President Karzai Condemns Blasts in Egypt - Released: 23 July 2005

Presidential Palace, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is disturbed by the news of the series of bomb blasts which occurred in Sharm al-Sheikh, Egypt, killing at least 62 people and wounding scores more.

In his reaction to the news the President said, “I am saddened that today

terrorism has claimed yet more innocent lives. Like the terrorist attacks in London recently and all others that we have seen, this terrorist act is shocking and despicable. It is aimed at killing innocent civilians, and I condemn it in the strongest terms.”

“Terrorism is the enemy of Islam, as much as the enemy of any other faith. It is the enemy of humanity. I call once again on all nations to come together and decisively fight this menace to its roots.”

“The people of Afghanistan extend their deepest sympathies to the victims

of this attack, and to the Government and people of the brotherly nation of Egypt.”

This incident reminds us that terrorism continues to pose threat to the peace and prosperity of all nations in the world. It is imperative on the international community, to step up the struggle against this menace until

it is decisively defeated from the face of the earth. Afghanistan stands in firm solidarity with those countries that are affected by and are fighting terrorism. We will play our full part in this fight.

Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President

Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Welcomes the Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan

Kabul - H.E Shaukat Aziz, the Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan will arrive in Afghanistan for a one day official visit on Sunday, 24 th of July 2005.

H.E Shaukat Aziz will call on H.E Hamid Karzai, the President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and H.M Mohammad Zahir, Father of the Nation.

The Two sides, in addition to a review of the bilateral relations between the two neighboring countries, will hold discussions on a wide range of issues including trade and transit of commercial goods, private investments, regional economic and security cooperation, counter-narcotics and counter-terrorism.

The Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan warmly welcomes the visit of H.E Shaukat Aziz to Afghanistan which will further strengthen friendly relations and increase cooperation between the two countries in different fields, especially in counter-terrorism efforts.

The Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan believes that strong friendly relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan is in the national interest of both countries and an essential component to promote stability in the region.

Released by the Office of the Spokesperson

Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Kabul, Afghanistan

July 23, 2005

Afghan complaints over Taliban await Pakistan's PM

Kabul (Reuters) - Pakistan's Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz will visit Kabul on Sunday amid growing Afghan irritation over Taliban infiltration across its southern border in the run up to the Sept. 18 parliamentary polls.

Aziz will discuss trade, investment and security issues with President Hamid Karzai during the one-day visit, Afghan officials said. There has been a surge in Taliban activity in south and southeast Afghanistan in the past few months, dashing hopes of U.S. commanders that the insurgency was fading.

Scores of people have been killed in the violence, including 30 U.S. soldiers since March, and many in Afghanistan blame militants from across the border in Pakistan for the unrest.

"There have been infiltrations from the other side of the border for attacks here," a senior Afghan government official said on the condition of anonymity. "The attacks are organized there and people come for carrying them out from Pakistan. Senior Taliban live and operate in Pakistan," he added.

Diplomats say while much of the infiltration has been in Afghanistan's Paktika province neighboring Pakistan's restive North Waziristan tribal agency, several incidents have occurred well away from the border and could have been carried out by Taliban fighters or Islamist allies based inside Afghanistan.

Pakistan's army warned tribesmen in North Waziristan a week ago that they would begin an offensive unless foreign militants were evicted from the region. At least 17 foreign militants, including women and children, were killed last Sunday after refusing to surrender. U.S.-led forces based in Afghanistan had killed 24 suspected militants on July 14 on the Pakistan side of the border, again in North Waziristan.

Pakistan used to be the main supporter of the Taliban government in Afghanistan before U.S.-backed forces ousted it from power in 2001, after its refusal to surrender al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden following the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

While Pakistan has arrested hundreds of al Qaeda-linked militants after President Pervez Musharraf joined a global war on terrorism, there have been few arrests of Taliban fighters, many of whom fled to Pakistan. Earlier this week, Pakistani security forces arrested a handful of Taliban officials from an Afghan refugee camp at Akora Khattack, a town 100 km (60 miles) northwest of the capital Islamabad.

Pakistani newspapers quoted unnamed sources as saying that Mawlavi Abdul Kabir -- a deputy of the Taliban's elusive leader Mullah Mohammad Omar -- was among those arrested, but senior Pakistani officials were unable to confirm this.

