he said.
Popal is in close contact with the families of the Afghan victims in Kunduz. They wrote a detailed letter to the German government, in which they asked for those responsible for the deaths of their children, their fathers and their families be brought to justice.
"The Afghans are, of course, disappointed. This isn't justice we're dealing with, but the wrongful policies of the government with regard to Afghanistan," Popal said.
Anger over 'half-hearted help'
Just like Karimullah, Sayed Rasoul also still remembers the early morning of September 4, 2009 very clearly. His brother was one of the victims. Since the attack, he has been responsible for his orphaned nephews and nieces and barely knows how he will make ends meet, he said.
"The aid we were given was useless. If we had known that we would not be helped over the long term and that no one would think about the orphans three years on, we would have never accepted it."
Noor Jaan, who was seriously wounded in the attack, is also embittered. Close to tears and literally shaking with rage, he said "I lost a hand and half of the bones are missing in my shoulder. They promised to operate on me. But so far nothing has happened." The injured and bereaved would not have agreed to the aid if they had known that the aid would be only half-hearted, he said.
A decision is not expected at the first day of hearings, according to court spokesman Philip Prietze. What is also possible is an amicable termination of the proceedings. Germany has announced that it will request the charges be dismissed.
The trucks that keep the dollars flowing
The Age By Paul McGeough Chief foreign correspondent March 20, 2013
TARIN KOWT - Protecting trucks on the highway from Tarin Kowt to Kandahar is big business. And exaggerating the threats may be making it even bigger.
Oruzgan's millionaire police chief Matiullah Khan claims he was just a two-bit security operator until US Special Forces officers hit on the idea for his financial jackpot – protecting trucks against Taliban attacks on the highway between Tarin Kowt and Kandahar.
Despite the fact that supply convoys for the Australian and American bases in Oruzgan pay the bulk of his massive fees, he says: “They showed no interest in setting the fees I'd charge – it was all between me and the trucking.”
They needed us because we knew the area and we knew the people. We were disciplined and co-ordinated.
Previously Matiullah had been provincial chief of the Afghanistan Highway Patrol, itself a lucrative operation because it was a perfect cover for huge quantities of drugs being moved ahead of shipment beyond the country – which led to its controversial disbandment in 2007.But in a remarkable exercise of inside political schmoozing, Matiullah and Jan Mohammad Khan, his late cousin and former Oruzgan provincial governor, negotiated with the Karzai Government for MK, as the police chief is known, to retain the patrol and some of its public funding as the bones of what would be Matiullah's private strike force, the Kandak-e Amniat-e Oruzgan (KAU).
Whether on the highway, with most of its 140 kilometre length in adjoining Kandahar province, or on other key roads within Oruzgan, Matiullah is often accused of exaggerating insecurity and then demanding ferocious fees to protect road-users – earning what one of his associates estimated in mid-2010 to be a monthly income of $2.5 million.
Ultimately, the Americans did take an interest in the business. It was in the second half of 2010 when, as revealed in the WikiLeaks disclosures, they rushed to aid a fuel convoy which had come under "Taliban" attack as it headed for Tarin Kowt, only to discover the attackers were Matiullah's men demanding his trucking fee.
His convoys are an epic undertaking. Matiullah recruited 800 extra guards and set up 76 checkpoints, most within sight of each other on the cratered highway running south to Kandahar.
He insists there is no crossover between his public duties and his private security business, which Canberra estimates has pulled more than $45 million from convoys supplying military bases in Oruzgan.
But the initially blurred public financing of a private business became even more lucrative when Matiullah was appointed police chief in 2011. Now he has control of an extra 3000 police and a sizeable chunk of the national security hardware in Oruzgan – most of the vehicles that ride with his highway convoy look like regular police vehicles.
Businesses in Tarin Kowt argue that highway safety should be part of the police chief's publicly funded brief, claiming that Matiullah's security levies amount to his private tax on locals moving supplies or produce.
“The cost of a bag of cement in Gizab [in the north of the province] more than doubled because of his charges on the road from TK,” a local businessman says. Gizab farmers are famous for their almonds, he says, but their harvest is stuck in warehouses, because they cannot afford to pay the security tolls to get the crop to market.
What price to stay alive on the TK-Kandahar highway?
Some reports put the fee as high as $3000 per truck, others at $1200 for big trucks and $800 for smaller ones. And in some cases, according to research by the Liaison Office (an NGO specialising in peace building), the police chief offers a kind of insurance – if a truck is robbed or bombed, he will pay the owner an amount between $11,000 and $16,000.
But these days the man who is reputedly the wealthiest in Oruzgan pleads poverty. Interviewed at his compound in Tarin Kowt, he predicts that the next day's convoy will comprise maybe 20 trucks and that he charges just $700 per vehicle – a return of $14,000.
We join the convoy as it thunders down the highway, through a boulder-strewn landscape in an eerie dawn light. Huge trucks travel two, even three abreast, which makes it difficult to count. There seem to be at least 200 and if Matiullah's fee is up near the much-reported $3000 per truck, the morning's outing may be worth $600,000.
