In this bulletin:

· President Karzai Condemns the Killing of a School Teacher in Helmand Province
· Gunmen open fire on Afghan school, student and janitor killed
· Four policemen, three 'Taliban' killed in Afghan attacks
· Afghan villagers riot after police capture suspected Taliban
· Cheney to visit Afghanistan, other allies
· German defense minister to travel to Washington, Pakistan and Afghanistan
· Deputy DM visits Greek peace-keeping contingent in Afghanistan
· NATO to increase Afghan contingent and help guard Tajik borders - NATO representative
· Afghanistan's new parliament dominated by warlords
· Afghanistan's Chance to Heal
· Afghans Filled With Hope, Disillusionment
· U.S.-Afghanistan calls screened
· Pakistan envoy sees no major Taliban resurgence
· Former Taliban commander calls on militants to give up resistance
· Afghan Daily Report
· Over 445,000 Afghan refugees return home from Pakistan
· Last convoys of the year head home to Afghanistan from Pakistan
· India to step up security for nationals working in strife-torn Afghan
· Free trade between Pakistan, Afghanistan urged

President Karzai Condemns the Killing of a School Teacher in Helmand Province - Date of Release: 17 December 2005

Arg, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, strongly condemned the killing of a secondary school teacher by the enemies of Afghanistan in the Nad Ali district of Helmand province on Thursday.

In his reaction to the news the President said, “This heinous act of terrorism was aimed at depriving the children of Afghanistan of their rights to education and I condemn it in the strongest terms. The enemies of Afghanistan must understand that their evil acts won’t close doors on schools in our country.”

The President expressed his heartfelt sympathies and condolences to the family of the victim.
Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President - Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

Gunmen open fire on Afghan school, student and janitor killed

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - Men on a motorcycle have opened fire on students leaving school in volatile southern Afghanistan, killing a pupil and a janitor, a provincial official said.

The attack in Lashkargah, capital of insurgency-hit Helmand province, comes two days after a schoolteacher was shot dead in the province in what President Hamid Karzai condemned as an act of terrorism.

No one claimed responsibility for either attack. Helmand deputy provincial governor Moheedin Khan said after Saturday's shooting: "We don't know who carried out the attack but definitely they're the enemies of Afghanistan."

Afghan officials use the term to refer to insurgents, including those from the ultra-conservative Taliban movement toppled in a US-led invasion in late 2001.

Remnants of the militia are waging an insurgency against Karzai's US-backed administration, which is trying to combat them with the help of thousands of US-led and NATO troops.

In a statement released after the shooting of the teacher in Helmand's Nad Ali district on Thursday, Karzai said: "This heinous act of terrorism was aimed at depriving the children of Afghanistan of their rights to education and I condemn it in the strongest terms."

"The enemies of Afghanistan must understand that their evil acts won't close doors on schools in our country." As part of their anti-government campaign, the Taliban target Afghan and foreign troops as well as aid workers and officials in Karzai's administration.

The violence has left more than 1,500 people dead this year alone. After nearly three decades of war and internal conflict, Afghanistan lacks basic educational facilities.

The Taliban, who ruled the country from 1996 to 2001, introduced a tough version of Islamic law that included barring girls from attending school and women from teaching, which in turn affected boys' education.

With the downfall of the regime, a massive campaign was launched to encourage children to return to school, a message that was heeded by about five million girls and boys.

Four policemen, three 'Taliban' killed in Afghan attacks

Kandahar (AFP) - Four policemen and three suspected Taliban fighters were killed and an Afghan interpreter have been wounded in attacks in volatile southern Afghanistan, police and an official have said.

About a dozen suspected insurgents stormed a police checkpost on a main highway late Saturday, sparking a fierce gun battle in which three policeman and an attacker were killed, highway police commander Mohammad Nabi Allahyar said. "The fighting lasted for more than one-and-a-half hours," Allahyar told AFP.

He blamed the attack in Zabul province, on the highway linking southern city Kandahar with the capital, on remnants of the extremist Taliban regime in power between 1996 and 2001. Some of the 10 to 15 attackers were wounded in the gunfight but their comrades were able to evacuate them, he said Sunday.

Another policeman and two militants were killed in a clash after a suspected Taliban ambush in neighbouring Uruzgan province the same night, provincial governor Jan Mohammad Khan told AFP.

"Our police were on a routine patrol when they came under attack by Taliban fighters in Deh Rawood," he said, referring to one of the province's most insurgency-hit areas.

An Afghan interpreter working with private US security firm USPI was meanwhile wounded on Sunday when Taliban attacked his vehicle in southwest Helmand province, police said.

Several policemen accompanying the interpreter were also able to escape the attackers, said Dil Jan, district police chief of Sangin where the attack took place. Afghanistan's fledgling police force has been a regular target of attacks by fighters loyal to the Taliban, ousted in a US-led invasion in late 2001.

Taliban and other Islamic militants are waging an insurgency against the new US-backed government which has left more than 1,500 people dead this year, most of them militants killed by Afghan and foreign security forces.