Nothing will change until Musharraf closes Pakistan's militant madrassas By Ahmed Rashid - Daily Telegraph, Lahore 7/23/05

In her first thriller, At Risk, Stella Rimington, the former head of MI5, writes about a Pakistani militant who arrives by ferry boat in Britain to blow up the commander of a US-British air force base in the Fens. His main helper is an English girl who has converted to Islam and has been in a training camp in Pakistan, while MI5 misses several signals that an attack is coming.

Not surprisingly, when you are reading a novel by someone who has spent 35 years in the secret service, fact and fiction merge. The suspected Pakistani mastermind of the July 7 bombings is believed to have arrived by boat to trigger the four bombers, then left the country a day before the attack. Yesterday's bungling bombers seemed to lack such foreign expertise.

"There is no way you can deal with this menace [of terrorism] except head-on," said Prime Minister Tony Blair. Yet the truth of the matter is that neither government has tackled the issue of Islamic extremism head-on.

Until this month, terrorist attacks were long-distance events for most British people, but not for Pakistanis - 1,000 civilians and the same number of security personnel in that country have died since September 11 in terrorist and sectarian violence.

Britain has allowed militant Muslim preachers freedom to preach their message of hate in the mosques, the meeting halls and the sitting rooms of British Muslims. Literature and videos promoting extremism have been allowed to spread deep into the Muslim community. While some outsiders saw this as typical British eccentricity or liberalism, foreign intelligence agencies have been furious with British laxity for some years.

The four July 7 bombers did not have to enrol in a Pakistani religious school or madrassa to learn about Islamic extremism, because it was available in Yorkshire. Experts now think it unlikely that the three London bombers who came to Pakistan last year enrolled in a madrassa to become ideologised. Instead, they arrived fully brainwashed and probably used their time making contact with al-Qa'eda and Pakistani militant groups to train in explosives.

And every Pakistani who saw the TV pictures of how British Pakistanis live in Leeds was shocked at how no attempt has been made to integrate them. The Leeds suburbs looked like ghettos or a typical poverty-stricken Punjabi village, except in red brick.

British Muslims also must share a great part of the blame for failing to speak out against the extremists living in their midst, refusing to integrate or agree to mixed marriages, and insisting upon bringing prayer leaders from their home villages - men who are either totally ignorant of the world or are extremists.

Immigrants are traditionally torn between their traditions and the modernity offered by the host country, but no group has more rigorously spurned modernity then Asian Muslims, which is a crying shame.

At the same time, the overwhelming anger that more than 60 per cent of Britons feel about Blair's policies in Iraq - according to a Guardian poll - is felt far more strongly in the Muslim community. The truth is that Blair will have great difficulty countering extremism among Asian Muslims while continuing to pursue the same Iraq policy.

Pakistan's military ruler, General Pervaiz Musharraf, has done even less to curb extremism, despite the daily haemorrhaging of his citizens on the streets of Pakistani cities due to terrorist attacks. On Monday, the general gave a tub-thumping speech to a youth conference, wagging his angry finger at the madrassas and repeating for the umpteenth time that banned militant groups were forcing their ideology on others.

This week, more than 250 militants have been arrested and, in a speech to the nation last night, Musharraf again asked the public to join him in a jihad against Islamic extremism. But since September 11, such crackdowns have taken place frequently, and those arrested are invariably freed after 90 days in jail.

Pakistanis now respond to such speeches with a wave of the hand and a bored look, commenting that it is all for the gallery of Western onlookers. Since September 11, the general has been through this routine so many times that people have lost count and interest. Despite all the political pressures on the military from the West since September 11, all the debt forgiveness by Western countries, the lavish foreign aid - $3 billion from Washington alone, new weapon systems and intelligence equipment and the rush of cash to reform the madrassa system - nothing much has changed.

Last night, Musharraf still failed to order the closure of madrassas controlled by extremist groups. The promised reform in 2002, which Musharraf pledged at meetings with Bush and Blair in Washington and London, has not been implemented. Until the London bombings, neither leader had bothered to ask Musharraf why not, although both have given funding for education.

Madrassas controlled by militant Pakistani groups who work for al-Qa'eda continue to function freely. One of the largest extremist groups in the country, Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, has members who have helped al-Qa'eda. It now operates under a new name and has even changed the look of its largest madrassa complex to become a model it can show to the Western press. It's like the Earls Court motor show without the short-skirted models.

The enormous Islamic extremist infrastructure that the military maintained before September 11 to fight its wars in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan and Indian Kashmir have not been broken up, only put to temporary sleep while clandestine training camps still spring up at new locations. Some militant groups have been banned three times, only to re-appear under different names.

