Iraqi President Jalal Talabani (L) talks to his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai (R) as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (C) smiles before the prayer for the soul of King Fahd at Imam Turki bin Abdullah in Riyadh August 2, 2005. King Fahd was buried in a simple unmarked grave on Tuesday after a brief funeral to mourn the monarch who ruled the oil superpower for more than two turbulent decades. In keeping with the kingdom's austere Islamic tradition Fahd, who in life enjoyed enormous wealth and privilege, was laid to rest in a sprawling Riyadh cemetery alongside hundreds of other unidentified dirt graves. REUTERS/Zainal Abd Halim

Pakistan Forcing Afghan Refugees to Move – AP 8/2/05

ISLAMABAD - Afghan refugees living in the capital Islamabad and a nearby city will be moved to camps in Pakistan or asked to return home because of security concerns, the Interior Ministry said Tuesday.

More than 3 million Afghans have been living in Pakistan, fleeing wars, poverty and years of drought. Thousands are living in Rawalpindi, a city near Islamabad, and in shanty homes on the outskirts of the Pakistani capital.

Authorities believe the refugee settlements provide easy shelter for criminals like robbers and even terrorists.

Afghans living in the two cities will be "relocated" to refugee camps elsewhere in Pakistan or they will be voluntarily repatriated to their homeland with assistance of the U.N. refugee agency,     United Nations High Commission for Refugees, the ministry said.

It said security was the reason. The statement did not say when the relocations will begin or how many Afghans are in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

Millions of Afghans came to Pakistan after the Soviet Union invaded their country in 1979, many of them settled in camps scattered across Pakistan.

While a large number of Afghans have returned home after a U.S. military operation ousted the Taliban militia from power in late 2001 for harboring al-Qaida, 3.04 million others still live across Pakistan, according to a refugee count conducted jointly by Pakistan and UNHCR earlier this year.

Police officer along with daughter shot dead in south Afghanistan - Xinhua / August 2, 2005

Unidentified armed men shot dead a traffic police officer along with her daughter in the restive southern Helmand province of Afghanistan Monday, an official said Tuesday.

"The incident took place yesterday morning in Gresk district and a police officer and his nine-year-old daughter were killed," provincial secretary Mohiudin Khan told Xinhua.

Those behind the attack have managed to escape, added the official, declining to give more details. Putting the attack on Taliban, the official said the enemies of peace and security, a term used against Taliban, were behind the gruesome crime.

Remnants of the fundamentalist movement whose regime was ousted by US military in late 2001 have intensified their attacks on Afghan and US troops since early this year during which over 400 including rebels, government servants, Afghan and US solders as well as civilians had been killed.

Daily Afghan Report - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty - August 1, 2005

Russian Defense Minister Says Taliban Control Most Of Afghanistan...

Sergei Ivanov told journalists in the Russian far eastern city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on 28 July that "most [of] Afghan territory is not controlled by anybody but the Taliban," Interfax reported. Ivanov was speaking about Afghanistan as the only "excuse" for the presence of U.S. military forces in Central Asia.

Ivanov said the situation in Afghanistan is very "contradictory" because while the Taliban roam free in most of Afghanistan there are "no active military" operations taking place.

Discussing the duration of the U.S. presence in Central Asia, Ivanov said that "it would be good to define for how many years the war in Afghanistan is going to last: 23, 30, or 250 years." Ivanov also claimed that "other countries are actively interfering" in the southern and eastern parts of Afghanistan, though he did not say which countries.

Ivanov also said there is a lack of action against the drug trade in Afghanistan. "Nobody is lifting a finger to address drug production in Afghanistan," he added. At their July meeting, members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization called on the United States and its allies to withdraw their troops from Central Asia (see "RFE/RL Afghanistan Report," 25 July 2005).

Uzbekistan recently asked the United States to leave a military base it is using in that country (see today's "Newsline," Part 1). AT

...As Kabul Says Remarks 'Irresponsible'

Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zaher Azimi told a news conference in Kabul on 31 July that Ivanov's remarks about the Taliban controlling most of Afghanistan and on the narcotics problem in the country were "irresponsible" and were "political adventurism," Afghan Voice Agency reported. Afghanistan hopes that the "remarks of Ivanov only represent his personal view and not Moscow's official stance," Azimi added, Pajhwak Afghan News reported on 31 July.

