This undated handout photo issued by West Thames College, Thursday July 21, 2005 shows Atique Sharifi, who was killed in the July 7, 2005 London bombings. The 24-year-old Afghan national from Hounslow in west London fled from the brutal Taliban regime three years ago. ( AP Photo/ West Thames College)

Afghan President Hamid Karzai due in Italy for talks with top officials

ROME - (AP) Afghan President Hamid Karzai begins a visit to Italy on Thursday that will include talks with Premier Silvio Berlusconi and other top Italian officials.

Karzai was scheduled to hold talks with his Italian counterpart, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, on Thursday. A day later he was to meet with Berlusconi and attend a conference on Afghanistan organized by Italy's foreign ministry.

Karzai was coming from London, where he held talks with Prime Minister Tony Blair and joined in discussions the British leader held with Muslim leaders in that country following the July 7 London bombings.

Karzai's European trip is focusing on Afghanistan's economic development and other issues. Britain and Italy have provided financial, humanitarian and military support for Karzai's government. 

Cautious Karzai spells out his message for Pakistan - By Bronwen Maddox - The Times (UK) - July 21, 2005

SHUT down the worst of Pakistan’s madrassas. If President Karzai of Afghanistan has a single message for Tony Blair, and his neighbour President Musharraf, it is that.

On his visit this week to Britain, Karzai has gone to great lengths, sometimes comical, not to single out Pakistan for blame. He is a close ally of Musharraf and the two speak regularly. Nevertheless, Karzai has found ways of saying clearly that Pakistan-based terrorists are the source of some of his worst problems.

Karzai, speaking over coffee yesterday in his Kensington hotel, was determined to tell an upbeat story. Trade has soared with neighbouring countries. Poppy production will fall next year. Donors have delivered almost all of the money pledged three years ago, and it has been put to good use.

There is little need for more foreign troops. Those in Afghanistan are used mainly for civilian reconstruction, with a bit of security help for the parliamentary and provincial elections scheduled for September.

Compared with Iraq, he suggests, his country is enviable. “Afghanistan is the world’s success story”, he says. Some of this is convincing. Trade has given Kabul a source of revenue, and a way of showing Afghans that the country is opening up to the world.

If the elections happen on time, the test is whether warlords and drug barons can appropriate them to consolidate their grip on power. Karzai maintains that many candidates have agreed to surrender weapons, and that the national enthusiasm for elections is undermining the old leaders. Perhaps. Afghanistan’s twin vulnerabilities remain: drugs and terrorism. This year there has been an upsurge in violence in the southeast, and the harvesting of a record opium poppy crop.

Karzai was faultlessly polite in not chiding Britain for failing to get a better grip on the drugs crop in the south, the task it has been assigned within the international coalition.

Next year will be better, he says (so do British officials). Karzai has vetoed the US’s preferred tactic of spraying crops from the air. That has proven efficiency, if it is also provocative. But Karzai argues that the damage to livestock and the farms in general is too great. On terrorism, he does not claim to have an answer. He says that “terrorism was there before Iraq, before 9/11, but because it did not reach the West, we did not call it terrorism”.

Now that we do, what should we do about it? “There are some places called madrassas that are not that. They are training camps for terrorists,” he says. “They have to be closed down by all of us.” Pressed on where they are, he says “Pakistan, Afghanistan, wherever” but finally concedes “Yes” to the question “Are some of these in Pakistan?”

Karzai’s reluctance to offend Musharraf is understandable. The two leaders have, in parallel, taken on the Taleban culture embedded in southern Afghanistan and western Pakistan, and the support that it may give to al-Qaeda militants.

Members of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence are known to loathe this change of direction, as well as support for the US and Kabul. Karzai, who has criticised Pakistan in the past for permitting terrorist traffic across the border, hinted at this dissatisfaction with his ally yesterday, saying that “when the attacks stop, then our co-operation (with Pakistan) will be successful”.

A carefully scripted message, then, from a man used to brokering a deal between competing warlords. The question the elections will answer is whether Karzai is President of a liberated country, or simply mayor of the city of Kabul, with uncontrolled wilderness stretching beyond.

14 killed in fighting across Afghanistan - By NOOR KHAN 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - (AP)    Fighting across Afghanistan left 14 people dead, including nine tribesmen killed by suspected Taliban rebels, while the commander of a NATO-led force expressed confidence that security would be tight for upcoming parliamentary elections.

The nine ethnic Hazaras were killed when rebels raided their village Monday in central Uruzgan province, Gov. Jan Mohammed Khan said. Then on Wednesday, other residents of the victims' village raided a nearby ethnic Pashtun hamlet, killing four people, he said.

The Taliban consists mostly of Pashtuns, the dominant ethnic group in southern Afghanistan, and the families of the nine Hazaras mistakenly thought the attackers had been from the nearby Pashtun village, Khan said.

