Billions of Afghan coins said missing

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Tonnes of newly minted Afghan coins have gone missing while being transported to Afghanistan through Pakistan, a Pakistani newspaper and police said on Saturday.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has sought the help of his Pakistani counterpart, Pervez Musharraf, in unearthing the scam, the News newspaper said.

An official at the Afghan embassy in Islamabad declined to comment on the report which said tonnes of two and five afghani coins (two and five pence), made in Germany and shipped through the Pakistani port of Karachi, had disappeared.

"It was unbelievable to know that the containers were almost empty," the newspaper quoted an unidentified "source closely monitoring the situation" as saying. "Only nine tons out of 30 tons of coins were found in both the containers," the source said.

Pakistani customs officials at the old Khyber Pass border crossing with Afghanistan noticed seals on two trucks carrying Afghan coins had been tampered with last week, said a police officer in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar.

Upon inspection, they found that about 20 tonnes of coins were missing, said the officer, who declined to be identified. The drivers of both trucks and their assistants escaped, the officer said. Afghanistan introduced small denomination coins to replace bank notes this year.

Britain mulls plan to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan

London - AFP - Britain is mulling a plan to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan to help efforts to combat insurgents and drug barons in the volatile south of the country, according to the Ministry of Defence.

The comments came as Defence Secretary John Reid began a whirlwind tour of Afghanistan. "We are discussing the various options that exist with NATO and our partners and we will make a decision in due course as to exact numbers when it is appropriate," a Ministry of Defence spokesman said Saturday.

The final figure of troops would likely be around 1,500 but it could be as many as 4,000, sources said. Britain already has 900 soldiers on the ground. Reid outlined hopes to send a "sufficient" number of troops into the Helmand region next year to bolster efforts to seek out Al Qaeda-linked fighters and take on powerful warlords behind the world's largest heroin market.

The minister, who is on his first ever trip to Afghanistan, said the force would be in addition to a commitment to take control of Nato's Allied Rapid Reaction Corp (ARRC) next May.

Reid, who is due to hold talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and defence minister General Abdul Rahim Wardak to offer the increased British assistance, said he hoped to meet key objectives in Afghanistan over the next 12 months.

Speaking in Kabul, he was quoted by Britain's domestic Press Association as saying: "One of them is to develop ISAF's (the International Security Assistance Force's) presence in the south of Afghanistan, to supplement and extend the presence in the north and the west.

"But if we are going to do that I want to make sure it is of sufficient size to accomplish the task. It would be a sufficient number of soldiers, but would also need a degree of mobility." He said the troops would be charged with counter-terrorism, counter-narcotics and counter-insurgency work.

The southern provinces account for the majority of Afghanistan's heroin production -- with Helmand responsible for half of all opium yields. Officials admit those areas are beyond most control of authorities in Kabul and suspect the region may harbour Al Qaeda-linked extremists.

The United States -- which has troops in the south - has lost 51 soldiers this year, making it the bloodiest 12 months since the fall of the Taliban. Reid admitted that a drive into Helmand could result in British fatalities, but said he thought the public would support the move.

He said Afghanistan had been a breeding ground for the extremists who attacked the United States on September 11, 2001. "While we are in Afghanistan we are defending people in Britain, the US and the rest of the world by denying terrorists a base from which to plan their operations," the Press Association quoted Reid as saying. "It is not a matter of casualties, but a matter of trying to avoid innocent casualties of terrorism."

At the same time, Reid denied any new push in Afghanistan would put a strain on resources focused on countering the increasing degree of resistance in Iraq. "Whatever I need for Afghanistan is independent of the need to draw down on forces in Iraq. We will continue what we are doing in Iraq, until we achieve what we set out to achieve," he said.

New Militant Group Threatens to Kill Candidates - RFE/RL 09/30/2005 By Amin Tarzi

A militant group calling itself the Mujahedin Secret Army has threatened to kill Afghan parliament and provincial council candidates, the Peshawar-based Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported on 28 September.

"The 6,000 parliamentary candidates have signed their own death warrants," a group statement faxed to AIP indicated. The mujahedin will not "spare any" of the candidates "because they are all the servants and slaves of America," the statement added.

In a statement likely directed to members of the Afghan resistance to the Soviets, the warning adds that "it is shameful that the former mujahedin have forgotten their God and are worshipping [U.S. President George W.] Bush." Signed by Khaled Habib, the statement ends: "Death to all the 6,000 parliamentary candidates."

In February 2004, the renegade leader of Hizb-e Islami, former Afghan Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, declared that he and Jalaluddin Haqani will direct a new strategy which will be carried out by the Secret Army of Mujahedin (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 25 February 2004).

Other than the statement by Hekmatyar, the new group has been unheard of among militant organizations opposing the Afghan government and its foreign backers.