The failure of the West since September 11 has been to conduct its entire relationship with Musharraf in secret, as though that would give him the time and space to do the right thing. What is needed is a heavy dose of public diplomacy that would force the military to act rather than to deny and fudge. At the same time, Britain needs to wake up to the new post-July 7 world in which it will have to do far more to integrate its Muslim minority than it has done so far.

Three Afghan government figures killed in Taliban stronghold - Jul 23,

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - Suspected Taliban insurgents shot dead a judge in violence-plagued southern Afghanistan, where a government official and a policeman were also killed in separate attacks.

Two gunmen killed Qazi Namatullah, a district judge and cleric in Panjwayi district of Kandahar province, as he walked to a mosque for morning prayers in Kandahar city, said Panjwayi district governor Niaz Mohammed Sarhadi.

"The Taliban were riding a motorbike, and they managed to escape the area," he told AFP in the city, about 500 kilometres (300 miles) south of Kabul, that has remained a hotbed of Taliban support since the hardline regime' ouster.

The same morning, Mohammed Shafi, the district administration chief of Shawalikot, was killed by a remote-controlled bomb blast at the gate of his family home, district police chief Abdul Malik told AFP on Saturday. "At this stage we don't know who was behind the attack," he said. "We are investigating the case."

In an attack early Friday, a highway policeman was killed on the road to the western city of Herat, just outside Kandahar in Zhari district, Kandahar police chief Mohammed Hakim told AFP.

Taliban spokesman Mullah Abdul Latif Hakimi -- who has claimed the movement was responsible for the killings of four pro-government clerics in the past two months -- was not available for comment on Namatullah's death.

More than three years after their ouster by US-led military forces, the Taliban have stepped up attacks in southern and eastern Afghanistan ahead of landmark parliamentary elections in September. More than 770 people have been killed in political violence in Afghanistan so far this year compared with 850 in all of 2004.

Afghans recover three kidnapped poll workers

KABUL (Reuters) - Three Afghan election workers who were kidnapped by suspected Taliban or al Qaeda militants have been found unharmed in the northeastern province of Nooristan, an official said on Saturday.

Mohammad Yusouf, secretary for the governor of Nooristan, said the men were found in a house following a major hunt by security officials in the Kamdesh district where they were abducted three nights ago. "We have received reports from the police chief that the three men have been found, but none of the kidnappers has been arrested," he told Reuters.

The abduction was the latest in a series of violent incidents in the approach to Sept. 18 parliamentary polls, the next big stage on Afghanistan's difficult path to stability. The three men were seized from a villager's house after the end of a voter registration program in the rugged region.

Yusouf said the victims could not recognize the kidnappers as they had covered their faces, but said they spoke in a local language. "We suspect al Qaeda or Taliban were behind the kidnappings," Yusouf earlier told Reuters.

A woman Afghan election worker was wounded last week in an attack on a voter registration center in the same district. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack or the abductions.

Separately, a district judge and a senior district official were killed by suspected Taliban militants in two attacks in the southern province of Kandahar, one late on Friday and the other early on Saturday, officials said.

Taliban officials could not be reached for comment about the incidents. Members of the radical Islamic government ousted by U.S.-led forces in late 2001 have threatened to derail the polls, and warned Afghans against contesting them or registering as voters.

Case of ex-intelligence boss taken up after 13 years

KABUL, July 21 (Pajhwok Afghan News): A communist-era heavyweight accused of mass murder and torture has been languishing in a Kabul jail for 13 years. His case took an excruciatingly long time coming up for hearing a fortnight back.

Asadullah Sarwary was Afghanistan's intelligence chief during the pro-communist government of then President Noor Mohammad Tarakai, who had ascended to the throne in a bloody coup in April 1978.

Sarwary, now in an intelligence detention centre here, told Pajhwok Afghan News in an interview he had been arrested on charges of plotting against the then government from his home in Kabul in 1992 when mujahideen stormed the capital.

He was taken to Panjshir by Ahmad Shah Masood's forces after the civil war broke out among different mujahideen factions in the capital. He was brought back to the capital city in April 2002.

"Even until the 10th of the current month, I remained under investigation. Two weeks back, my case was opened and I don’t have even a lawyer to defend me since I don’t have money," Sarwary complained.

However, Gen. Abbas, a prosecutor at the primary court at the intelligence directorate, promised: "Anwary's case will be tried in the near future." He accused past regimes, during which he stayed in detention, of paying no attention to his case.