Security forces have deployed to the region to reduce tension between the two communities, he said. Meanwhile, U.S. forces killed a militant and wounded another after coming under attack in neighboring Zabul province Wednesday, a U.S. military statement said.

Also Wednesday in the country's main western city of Herat, two small bombs exploded, but caused no casualties or damage, in an attack thought to be linked to a local power struggle.

The blasts occurred outside the police chief's office and on a roadside near the governor's residence in the capital of Herat province, said provincial Gov. Sayed Hussain Anwari.

The bombs were thought to have been laid by local people embroiled in a political struggle between local strongmen, Anwari said. No suspects have been arrested, but an investigation is underway, he said.

A local police official who gave his name only as Sardar said four people had been arrested and were being interrogated. Security officials also seized bombs in other parts of Herat, he said, without elaborating.

On Tuesday, a suspected suicide bomber died in a failed assassination attempt against a district chief in the region. Herat has been spared much of the violence that has wracked Afghanistan's southern and eastern provinces since March. More than 700 people have died in an unprecedented surge of killings ahead of legislative elections in September.

Meanwhile, the commander of Afghanistan's International Security Assistance Force _ a NATO-led force of 8,000 troops responsible for security in Kabul and much of the country's north and west _ said security would be tight for the poll. "I'm sure there will be no problem with security for the election," Lt. Gen. Ethem Erdagi told a news conference.

NATO plans to boost ISAF by 3,000 troops in the lead-up to the elections on Sept. 18. The extra troops will provide security for thousands of candidates and hundreds of polling stations.

NATO similarly boosted its peacekeeping force during the presidential elections last October. On Sunday, a female Afghan election worker was shot and wounded about three kilometers (1.9 miles) from a voter registration station in northeastern Nuristan province, the government's electoral body said in a statement Thursday.

Two powerful explosions rock Herat City

HERAT CITY, July 21 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Two powerful explosions Wednesday night rocked this provincial capital of the western Herat province with no casualties.

The first explosion happened in front of the governor's office followed by another before the police station. The two blasts have spread a wave of fear among people of the relatively calm and peaceful Herat City.

Several nearby buildings were partially damaged while window-panes of houses and shops, situated in a radius of 200 metres of the blast site were shattered.

Commenting on the blasts, Herat Governor Syed Hussain Anwari said it was aimed at destabiling the government. He assured the perpetrators would soon be brought to book.

He said the provincial government was trying to equip the police with modern techniques and increase their existing strength to cope with the rising incidence of crime.

A day earlier, security officials had defused four Scud-20 missiles fitted to attack the Herat airport. Earlier, a young man had blown himself up outside the house of Enjil district police chief. The officer narrowly survived the suicide attack.

Shah Mohammad Rasooli, an inhabitant of the area, termed the security officials responsible for the recent spate of attacks and bomb blasts. "How can they protect the common man when they themselves are vulnerable to such attack," he questioned.

Afghan Ministry's employees abducted, released

KABUL, July 21 (Xinhua) -- Suspected Taliban militias briefly  made captives two employees of Afghan Ministry for Refugees  Affairs and set them free Wednesday afternoon, spokesman of the  Ministry confirmed Thursday.

"Armed Taliban abducted two employees of a four-member team of our ministry near Zari Dasht of Kandahar yesterday morning but  released them in the afternoon," Nadim Khan told Xinhua. 

However, he added that the abductors did not return the vehicle of the team.  The team, he said, was going to review the living condition of  refugees at Zari Dasht. 

Zari Dasht, a refugee camp housing hundreds of internally  displaced Afghans has been frequently visited by the Ministry of  Refugees as well as UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to tackle their  problems. 

Kandahar, the former stronghold of Taliban and neighboring  provinces of Zabul, Helmand and Uruzgan has been the scene of  increasing insurgency since early spring.  Enditem

Two Afghans arrive home after more than three years in Guantanamo Bay

KABUL, July 20 (AFP) - Two Afghan men arrived in Kabul Wednesday after more than three years in US military detention in Guantanamo Bay as part of a move to bring Taliban detainees back into political life, officials said.

Both men described conditions in the US detention centre in Cuba, the controversial site of several reported abuses, as "inhuman" and one said more than 100 prisoners there had just staged a hunger strike. "It was very inhuman in the jail," former Taliban soldier Habibul Rasoul told a Kabul press conference. "God forbid that other people end up there".

Rasoul, who was detained during the US-led invasion in 2001, said in the two weeks before he was released, 105 prisoners in Guantanamo Bay had staged a hunger strike to protest conditions, although he did not take part. Rasoul, from southeastern Khost province, a stronghold of the former Islamic hardline regime, was detained in northern Sheberghan in 2001.

