President Karzai Is Deeply Saddened by Deaths in Herat - Date of Release: - 30 April 2005

Presidential Palace, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is deeply saddened by a violent incident during the Education festival yesterday in Herat, which caused the death of 2 women and injured 7 people.

In his reaction to the news, the President said: "I am deeply saddened by this incident which took place during a happy gathering of our youth and their parents. I present my heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and I wish a quick recovery to the injured".

The President has ordered an immediate and thorough investigation into the incident to determine the facts and bring the culprits to severe punishment. A team of the Ministry of the Interior and Defense, the National Director for Security and the prosecutor general's office has been sent to Herat.

Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

Airstrike in Afghanistan Kills Seven - By STEPHEN GRAHAM, AP April 30, 2005

KABUL, Afghanistan - An airstrike on a suspected insurgent camp killed three civilians and four militants in central Afghanistan, the U.S. military said Saturday. Afghan security forces opened fire during a celebration in a western city, killing a mother and her daughter.

The shootings, which occurred Friday during celebrations commemorating the fall of Afghanistan's last communist government, drew protesters into the streets of Herat and underscored President Hamid Karzai's challenge to bring stability to the nation. Demonstrators angered by the killings called for the return of a regional strongman and shouted "down with America."

Police chief Baba Jan said a soldier accidentally opened fire on Friday evening as crowds surged toward an event organized by the Education Ministry in a city park. But interior ministry spokesman Latfullah Mashal said shooting broke out during a row between troops and police. Jan said eight people were hurt in the ensuing panic.

Officials said a soldier was arrested and officials dispatched from Kabul to investigate. The U.S. military said Friday's airstrike occurred during a series of attacks over two days against insurgents in Uruzgan, a mountainous province that U.S. and Afghan authorities have failed to pacify despite intense military operations.

"The attack killed one Afghan woman, one Afghan man and a child," the statement said. Two more children were wounded and taken to the U.S. base in the southern city of Kandahar for treatment, the military said in a statement. It didn't say whether U.S. planes carried out the attack or give details of the victims and a spokeswoman had no further details.

Afghan officials and human rights groups repeatedly have complained about civilian casualties in U.S.-led military operations and said heavy-handed tactics could stoke sympathy for militants who have maintained a stubborn insurgency since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. American commanders insist they modify their operations to try to avoid hurting civilians and accuse militants of using civilians for protection.

The defense ministry said a woman and her daughter were killed during the festivities, but it didn't identify them further. Witnesses said troops fired more shots into the air to force back rock-throwing protesters enraged by the initial incident.

Karzai expressed condolences to the families of those killed and wounded and ordered "severe punishment" for those responsible, his office said in a statement.

On Saturday morning, hundreds of people marched from the home of former Gov. Ismail Khan to the office of his successor, Sayed Mohammed Khairkhwa, carrying portraits of Khan and calling for his return.

Khairkhwa said that police fired into the air to force the crowds back from his residence and that the protesters had pelted a government building and an army recruitment center with rocks, breaking several windows.

U.N. staff and foreign relief workers in the city were ordered to stay at home or take refuge in bunkers on U.N. compounds. The violence was the worst in Herat since September last year, when Khan's ouster prompted street riots in which three people died and mobs ransacked the U.N. offices.

Khan, now a minister in Karzai's Cabinet, was a veteran leader of mujahedeen rebels who fought occupying Soviet troops in the 1980s and took power in Kabul on April 28, 1992, before plunging the country into civil war.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad had pressed for the removal of Khan, whom the central government accused of withholding customs revenue from the nearby Iranian border and whom the U.N. accused of holding up disarmament.

Team in Herat to probe shooting blamed on army - Pajhwok Afghan News

04/30/2005 By Sadiq Bahnam
HERAT CITY - A team appointed by President Hamid Karzai arrived here on Saturday to investigate the killing of two people in army firing. Reportedly sparked by an exchange of hot words between army and police officials, the shooting occurred at a function arranged by the Education Ministry in this provincial metropolis on April 29.

Consisting of representatives from Interior Ministry's National Security and Attorney General's office, the delegation left for Herat early in the morning to look into the fatal shooting.

A woman and a girl were slain instantly in the shooting witnesses blamed on Afghan National Army troops. President Karzai, roundly condemning the slayings at a news conference, promised Friday night a probe into the incident.

While sympathizing with relatives of the victims, the president wished the injured speedy recovery and vowed strict action against those found guilty of firing at the civilians.

An injured resident, Faridoon, told Pajhwok Afghan News on Saturday: "I don't know whether the army fired at the civilians intentionally or unintentionally. I saw the poor woman and the girl die as a result of the firing, which also injured eight others."

Herat Scouts head Kamran Daqiq, confirming the eyewitness account, admitted: "Soldiers of the Afghan National Army opened fire when policemen gate-crashed into the function." He added people started chanting full-throated slogans against the army, who responded with firing into the air.

However, Herat security chief Gen. Baba Jan denied any clash between the army and police, saying: "People trying to sabotage the event jumped at policemen and army troops to snatch weapons from them. Consequently, the soldiers fired in self-defence." Baba Jan confirmed two people were killed and eight injured in the shooting.

An irate Mohammad Jan, a protestor, informed this reporter last night: "We don't need this killer army; we want the soldiers to be punished promptly for killing innocent citizens."

About 5,000 people attending the function ran pell-mell after the shooting, with many denouncing what they called "an anti-masses army" and calling for bringing the guilty to justice.

On Saturday morning, hundreds of angry residents poured on to the road and massed in front of Governor Sayed Mohammed Khairkhwa's office. They demanded the governor's removal and chanted "Death to Americans."