One ex-Taliban rockets, others bomb in Afghan vote - Reuters 09/30/2005 By David Brunnstrom

KABUL - A former Taliban commander named for his skill with rocket grenades appears headed for a seat in a new Afghan parliament, but voters look to have shunned other Taliban defectors, including a former top religious policeman.

Partial results from September 18 legislative elections published by the U.N.-Afghan vote organisers as of Friday showed Mullah Salman Rocketi leading the field for one of Zabul province's three seats, with 17 percent of the 40 percent of votes counted.

But with over half the vote counted in Logar province, former religious policeman Mawlavi Qalamuddin, once Taliban minister for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, had just 428 votes, or 0.9 percent of the provincial total.

In Kandahar province, former Taliban foreign minister Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil was even less popular, polling just 0.8 percent of the 13 percent of ballots counted, or 214 votes.

Last in the field of defectors was Mullah Abdul Samad Khaksar, a former Taliban spy chief and deputy interior minister, with just 16 votes from 28,434 counted in Kandahar.

While incomplete, the count should be reasonably indicative as votes from all over each province are supposed to be mixed before being counted. Organisers are aiming for full provisional results by early October and final results by October 22.

The Taliban, driven from power by U.S.-led forces in late 2001 and now fighting a guerrilla war against President Hamid Karzai's Western-backed government, denounced the polls as a farce and the group has disassociated itself from the defectors.

In the closely watched race in Kabul province, counting has been especially slow. With 13 percent, or 54,000 votes counted, opponents of Karzai were leading. They were headed by Haji Mohammad Mohaqiq, an ethnic Hazara factional leader, with 16 percent of the total.

Second was Ramazan Bashardost, a French-educated technocrat who quit the cabinet last year complaining of a failure to deal with corruption. He was just ahead of self-styled opposition leader and former education minister Yunus Qanuni.

Karzai ally Abdul Rabb Rasoul Sayyaf, another of the factional leaders, was in fourth place for one of the 24 seats open to men in Kabul.

While all candidates stood as independents rather than party representatives, Qanuni, runner up to Karzai in October presidential polls, heads a loose bloc of parties opposed to the president called the Understanding Front.

Qanuni predicted before the vote that the front would win half of the 249 national assembly seats and has warned it might not approve all of Karzai's cabinet.

Turnout was significantly lower than in the presidential vote, with analysts blaming the presence of warlords on the ballot and disappointment at slow postwar reconstruction.

Analysts expect the parliament to be conservative, fragmented and locally focussed and possibly more of a hindrance than a help to Karzai's attempts to strengthen central rule.

U.S., Afghan forces arrest suspected Taliban commander

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — U.S. and Afghan forces arrested a Taliban commander suspected in bomb attacks against coalition forces during a raid on central Afghanistan home, where he tried to conceal his identity by dressing as a woman, police said Saturday.

The commander, known as Gafar, was arrested Wednesday in Andar district of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital, Kabul. A U.S. military statement said he was a "key enemy commander" behind attacks on Afghan and U.S. forces in the province carried out with homemade bombs, rockets and small-caliber handguns.

"He was a threat in Ghazni," provincial police chief Gen. Abdul Rahman Sarjang said. During the raid, the suspect tried to conceal his identity by dressing as a woman with a veil and sitting with other women in the house, Sarjang said.

Gafar was handed over to U.S. forces for questioning, he said.

Pakistani forces attack militants on Afghan border

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani forces attacked al Qaeda-linked militants in mountains near the Afghan border for a third day on Saturday, pounding their hideouts with helicopter gunships, security officials said.

Pakistan has been trying to clear its lawless tribal areas on the border of militants since early last year. Hundreds of militants and Pakistani soldiers have been killed in clashes. A military spokesman said five Pakistani troops had been killed since the latest fighting began on Thursday.

The militants were believed to have suffered casualties but the spokesman, Major-General Shaukat Sultan, said he had no information on the number of militant casualties.

"Fighting is still going on and we are facing quite a resistance from the other side," Sultan said. "We are pursuing them," he said, adding that helicopter gunships were being used.

Four soldiers and a paramilitary official had been killed since Thursday, Sultan said, denying media reports of heavier casualties and that 22 soldiers were missing. "We have not suffered any further casualties," he said.

Many al Qaeda militants and their Taliban allies were believed to have slipped into Pakistan after U.S.-led forces ousted the Taliban government in Afghanistan in the wake of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

Hundreds of militants have been killed since Pakistan began trying to clear them out early last year but security officials estimate scores remain in the remote, rugged border area.

Pakistani forces began attacking suspected hideouts in the North Waziristan tribal region, 400 km (250 miles) southwest of Islamabad, on Thursday after a clash with militants. Residents said they had heard that at least 25 people, both Pakistani tribesman and militants, had been killed. The dead included five foreigners, some residents said.

