Afghanistan says has turned corner on opium trade

BRUSSELS, Sept 6 (Reuters) - Afghanistan's top anti-narcotics official said on Tuesday his country had turned a corner in its fight against the drug trade but called for more money to make further progress to halt opium cultivation.

The United Nations said last month a 21 percent fall in the area of land devoted to opium poppies this year was mainly due to low prices and government efforts to persuade farmers to stop cultivation, including a threat to destroy fields.

"The tide has been turned," Afghan Counter Narcotics Minister Habibullah Qaderi told a news conference in Brussels after a meeting with European Union officials.

"We have turned a corner and I think it gives us hope and hope to everybody in the world community," said Qaderi, whose country is the world's main source of opium and its refined form, heroin, producing about 87 percent of global supply.

He acknowledged opium production was far more lucrative for Afghan farmers than crops such as wheat, but said the tough line taken by both the government and religious leaders was making an impact on the drug trade.

Qaderi will meet EU justice and interior ministers later this week in the northern English city of Newcastle to ask the bloc for more help to boost Afghanistan's fight against opium production.

Some 90 percent of heroin in the EU comes from Afghanistan. Qaderi said Afghanistan needed more money to help persuade farmers give up opium growing and to rebuild irrigation systems and roads destroyed by decades of wars in the country.

"If we have the money we can hire the expertise, we can bring the expertise to help us make the roads, repair the canals. It is certainly very important," he said.

Opium production in Afghanistan has risen to record levels since the 2001 U.S.-led ousting of the then Taliban government. Last year, a U.N. report said if nothing was done, Afghanistan could turn into a lawless "narco-state" run by drug cartels.

EU presidency holder Britain said the efforts made by the Afghan government to curb cultivation were a "good start", but fighting drug production in the war-ravaged country was a long-term problem.

"The immediate risk is not there ... but the key is going to be maintaining the reduction in production into the future," said Peter Holland, head of Britain's Afghan Drugs Interdepartmental Unit.

Britain has led an international campaign against the $2.8 billion-a-year Afghan opium trade. Drug exports make up 60 percent of Afghanistan's economy.

UK funding boost for Afghan drug fight - Politics.co.UK 06/09/2005

Britain has increased funding for the fight against drugs in Afghanistan by £115 million, Foreign Office minister Kim Howells said last night.

Speaking after a meeting with Afghan counter-narcotics minister Habibullah Qaderi, he reiterated the UK's commitment to tackling the production of heroin in Afghanistan. "Over the next three years we will commit over £270 million – an increase of £115 million – to help tackle the menace of the drugs trade," Dr Howells said.

He added: "More than 95 per cent of the heroin in the UK originates in Afghanistan. Working to eliminate opium is vital for Afghanistan's future and is key to its stability."

Mr Qaderi welcomed the support, saying the additional funding would "greatly help" his country's efforts to tackle drugs.

"Across Afghanistan, from Kabul to the provinces, we need to do more to stop the evils of the drugs trade and those involved in it," he said.

Opposition leader eyes up to half of seats

KABUL (Reuters) - The head of Afghanistan's opposition said on Wednesday President Hamid Karzai was a weak leader and a new parliament, to be elected on September 18, would have to improve government policy across the board.

Yunus Qanuni a former interior minister and education minister in Karzai's transitional government and runner-up to Karzai in last year's presidential election, said he and his allies expected to win up to 50 percent of parliament seats.

"Afghanistan faces a leadership crisis, the main crisis is the weakness of the leadership," Qanuni told Reuters in an interview at his home in the northern outskirts of Kabul.

"The government's economic policies are unsuccessful, its policy against terrorism has collapsed, its policy against drugs has collapsed, corruption is rising daily and international aid has not been used effectively and transparently." "These are the priorities which parliament should debate and help the government move towards improvements."

Afghans will vote for a lower house of parliament and provincial councils to complete the last step in an international plan to restore democratic government after 25 years of conflict with security worries mounting on a surge of Taliban violence.

The United States has 20,000 troops in Afghanistan, most of whom are focussing on election security, as are 10,000 NATO-led peacekeepers. Qanuni, an ethnic Tajik from the Panjsher Valley, the heart of opposition to Soviet occupation and Taliban rule, said the government had no strategy to end the insurgency,.

"The problem of the Taliban is not because of the Taliban's power and strength, it is because of the weakness of the government," he said. "If we had a powerful government and a strong leadership, the issue of Taliban and terrorism would have been solved," he said. U.S. troops would need to stay for stability, he said.

Despite his criticism, he said he did not want to see hostility between the legislature and the government. "We're hopeful that at the beginning there won't be hostility ... Our vision of a future parliament is a moderate one.

"We hope to have a real national parliament, through transparent elections, which is neither an enemy of the government nor its tool," he said. But in a sign of possible trouble ahead, Qanuni said the new parliament may not approve all of Karzai's cabinet, which will be one of its first tasks.

"The current cabinet of Afghanistan has no tangible achievements ... I'm not so hopeful that all members can be approved," he said without elaborating. Qanuni was a senior Northern Alliance leader who helped U.S.-led forces topple the Taliban in 2001.