Apart from road security and drugs, the 2012 report by the Liaison Office cites the Rahimi Construction Company as a third revenue stream. Run by one of Matiullah's brothers, it has “won the bulk of internationally-funded infrastructure contracts in Oruzgan”, an NGO source said.
“I use the money to pay for the police posts and the rest goes to good works,” Matiullah says, referring to a range of community projects and services that he funds.
Matiullah and his men were enlisted alongside the Australian and American Special Forces as, in the words of one analyst, "an imperfect but indispensible operational partner".
Checking off key centres around the province, MK says: “We liberated Chora and Dihrawud – and in the last year, I opened the roads to Char China, Darafshan and Mirabad.”
He fails to acknowledge that, with the exception of Chora, all these centres had swung back to the Taliban, precisely because of the revenge attacks on their tribal leaders by his uncle – the former governor JMK – and his old-guard mujahedeen network. They regained power after the downfall of the Taliban regime, by dint of their links to President Hamid Karzai and the backing of the Australian and American forces.
Matiullah counters: “The Australians had several outposts, but they could not open the road. They were sitting in their forward bases, but I put police check posts on the road and the Australians pulled back to the base in TK.”
Analysts acknowledge that Australian and Afghan National Army troops had a role in the push to open these vital routes, but MK gets all the credit – in part, some suspect, because he was deliberately contributing to the insecurity to demonstrate a need for someone like himself to be appointed as police chief.
The Liaison Office research states: “[The police] achievements under [MK's] command in such a short period of time are impressive and beg the question of how [he] was able to lead his troops to success in areas where his predecessors had utterly failed for years.”
The report puts MK's strike force above the rest of the security pack: “The KAU led efforts to recapture Gizab [in April 2010] and Char China [in late 2011]. In cooperation with [Australian and Afghan troops], KAU spearheaded operations to clear the roads into and within Char China [district], rendering it safe for civilians to travel for the first time in years.”
The report ties a re-energised effort by the other Afghan security forces to MK's leadership. But it also acknowledges an Australian contribution that locals and NGOs rated more highly than any American effort – “a proactive, 'go get 'em' mentality and a willingness to maintain 'direct physical security'.”
An NGO official tells the Liaison Office: “When the Australians hear a report of roadblocks or mines, they directly go there, risking their lives [to] maintain the peace.”
At times Matiullah and as many as 200 of his men went on missions with the Australian Special Forces "every day, or maybe every few days", but not any more.
“They needed us because we knew the area and we knew the people,” he says. “We were disciplined and co-ordinated – sometimes it was me, sometimes the police and sometimes the KAU guys.”
As though reporting an unusual set of circumstances, MK boasts that his men – KAU or police – do not steal from the people. Under his predecessors, they had been driven to theft because their superiors skimmed their salaries.
“I had to organise a good force that the foreigners would want to use,” he says, explaining that his checkpost commanders each receive $200 a month as "etcetera, etcetera money" with orders not to dip into their men's wages. He claims to lease land near each post for the police to grow vegetables, instead of stealing from local growers. He supplies them with corn and pomegranates which he buys from local suppliers.
MK also employs teachers who move between police posts to work on improving literacy in the ranks.
Afghan National Army convoys are rarely seen on the roads and tracks. “Always in the bases,” mocks one of MK's men as our bullet-proofed four-wheel-drive and five-vehicle police convoy whips up a trail of dust on the track to Chinartu, in the south of the province. “Scared of the Taliban, they are.”
Several times we're told that the ANA officers strike deals with the Taliban – “you don't touch us and we won't touch you”, one of MK's commanders chortles. A belittling rivalry between the police and army is intense – “better salaries, food and weapons and no effort required from the ANA”, one of MK's men jabs as we pass another ANA hilltop post.
MK always pays his men on time, but Kabul is two months behind in paying local police salaries. That's a central government habit that could play to MK's strength in the future, because local tribal elders predict that police and soldiers will simply walk if they are not paid.
The likelihood is that they will walk down the road and offer their services to MK, who, in the absence of foreign-backed haulage contractors, is expected to demand that the tribes and other road-users pay the tolls to ensure that he continues to be the richest, most powerful man in the province.
www.afghanistannewscenter.com
Wednesday, 20 March 2013 17:10 Written by Rafi Sediqi tolonews.com
Afghan lawmakers Wednesday criticised presidential spokesman Aimal Faizi for calling the Nato mission in Afghanistan "illogical and aimless", warning that such comments threaten the stability of the country.
The lawmakers said that the views coming from President Hamid Karzai's representative should be clarified as a personal idea of Karzai and not the views of the Afghan people.
"Such speeches will cause chaos in the country," MP Mohammad Naeem Lalai Ahmadzai said in Wednesday's parliamentary session. "The president is trying to remain in power by such statements. It is his personal idea, not the people's."
Fatima Aziz, an MP from northern Kunduz province, suggested the statement was too late considering Nato had been in Afghanistan more than a decade.
