Afghan Taliban say they killed Indian hostage

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Taliban guerrillas have killed an Indian road engineer after his company failed to meet an ultimatum to cease operations in Afghanistan, a spokesman for the militants said on Tuesday.

P.M. Kutty was shot dead on the orders of the Taliban's council at 6:00 p.m (12:30 p.m. British time), after a deadline passed for his company to pull out of Afghanistan, Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters.

President Karzai Condemned the Abduction of an Indian National and three Afghans - Date of Release: 21 November 2005

Arg, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, expressed his regret at the abduction of an Indian national and three Afghans and strongly condemned it.

According to reports, an Indian engineer from the Border Road Organization (BRO), together with his two bodyguards and one driver, was kidnapped Saturday night by armed men in the southern province of Nimroz.

In his reaction to the news the President said, “The abduction of an Indian national and three Afghans who were working on a highway between Delaram and Zaranj is a disgraceful act of terrorism which can not hinder the people of Afghanistan from reconstructing their country and achieving peace and prosperity.”

The Zaranj-Delaram highway is part of a larger highway connecting Nimroz province with Chah Bahar in Iran and its satisfactory completion will boost regional trade between Afghanistan and our neighbours. Over US$ 70 million has been assisted by the Government of Republic of India for construction of the highway.

The President ordered the relevant authorities to strive to secure the safe release of the kidnapped BRO employees.

Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President

Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

Abducted Afghan driver set free – BBC

An Afghan driver, who was kidnapped along with an Indian in the southern Afghan province of Nimroz, has been released, the authorities say. Taleban insurgents say they abducted the Indian along with three Afghans last week.

Afghan officials say efforts are continuing to secure the release of the Indian driver. This year has seen an upsurge in violence linked to militants, with more than 1,400 people killed.

Presidential spokesman Jawed Ludin told the BBC news website that officials were questioning the released Afghan driver. Mr Ludin said the Afghan authorities were trying to trace the Indian, M Raman Kutty, a driver with India's state-run Border Roads Organisation. "We are watching the situation closely. Efforts are going on to find the Indian national."

The Indian national was among some 300 Indians working on a road project in the province. The Indian ambassador in Afghanistan, Rakesh Sood, had said that a number of Afghan and Iranian workers were also working on this $83m road project.

The Taleban have been responsible for a number of abductions of engineers, including several Turks and Indians, in southern Afghanistan. One Turk was killed but the others were freed. A British engineer was abducted and killed in Farah province in September.

Two Indians working on a road in southern Zabul province were kidnapped in 2003 but released unharmed two weeks later. Taleban insurgents are active in much of south and east Afghanistan. The US-led coalition in the country has about 20,000 troops fighting the insurgents.

INDIAN COMPANY VOWS NOT TO LEAVE AFGHANISTAN DESPITE HOSTAGE THREAT – RFE/RL

Indian Border Roads Organization will not leave Afghanistan despite an ultimatum issued by the purported neo-Taliban hostage takers to kill an Indian national whom they abducted recently, Indian Ambassador Rakesh Sood told All India Radio in Kabul on 21 November. The Indian national, along with three Afghans working for the Indian government-owned construction company, was kidnapped in Nimroz Province in southern Afghanistan on 19 November; their abductors have threatened to kill their Indian hostage if his employer does not leave Afghanistan (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 21 November 2005).

The neo-Taliban have not contacted Indian authorities, Sood added. Then on 22 November, Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Yousif Stanikzai announced that the Afghan driver abducted along with the other three men was released unharmed the previous day and was being questioned by local intelligence agents, RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan reported. Nimroz security officials mobilized 70 policemen to search for the kidnapped Indian citizen, Kabul's Tolu Television reported on 21 November. An official spokesperson of the Indian External Affairs Ministry in New Delhi on 21 November identified the kidnapped Indian national as Shri Maniappan Raman Kutty. The Indian government has identified Shri Kutty as a driver rather than an engineer, as was previously reported. AT

Militants fire three rockets at Afghan capital - 11:51 2005-11-22

Militants fired three rockets at the Afghan capital Tuesday, destroying a house but causing no casualties in the latest in a series of insurgent attacks on Kabul, officials said. The rockets exploded at dawn in western Kabul, said Interior Ministry spokesman Yousuf Stanekzai.

