Afghan governor survives suicide attac k

Kandahar (AFP) - A suicide bomber tried to kill the governor of a volatile southern Afghan province by blowing up an explosives-filled vehicle as the official was going to work, officials said.

A man who said he was a spokesman for loyalists of the Taliban government ousted in 2001-claimed responsibility for the attack on behalf of the hardliners, who are waging an insurgency.

The attacker detonated the explosives as Helmand governor Sher Mohammad left his vehicle to enter his office in the provincial capital Lashkar Gah, his spokesman Mohammad Wali said on Monday.

The governor was not hurt. The bomber survived but lost both his arms and both his legs, Wali said. Intelligence officers were trying to get as much information as possible from the man "before he dies," including his nationality, Wali said. "He's an elderly man with a shaved face and big moustache," Wali said.

Interior ministry spokesman Yousuf Stanizai said the bomber was a foreign national. "He has been badly injured and is in coma at the hospital," Stanizai said in the capital Kabul. But purported Taliban spokesman Yousf Ahmadi telephoned AFP and said the attacker was an Afghan national from Helmand.

"The suicide attack was carried out by one of our mujahedin (holy warriors). His name was Salahuddin and he was 55 years old," he said from an unknown location.

He said the attack was aimed at US military forces based near the governor's office. Wali said the governor had been due Monday to meet US-led forces and local security agencies to discuss security in the troubled province.

Helmand is one of several southern provinces that sees regular attacks as part of an insurgency against the government being waged mainly by the Taliban and their supporters.

This year has been the worst for insurgency-linked violence since the fall of the Taliban, with about 1,400 people killed -- most of them militants.

Afghanistan to announce final election results this week

Kabul (AFP) - The final results from Afghanistan's first legislative election for more than three decades will be announced this Wednesday after delays due to fraud complaints, an election official said.

"The final results from the parliamentary election will be announced at a press conference on Wednesday," said a spokesman for the Afghan and UN Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB), Aleem Siddique.

Ballots cast in up to three percent of polling stations were excluded from the vote count because of fraud allegations including ballot-stuffing, the JEMB said last month.

The JEMB had received about 5,400 complaints but the vast majority could not be substantiated. Only 500 could affect the outcome of the ballot. The elections were held in September for the 249 members of the Wolesi Jirga, or lower house of parliament, and 420 members of the 34 provincial councils.

Siddique said the JEMB will also announce criteria for the formation of the war-shattered country's 102-member Upper House (Meshrano Jirga). Two thirds of the Meshrano Jirga will be appointed by provincial councils and one third by President Hamid Karzai, he said.

Under Afghan electoral law, one third of the Meshrano Jirga was to be chosen by Karzai, one third by provincial councils and one third by district councils. Results had initially been expected by October 22. However, the vote count for the whole country was only completed early last week. Parliament is due to sit in December.

Afghanistan's last parliamentary elections were held in 1969, before a coup in 1973 and the 1979-89 occupation by the Soviet Union. The years of civil war that followed culminated in the rise of the fundamentalist Islamic Taliban regime in 1996. They were ousted by a US-led invasion in late 2001.

Ahmadinejad, Karzai discuss regional developments - IRNA 11/06/2005

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai discussed mutual as well as regional developments over phone on Friday.

During the conversation, the two presidents also congratulated each other and the two nations on the auspicious occasion of Eid al-Fitr marking the end of holy month of Ramadan.

The Iranian president expressed hope that with the establishment of security and peace in Afghanistan, grounds for manifestation of Islamic traditions would be created in the country.

The Afghan president, for his part, said that the Iranian government and nation have in recent decades had the best attitude towards and developed the best possible ties with Afghanistan and expressed the hope that the friendly ties would be continued in the future.

According to the Press Bureau of the presidential office, the two presidents underlined exchange of high ranking delegations between the two countries' officials in the near future.

Taliban's fugitive leader calls for new jihad in Afghanistan

Kandahar (AFP) - The fugitive leader of Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents has called on people to unite and join his ousted guerrillas in a "jihad" or holy war against US forces in the country.

Mullah Mohammad Omar, whose fundamentalist regime was toppled by a US-led invasion in late 2001, said the Taliban would increase attacks on US forces and that "the victory is close."

"...I'm calling on the Muslim nation of Afghanistan to do not get disappointed and join the jihad against the invader Americans," he said in a statement faxed to news agencies in the southern city of Kandahar, a Taliban stronghold till late 2001.

"The victory is close," said the statement faxed from his press office, which quoted Omar as saying that jihad meant using arms, money and writing. "The Muslim nation should allocate their lives, wealth and pens for the jihad," it said on Sunday. The statement contains greetings from Omar for the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr and was issued last Friday.

AFGHANISTAN JOINS CENTRAL ASIAN REGIONAL ECONOMIC COOPERATION PROGRAMME - UzReport.com 06.11.2005

Afghanistan has joined the Central Asian Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) programme, following a decision by the CAREC 4th ministerial conference in Bishkek, Kyryz Republic on Sunday.

Considering the proximity of China, India and Russia as rapidly developing markets, Afghanistan's participation is strategically important for the organization's member states and will increase transit to sea across Afghanistan, the conference said in a statement.