The attacks occurred two days before the first sitting of the war-ravaged country's legislature due on Monday after more than three decades of conflict.

Heavy security has been put in place for the opening ceremony to be attended by President Hamid Karzai and foreign dignitaries including US Vice President Dick Cheney, with the government fearing similar attacks on the parliament.

Afghan villagers riot after police capture suspected Taliban - Dec 17

KABUL (AFP) - Hundreds of villagers clashed with police near Afghanistan's capital to demand the release of six men they said were ordinary mullahs but whom police suspected were Taliban fighters, authorities said.

The villagers rioted in Logar province just south of Kabul on Friday, breaking windows and throwing stones, deputy police chief Abdul Rasoul said on Saturday. Gunfire was also heard coming from the mob, he said.

The crowd claimed police had shot dead two of the protesters, Rasoul said, adding though that officers had only fired into the air and that no bodies had been found after the clash.

"We've seen some blood at the scene of the riot but not any bodies to back up their claims. We are investigating everything," he told AFP. The protest erupted in the province's Charkh district after police arrested the men, alleging they had been preparing to ambush a police convoy.

"Four men were arrested on Thursday and two others on Friday. We suspect that they have links to Taliban," Rasoul said. The men were being questioned, he said. "An investigation will reveal whether they're Taliban or not."
Logar is among regions of southern Afghanistan badly hit by a Taliban-led insurgency launched after the hardline movement was removed from power in a US-led invasion in 2001.

Most insurgency-linked attacks however occur along the border with Pakistan, where the Taliban and their Islamic allies, including those from Al-Qaeda, are believed to have fled. More than 1,500 people, many of them militants, have been killed this year, more than double last year's toll.

Cheney to visit Afghanistan, other allies

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney will go to Afghanistan for the first session of its new parliament next week and also make stops in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Oman -- all allies in the U.S. war against terrorism.

"The vice president will represent the United States at the opening session of Afghanistan's new, democratically-elected parliament," Cheney's office said in a statement on Friday.

He will also meet with President Hamid Karzai and visit U.S. troops.
Cheney will be among other foreign dignitaries attending the landmark session of Afghanistan's first elected parliament since the 1970s.

Tens of thousands of U.S.-led foreign troops and billions of dollars of aid have ensured relative stability in Afghanistan and brought new prosperity to cities like the capital Kabul.

But the insurgency by Taliban Islamic militants has intensified and security at the opening on Monday will be tight after a wave of attacks blamed on the militants. President George W. Bush has made spreading democracy overseas, especially in the Middle East, a key foreign policy objective for his administration since the September 11, 2001, attacks on America.

Cheney's visit follows elections in Iraq on December 15 that were viewed by the White House as another step toward democracy in that country and the region.

Cheney will also visit Pakistan and plans to meet President Pervez Musharraf, whom the United States considers a key ally in the fight against terrorism.

“President Bush has asked the vice president to stop in Pakistan as well to assess ongoing U.S. relief and reconstruction efforts in the wake of October's devastating earthquake," the statement said. Some top al Qaeda leaders have been captured or killed in Pakistan, and U.S. officials say Osama bin Laden is hiding around its mountainous border with Afghanistan. Musharraf recently announced that a senior al Qaeda figure, Abu Hamza Rabia, was killed in a tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

Cheney will meet the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Oman to discuss "key issues of mutual concern relating to President Bush's freedom agenda and the war on terror," the statement said.

Egypt recently held parliamentary elections in which President Hosni Mubarak's party won about three quarters of the seats, but opposition supporters have protested that the elections were rigged.

German defense minister to travel to Washington, Pakistan and Afghanistan - PRAVDA NEWS - 16:38 2005-12-16

Germany's new defense minister will travel to Washington on Monday for talks with his U.S. counterpart Donald Rumsfeld and other officials, the government said Friday. Franz Josef Jung will also meet in Washington with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, German Defense Ministry spokesman Thomas Raabe said.

Raabe didn't say what issues Jung, who took office along with new German Chancellor Angela Merkel last month, would raise. From Washington, Jung travels on to Djibouti, the base for German sailors patrolling off the Horn of Africa as party of the U.S.-led counterterrorism operation Enduring Freedom.

Jung was to continue to Islamabad to examine German military efforts to help victims in Pakistan of the Oct. 8 earthquake, and to Afghanistan to visit German troops serving with the NATO-led security force, reports the AP.

Deputy DM visits Greek peace-keeping contingent in Afghanistan - Athens News Agency, Greece 12/16/05

Deputy defence minister Vassilis Michaloliakos on Thursday visited the Greek contingent (ELDAF) to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, in the first-ever visit by a representative of the ministry's civilian leadership to the contingent.

Michaloliakos praised the work of the Greek contingent in Afghanistan, both at operational level and at the level of health services provided by the Greek mobile army surgical hospital (KIHNE).

The ELDAF and the KIHNE have both been highly praised by NATO.