One hit a home as a family slept inside, but they all fled before it collapsed. Another rocket landed near a high school, while a third exploded on a patch of bare land and caused no damage.

Rebels fire rockets on the city of 4 million about every two weeks. They rarely cause damage or casualties. Last week, two suspected al-Qaida suicide bombers attacked NATO peacekeepers in Kabul, killing at least nine people. Despite the attacks, the capital is considered one of the safest parts of Afghanistan and about 3,000 foreigners live there.

Violence in the country's volatile southern and eastern regions has spiked this year, leaving almost 1,500 people dead, the most since U.S.-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001, reports the AP.

Briton charged with gun-running in Afghanistan

London (AFP) - A British electrical engineer arrested in Afghanistan last month has been charged with gun-running, the Foreign Office in London said.

Peter Eaton, 52, from Milford Haven, west Wales, is accused with three other men -- believed to be another Briton, an American and an Indian -- of buying and selling weapons.

"We have visited him (Eaton) a number of times... in (the Afghan capital) Kabul," a Foreign Office spokesman told AFP. "We were informed by the court of the charges on November 17, which were buying and selling weapons."

"One of our consular staff visited Peter Eaton and briefed him on what the court decided. The latest state of play is that the judge has 60 days to look at the case before the trial must take place."

No details were released about the other detainees. According to British media reports, the foreign nationals were detained in Kabul on October 12 and alleged to have had in their possession guns and fake badges representing the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

Eaton's wife Anisa Ahmed has since expressed concern for his health, telling the BBC: "He's in a very difficult position, he's very stressed, his health is going really bad. He is not very well at all." She added: "Peter is not involved in any weapons or anything like that."

Make use of Afghan opium, West told – Sydney Morning Herald 11/22/05

Western countries should buy opium from Afghanistan and use it for medicinal purposes rather than soldiering on in a futile bid to destroy the poppy crop, says a think-tank specialising in drugs policy.

Western powers are wasting millions of dollars trying to stamp out the illegal opium trade, the Senlis Council said on Monday. Instead, they should develop a licensing system to allow Afghans to sell opium legally for use in painkillers like morphine and codeine.

"It is a pipe dream to believe that the goal of the reconstruction of Afghanistan will be achieved by using force against Afghan poppy farmers," Senlis executive director, Emmanuel Reinhert said.

"It is totally unrealistic to attempt to eliminate the crop which accounts for as much as 60 per cent of the country's economy." Afghanistan is by far the world's biggest source of illicit opium and its refined product heroin, accounting for about 87 per cent of global supply.

Production has risen to record levels since the 2001 US-led invasion. Last year, a United Nations report said if nothing was done, Afghanistan could turn into a lawless "narco-state" run by drug cartels.

President Hamid Karzai has vowed to wipe out poppy production but has admitted it could take up to 10 years. Senlis, unveiling findings from the first stage of its feasibility study into opium licensing, said there was a ready market for at least part of Afghanistan's huge opium crop, which climbed to about 4100 tonnes last year.

At the moment, opium is produced legally in several countries - including India, Turkey, Australia and France - for use in medicine. Three-quarters of the world's morphine is used in just seven developing countries. If more were available, the price of painkillers would fall, the think-tank says.

Howard gives personal touch to troops - November 22, 2005

Prime Minister John Howard says his third top-secret visit to Australian troops serving in trouble spots abroad in 18 months is his way of personally telling troops how much their country values them.

Mr Howard donned body armour and a helmet to land at Camp Russell in central Afghanistan, where an elite Australian team of 190 Special Air Services (SAS) and Commandos troops are battling the Taliban.

The risky visit, sandwiched in between the APEC summit in Korea and a two-day visit to neighbouring Pakistan, was kept secret until Mr Howard arrived safely in the Afghan capital Kabul.

Media travelling with the prime minister were not told of the visit until Mr Howard was already at Camp Russell, and the only photographs and footage made available of the camp and the personnel were taken by defence officers and vetted by senior officials before release.