The war of words between Kabul and Moscow has gone on for some time and usually has involved Ivanov, but has reached new heights since May when Russian officials began pointing to Afghanistan as the origin of the demonstrations in Andijon that were violently suppressed by government forces (see "RFE/RL Afghanistan Report," 27 May 2005). AT

Afghan Official Commentary Remembers Soviet Invasion

A commentary posted on the website of the official Bakhtar News Agency on 31 July in response to Ivanov's remarks writes that the "Russians should have gained good experience from their defeat in Afghanistan," and stop interfering in the affairs of Afghanistan by making "irresponsible" speeches (http://www.bakhtarnews.com).

According to Bakhtar, Ivanov's comments that the neo-Taliban have established their control on the majority of the provinces in Afghanistan "recalls" the "realities" which existed during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1979-89) when Moscow's "puppet regime" governed only in Kabul only. In the same manner that the "dreams" of the former Soviet Union to conquer all of Afghanistan did not come true, Moscow's recent propaganda on instability in Afghanistan and the existence of the Taliban in several provinces will also prove untrue, Bakhtar concludes. AT

Dozens Of Antigovernment Afghan Militia Members Killed

According to Afghan Defense Minister spokesman Azimi, Afghan National Army (ANA) and U.S.-led coalition forces killed 26 neo-Taliban militiamen and arrested 49 during a joint operation in the southern provinces of Oruzgan, Helmand, and Zabul in the past few days, Bakhtar reported on 31 July. Azimi added that during these operations the ANA suffered three injuries. AT

Southern Afghan District Chief Killed And Three Others Killed

Abdul Jabbar, the district chief of Chahar Chino in Oruzgan, and three of his bodyguards were killed when their vehicle was blown up by a remote-control explosive device on 30 July, Pajhwak reported the next day. Neo-Taliban spokesman Latifullah Hakimi told Pajhwak that the militia carried out the attack. AT

Austria to send 93 soldiers to Afghanistan - Xinhua / August 2, 2005

Austria is set to send 93 soldiers to Afghanistan late Monday to help maintain security in the country during the upcoming parliamentary elections.

Under an Austrian government plan, the first group of 82 soldiers will fly to the Afghan capital Kabul and then go to the northern region of Kunduz, which is about 350 km from Kabul. The rest 11 soldiers and armored vehicles will arrive in the country before Aug 7.

These Austrian soldiers will serve in a reconstruction team headed by Germany for three months and they will be responsible for maintaining security during the elections rather than taking a combat role.

Austrian Defense Minister Gunther Platter said Monday that the reinforcement of troops in Afghanistan would not increase the risk of an Islamist terrorist attack in Austria.

This is the largest dispatch of soldiers to Afghanistan in Austrian history. Back in February 2002, the first five Austrian soldiers were sent to the Asian country to support the International Security Assistance Force there.

Afghan TV broaches marriage taboos - By Jill McGivering BBC News, Kabul

Television viewers in Afghanistan were mesmerised recently by a hard-hitting edition of a TV programme, Corridors, on the privately-run Tolo TV station.

A young woman featured on the programme spoke out forcefully, accusing her parents of having tried to get her engaged to a man without her consent. In defiance, she had run away to Kabul and married another man, for love.

"It's my right under Sharia law and the constitution," she said on camera, "to break off my engagement and marry someone else. I have the right to make my own choice. Why should I be pressurised?"

Angry members of her family also appeared on the programme, rejecting her argument. The man her parents had chosen to be her husband also spoke out, equally angry.

"Everyone has sisters and mothers," he said, "and as a result of all these women's rights, a man might go to work during the day and come home to find his wife has run off with someone else or someone's taken her."

In Afghanistan, a woman who breaks off a genuine engagement can be punished with a prison sentence. Now the courts will have to decide if this particular young woman got engaged willingly or not.

But the mere fact that these people spoke about such a sensitive issue on a prime time current affairs programme was news in itself. Those who support women's rights see it as a positive example, saying it could influence others to resist forced marriages.

Shamsola Mazai of Afghanistan's Human Rights Commission says that they have seen a sudden increase in women seeking help, partly because of television coverage like this.

"The public is getting information about their rights from the media, the human rights commission, the ministry of women and other sources," he told me. "When they hear about the rights of women, it helps them know their rights and come forward to demand them."

The presenter of the TV programme, Corridors, Humayoon Daneshyar, wants his programme to foster change. From now on, he told me, any families trying to push their daughters into forced marriages know that their daughters might speak out on television too and shame them.

"It's like climbing a staircase," he said, "and we've taken the first step. Afghanistan is a developing society and because of the war, we still have people with very old fashioned attitudes towards women."