"The army is asking militants to put down their arms. They are using loudspeakers," said a resident of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan. A security official in the region later said troops had entered the area where militants were believed to have been hiding, at Khati village, but had found no one.

"All of them somehow managed to escape," said the official, who declined to be identified. "Now the search operation has started and troops are looking for militants inside damaged houses and other hideouts." Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his top deputies are believed to be hiding out somewhere along the rugged frontier between Afghanistan and Pakistan but Sultan said the military had no evidence of any "high-value target" in the area. Bin Laden was the architect of the September 11 attacks.

Gen. Musharraf 's Lies - The Washington Post Company, Editorial 10/01/2005

PAKISTANI President Pervez Musharraf complains that his country is unfairly portrayed as a place where rape and other violence against women are rampant and frequently condoned. In fact, it deserves such a reputation. According to Pakistani human rights groups, thousands of attacks are reported every year, including gang rapes and "honor killings" of women who are accused of having affairs or who refuse an arranged marriage.

Most of these attacks go unpunished. So retrograde are Pakistan's laws that there are more than 1,500 women in prison as a result of rapes -- they were prosecuted for adultery -- while arrests of men occur in only about 15 percent of reported cases.

Gen. Musharraf, too, deserves the reputation he is earning as a ruler who cares more about how he is perceived in the West than in implementing the policies he claims to espouse, or even in speaking the truth. The general, who seized power in a coup six years ago, has reneged on promises to retire from the army or restore democracy. He has not carried out the reform of Islamic religious schools that he promised in 2001.

He has allowed the extremist Afghan Taliban movement to base itself in Pakistan's western provinces with virtual impunity. He has repeatedly insisted, almost certainly falsely, that Osama bin Laden is not in Pakistan. All the while he has gone on collecting hundreds of millions of dollars in aid each year from the Bush administration, which accepts his words and ignores most of his actions.

Gen. Musharraf claims to champion a "moderate Islam" that respects the rights of women. But when Mukhtar Mai, a victim of a gang rape whose attackers have not been punished, tried to visit the United States earlier this year, the president barred her from leaving the country. In an interview with The Post last month, he claimed that he had relented. But then he said this: "You must understand the environment in Pakistan. This has become a money-making concern.

A lot of people say if you want to go abroad and get a visa for Canada or citizenship and be a millionaire, get yourself raped." This statement was, as Pakistani activists and the Canadian government soon pointed out, an outrageous lie. There is only one known case of a rape victim moving to Canada, a doctor who was assaulted by a military officer. A far more common outcome for rape victims is to be ostracized by their communities or jailed.

When Gen. Musharraf's statement provoked an uproar, he responded with another lie: He claimed that he had never made it. In fact, a recording of him speaking is available on The Post's Web site, washingtonpost.com. His words are quite clear. "These are not my words, and I would go to the extent of saying I am not so silly and stupid to make comments of this sort," the general said. Well, yes, he is.

More Germans for Afghanistan - Der Spiegel 09/29/2005

Germany's parliament on Wednesday voted to extend and enlarge the Bundeswehr's mission in Afghanistan. It's a move that might gain Germany some international respect, but it will put even more German soldiers in danger. Will it make Afghanistan any safer?

Once again, German troops in Afghanistan came up for vote in the German parliament on Wednesday and, by an overwhelming majority, parliamentarians agreed to not only continue, but broaden the Bundeswehr's mission in Afghanistan. The Bundestag signed-on to increase troop-levels from 2,250 to 3,000, and an assumption of command in the north-eastern section of Afghanistan, which would require opening a new base in the city of Masar-i-Sharaf.

The "expansion" is, of course, minimal by other countries' (read: US) standards. But, even simply as a re-affirmation of the military enterprise, the vote is an objective milestone for a country whose citizens and politicians, for a good half-century after World War II, were too busy piecing together their society -- and trying to make sense of the unprecedented misery that they had perpetrated -- to seriously consider the thought of putting its troops into action.

Now, ever-aware of its past transgressions, Germany sees itself as a major player on the world stage, eager to assume all the clout and self-importance -- and the military responsibilities -- that status implies. Since 1999 German troops have been prominently stationed in the Balkans and Afghanistan, if not in Iraq.

The Afghan mission, in particular, has proved more intractable than originally envisioned: warlords are still in control of much the country, opium production has increased exponentially, and the country's fledgling democracy is constantly threatened by remnants of the Taliban. Despite reminders that Afghanistan was a dangerous place -- reinforced by news of a Taliban suicide attack in Kabul on Wednesday that killed nine people -- parliamentarians proved, across all party lines to be supportive of the mission. German commentators took the opportunity to sound off.