"Why didn't the government say ten years ago that the Nato mission is illogical and aimless? The Nato mission was not a secret," she said. "The comment will damage Afghanistan."
Lawmakers said they believed that Afghanistan needed the cooperation of the US and the presence of the foreign forces.
"Afghanistan's war is being planned by neighboring countries especially in Pakistan. And the country [Afghanistan] has serious need for international cooperation and the presence of foreign forces because the war has not ended in the country," member of the parliamentary international committee Noor Akbari said.
MPs said that main cause of war in Afghanistan is the intervention of the regional countries especially Pakistan where insurgents are being funded and equipped to be insurgents, creating more security challenges and thereby the need for foreign forces to assist until the Afghan forces can defend the country.
Faizi said Tuesday that the Nato-led military operation was "illogical and aimless", the latest public criticism of the foreign forces after Karzai's recent broadsides against the US.
His statement came after Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen rejected Karzai's recent allegations of US collusion with the Taliban.
"The people of Afghanistan ask Nato to define the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror.... (They) consider this war as aimless and illogical to continue," Faizi said.
Afghan govt hits back at NATO chief, says war aimless
Reuters By Jeremy Laurence March 19, 2013
KABUL - The Afghan government has hit back at remarks by the head of NATO who said Kabul must recognise the sacrifices made by other states, calling the alliance's war on terrorism in Afghanistan "aimless and unwise".
In the latest outburst of vitriol from the Afghan leadership deriding its Western allies, the spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the people of Afghanistan "ask NATO to define the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror".
"As they question why after a decade, this war in their country has failed to achieve its stated goals, but rather has resulted in the loss of thousands of innocent lives and destruction of their homes", Aimal Faizi said in a statement.
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on Monday he was concerned about the increasingly harsh rhetoric between Karzai and the United States, which contributes the largest contingent to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.
He told a news conference in Brussels that "we would also expect acknowledgement from the Afghan side that we have ... invested a lot in blood and treasure in helping President Karzai's country to move forward".
More than 3,000 foreign troops from 50 countries have been killed in Afghanistan since the U.S.-led military intervention began in 2001. Some estimates put the cost to the United States alone of the Afghan war in the hundreds of billions of dollars.
Speaking to the state news agency, BIA, Faizi said: "The people of Afghanistan ask NATO Secretary-General that while it is clearly known to NATO that terrorism sanctuaries are outside Afghanistan, why this war then continues in their homes and villages unproductively?"
"Therefore, the Afghan people consider this war as aimless and unwise to continue," he said.
WAR OF WORDS
Karzai marred a debut visit to Afghanistan by the new U.S. defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, last week by accusing Washington and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed beyond 2014, when NATO is set to wrap up its combat mission and most foreign troops are to withdraw.
Washington denies the accusation, and found support from Rasmussen who said the allegation was "absolutely ridiculous".
Karzai's remarks further strained already fraught ties between the president and the Western allies who are fighting to protect his government from insurgents.
The United States still has 66,000 troops in Afghanistan, down from almost 100,000 two years ago at the height of a surge ordered by President Barack Obama. Washington intends to withdraw most of them by the end of next year but wants to negotiate a continued, smaller presence.
Karzai has been increasingly assertive towards the United States. Last month, he ordered U.S. special forces to leave Wardak province after residents complained that they, and Afghans working with them, were torturing and killing civilians, an allegation denied by the Americans.
Opposition politicians saw Karzai's order as a political move to bolster his party's support base ahead of a presidential election next year. Karzai is not allowed to stand again.
"As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the country and businessmen leave," Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.
He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes. (Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Jon Hemming)
US military, Afghan government reach deal for partial troop pullout from contentious province
By Kimberly Dozier, The Associated Press
KABUL - The U.S. military and the Afghan government reached a deal Wednesday on the pullout of American special operations forces and their Afghan counterparts from a strategic eastern province after complaints that they were involved in human rights abuses.
American military officials have steadfastly denied the Afghan abuse allegations, which led President Hamid Karzai to demand the withdrawal of the U.S. commandos from Wardak province despite fears the decision could leave the area and the neighbouring capital of Kabul more vulnerable to al-Qaida and other insurgents.
The agreement calls for the U.S.-led coalition to pull the special operations forces from Wardak's Nirkh district, the area where the abuses allegedly occurred, along with the Afghan forces who work with them, as they are replaced by Afghan army or national police. The rest of the province would "transition over time," according to a statement.
It was a symbolic victory for Karzai, who has long complained the U.S. special operations forces and their Afghan partners were outside his control. It will also speed the handover of security in the troubled province, faster than U.S. officials and some members of Karzai's own government had recommended or planned.
Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman Gen. Zahir Azimi said Afghan forces were ready to fill the gap.
"The international forces are ready to withdraw the special forces from Nirkh district of Maidan Wardak province, and Afghan army units are going to replace them in the coming days," Azimi said at a news conference in Kabul.
He said there are no other U.S. commando units elsewhere in the province.