Mr Howard, the first Australian prime minister to visit Afghanistan, said he felt that if he was prepared to send Australians into danger, he owed them a visit.

"I think the most important thing I can do is to convey in the strongest personal way that I can, and that is by visiting them, the support the Australian people have for our troops," he told reporters in the Pakistan capital Islamabad on Tuesday.

"The respect they have for the professional job they are doing and how important it is to maintain them in the frontline in the war against terrorism.

"It's one thing to ask people to go and do these things and to risk their lives. It adds some dimension to one's commitment to be willing to go and see them where they are cooperating and to thank them personally on behalf of the Australian people and that is the principal, but not the only, reason why I went to Afghanistan."

Mr Howard, accompanied by defence force chief Angus Houston, sat in the cockpit of an RAAF Hercules as its pilots made a tactical evasive landing, hurtling along at high speed close to the ground to dodge any would-be attackers.

After inspecting the camp, built from scratch by the Australians and named after Andrew Russell, Australia's only military casualty in the war on terror in Afghanistan, Mr Howard told a gathering of about 80 troops that he was grateful for the job they were doing.

"No-one should be taking Australian fighting men and women for granted. I don't and Australians don't," he told them during a short address in the camp mess. He capped off his flying eight-hour visit with a stopover in the capital Kabul and a meeting with President Hamid Karzai.

He was driven from Kabul airport to the presidential palace in a high-speed, heavily armoured motorcade, which careered through Kabul's narrow streets of mud-brick homes, sending children scattering as they played beside the road.

Mr Howard and President Karzai discussed Australia sending a further 200 troops to help rebuild the war-shattered country but no decision has yet been made. But President Karzai said a provincial reconstruction team (PRT) would be welcome. "If Australia decides to send us a PRT, we will be very happy," he said.

It is the third time the prime minister has made a highly secret trip under extraordinary security to visit troops serving in the Middle East. In July this year, he flew into Baghdad to meet defence personnel and to hold talks with Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari.

And on Anzac Day last year, he made a surprise visit to Baghdad to meet Australian troops and attend a special dawn service at Baghdad airport. As well as sending a big troop contingent to Afghanistan this year, Australia committed $5 million to help with the nation's recent elections, which followed last year's presidential poll.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to visit - 21 Nov 2005

Source: IRINKABUL, 21 November (IRIN) - The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees will begin a two-day visit to Afghanistan on Tuesday.

"High Commissioner Antonio Guterres, who took office in June, plans to travel first to Kabul, where he will meet President Hamid Karzai, other senior officials and UNHCR staff to discuss the repatriation and reintegration [of Afghan refugees] operation in the country," Nader Farhad, spokesman for the office of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said on Monday.

He added Guterres would also travel to the eastern city of Jalalabad, where he will visit recent returnees, UNHCR staff and local officials.

Since 2002, more than 4.4 million Afghans have returned home from Pakistan and Iran, 3.5 million of them assisted by UNHCR, according to the UN refugee agency.

"Guterres will also be briefed about longer-term prospects for Afghanistan's reconstruction, which are crucial for any successful return programme," Farhad explained.

More than 3 million Afghans remain outside their country, mainly in Pakistan and Iran. Guterres is scheduled to arrive in Pakistan on Thursday for a two-day visit that will include an inspection of UNHCR's emergency assistance to victims of the devastating 8 Oct earthquake, as well as meetings with several senior Pakistani government officials.

Afghanistan Makes Sweeping Changes in Education System tem

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 22 (Bernama) -- After decades of war and internal conflicts, Afghanistan's education system is now undergoing sweeping changes ranging from reform in the school curriculum to the admission of women in their schools and colleges.

Its Deputy Information Minister S. Agha Sancharanki said Tuesday that the changes involved primary and secondary schools, colleges, vocational schools and polytechnics as well as universities in this once war-ravaged country of some 26 million people.

Girls and women who were once banned from going to schools or joining the workforce during the Taliban's hardline rule are today free to do so and presently constitute more than 50 per cent of the total students in schools.