Afghan officials praised the prisoners' release at a Kabul press conference. "I am so glad," said President Hamid Karzai's spokesman Rafiullah Mojaddedi. "I congratulate you and I congratulate us for succeeding to release two of you from Guantanamo Bay. We hope we will be able to release more people."

The second released prisoner, Mohibullah, who goes by one name and hails from the country's main southern city of Kandahar, also said conditions in the US detention centre were "inhuman" but gave no further details.

Hazrat Sebghatullah Al-Mujadadi, chairman of Afghanistan's reconciliation council, said releases would continue as part of a reconciliation drive with former Taliban fighters, many of whom had been unjustly detained. "There are hundreds of Afghans who spend day and night in the Cuba jail," he said. "They've been captured for no reason, some on personal enmities."

US troops are still holding about 500 Afghan prisoners at military bases in Bagram and Kandahar, Afghanistan, and scores more in Cuba, but Afghan officials claim many had been detained as a result of faulty intelligence.

Italian general takes helm of multinational brigade in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan - (AP)       Officials and troops from 23 countries attended a ceremony on Wednesday to usher in an Italian general as the next leader of a multinational brigade that provides security for Afghanistan's capital.

Brig. Gen. Claudio Graziano took the helm of the Kabul Multinational Brigade from Turkey's Brig. Gen. Umit Dundar in the formal ceremony at a military compound near Kabul. Graziano is to serve a six-month tour of duty.

The brigade is part of Afghanistan's International Security Assistance Force, a NATO-led force of 8,000 troops responsible for security in Kabul and much of Afghanistan's north and west.

It has plans to expand next year into southern Afghanistan, where a separate 20,000-strong U.S.-led coalition is busy fighting Taliban-led rebels. "I am excited about being here in Afghanistan at such a crucial juncture in the country's history," Graziano said. "We must ensure a secure and stable environment for the city of Kabul and surrounding areas."

The general said his forces will strive to help the international community achieve its aim, "which is to provide humanitarian aid and improve the infrastructure in the region." A recent surge in violence _ mostly in Afghanistan's south and eastern provinces _ has left more than 700 people dead over the past three months.

France is committed to Afghanistan, says French defense minister

WASHINGTON, July 21 (AFP) - France remains committed to help Afghanistan in its transition process, as part of a broader European defense policy to stem international terrorism, French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie wrote Thursday in The Wall Street Journal.

"In the context of securing Afghanistan and fighting international terrorism, we have pledged to help rebuild the Afghan State, along with our partners," she said in her commentary. Of special concern, she said, was stemming drug trafficking in Afghanistan, "still the world's leading opium producer."

"As trafficking is aided by instability, traffickers have an interest in maintaining it. Since 2002, this traffic has increasingly, and, with impunity, nurtured terrorist networks throughout the world," she said. "Fighting traffickers must be our first priority," she emphasised.

Alliot-Marie said Afghanistan had managed to seize more than 50 tons of drugs since the start of the year and urged the international community "to redouble its efforts to help Afghanistan in this struggle," by strengthening its legal system and training special police forces. She said she would discuss such initiatives with Afghan authorities during her visit to Kabul starting Thursday "on the occasion of a French troop rotation."

"As the world slowly recovers from the bloody attacks in London, never has the need for international cooperation on defense and in fighting terrorism been so strong," she noted.

"While exercising vigilance within its borders, European defense must remain involved in the stabilization and reconstruction of outside countries," she concluded.

Victim's parents died at hands of Taleban - By Sophie Kirkham / The Times (UK) / July 21, 2005

ONE of the last victims of the London bombings to be named by police was a young Afghan Muslim whose parents were killed by the Taleban.

Ateeque Sharifi, 24, who was living in Hounslow, West London, fled Kabul three years ago to seek refuge in Britain. He was the only male member of his family to escape death at the hands of the Taleban. He died in the explosion set off by bomber Jermaine Lindsay as their Piccadilly Line train approached the station at Russell Square.

Eight months after arriving in Britain, Mr Sharifi enrolled in West Thames College and began mastering the English language, working in his spare time at a take-away pizza restaurant. Most of his wages were sent to Afghanistan to his younger sister who still lives there.

“The deep irony of this tragic event is that Ateeque had left Afghanistan to seek safety in Britain, only to find his fate at the hands of extremists here,” Thalia Marriott, principal of West Thames College, said. Mr Sharifi had been one of the most popular students in the college, she added.

Mr Sharifi had been travelling home after spending the night with friends when he was caught in the blast, it was reported last night in The Independent newspaper.

Mr Sharifi counted many British as well as Indians and Pakistanis people among his friends. He attended the mosque close to where he lived with three friends. He had hoped to pursue a career in IT, while following his dream of marrying and raising a family in Britain, his friends said.