Roadside Bomb Kills Three Afghan Police - Sun May 1

KABUL, Afghanistan - A bomb tore through a jeep carrying Afghan anti-drug police in eastern Afghanistan, killing three officers and injuring two more, an official said Sunday, in the first deadly attack on the country's new counter-narcotics forces.

The bomb hit the vehicle on Saturday in Kunar province, where the team were surveying opium cultivation, said Gen. Said Kamal Sadat, chief of the federal Counter-Narcotics Police. A second jeep carrying provincial police escaped the blast.

Sadat blamed drug traffickers for the attack, though had no evidence to support his assertion. "The smugglers are not able to attack us directly, but are trying to find other ways to resist," Sadat said. "They hit their target."

Afghanistan last year produced about 87 percent of the world's illicit opium, the raw material for heroin, sparking warnings that it is turning into a "narco-state" three years after U.S. forces ousted the Taliban and ended its role as a haven for al-Qaida.

Authorities have responded with a crackdown using new anti-drug forces funded by donors including the United States and Britain. The units have smashed a string of drug laboratories, including several in Nangarhar province, which borders Kunar, and made several arrests. Donors are also channeling hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to help farmers switch to alternative crops.

Afghan arrest mullah, five others for killing woman accused of adultery

The Associated Press 04/30/2005
KABUL - Afghan authorities have arrested a mullah and five others for the killing of a woman accused of adultery, an official said on Saturday. The six, including the mullah, or Islamic preacher, were arrested last week after the Ministry of Interior dispatched investigators to the northwestern province of Badakhshan following reports - quickly denied - that the woman was stoned to death.

"The mullah who authorized the father to kill her was not a judge," Interior Ministry spokesman Latfullah Mashal told The Associated Press. "The killing was against the law."

Islamic law permits the death penalty against women for adultery, though the punishment was more commonly reported under the former Taliban government. Mashal said the woman might have been beaten, but not stoned, before she was fatally shot with a Kalashnikov assault rifle.

He said the mullah, the woman's father, her alleged lover and three others would go on trial soon in the capital on charges being prepared by the attorney-general.

Officials say the victim, Amina, who was in her late 20s, was killed on April 21, a day after being caught in the home of a man called Mohammed Karim. Karim was beaten but escaped with his life, officials said. The woman's husband had recently returned from Iran.

Afghan parliamentary poll registration begins

KABUL, April 30 (Xinhua) -- Nomination of candidates for the first-ever parliamentary elections in the post-war Afghanistan formally kicked off Saturday amid opposition's objection across the country.

"I think in Kabul at all nine or 10 candidates presented their nominations including a number of women. Our offices are open and the candidates can come in either collect information or present their candidacy, "Chief Operation of the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) Richard Atwood told reporters here at candidates' nomination office.

About 10,000 hopeful candidates are going to present their nomination for the 249-seat Wolesi Jirga or national assembly elections slated for September 18. "Any one wishes to run, present their candidacy at one of our candidates' nomination offices over the next three week (till May19),"the official added.

"Wolesi Jirga seats are distributed proportionally. In addition to the proportional seats, 36 seats are reserved for women and 10 seats for nomads, "he said.

Describing the process as a milestone towards strengthening democracy in the war-shattered nation, Bismillah Bismil, chairman of the UN-sponsored JEMB urged his fellow Afghans to participate in it.

"It is a turning point in the history of Afghanistan towards democracy and durable stability, so I urged all Afghans to actively participate in it and elect their true candidates," Bismillah told reporters.

In the meantime, Mohammad Yunus Qanooni, head of the opposition alliance National Understanding Front had dubbed the JEMB as a government election commission and called for its reshuffle.

"The Election Commission is a government-appointed commission so its impartiality is questionable and we want the government to appoint its member in consultation with opposition," the opposition leader has said.

However, Deputy Chairman of the JEMB Ayub Asil rejected the demand as unconstitutional, saying the commission has been constituted in line with the country's law.

Abdul Hakim Noorzai of Afghanistan's National Unity Party has also doubted JEMB's credibility. "Instead of consulting with political parties, the JEMB is acting on its own while it is responsible to hear our concerns, "Noorzai said in the nomination's office.

On the other hand, Sibghatullah Sanger, head of the newly-established Republican Party, cautiously said that he wished to see a transparent legislative election in the country.

"I wish the mistakes of presidential election not to be repeated in the parliamentary polls,"he told Xinhua while referring to last year's presidential elections and the alleged fraud in the process.

Remnants of the former Taliban regime who failed to derail last year's presidential polls have intensified their insurgency in a bid to defame the government and disrupt the coming elections.

Over 50 people including Afghans, US-led coalition troops as well as militants have been killed since the start of spring, mostly in the troubled south and southeastern provinces of Afghanistan, commonly known as the birthplace of Taliban.

To meet any eventuality and to ensure peaceful environment during the historic legislative Afghan elections, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) as well as US-led coalition force have begun talks with Afghan authorities to put necessary security arrangements in place. Enditem

Afghan poll registration starts - BBC News / Saturday, 30 April, 2005

Registration has opened in Afghanistan for those wanting to stand in parliamentary and local elections due to take place on 18 September. The nomination period will last three weeks, during which the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) says it expects some 10,000 nominees to come forward.

Candidates must be over 25 and present the signatures of 300 supporters. Correspondents say organising the polls will be challenging due to the number of candidates and local rivalries.

Security fears - Would-be legislators must resign top government position and officially declare they are not related to illegal armed groups. The final candidate list will be published in July.

Correspondents say the election is a milestone on Afghanistan's path to democracy. Despite threats by the Taleban insurgents to disrupt the presidential election and the violent deaths of 12 electoral workers, last year's vote was a success.

But this time, observers have expressed concern that local rivalries between tribal leaders will hamper policing operations. American military authorities have also warned of a possible major attack, although they say no specific intelligence pointing in that direction has been collected so far. The hard-line Islamic Taleban government was ousted by US-led forces in 2001.