CAREC now includes Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. "We hope that during our next meeting in Urumqi [China], Russia, which attended today's talks as an observer, will join the CAREC," Deputy Kyrgyz Finance Minister Emirlan Toromyrzayev said during the meeting.

During today's meeting, representatives of Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan called on one another to accelerate the integration of the economies of the region's countries and neighbouring states.

"The region's high rates of economic growth reflect a new era in which the growth of trade and other forms of openness and modernization replace prejudices. Although trade barriers and transportation costs are still seriously hindering the development of the region, the CAREC countries recognize that only through cooperation can they make progress," the participants say in the final statement.

The Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) programme is an ADB-supported initiative to encourage economic cooperation in Central Asia that began in 1997. The primary objective of the CAREC Program is to promote economic growth and raise living standards in its member countries by encouraging regional economic cooperation. The Program concentrated on financing infrastructure projects and improving the region's policy environment in the priority areas of transport (especially road transport), energy (including the water-energy nexus) and trade policy trade facilitation (especially customs cooperation).

Afghan poet dies after battering – BBC

Nadia Anjuman had a cut to her head

A well-known Afghan poet and journalist has died from her injuries after being beaten, police say. Officers found the body of Nadia Anjuman, 25, at her home in the western city of Herat.

A senior police officer said her husband had confessed to hitting her during a row. Nadia Anjuman, a student at Herat university, had a first book of poetry printed this year. She was popular in Afghanistan and neighbouring Iran.

Police say the poet received a cut to her head. Blood she vomited may help determine the cause of death, the Pajhwok news agency reported. It said her family had refused to allow doctors to carry out a post mortem.

Delays Hurting U.S. Rebuilding In Afghanistan -

By DAVID ROHDE and CARLOTTA GALL Published: November 7

TURMAI, Afghanistan, Nov. 2 - Islamuddin Ahmadiyar, a 22-year-old student, remembers the excitement in this dusty farming hamlet in central Afghanistan when American contractors broke ground two years ago.

A one-story, 12-room health clinic, nestled between apple and mulberry tree groves, was to replace the mud hut where the village's lone doctor labored through Afghanistan's quarter-century nightmare of Soviet occupation, civil war and Taliban rule.

But the clinic remains an unfinished shell, one of 96 American-financed clinics and schools that a New Jersey-based company was supposed to build by September 2004. To date, nine clinics and two schools have been completed and passed inspection, according to the company.

The company, the Louis Berger Group, says progress has been slowed by the requirement to use Afghan construction companies, forcing it to hunt, sometimes vainly, for those that can work fast and to high standards. A design flaw is also forcing it to replace or strengthen the roofs of 89 of the buildings.

"If you play just the numbers game, we're going to look bad, no doubt about it," said Thomas Nicastro, a Louis Berger vice president. "But if you look at this as a development issue, then you have an understanding of what we're trying to do."

Four years after American-led forces ousted the Taliban, the United States has spent $1.3 billion on reconstruction in Afghanistan, intending to win over Afghans with tangible signs of progress. And indeed, there are some. But to Afghans, the Turmai clinic is emblematic of what they see as a wasteful, slow-moving effort that benefits foreigners far more than themselves. "The aid that comes from other countries for the Afghan people, it's not going to the Afghan people," said Mr. Ahmadiyar. "It's being wasted."

The stakes are enormous. Afghans, famed for briefly tolerating and then viciously turning on occupiers from the British in the 19th century to the Soviets in the 1980's, are increasingly disenchanted with the American-led reconstruction program.

Meanwhile, the United States hopes to withdraw 4,000 soldiers from the country's south next spring; a drop in overall foreign aid is expected; and Taliban attacks are rising. So both Afghan officials and foreign diplomats are assessing what has been achieved during the past four years, and many are disturbed by what they see.

Government ministers here say that the foreign consultants and contractors the Americans pay for are producing shoddy work and achieving little - though charging dearly.

"Assistance is coming to Afghanistan, but we don't know how it is spent, where it is spent," said Amin Farhang, the Afghan minister of economy, who oversees foreign assistance programs.

And a July report by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, sharply criticized the American reconstruction effort and the department leading it, the United States Agency for International Development. It said inconsistent financing, severe staff shortages and a lack of oversight slowed the efforts.

"We really need to reform the external assistance in this country," said Jean Mazurelle, the World Bank manager in Afghanistan. "We are not in the position to provide the result on the ground that the people of this country are expecting."

Alonzo Fulgham, A.I.D.'s mission director in Kabul, said much progress had been made, citing two national elections and five times as many children in school, including 1.6 million girls. He dismissed criticism, saying that under dangerous conditions the agency had produced strong oversight, planning and achievements. He said American programs had built or refurbished 312 schools and 338 clinics, and constructed 500 miles of asphalt road and resurfaced another 500 miles. He said major progress had been made despite Taliban attacks that have killed 80 people working on agency projects, most of them Afghans.

The head of A.I.D. in Washington, Andrew Natsios, also defended his agency, which leads the American nation-building efforts in Iraq as well. But he noted that the agency's spending had doubled since 2000 to $14 billion, while its staff of 2,300 had grown by only 100.