"Our education system and schools were destroyed during the war, but now there is a drastic change...to a better situation and the changes are comprehensive," Sancharanki told Bernama on the sidelines of the Sixth Conference of the Ministers of Information of Non-Aligned Countries (Cominac VI) here.

He said the number of primary and secondary schools throughout the country had increased manifold -- from just few during the Taliban's rule to more than 5,000 schools today.

And there are also international schools to cater to the needs of the expatriates who are helping in the reconstruction process and also the wealthy Afghans.

He also said that the development of universities and the demand for higher education, where last year some 30,000 and this year some 41,000 sat for university entry examinations, was a manifestation of the desire of young Afghans to uplift their lives through education.

But the number of universities which can only cater for 11,000 students are still far below capacity in meeting the demand, he said.

Sancharanki said graduates still depended on the public sector for jobs but now the government of President Hamid Karzai was also encouraging vocational studies and training so that they would be able to find jobs in the private sector.

He said the government was also reforming the education system especially the school curriculum -- from religious-based during the Taliban's rule to more balanced secular and traditional approaches.

Sancharanki also observed that there was a demand and interest among Afghans to learn English and computer studies.

"And now in every corner and streets of our towns you can see classes offering English and computer studies... and this is a very positive development," he said.

Sancharanki said a major change was the participation of women in education with a huge number of them attending schools so much so that primary schools have to conduct three sessions a day and in secondary schools -- two sessions a day.

"However, in primary and secondary schools, girls and boys are studying in separate classes," he said, adding that the number of women working as teachers had also increased tremendously.

He said while primary education was compulsory, education from primary to university level was also free to ensure that poverty would not be a hindrance to their quest for knowledge and make them a well-informed society.

Press Briefing - United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan

Office of Communication and Public Information Kabul - Afghanistan – 11/21/2005

Information about new Afghan Parliament

At last week’s press briefing I mentioned that we would be seeking to provide you in the near future with fuller information on the new Afghan Parliament. Since February this year, and as you may already know, UNDP has been running a project aimed at assisting in the establishing, training and equipping of a Parliamentary Secretariat.

This week, the Secretariat is planning a press briefing to answer your questions, and to provide you with information about the various orientation and training programmes that are being run over the coming weeks. They will also update you on progress with work in readying the parliament building for the inauguration, which currently is expected in December.

Details of the press briefing, including the time and location, will be sent to you shortly. In the meantime, the person to contact at the Parliamentary Secretariat for public information matters is Tahera Shairzay. Her number: 079 037 347.

UNODC looking to establish justice support centre and new prison in Mazar

The Justice Programme of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime recently fielded a mission to Mazar-e-Sharif to look into establishing a justice support centre and the construction of a new prison.

The current situation with regard to prison facilities in Mazar, as well as other provincial centres, is below minimum requirements of international standards.

UNODC, in cooperation with the Government and partner agencies, is currently looking at extending its judicial capacity-building as well as its prison reform project to the provinces. Mazar, along with Gardez, have been identified as priorities. This project involves the establishment of judicial support centres to help judges and prosecutors, the training of personnel working in judicial institutions, and the construction and renovation of prison facilities.

UNICEF led five-day conference on juvenile justice underway in Mazar

A five-day Regional Conference on Juvenile Justice, organized by UNICEF, is under way this week in Mazar-e-Sharif, with over 50 participants from the police and justice sectors in nine provinces.

The conference is part of a nationwide programme between UNICEF and the Ministry of Justice that aims to ensure that Afghan legislators and legal officials have a clear understanding of juvenile justice issues, including sensitization on Afghan law and international standards, the new Afghan Juvenile Code, and the need for family support for children in conflict with the law.

So far this year nearly 170 people have gone through training. At least 250 more will receive training by the end of 2005. The programme is being supported by the Government of Italy and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.

UNHCR High Commissioner makes first visit to Afghanistan

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr. António Guterres, will be in Kabul tomorrow, Tuesday November 22, for a two-day mission.

This will be the first time the High Commissioner has visited Afghanistan and the region since he took office in June.

Mr. Guterres will meet President Karzai and members of his cabinet. He will also visit UNHCR operations in Kabul and Jalalabad.