Warlords - Some 18,300 coalition troops are still deployed in the country, where the search for Osama Bin-Laden and the fight against the Taleban still continues.

Nato has an 8,000-strong presence stationed in Kabul, Herat and the north of the country. The vote for the Wolesi Jirga or lower house of parliament and for provincial assemblies should have taken place at the same time as the presidential elections, but security fears and logistical problems led to a delay.

In the lower house, 70 seats out of 249 will be allocated to women, the JEMB said. Many of the about 70 political parties which have registered so far are run by former mujahideen who fought the Soviets in the 1980s and the Taleban in the 1990.

Afghan clashes, air strikes leave 9 dead One Taliban commander killed, another held - Pajhwok Afghan News 04/30-Habibur Rahman Ibrahimi & Aziz Zahid

KABUL - A senior Taliban commander was killed and another captured alive in clashes with Afghan and coalition forces in militancy-plagued Zabul and Kandahar provinces, security officials claimed on Saturday.

Shah Mahmood, deputy to Zabul's Dai Chopan district security chief, informed Pajhwok Afghan News on April 30: "Afghan and American soldiers clashed with Taliban militants in Village Chenaroono on Thursday."

A fighter was shot dead and two Taliban activists were wounded in the anti-insurgency operation, which also left an American soldier injured, he revealed, saying the clash lasted about half an hour.

At least seven people including women and children were killed separately in air strikes on what the US military called a "suspected insurgent camp" in the central Uruzgan province.

Coalition warplanes pounded the "camp" on Friday, said a US military statement issued here on Saturday. Four militants were among the fatalities caused by the bombing.

Gen. Hamid Muslim, the 205-Kandahar Corps Commander, asserted they had killed key Taliban commander Mullah Bismillah and arrested another named Mullah Abdul Manan in a shootout Thursday night.

The fighting erupted in Village Sarchino in Trinkot district of Uruzgan province after the Taliban attacked the troops, he said, describing Bismillah and Manan as key Taliban commanders in the troubled region.

Gen. Muslim said Afghan army troops, backed by coalition forces, seized a pistol, two guns, a satellite phone and some remote-controlled bombs in the operation.

Defence Ministry spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi confirmed the clashes, but Taliban representatives were not immediately available for comments on the operations.

Afghan Military with help of US forces is winning over Taliban and Al-Queda but can they withstand spreading popular uprisings? India Daily 04/30/2005 By Sonia Chopra

The American Military and others serving in Afghanistan in collaboration with Afghan Government forces are winning over Talibans. Al-Queda is on the run in Afghanistan and Pakistan once the breeding ground of Al-Queda led terrorism.

But something else is happening in the region. Pakistan is boiling over people's desire for multiparty democracy. Afghan common people are slowly getting disillusioned over "supervised democracy" in the nation.

A protest in the Afghan city of Herat turned violent on April 30 when police fired into a crowd of about 400 people outside the home of provincial Gov. Sayed Mohammad Khairkhawa. One person was killed and stones hit two policemen, local hospital officials said. The protesters demanded the governor's resignation in the wake of an April 29 clash between U.S.-trained Afghan soldiers and local police that broke out after a soldier shot dead a local woman suspected of carrying a bomb.

The problem in Afghanistan, especially in the Kandahar region, is that people in Southern Afghanistan (Pashtuns) have less confidence on the current Government. The Government has tried to revive the Government by bribing local landlords with blanket-hidden permit to cultivate opium. But that may not be sufficient to cool down the growing uprising coming from common people who perceive the current Government as agents of foreign power elected in an election with questionable participation and tactics used to gain power.

However, the current Afghan Government in collaboration with alien troops from United States and other Western countries have been able to cripple the Taliban infrastructure and Al-Queda's spear.

The Afghan military on April 29 killed Mullah Besmillah, a top commander in the former Taliban regime, and captured Abdul Manan, another important Taliban militant. The attack was a part of a coalition-backed effort by the Afghan military to weed out Taliban insurgents in southeastern Afghanistan. Gen. Muslim Hamed, the military commander in Afghanistan's southeastern region, says the capture of the men will have a "major impact on security."

The Afghan Government was able to capture the country easily. They are also gaining military strength and confidence. But breeding ground for so called "terrorism" as defined by western nations are caused by people's dissatisfaction and inability to express the same through peaceful channels like unbiased elections and judicial systems. If that is case, the future for Afghanistan is questionable. What the Western nations must start to understand is the difference between 1920s and 2005.

People in the third world are much more educated. They understand the concept of colonialism, which is sometimes called "supervised democracies under the gun." Afghan Government needs to listen and bring the common people into the mainstream politics with unbiased local and federal elections as well as appropriate judicial systems. Otherwise, again the same will happen what happened ten years back. This time it may not be Pakistan supported Taliban but something else.

Kabul Daily Calls On Pakistan To Help Locate Neo-Taliban Radio Station -
Daily Afghan Report Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty - April 28, 2005

Commenting on the recent reactivation of the Shari'ah Zhagh (Voice of Shari'ah) radio by the neo-Taliban, the "Kabul Times" wrote on 26 April that while the Afghan government is not worried about the radio station, U.S. military officials have vowed to find and destroy the transmitters. The newspaper says that no radio station can operate without the assistance of professional engineers, and since the neo-Taliban as "a bunch of mullahs...are completely ignorant about engineering," it asks who is helping them technically and financially with their radio station. Then the paper speculates that Pakistani military intelligence, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), must have answers to these questions as "it has been dealing with the Taliban since their inception." The "Kabul Times" adds that since Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has consistently declared his resolve to fight terrorism, the ISI "is expected to fall into line and find out" about the Shari'ah Zhagh. The neo-Taliban radio station began limited broadcasting to southern Kandahar Province in mid-April (see "RFE/RL Afghanistan Report," 27 April 2005). AT

Afghan police deployed to north to destroy opium poppy crops - Associated Press / April 30, 2005

Authorities on Saturday sent police to northern Afghanistan to destroy opium poppy crops, the Interior Ministry said, expanding a crackdown on the world's largest illegal drug industry.