But the prospect of change is already causing concern. Fazl Hadi Shinwari is Afghanistan's Chief Justice, head of the Supreme Court and a top Islamic scholar.

He wants Tolo TV banned, objecting in particular to women appearing unveiled and Asian music videos showing women dancing in outfits he considers immodest.

"Some of Tolo TV's programmes violate Islamic principles," he said. "We've condemned that and asked the authorities to stop them. Western women walk about half-naked. But in Islam we say women should be covered, apart from the face."

In a small Kabul beauty parlour set back from a busy main road, we found women of all ages chatting as they had their hair or make-up done. Everyone there had seen or heard the Corridors programme on forced marriage - and heartily approved.

"This is an independent TV channel," said the salon manager, hairdryer in hand, "and will bring positive change. A lot of other young women will be inspired to talk about their problems, not hide them."

"At the moment lots of young girls forced into marriage commit suicide. If they're able to talk openly on TV, it might reduce the problem."

The courts are yet to pass judgement on the particular case featured in the programme. But there's no doubt that the mere fact her family dispute has been aired so publicly has already made a previously taboo topic the talk of Afghanistan.

Barred cleric returns to Pakistan – BBC

The parliamentary leader of Pakistan's Islamic opposition has returned to Pakistan after being refused entry to the United Arab Emirates. Maulana Fazlur Rehman had been stopped at Dubai airport because his name was on a UAE blacklist, Pakistan's information minister said.

Mr Rehman is general secretary of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), a six-party religious alliance. The outspoken and hardline cleric had been heading on to Saudi Arabia.

Mr Rehman told the BBC's Urdu service before returning to Pakistan that he was surprised at being included on the UAE government blacklist.

"When I applied for a visa to visit the United Arab Emirates, the embassy held on to my passport for several days, which gives me the impression that they must have sought clearance from the authorities before issuing the visa," Mr Rehman said.

A spokesman for Pakistan's foreign ministry said Mr Rehman was initially given permission to leave the airport following the intervention of Pakistan's ambassador in the UAE, but later that decision was revoked.

The spokesman, Nayeem Khan, said Mr Rehman had now decided to return to Pakistan. Mr Rehman, leader of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (Islamic Party of Religious Leaders - JUI), was taking a two-day break in Dubai before heading to Saudi Arabia.

Pakistan information minister, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, said Mr Rehman was expected back on Tuesday morning but had no knowledge of why he had been turned away.

Mr Rehman was a strong supporter of Afghanistan's ousted Taleban regime and has been a staunch critic of President Pervez Musharraf's policy of backing the US-led "war on terror".

M adrassas ask for foreign support – BBC

One of Pakistan's largest madrassas, or religious institutions, has turned to foreign diplomats in a bid to overturn a recent ban on foreign students. The head of Karachi's Jamia Binoria school told the BBC news website that "all foreign diplomats in Pakistan" had been invited to visit the schools.

The schools want President Musharraf to rethink his ban on foreign students. Madrassas became a centre of attention after reports that a London bomber had studied in one of them.

Jamia Binoria has over 100 foreign students, many from Europe and the US. "We will do whatever we can to help them complete their education," the school's Mufti Naeem told the BBC.

"But if the government says its decision is final, there is not much we can do." Madrassa leaders say they have also contacted one of Pakistan's top lawyers, Sharifuddin Pirzada, to explore the possibility of challenging the government's expulsion decision in the Supreme Court.

Mufti Naeem said foreign students were still reeling from the impact of the government's decision. "These last few days have been like a living hell for us," he said.

"We spend our days answering calls from the media and our nights answering calls from anxious parents in Western countries wanting to know what the future holds for their children."

Mufti Naeem said the students were "absolutely determined" not to abandon their studies. He said his greatest fear was that many of them may now go to India to complete their studies.

"What impression is this going to give about Pakistan?" he asked. "Do we want Muslims to go to India instead of Pakistan to study Islam?"

As head of Jamia Binoria Alamiya, which is an international religious institution, Mufti Naeemi is one of the most influential madrassa leaders in Pakistan.

Jamia Binoria is said to have had the highest enrolment of foreign students before their influx dropped following the September 11 attacks on the US. It currently has 3,000 male and 500 female students.

"We have students from the US, Canada, UK, France, Germany and many other Western countries as well as those from the Far East," said Mufti Naeemi. All madrassa leaders in Sindh whose seminaries admit foreign students were called for a meeting with the Sindh home secretary, Brig (Retd) Ghulam Mohtarim.

"He said the government wanted all foreign students out as soon as possible," one of the participants of the meeting told the BBC. "From the way he was talking, it seemed as if the government wanted these students out of the madrassas within 24 hours."