Abbas added they had received evidence against Sarwary and more documents were still being sought from government detection centres, which had been assigned with collecting documentary proofs.

Jurists opine keeping an accused in detention without a trial for so long is illegal. Abdul Kabir Ranjbar, a prominent lawyer based in Kabul, said Sarwary should have been investigated and tried much earlier.

Meanwhile, Ranjbar directly accused Sarwary of murdering the husband of his aunt and his uncle, who was student at the Polytechnic University in Kabul. Another government official, who wanted to stay anonymous, too accused Sarwary of murder. He claimed two ex-judges and a former parliamentarian had been killed by the erstwhile intelligence chief.

Ahmad Shah Mirdad, a senior official of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission which is entitled to visit prisoners throughout the country, had no information about Sarwary and his case.

Attorney General Abdul Mahmood Daqiq believed a case had definitely been filed against Sarwary after his arrest but could not be taken up for hearing owing to the fluid situation in Afghanistan, where the change of government came about with a disturbing frequency.

Daqiq said Sarwary was accused of killing 26 family members of the former mujahideen President Sibghatullah Mujaddedi. The tall man said he had obtained a masters degree in military sciences and had held different positions in the air force. He was once deputy to the pro-Soviet President Babrak Karmal.

Southern Afghan governors meet to discuss elections, security

COMBINED FORCES COMMAND – AFGHANISTAN COALITION PRESS INFORMATION CENTER
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - July 23, 2005

BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan – Governors from across southern Afghanistan met in Kandahar with Coalition leaders and a variety of aid and assistance agencies July 19 to discuss security for upcoming parliamentary elections.

The meeting was attended by governors from the Kandahar , Helmand , Oruzgan and Zabul provinces and focused mainly on election security, election preparation and governance as a whole.

In addition to the governors, attending were representatives from Coalition provisional reconstruction teams, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan , the Joint Electoral Management Body, and Coalition mentors assigned to the Afghan National Army.

“Each governor had the chance to discuss election threats and concerns in their provinces,” said U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Jason Kamiya, commander of the Coalition’s Combined Joint Task Force-76. “We also discussed the status of voter registration and any other significant items of interest in their area.”

Many of the governors blamed outside influences on the difficulties facing Afghanistan and noted that disruption of the upcoming parliamentary election was only a short-term goal of enemy forces operating in the country. Most felt that enemy forces in Afghanistan have a long-term strategy to wait out Coalition forces.

Kamiya made it clear when he addressed the group that safe, secure and fair elections were the top priority of U.S. forces and that the Coalition was committed to long-term peace in Afghanistan . He added that the responsibility for those priorities was shared by all.

The governors agreed to meet again in one month to measure progress on the issues discussed. Kamiya reminded the governors that their progress was being monitored and the world was counting on their leadership to secure a safe and fair environment for the elections.

Afghan police training needs more time and money - By Caroline Drees, Security Correspondent

WASHINGTON, July 22 (Reuters) - Police training in Afghanistan is two years behind schedule and needs another $600 million in aid to succeed, a senior German official involved in the project said on Friday.

Germany is leading international efforts to build an Afghan police force after the U.S.-led war against Afghanistan. The war, triggered by the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, overthrew the Taliban government which had given sanctuary to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda.

But more than three years after the Taliban's overthrow, Afghanistan is still struggling to overcome widespread violence from extremists and factional militias. Taliban guerrillas active in the south and east are considered the main threat to Sept. 18 parliamentary elections, the next big stage on Afghanistan's difficult path to stability.

Although the new Afghan military has the lead in counterterrorism efforts, police also play a critical role, especially by securing borders and cracking down on the flourishing drug trade.

"We had to start out from scratch in 2002. Nothing was left. The structures were destroyed," said Ortwin Hennig, a senior German Foreign Ministry official whose job includes responsibility for police training in Afghanistan.

"It will take years until we will have achieved what we want to. We had hoped originally as lead nation that we would have completed our task by the end of 2005, ... that we would have 62,000 well-trained Afghan policemen," he said, adding between 50,000 and 55,000 had actually been trained so far.

"Now we start from the assumption that we will have finished our job by the end of 2007," Hennig told reporters on a visit to Washington. According to a handout he provided, Germany estimates that an additional 490 million euros, or about $600 million, will be needed to complete the police training project.

Hennig said Germany hoped to organize an international donors' conference early next year to raise more funds, much like a 2004 meeting in Doha at which donors pledged $350 million. He said he would also discuss additional aid with officials here in the United States, which he said had been a leading contributor.