Michaloliakos said that Greece, with its participation in international missions of a humanitarian nature "which have been endorsed by the UN Security Council by virtue of a relevant Resolution", is "among the protagonists in the international community's effort for the consolidation of peace and stability on the planet".

The minister brought gifts of the traditional Greek Chrismas sweets melomakarona and kourambiethes, wines, and digital cameras as gifts for the troops, as well as photo printers per unit.

Due to lack of time on both sides, the defence deputy minister was unable to meet with the commander of the NATO Allied Forces Europe, who was also in Afghanistan on a visit.

During a stopover in Yrevan on his return from Afghanistan, Michaloliakos met with his Armenian counterpart, deputy defence minister Artur Agabekian, with whom he discussed the course of bilateral cooperation between the two countries.

Michaloliakos arrived in Kabul together with 85 Greek soldiers who replaced colleages in the ELDAF whose tour of duty had been completed, and returned to Athens with the returning troops.

The Greek contingent in Afghanistan (ELDAF) comprises one company of 128 men from the army engineers corps to support roadbuilding networks and provide humanitarian and public benefit services and, since August this year, an additional 45 troops were deployed to staff the mobile surgery hospital, which provides health services to members of the ISAF and to Afghan citizens.

Also, as of December 1 this year, the Hellenic Air Force deployed a 38-member mission to assume the rotating administration of Kabul Airport for the period to April 2006.

NATO to increase Afghan contingent and help guard Tajik borders - NATO representative

DUSHANBE. Dec 16 (Interfax) - NATO will increase its contingent in Afghanistan to 9,000 troops and help Tajikistan guard its borders, NATO's Special Representative for the Caucasus and Central Asia Robert Simmons said on Friday in Dushanbe.

NATO has decided to increase its contingent in Afghanistan, because it will continue its antiterrorist operation in that country, he said, after a meeting with Tajik President Emomali Rakhmonov.

Afghanistan's new parliament dominated by warlords

Kabul (AFP) - About two-thirds of the seats in Afghanistan's first parliament in 30 years, to meet on Monday, will be filled by warlords from years of bloody conflict but they are unlikely to form a bloc, analysts said.

Instead the diverse backgrounds of the lawmakers and the fact that one-third of all seats are held by independents will likely give US-backed President Hamid Karzai majority support, they said.

"The majority of the parliamentarians are mujahedins (warlords) or linked to mujahedins," said analyst Neik Mohammed Kabuli from the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in Kabul.

"Mujahedin leaders and parties are a majority in the parliament," confirmed Sabrina Saqeb, 25, the youngest of the MPs to be elected to the 249-seat House of Representatives, the Wolesi Jirga.

The fighters rose to prominence when they joined the resistance to the 1979-1989 Soviet occupation. They later turned on each other in the bloody 1992-1996 civil war for which some have been accused of rights abuses.

That they made a strong showing in the September 18 election is not a surprise given their still considerable influence in the provinces. "The parliament is between 60 and 70 percent mujahedin or related. But they don't necessarily represent a bloc," a UN analyst said, requesting anonymity.

Sitting among the one-time fighters on the benches will be several progressives, including many of the women who were reserved 25 percent of parliamentary seats.

Ethnic divisions, exacerbated by the 1990s civil war, could count more in determining the future track of the assembly, analysts said.

Close to half of those elected are from the dominant Pashtun group, from which Karzai comes. Pashtuns, who make up nearly 50 percent of the population and dominate in the south and east of the country, were in power without interruption between 1747 and 1978.

"There will be a lot of ethnicity involved," said political analyst and former minister Hamidullah Tarzi. But MP Shukria Barakzai was confident this would not be a factor for long.

"In the short term, we'll see a divide between Pashtuns and others. But soon the atmosphere will change, and a majority will try to work with Karzai," she said.

Several analysts believed the range of the parliamentarians would allow Karzai, who has the military and financial backing of the international community and represents the progressive camp, to secure majority support.

The only declared opposition force, a coalition led by failed presidential contender Yunus Qanooni, "will be very far from a majority in the Wolesi Jirga", the NDI said in a report.

Karzai's backing is likely to come from most of the Pashtuns, the independents, democratic intellectuals, women and former communists and Taliban, Kabuli said.

The president might also try various "arrangements" to win support, he said. Tarzi agreed "all kind of incentives" could be on offer. "There will be attempts to have coordination (between the MPs) for political stability. I don't think there is any other option," he said.

Still trying to recover from the wounds of the past, the country would like to do all it can to avoid a return to the divisions that tore it apart in the 1990s, the analysts agreed.

"If the parliament comes against the government, that will be a new tragedy for Afghanistan," said Sayed Ishaq Gailani, head of a moderate mujahedin party. The progressive Barakzai added: "We come with new ideas. We cannot go face to face with mujahedins, it would not work. So we have to work together."

Afghanistan's Chance to Heal - Diverse New Parliament Will Bring Together Former Adversaries By Griff Witte Washington Post, December 18, 2005

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Mamoor Shelgaray is a former fighter. He spent a decade battling Soviet troops as a member of one of the country's most hard-line Islamic parties. Wary of U.S. involvement in Afghanistan, he said he believes his country should return to its religious roots by shielding its children from Western television and videos.