A U.S. military official confirmed that, saying a small, mostly U.S. Army special operations team and the Afghan troops working with them would withdraw from Nirkh.
The deal took more than three weeks for U.S. and Afghan security officials to craft, more than a week after the expiration of the deadline for the U.S. pullout initially set by Karzai.
"The pace...is really driven by a requirement to have effective security, not just for us, it's for the Afghans as well," Dunford said in an interview with The Associated Press on Monday.
Speaking ahead of the announcement of the deal, Karzai's spokesman Aimal Faizi said Afghan security forces would take control of the province eventually, so the gradual transfer "can be a testing period."
Faizi insisted earlier this week that an Afghan-American man working for the U.S. special operations forces was filmed abusing a suspect, on U.S. orders. The spokesman said the video was obtained during an Afghan defence ministry investigation, which was completed over the weekend.
Dunford rejected the abuse charge in Monday's interview. He said a recently completed U.S. investigation found the interpreter in question was not working with U.S. forces at the time of the incident.
"We've investigated this three times, so I'm confident," Dunford said. "There were no U.S. forces in or around that incident, and the interpreter was not in our employ at the time of the incident."
It was not clear what the agreement would mean for dozens of small U.S. special operations outposts throughout Afghanistan, and the Afghans units partnered with them.
The posts are intended to help extend security and Afghan government influence to more remote, Taliban strongholds that are beyond the geographic range of the Afghan army or police. American commandos partner with small bands of Afghan Local Police or "ALP," a force that was created by the U.S., and later incorporated into the Afghan Interior Ministry. While the units work with Americans, they answer to the local district police chief, according to an Afghan security official who spoke on condition of anonymity as a condition of discussing the sometimes controversial program.
To join the local police, the members, all drawn from the local villages, must be vouched for by local elders, then vetted by the Interior Ministry, including a background check by Afghan intelligence to rule out prior participation with the Taliban. If approved, they get rudimentary training on weapons safety and basic police skills and military tactics.
Afghan and coalition officials say the back-country policemen have so eroded militant influence that they've become a top target for the Taliban. Bounties for individual policemen are $6,000, compared to $4,000 for regular policemen and $2,000 for Afghan soldiers, one Afghan official said.
But Karzai's national security council has delayed an interior ministry request to recruit and train another 45,000 local police. Karzai believes the units are "outside his control," Faizi said, adding that some members have been caught preying on locals with impromptu checkpoints, or abusing the civilians under their care.
U.S. and Afghan officials point out the Afghan Interior Ministry handed over five local police accused of rape last year for prosecution last year. The men were given lengthy jail sentences. But the United Nations mission to Afghanistan says accountability among the units is uneven, varying from province to province.
"As with any program, there have been challenges," said Washington-based Rand Corp. analyst Seth Jones, who was on the original team that helped set up the program. "Some (units) are better than others. One key question over the long run is: How effective will the Afghan Ministry of Interior and Afghan forces be in running the ALP program without U.S. forces assisting in villages? It's unclear at this point."
Also Wednesday, police in southern Afghanistan opened fire on a crowd protesting the alleged desecration of the Muslim holy book, the Qur’an, by a member of the local police force, the provincial governor's spokesman Ahmad Zarak said, adding that four civilians were killed.
He said the police were responding to fire from a militant who was hiding in the crowd in the Musa Quala district of Helmand province.
Obaidullah Jan, one of the protesters, told the AP that the demonstrators did not fire at all but the police opened fire when the crowd reached 100 metres (yards) from their position.
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Associated Press writers Rahim Faiez in Kabul and Mirwais Khan in Kandahar, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.
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Dozier can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/KimberlyDozier.
Interview: Afghan opposition leader to president: trust Taliban at your peril
Reuters By Mirwais Harooni and Jeremy Laurence Tue Mar 19, 2013
KABUL - Afghan President Hamid Karzai could face the same grisly fate as the last Soviet-backed communist ruler by trusting the Taliban as he scrambles to secure a peace deal before NATO troops withdraw, Afghanistan's main opposition leader said on Tuesday.
"President Karzai is repeating the same mistake and he thinks that Taliban will show him mercy because of his ethnicity," Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.
"But Taliban has already announced that the way the president is going, he will end in Ariana Square."
The former president, Mohammad Najibullah, oversaw the withdrawal of occupying Soviet forces in 1989 before he himself was overthrown by the mujahideen opposition guerrillas.
In 1996, when the Taliban took Kabul, Najibullah was dragged behind a truck and publicly hanged in Ariana Square.
Like Najibullah, Karzai is an ethnic Pashtun, as are most of the Taliban, who were toppled in 2001 after the September 11 attacks on the United States.
Karzai has reached out to the Taliban, whom he calls brothers, trying to lure them to the negotiating table by offering them a role in politics as the country prepares for the withdrawal of foreign combat troops by the end of next year.
A presidential election is also due next year and a parliamentary poll the following year.
Exploratory talks between the United States and the Taliban began clandestinely in Germany in late 2010, but the insurgents abandoned the process last March, blaming "shaky, erratic and vague" U.S. statements.