Until this year, the A.I.D. office in Kabul suffered severe personnel shortages that limited its ability to monitor contractors, according to the G.A.O. report. The agency went from 12 staff members in Kabul in 2002 to 39 in 2003, 101 in 2004 and 160 this year, with 35 in outlying provinces. The report said the mission managed $11.2 million per staff member in 2004, while worldwide, the norm is $1.3 million.

The reconstruction effort also began slowly. The United States spent $214 million on that in fiscal 2002 and 2003, and then began an "accelerating success" initiative to produce more visible achievements before Afghan and American presidential elections in the fall of 2004. Reconstruction spending increased to $1.1 billion in fiscal 2004 and 2005. In Iraq, the United States has spent $9 billion on reconstruction. President Hamid Karzai and his top ministers, who now will have to answer to Parliament as well as the public, are calling for stricter oversight over all and greater government control of reconstruction money.

While Afghans remain grateful, they argue that much more could have been achieved. "This golden period has also been this massive waste period," said Jawed Ludin, Mr. Karzai's chief of staff. "The efficiency has to be increased."

Slow Gains Cause Rancor - The discontent was reflected in the elections last month, according to Western diplomats and analysts. Ramazan Bashardost, a demagogic former minister who bitterly, and often falsely, accused "a mafia" of foreigners and government officials of pocketing vast amounts of reconstruction funds, was elected to Parliament with the third highest vote total in Kabul.

Seated this week outside the modest tent that served as his campaign headquarters, the populist vowed to start a formal investigation when the new Parliament sits next month. "From the tax money of Americans, these people are living like kings," Mr. Bashardost said. "This money is donated so that it should be given to the hungry people of Afghanistan."

At the unfinished health clinic in Turmai, Mr. Ahmadiyar and other college students smiled when asked when they thought the building would open. "Probably another three years," Mr. Ahmadiyar said, and laughed.

In 2002 and 2003, profit-making companies won five of six major A.I.D. contracts in education, legal reform, agriculture, economic governance and infrastructure.

Louis Berger, an engineering consulting company with 3,000 employees worldwide and extensive construction experience in developing countries, won the largest: a sweeping contract, eventually worth $665 million, to build schools, health clinics, roads and power systems.

In April 2003, after President Bush promised a new highway to link Kabul to the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar by the end of the year, A.I.D. officials directed Louis Berger to focus on the road.

The urgency doubled costs, according to the Government Accountability Office report. Louis Berger hired Turkish and Indian road construction companies. Taliban attacks killed several employees and guards. At a final cost of roughly $1 million per mile, the road was completed on schedule.

The company's school and clinic program, meanwhile, progressed slowly. Mr. Nicastro of Louis Berger said the company and the aid agency decided to build California-standard earthquake-resistant schools and clinics, at a cost of $174,000 for a school and $133,000 for a clinic. It struggled to find Afghan companies that could build to its specifications.

Officials from one nonprofit organization, which builds A.I.D.-approved schools for roughly $150,000 and clinics for $85,000, said the Louis Berger designs were more complex than necessary.

Louis Berger initially proposed building prefabricated school buildings, a company official said, but aid agency officials rejected the idea because it would not help develop an Afghan construction industry.

"Part of the mission was to build Afghan construction capability," said Larry Walker, a vice president. "By the time we finish, there will be eight Afghan construction firms that are able to do international-quality construction."

The company subcontracted the construction of the Turmai clinic to a local company. That company, villagers said, passed the work on to another Afghan company. Neither subcontractor could be reached for comment.

The second began work but cut corners, using four reinforcing beams instead of six, putting sand under the floor in some places instead of concrete and building doors out of chipboard instead of wood, according to villagers. That company failed to pay local workers for months.

Mohammed Ali, a 40-year-old security guard and father of six who had not been paid for half a year, said American employees of Louis Berger visited the site at least three times. Inspectors contracted by A.I.D. visited weekly, he said. All companies made their profit, he said, but no one seemed to ensure that the clinic would be properly built. "Everyone is doing their reports," he said. "They don't care about what they should actually be doing here."

Louis Berger officials said they maintained strict oversight over all their projects and have fired 3 of 11 Afghans subcontractors for poor quality work and other problems.

Last month Louis Berger hired Afghans to finish the clinic and said it would pay the additional costs itself. The company said all 96 of its contracted buildings would be done by the end of the year.

As for the faulty roof design, Louis Berger officials blamed an American subcontractor who they declined to name, saying they were pursuing damages. They said Louis Berger would pay the $3 million costs of strengthening or replacing the 89 roofs.

Mr. Fulgham, the A.I.D. director in Kabul, defended Louis Berger's work, saying that finding qualified contractors was difficult and that its road construction was successful. "It's very easy to look back and be a Monday morning quarterback," he said. "But I think they answered the call."

The five nonprofit groups also building schools for A.I.D. have also struggled to find skilled contactors and experienced delays, aid agency officials said, though none as severe as Louis Berger. Development groups with long experience in Afghanistan said Louis Berger's experience showed that large foreign contractors may not be the best choice to build in difficult places like Afghanistan, where intensive supervision is an absolute necessity. One, Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, said it had built 16 health clinics in the northern province of Kunduz on time, while the 16 that were to be built in the same province by Louis Berger remain unfinished four months after the deadline.