A press conference with the High Commissioner is scheduled for 3pm on Wednesday November 23, here in the UNAMA pressroom.

Click here to read the UNHCR press release.

ANBP asks for community support in identifying ammunition and weapons

In support of the peace process and stability Afghanistan’s New Beginning Programme is asking all Afghans, community elders, Mullahs, teachers and the younger generation to continue assisting ANBP’s ammunition survey by informing authorities when they discover weapons or ammunition.

So far nearly 666 thousand (665,951) boxes of ammunition and 2.235 million (2,235,428) pieces of unboxed ammunition have been surveyed.

Survey teams are operating in eight regions of Afghanistan.

Click here to read the DDR press release.

Kandahar student wins international art competition

A 12-year old school girl from Kandahar is the winner of the World Food Programme’s worldwide School Feeding Art Competition for 2005.

Drawings for the international competition, took place in 37 countries involving students receiving food under WFP’s school feeding programme.

Shazia Shaw’s winning sketch depicts her fellow students receiving WFP cooking oil.

Click here to read the WFP news release.

UNDP: GMA winners announced

Last Saturday (November 19) a ceremony was held to announce the winners of the Global Micro-entrepreneurship Awards. This UNDP-coordinated national business competition is part of the United Nations International Year of Microcredit 2005.

Awards were given in six categories including agriculture, businesses outside Kabul, widows, demobilized soldiers, returned refugees and alternative livelihoods.

Questions & Answers

Question: Is there any specific deadline for the inauguration of Parliament?

Spokesperson: At the moment we are still looking at the third week of December.

Question: Can you give us an assessment of the security situation in Afghanistan?

Spokesperson: I can refer you to comments that have been made by the Special Representative to the Security Council throughout the year. These will provide you with some detail of our assessment. They are available via the UN documents website. However, what I can tell you right now is that security remains a paramount concern. We have seen something of a deterioration of the security environment in recent months and obviously we need a positive security environment to properly conduct programme delivery throughout the country. The Special Representative has called, on a number of occasions, for security problems to be addressed at several levels: both from a perspective of resolving internal conflicts - how to deal with the conflict inside the country – and through tackling the external factors which lead to insecurity and instability.

Question: From the total 8 billion dollars to Afghanistan how much is being spent by the United Nations and in which areas?

Spokesperson: With UNAMA the total annual budget is in the region of $55 million. I don’t have a precise figure to hand for the costs of all United Nations operations, however I would be happy to provide that to you after this briefing.

Question: In what areas is the money being spent?

Spokesperson: There is an enormous range of areas in which we work. You’ve seen, for example, the elections. There’s work going on in building capacity of government institutions, including the Justice sector, law enforcement, the army, the police. There are programmes on health care, sending children back to school, polio eradication. You have a large number of UN agencies at work here, including in areas related to the Millennium Development Goals. Shortly, you will hear from our colleagues at UN-HABITAT on work they are doing. In short, what I am saying is that there is an enormous amount of UN activities going on across this country each and every day of the year. As you know, security incidents tend to get more news coverage than the massive development programme that is underway here. But it [development work] represents a huge range of programme activity. The UN has been doing work here since the 1950’s and we are very committed to helping this country. We expect to continue our activities here very much into the future.

Question: Does the United Nations have any specific long-term political agenda following the end of the Bonn process?

Spokesperson: Work on helping develop the benchmarks and agenda for the next few years is underway right at the moment and we are hoping to see this come together in a conference to be held in London at the end of January. We hope this will be an occasion [for Afghanistan] to set out its plans for the next few years, building on what has happened so far, learning lessons and applying them. It’s likely you will see greater activity in areas such as Rule of Law, for example and also in relation to the various different Millennium Development Goals. As the London Conference is something of a work-in-progress, we will be providing you with a fuller briefing on what is to be expected there at a later stage.

Today’s guests

Today’s guests are from UN-HABITAT, the United Nations Human Settlements Programme. Madhab Mathema is the Director of the UN-HABITAT Regional Office for Asia Pacific, and Abdul Baqi Popal is Provincial Manager for Kandahar and an urban specialist.