He was also a top political official for legendary opposition leader Ahmad Shah Masood, killed in a suicide bomb blast days before the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

A portrait of Masood hangs on a wall in Qanuni's plush reception room and a photograph of the mujahideen, or holy warrior, guerrilla leader is on a side table.

Qanuni dismissed worry about regional commanders, or warlords, posing a threat to the government saying it was a government scare tactic to use against rivals. "Warlordism is not a real threat to Afghanistan. It is an artificial threat the government creates. Government institutions today are the real threat to democracy, to transparent elections."

Under the voting system being used on September 18, candidates stand as individuals. Each voter will cast a single ballot even though more than one representative will come from each constituency. Qanuni criticised the system but said he and his allies in a bloc of opposition parties known as the National Understanding Front had a strategy.

"We've organised it so votes will not all go to one candidate, they'll to be shared out ... We hope to have between 45 to 50 percent of seats," he said. Asked about two ornate chess sets on display, Qanuni said with a laugh: "They're the same thing. They go hand in hand: chess and politics."

Maulana Fazl's statements to fuel terrorism, says Karzai - International News Network, Pakistan 09/06/2005

KABUL - Afghan President Hamid Karzai Tuesday said that the recent statement of Leader Jamiat-ul-Islam Maulana Fazl ur Rehman concerning Afghanistan are irresponsible with a soul purpose of encouraging terrorism.

While giving an interview to an Arab TV, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that Afghan government is vigilantly reviewing the statements of Leader Jamiat-ul-Islam Maulana Fazal ur Rehman concerning Afghanistan stressing that he has also been an active member of Taliban.

He said that he has asked Taliban and Hizbul Islami that if they lay down their arms then they will be forgiven. "If masses have forgiven communists who along with Russian troops were implicated in violence and aggression then why not Taliban who are also citizens of the country", Karzai maintained.

Karzai further added that Afghan government is grateful to Pakistan as they have always supported them and such statements can cause uncertainty and misunderstanding between the two countries.

Karzai still has good feelings for Taliban: MMA

ISLAMABAD - Afghan president Hamid Karzai had remained associated with Taliban and Osama bin Laden, and still has good feelings for them, claimed Hafiz Hussain Ahmad, the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal central leader.

"Karzai is still with Taliban but he is acting like a hypocrite in current circumstances," Hafiz Hussain told reporters outside Parliament House on Tuesday.

The MMA leader said Karzai could not restore peace and stability in Afghanistan despite US-led coalition forces' support. He said Afghan president's rule was limited to Kabul.

"Karzai only rules Kabul and he has no control over other parts of the violence-stricken country", he said. Hafiz Hussain said 'duplicity' of Karzai like characters was behind the law and order crisis in Afghanistan.

He said Karzai was trying to 'pass the buck' to Islamabad to deceive the world about his failure to maintain law and order.

Bungled car bomb kills four in south Afghanistan

KABUL, Sept 7 (Reuters) - A car exploded in a southern Afghan town on Wednesday, killing its three occupants and a passerby, in what appeared to be a bungled suicide attack, a provincial official said.

Security has been stepped up across Afghanistan in the run-up to Sept 18 elections that have been denounced by Taliban insurgents, who have been battling U.S. and government forces since their ouster in 2001.

The car was passing a policeman's house in the town of Girishk when it exploded but that was not believed to have been the target, said Mohammed Wali Alizai, spokesman for the Helmand provincial governor.

"It seems their aim was to carry out a suicide on attack on the Americans but it went off early," Alizai said. "The car was completely detroyed, it's in pieces," he said. The United States has 20,000 troops in Afghanistan, most of whom are focusing on election security, as are 10,000 NATO-led peacekeepers and tens of thousands of government forces.

More than 1,000 people, most of them insurgents but including 49 American soldiers, have been killed this year, the bloodiest period since U.S.-led forces arrived.

The parliamentary and provincial elections are the final part of a plan meant to restore democratic government and stability in Afghanistan after 25 years of conflict. 

US forces not to conduct operations sans Afghan army -Pajhwok Afghan News 09/06/2005 By Abdul Majid Arif & Ilyas Wahdat

KHOST CITY/ GARDEZ -The coalition forces based in the southeastern Khost province have announced they would not conduct search operations without the Afghan National Army (ANA).

Addressing a news conference in Khost City on Tuesday, Colonel Michael Fenzel said the US-led coalition would be accompanied by Afghan forces in future operations. The Afghan army, enjoying the status of a national force, would lead the coalition in such operations.

The announcement came after residents protested the house searches, saying such operations were inconsistent with Afghan traditions.

The Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT), through the interior ministry, would donate 10 vehicles to the Khost police, promised the colonel, who added a joint command center would be established to streamline security.

Zones for the police, the Afghan army and coalition forces would be demarcated to improve the security situation in the city, he revealed, explaining police would monitor frontline while the ANA and coalition forces would back them.

A modern reporting system would be set up for faster communications. This system will be operative before and after the legislative elections.