The center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung notes that the German engagement in Afghanistan has reaped some positive political dividends, but takes the government to task for not having a more clear-eyed vision of their mission. "There remain protective walls behind which the Germans are hiding." The commentators point out that, according to its mandate, "the Bundeswehr is not to get involved in the dealings of the warlords or take action against drugs trading." The Parliament, though, hasn't shown the will to issue a "more robust mandate". Thus, what's left is a half-baked policy that is "reflective of either ignorance to the reality of the situation or the desire to leave unpleasant tasks to the partner nations". And such a mandate, the writers conclude, is unlikely to be successful.

The conservative editors at Die Welt chime in as well. In a fatalistic tone, the paper castigates parliamentarians for investing, at all, in the possibility of victory. They point out that the area for which German troops are responsible is equivalent in size to the terrain that lies between Paris and Warsaw: "It is an illusion to believe that a few thousand soldiers can provide stability in such a region," they opine. "They can undertake nothing against the huge production of narcotics because the region cannot be completely monitored." The parliament's ostensible support of the military is actually, then, an abuse. Not only have politicians not given the soldiers a chance to win -- by avoiding discussion of a realistic exit strategy -- but, they ignore the German lives that have been lost as a result of their neglect.

Readers looking for a more optimistic assessment can turn to the Financial Times Deutschland. "The engagement in Afghanistan is a success story of the Schröder-era," a bold-face pull-quote announces. "Germany has contributed immensely to the stability of Afghanistan," the writers confidently assert. But, they warn that the public should not fall under the illusion that the mission is without peril. In fact, they remind that the mission "will become even more dangerous when troops move from the relatively safety Kabul to more northern regions." Nonetheless, troops should steel themselves, because "if Germany takes its role seriously, then it has to take this step." It's the responsibility of policy-makers in Berlin, though, the paper concludes, to ensure that German participation in the UN-mandated peace-keeping operation does not get hopelessly intermingled with the aggressive American-led operations.

Of course, a day of German punditry wouldn't be complete without some musing on last week's chaotic election. The center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung steps up, with a reflection on how yesterday's Afghanistan vote bodes well for the expected "Grand Coalition" between the SPD and the CDU/CSU. The problems between the parties were always a matter of "style, rather than content." Despite differences over certain foreign policy strategies -- dealings with Bush, Putin and China, for example -- the two major parties have major similarities and yesterday's vote was evidence that when "the major protagonists get out from under their circus tents (or leave the market place), they'll find their way to one another -- especially when it concerns the use of troops in conflict zones."

ICELANDIC OBSERVATION TEAM ARRIVES TO JOIN PROVINCIAL RECONSTRUCTION TEAM IN MAIMANA – Headquarters International Security Assistance Force Kabul, Afghanistan NEWS RELEASE date - 30 Sep 05 MAIMANA, Afghanistan -

The arrival of an Icelandic Observation Team on 28 September marked a welcome addition to the Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) in Balkh Province. The Observation Team in Maimana consist of civilian specialists with the backgrounds and experience to meet the challenges of each mission. However, members wear military uniforms and are trained in military skills for self-defence purposes. The team is part of Iceland's Crisis Response Unit and have specialist skills that will be used in a peacekeeping capacity.

These include fire-fighting, policing, medical and other essential trades which will provide valuable specialist advice to the region. The Icelandic team have also deployed specialist vehicles that are designed to operate in mountainous terrain along with experienced drivers, which will expand the reach of the PRT in Balkh province, particularly in hostile winter conditions.

This will increase the capabilities of the ISAF personnel working in the PRT and ensure that even more communities can benefit from the assistance and support of ISAF, extending the influence of the Government of Afghanistan in accordance with the ISAF mandate.

WORK ON TEN NEW SCHOOLS BEGINS IN HERAT PROVINCE

Regional Area Coordinator West Herat – Afghanistan Press release september 29th, 2005 Herat Afghanistan, Plans for ten shools are in motion with the recent opening of ten building sites. The province of Herat's social and material reconstruction will receive a boost from the completion of these new education establishments and in the future the area will benefit from a better educated and more highly skilled population. The construction of these schools is supported by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the Italian government as part of their commitment to the future of Afghanistan.

During the last three days the Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) commander, Colonel Amedeo Sperotto has participated in the laying of foundation stones in Nang Abad, Karokh and Kazergah. Villages where, in a few months, children will have a proper school building leaving behind the tents and ramshackle facilities they have been attending lessons in until now. Nang Abad's school will cost $182.000, Karokh's one $217.500 and that of Kazergah $183.000. All ten schools are being constructed using funds from the 2005 Italian Ministry of Defence budget; the total cost is some 1.795.000 dollars.