Afghan government officials have failed in efforts to secure direct talks with the Taliban. The insurgents refuse to discuss reconciliation with Karzai, calling him a "stooge of the invaders".
Massoud, an ethnic Tajik and a former vice-president, said the Taliban had no intention of brokering peace and would be emboldened to boost their insurgency as foreign troops withdraw.
He said the Taliban's fighting ability was helped by their trade in drugs and extortion which raised $400 million annually.
"We are at a threshold of collapse ... there is no sign of political stability and security in Afghanistan after 2014," he said, calling on the president to resign and the appointment of an interim government to oversee an early election.
"BAD YEAR"
Government officials fear the militants will infiltrate the capital from hideouts, some only 40 minutes drive away, as the warm-weather fighting season gets underway as the snow melts on mountain passes.
Last week, intelligence officials defused an eight-tonne truck bomb in Kabul.
"The Taliban as an enemy are just next to us ... this year will be a very bad year," Massoud said.
Massoud is the younger brother of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud, a hero of the war against Soviet forces in the 1980s, and leader of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban in the 1990s. He was assassinated days before the September 11 attacks.
Karzai has become increasingly vitriolic against the United States, even accusing Washington of colluding with the Taliban.
The United States denies Karzai's assertion. Massoud warned that the president's accusations were eroding the relationship.
"As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the county and businessmen leave," said Massoud.
He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes.
He said his coalition of ethnic Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek and Pashtun groups would hold a series of meetings very soon to choose a presidential candidate, and he did not rule being a contender.
(Editing by Robert Birsel)
Afghan supporters rally for renewal of UN mission
Xinhua By William M. Reilly March 19, 2013
UNITED NATIONS - The UN Security Council on Tuesday unanimously renewed for another year the mandate of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) while dozens of nations voiced support for Kabul taking responsibility in 2014 for most of its own security, governance and development.
Most of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force ( ISAF) troops were expected to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of next year.
Nonetheless, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon pledged that the UN must continue its strong support to the Afghan government, now led by President Hamid Karzai, even after it resumes its own responsibility.
"Let us work as hard as possible to ensure that this transition leads to the stable, prosperous and safe future that the country's people deserve," he said. "We should continue providing good offices, including support for elections. We should maintain our work for reconciliation and regional cooperation. We must stand firm for human rights. And we must advance development."
Humanitarian action was also necessary in the world organization's future role, considering Afghanistan's "chronic vulnerability" and the impact of transition as ISAF and others withdraw most of the troops, he told the council.
The secretary-general said that since Afghanistan politics would be dominated by the 2014 elections, broad participation was essential in a credible process, leading to a widely accepted leadership transition. He also expressed concern over a UN report last month of about 20 percent increase in civilian casualties among women and girls last year.
He noted two statements from the Taliban perhaps indicating a willingness to engage and encouraged a meaningful dialogue to reduce an intolerable, continuing death toll.
"In just two days, the Afghan New Year will begin, a year in which transition to full Afghan responsibility is central to our efforts, a year that will take us to the next elections, a year to bring an end to war and a year of building confidence and resilience," said Ambassador Zahir Tanin of Afghanistan.
"Since the adoption of UNAMA's mandate last year, Afghanistan and the international community undertook a new focus on the needs of the transition period, which involves strengthening peace and security and the realization of national priorities," he said. " With the international community, we developed the parameters of future cooperation to ensure building a peaceful, stable, prosperous Afghanistan that is able to stand on its own feet."
"More will need to be done to crystallize all aspects of cooperation between Afghanistan and the international community, including the shaping of our relations with the region," Tanin said.
Ambassador Masood Khan, of Pakistan, Afghanistan's neighbor to the east, said Islamabad's "commitment to this process stems from our strong conviction that peace and stability in Afghanistan are essential for peace and stability in the entire region. Afghanistan is on the cusp of three concurrent security, political and economic transitions up to 2014 and into the Decade of Transformation."
"If these transitions are managed responsibly and skillfully, Afghanistan will see a dawn of security and stability; and so would the region," he said. "We are glad that this time there would be no precipitous disengagement of the international forces from Afghanistan. The drawdown is phased and well-planned; and bilateral and regional mechanisms will be in place to help with the transition."
China, another neighbor to the east, was represented by Ambassador Li Baodong, who said, "A stable and prosperous Afghanistan where all ethnic groups live together harmoniously requires long-standing efforts on the part of Afghan government and people as well as sustained support and assistance by the international community."
"China is in favor of providing adequate resources to the mission to implement its mandate," he said. "During the transitional period, Afghan national institution-building and capacity for self-governing will keep increasing. China hopes that UNAMA will continue to engage in full consultations with the Afghan government on implementation of the Security Council mandate."
"China has always been committed to good, neighborly relations with Afghanistan," Li said. "We will continue to provide assistance to Afghanistan within our capacity and play a constructive role for the early realization of peace, stability and development of Afghanistan."
China and Pakistan were the only two of Afghanistan's six neighbors to speak at the meeting.