They are here to talk about UN-HABITAT’s human security project being carried out in three Afghan cities – Kandahar, Mazar, and Jalalabad.

Madhab Mathema, Director, UN-HABITAT Regional Office for Asia Pacific

UN-HABITAT has been working in Afghanistan for the last 18 years. As a matter of fact we returned to Afghanistan in 1981 when we started projects in Mazar and Kandahar. And during those days we worked very closely with UNDP - we still do as a matter of fact - and during the Taliban times we started a programme called ‘Community Development Programme’ starting from Mazar which gradually spread to Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, Bamyan and Farah and based on the experience of the programme the government has now launched the National Solidarity Programme of which we take an active part.

Of course in all our engagements in Afghanistan our founding principle is that we work with the government and not for the government. We work with people and not for the people. We also subscribe to the view that all of our present programmes must have an Afghan leadership. Our activities with the government and the people of Afghanistan span a long range of activities which includes working with communities through the National Solidarity Programme, working in disaster preparedness programmes. Now we are going to launch a new project which is being funded by what we call the United Nations Human Security Trust Fund that I am here to talk about.

We also try our best to remain engaged with the government, especially the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, and principle municipalities like Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, and so forth, in the policy debate especially related to the management of urban development in this country. Under the banner of technical support to the government we are assisting the government to develop a new municipal law and we are also engaged with the Minister of Interior in developing a framework of new land law and hopefully in months to come we will be working with the Ministry of Housing and Development in developing a new planning law for the country.

Against this background I am pleased to announce that we are launching a project in Kandahar, Mazar and Jalalabad, funded by the United Nations Human Security Trust Fund.

There is an understanding all over the world, both in the political field and among the specialists, that for a society to grow to its fullest requires its citizens to enjoy freedom from want and freedom from fear. The Human Security concept, which was championed by Japan during the Millennium Summit in 2000, basically tried to link these two concepts into one. There are two pillars of the Human Security concept. One is the fact that we need to protect people from the vagaries of the changing political and economic situation. Secondly, it is through the process of empowerment that we help people to develop greater resilience to protection. The project we launched is really about development or upgrading of informal settlements in these cities. There are three important elements of the project. To work with people in the process empowering them; to help address their basic needs in time of access to basic services; and finally in implementing the project we would like to work closely on a day-to-day basis with the municipalities so there is a direct connection with the municipal development processes and community development.

The project will cost US $3.5 million and will take about 14 months to complete. From this, less than 1% of the costs will go to international staff costs. Just about 80% will go towards direct support to the communities and the rest will go to national staff.

Questions & Answers

Question: What type of areas are called ‘Informal Settlements’ or ‘Informal Areas’?

Regional Director: I believe there is no official definition of the term “Informal Settlements”, but based on my understanding and discussions of the various municipalities as well as the ministry people, I understand that “Informal Settlements” are settlements that do not conform to a master plan. Take the case of Kabul, for example. Kabul has a master plan with two layers. The first layer is called ‘master plan’, while the second layer is called ‘construction plan’. In the construction plan everything is detailed out, the streets, the plot size, the location of houses and so forth. We are in an area that does not conform to the construction plan. That is also called ‘Informal Settlement’.

Question: My first question is what is the significance of this project? Second, do you have any plans to extend the project to other parts of Afghanistan? And third is this the first time that you are launching these types of projects here?

Regional Director: As far as the significance of this project is concerned the majority of urban dwellers in this country live in informal settlements. Therefore the upgrading of this kind of settlement in lieu of new land development becomes very critical because that’s where the majority of people are living. I think by establishing a method of urban upgrading rather than an entirely new development the government would be able to bring services to a majority of urban dwellers at lower cost. The lesson the municipality will learn from this project will have a direct bearing on how you deal with the development problems Kabul is facing right now. And of course this project will also help fix a number of problems in this community to meet their basic needs. This is the first time Afghanistan has received funds from the UN Human Security Trust Fund in the urban sector, but this is not the first time we are doing this kind of project in this country. For example quite recently we completed another project in districts 6, 7, and 8 of Kabul where it was basically using the funding provided by the European Commission and working with people directly trying to improve their infrastructure. The whole idea is basically to let people decide and set their own priority and then we provide technical support and facilitating the whole process.