An undisclosed number of federal police were sent to Balkh, which includes the main northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, because of a "significant increase" in poppy cultivation in the province, a ministry statement said.

Donors including the United States and Britain are funding an effort to eradicate poppy fields, smash drug labs, arrest traffickers and help farmers switch to alternative crops. Violent clashes between farmers and teams sent to destroy their crops have marred recent eradication efforts in the south and west of the country.

Last year, Afghanistan supplied an estimated 87 percent of the world's illicit opium, the raw material for heroin, sparking warnings that it is turning into a "narco-state" three years after U.S. forces ousted the Taliban to end its role as a haven for al-Qaida.

Tax Changes Spark Controversy - IWPR 04/29/2005 By Amanullah Nasrat

The government seeks to increase its revenues by boosting the sales tax on imported goods and imposing a new income tax

Kabul - Changes in tax laws designed to let the Afghan government pay a larger share of its internationally subsidised budget are drawing protests from business leaders who say higher taxes on imported goods will stifle trade and thus economic growth.

The government relies heavily on foreign assistance to pay its bills. This year's core operating budget projects 678 million US dollars in expenditures. The international community and the Afghanistan government will raise about fifty per cent each.

To reach that target, the authorities last month announced that they would reduce customs duties on imported and exported goods from the current rate of 20 per cent of value to 15 per cent, and at the same time raise the sales tax charged on imported products from 0.5 per cent to 2.5 per cent of the merchandise's value. In addition, personal income tax will be introduced for anyone earning more than 250 US dollars a month, charged at a rate between 10 and 20 per cent.

"During 30 years of war, Afghans have neither paid taxes nor realised the importance of taxes," said Abdul Malik Rahmani, director of the revenue department at the finance ministry.

Khan Jan Alokozai, one of the nation's best known businessmen, was among the first to complain about the new tax rules. Alokozai said that following the fall of the Taleban, President Hamed Karzai had promised that traders would be exempt from taxes. Even the 0.5 per cent sales tax on imported goods represented a broken promise, he said.

"Afghan traders are going to get together to present our protests to the president, and if he turns us down, we will have to sell the goods we've purchased," said Alokozai, who is also a leader in the local chamber of commerce. "Then we will stop trading into Afghanistan, and there will be a major economic crisis."

"Since the new taxes were imposed, traders have halted thousands of containers of merchandise at customs and are unwilling to pay taxes," said Alam Khan Hamdard, deputy director of the chambers of commerce. He called on the government to roll back the taxes and warned that companies might transfer their assets abroad.

The imposition of an income tax, on the other hand, sparked little protest, in part because the government offered no explanation on how it would collect the money. Finance ministry officials said that they did not expect to devise a tax-collection system before the end of the year, and that it would take even longer to implement the arrangements.

With an average income of about 700 dollars a year, few Afghans will be required to pay much, if any, income tax since the threshold is 3,000 dollars a year.

Government employees will mostly be exempt, and in any case many have not even been paid for five or six months, according to Ghulam Nabi Farahi, a deputy minister with the commerce ministry. Most people seemed more concerned about the levy on imported goods than the income tax.

Mohammad Salem, 36, who has a government job, said his monthly pay of 36 dollars isn't enough to live on as things stand. "If taxes are raised, prices will rise too, and that will make government employees steal because they won't have a choice," he said.

The government's operating budget is a fraction of the funds that are budgeted for reconstruction and development. The overall budget for 2005, including donor-funded projects, has been announced at 4.75 billion dollars, with 93 per cent of it to be funded from abroad. Amanullah Nasrat is an IWPR staff writer in Kabul.

Temporary Afghan Radio And TV Commission Established - Daily Afghan Report - April 29, 2005 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

Based on a decree by President Hamid Karzai, and in accordance with Article 20 of the law on mass media, a temporary commission for Afghan national radio and television broadcasting has been established, Radio Afghanistan reported on 27 April. The five-member commission is headed by Mohammad Musa Marufi and its remaining members are Mawlawi Mostafa Farahi Barakzai, Sajeda Milad, Hashem Esmat Elahi, and Jailani Shams. The media law stipulates that the commission "shall be established for better regulating of audio and visual media." According to the law, the commission can issue licenses and allocate frequencies to radio and television stations, issue "professional guidance to political parties" for using the airwaves, issue guidance to "owners of the electronic media; and monitor the "observation of the provisions" of the media law by the media (for more on the Afghan media law, see "RFE/RL Media Matters," 2 July 2004). AT

Firing at ministry gate remains shrouded in mystery - Pajhwok Afghan News

04/30/2005 By Habibur Rehman Ibrahimi
KABUL - Firing at security personnel guarding the Interior Ministry's western gate remains shrouded in mystery, as senior officials here gave different versions of the incident on Saturday.

Interior Ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal, speaking to Pajhwok Afghan News, said unidentified motorists passing by the ministry had fired the shots Friday night. "No one has been arrested so far," he added, without commenting on the motive behind the gunfire.

Mashal opined accomplices of dacoits including Tilagai, arrested on the Kabul-Parwan Highway Thursday night, might have fired at the Interior Ministry guards in revenge. No one was injured in the arcane firing.

Ringleader of the dacoits' gang Tilagai was among the detainees, he claimed, alleging the outlaw had masterminded the kidnapping of three officials of the UN joint electoral management body from the posh Kabul neighbourhood of Cinema Baharistan in October last.