Madrassa leaders were given a form on which they are required to fill out personal details of each one of their students by Thursday. Sources said that the government had offered to charter a plane to fly these students back to their respective countries.

King Fahd: Soviets and madrassas - By Shirazuddin Siddiqi BBC News website

King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, who has died aged 84, leaves a significant but complex legacy for South and Central Asia, and the wider world. The king played a key role in the war against Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s - his country's financial input was believed to be as big as the US contribution.

And he embarked on a partnership with General Zia to Islamicise Pakistan, gathering large numbers of young Muslims from different countries to become "ambassadors of faith" for the wider world.

The king's ambition was to spread Wahabi Islam - a sect that now has followers in both Pakistan and Afghanistan - around the world. He was among the first to help fund religious schools or "madrassas" in Pakistan, some of which are now accused of links with militant groups blamed for carrying out or inspiring terror attacks in a number of countries.

The war against the Soviets gained unexpected momentum after King Fahd ascended the throne in 1982. Saudi Arabia, under him, matched every dollar that the American administration put aside to defeat the Red Army.

King Fahd's combined religious and financial commitment inspired many in the Arab world, some of whom came together in Afghanistan to participate in the jihad (holy war) from which al-Qaeda eventually emerged. Hundreds of Muslim fighters travelled to Afghanistan and trained to fight against the Soviets.

The combination of unprecedented large sums of money and the increase in numbers of foreign fighters led to a rapid escalation of the war in Afghanistan in the mid-1980s which took the Soviet forces by surprise.

The USSR collapsed within a couple of years of the withdrawal. King Fahd's foreign policies had many repercussions.

His invitation to US forces to help protect his kingdom in the early 1990s angered many of his subjects, some of whom later turned up as jihadists in Afghanistan, and are still a problem for Saudi Arabia and the world today.

Around the same time in Afghanistan, he lent support to the mujahideen, and later to the Taleban after they came to power. Saudi Arabia was one of only three countries in the world - beside Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates - which officially recognised the Taleban regime.

His government found itself in a difficult situation over the Taleban, which Saudi-born al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, the royal family's sworn enemy, was also seen as bankrolling.

King Fahd also lent immense economic support to Pakistan and pumped tons of free and subsidised oil into the country, which contributed to economic progress never before experienced there.

But observers say many ordinary Pakistanis were not aware of what King Fahd did for their country. The king's significance in the region was illustrated by the manner in which Afghanistan and Pakistan both responded to his death.

Afghanistan announced three days of official mourning and Pakistan seven. Pakistan's President, Pervez Musharraf, praised the king as a "statesman of high calibre" of the Muslim world.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai described him as a "friend and brother of the Afghan people". He said the people of Afghanistan would continue to remember "his unstinting support during the years of jihad against the Soviets".

The Taleban, too, offered thanks for the king's support and said, had they been able, they would have sent a delegation to his funeral. "We share the pain of the Saudi nation over this great loss," Mufti Latifullah Hakimi, who claims to speak for the Taleban, told the Afghan Islamic Press.

The complexity of King Fahd's legacy is not difficult to notice in today's world. Afghanistan, with support from the Saudis and the West, drove the Soviets out and achieved its independence.

The same support enabled Pakistan to make huge economic progress. And yet both countries, and the entire world, are haunted by the threat posed by Islamic fundamentalism.

What stands behind Uzbekistan's demand to withdraw U.S. base?

RIA Novosti, Russia - August 2, 2005 MOSCOW. (Alexei Makarkin for RIA Novosti.)

The Big Game for control over Central Asia has been going on for centuries. The U.S. replaced Britain after it lost its imperial ambitions, and countries that appeared on the world map only in the 20th century have become independent players in this game.

The recent events in the region - the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in Astana, the regional tour by U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and Uzbekistan's demand to pull out the American base within six months - marked a new stage in the Big Game where every player has his own interests.

The U.S. wants to preserve its military-political presence in the region after "appeasing" Afghanistan. The first reason for this is that the regime of President Hamid Karzai will hardly be strengthened by the parliamentary election set for the coming fall, and the U.S. will want to have a transport infrastructure for delivering troops to Afghanistan. Another reason is a desire to reinforce its standing in the region, pushing back Russia, whose traditional sphere of influence includes Afghanistan, and China, which has interests in Central Asia.

Rumsfeld came to the region to prop up Washington's positions in Kyrgyzstan and, if possible, in Uzbekistan, shaken by the SCO's recommendation to the U.S. to set the deadline for its military bases in the region.