Hamid Karzai, the Afghan President, laid flowers outside King’s Cross station yesterday in tribute to Mr Sharifi.. Earlier, he told an audience at Chatham House: “Afghanistan knows better perhaps than any other nation the pain of those families that suffered terrorist atrocity.”

• Refugee repatriation

The number of Afghan refugees who have returned from Pakistan has now passed 2.5 million. This means that in total more than 3.7 million people have returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan and Iran since 2002 when the UN refugee agency, UNHCR (UN High Commissioner for Refugees), began its current repatriation programmes. Among these are more than 200,000 individuals who have returned from Pakistan with UNHCR help so far this year.

In Iran, UNHCR has helped nearly 800,000 Afghans to repatriate since 2002, with another 400,000 leaving on their own. So far this year, the United Nations has helped some 26,000 Afghans return from Iran.

• DDR / DIAG update

55,837 ex-combatants are now into the reintegration phase of DDR, which as you know is the last remaining stage in the Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration process.

On Monday I told you that the cantonment of heavy weapons had been completed. Afghanistan’s New Beginnings Programme (ANBP) has advised since then that this information was incorrect, and that while the vast majority of weapons has been either cantoned or disabled, some weapons remain to be cantoned or otherwise put out of use in Herat, Kunduz and Panjshir.

As a part of ANBP’s activities, ammunition survey teams have collected almost 484 thousand [483,701] individual items of ammunition and 1.4 million [1,402,013] boxes of ammunition.

With the Disbanding of Illegal Armed Groups programme 7,739 weapons are now verified as having been handed in, 4,048 of these by candidates in the upcoming elections. To put this in some context this is a very slight increase from the figures I provided you with on Monday. 17,036 boxes of ammunition and 27,684 individual pieces are now verified as collected.

• Special guest for Monday’s briefing

Next Monday’s regular UNAMA press briefing and press conference will be on the Child Soldier Demobilization Programme. Ibrahim Sesay, who is acting head of UNICEF’s child protection programme in Afghanistan will be our guest speaker.

Ibrahim Sesay has worked on child-specific demobilization and reintegration programmes for the past six years in Sierra Leone and Afghanistan.

Prior to coming to Afghanistan, Mr. Sesay worked with the World Bank and the Government of Sierra Leone, as well as NGO Caritas in his native Sierra Leone in the areas of post conflict reconstruction and development, and child protection. His areas of expertise also include social policy development.

• UNFPA assists MoPH and RTA quiz show on “equality”

The United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA) has recently provided technical and financial support to the Ministry of Public Health for a logistics management system.

UNFPA is also providing the technical and financial support for a quiz show to be broadcast tomorrow night on RTA. The show focuses on gender equality, early marriage and women’s access to reproductive health services.

• OCPI releases board game: “The Road to Peace”

UNAMA’s Office of Communication and Public Information (OCPI) has produced 10,000 board games in both Dari and Pashtu for disadvantaged children throughout Afghanistan.

The game, which is called “The Road to Peace”, is primarily aimed at 10-14 year olds, and is currently being distributed around Afghanistan to war-affected children, former child soldiers, underprivileged children, and refugee families.

The game aims to teach children about the key events in the peace process and reconstruction of Afghanistan - including the signing of the Bonn Agreement, the Emergency and Constitutional Loya Jirgas, and the elections. It also highlights key issues such as the environment, health, and education.

• JEMB press conference on counting of ballots and conclusion of voter registration update

Some election notes to pass your way. The Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) will be holding a press conference at 1:30pm this afternoon, at their Electoral Compound on Jalalabad road, to mark the end of the voter registration period and the counting of ballots.

• The Asia Foundation supporting elections content in women’s magazine Mursal

The Asia Foundation is supporting elections in eight consecutive issues of the Afghan women’s magazine Mursal.

The foundation’s special inserts will feature interviews with Afghan women expressing their thoughts, ideas and hopes for a government that represents their issues and needs. Also included will be the platforms of local candidates from each region. In addition, a special August edition will focus entirely on the September 18 th elections.

• MoWA sends teams to 21 provinces with goal of enhancing women’s participation in elections

The Ministry of Women’s Affairs has dispatched teams to 21 provinces to motivate and promote awareness among women of the need to participate actively in the upcoming elections.

The 10-day project, which began on July 16 th, involves 63 people who will be meeting village leaders and utilizing local media, mosques, NGOs, and schools to help in the information campaign. Media members interested in more information can contact MoWA’s public relations office at 079 282 074.

Briefing by Edward Carwardine, UNICEF Spokesman, on Child Soldier Demobilization

Local Demobilization and Reintegration Committees, made up of community leaders and locally-based NGOs, began work this week in Herat province to identify and assess up to 500 eligible children; that is, those children of 18 years or younger who have been attached to a military unit with a formal command structure who wish to benefit from the programme’s reintegration opportunities. The programme, supported by UNICEF, began in February 2004 and has assisted just over 4,000 former child soldiers.