Foreign Minister Bob Carr of Australia, sponsor of the resolution, said, "This year's UNAMA mandate will cover a crucial period."
He urged the Afghan government to "work to address the economic and fiscal impact of transition; intensify its preparations for the presidential election in 2014; lead progress in the reconciliation process; and take lead responsibility for security. "
"Afghanistan, through the leadership of its government, determination of its people and support of the international community, has come a long way," said Carr. "Large parts of the country have been made significantly safer. Afghan people now live much longer. Nearly 8 million people are enrolled in schools today, including more than 2.7 million girls. Around 85 percent of the population has access to health care. The Afghan economy is growing at over 8 percent a year."
Gains in security "have ensured that Afghanistan will never again be a safe haven for international terrorism," he said. " Development and governance gains have helped ensure the international community has a stable partner. I am confident that the years ahead will see the Afghan government protect these gains. "
U.N.'s Ban disturbed by Afghan impunity on violence against women
Reuters By Michelle Nichols 19/03/2013
UNITED NATIONS - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday that there was a deeply disturbing "pervasive climate of impunity" in Afghanistan for the abusers of women and girls and he called on Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government to take action.
Despite a fall in civilian casualties in Afghanistan for the first time in several years, the United Nations said last month more than 300 women and girls were killed and more than 560 injured in 2012, a 20 percent increase from 2011.
Activists and some lawmakers have blamed the rise in violence against women on what they say is the Karzai administration's waning interest in women's rights, a claim Karzai denies.
"I remain deeply disturbed that despite some improvements in prosecuting cases of violence, there is still a pervasive climate of impunity in Afghanistan for abuses of women and girls," Ban told a U.N. Security Council debate on Afghanistan.
"They have an inviolable right to live free of fear or attacks. And women and girls are key to a better future for Afghanistan. Protecting them is central to peace, prosperity and stability for all people in the country," he said.
Ban called for the Afghan government to strictly implement a 2009 law on the elimination of violence against women, which made child marriage, forced marriage, rape and other violent acts criminal offenses.
The U.N. political mission in Afghanistan, led by special envoy Jan Kubis, said in December that Afghanistan still had a long way to go in implementing the law. Kubis said on Monday that violence linked to culture was the main reason for the rise in deaths and injuries of women girl last year.
Zahir Tanin, Afghanistan's ambassador to the United Nations, told the Security Council that Kabul was committed to upholding international commitments on human rights, including women's rights.
EMBRACE WOMEN
Afghanistan is a conservative Muslim country, where under Taliban rule between 1996 and 2001 women were forced to cover up and were banned from voting, most work and leaving their homes unless accompanied by a husband or male relative.
U.S.-backed Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in late 2001 for refusing to hand over al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
As foreign forces prepare to withdraw by the end of 2014, the United Nations and rights groups are concerned human rights in Afghanistan, particularly those of women, will further deteriorate.
Afghan women have won back basic rights in education, voting and employment since the Taliban were ousted from power in 2001, but fears are mounting that such freedoms could be traded away as Kabul seeks peace talks with the group.
"As Afghanistan builds a better future, the contributions, intrinsic worth and fundamental dignity of Afghan women must continue to be embraced," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice told the council.
The 15-member Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution on Tuesday to extend the U.N. political mission in Afghanistan for another year. The resolution also expressed concerns about civilian casualties and the rights of women and girls.
The resolution "recognizes that despite progress achieved on gender equality, enhanced efforts, including on measurable and action-oriented objectives, are necessary to secure the rights of women and girls and to ensure all women and girls in Afghanistan are protected from violence and abuse, enjoy equal protection under the law and equal access to justice."
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Stacey Joyce)
Kunduz victims demand justice three years on
DW 19/03/2013
After the 2009 Bundeswehr air raid in Kunduz, the victims' families are still waiting for justice. They demand higher damages be paid and that the colonel who ordered the strike be brought before a court.
Early on September 4, 2009, German Colonel Georg Klein ordered an airstrike in the north of Afghanistan on two hijacked fuel tankers near the German army base in Kunduz. The strike killed 91 Afghans and seriously injured 11. Most of the casualties were civilians, among them many children.
Four years have passed since the strike. Karimullah, a young man from the region, remembers the night. He told DW a number of people from his village had been at the trucks to siphon fuel. "And when the Bundeswehr struck, these people were killed."
Karimullah is one of the many family members of the victims. "It is a tragic case. We expect from the Germans and also the Afghan government that those responsible will be brought to justice." He said this is on the minds of many people who had family members killed in the strike.
Justice
The families have so far received 5,000 US dollars in damages for each victim. But for many of them, that is not enough. They are demanding justice. Two of the families will be present in Bonn for the first trial to demand higher compensation and that Klein be brought to justice on Wednesday, March 20.
Despite his poor judgment behind the airstrike, Klein has not been brought before a court. After the attack, the German Federal Prosecutor's Office investigated him on suspicion of a war crime. The investigation, however, was closed.