Roshanak Wardak is a healer. She spent five years defying Taliban authorities by providing medical care in one of Afghanistan's poorest provinces, while refusing to veil her face. A political independent, Wardak strongly supports the American role here and wants to expand the rights of women.

On the surface, the two Afghans share little. But as of Monday, they will have one thing in common. Both will become members of Afghanistan's new parliament, which will open more than three decades after the country's last freely elected legislature closed its doors. In between came unrelenting conflict, and each of the 351 new members bears its scars.

Like the country, the parliament is badly fractured. The 249 members of the lower house, who were elected in September, and the 102 members of the upper house, who were partly chosen by local councils and partly appointed by President Hamid Karzai, include Islamic scholars, communists, women, Taliban members and technocrats.

Most are people like Shelgaray and Wardak, little known outside their home provinces. But some are nationally known former leaders of factional militias -- such as Mohammed Fahim and Abdurrab Rasul Sayyaf -- who are revered by their followers and despised by others for their bloody roles in the civil war of the 1990s.

When the first session convenes Monday, with Karzai, Vice President Cheney and other foreign dignitaries expected to be looking on, former oppressors will stand and take the oath beside former victims. But a question will hang over the ceremony: After a generation of violent score-settling, will such an eclectic array of people be able to resolve their differences through civilized debate?

"They're going to have to learn to tolerate each other and to cooperate with each other," said Musa Maroofi, a professor of law and political science at Kabul University. "They sense that conflict doesn't work, that fighting each other with weapons is not getting them anywhere. This is the best, and only, opportunity for them to work for a common cause -- for the public interest, rather than their individual interests."

Afghanistan's recent history -- especially the civil war that followed the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1989 -- suggests such hopes may be misplaced. But Wardak and Shelgaray, both elected members of the lower house, offer at least some cause for optimism. Both have sacrificed much to get to the parliament, and both say they do not plan to waste the chance to help reknit their broken country.

In the past several months, Wardak's homestead of wheat fields and apple orchards in Wardak province, 25 miles southwest of the capital, has been sprayed by machine-gun fire and assaulted with rockets. It is the work, she suspects, of political opponents. "Maybe," she said matter-of-factly, "I will lose my life."

Wardak, a serious woman of 49 with a sturdy build and dark green eyes, operates a rudimentary clinic -- a couple of beds, an IV drip and basic medical supplies -- out of her rural home. She was trained as a gynecologist, but in a province with so few doctors, she ends up handling any medical case that comes her way, day or night.

Wardak's grandfather and uncle both served as leaders of the former Afghan national assembly. As a student, she aspired to politics, but her father convinced her that medicine was more suitable for a woman. After the Soviet invasion in 1979, she spent years in Pakistan caring for Afghan refugees. She returned during the civil war and opened her clinic.

In the past several months, Wardak's homestead of wheat fields and apple orchards in Wardak province, 25 miles southwest of the capital, has been sprayed by machine-gun fire and assaulted with rockets. It is the work, she suspects, of political opponents. "Maybe," she said matter-of-factly, "I will lose my life."

Wardak, a serious woman of 49 with a sturdy build and dark green eyes, operates a rudimentary clinic -- a couple of beds, an IV drip and basic medical supplies -- out of her rural home. She was trained as a gynecologist, but in a province with so few doctors, she ends up handling any medical case that comes her way, day or night.

Wardak's grandfather and uncle both served as leaders of the former Afghan national assembly. As a student, she aspired to politics, but her father convinced her that medicine was more suitable for a woman. After the Soviet invasion in 1979, she spent years in Pakistan caring for Afghan refugees. She returned during the civil war and opened her clinic.

Mamoor Shelgaray, 51, an imposing figure with jet-black hair and a long, bushy beard, has similar aspirations for his constituents in Ghazni province, an hour's drive south of Wardak on a dusty plain wedged between snow-capped peaks. But he is also realistic.

"I told the people, 'If I get to the parliament, you should not think that the next day I will build a school for you. It will take a long time,' " he said over tea in his home village of Ander. "Besides, the government doesn't have any money."

Shelgaray said he thinks a more achievable, and urgent, goal is to curb the import of racy Western television programming, which he believes is undermining Afghanistan's Islamic values. He also said he would push for a more severe penalty for Ali Mohaqeq Nasab, a Kabul journalist who was recently sentenced to two years in prison for writing articles deemed blasphemous by the courts.

The son of a tribal leader and Islamic scholar, Shelgaray was denied formal education because of the war with the Soviet Union that broke out in his country when he was a young man. Veterans of that war, known as mujaheddin, form the largest single bloc in the parliament. Shelgaray, who killed countless Soviet soldiers, sees his mission as much the same today as he did then: to defend Islam.
Shelgaray is a longtime member of Hezbi Islami, an Islamic militia that received large amounts of covert U.S. aid during the war against the Soviets. In more recent years, its leader, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, has been hunted by the U.S. military as a terrorist. Shelgaray said he and the 40 other Hezbi Islami members in parliament have reluctantly broken with Hekmatyar.