UN poll workers Annetta Flanigan from Northern Ireland, Shqipe Hebibi from Kosovo and Angelito Nayan from the Philippines, abducted on October 28 last year, were freed after four weeks in captivity.
"Tilagai was involved in the sordid affair," insisted the spokesman, who did not know whether the armed motorists had fired into the air or the Interior Ministry building. "We haven't yet seen any bullet marks on the building," he explained.

But Kabul police chief Gen. Mohammad Akram Khakrezwal, contradicting this version, said the motorists had no link to the shooting episode. "The shots were accidentally fired by one of the gatekeepers," he believed, but gave no details.

Interior Ministry's Rapid Reaction Force Commander Gen. Mehboob Amiri thought the gunfire came from Kabul City TV Mountain. Police were probing the incident but no one had been held hitherto, he continued.

On April 29, an Interior Ministry guard, apparently corroborating Mashal's view, told this news agency that they returned fire from the unidentified motorists, who whizzed down the road "as soon as we responded."

Musharraf has excelled Alexander the Great, says US official - Khalid Hasan / Daily Times / April 30, 2005

WASHINGTON: An aide to President Bush has complimented President Pervez Musharraf for launching an operation in an area that even Alexander the Great was afraid to enter.

Mike Green, special assistant to the US President, was referring to the operation launched by the Pakistan army in tribal areas against terrorists said to be holed up there. He made the remarks to a group of Pakistanis - members of the American-Pakistani Physicians of North America - during a special briefing organised for them. The doctors are here for a series of meetings.

Green said President Bush recognises the "tough stand" taken by Pakistan against terrorism. He also acknowledged that the Pakistan army had suffered casualties in pursuit of a greater cause. He pointed out that there was a personal understanding between the American and Pakistani presidents and Gen. Musharraf was one of the few foreign leaders to have been invited to Camp David. He said there was bipartisan commitment in favour of Pakistan on Capitol Hill today. He noted that after 9/11 the Pakistani leader "took a prompt, bold and historic decision to side with forces determined to defeat terrorism, and the decision was not risk-free, but he courageously took it, and the United States appreciates it very much."

The decision to sell F16s to Pakistan, Green described as "symbolic" to "erase the impression" that the US was "a fickle-minded or unreliable friend." He added that the US "took the decision in the interest of Pakistan's security." Turning to democracy, he said President Bush and President Musharraf issued a joint statement in New York in September 2004 that reiterates a commitment to democracy. Pakistan, he added, has "certain traditions" that necessitate improvement. President Musharraf has taken certain steps, and there are visible efforts for the creation of an enabling environment and capacity-building through training that involves civil society, he noted. "President Bush likes leaders who speak straight, and he (Musharraf) is very frank," he added. He also praised President Musharraf's concept of enlightened moderation, describing it as "an enlightened vision of Islam in the 21st century."

On Kashmir, Green said, in the wake of a thaw in Pakistan-India relations and improvement of ties, we would be nearing an amicable resolution of the issue. "The bus link is very symbolic and engaging, and it has really turned the corner; and the softening of the known respective stands is very much visible." He called the prospects good. People-to-people contacts, he stated, would lead to "further flexibility and resolution of issues."

Ms Xeina Dormandy, director for South Asia at the National Security Council (NSC), said beside the $3 billion multi-year assistance package, the United States was extending $300 every year to the health and education sectors in Pakistan. People-to-people contact was now expanding and members of the Congress are convinced that Pakistan-US relations should expand further.

'Change in tribal region inevitable' - Daily Times (Pak) / April 30, 2005

GHALANAI: Khalilur Rehman, the governor of North West Frontier Province, said on Friday that a change in the tribal areas was "inevitable" in the modern times but it would be in line with tribal norms, customs and traditions.

"The government has no intention to change the current status of the tribal area," he told a jirga on his first visit after taking charge on March 15. Asked about the post 9/11 world order, the governor said there was an abrupt change and "peace is the new order". He said the countries in the world were trying to resolve conflicts to establish durable peace.

The governor stressed the need for peaceful atmosphere in the tribal region urging tribesmen to give up differences, resolve conflict through mutual understanding and abandon arms culture. "The real power lies in knowledge and not in weapons," he said. Warning the tribesmen against growing poppy, he said the government would severely punish those who break the law, adding that the government was committed to achieve zero poppy cultivation in tribal areas.

Don't Let Afghanistan Slide Back Into Chaos - The Intelligencer 05/01/2005

One of the most overlooked aspects of the global war against terrorism has been the United States victory in Afghanistan. But, as that nation's president warned this week, it would be all too easy to allow defeat to be snatched from the jaws of victory.

It became apparent quickly after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that the Taliban regime in Afghanistan was providing a safe haven and material aid for Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida terrorist organization. An international coalition led by U.S. troops swept into Afghanistan and, within weeks, had deposed the Taliban. Many of the liberties stripped from the Afghan people were restored.
But armed conflict continues in Afghanistan, with thousands of U.S. troops still needed there to keep the country from sliding back into chaos.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai warned this week that the United States and other countries need to make a long-term commitment to Afghanistan, in order to avoid disaster.

Though Afghanistan is relatively calm in comparison to Iraq, remnants of the Taliban - and, no doubt, al-Qaida - still exist in substantial numbers. And it must be remembered that dozens of warlords in the country are not reluctant to use force to expand their power bases.

Americans simply cannot afford to be the world's policeman forever - and, given the fact that the al-Qaida brand of terrorism can strike anywhere, other countries have a stake in Afghanistan, too.
U.S. leaders, then, should begin forming a coalition to provide the long-term support sought by Karzai, in order to preserve the fruits of victory in Afghanistan.

Afghan memorial for US activist - By Andrew North BBC News, Kabul 4/29/05

A memorial ceremony has been held in Afghanistan for a US rights activist who raised millions of dollars for civilian victims of US military action.