The sites for the new schools were selected by a joint team of local education and PRT personnel. During the foundation stone ceremonies, PRT personnel have received enthusiastic welcomes from the village headmen, local authorities and inhabitants, all grateful for this much anticipated sign of progress. "Culture and education of young people are the main themes in order to lay the foundations for a good future, and this is the reason we worked together with local authorities to give an answer, in this important field, to people's demands"-Colonel Sperotto said during a public address.

The ten projects, planned by the specialists of the civil-military co-operation cell, have been allocated to local companies to boost the local economy. The firms are to build one or two storey schoolhouses, depending on the needs of the area, with a maximum of 16 classrooms in each.

AFGHANISTAN: Recent refugee influx ups pressure on aid agencies [This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations] KABUL, 29 September (IRIN) - The arrival of 21,000 Afghan families from Pakistan over the past six weeks has placed an additional strain on aid agencies in providing adequate humanitarian assistance, representatives say.

"The return of such a large of number over [such] a relatively short period of time just before the winter has created additional pressures for reintegration operations," Tim Irwin, a spokesman of the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said in the Afghan capital, Kabul, on Thursday.

Together with relevant government ministries, other UN agencies and non-governmental organisations, the UN refugee agency was working to ensure that families and individuals were able to settle in their places of origin before winter sets in, Irwin maintained.

As part of a previous decision made in 2004, Islamabad announced plans to close all refuge facilities by 1 August located across the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), a western restive tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, offering Afghan residents in the area the option of repatriating or relocating to any other site inside Pakistan. That decision prompted more than 120,000 Afghans living in the refugee camps of the tribal Kurram and Bajaur agencies to head to Afghanistan - availing themselves of the voluntary UNHCR repatriation assistance package.

The influx of FATA returnees included mostly those Afghans who had crossed into Pakistan in the early years of the Soviet-Afghan conflict in the late 1970s. According to UNHCR, to date, the destinations of over 94,000 Afghans from Pakistan's tribal areas include the eastern and central provinces of Paktya, Khost, Nangarhar, Kunar, Logar and Kabul.

"Many of the families are returning to areas where there has been limited development due to the security situation," Jacques Mouchet, UNHCR representative in Afghanistan, said earlier this week in Kabul. "There are also a large number of individuals who left Afghanistan 25 years ago and who face challenges in reintegrating into their former communities." Under UNHCR's current voluntary repatriation assistance programme, returnees are eligible for transport assistance ranging from US $4 to $37 per person, depending on the distance to their destination. Additionally, they receive a grant of $12 each to help them with additional costs.

The return assistance is complemented by programmes designed to help returnees re-establish their lives in their places of origin. To assist the returnees in their foremost need of shelter, the UN refugee agency plans to build some 24,000 housing units across the country in 2005. Of this, some 7,000 units were completed by the end of August, located primarily in the provinces of Kabul, Parwan, Logar, Kunduz and Balkh.

The refugee agency has also been working to increase access to fresh water, with water points for some 65,000 individuals across the country being dug - mainly in Baghlan, Faryab and Jawzjan provinces in the north, Kandhar and Uruzgan in the south, Herat and Nimruz in the west and Daikundi province, located in the Central Highlands. Moreover, UNHCR has been running about 21 income generation projects across the fledgling state to assist poor communities in supplementing their earnings in southern, eastern, and central regions. These include poultry farming, road rehabilitation, tailoring and handicrafts.

Meanwhile, the Afghan government has also been helping by providing the returnees land for shelter. Recently, the Ministry of Women's Affairs announced its plans to build accommodation for at least 1 million vulnerable Afghan women across the country with a German construction firm.

Afghan repatriation, now in its fourth year, is the largest organised repatriation operation in the history of UNHCR. Since the repatriation effort began in March 2002 following the collapse of the Taliban regime, a total of 2.9 million Afghans have returned from Pakistan and 1.3 million from Iran. According to the latest figures, Pakistan still hosts some 3 million Afghans in the country, with another 900,000 living in Iran.

A Home for Parliament - With votes still being counted to decide who will sit in the new parliament, there is still no building for it to meet in. Institute for War & Peace Reporting By Amanullah Nasrat in Kabul (ARR No. 190, 30-Sep-05)

As would-be parliamentarians await the results from the September 18 election, some 700 workmen are racing to complete a building in which members will debate and exercise their new powers.

Rising from the ruins of a building that was used by parliament in the last years of the reign of King Mohammad Zahir Shah, who was overthrown in 1973, the structure was badly damaged during the internecine conflict of the early Nineties.

Once repaired, it will still only be a temporary home for the parliament, until a new building – paid for by India – is completed.

Located on an acre of land, the interim parliament building lies three kilometres from the presidential palace and not far from the Darulaman Palace, which stands today an imposing skeletal ruin - mute testimony to the destruction caused by the 1992-96 civil war.