He said there had been "talk" of an additional $900 million or $910 million over several years from Washington, and said he would seek clarification on the amount of actual planned aid and the timetable for distribution.

Among the key challenges now is recruitment. Hennig said poor pay -- especially compared to the Afghan army which the United States is in charge of setting up -- meant many recruits were illiterate. "We do not attract the best-qualified people because of the pay structure," he said. "The army pays much better, attracts better-qualified people."

Hennig said the current police force structure was also far too top-heavy, with too many officers and too few ordinary beat cops. He said the force lacked adequate equipment and infrastructure, and needed to work together more closely with law enforcement from neighboring and regional countries.

"The Afghan police and border police can only be successful if they cooperate at an international level, especially with their neighbors, in particular (in) the prevention of international terrorism and drug trafficking," he said.

Taleban deny arrest of senior figure - Afghan Press Monitor (No 115, 21 Jul 05) - published by the Institute for War & Peace Reporting

(Erada) Taleban spokesman Latif Hakimi has denied that Maulawi Abdul Kabir has been arrested by Pakistani intelligence. "I contacted his son, nephew and family, and they told me he has not been arrested," said Hakimi. Officials in Pakistan, meanwhile, said they were hopeful that they would be able to track down other militants using the information they expect to receive from Taleban leaders already in their custody. Pakistan says it has arrested Maulawi Kabir, former governor of the eastern province of Nangahar, and also Maulawi Abdul Qadir, deputy to fugitive Taleban leader Mullah Omar, and three others a few days ago in an area near the Afghan border. (Erada is an independent daily run by the Afghan Media Resource Centre.)

Pakistan Denies Arrest Of Neo-Taliban Membe r - Daily Afghan Report - July 21, 2005 - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed on 19 July denied recent reports that a top neo-Taliban member was arrested in North-West Frontier Province (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 20 July 2005), the Lahore-based "Daily Times" reported on 20 July. According to several reports from Pakistan, Mawlawi Abdul Kabir --who served as the governor of the eastern Nangarhar Province and commanded the eastern council under the Taliban regime -- was arrested by Pakistani security forces along with four other people (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 20 July 2005). However, Rashid said Pakistani forces did not arrest Abdul Kabir. "I don't know if other people were arrested," he added. An unidentified Pakistani military security official also denied that Abdul Kabir was arrested. The initial news of the arrests was met with a positive response by Kabul. AT

Rallies against Pakistan crackdown fall flat - Faisal Aziz - July 22, 2005

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - An Islamist call for nationwide protests in Pakistan against a crackdown on militants after the July 7 London bombings fell flat on Friday with rallies in big cities failing to attract more than a few hundred people.

More than 300 militant suspects have been detained across Pakistan since revelations that three of the four London bombers were British Muslims of Pakistani origin who had visited the country before the attacks.

Pakistan's main alliance of Islamist parties, the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, called for protest rallies after Friday prayers, when tens of millions of Pakistanis visit mosques.

But like previous calls for demonstrations against President Pervez Musharraf's support for the U.S.-led "war on terror," it failed to draw big crowds. Up to 700 Islamists, most of them teenagers or in their 20s, chanted anti-Musharraf and anti-U.S. slogans at Islamabad's Lal or Red Mosque, which was raided by security forces searching for militants on Tuesday.

Some shouted slogans in support of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and Afghanistan's fundamentalist Taliban government, which was overthrown by U.S.-led forces after the al Qaeda attacks on U.S. cities on Sept. 11, 2001.

The protesters pelted a police post with stones, destroyed lamp posts and set fire to a police motorcycle. Similar rallies were held in the cities of Karachi, Lahore, Quetta and Peshawar. Many of the protesters were students from Islamic schools, or madrasas, some of which are accused of being breeding grounds for militancy.

MUSHARRAF URGES WAR ON HATE - The protests followed a televised address to the nation by Musharraf on Thursday night in which he called for a holy war against preachers of hate and announced steps to rein in militant madrasas and groups seen as having influenced the London bombers.

Young girls who took part in a protest in Islamabad in the morning, some of them not yet in their teens, carried placards saying: "Uncle Musharraf, I am not a terrorist" and "Mr Tony and Bush, we are human beings also."

Mairaj-ul-Huda, an MMA leader in Karachi, questioned why there should have been a crackdown in Pakistan. "British nationals are involved in the London blasts," he told a rally of about 600 supporters in Karachi. "Why then is there a crackdown on religious institutions and religious scholars in Pakistan?"