Consultants and Criticism - Louis Berger is not the only company that has drawn criticism. Bearing Point, formerly KPMG Pete Marwick, won an aid agency contract to "improve economic governance" in the Afghan Finance Ministry and Central Bank and other ministries. The contract eventually grew to be worth $98 million.

The company, based in McLean, Va., put roughly 50 foreign advisers to work in the bank and ministries in 2003 and 2004. Bearing Point and A.I.D. officials declined to give the cost, but Afghanistan's current finance minister said it was $500,000 a year for each consultant, roughly $150,000 for a consultant's salary and the rest to cover living expenses and security, and the company's overhead and profit.

Complaining that the consultants were too numerous and too expensive, and sometimes less effective than expected, Afghan officials tried to terminate the contract in 2004, according to the G.A.O. report. But A.I.D. said the consultants were performing well, and Bearing Point remained.

Anwar ul Haq Ahadi, the finance minister (on leave from Providence College in Rhode Island, where he is a professor), cut the number of his Bearing Point advisers roughly in half this year, to 27.

"There were some advisers I don't think were terribly necessary," said Mr. Ahadi. "In some cases, the positions were not necessary, and in other cases they were not the strongest professionals."

Rob Hager, an American lawyer and former Bearing Point consultant who now works for the Asian Development Bank in Kabul, agreed that some consultants were subpar. He said A.I.D. should be far more stringent and confrontational with contractors in Afghanistan. "They can put in any bozo," said Mr. Hager. "Pay them what they want and make their profit."

Lori Bittner, a managing director for Bearing Point, declined to state the company's fees, but said they were commensurate with those of other consulting companies. She said that Afghan officials approved the number of consultants and that they had helped introduce a new currency, attracted 12 commercial banks and issued licenses to cellphone companies.

"Many of them have been with Bearing Point for 5 to 10 years and have worked in many countries," she said. "They are individuals that know how to build a government, and revamp a government and give advice."

Some members of Congress say an understaffed A.I.D., which has shrunk from a height of 13,000 during the Vietnam War, has become far too reliant on large construction companies and Washington-based consulting firms to carry out its development programs. "Usaid increasingly is becoming a check-writing agency," said Tim Rieser, an aide to Senator Patrick Leahy, Democrat of Vermont. "We have to address the agency's staffing shortage in the context of designing and implementing effective programs."

Eager to blunt Afghan frustration, Mr. Karzai has ordered his ministers to tour the provinces and inspect reconstruction projects. Mr. Farhang, the economy minister, said he had used government pressure to force contractors to redo inferior work on two roads and a dozen schools.

"The important thing is to have supervision, otherwise we will lose money," he said. "In the end, it is the Parliament and the Afghan people who will ask me and the other ministers what we did and where the money was spent."

1.3m of the 2.3m Afghan refugees in Iran return

LONDON, November 7 (IranMania) - An Interior Ministry official said 1 mln and 300 thousand of the 2 mln and 300 thousand Afghan refugees in Iran have returned to their country since 2001.

Speaking on the sidelines of the inauguration of the Arbitration Committee of Qazvin Afghan Refugees, Ahmad Hosseini, who heads the ministry?s Bureau for Aliens and Foreign Immigrant Affairs, told IRNA that 100,000 of the total 200,000 Iraqis have also returned to their country during the same period.

Noting that the Interior Ministry is planning to conduct the second phase of the census of Afghan nationals in Iran, Hosseini said the Interior Ministry will announce its policies toward Afghans after completing the census.

“What is evident is that all Afghans will eventually return to Afghanistan. This is what the people and government of Iran favor,” he said.

The Interior Ministry official noted that the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai has officially asked Afghans to return to their country. “If the return of Afghans to their country is delayed, it will create more problems for Iranians,” he said.

Hosseini further said the Interior Ministry is trying to remove obstacles to the return of Afghans to their country. “Establishment of arbitration committees for expediting the investigation of judicial cases is one such measure,” he said.

Referring to the fact that Iranians are not racists, Hosseini said the ugly scenes seen in certain countries that claim to be advocates of human rights are absent in Iran.

Press Briefing by Adrian Edwards Spokesperson for the Special Representative of the Secretary-General Kabul – 7 November 2005

• HALO Trust to Destroy 1,100 Mines

On Wednesday, 9 November, HALO Trust will oversee the largest single destruction of mines thus far in Afghanistan. More than 1,100 mines—mostly anti-personnel mines—will be destroyed at HALO Trust’s central demolition site just outside Kabul.

The aim is to alleviate the risk posed by such ordnance, as well as to assist the Government of Afghanistan in meeting its stockpile destruction obligations.

Afghanistan is a party to the Ottawa Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction.

HALO Trust, a non-governmental organization specialised in the removal of war debris, is one of the Afghanistan New Beginnings Programme’s (ANBP) implementing partners for mine destruction.

Last July, ANBP signed a memorandum of understanding with the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to include destruction of anti-personnel landmines in its ammunition survey efforts.

Journalists wishing to attend the event should present themselves at HALO Trust headquarters on Jalalabad road at 10 am on Wednesday.