"Work has been going on for about a year on the [temporary] parliament, financed out of the government budget, and it has cost 2.5 million US dollars to date," said the deputy minister of housing and urban development, Sayed Sharif Hussaini.

He added that work was progressing quickly and that in the past 45 days, many rooms and other essentials, like parking area, mosque and printing office, had been finished. He said that 90 per cent of the construction was now completed.

The four-storey building has three different sections: one for the Wolesi Jirga or lower house of parliament, one for the Meshrano Jirga or upper house, and a third for administrative offices.

The frantic pace of work can be judged from the fact that 18 workmen are high up on scaffolding in the future Meshrano Jirga, painting the ceiling. But some of the workforce are sceptical that the renovation will finish by the time the final election results are announced.

"There’s still lots of work left to do,” said one worker. “I don't think it will be finished within two months, either." No date has yet been set by President Hamed Karzai for the first session of the new parliament.

"The new parliament's first meeting will be held in this building," Dr Azizullah Luddin, head of parliament’s interim secretariat, told IWPR. "The building… has historic value because it was used for parliamentary business during the reign of Mohammad Zahir Shah."

Luddin said there was a five million dollar budget to meet construction expenses, staff and delegates' salaries until the end of the year, and promised, "We will have the building ready between October 15 and early November."

Since the first session is expected to be a crowded gathering, with foreign and other guests in attendance, Hussaini said tents with a televised link to the main hall would be used to accommodate the overflow.

Meanwhile, work has already started on a brand-new building which will be located on a 38,000 square metre plot of land behind the Darulaman Palace.

Hussaini said he himself wrote the blueprint for the structure, which was then designed by Indian engineers. It will consist of three octagonal structures - one each for the Wolesi Jirga and the Meshrano Jirga, and one for offices. There will also be a mosque and a library.

The plans were presented to Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh during his visit to Kabul in August. Singh laid the foundation stone for the building, which is being paid for by his country. The construction work is expected to take three years. Amanullah Nasrat is an IWPR staff reporter in Kabul.

TV show aims to be Afghan Oprah By Soutik Biswas BBC News, Kabul Saturday, 1 October 2005

At the well-secured offices of the Tolo TV station in Kabul, presenter Farzana Samimi is getting ready for a new show called Banu - "woman" in the Dari language.

The 27-year-old veterinary science and psychology major turned TV presenter says the show is about problems faced by Afghan women - largely a taboo subject.

Three times a week for the past month, Ms Samimi has teamed up with a Kabul-based psychiatrist, Mohammed Yasin Babrak, to talk about the "psychological and social problems" of women.

Today's subject is about the common fears that women usually have, says Ms Samimi, who thought up the programme. In a poky blue-walled studio, the presenter and doctor sit on beige leather seats across a wooden table. A ceramic tea pot and three cups on the table complete the minimalist setting.

Ms Samimi begins by asking Dr Babrak about the fears women usually have. The discussion drags a little - a long talkathon on phobias. But even this is quite revolutionary in war-ravaged Afghanistan, where women are still struggling to make their voices heard, four years after the demise of the Taleban.

Banu aspires to become an Oprah Winfrey clone, where women can sit around a table or phone in to discuss their problems. "Most Afghan women cannot pour their hearts out to anyone when they have a problem. We hope to make this programme their pulpit, so to speak," says Ms Samimi.

The daughter of an engineer father who now lives with her homemaker mother in Turkey, Ms Samimi believes Afghan women are among the worst off in the world. "They have not got their rights in family and society. Even if she wants to change her hairstyle, she has to get her husband's permission. They have no control over their destiny. Obviously, they suffer many problems, including mental ones," she says.

Ms Samimi was luckier than most Afghan women - she chose a calling in television after training to be a psychologist. Her siblings have been lucky too - one sister is a doctor, the other painter, and the third is studying economics. She says she thought up the show after watching the plight of women go from bad to worse over the war-ravaged years in Afghanistan.

Dr Babrak came in handy to answer questions - the Pakistan-trained psychiatrist sees some 40 women patients at his Kabul chamber every week. The nearly three-decade-long civil war impacted on women most in Afghanistan.

In Kabul alone, 30,000 were left as widows and the only earning members of their family, according to one estimate. During the civil war, women were killed, raped and abused by the various warlord-led militias.

"Most of the women who come to me don't know what is going wrong with them. Most of them suffer from forgetfulness, mood swings, schizophrenia," says Dr Babrak.

He talks to them and sometimes prescribes pills. But long-term psychotherapy for women patients is still impossible. "This is a traditional country. There is no concept of a shrink's couch here," says Dr Babrak.

So Banu is one way of telling women how they may be able to cope with their problems without visiting a doctor. The afternoon show seemed to have struck a chord already - women have begun writing in about their problems, and calling in after watching the programme.