Marla Ruzicka died earlier this month in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, after her vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb. She was well known in Baghdad and Kabul for her campaigning work. Victims of mistaken US bombing raids in Afghanistan, as well as government officials, were among those attending Friday's memorial.

Many of those Ruzicka had helped or worked with came to the memorial ceremony at a guesthouse in the capital, speaking of her warmth and enthusiasm. People held red tulips which were then laid beneath a plaque on a wall.

It was unveiled by a young boy, Esanullah, injured by cluster bomb munitions who eventually received compensation after Ruzicka's intervention. One woman, Arifa, who lost eight children in a bomb attack in 2002, broke down in tears as she spoke about the 28-year-old Californian.

"The same thing that happened to me three years ago has happened again now with the death of Marla," she said. There were also tributes from Afghanistan's women's affairs minister Dr Massouda Jalal and Afghan human rights activists.

Ruzicka had spent more time in Iraq since the US-led invasion there. But it was in Afghanistan that she began her campaigning on behalf of civilians caught in conflict.

A United Nations worker said it was because of her energetic campaigning - which included a demonstration outside the US embassy in Kabul in 2002 - that the US government had set aside $8m to compensate civilians suffering death or injury as a result of wrongly-targeted American strikes.

She is also credited with securing over $4m of US government funds to help communities in southern and eastern Afghanistan worst affected by the continuing conflict with Taliban-led insurgents.

Stirring the ethnic pot - By Iason Athanasiadis / Asia Times Online / April 29, 2005

TEHRAN - Today's Iran is the latest manifestation of a great and endlessly undermined Persian empire that once stretched from Iraq to Afghanistan, embracing a multitude of ethnicities along the way. The Islamic republic that came into being a generation ago is a microcosm of its imperial past, with Arabs, Azeris, Bakhtiaris, Balochis, Kurds, Turkmens and Lurs co-existing alongside the majority Persian population.

But as this month's riots by ethnic Arabs in the southern province of Khuzestan demonstrated, Iran's multicultural milieu could also be its Achilles' heel, an open door for foreign opportunists seeking to infiltrate this fledgling nuclear power.

Iran is particularly vulnerable to foreign penetration in that non-Persian, non-Shi'ite ethnic minorities inhabit its extremities. Aside from Khuzestan's Shi'ite Arabs, there are Sunni Balochis in the southeast, Sunni Kurds and Shi'ite Azeris in the northwest and Sunni Turkmens in the northeast.

All these areas adjoin countries that are either hostile to Iran's ruling clerics or contain US troops. The United States has dramatically expanded its presence in the region post-September 11, 2001, even as it has raised the level of its anti-Tehran rhetoric. US troops and advisers currently reside in Iraq, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Pakistan. At the same time, Tehran maintains ambiguous relations with neighbors Pakistan, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Iraq, although it is currently on a regional charm offensive and a pro-Iranian government seems poised to come to power in Baghdad.

Tensions rising in Balochistan - While Iraq is already a proxy battleground between Tehran and regional powers Saudi Arabia and Israel, flashpoint areas for ethnic and other trouble appear along Iran's edges, too. In the arid southeastern province of Sistan-Balochistan, the Iranian army has been fighting for years a bloody campaign against organized drug-smuggling networks that run heavily defended convoys along the heroin route from Afghanistan to Europe.

The province is particularly crucial for Iran's national security in that it borders Sunni Pakistan and US-occupied Afghanistan. Moreover, its Balochi inhabitants complain that, as a Sunni minority, they face institutionalized bias by the Shi'ite state. In addition, they complain of discrimination in the education they are given, the jobs they can get, and the forms of cultural expression they are allowed.

Sections of the population claim that a systematic plan has been set in motion by the authorities over the past two years to pacify the region by changing the ethnic balance in major Balochi cities such as Zahedan, Iran-Shahr, Chabahar and Khash. Similar allegations sparked the rioting in Khuzestan this month, after a letter purportedly signed by Iranian Vice President Mohammad Ali Abtahi advising that the Arab element in the province be diluted was circulated in Balochistan, and that US special forces teams have allegedly fanned out into Iran from Afghanistan.

Though the claim has been strenuously denied by Tehran as much as Washington, it remains that, three years after the US-backed ousting of the Taliban, the US military is digging into Afghanistan for a long stay. Furthermore, Tehran has long been suspicious of a US military presence in the Pakistani port of Gwadar, fearing that the deepwater facility could be used as a launching pad for US espionage in Iran and the sponsoring of separatist meddling in Balochistan.

All this is against the backdrop of a simmering Baloch insurgency against Islamabad on the Pakistani side of the border, which local officials blame Tehran for inciting. The construction of a military base housing an army battalion with heavy weapons, including tanks, on the Pakistani side of the border has sharpened tensions. It has also been reported that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence set up a unit in the provincial capital, Quetta, last year to monitor suspected Iranian activity in Balochistan.

A former Pakistani interior minister was also quoted by the Daily Telegraph as saying that Tehran's state-controlled radio had launched a propaganda campaign against Islamabad. "Radio Tehran broadcasts between 90 and 100 minutes of programs every day which carry propaganda against the Pakistan government," the former minister said. He added that Iran was suspected of providing financial, logistical and moral backing for the insurgency. United Press International also recently quoted unnamed US officials claiming that Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf had granted the Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK) organization permission to operate from Pakistani Balochistan.

If true, this is sure to escalate tensions between Islamabad and Tehran over the controversial Marxist-Islamist group that has assassinated several top Iranian government figures since 1979 and enjoyed Saddam Hussein's protection until 2003. The MEK are reportedly in talks with Washington, while their fighters are under US protection in Camp Ashraf in Iraq.