Officials say the three bombers of Pakistani descent entered Pakistan last year and at least one visited madrasas. In his television address, Musharraf said all madrasas must register with authorities by December.

He also said banned militant groups would not be allowed to re-form under new names or to raise funds, while keeping of unauthorized arms would be strictly prohibited and action taken against distribution of literature designed to spread hatred.

In a rare show of solidarity, self-exiled former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, for long Musharraf's bitter rival, backed his decision to register madrasas. The suspects detained in the crackdown have been picked up in raids on private houses, mosques and madrasas.

At least 18 more members of banned religious groups were detained overnight in Quetta, police said. According to British diplomats in Islamabad, none of those detained in Pakistan since July 7 had had anything to do with the London bombings.

Assailants Kill Tribal Elders in Pakistan - AP

Assailants killed five tribal elders who had helped Pakistan's army hunt for al-Qaida-linked militants in a remote, lawless region near the Afghan border, residents and officials said Friday.

The elders were gunned down in three attacks in various parts of South Waziristan, a deeply conservative mountainous region run by local tribes, and only nominally ruled by Islamabad.

Officials have blamed Islamic militants in the region for previous attacks on pro-government elders in the country's tribal areas, where Pakistan has deployed more than 70,000 troops to trace and arrest al-Qaida-linked militants and their local supporters. At least 50 other elders have been killed after they started cooperating with the Pakistani army.

Tribal elder Malik Mir Zalim and four people with him were gunned down Friday on a road in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan, said local resident Taj Hayyat. An intelligence official confirmed the killing on condition of anonymity, citing government rules about talking to the press.

Elders Khandan Malik, Musa Khan and Hussain Malik were ambushed Friday in their car on a dirt road in Karwan Manza, a town 75 miles south of Wana, said local official Mohammed Khan.

Elder Taj Mohammed was gunned down late Thursday in Lalizhai, a South Waziristan village about 60 miles south of Wana, local official Mohammed Rasool said. The slain elder had helped forces in an operation against Abdullah Mehsud, a former U.S.-held prisoner in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba whose men kidnapped two Chinese engineers in October. Also Friday, three soldiers were injured when their vehicle hit a land mine in North Waziristan, officials said.

Pakistan: Afghans want Balochistan refugee camp to remain open - Source: United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs - Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) [This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

ISLAMABAD, 21 Jul 2005 (IRIN) - Afghans living in a refugee camp scheduled for closure by August, have asked Pakistani authorities to extend the life of the facility for at least one year, to give residents a chance to make proper arrangements to leave.

Pakistani authorities in the capital, Islamabad, announced in June the intention to close two refugee camps in the Pishin and Chaghai districts of the southern province of Balochistan by the end of August because of security concerns.

Muhammad Ayub, an Afghan elder from the Girdi Jungle camp, one of the settlements earmarked for closure, speaking in Islamabad on Thursday, said he believed it was unreasonable to expect people to move with so little notice.

"About 20,000 households have been living in the camp for more than 25 years. How can such a large population prepare to leave the area all of a sudden in just two months?"

Ayub, along with seven other representatives of the Afghan community from the Girdi Jungle camp, travelled from Chaghai district earlier this week to meet member of the government body dealing with Afghan refugees, the Commissionerate for Afghan Refugees (CAR).

"We'll consult provincial and other relevant authorities in this regard and will try to accommodate their concerns," Jehangir Khan, the head of CAR, told IRIN in Islamabad after meeting the Afghan elders.

According to the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the Girdi Jungle camp, which was established in 1980, has a population of 43,858. This total was recorded in the Afghan population census conducted earlier this year. Observers believe the population may be much higher because participation in the census was voluntary, so the real population level may be well above that recorded.

"Due to the security conditions, it's becoming difficult to gain access to the area and also provide other facilities like education, health, water and sanitation," said Babar Baloch, a UNHCR spokesman, in Islamabad.

The refugees say the closure is unfair because there is no possibility of repatriation due to the poor economic and security situation in Afghanistan.

"Most of the people have no land back in Afghanistan to provide themselves with shelter and also the country [Afghanistan] lacks social services. So many repatriated Afghan children died last winter due to cold weather, starvation and non-availability of medical treatment." another Afghan elder, Haji Jamal, said.

Afghan refugees not wishing to repatriate were offered relocation to Mohammad Kheil camp near the Balochistan provincial capital, Quetta. "The Afghans wishing to relocate to Mohammad Kheil camp would be provided free transportation," said the UNHCR spokesman.