Ms Samimi is already a star in the making for her women viewers and has stopped going to markets as "people bother me". She confesses she feels "scared sometimes" hosting a show for women - a former presenter for Tolo TV, who used to work for a popular youth music show, was shot dead by unknown gunmen in Kabul in May.

"My husband really does not want me to do this programme because of security fears. But I still manage because I want to do something for women," she says. Only time will tell whether Banu picks up and becomes a talking point in Afghanistan, but for the moment the plucky presenter and good doctor will soldier on.

In a war zone, reality no longer sells ioneering director laments Afghans' preference for glitzy films and wrestling over social commentary, GRAEME SMITH writes By GRAEME SMITH / The Globe and Mail (Canada) / Friday, September 30, 2005

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- When Hidayatullah Azizi first showed his films in public, so many people wanted to see his grainy VHS tapes that they filled the seats in Kandahar's education centre and even crowded onto the stairs at the back, fanning themselves in the stuffy heat.

Dignitaries from this southern province of Afghanistan made speeches before the film, and Mr. Azizi won applause for his lecture about how he made the two movies to illustrate the plight of Afghan refugees.

That was October, 2002, only a year after the defeat of the Taliban, which had banned every kind of film and television. Movies were still a novelty to the people in this broken city, the former headquarters for the strict regime.

But nobody has expressed the slightest interest in Mr. Azizi's latest script, about the drug trade that is rotting Afghan society.

"People don't take an interest in reality any more," said the 30-year-old director. "They don't want Afghan movies. They want Bollywood and professional wrestling."

Blackouts, roadblocks and the constant threat of violence aren't the biggest challenges for an independent filmmaker in this dangerous region, it seems, despite the soldiers still roaming the countryside on the hunt for Taliban insurgents and the homemade bombs killing people on a regular basis.

The real problem is finding anyone who appreciates social commentary, Mr. Azizi said, amid the chaos of the new Kandahar. Vendors here sell a colourful assortment of pirated movies: Hollywood blockbusters, Bollywood musicals from India and martial-arts films from Hong Kong.

The vast majority of women in the markets still wear the traditional Islamic burqa, but under the counter many stalls also hide a stash of illegal pornographic DVDs. Behind the mud walls of the city's more comfortable homes, satellite dishes and cable television have inspired a craze for the steroid-fuelled antics of U.S. wrestling shows.

Few people in Kandahar seem to think that Vince McMahon would rig a fight, and bodybuilding clubs have sprung up as quickly as English schools, as young men strive to look and sound like their heroes.

There isn't much homegrown entertainment to balance the local media diet. A few film companies have emerged in Kabul, but Mr. Azizi says he's the only film director in Kandahar, the second-biggest city in the country. He carries a laminated identity card, stamped and signed, declaring, "Occupation: Film Director." But the truth is that he's now unemployed, and unsure when he will be able to scrape together enough money for his next film.

He's unwilling to give up the profession, however. His father was a director, one of a handful of filmmakers under the regime of communist leader Mohammad Najibullah, making films about the atrocities of the mujahedeen that have been described as either propaganda or documentaries.

Like many Afghans, they fled for Pakistan when the Taliban took over in 1996. His father took a risk by trying to save his life's work, smuggling out a cloth bag full of video cassettes despite the fact that they could have been killed if the Taliban had noticed the forbidden materials.

"My hands were shaking, because I was very afraid," Mr. Azizi said. He spent six years saving up for his first two films, working 18-hour days as a clerk for pharmacies, plumbing stores, and carpet dealers. At night he worked on his scripts, writing about his neighbours in the slums of Quetta, Pakistan.

"I would write until 2 a.m., and cry the whole time," Mr. Azizi said. "These are sad stories, about poor children. They rummage in the garbage without any shoes, taking the scraps other people throw away. So I wept when I wrote those words."

Finally he rented a clunky Panasonic M3000 and turned the words into pictures. He did most of the work himself, with a cast of friends. The results were amateurish but touching. Return to Homeland features Afghan orphans living in Pakistan, and shows some unnecessarily long scenes of death and mourning during its 150 minutes. His other film, Poverty, runs 80 minutes and tells a more engaging story about a boy who tries to win a school competition so his sister can have a pair of shoes.

Neither film has been released, but Mr. Azizi is patient. Afghanistan may not be ready for that kind of social realism at the moment, he said, but some day the mood will change.

"We had 25 years of war in this country. The people are very tired. They want comedy, fighting, love stories. But I don't care. My next film, if I get a chance, will be about drug smokers."

CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap [This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations] ANKARA, 30 September (IRIN) -

The trial of 15 men accused of plotting to overthrow the Uzbek government in the eastern city of Andijan entered its second week in the Uzbek capital, Tashkent. Upwards of 1,000 civilians may have been killed in Andijan on 13 May, according to some rights groups, when security forces opened fire on protesters demonstrating against the government of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, who has ruled Central Asia's most populous state since the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991.

Despite international pressure, Tashkent has rejected all requests for an independent international inquiry, placing the official death toll at 187. The 15 men have pleaded guilty to trying to overthrow the Uzbek government and create an Islamic state in a violent uprising that prosecutors maintain was stoked by Western media. More than 100 people face charges that include murder, fomenting mass arrest and an attempted coup.

On Monday, three defendants testified they had trained at military camps in neighbouring Kyrgyzstan, further backing Tashkent's claim of a conspiracy that included foreign fighters and funding, one AFP report said. "We were given money by the US embassy to achieve our goals," Tavakkalbek Hojiyev, one of the alleged insurgents, reportedly told the court. But human rights groups, who have repeatedly called for international pressure, maintain the well orchestrated trial was merely a concerted effort to bury the truth.

On Thursday, the European Union (EU) answered those calls by announcing it would impose "smart sanctions" on Tashkent following its refusal to allow for an international inquiry. The decision, to be approved by EU foreign ministers on Monday, marks a hardening stance by the international community against Tashkent, Britain's Telegraph newspaper reported. Criticism of the Uzbek authorities from Washington has already led to the US being ordered to remove its airbase at Karshi-Khanabad, in the southeast, the report added. Once a staunch ally in America's wars against terror, relations between the two countries have soured over Andijan. On Monday, the US vowed not to trade democratic principle for continued use of the base, the AFP reported.

EU diplomats reportedly said the sanctions would include redirecting EU funds from the Uzbek government to grassroots organisations, banning senior Uzbek government figures from visiting European countries and halting the sale of weapons. Moving to Tajikistan, Tajik President Emomali Rahmonov on Tuesday told a conference on coordinating donor aid to protect the Tajik-Afghan border that the situation with regard to drug proliferation was in hand.

Despite a lack of military equipment, Tajik border guards had proved they could protect their 1,206 km border on their own, following the departure of Russian troops in the area in June, the president claimed. The country has become a major route for drugs smuggled to Europe and Russia from Afghanistan. One day earlier, US Ambassador to Tajikistan Richard Hoagland and Minister of Foreign Affairs Talbak Nazarov signed a Letter of Agreement for US $9 million to assist the country's border guards. According to an embassy statement, the funding would provide infrastructure improvements, border outpost development, transportation and other necessary equipment for the guards.

The funding is part of the US Department of State's Bureau of Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs continuing support for Tajikistan's border guards, the Tajik Drug Control Agency and the Ministry of Interior. Since December 2004, Washington has provided or is in the process of providing over $16 million worth of assistance to the former Soviet republic's law enforcement agencies.

Staying in Tajikistan, Tajik authorities on Tuesday confirmed the arrest of a Russian citizen who allegedly belonged to the outlawed Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), the AP said. Blamed for a series of armed incursions into Uzbekistan in 1999-2001, as well as other attacks, the IMU has been designated by the US State Department as a terrorist organisation, the report added. Kyrgyzstan's parliament on Tuesday turned down six of 16 candidates proposed by President Kurmanbek Bakiyev to form a new cabinet, including his close ally Roza Otunbayeva, who was nominated to head the foreign ministry.

According to the AP, many lawmakers, many of whom were holdovers from the era of Bakiyev's ousted predecessor, Askar Akayev, also rejected the appointment of Bakiyev's nominees for the cabinet's chief of staff as well as culture, labour and transport ministers and the head of the migration service. On 1 September, parliament approved Felix Kulov as prime minister. Kulov was a former security chief who had been jailed by Akayev for alleged corruption, the reported said.

Meanwhile in Kazakhstan, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Wednesday condemned the action of the Kazakh printing press Vremia Print in unilaterally terminating contracts to print seven opposition newspapers without explanation on Monday. "It is unacceptable that the Kazakh public is being deprived of independent and opposition news in the run-up to the 4 December presidential elections," the press watchdog group said. "We call on President Nursultan Nazarbayev to respect press diversity, especially at such a crucial moment in the country's political life." Print media had proven the only source of independent news in Central Asia's largest state, as all TV stations were controlled by Nazarbayev associates, RSF claimed. Lastly in Turkmenistan, the Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights announced that all Russian schools which used to operate had been transformed into Turkmen schools.

Yet, one class with Russian as the language of instruction would remain in each of the schools. With Russian schools being closed and demand for Russian instruction exceeding available places, only those children whose parents held Russian citizenship or a migrant status to Russia would be allowed to attend, the Vienna-based group noted on Tuesday.

[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.]