The attack became a controversial matter in German politics and eventually led to the resignation of Defense Minster Franz Josef Jung and the sacking of army chief Wolfgang Schneiderhan.
International legal significance
For Klein, on the other hand, things are looking up: Later this year, he will be promoted to brigadier-general. For the survivors, this is a slap in the face, said Karim Popal, lawyer for the families of the victims in Kunduz.
Popal has been involved with the Kunduz case from the beginning and represents the plaintiffs in court. He said the case has had great significance in international law but that Germany's Afghanistan policy has been a disappointment.
"The German government and people are in favor of international understanding and for rebuilding Afghanistan," Popal said. "But the way in which the government has been making policy in Afghanistan - ignoring the illegal trade in carpets and the lies of top politicians, concealing the information coming out of Afghanistan and last but not least, promoting someone who, in my view, is a war criminal - does not make the situation any better," he said.
Popal is in close contact with the families of the Afghan victims in Kunduz. They wrote a detailed letter to the German government, in which they asked for those responsible for the deaths of their children, their fathers and their families be brought to justice.
"The Afghans are, of course, disappointed. This isn't justice we're dealing with, but the wrongful policies of the government with regard to Afghanistan," Popal said.
Anger over 'half-hearted help'
Just like Karimullah, Sayed Rasoul also still remembers the early morning of September 4, 2009 very clearly. His brother was one of the victims. Since the attack, he has been responsible for his orphaned nephews and nieces and barely knows how he will make ends meet, he said.
"The aid we were given was useless. If we had known that we would not be helped over the long term and that no one would think about the orphans three years on, we would have never accepted it."
Noor Jaan, who was seriously wounded in the attack, is also embittered. Close to tears and literally shaking with rage, he said "I lost a hand and half of the bones are missing in my shoulder. They promised to operate on me. But so far nothing has happened." The injured and bereaved would not have agreed to the aid if they had known that the aid would be only half-hearted, he said.
A decision is not expected at the first day of hearings, according to court spokesman Philip Prietze. What is also possible is an amicable termination of the proceedings. Germany has announced that it will request the charges be dismissed.
The trucks that keep the dollars flowing
The Age By Paul McGeough Chief foreign correspondent March 20, 2013
TARIN KOWT - Protecting trucks on the highway from Tarin Kowt to Kandahar is big business. And exaggerating the threats may be making it even bigger.
Oruzgan's millionaire police chief Matiullah Khan claims he was just a two-bit security operator until US Special Forces officers hit on the idea for his financial jackpot – protecting trucks against Taliban attacks on the highway between Tarin Kowt and Kandahar.
Despite the fact that supply convoys for the Australian and American bases in Oruzgan pay the bulk of his massive fees, he says: “They showed no interest in setting the fees I'd charge – it was all between me and the trucking.”
They needed us because we knew the area and we knew the people. We were disciplined and co-ordinated.
Previously Matiullah had been provincial chief of the Afghanistan Highway Patrol, itself a lucrative operation because it was a perfect cover for huge quantities of drugs being moved ahead of shipment beyond the country – which led to its controversial disbandment in 2007.But in a remarkable exercise of inside political schmoozing, Matiullah and Jan Mohammad Khan, his late cousin and former Oruzgan provincial governor, negotiated with the Karzai Government for MK, as the police chief is known, to retain the patrol and some of its public funding as the bones of what would be Matiullah's private strike force, the Kandak-e Amniat-e Oruzgan (KAU).
Whether on the highway, with most of its 140 kilometre length in adjoining Kandahar province, or on other key roads within Oruzgan, Matiullah is often accused of exaggerating insecurity and then demanding ferocious fees to protect road-users – earning what one of his associates estimated in mid-2010 to be a monthly income of $2.5 million.
Ultimately, the Americans did take an interest in the business. It was in the second half of 2010 when, as revealed in the WikiLeaks disclosures, they rushed to aid a fuel convoy which had come under "Taliban" attack as it headed for Tarin Kowt, only to discover the attackers were Matiullah's men demanding his trucking fee.
His convoys are an epic undertaking. Matiullah recruited 800 extra guards and set up 76 checkpoints, most within sight of each other on the cratered highway running south to Kandahar.
He insists there is no crossover between his public duties and his private security business, which Canberra estimates has pulled more than $45 million from convoys supplying military bases in Oruzgan.
But the initially blurred public financing of a private business became even more lucrative when Matiullah was appointed police chief in 2011. Now he has control of an extra 3000 police and a sizeable chunk of the national security hardware in Oruzgan – most of the vehicles that ride with his highway convoy look like regular police vehicles.
Businesses in Tarin Kowt argue that highway safety should be part of the police chief's publicly funded brief, claiming that Matiullah's security levies amount to his private tax on locals moving supplies or produce.
“The cost of a bag of cement in Gizab [in the north of the province] more than doubled because of his charges on the road from TK,” a local businessman says. Gizab farmers are famous for their almonds, he says, but their harvest is stuck in warehouses, because they cannot afford to pay the security tolls to get the crop to market.
What price to stay alive on the TK-Kandahar highway?