U NMACA to Provide Media Session This Week

The UN Mine Action Center for Afghanistan (UNMACA) is conducting a training session for national media at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs tomorrow, Tuesday November 8th 2005, starting at 9 am sharp and running to 1 pm.

This session will provide an overview of the work of the Mine Action Programme for Afghanistan. Dr. Mohammed Haidar Reza, Deputy Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the Chairperson of the Mine Action Consultative Group will attend.

Afghan journalists who are interested in participating should contact Masood Ahmad Hamidzada from UNMACA on 070-282-229

• “ Come and Talk” Visit Reaches Out to Afghan Refugees in Iran

Provincial officials and representatives of the UN refugee agency and Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission will this week visit Iran to provide refugees there with first-hand information about conditions in Balkh for returning migrants.

The six-member delegation, which leaves tomorrow, will meet Afghan refugees and officials in Tehran and Mashhad. The aim is to communicate an accurate picture of the current situation in Afghanistan, as well as to address concerns that refugees may have about returning.

Over the past years, similar “Come-and-Talk” visits have been carried out with positive results in Pakistan and Iran, as well as within Afghanistan for internally displaced persons. This is the first mission from Balkh province.

Since March 2002, when UNHCR began its voluntary repatriation operation, more than 832,000 Afghans have returned from Iran with UNHCR assistance, including more than 53,000 so far this year.

International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflicts

Yesterday, Sunday November 6, was international day for preventing exploitation of the environment in war and armed conflict. Addressing the environmental damage caused by war is an integral aspect of post-conflict reconstruction and recovery, and is thus a growing focus of UN activities.

Here in Afghanistan, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), is helping to build the country’s Environmental Protection Agency and has carried out extensive post-conflict studies to help focus rehabilitation of livelihoods. In Serbia and Montenegro UNEP has cleaned up chemically contaminated sites, while in the Mesopotamian marshlands between Iraq and Iran work has been ongoing to re-flood and re-habilitate areas that were previously almost completely destroyed.

The Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, marked the occasion yesterday by calling for a redoubling of efforts to prevent the exploitation and degradation of the environment during times of war.

Click here for the Secretary-General’s full statement.

Questions & Answers

Question: As we know, election results will be announced on Wednesday. So far, a number of the commanders who were involved in the civil war and atrocities in the country are on the list [of winning candidates]. Isn’t the UN concerned about the involvement of people who have been accused by human rights watchdogs?

Spokesperson: I think first of all, we’ll have to wait and see exactly who gets in to Parliament and Provincial Councils when the results are finalized later this week, and once we’ve seen the entire outcome of the complaints process that the ECC is finalizing at the moment.

As you know, the election provided some guidelines as to who could be included as a candidate for elections, and these precluded people who had prior convictions for crimes, including crimes against humanity.

We all know that some people who do have pasts that involve human rights violations are likely to end up in Parliament and the Provincial Councils. Obviously, we wish that a better means could have been found to ensure a successful parliament. But I think the important point here is that you’re bringing people with such pasts into a forum where they will have to follow certain democratic and peaceful norms.

This is the first parliament in your country in over 30 years, and I think it would be wrong to overlook the fact that you’re [also] getting many people into Parliament who do not have such troubled pasts behind them. As an optimist, I would look at Parliament in terms of the possibilities that might come out of it. We do believe there will be many good people in Parliament, and they have an important job to do for Afghanistan.

Question: I think his question was whether it concerns the UN that those with bad pasts will end up in Parliament.

Spokesperson: Whether it concerns the UN or not, I think we have to acknowledge that there has been a process here that has been followed in this election. That process has included vetting. It has included an election campaign in which people were free to vote for whomever they chose. And let’s not forget that this is something that was not in place before. This is part of the Bonn process. You will now have a representative Parliament and representative Provincial Councils.

It has been a difficult process—we acknowledge that these things are not easy. The important thing now is to look at this Parliament and see what we can get on with. This is something we have to work with and we hope it is going to be beneficial for the future of this country.

I understand the point you’re making. It is difficult, after a long period of war, to have elections and totally exclude people who may have backgrounds that are undesirable.

Question: Can you confirm there are some people who have bad pasts and who are going to be in Parliament?

Spokesperson: I think we all know that among the people who are likely to be in Parliament, there are a number whose names have appeared in human rights reports.

Question: Can you give us a rough figure of how many such people will be in Parliament?

Spokesperson: That question is better addressed to two groups: the JEMB and the Electoral Complaints Commission—as I said, we have to wait for the final results.

But there is substantial documentation about the human rights situation—you can find that from talking to members of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, you can look at what Human Rights Watch has had to say, and you can look at what others have had to say, including UNAMA, on these issues.

Question: You said you are optimistic because this parliament can bring people in who can follow the democratic rules. But don’t you think it will strengthen the culture of impunity in the country?

Spokesperson: Your question is a correct one. However, I think it’s important to consider that there are other aspects at play than simply bringing people to Parliament.

Afghanistan, as you know, is considering a transitional justice plan. UNAMA has been involved in discussions with the Afghan government about this, and we think it’s important that that process continue as well—it [transitional justice] cannot stop simply because a parliament is coming into being.