An American spy visits Iran - When Reuel Marc Gerecht climbed into the back of a truck a decade ago at the start of a secret trip to Iran, he was embarking on a long-cherished journey into a country that he had spent his entire life until then studying, but could never visit. He was also rebelling against a career of often numbing tedium in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), mostly spent at headquarters or sitting in the US Consulate in Istanbul sifting through Iranian visa applicants in his search for well-connected intelligence recruits to run inside Iran.

In his book Know Thine Enemy , Gerecht penetrates Iran with the help of an Azeri-Iranian accomplice as he mulls over ways to destabilize its clerical regime. From cultivating high-ranking Azeris to inciting separatist Kurds to fostering divisive clerical rivalry between the holy Shi'ite cities of Najaf in Iraq and Qom in Iran, Gerecht constantly mentally prods methods of destabilizing the Islamic republic.

In the process, he sheds valuable light on how an intelligence professional might approach the dismemberment of a hostile country. "I continuously scripted possible covert action mischief in my mind. Iranian Azerbaijan was rich in possibilities. Accessible through Turkey and ex-Soviet Azerbaijan, eyed already by nationalists in Baku, more Westward-looking than most of Iran, and economically going nowhere, Iran's richest agricultural province was an ideal covert action theater."

Worried that he would be revealed as an American infiltrator, Gerecht never made it to Tehran. But his book is a fascinating introduction into the psychological warfare that intelligence operatives wage. Examining opportunities for exploiting the ethnic distinction between the Azeris and the Persians, he looks for "a weak link between Azeris and 'proper' Persians" that would allow "a case officer [to] slice a man's soul, the regime and conceivably the country apart".

Gerecht wistfully comments that "a well-constructed program, even if it failed, could still unnerve the mullahs. Here, covert action needs only to scare - to let the mullahs know the Great Satan is toying with the idea of tearing Iran apart. Even the hardcore Iranians know they will lose if the United States really takes aim. Worldwide Islamic revolution, terrorism or assassination wouldn't look so appealing if the price were Azerbaijan."

Last week, as violent riots raged in Iran's southern province of Khuzestan between ethnic Arabs and government forces, another powerful extract from Gerecht's book came to mind: "An independent or autonomous Shi'ite state in southern Iraq would have re-energized Iraq's Shi'ites, long docile under ferocious Sunni rule. The age-old clerical rivalry between Najaf and Qom would have been reborn. Hostile to the clerical hubris of [ayatollah Ruhollah] Khomeini's Iran, Najaf's Arabic-speaking mullahs would loudly have debated the fundamentals of Khomeini's theocratic rule. Dissident senior Iranian clerics disgusted with Tehran could have repaired to Najaf, as the ayatollah once did under the Shah. A network of anti-regime clerics could have formed. At minimal cost to the United States, Washington could have encouraged a Shi'ite civil war."

What Gerecht did not explore were the effects that a burgeoning rivalry between Najaf and Qom - coupled with the coming to power of a Shi'ite-majority government in neighboring Iraq - might have on Iran's Shi'ites, especially the ethnic Arabs living in the southern province of Khuzestan.

This month's riots gave a tantalizing indication of what a US-backed covert operation in Iran might look like. After several days of civil chaos, between five and 31 people were dead with hundreds injured or imprisoned. Iran's defense minister and the highest-ranking ethnic Arab in government, Rear Admiral Ali Shamkhani, arrived in Ahwaz to declare that "Iranian Arabs enjoy a high status in the Islamic Republic of Iran, and I assure you any other type of political system but the Islamic Republic would have sought ways for uprooting them, just as the ousted Shah's regime moved in that direction".

Under the Shah, who was thrown out in the revolution of 1979, ethnic minorities were largely ignored and their languages banned as part of a national policy of stressing the Persian character of the state. In line with the Shah's anti-Arab policy, Khuzestanis were marginalized and their province was the only territory not to be named after its ethnic minority, unlike Kurdestan, Azerbaijan and Balochistan.

But the Arabs were not the only ones to be discriminated against. The Kurds were portrayed as being wild and untrustworthy, an official position that largely contributed to their taking up arms just five months after the proclamation of an Islamic republic and at a time when the country was domestically weak and fragmented.

The revolution arrived on a tide of rhetoric about the reinstatement of justice and equality for the oppressed Iranian people. Encouraged by the new approach, the country's ethnic minorities banded together to form a 30-member committee and went to Tehran to negotiate with the newly formed Supreme Revolutionary Council for more rights and even regional autonomy.

The government's reaction to their demands was to stress that there are no nationalistic boundaries within Islam. Talks broke down. When Saddam Hussein invaded Iran in September 1980 and transformed Khuzestan into a bloody battleground, the Kurds seized the opportunity to rebel in the north.

Ayatollah Khomeini demanded a "saintly war" against them and the insurgency was quashed after two years of fighting. In the south, the main theater of the Iran-Iraq War, several cities in the oil-rich province were laid waste, with the blasted ruins of Khorramshahr becoming Iran's Stalingrad and a turning point in the eight-year war of the 1980s. Khuzestan's inhabitants fought bravely during the war and proved their allegiance to Iran, but today, more than 15 years after the end of hostilities, many feel poorly rewarded, and parts of their province's infrastructure remain shattered.

They protest that the central government shows no concern for their economic plight and that the huge profits generated by the province's oil industry and agricultural sectors are not trickling into the local economy. "We're talking about the repressed complaints of the [Khuzestani] people," a high-ranking Iranian official with Arab roots told the Asia Times Online.

"After the end of the war, the government did not carry out reconstruction in Khuzestan as it did in other provinces. If the government wants to end this situation now, it can. It can change the governor and invest money in the region."

