Kazakh senate rejects sending soldiers to Afghanistan

[unknownprince]

Kazakh senate rejects sending soldiers to Afghanistan

Kazakh senate rejects sending soldiers to Afghanistan - Monsters and Critics


Jun 9, 2011, 9:53 GMT


Astana/Moscow - Kazakhstan's senate on Thursday rejected a proposal to send four Kazakh officers to serve with NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, but a new vote on the controversial measure could come in late June.
Last month, the Central Asian country's lower house approved the deployment, which requires the support of the upper house and the president to take effect.
Taliban officials said after the lower house's approval that if the deployment occurred, they would target Kazakhstan, which is heavily Muslim and is home to ethnic minorities with historic ties to Afghanistan.
The lower house on May 18 approved the deployment for non-combat jobs in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).
'Right now the US is thinking about how to get its troops out of Afghanistan,' said senate deputy Svetlana Zhalmagambetova before the upper house voted to reject the measure.
'Is it worth it to ruin our reputation as a peaceful country at the very last moment of the war?' she said, according to the Interfax news agency.
The proposal has sparked a wide-ranging discussion in Kazakh society and media, which are normally tightly controlled by the regime of President Nursultan Nazarbayev.
Energy-rich Kazakhstan has attempted to take a neutral position between Russia, the US, and China, all of which are pushing to increase their influence in Central Asia.
Astana in 2010 approved the movement of NATO lorry convoys through its territory to deliver supplies to IASF forces in northern Afghanistan, but Kazakhstan's military cooperates most closely with Russia.

[unknownprince]

Taliban warns Muslim Kazakhstan on entering Afghan war


Taliban warns Muslim Kazakhstan on entering Afghan war | Reuters


By Amie Ferris-Rotman
KABUL | Sun May 22, 2011 4:16am EDT

KABUL (Reuters) - The Taliban has warned majority Muslim Kazakhstan that its decision to send troops to the NATO-led war in Afghanistan would have severe consequences and was not in its regional interest.
The statement, distributed to media on Saturday, appeared to nod to a growing Islamist tendencies in ex-Soviet Central Asia, where militants enjoy support from the Taliban and have worried Kazakhstan and neighboring Russia.
The Kazakh parliament decided on May 18 to become the first nation of mainly Muslim, ex-Soviet Central Asia to send troops to join the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) as the war drags into its 10th year.
Though not a member of NATO, Kazakhstan said it would send an unspecified number of soldiers on six-month missions. It has been providing air and ground corridors for the delivery of supplies to Western troops in Afghanistan.
"(Kazakhstan) has focused on protection of American interests instead of taking into account the aspirations of their people and the regional interests," the English-language Taliban statement said.
Kazakhstan is Central Asia's most successful economy and largest oil producer. Seventy percent of its 16.4 million people are Muslim. The vast nation has to date avoided the Islamist violence that has occurred in its ex-Soviet neighbors.
"The Muslim people of Kazakhstan should stand against this wrong policy of their rulers ... This step on the part of Kazakhstan will leave a long-term negative impact on relations between Afghanistan and Kazakhstan and the region," the statement said.
Analysts have warned that Central Asian militants, after years fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, are filtering back across the region's porous borders to their homelands, bringing with them ambitions to spread jihad, or holy war.
Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan all border Afghanistan.
Tajikistan's army has been fighting insurgents in the country's mountainous east since an attack on a military convoy killed 28 troops last September, shortly after suicide car bombers attacked a police station in the country's second city.
Several militant Islamist groups have stated their objective of creating a Muslim caliphate incorporating large swathes of Central Asia, a region twice the size of Saudi Arabia.
However, in contrast with poorer republics in Central Asia, analysts have said militant groups were unlikely to garner much support in relatively prosperous Kazakhstan.
Despite the presence of up to 150,000 foreign troops, violence across Afghanistan is at its worst since the 2001 overthrow of the Taliban government by U.S.-backed Afghan forces. Last year both sides suffered record casualties.

[unknownprince]

Kazakh Senate rejects sending troops to Afghanistan (UPDATE)

Kazakh Senate rejects sending troops to Afghanistan (UPDATE) | Afghanistan | Trend

09.06.2011 15:00


Details about the vote in the Senate added (previous news posted at 12:44)
Azerbaijan , Baku, 9 June/ Trend/
Kazakh Senate, the Upper House of the Kazakh Parliament, on Thursday rejected a bill to send troops to join NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, Novosti-Kazakhstan reported.
"The International Affairs, Defense and Security Committee has proposed to reject the bill and return it to the Majilis [Lower House]," lawmaker, co-rapporteur of the same bill Mukhtar Altynbayev said.
He mentioned that according to the Constitution of Kazakhstan, decisions on joining of Kazakh military forces to the international missions are taken at the joint meetings of both Houses of Parliament.
"Right now the US is thinking about how to get its troops out of Afghanistan," said Senate deputy Svetlana Zhalmagambetova before the upper house voted to reject the measure, DPA reported referring to the Interfax news agency.

"Is it worth it to ruin our reputation as a peaceful country at the very last moment of the war?" she said.
On 18 May Kazakh Majilis approved a bill to send four officers to Afghanistan to support the coalition forces for a period of six months. Subsequently, the deadline may be extended.
A few days later, on 22 May the Afghan Taliban have threatened Kazakhstan by "serious consequences" for the decision of the leadership of the country where Muslim population predominates to take part in the war of allies in Afghanistan.
The Kazakh Foreign Ministry reacted by saying that it was planning to send just four officers to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) staff.
Kazakhstan is not the first and the only state with Muslim population participating in the war in Afghanistan. The international coalition includes 47 countries, 19 of which are not included in NATO and six are the members of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC).
The coalition forces have been deployed in Afghanistan since 2001 when the U.S. began its war against international terrorism.

[MDresden]

Do you really need to figure that out Adam? Taliban/ Al-Qaeda and Haqqani are world-wide terrorist organizations. Probably some practice for their own military forces.

[MDresden]

Adam, NATO has labeled them as "global terrorist organizations." It's not merely me labeling them. When NATO does something, it's always got world-wide implications.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._organizations

Taliban
Hezbollah
Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi
Muslim Brotherhood
Mujahedin-e Khalq
Khuddam ul-Islam
Jaish-e-Mohammed
Hizbul Mujahideen
Fatah
al-Qaeda

(Haqqani is still being investigated and such, not enough information presented yet.)


As you can see, there are many groups listed...which includes Taliban. And, being labeled a terrorist, a kill on sight is not a global war crime.