It’s worth recognizing that in order to deal with impunity, you need to deal with your past. It is for Afghanistan to decide how it wants to address the issue of its past, but dealing with this matter is something UNAMA has been working on with the Afghan Government and others.

Question: Does UNAMA have a reaction regarding Nadia, the woman who was killed yesterday in Herat?

Spokesperson: Thank you for that question—yes. The death of [poet and writer] Nadia Anjuman, as it was reported, is indeed tragic and a great loss to Afghanistan. It needs to be investigated, and anyone found responsible needs to be dealt with in proper accordance with law. As the full circumstances are not yet clear, it would be premature to make a full statement at this point.

However, you may recall that on 18 July this year, Yakin Erturk, the UN’s Special Rapporteur for Violence Against Women, stated here in this room that violence against women remains dramatic in Afghanistan—in its intensity and its pervasiveness. She also made a number of recommendations about dealing with this problem, and I think we’ll be seeing more on this in the months to come. I can refer you to the recommendations she made at that time, which are on UNAMA’s Web site under ‘press briefings’, dated 18 July.

Question : Do you have any contact with the Afghan government on this issue at the moment?

Spokesperson: Our human rights office is aware of this case. As you know, it has only very recently been reported, so I don’t have much to tell you at the moment.

Question: You may have heard there was a suicide attack this morning in Helmand in front of the governor’s office. The attack was at 9 o’clock, and at 10 o’clock there was a meeting scheduled for security agencies with the provincial governor. Was there any UN involvement in the meeting?

Spokesperson: I’ve seen the same reports about this incident. I am not aware of who was supposed to participate in the meeting. If you’d like, I can check into it and get back to you this afternoon.

Afghan Prosecutor releases men held over candidate slaying - Monday November 07

KABUL: Prosecutors in Balkh Province released three men detained in connection with the assassination in late September of Ashraf Ramazan, Pajhwak Afghan News reported.

Ramazan, a candidate for the People`s Council (Wolesi Jirga) of the Afghan National Assembly, was killed along with one of his bodyguards on 27 September in Mazar-e Sharif, the provincial capital of Balkh.

Ramazan`s murder led to large protests in Mazar-e Sharif and in Kabul, prompting the central government to send a special police detachment to Balkh that in October arrested the three men.

Prosecutor Abdul Khaleq La`lpurwal said that Habib al-Rahman, Khan Bai, and Sayyed Asad are all affiliated with the Jami`at-e Islami party and were detained at the request of Ramazan`s family. The men were released after Ramazan`s family failed to "present solid proof" of their guilt, La`lpurwal told Pajhwak.

Protesters in Mazar-e Sharif and Kabul had alleged that Balkh Governor Ata Mohammad Nur, who also is affiliated with Jami`at-e Islami, was somehow implicated in Ramazan`s death. Ramazan won a seat in the national legislature from Balkh that protesters have d emanded should be turned over to his brother.

Afghan general gets his life back - Channel 4 News, UK 11/06/2005

A former Afghan General who became a British citizen has won his life back, by sucessfully petitioning the UN Security Council to remove his name. Before, he was branded an international pariah and deprived of any funds or support, because his name was on the United Nations list.

General Rahmatullah Safi is one of only three people in the world to have their names withdrawn from the international list of those linked to al-Qaeda and the Taleban; a list which is despatched to every country in the world.

Ironic twist landed Afghan satirists in jail - By James Rupert, Newsday  |  November 6, 2005

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Badr Zaman Badr and his brother Abdurrahim Muslim Dost relish writing a good joke that jabs a corrupt politician or distills the sufferings of fellow Afghans. Badr admires the political satires in ''The Canterbury Tales" and ''Gulliver's Travels," and Dost wrote some wicked lampoons in the 1990s, accusing Afghan mullahs of growing rich while preaching and organizing jihad.

So in 2002, when the US military shackled the writers and flew them to the US naval prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, among prisoners whom Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld declared ''the worst of the worst" violent terrorists, the brothers found life imitating farce. For months, interrogators grilled them over a satirical article Dost had written in 1998, when the Clinton administration offered a $5 million reward for Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Dost responded that Afghans put up 5 million Afghanis, about $113, for the arrest of President Clinton.

''It was a lampoon . . . of the poor Afghan economy" under the Taliban, Badr recalled. The interrogators didn't get the joke, he said. ''Again and again, they were asking questions about this article. We had to explain that this was a satire." He paused. ''It was really pathetic." It took the brothers three years to convince the Americans that they posed no threat to Clinton or the United States, and to get released.

As Badr and Dost fought for their freedom, they had enormous advantages over the approximately 500 other captives at Guantanamo Bay. The brothers are university-educated, and Badr, who holds a master's degree in English literature, was one of few prisoners able to speak fluently to the interrogators in their own language. Because both men are writers, much of their lives and political ideas are on public record here in books and articles they have published.

A Pentagon spokesman, Lieutenant Commander Flex Plexico, declared this summer that ''there was no mistake" in the brothers' detention because it ''was directly related to their combat activities [or support] as determined by an appropriate Department of Defense official."