The programme relies heavily upon the support of local communities, who help to identify eligible young people. Reintegration options, which focus on education and vocational training opportunities, are also based in the community in an effort to help young people play a constructive role in their local society.

The programme has enjoyed considerable success to date, with more than 3,300 former child soldiers aged between 14 and 18 years old undertaking a range of training programmes including animal husbandry, motor mechanics, tailoring, masonry and carpentry. Training programmes are linked to employment opportunities, to enable participants to have an increased chance of tangible income generation on completion of the one-year courses.

The child soldier demobilization and reintegration initiative is being funded with support from the Governments of the United States of America, Japan and Germany as well as UNICEF fundraising committees in France, Germany and Japan.

Afghan consul-general repudiates Durrani's accusation

PESHAWAR, July 20 (Pajhwok Afghan News): An Afghan envoy Wednesday repudiated NWFP Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani's accusation that Afghanistan was meddling in Pakistan's internal affairs.

Afghan Consul-General in Peshawar Haji Abdul Khaliq Farahi, spurning the charges as baseless, insisted his country was desirous of forging closer ties with all countries and abhorred interference in their business.

Chief Minister Durrani had told media-people a day earlier: "We aren't intrusive at all; it's the Afghan government which is interfering in Pakistan's domestic affairs." The Frontier chief minister had also accused "certain elements in the Karzai administration of blocking cordial ties between the two countries."

In an exclusive chat with Pajhwok Afghan News, Farahi insisted: "In no way does the Afghan government meddle in Pakistan and Akram Khan Durrani's diatribe could have an unwholesome effect on our bilateral relationship."

The diplomat maintained his country was in an all-out push to cultivate robust links with all the neighbours, particularly with Pakistan and Iran because of their cultural, religious and linguistic commonalities.

Farahi equated Durrani's invective with outright meddling, vowing: "Under no circumstances can we allow anyone to do that." He underlined the need for an immediate stop to such vitriolic statements as might damage Pak-Afghan friendship.

In recent weeks, a number of high-ranking Afghan officials have directly faulted Pakistan for escalating militant attacks on government and coalition forces in southern and eastern Afghan provinces.

PAKISTAN: Afghans asked to leave tribal North Waziristan - [This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

ISLAMABAD, 19 Jul 2005 (IRIN) - Afghan refugees living in Pakistan's North Waziristan agency's western tribal belt bordering Afghanistan have been asked to leave the area in six weeks, an official from the Afghan refugee directorate told IRIN from the agency's capital, Miranshah, on Tuesday.

For last two years, Pakistani security forces have been busy in a full-scale offensive against militants in the western belt of the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA).

"By 7 September, all Afghans living in urban and rural clusters have to leave the North Waziristan agency. The Afghan population living in the area has been informed about the decision through public announcements at local radio and through drum beating at other prominent places like markets," Akbar Ali Jan Wazir, agency administrator for Afghan refugees said from Miranshah, some 190 miles southwest of the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.

Of the 58,000 Afghans in the tribal North Waziristan agency, some 50,000 Afghans have already repatriated over the last six weeks on their own, as well as through the assistance from the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), according to the state-run body dealing with Afghan refugees in North Waziristan.

According to UNHCR, more than 30,000 Afghans, mostly hailing from refugee camps, have been assisted by the agency, under their voluntary repatriation programme.

But the remaining 900 Afghan families living in urban and rural clusters of North Waziristan are more established than those of the camp population. "They run businesses here, most of them own shops in markets, that's why they have been given a deadline of six weeks from now to wind up their businesses and leave the area," Wazir explained.

Aside from repatriating to Afghanistan, the Afghans can avail the option of relocating to the Gandi Khan Khel refugee camp, located in the neighbouring district of Bannu in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and to date, some 93 Afghan families from the Qutubkhel refugee camp have shifted to Gandi Khan Khel. "However, most of the Afghans have preferred to move back to Afghanistan," Wazir added.

Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation in the tribal belt is worsening as military operations against suspected al-Qaeda elements continue, according to local journalists.

According to one BBC report last year, the co-ordinated effort is largely aimed at capturing top al-Qaeda leaders Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri. The men, and many of their close associates, are widely believed to be hiding in and perhaps operating out of the area.

Since the start of operation, the military authorities have firmly maintained that a large number of Uzbek, Chechen and Arab militants were in the area, the report said, a claim local tribesmen vehemently deny.

"17 persons killed by Pakistani security forces in Miranshah two days ago include ten children under the age of ten with six boys and four girls. Can such young people - irrespective of getting into their nationality debate - be counted as militants?" Dilawar Khan, a local journalist asked from Wana, tribal capital of the adjacent South Waziristan agency, the scene of last year's offensive.