Question: In these projects is water and electricity included?

Regional Director: Water supply and sanitation feature high in the priority list of the community. It is the community that identifies the priority. Depending on what the community wants to work in we provide support, so we cannot say whether it is going to be water supply or electricity. But in all probability it will not include electricity if it requires a massive investment in terms of network installation and so forth.

Question: What is the difference between the National Solidarity Programme and this programme that you are launching?

Regional Director: The spirit is the same, but the location is different. This project is really working in urban areas, whereas the National Solidarity Programme is working mainly in rural areas. The second thing I must admit is that the National Solidarity Programme has much more developed institutions, for example, organization, training manuals, etc, whereas with this project it is a bit of an experiment for us. And of course the numbers are different. With the National Solidarity Programme the whole programme covers around 33,000 communities while HABITAT works with 3,000 communities.

New Zealand has no plans to deploy more troops to Afghanistan -
Pravda.RU (Russia) 15:11 2005-11-21

New Zealand has no plans to deploy more troops to Afghanistan and wants assurances from NATO that its soldiers will receive support once the Atlantic alliance assumes joint force command, Prime Minister Helen Clark said Monday.

Foreign Minister Winston Peters said last week while in Busan, Korea, at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit that New Zealand's military deployment to Afghanistan may be extended, and the government could consider increasing troop levels.

Clark dismissed that Monday. "I can assure you, Cabinet has no plans to commit more troops to Afghanistan," she said _ adding that for a small country, New Zealand "has made an incredible commitment to Afghanistan."

New Zealand currently has 50 elite commando troops fighting insurgents in Afghanistan. Another 120 troops are involved in a reconstruction project in Bamiyan province, which is scheduled to end next September.

NATO takes over joint forces command from the U.S.-led coalition in the troubled Central Asian nation next year. Clark said transferring the current command of troops to NATO would not be an issue "if we got satisfactory assurances of backup."

She said troops operating in remote areas of Bamiyan needed support "to know the helicopters are coming" if they are attacked or need medical evacuation.

New Zealand has not agreed to the transfer of the provincial reconstruction team to NATO, she said, and will only do so if "satisfactory backup" was assured by NATO commanders.

Britain's The Guardian newspaper earlier reported the United States plans to pull 4,000 U.S. troops out of Afghanistan early next year, and Britain has been trying to put together a coalition to fill the gap in advance of a NATO meeting in Brussels on Dec. 7.

Journalist reflects on reporting in Afghanistan - Megan Munguia
Princetonian Staff Writer

Ahmed Rashid, an award-winning Pakistani journalist and author, advocated continued U.S. military commitment in the Middle East in a lecture Monday titled "Afghanistan, Pakistan and Terror."

    Rashid, the recipient of the 2001 Award for Courage in Journalism from the Human Rights Society of Pakistan, began his lecture by commenting on the military effort in Afghanistan immediately after Sept. 11, 2001. A few months after the invasion, Rashid pointed out, the United States' commitment weakened and its military focus shifted to Iraq.

    As a result, the "whole region is on a knife edge," he said. Afghanistan is already being called "a forgotten war," and the United States is expected to withdraw an additional 4,000 troops in the spring. Instead of reducing the military effort, Rashid advocated increasing the number of troops and resources in the area, as he fears that U.S. allies will not take the lead if the United States decreases its current effort.

    While Rashid conceded that dramatic progress has been made in Afghanistan, he said the administration should be wary of how easily the country could be pulled backwards by a resurgence of the Taliban, a growth in Afghanistan's opium production and the presence of warlords in parliament. The Taliban has been responsible for roughly 1,500 deaths in the country since March.

    Rashid then shifted his discussion to Pakistan, noting that the United States has done little to encourage democracy there. While Pakistan does have extremists, the overwhelming majority of the country's population — about 70 percent — is not affected by these minority groups, he said. Their presence, however, has provided an excuse for the military to shun democracy as an option due to the belief that democracy would be too weak to contain them.

Hypocritically, the military, while denouncing these groups, still continues to recruit from within them. In this way, the military is "part of the problem with extremism, not part of the solution," Rashid said.