The Pentagon chief was assured that the U.S. would remain in Kyrgyzstan. But the attempt to keep the base in Uzbekistan was complicated by Washington's desire to force Islam Karimov to promote democracy in his country. As a result, Karimov demanded an unexpectedly quick pullout of the base.

The U.S. is now expected to shift its attention to the base in Kyrgyzstan, which entails a complication, as planes flying from it to Afghanistan will have to refuel in the air. The Americans may therefore try to create one more base in a former Soviet state, possibly in Azerbaijan, under the pretext of ensuring the security of the Baku-Ceyhan oil pipeline.

Russia is playing its own part in the Big Game. It does not want to publicly quarrel with the U.S. by forcing its bases out of the region, as this may provoke accusations of torpedoing the counter-terrorist coalition. Russia's goal is to ensure that the US bases are pulled out after the Afghan operation.

This stand corresponds to the opinion expressed at the SCO summit in Astana. The prolongation of the U.S. base in Kyrgyzstan, provided it is linked to the operation in Afghanistan, does not contradict Russia's long-term interests within the SCO strategy. In addition, Russia wants to preserve its military presence in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

The sensational decision by Uzbekistan to demand the withdrawal of the American base means that Tashkent is acting in its own interests but is also showing its pro-Russian sentiments increasingly openly. This suits Moscow, which is not responsible for the actions of Islam Karimov and, as far as can be judged, did not encourage him to take such a harsh decision.

Karimov wants to show Russia (and China) that he has burned the boats in relations with the U.S. It was his "geopolitical present" for the support given to his regime by the SCO countries after the Andijan crisis.

The Americans softened their criticism of Karimov before Rumsfeld's visit, but this did not change the stand of Tashkent. The Uzbek leader knows very well that the U.S. will continue pressing him to promote democracy in the country. In this situation, Americans' assistance in airlifting Uzbek refugees from Kyrgyzstan to Romania became an additional irritant for Tashkent, who had made a decision of principle on the matter.

Now for the interests of other states. The new leadership of Kyrgyzstan is trying to develop balanced relations with Moscow and Washington. The U.S. plans to grant Kyrgyzstan an interest-free loan of $200 million, which amounts to 60% of the republican budgetary revenues, in return for the preservation of the base. Tajikistan is mostly pro-Russian.

China has been trying to strengthen its influence in Kyrgyzstan, to no avail so far. "The issue of the deployment of a Chinese military base in Kyrgyzstan was discussed at a very high level, but Kyrgyzstan's position is clear-cut: we do not plan to turn the country into a military-political range," said acting vice-premier Adakhan Madumarov.

Besides, there are no visible differences in Moscow's and Beijing's attitudes to regional problems. The Big Game in Central Asia is waged with mixed success and mostly under the carpet. The results of bargaining held behind closed doors seldom become public knowledge, but it appears that competition between the players will grow. China will hardly abandon the idea of gaining a military-political foothold there. And the U.S. will work hard to remain in Kyrgyzstan even after the "appeasement" of Afghanistan.

Alexei Makarkin is deputy general director of the Center of Political Technologies - opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and may not necessarily represent the opinions of the editorial board.

U.S. Uzbekistan Base May Be Stationed in Azerbaijan - report

Baku Today (Azerbaijan) / Assa Irada / Nezavisiyama, August 2, 2005

The military base the US plans to withdraw from Uzbekistan may be stationed in Azerbaijan, Russian Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper reported.

The Khanabad base, previously the former Soviet Union air force base, was given to the disposal of the United States prior to the attack it launched on Afghanistan in October 2001. The base, located close to the Afghan-Uzbek border, is the key US military ground in Central Asia, stationing 1,500 military men supplied with 30 military helicopters.

The F-15 and F-16 airplanes took off 50 to 60 times from Khanabad during the military action in Afghanistan. The base is currently used as an airport for heavy airplanes carrying cargo and fuel to US troops in Afghanistan.

The Russian publication also said that due to the presence of similar US bases in Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan, losing the base in Khanabad is not likely to seriously affect the military supplies of US contingent.

Official Tashkent has made a decision for US to pull out its base from Khanabad over the next 180 days.

The Azerbaijan Defense Ministry spokesman Ramiz Malikov, commenting on the possibility of moving the base to Azerbaijani territory, told local ANS TV channel that although the issue is of military nature, ‘it is of political importance’. “The Ministry therefore cannot express its position on the matter. The issue should be addressed on the state level,” he said.

[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.]