"After a long discussion, we decided we should support the government. If I was supporting Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, I would not be here now. I would have a Kalashnikov and be in the mountains," he said.

Still, he questioned why Hekmatyar had not been invited to participate in Afghanistan's reconstruction. Shelgaray ran for parliament on a platform of national unity. He said that should mean reconciling with individuals who are now considered terrorists. On that point, Shelgaray has a surprising ally in Wardak, who believes that in parliament she can stand toe-to-toe with commanders who once spread fear.

"The position of the warlord is much different than his previous position. Now he is the people's representative. According to the rules, there is no difference between him and me. Now we are equal," she said. "And today, or tomorrow, or maybe after a few months, he will learn that."

Each day for the past week, Wardak has been sitting with those commanders as all new members of parliament participate in training sessions. And each night, she has made the hour-long drive to her village of Shakhabad, in Wardak province, so she can treat as many patients as possible before morning.

But her absence has already been felt. An hour after Wardak left for the capital this month for the first day of training, a woman appeared at her gate. Crying and crouched in obvious pain, she asked to see the doctor. It was left to Wardak's brother to tell the woman that the doctor had gone to Kabul.

Afghans Filled With Hope, Disillusionment - By ERIC TALMADGE, AP Dec 17

KABUL, Afghanistan - Not so long ago, Mohammad Tahir was a government official with a comfortable salary and a position in the Defense Ministry. Today, he sells bread from a wood shack on the side of a road. To Tahir, democracy is a distant dream.

"It appears our country is moving in that direction," he said as just a few miles away the final preparations were being made to open Afghanistan's first parliament in more than 30 years. "But my life is getting worse."

Though proud to be once again participating in the administration of their own government, the anticipation many Afghans feel ahead of the opening of parliament Monday is marred by deep-rooted pessimism and doubt.

Like Tahir, many cite a litany of pressing day-to-day concerns — rising unemployment and prices, long stretches without electricity, the dangers of crime and the random violence of an ongoing insurgency.

"I'm not optimistic at all," Tahir said as a group of fellow shopkeepers nearby nodded in agreement. "We've done our part. Now it is up to the politicians to do theirs."

In a historic vote, Afghans filled the 249-seat Wolesi Jirga in elections three months ago. They also elected provincial councils that then chose two-thirds of the 102-seat upper chamber, the Meshrano Jirga. President Hamid Karzai, a popular figure here, appointed the remaining 34 members.

The elections were generally seen as a success and marked a major step forward after the ouster of the hardline Taliban regime four years ago. It will be the first time parliament has convened in this war-ravaged country since 1973.

The elections were even more impressive considering the hurdles Afghanistan continues to face. After three decades of occupation and civil war, its economy is in shambles and its security is in large part in the hands of the 20,000 U.S. troops and thousands of international peacekeepers deployed here. Bombings and suicide attacks are a fact of daily life.

So everyone agrees the road ahead will be bumpy. Many critics — and average Afghans such as Tahir — say the legitimacy of the parliamentary elections was undermined by the government's failure to keep warlords from strong-arming their way into office.

"The opening of parliament will not be viewed by many Afghans as a positive step," said Saman Zia-Zarifi, the research director for the Asia division of New York-based Human Rights Watch. "They will see it as a potential disaster."

Human Rights Watch has accused many of the lawmakers of rights abuses or of involvement in the drug trade, which Zia-Zarifi said gives them money, power and independence from the dictates of the central government.

NATO's top operational commander, U.S. Gen. James L. Jones, said this week that drugs are a greater security threat in Afghanistan than a Taliban resurgence. Opium production has boomed since the fall of the Taliban, stoking fears that Afghanistan — source of 80 percent of the world's heroin — is becoming a state financed by the illegal drug trade.

Human Rights Watch has singled out a number of politicians for abuses including one-time Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim, a former Northern Alliance leader and warlord; Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, another powerful militia leader; and Abdul Salaam Rocketi, a former Taliban commander.

"People look at the parliament and they think, `All these guys are back,'" Zia-Zarifi said. "The day parliament opens, people are going to look at whether the warlords are going to behave themselves, and what is the government going to do about it."

U.S.-Afghanistan calls screened - Eric Lichtblau, James Risen, New York Times Sunday, December 18, 2005

Washington -- The National Security Agency first began to conduct warrantless eavesdropping on telephone calls and e-mail messages between the United States and Afghanistan months before President Bush officially authorized a broader version of the agency's special domestic collection program, according to current and former government officials.

The security agency surveillance of telecommunications between the United States and Afghanistan began in the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and the Pentagon, the officials said.

The agency operation included eavesdropping on communications between Americans and other individuals in the United States and people in Afghanistan without the court-approved search warrants that are normally required for such domestic intelligence activities.