But according to Pakistani military spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan on Monday, the 17 militants gunned down near the Afghan border were all from Kazakhstan and included women and teenage youths. However, the identity of those killed has been reported by local media as Uzbek origin, which may hail from Afghanistan. "The truck which came under the indiscriminate fire of the army is the type usually hired by refugees and was having household items. The burnt stuff is still lying at the scene," Khan added.

Pakistan bans Afghan truckers' entry

TORKHAM, July 20 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Pakistani border guards at Torkham Wednesday slapped a ban on the entry of Afghan trucks, a step that led to long queues of heavy vehicles parked on both sides of the road.

The restriction comes hard on the heels of a 10-day protest by Pakistani truckers against the attitude of Afghan officials, who allegedly tease them on their way to Kabul.

Beginning their protest from July 10, many Pakistani drivers staged a noisy demonstration in Khyber Agency to denounce the hurdles created to their loaded vehicles by Afghan police. They chanted slogans against Afghan authorities and hurled stones at the vehicles plying the road in the semi-autonomous Pakistani tribal region.

But Sher Ahmad, an Afghan police official in the border town, justified the roadblocks placed in Sarobi to test the trucks' roadworthiness before they reached the bumpy mountain road. "Vehicles that manage to clear the hurdles are allowed to go ahead."

He admitted the lorries failing to climb the mound were sent back to Torkham, because they could not ply the Lata Band Road - zigzagging through a long range of mountains.

However, the weird arrangement has infuriated the Pakistani drivers, who have parked nearly 2,000 trucks on both sides of the road - long lines stretching from Ali Masjid to the Torkham border town.

Pakistani border officials implied the ban on Afghan truckers' entry had been imposed in retaliation for unnecessary problems created for Pakistani drivers and transporters.

"The ban went into effect from today and will remain in place as long as the two governments reach an agreement on how to deal with the situation," said Bakhtiar Momand, Torkham's assistant political agent (APA).

Two killed in grenade attack on Pakistan mosque near Afghanistan

Islamabad (AFP) - Two Islamic preachers were killed and four others wounded in a hand grenade attack against a mosque in a Pakistani tribal district bordering Afghanistan, officials said.

Unknown attackers threw the grenade into a mosque in the Khabianga village of the Kurram agency tribal district, some 260 kilometres (160 miles) west of Islamabad, local administration official Basir Khan Wazir told AFP on Thursday.

Two members of the Tableeghi Jamaat (Preaching Party) died on the spot, while four people were seriously hurt and taken to hospital, he said. Authorities had detained some 15 Afghan refugee suspects in the area as part of their investigation into the attack.

Kurram, a usually-quiet tribal district, borders Afghanistan and the rugged North Waziristan tribal zone, where Pakistani troops are hunting Al-Qaeda linked militants and where Taliban forces killed 17 in a clash on Sunday.

Pakistan, a key ally in the US "war on terror", has deployed about 70,000 troops along its border with southeastern Afghanistan to track down foreign militants in the region.

Taliban attacks in the Afghan southeast have surged in recent months ahead of Afghanistan's landmark parliamentary elections in September. Al-Qaeda and Taliban members fled to the deeply-religious region after the Taliban regime was toppled in late 2001 by US-led forces.

In a series of operations since last year, Pakistani forces have destroyed hideouts and training camps of militants linked to Al-Qaeda and killed hundreds of rebels, officials say. About 250 Pakistani soldiers have also been killed.

Pakistan tells US to respect borders in terror war - Jul 20

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has assured the United States of unwavering support in the war on terrorism, but said he would not tolerate violation of the country's borders by U.S. forces, newspapers said.

Musharraf met U.S. Central Command chief General John Abizaid on Tuesday after strikes by Afghanistan-based U.S. forces killed 24 suspected militants in a Pakistani tribal region bordering Afghanistan last week.

The strikes prompted anti-U.S. protests by pro-militant tribesmen in North Waziristan, just inside the Pakistan border, during funerals for some of the dead on Saturday.

Wednesday editions of Pakistani newspapers quoted Musharraf as telling Abizaid during a meeting in the garrison city of Rawalpindi that Pakistani forces were doing everything they could to purge the country of terrorists.

"Now we want our borders to be respected in the war on terrorism and will not put up with future border breaches," the Daily Times quoted Musharraf as saying. There was no comment from the Pakistan government on the newspaper reports.

The U.S.-led raids followed a warning by a U.S. official that forces on both sides of the border needed to squeeze the frontier region where al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden might be hiding.

U.S. and Afghan officials have long complained that, despite Pakistan's status as a key ally in the war on terrorism, Taliban and allied militants have been able to launch attacks in Afghanistan from Pakistan and escape back there.