Some reports put the fee as high as $3000 per truck, others at $1200 for big trucks and $800 for smaller ones. And in some cases, according to research by the Liaison Office (an NGO specialising in peace building), the police chief offers a kind of insurance – if a truck is robbed or bombed, he will pay the owner an amount between $11,000 and $16,000.
But these days the man who is reputedly the wealthiest in Oruzgan pleads poverty. Interviewed at his compound in Tarin Kowt, he predicts that the next day's convoy will comprise maybe 20 trucks and that he charges just $700 per vehicle – a return of $14,000.
We join the convoy as it thunders down the highway, through a boulder-strewn landscape in an eerie dawn light. Huge trucks travel two, even three abreast, which makes it difficult to count. There seem to be at least 200 and if Matiullah's fee is up near the much-reported $3000 per truck, the morning's outing may be worth $600,000.
Apart from road security and drugs, the 2012 report by the Liaison Office cites the Rahimi Construction Company as a third revenue stream. Run by one of Matiullah's brothers, it has “won the bulk of internationally-funded infrastructure contracts in Oruzgan”, an NGO source said.
“I use the money to pay for the police posts and the rest goes to good works,” Matiullah says, referring to a range of community projects and services that he funds.
Matiullah and his men were enlisted alongside the Australian and American Special Forces as, in the words of one analyst, "an imperfect but indispensible operational partner".
Checking off key centres around the province, MK says: “We liberated Chora and Dihrawud – and in the last year, I opened the roads to Char China, Darafshan and Mirabad.”
He fails to acknowledge that, with the exception of Chora, all these centres had swung back to the Taliban, precisely because of the revenge attacks on their tribal leaders by his uncle – the former governor JMK – and his old-guard mujahedeen network. They regained power after the downfall of the Taliban regime, by dint of their links to President Hamid Karzai and the backing of the Australian and American forces.
Matiullah counters: “The Australians had several outposts, but they could not open the road. They were sitting in their forward bases, but I put police check posts on the road and the Australians pulled back to the base in TK.”
Analysts acknowledge that Australian and Afghan National Army troops had a role in the push to open these vital routes, but MK gets all the credit – in part, some suspect, because he was deliberately contributing to the insecurity to demonstrate a need for someone like himself to be appointed as police chief.
The Liaison Office research states: “[The police] achievements under [MK's] command in such a short period of time are impressive and beg the question of how [he] was able to lead his troops to success in areas where his predecessors had utterly failed for years.”
The report puts MK's strike force above the rest of the security pack: “The KAU led efforts to recapture Gizab [in April 2010] and Char China [in late 2011]. In cooperation with [Australian and Afghan troops], KAU spearheaded operations to clear the roads into and within Char China [district], rendering it safe for civilians to travel for the first time in years.”
The report ties a re-energised effort by the other Afghan security forces to MK's leadership. But it also acknowledges an Australian contribution that locals and NGOs rated more highly than any American effort – “a proactive, 'go get 'em' mentality and a willingness to maintain 'direct physical security'.”
An NGO official tells the Liaison Office: “When the Australians hear a report of roadblocks or mines, they directly go there, risking their lives [to] maintain the peace.”
At times Matiullah and as many as 200 of his men went on missions with the Australian Special Forces "every day, or maybe every few days", but not any more.
“They needed us because we knew the area and we knew the people,” he says. “We were disciplined and co-ordinated – sometimes it was me, sometimes the police and sometimes the KAU guys.”
As though reporting an unusual set of circumstances, MK boasts that his men – KAU or police – do not steal from the people. Under his predecessors, they had been driven to theft because their superiors skimmed their salaries.
“I had to organise a good force that the foreigners would want to use,” he says, explaining that his checkpost commanders each receive $200 a month as "etcetera, etcetera money" with orders not to dip into their men's wages. He claims to lease land near each post for the police to grow vegetables, instead of stealing from local growers. He supplies them with corn and pomegranates which he buys from local suppliers.
MK also employs teachers who move between police posts to work on improving literacy in the ranks.
Afghan National Army convoys are rarely seen on the roads and tracks. “Always in the bases,” mocks one of MK's men as our bullet-proofed four-wheel-drive and five-vehicle police convoy whips up a trail of dust on the track to Chinartu, in the south of the province. “Scared of the Taliban, they are.”
Several times we're told that the ANA officers strike deals with the Taliban – “you don't touch us and we won't touch you”, one of MK's commanders chortles. A belittling rivalry between the police and army is intense – “better salaries, food and weapons and no effort required from the ANA”, one of MK's men jabs as we pass another ANA hilltop post.
MK always pays his men on time, but Kabul is two months behind in paying local police salaries. That's a central government habit that could play to MK's strength in the future, because local tribal elders predict that police and soldiers will simply walk if they are not paid.
The likelihood is that they will walk down the road and offer their services to MK, who, in the absence of foreign-backed haulage contractors, is expected to demand that the tribes and other road-users pay the tolls to ensure that he continues to be the richest, most powerful man in the province.
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