On Saturday, President Bush confirmed the existence of the security agency's domestic intelligence collection program and defended it, saying it had been instrumental in disrupting terrorist cells in America.

After the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration and senior U.S. intelligence officials quickly decided that existing laws and regulations restricting the government's ability to monitor American communications were too rigid to permit quick and flexible access to international calls and e-mail traffic involving terrorism suspects.

Bush administration officials also believed that the intelligence community, including the CIA and the NSA, had been too risk-averse before the attacks and had missed opportunities to prevent them.

In the days after the attacks, the CIA determined that al Qaeda, which had found a haven in Afghanistan, was responsible. Congress quickly passed a resolution authorizing the president to conduct a war on terrorism, and the security agency was secretly ordered to begin conducting comprehensive coverage of all communications into and out of Afghanistan, including those to and from the United States, current and former officials said.

It could not be learned whether Bush issued a formal, written order authorizing the early surveillance of communications between the United States and Afghanistan that was later superseded by the broader order. A White House spokesman, Maria Tamburri, declined to comment.

Pakistan envoy sees no major Taliban resurgence - Dec 16, 2005

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pakistan's ambassador acknowledged on Thursday that "remnants" of Taliban and al Qaeda militants continue to operate in Afghanistan and his country's border, but insisted they are not resurging significantly.

In an interview with Reuters, Jehangir Karamat said Osama bin Laden has lost effectiveness, that his al Qaeda organisation has no overarching leadership capable of directing attacks worldwide and that it would be unwise to become "obsessed" with capturing the Islamist militant who directed the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Four years after U.S.-led forces overthrew the Taliban, Afghanistan is still troubled by a Taliban-led Islamist militant insurgency and the country has seen a spate of suicide attacks in recent weeks.

In addition, there are media reports that Pakistan's rugged Waziristan region along the Afghan border may be slipping back into the hands of Taliban and al Qaeda militants, despite the presence of some 60,000 Pakistani troops.

In Afghanistan, "these are dissidents, political outsiders, some remnants of the Taliban on the run who are carrying out these episodic periodic attacks (but it is a) transient tactical phenomenon" that will end when the country stabilises, Karamat said.

"I think there is no large-scale organised Taliban presence anywhere" in Afghanistan and the overall outlook is "excellent," said Karamat, former chairman of Pakistan's joint chiefs of staff and chief of army staff.

As for Waziristan, Karamat played down recent unrest, attributing it largely to "tribal infighting" and the involvement of Taliban and dissidents who prefer an unstable environment in which to traffic narcotics and weapons.

A blast in North Waziristan killed an al Qaeda commander, Abu Hamza Rabia, and four other people on December 3. Authorities in Pakistan say Rabia died when explosives at his hide-out detonated accidentally, but villagers said the blast was caused by a missile from an aircraft, possibly a U.S. drone.

The former U.S. September 11 commission, which wrote a 2004 analysis of what went wrong before and after the 2001 hijacked plane attacks, last month criticised Pakistan for continuing to be a sanctuary and training ground for terrorists.

Karamat said Islamabad was vigorously working to keep the region under control with the border "strongly defended on both sides with no chance of any alien presence there."

Saudi Arabia's ambassador to Washington, Prince Turki al Faisal, said last week bin Laden has been marginalized but the failure to capture him enhanced a sense of al Qaeda's invincibility and the group remained capable of launching attacks.

Karamat said he did not know the status of bin Laden -- widely believed hiding along the Afghan-Pakistani border -- but "I don't think he's effective (and) I don't think there is an overarching leadership that is directing operations worldwide."

Recent edicts and tapes issued in al Qaeda's name are "a ploy to give an impression that there is overall control, guidance and direction" to the group's activities, he said.

Last week, al Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahri released a video urging militants to attack oil targets in Muslim states. Karamat said efforts are still under way to find bin Laden but "we shouldn't be obsessed with that" because it would divert attention from other anti-terror war operations.

He said Pakistan continues to press the Bush administration for the opportunity to negotiate the same kind of civilian nuclear co-operation agreement reached in July with India, even though senior U.S. officials have publicly ruled out this possibility.

Former Taliban commander calls on militants to give up resistance – Xinhua via People's Daily (China) / December 17, 2005

Mullah Abdul Salam Rcoketi, a former Taliban commander and member of Afghanistan's post-Taliban parliament, on Saturday called on his former comrades to give up militancy and join government.

"War is not the way to serve our people. I urge the Taliban to lay down arm, to give up resistance and join the government to serve the nation through the government platform," he told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.

The bearded ex-militias commander, who earned the name of Rocketi for his skill in using rockets against helicopters, was of the view that fighting government would further damage the country's interests. "Afghans have to get untied and should work for stabilizing durable peace and security in the country," he stressed.

Commenting on his possible problem with his former foes in the parliament, the 49-year-old former Taliban commander emphasized " forgetting the past," adding that "We should bury the past and serve our nation through parliament."

Majority of the members of the two-chamber parliaments are associates of the former regimes, anti-Soviet Union resistance groups and Taliban's former loyalists who fought each other for power and were involved in the past 25 years of war and civil strive.