Musharraf asked for more technical support from the United States for Pakistan's intelligence and law enforcement agencies to help them free the rugged border region of the al Qaeda and Taliban militants, the Daily Times said.

Musharraf also sought greater military assistance from Washington to maintain a regional balance of power -- a reference to the growing military strength of Pakistan's neighbor and nuclear-armed rival, India.

Afghan and Pakistani military officials have said that more than 60 militants were killed in the border region between Thursday and Sunday. They included 24 killed by U.S. fire into North Waziristan.

The border attacks have come amid a broad crackdown on militants in Pakistan launched after the July 7 bombings in London, which involved bombers of Pakistani descent.

Islamic parties call rallies against mass arrests in Pakistan

Pakistani fundamentalist Muslim parties called for a national day of protest against the police raids on suspected militants that they labelled part of a global conspiracy against Islam.

The six-party Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) alliance urged followers to rally outside local mosques after the weekly congregations on the Muslim day of prayer, its senior leader Liaquat Baloch told AFP on Thursday.

The raids that have led to more than 200 arrests came under international pressure on Pakistan to crack down on militants and to search for a possible mastermind of the London 7 attacks that killed 56 people and wounded 700.

But Muslim leaders have stressed that most Islamic schools teach a moderate version of Islam and condemned the continuing crackdown against religious figures and media outlets said to be preaching hatred.

"We strongly condemn the London bombings, and the rallies have been convened to denounce the July 7 attacks and the subsequent arrests by the military regime, which wants to fulfill its own secular agenda," Baloch said.

"Prayer leaders in their sermons will condemn the bombings in London and the indiscriminate arrests in Pakistan in the garb of (searching for the perpetrators of the) London attacks," he said.

Security officals told AFP they would send officers to mosques on Friday to monitor whether any clerics would call for militant action following the wave of arrests and interrogations.

The MMA in a statement late Wednesday lashed out at President Pervez Musharraf, a general who assumed power in a coup in 1999, for what it said were the arrests of hundreds of students, teachers and journalists. They also charged that police had mistreated female students in madrassas in Islamabad during raids on Tuesday night.

"The Musharraf regime, which called itself a champion of women rights, is fighting the enemies' war against its own citizens and has now reached to the limits where its hands were disgracing the girl students of religious seminaries by snatching their headscarves," it said.

"General Pervez Musharraf has resumed the crackdown on religious seminaries and arrests of Islamic scholars and students to please Washington and London," the MMA said in a statement that called for protests "to condemn the global conspiracy against Islam."

Baloch demanded an impartial investigation into the London attacks, in which three of the four suspected bombers were Britons of Pakistani origin who had recently spent time in the country.

"We strongly condemn terrorism and we want a dialogue between Islam and the West to find a permanent solution to rid the world of this menace," he said, calling for an international effort to eradicate the "root cause of terrorism."

Baloch denied involvement of madrassas in terrorism and blamed Western countries who trained Islamic militants in Pakistan to fight Soviet forces in Afghanistan during the country's 1979-1989 occupation.

He said Western agencies had "recruited Muslims of Arab, American and British origin and trained them to fight against the Russian invasion of Afghanistan."

"They were not trained in madrassas, the whole world knows who trained them. Those who trained these young men did not forecast what would happen to this large force of leaderless militants after the defeat of Russians."

Gwadar port to stimulate Pak-Afghan trade

ISLAMABAD, July 21 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Islamabad is optimistic of a substantial upsurge in the Pak-Afghan trade volume with the construction of a sea-port in Balochistan's coastal city of Gwadar.

Pakistan's Communication Minister Shamim Siddiqi Thursday asserted bilateral trade between the neighbours would account for billions of dollars once the sea-port was completed in the province bordering Afghanistan.

In an exclusive interview with Pajhwok Afghan News, the minister hoped the port, 450 kilometres from Karachi, would also lend a fillip to Pakistan's trade links with the Central Asian republics.

"Pakistan, exporting building materials, foodstuffs and other daily-use items to Afghanistan, is playing a proactive role in the rebuilding of that country," he claimed, promising all possible facilities for Afghan entrepreneurs.

Siddiqui added the completion of roads in Gwadar would enormously benefit Afghanistan in terms of forging deeper trade relations with Pakistan, China, Iran, India and Middle Eastern countries.

He was of the opinion the Gwadar port would make Afghanistan a commercial hub in the region on the one hand and translate into better trade prospects for Central Asian states on the other.

"We invite Afghanistan to make us of the enabling economic environment here and accord Pakistan the most favoured nation status," observed the minister, who concluded Kabul would dispassionately analyse the business opportunities his country offered.

The mega project is being executed on a fast-track basis despite stout opposition from Baloch nationalist leaders, who allege the port would bring no concrete gains to the local people.