Afghan returns from Pakistan cross 2.5 million mark - Source: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) By Jack Redden UNHCR Pakistan

ISLAMABAD, July 21 (UNHCR) – More than 2.5 million Afghans have repatriated from Pakistan as the UN refugee agency's largest voluntary repatriation programme continues to assist refugees to return to Afghanistan.

The programme, initiated in 2002 in both Pakistan and Iran, passed the landmark number today with the departure of the 207,210th Afghan refugee from Pakistan so far this year. In addition, more than 1.2 million Afghans have returned from Iran, bringing to over 3.7 million the total returns to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistan.

"This is an unprecedented number of people returning to their homeland and a testament both to the improving conditions in Afghanistan and the desire of Afghan refugees to participate in the rebuilding of their country," UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres said in Geneva.

"Even the 200,000 Afghans who have received UNHCR assistance to go home from Pakistan in 2005 make this our largest voluntary repatriation programme anywhere in the world this year," he said. "This programme continues to meet the needs of most Afghans in Pakistan even as we discuss with the government of Pakistan solutions for those who still remain."

The UNHCR programme was launched more than three years ago from both Iran and Pakistan – the two main countries hosting Afghan refugees – following the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which gave the chance for peace after more than 22 years of war that had forced millions of Afghans into exile.

Nearly 1.6 million Afghans returned from Pakistan with UNHCR in 2002, followed by some 340,000 in 2003 and more than 390,000 last year. UNHCR estimates that 400,000 Afghans will return from Pakistan in 2005.

The UNHCR repatriation programme from Pakistan is governed by a Tripartite Agreement grouping UNHCR and the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan. The accord expires next March and the parties are negotiating what arrangements will follow.

Under the programme, Afghans wishing to return from Pakistan receive travel grants ranging between US$3 and $30 per person, depending on the distance to the destination in Afghanistan, plus a $12 per capita grant to help them re-establish themselves in their homeland. All returnees over the age of six years are given iris recognition tests to ensure that they have not previously received repatriation assistance.

While voluntary repatriation is the preferred solution for Afghans in neighbouring countries, UNHCR has begun talks with the governments of Iran and Pakistan on how to manage Afghans who remain after the Tripartite Agreements expire.

Afghanistan, which was an extremely poor country even before it was devastated by decades of war, could take many years of development before it can absorb all those Afghans who remain outside its borders.

Afghanistan: Women election educators at work in the provinces - Source: United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs - Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) [This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

KABUL, 21 July (IRIN) - Female civic educators have been dispatched to provincial areas of Afghanistan to promote awareness of the forthcoming parliamentary elections among women, officials at the Ministry of Women's Affairs (MoWA) announced on Thursday in the capital, Kabul.

According to MoWA, the 10-day programme, which began last week, involves 63 women meeting village leaders and approaching the local media, mosques, NGOs and schools to help with the information campaign.

"We have to use all possible means to deliver election information to women in rural areas where the majority of women are illiterate," Nafisa Kohistani a MoWA public information officer said. Cultural sensitivities and discrimination against women are likely to discourage female involvement in the historic poll slated for 18 September, observers say.

"The teams will also encourage and identify women who will voluntarily help election staff on voting day," Kohistani said, adding that every team consists of three female educators and aims to target at least 1,000 women per province.

"Then, these targeted women will further convey the election messages to fellow women in their communities," she said. The voter education project is costing US $ 10,000 and is funded by the government of the Netherlands.

Up to 6,000 Afghans have registered to stand in the legislature and provincial council elections. According to the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) of the 2,915 people who have registered to stand for the 249 seat general assembly, 347 are women. Afghan electoral law requires that at least 68 seats in the general assembly be reserved for women.

Despite their second-class status in much of Afghanistan, women appear committed to the country's democratic process. More than 40 percent of the eight million who voted in last October's presidential election were women. Even so, it is a huge task to educate the entire Afghan people about the electoral process, its significance and how the whole process works.

"It is more lack of information than security or conservatism. Often women don't know why they should go to the polling stations again after last October's presidential elections," Najiba Maram, a local journalist and deputy director of the Voice of Afghan Women radio station in Kabul, said.

MOWA's initiative follows a massive national civic education campaign run by the JEMB. Since the beginning of May four million posters, seven million pamphlets and one million stickers, carrying information about the general assembly and provincial council elections, have been distributed across the country. The JEMB has also deployed nearly 2,000 civic educators to raise awareness of the elections.