Remnants of the ousted Taliban regime who staged a violent comeback have vowed to overthrow the Karzai-led administration and expel the US-dominated foreign troops from Afghanistan by Jihad or holy war.

The maiden session of the 249-seat Wolsi Jirga or Lower House and 102-member Mushrano Jirga or Upper House of parliament would be held amid tight security soon.

Afghan Daily Report - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty 16 December 2005

Education Head And Staffer Killed In South-Central Afghanistan

The bodies of the leader of the Giro District Education Department in Ghazni Province and one of his staffers were found on 15 December, Xinhua News Agency reported. The intelligence department chief of Ghazni, Abdul Wakil Kamyab, told Xinhua that Asadullah and one of his staff were kidnapped by a "group of militants" they day before their bodies were found in Andar District, north of Giro. Kamyab blamed the "enemies of Afghanistan" for the attack -- a term used by Afghan government officials to denote the neo-Taliban. AT

U.S. Soldier Killed In Southern Afghanistan

A U.S. serviceman was killed and another U.S. soldier and an Afghan National Army soldier were wounded in a firefight with suspected neo-Taliban in Kandahar Province on 15 December, Reuters reported. One neo-Taliban militiaman was also reported killed. AT

Video Recording Of Afghan Suicide Bomber Discovered

A videotape of a neo-Taliban member involved in a deadly suicide attack in Kabul in November has been released in Miarnshah, a city in the Northwest Frontier Province of Pakistan, Pajhwak News Agency reported on 15 December. The recorded testimony, similar to those made by Arab suicide bombers operating in Iraq and Israel, reportedly shows a man identified as Amanullah who was one of two suicide bombers targeting NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) troops in Kabul, killing a German soldier and several Afghan civilians (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 15 and 16 November 2005). Amanullah says in the 30-minute recording that he is willing to "die in the way of Allah." "I am ready for staging a suicide attack and hope Allah will give me a place in paradise," Amanullah says in the recording. It also shows Amanullah on a motorcycle carrying out his mission. At the time of the attack, the neo-Taliban said one of their ranks from Nangarhar Province in eastern Afghanistan was responsible. According to Pajhwak, the man speaking on the videotape has an accent common in eastern Afghanistan. AT

Bosnian Serbs To Donate Weapons To Afghanistan

Republika Srpska Defense Minister Milovan Stankovic has proposed to donate surplus weapons to Afghanistan, the Banja Luka daily "Nezavisne Novine" reported on 15 December. If the proposal is accepted by Bosnian Serb authorities, the Afghan government would receive thousands of automatic rifles and several hundred machine guns. The surplus weapons were to destroyed, Stankovic said. According to a report the United States proposed that the Bosnian Serb forces send their surplus weapons to Afghanistan. AT

Over 445,000 Afghan refugees return home from Pakistan - (DPA) 16 December 2005

ISLAMABAD - A United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) official said on Friday that more than 445,000 Afghans had been repatriated to their country from Pakistan this year, the highest in three years.

The remarks by Indrika Ratwatte, UNHCR’s Assistant Representative in the country, came amid plans by the commission to temporarily suspend its voluntary repatriation programme for Afghan refugees in Pakistan.

“It’s the highest number of returns since 2002, when nearly 1.6 million Afghans went home from Pakistan with UNHCR assistance,” Ratwatte said.

In all, more than 2.73 million Afghans have gone home from Pakistan under the voluntary repatriation programme (VRP) since it started in 2002. “Next year’s repatriation season will begin in March as usual,” Ratwatte said. There are an estimated 2.6 million Afghans still living in Pakistan.

Last convoys of the year head home to Afghanistan from Pakistan - The Pakistan Link

ATTOCK Dec 16 : The year's last return convoys are leaving Pakistan for Afghanistan as the UN refugee agency winds up its repatriation season for the winter.

A total of 29 Afghan families – 164 individuals – left three different Pakistani provinces and joined a convoy that set off on Monday towards their homes in three different Afghan provinces. Their departure from Pakistan's North West Frontier, Sindh and Balochistan Provinces came a week before December 20, when UNHCR will temporarily suspend its voluntary repatriation operation over the course of winter.

"I know this is not a suitable time for repatriation, because there is a harsh winter in Afghanistan, but my family feels alone here without my relatives, who left earlier this year," said Mohammad Zia, aged 27. "We want to join them. At least we'll be happy among our relatives."

Zia had been living for five years in Attock, about an hour's drive from the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. "I'm a carpet weaver and I was working in the carpet-weaving factory in Attock," he explained, adding that he had to complete his last carpet – which took three months to make – before receiving his last pay-check.

"I have a house and land in Kabul and I want to rebuild them now," he said. "I hope and believe that I can spend my life in Afghanistan better than in Pakistan. At least I will not be a refugee, and I will try to find a job. If I don't find one, I will start a small carpet-weaving factory with the help of my uncle in Kabul."