    This atmosphere within Pakistan has provided a place for the Taliban to hide, and the resurgence forces in Pakistan and Afghanistan's other neighboring countries are counting on the United States to leave Afghanistan and let it collapse, Rashid added.

    Because of the region's fragility, Rashid said the U.S. or allied military presence in Afghanistan is still necessary. The people of Afghanistan have generally been welcoming to American troops, accepting that, if they want progress within the country, they will have to tolerate the interference of the international community.

    Rashid closed his lecture by expressing his dismay that the current administration is failing to take the lead in the military effort in Afghanistan.

    Since such an initiative is lacking, he reiterated the need for the presence of international resources and troops for as long as the people in Afghanistan are willing to let the international community help combat the region's problems.

    Rashid is a regular contributor to The Wall Street Journal, BBC and other international news organizations, and is the author of three bestselling books. In September 2002, he became the first journalist to address the United Nations General Assembly.

Uzbekistan Ends U.S. Use of Airbase Aiding Afghanistan Mission

Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Uzbekistan closed an airbase used by the U.S. military to support operations in Afghanistan after relations deteriorated over the Uzbek government's use of force to control an uprising in May.

A C-17 transport aircraft carrying 90 U.S. military personnel left Uzbekistan shortly after a flag-lowering ceremony yesterday at the Karshi-Khanabad airbase in the south of the country, Lieutenant Commander Joe Carpenter, a U.S. Defense Department spokesman, said late yesterday in Washington.

President Islam Karimov's government in July ordered U.S. forces to leave the base after the U.S. led international calls for an investigation into the uprising in the eastern city of Andijan. The Uzbek government said 187 people were killed when the uprising was put down. Human rights groups said several hundred people, most of them civilians, may have died.

Uzbekistan, a landlocked nation of 26 million people, was the first central Asian country to allow the U.S. to use a military base in the anti-terrorism war that began in 2001. The U.S. has bases in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan supporting military operations in Afghanistan.

The U.S. deployed about 1,000 military personnel at Karshi- Khanabad, many helping with humanitarian operations to support the government of President Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan. The base also served as a refueling point for transport aircraft.

Uzbekistan, a former Soviet republic, slightly larger than the U.S. state of California, is the world's second-biggest exporter of cotton and an oil and gold producer. It shares 137 kilometers (85 miles) of its southern border with Afghanistan.

The U.S. government last week condemned as unfair the convictions and jail sentences of 15 alleged leaders of the revolt in Andijan and renewed calls for an independent inquiry.

The European Union, at the same time, banned arms sales and travel to EU countries by 12 Uzbek officials, including Interior Minister Zakirjan Almatov and Defense Minister Kadir Gulamov, citing ``excessive, disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force'' when the revolt was put down.

Uzbekistan's Supreme Court on Nov. 19 said the U.S. and EU statements and actions were unfounded and biased, Russia's Interfax news agency reported from the capital, Tashkent.

``Statements by the U.S. and EU give grounds for Uzbekistan to feel concern about them as ardent opponents of terrorism,'' the Supreme Court said in its statement, according to Interfax.

The Uzbek government blamed Islamic extremists for the violence in Andijan. The fighting began after armed men protesting a trial of Islamic extremists broke into a jail and freed prisoners.

A clampdown followed as police and soldiers in Andijan and nearby towns fired on protesters, most of them civilians opposed to Karimov's government. Karimov has led the country since 1991.

Karimov last week signed a defense treaty with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The accord grants each country the right to use military sites located on their territories ``should it prove necessary,'' Interfax reported at the time, citing a clause in the treaty it obtained.

The U.S. has increasingly faulted the human rights practices of the Karimov government. The U.S. withheld $10.5 million in aid, including $6.87 million in military aid, in the fiscal year 2004 because the State Department couldn't certify that Uzbekistan was moving toward multiparty democracy.

As much as $22 million, including $11.7 million in military aid, is in danger of being withheld this year for the same reason, department spokeswoman Joanne Moore said in June. The country received $87.4 million in aid from the U.S. in 2003, according to U.S. government data.

[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.]