"Of the 13 million eligible voters, our direct outreach activities aim to target 6.9 million voters - over half the electorate," Samantha Aucock, head of the JEMB public outreach programme, said.

Every medium has been utilised to deliver the election message. As might be expected, these include the print media and both private and state radio services. Slightly more novel has been the use of Afghanistan's fledgling state television service and even mobile theatre groups. These have been dispatched to rural areas to stimulate understanding and interest in the election process which is a novel experience for the vast majority of Afghans.

Aging Sea Kings won't be taking a trip to Afghanistan: Canada's top soldier

TORONTO (CP) - Canada's geriatric helicopter fleet won't be making the trek to Afghanistan, Canada's top soldier said Friday. "We have no intention at this point in time to deploy the Sea Kings," said Gen. Rick Hillier.

"If it could do the job there, in that hot climate at very high altitude, and be able to lift enough of a load, would I deploy it there? Absolutely. But I do not believe it can do the job there."

Reports had suggested that the decades-old fleet would be refitted for use by the 250 soldiers who will be in Afghanistan as of next week. Forty-four personnel are already in Afghanistan as part of Canada's reconstruction mission that will swell to 1,500 by February.

Hillier said the dangerous situation in Afghanistan means a large helicopter is necessary, especially to make sure that Canadian troops stay as safe as possible. "One of the things that we have articulated that we're going to need in the near future is a big helicopter - I've described it in the past as a big honking helicopter," he said.

"And we're going to need to go out and acquire that because that's the kind of thing that's extremely valuable in an operation such as the one we are involved in inside of Afghanistan." But Hillier said that the helicopter wouldn't be coming in time for the soldiers travelling to Afghanistan.

Hillier, who was appointed chief of defence staff earlier this year, was in Toronto to talk to the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies about his new vision for the military in Canada. In light of the mission to Afghanistan and the recent bombings and bomb scares in London, Hillier spent much of his speech explaining how Canada would deal with terrorist threats.

He said Canada and other countries face danger from "failed and failing states" if Canada doesn't go in and try to help them create democratic states. Hillier also said people are just beginning to wake up and realize that present threats of terrorism aren't the same as the threat during the more "conventional" Cold War.

Hillier created controversy last week by calling terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere "detestable murderers and scumbags." But he said Canadians can't be passive observers and need to "take a stand" on terrorism in countries like Afghanistan.

Hillier said that despite ruling out bringing the Sea Kings, Canadian troops won't be entirely without helicopters in Afghanistan. As in past missions, he said, Canadian soldiers will be relying on other countries in the region to supply them with any helicopter power they need.

Afghanistan to build 30 airports in three years

KABUL, July 21 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Thirty Afghan provinces across the country will get their own airports during the next three years. Besides, the Kabul, Nangarhar, Balkh, Herat and Kandahar airports will be renovated and reconstructed to bring them on a par with international standards, said Transport Minister Inayatullah Qasmi.

In an exclusive interview with Pajhwok Afghan News here on Thursday, the minister informed construction agreements of 18 airports had already been inked with different companies, while contracts for the remaining would be signed in near future.

He said loans had been received from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for construction of the airports. In the first phase, he revealed, construction work would be initiated on Faizabad, Maimana, Bamyan, Chaghcheran, Zaranj, Farah and Qilla Naw airports.

He said during his last week's visit to Balkh, Samangan, Baghlan, Bamyan, Wardag and Ghazni provinces, people had registered gripes regarding transport problems being faced by them.

He said transport problems in the central capital had been overcome to some extent, adding the ministry was planning to give more buses to Herat, Kandahar, Mazar-i-Sharif and Jalalabad, the most populated cities. He recalled the Indian government's pledge regarding 200 mini-buses, saying if handed over, it would solve transport problems in many districts and cities.

Afghanistan extends Globecomm contract - Jul. 22 2005

HAUPPAUGE - Satellite services provider Globecomm Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: GCOM) has won a one-year extension from the Afghanistan Ministry of Communications to carry data and voice traffic, the company announced. Globecomm Network Services Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary, will provide Internet and Voice over Internet Protocol service for the government. Financial terms were not disclosed.

"Globecomm's investment in GNSC infrastructure continues to pay dividends. As new IP networks are deployed and the quality of the calls continues to improve, the migration to VoIP is a natural progression," said David Hershberg, chief executive officer and chairman of Globecomm Systems Inc.

[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.]