Having finished his last carpet just in time, Zia left on Monday on the last convoy of the year from Attock – the site of a string of long-standing refugee camps dating back to the 1980s' Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the evolving civil war that tore the country further apart during the 1990s.

In addition to those, like Zia, who were making for Kabul, other refugees on the convoy were heading for Jawzjan and Kunduz provinces in the far north of Afghanistan. For them, Kabul would simply be a pit-stop before they headed up the famous Salang highway which cuts through the Hindu Kush mountain range to the north.

Abdul Aziz was one of those heading for Jawzjan, along with his sister. However, he had decided to leave his wife and one-year-old daughter in Attock for the time being. "I am going now to my country because I want to construct my home," he said. "I want to start farming on my land and earn some money. I don't want my wife and daughter to face any problems when they come next year."

During 2005, UNHCR has helped more than 445,000 Afghans to return home from Pakistan under the agency's voluntary repatriation programme. "It's the highest number of returns since 2002, when nearly 1.6 million Afghans went home with UNHCR assistance," said Indrika Ratwatte, UNHCR's Assistant Representative in Pakistan. "In all, more than 2.73 million Afghans have gone home from Pakistan under this programme since it started in 2002."

A further 1.5 million refugees have gone home from Iran since early 2002 – meaning a staggering 4.2 million Afghans in all have returned to their homeland since the fall of the Taliban: the biggest organized repatriation since the UN refugee agency was created in 1951.

Under the assisted return programme, UNHCR offers Afghans who wish to go home a package of travel assistance, varying from $4 to $37 per person depending on the distance, and a cash payment of $12 per person to help them re-establish themselves in Afghanistan. The assistance is paid once returnees have actually arrived back in Afghanistan.

All those over the age of six who are repatriating with UNHCR assistance must go through an iris recognition test, which ensures that no one receives the return package more than once. This ground-breaking technology was first tested on returnees in Pakistan in the autumn of 2002, and adopted for all assisted returns the following year.

UNHCR and the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to extend the expiry date for the present Tripartite Agreement, which regulates the voluntary repatriation of Afghans, from March to December 2006. Next year's repatriation season will begin in March as usual.

There are an estimated 2.6 million Afghans still living in Pakistan. This figure is based on the March 2005 census that counted some 3 million Afghans in Pakistan and takes into account the 445,000 who have gone home since then. In the Islamic Republic of Iran, there are still approximately one million registered Afghans, after some 260,000 refugees repatriated in 2005 – meaning a total of some 700,000 have returned from both countries during the course of this year.

India to step up security for nationals working in strife-torn Afghan – (AP) 16 December 2005

NEW DELHI - India has decided to strengthen security for its nationals working in Afghanistan, weeks after an Indian was abducted and killed, an official spokesman said on Friday.

“A review of security guidelines for Indians working in Afghanistan is being undertaken in consultation with local authorities. Security arrangements are being strengthened and necessary precautions taken,” said Navtej Sarna, the External Affairs Ministry spokesman.

A team of Indian officials will visit Afghanistan soon to review the security situation and recommend measures to ensure the safety of Indians there, Sarna said.

An Indian driver, Maniappan Raman Kutty, working at a road construction site in southwestern Nimroz province was abducted and killed last month, prompting the Indian government to order the review of security for the roughly 2,000 Indian nationals working on numerous private and public-sector reconstruction projects in Afghanistan.

India is helping Afghanistan rebuild its schools and hospitals and has supplied dozens of trucks and jeeps to Afghanistan’s new US-trained army. It is also involved in building roads and a multimillion dollar dam near the western city of Herat.

India says it has spent about US$400 million (Ð302 million) in aid for Afghanistan since 2001, mainly for reconstruction work in the areas of hydroelectric power, road construction, agriculture, industry, telecommunications, education and health.

India pledged another $50 million (Ð40 million) for rebuilding infrastructure in Afghanistan during a visit by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Kabul in August.

Free trade between Pakistan, Afghanistan urged – The News International

PESHAWAR: ANP president Senator Asfandyar Wali Khan has repeated his party demand to do away with the visa restriction between the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan and allowing free trade and introduction of bus service via Peshawar-Kabul and Quetta-Kandahar routes.

The suggestion was made during a meeting with the Peshawar-based Afghan Consul-General, Abdul Khaliq Farahi, who called on the ANP president on Friday. Farahi was accompanied by Ahmad Saeedi and Zahir Babari while Asfandiar Wali was assisted by Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour, Afrasyab Khattak, Bashir Bilour, Mian Iftikhar Hussain, Imran Afridi, Khan Nawab and the party MPAs, Khalil Abbas, Shaukat Habib, Mukhtiar Ahmad and Mir Rehman.

He said that the ANP was in favour of promoting peace, economic stability and cultural relations with Afghanistan and in the region, adding that his party reiterated its stand on lifting the visa restriction between the two countries, construction and establishment of trade routes, contacts among educational institutions and starting bus services between Kabul and Peshawar and Quetta and Kandahar.

[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.]