US officials declined to discuss the case. The Pentagon's prison network overseas is assigned to help prevent attacks like those of Sept. 11, 2001, so ''you cannot equate it to a justice system," said Army Colonel Samuel Rob, who was serving this summer as the chief lawyer for US forces in Afghanistan.

Still, he added, innocent victims of the system are ''a small percentage." The military is slow to clear innocent prisoners, largely because of its fear of letting even one actual terrorist get away, Rob said. ''What if this is a truly bad individual, the next World Trade Center bomber, and you let him go? What do you say to the families?" Rob said.

Rob and the Defense Department say the prison system performs satisfactorily in freeing innocent detainees and letting military investigators focus on prisoners who actually are part of terrorist networks. Badr and others, including some former military intelligence soldiers who served at Guantanamo and in Afghanistan, emphatically disagree.

The United States for years called Badr and his brother ''enemy combatants," but the men say they never saw a battlefield. And for an America that seeks a democratized Afghanistan, they seem, potentially, allies.

Badr and Dost are Pashtuns, members of the ethnic group that spawned the Taliban. But the family library where they receive guests is crammed with poetry, histories, and religious treatises -- mind-broadening stuff that the Taliban were more inclined to burn than read.

Like millions of Afghans, they fled to Pakistan during the Soviet occupation of their country in the 1980s and joined one of the many anti-Soviet factions. Their small group was called Jamiat-i-Dawatul Quran wa Sunna, and Dost became editor of its magazine. Even then, ''we were not fighters," Badr said. ''We took part in the war only as writers."

UAE Red Crescent extends aid to Afghanistan - Government of the United Arab Emirates 30 Oct 2005

Kabul - The representative office of the UAE Red Crescent Authority in Afghanistan yesterday distributed various types of assistance to orphans and the needy at their residences, as part of UAE continuous support of the Afghani people.

Abdul Khalifa Saeed Al Murshidi, Director of the UAE RCA in Kabul, stated that at the instructions of President H.H. Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and follow-up of Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, the RCA has during current month distributed about US$162,362 to 574 orphans in Kabul, Jalalabad and other areas in addition to US$ 5442 worth of Eid clothes for 363 children. Also US$10,884 worth of food packages were distributed among 1555 families as Eid Al Fitr Zakat.

Al Murshidi said that 10 mosques were constructed in different parts of Kabul at the value of US$300,000. An additional mosque is nearing completion. He added that 1000 wells were dug during current year in Kabul and other parts of the capital at the value of US$90,000, and that construction of Sheikh Zayed City in Kabul was under construction worth US$4 million.

Estonia to send more soldiers to Afghanistan - 12:51 | 03/ 11/ 2005

TALLINN, November 3 (RIA Novosti, Nikolai Adashkevich) - The Estonian government approved a bill Thursday extending the mandate of Estonian peacekeepers in Afghanistan and increasing the country's contingent, the government press service said.

According to the press service, the bill drafted by the Estonian Defense Ministry stipulates that the mandate be extended by two years and the number of soldiers raised six-fold to 150 servicemen. The Estonian contingent will also be provided with the necessary equipment, including APCs.

Twenty-three Estonian soldiers are now serving in Afghanistan, namely 10 mine engineers, six intelligence officers, two field officers in Mazar-e-Sharif, and two field officers and three soldiers in airfield maintenance service in Kabul.

The Estonian 2005 budget allocated about 1.2 million euros for the Afghan peacekeeping contingent. The figure is expected to rise to 5.2 million euros next year.

Afghan veterans blockade government building in Ukraine - 03.11.2005

KIEV, November 3 (Itar-Tass) - More than a thousand members of the Union of Afghan war veterans have blockaded the building of the Ukrainian Cabinet on Thursday. The pickets are demanding to revise " inhuman" meager pensions for the veterans of the Afghan war.

Two days ago more than 500 veterans of the Afghan war held a demonstration outside the building of the regional administration in Donetsk, demanding to earmark funds in the 2006 draft budget for social benefits to veterans of the Afghan war.

Earlier, Afghan war veterans held numerous pickets, including a picket in Lvov held on January 19, 2005, a protest act in Kiev on May 31, when the protesters adopted an address to the Ukrainian president, demanding the resignation of the defense minister for non-compliance with the housing program for the veterans. The protesters declared then that the law on social benefits to Afghan war veterans “remained on paper only.”

Around 130,000 Ukrainians have been to the Afghan war. Including 3,290 killed, 70 reported missing. At total of 4,687 out of 8,000 Ukrainian servicemen wounded in Afghanistan returned from Afghanistan disabled. At present, there are 1,800 Afghan war veterans in the Ukrainian regular army.

Exports to Afghanistan at Rs 15b in Q1 - By Sajid Chaudhry Daily Times - Nov 03

ISLAMABAD: Exports from Pakistan to Afghanistan stood at Rs 15.908 billion during the first quarter July-September period of current fiscal year 2005-06 against the exports of Rs.13.9 billion in the same period of last fiscal year, an official told the Daily Times on Wednesday.

The exports through Torkham totalled at Rs 11.538 billion and goods worth Rs 4.369 billion were exported through Chaman. 29,871 trucks crossed into Afghanistan through Torkham and 16,158 trucks entered Afghanistan through the Chaman customs station.