Over 5,800 candidates to contest Afghanistan polls, 10 percent women - July 13, 2005

KABUL --  Some 5,805 candidates have been declared eligible to contest Afghanistan's first post-Taliban parliamentary polls in September, more than 10 percent of them women, election officials said on Tuesday.

A total of 2,778 candidates will stand for the 249-seat lower house Wolesi Jirga elections and 3,027 will stand for provincial councils, Bismillah Bismil, chairman of the UN-backed electoral commission, told reporters.

Some 583 women were running, he added. The relatively high level of female participation comes less than four years after the ouster of the fundamentalist Islamic Taliban regime, which banned women from working.

Under the hardline regime, which fell after a US-led invasion in 2001, women were barred from work, education and leaving the house without an all-covering burkah.

Releasing the final list of candidates, Bismil said that 17 people were struck off the list, 11 for links with armed groups, five for failing to get enough signatures to back their candidacy and one for refusing to step down from a government post.

Some 281 candidates, including 57 women, withdrew their candidacy before the final list was published. The commission on July 2 unveiled a blacklist of 208 names, most of who were to be investigated for links to private militias, and gave them five days to disarm and sever their ties.

The blacklist was complied after more than 1,000 complaints were received against some 500 candidates, but electoral officials did not explain why only 11 people were struck off for ties to militias. Almost 12 million Afghans have registered to vote in the elections set for September 18.

Japanese researchers find murals in cave near destroyed Afghan Buddhas

TOKYO, July 21 (AFP) - A Japanese team has found ancient murals in a cave near Afghanistan's giant Buddha statues which were destroyed by the Taliban, showing that Buddhism may have spread farther than previously thought, a researcher said Thursday. One mural retains a vivid red and gold color, according to the Japanese team, which believes the stone walls likely once featured many Buddhist icons.

Such caves have been found earlier in Afghanistan's central Bamiyan region but it was the first time they were discovered west of the once towering Buddha statues, which the Taliban blew up in 2001 citing Islam's ban on idolatry.

"We believe the murals were drawn after the giant Buddhas were built. This shows Buddhism was also propagated throughout the west side of the valley," Shunpei Ishii, a researcher at Japan's National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, told AFP. The world-famous statues were built at least 1,500 years ago when Bamiyan in the Hindu Kush mountains was a spiritual and commercial hub on the Silk Route.

The Japanese mission is part of an effort by the UN cultural organization UNESCO to preserve what is left of Bamiyan, where one statue that reached at least 50 meters (165 feet) was considered the world's tallest standing Buddha.

The newly discovered cave is six kilometers (four miles) from the former Buddha statues and the murals were likely drawn in the seventh or eighth century AD, Ishii said.

Ishii's seven-member team, which conducted the research from June 13 to July 16, found that one mural with the outline of a Buddhist figure was strikingly colorful.

"Most of the color in the cave had been fading or changing hue but we saw some red and green that were fairly bright. We also found a thin foil of gold cut into the wall," Ishii said.

The Taliban used tanks and dynamite in March 2001 to destroy the Buddha statues, enforcing an edict against idolatry under its austere interpretation of Islam despite international outrage. The hardline regime was ousted at the end of that year by US-led forces for sheltering Al-Qaeda. 

Chaos at landmark Kabul concert – BBC

The first major concert by a foreign musician in the Afghan capital Kabul since the fall of the Taleban has ended in chaos after the stage collapsed. The star of the show, Indian singer, Suno Nigam, was unhurt but other musicians were injured, reports say.

The reason for the stage collapse is not known but fans say it may have been caused by the crush of the crowd. Earlier police beat fans outside who could not get in, despite having tickets, leaving many injured.

The venue was the stadium where the Taleban carried out amputations and executions of those guilty of criminal offences. Around 10,000 fans from all over Afghanistan had arrived at the stadium by 1700 local time on Wednesday, four hours before the musicians arrived.

Correspondents say that the crowed cheered when the musicians appeared on the stage despite the delay. The excitement with which the Indian musicians were received was unprecedented.

The long-awaited concert was called off after the stage collapse, to the disappointment of the fans. Some people argued that Afghans "are not yet ready" for such concerts, others were critical of the security forces for failing to maintain order.

"Afghanistan is still far from hosting a great singer like Suno Nigam", one of the fans, 30-year-old Bashir Ahmad, told the BBC. "The country and its people have spent many years grappling with war and isolation. It is difficult for them to give a proper welcome to foreign musicians."

"Things went wrong", another fan said. "But I hope Suno Nigam doesn't leave the country with bad memories." The singer had hoped to give a memorable evening to his Afghan fans.

[Disclaimer: The content of this news bulletin does not necessarily reflect the view or policy of the Afghan Government, unless specifically stated as such. The collection of articles and commentaries from Afghan and international news sources is provided for informational purposes, and accuracy of the news is the responsibility of the original source.]