Although there is little proof of external interference in the recent riots - aside from the standard rhetoric about "paid agents" emanating from Tehran - a failure to address local grievances could allow conservative Persian Gulf governments to seize a foothold in the region. Already worried over the prospect of the developing of a Shi'ite arc that stretches from Tehran to Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut, Saudi Arabia and the conservative Sunni sheikhdoms around it are consulting with Washington on how best to contain Iran.

According to one well-connected ethnic-Arab consultant who spoke to Asia Times Online, Saudi-funded Khuzestanis are now active in the province, converting locals to Sunni Islam. "You have right now Saudis penetrating into this region and for the first time we're speaking about people converting from Shi'ism to Sunnism because of the money they're being offered and a lack of hope," he said, citing recent talks with the head of an Arab tribe.

While Saudi agents have been carrying out such a program in Baghdad's Shi'ite neighborhoods (Qadhimmieh is one example), this latest development marks an attempt by Riyadh to extend its activities into Iran. The efforts to import Arab and Sunni nationalism into Iran are a reply to former attempts by Tehran to export the Shi'ite Islamic revolution to Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Yemen.

"I doubt that you can destabilize the Iranian regime with Arab discontent in Khuzestan, there are just not enough of them," said Gregory Gause, director of the Middle East studies program at the University of Vermont. Arab discontent "is a problem, but not a regime-threatening one. The Gulf Arabs could supply money, but little else."

Despite fears in Tehran that outgoing Iraqi premier Iyad Allawi's US occupation-aligned interim government may have smuggled weapons into Khuzestan across its long common border, no reports of weapons being used surfaced during the recent disturbances. "It's a war on two sides," the ethnic-Arab consultant told Asia Times Online.

"Just as there's a Shi'ite community in northern Saudi, so are the Saudis now trying to find some footholds inside Iran. Khuzestan is an obvious choice. At the moment, it's very small scale. They enter with the appeal to pan-Arabism and slowly they put more pressure on people to convert to Sunni Islam. In the end, they convert because of political and economic dissatisfaction - it's not a religious thing yet."

The province is also potentially vulnerable for its mixture of vast oil supplies and an Arab-Persian demographic imbalance that bears a striking similarity to Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province, where an Arab Shi'ite majority sits atop most of the kingdom's oil supplies and is correspondingly viewed with suspicion by the Sunni royal family. So sensitive is the Eastern Province that the Pentagon's military planners drew up contingency plans in the 1970s to invade it and seize its oilfields in the event that serious unrest or a Soviet invasion should threaten the integrity of the Saudi monarchy.

Saudi Arabia's Arab Shi'ite minority rioted from November to February 1980 in the Eastern Province, where they form the majority, a sensitive issue in the Sunni Wahhabi kingdom. Coming in the aftermath of the seizure of Mecca's Great Mosque, in the same year, by Sunni fundamentalists and a siege that lasted 15 days, the Shi'ite riots demoralized the Saudi royal family. The tension was finally defused after the then-Saudi deputy minister of the interior, Amir Ahmad ibn Abd al-Aziz, drew up a comprehensive plan to improve the standard of living in Shi'ite areas. While his recommendations were immediately accepted, plans for an extensive electrification project, swamp drainage, the construction of schools and a hospital and other infrastructure projects have only partially been implemented.

At present, Khuzestan and Kurdestan remain Tehran's greatest ethnic separatist challenge. The province's Arabs are among Iran's least-integrated ethnic minorities and lack a national hero of the stature of Sattar Khan and Bagher Khan, who, as Iranian legends of Azeri extraction, played a key role in the Constitutionalist Revolution of 1906 and in incorporating their communities into the national body.

The coming to power of an Arab Shi'ite and Kurdish Sunni government in Baghdad caught the imagination of Iran's ethnic Arabs and Kurds. In Iran's Kurdestan province, civil disturbances erupted this month when Kurdish celebrations over Jalal Talabani's appointment to the Iraqi presidency turned violent. With Israeli military and intelligence personnel widely reported to be active in Iraq's Kurdish areas, training Kurdish militias and allegedly infiltrating Iran for intelligence-gathering, Tehran will have to be extremely careful in policing the mountainous territory between the Iranian, Iraqi and Turkish borders.

"The external factor has always had a crucial impact on Iran's ethnic movements," said Kayhan Barzegar, a professor of Iranian foreign policy at Tehran's School of International Relations. "Under the new circumstances in Iraq some people along the boundaries feel that now is the time to try. The Kurds considered the [Iraqi] electoral success a great victory. In Sanandaj they're saying that this is a great era, that they must express themselves."

Iran's government is anxious that there is no repeat of the foreign-sponsored, ethnic-centered republics of Mahabad and Azerbaijan (Kurdish and Azeri, respectively). Both republics were Russian-backed and short-lived and remain embedded in Iran's collective memory as unpleasant historical precedents of a foreign superpower meddling in domestic affairs.

Ultimately, the Islamic Republic is a far more robust country today than when it took its first faltering steps in the early 1980s. Even were the minorities to be whipped up against the central government, the Persian majority is unlikely to be won over by a minority agenda. The removal of a strong Iraqi government took away the only regional actor that could realistically inspire Iran's Arabs to revolt or mount covert operations against Tehran.

As long as Iraq remains a weak state, Khuzestan's Arabs will not be tempted to betray their country and throw their lot in with Baghdad. At the end of his trip to Iran, Gerecht speculates about the possible effects of a US-backed covert action operation in Iran. "Would we be playing with fire, tempting a geographic implosion of the Muslim world," he wonders. "Perhaps. But nation-states don't take shape unless there is a popular will for them. A lavishly funded CIA covert-action program to tear Brittany from France wouldn't work. Bretons may hate Paris, but they're French. The same may be true for Azeris and the Islamic Republic. Still, a little CIA mischief would help the two make up their minds - while convincingly reminding the mullahs of US omniscience and power."

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