The export of rice during the first quarter stood at Rs 505.715billion, export of ghee to Afghanistan during the first quarter stood at Rs 1.401 billion, export of sugar from Pakistan to Afghanistan during July-September period stood at Rs 301.588 million, fruits and vegetables Rs 143.166 million, milk and cereals Rs 289.784 million, wheat and wheat flour Rs 1.526 billion, other grains and lentils Rs 40.020 million, cement Rs.1.238 million, paints and varnishes Rs 383.700 million, mild steel products Rs 1.064 billion, sanitary wares Rs 10.040 million, construction materials Rs 241.974 million, electrical goods 189.067 million, medicines 161.172 million and miscellaneous goods of Rs.8.411 billion were exported to Afghanistan in the July-September period of fiscal year 2005-06.

Pakistan has imported from Afghanistan goods worth Rs 914.248 million during the first quarter July-September period of current fiscal year, imports of Rs 336.054 million were made through Torkham and Rs 578.194 million were made through the Chaman customs station. Pakistan has imported vegetable, fresh fruits, dry fruits, seeds, country drugs, spices, timber, scrap and other items during the July-September period of current fiscal year.

Afghanistan has imported goods worth Rs 5.022 billion under the Afghan Transit Trade Agreement (ATTA) during the July September period through Pakistan. The imports of Rs 3.720 billion were transferred through Torkham and Rs 1.302 million through Chaman to Afghanistan.

Afghanistan has exported goods worth $6.525 million to India through Pakistan. Goods worth $.2.398 million were exported through Torkham and $.4.127 million through Chaman to India from Afghanistan.

Iran seeks to renew nuclear talks - BBC - Sunday, 6 November 2005

Iran's chief nuclear negotiator has written to the UK, France and Germany to call for the resumption of stalled talks over its atomic programme. The three European powers have led talks with Tehran on behalf of the EU.

Negotiations broke down in August when Iran resumed uranium conversion activities in defiance of international calls to maintain a suspension. The US accuses Iran of using its nuclear power programme to develop nuclear weapons - a charge it denies.

Tehran's resumption of uranium conversion has led the board of the International Atomic Energy Agency to declare it in breach of its international obligations.

As a result, the Islamic republic faces being reported to the United Nations Security Council, where it could face sanctions. The letter from Ali Larijani, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, was handed to the ambassadors of the UK, France and Germany. According to Iranian news agencies, Mr Larijani said in the letter that Iran would "welcome negotiations that are constructive and based on logic".

It is the first approach that Mr Larijani has made to the EU powers - known as EU3 - since taking over the nuclear portfolio after hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became president in June. The three EU nations have yet to comment. Mr Ahmadinejad's recent call for Israel to be "wiped off the map" provoked international outrage.

Indian foreign minister to step aside in Iraq oil-for-food probe

New delhi (AFP) - Natwar Singh will step down as India's foreign minister during an inquiry into claims that he benefited from the UN's oil-for-food programme for Iraq but will stay in the cabinet, it was announced here.

Singh will remain in the cabinet as minister without portfolio and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will take over the post of foreign minister pending the outcome of the probe by a retired judge ordered earlier Monday, a government statement said on Monday.

It said the move was made at Natwar Singh's request. If cleared by the inquiry Natwar Singh will resume his duties as foreign minister, said the prime minister's spokesman Sanjaya Baru.

The ruling Congress party, which has also been named in a UN report as a beneficiary of Saddam Hussein's largesse, said Prime Minister Singh had acted in a "laudable" manner.

"The prime minister has taken a wise step to avoid a conflict of interest and, besides, it is the prime minister's prerogative to bring changes in his cabinet," said Congress party spokesman Abhisekh Sanghvi.

"Today even without any evidence our government set up a judicial inquiry... It is a laudable and wise step taken by the prime minister," he said as the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party demanded the 74-year-old foreign minister resign.

Earlier Monday India's former chief judge R.S. Pathak was named to inquire into claims in the UN report, prepared by former US Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, that Natwar Singh and Congress benefited from the programme.

The Volcker report named Natwar Singh as a non-contractual beneficiary of four million barrels of Iraqi oil allotted to Zurich-based firm Masefield AG.

Congress, India's oldest political entity, is also listed as a beneficiary of a separate allotment of four million barrels of oil as part of the transactions.

The report found that Saddam's regime manipulated the programme to extract about 1.8 billion dollars in surcharges and bribes, while an inept UN headquarters failed to exert administrative control.

On Sunday the government apppointed Virender Dayal, India's former undersecretary to the United Nations, to obtain information about the charges against the ruling party and its members. The government says the inquiry by Justice Pathak and the one headed by Dayal are independent of each other.

Congress lost power in the early 1980s following allegations of involvement in a multi-million dollar bribery scandal over an artillery acquisition deal from the Swedish firm Bofors. Natwar Singh has held senior diplomatic posts in previous governments and hails from an one-time royal family in the western desert state of Rajasthan.

He was appointed foreign minister in May 2004 after a Congress-led coalition came to power with the support of communist parties after defeating the Bharatiya Janata Party. Singh joined the foreign service in 1953. During a 31-year stint, he served in missions in China, the United States and the United Nations.

[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.]