Meanwhile, a joint- command centre of the coalition forces and Afghan National Army has been established in the neighbouring Paktia province. Hai Gul Salmankhel, police chief of Paktia, told Pajhwok Afghan News the intelligence, police, ANA and coalition forces would be deployed at the center.

Hakim Taniwal, Paktia governor, will head the center. Since he is not on duty these days, General Akram will be the centre's acting chief.

Military operation launched in NWA

MIRANSHAH – Daily Tiimes: Security forces launched a massive operation in North Waziristan near the Pakistan-Afghan border on Tuesday.

According to a TV report, the operation was expedited on information that foreign militants were present in the Shawal valley. Helicopters have been reportedly used in the operation. The surrounding areas are being searched.

Prior to this operation, the contingent of security forces was increased due to law and order situation in the area and in view of the upcoming elections in Afghanistan on September 18. online

Press Briefing by Adrian Edwards _ Spokesperson for the Special Representative of the Secretary-General and by United Nations Agencies in Afghanistan Kabul – 5 September 2005

Afghanistan accession to refugee convention

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, has welcomed Afghanistan's accession to the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, saying the decision was especially significant for a country that for decades was the origin of one of the largest populations of refugees and asylum seekers in the world.

Afghanistan's accession enshrines in international law the country's long-standing tradition of asylum. Even throughout its troubled recent history, Afghanistan kept its doors open to refugees - notably those from Central Asia, like the tens of thousands of Tajiks who fled their country's civil war in the early 1990s.

• UNHCR encashment centres to close during election period

UNHCR will close its encashment centres in Afghanistan in the days before and after voting in the Wolesi Jirga and Provincial Council elections. The centres, which distribute financial assistance to returning refugees, will be closed for five days, from September 16 th to 20 th.

• UN working staff level maintained during elections

As you may have seen, a news report yesterday mentioned that UN staff members are being urged to leave Afghanistan ahead of the elections. This, we feel, is misleading.

The United Nations in Afghanistan continues to operate at our normal working staff level. Decisions on whether staff can take leave during this period are made in exactly the same way as always – a staff member requests leave, and their supervisor then decides. It remains entirely up to individual supervisors whether to approve or encourage leave depending on their own office’s staffing and programme needs.

For the two or three days over the election weekend, attention is going to be very much on the elections themselves, and agencies not directly involved can of course grant leave requests at this time if they wish. This is something we have discussed among ourselves just as one might in any organization. But this is purely an internal managerial decision that is up to individual supervisors. This is not the same as having a UN-wide policy [for Afghanistan] to downscale staffing, as yesterdays’ report may have suggested. I repeat, that we continue at the same normal working staff levels as usual. With UNAMA, I can tell you we have no policy whatsoever of altering staffing levels over this period. We have a job to do here, and we’re committed to doing that.

• WFP identifies districts for winter assistance

Last winter was particularly harsh for Afghans living in remote regions, following a seven-year drought that brought plenty of snow and cold conditions and made getting food even tougher for some. With the coming winter only a short period away the World Food Programme has identified several districts in four provinces for assistance.

Eight districts of Nuristan Province (Want, Wama, Paroon, Bargimatal, Kamdesh, Mandol, Noorgaram and Doab) as well as Hesarak district in Nangarhar Province; Dawlat Shah district in Laghman Province, and Dangam district in Kunar Province will receive wheat, oil, pulses, salt and biscuits.

Ten NGO's have submitted proposals to perform the operation. Delivery is planned before the end of September.

UNIFEM releases report in anticipation of World Summit; August newsletter

A new report by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in anticipation of the 2005 World Summit, argues for closer attention to the role of women, particularly working poor women, in the informal economy, and the impact of this on efforts by nations to meet the Millennium Development Goals.

The report, which is titled “Progress of the World’s Women 2005; Women, Work and Poverty”, looks at employment and the potential it has to reduce poverty and gender inequality. [Meanwhile UNIFEM Afghanistan has just released the English version of the August issue of its newsletter, Gender Advocacy in Afghanistan .

In this issue several topics are discussed: infertility and women in Afghanistan; inheritance and women in Afghanistan; women police in Afghanistan; men and the cost of marriage in Afghanistan and the Afghan Constitution and Parliament.

Candidates making use of sponsored advertisement programme

More then 2000 candidates have sought and received authorization to use the Sponsored Advertisement Programme since its launch on August 17 th 2005.

The Media Commission designed this programme to ensure that candidates have equal and fair access to the mass media during the campaign period.

The Media Commission is pleased with the high number of candidates who have already used the Programme. Candidates are actively campaigning and eager to inform voters of their political platforms.

Candidates who have not yet gone to a broadcaster in their province to produce their message are encouraged to do so as soon as possible.

• UNDP releases September newsletter

UNDP has just issued its September newsletter. This month’s issue features personal stories of triumph regarding alternative livelihoods and refugee returnees. It also mentions the recent meeting in New York on the disabled, which you will be hearing more about in a few minutes.

Questions & Answers

Question: There have been reports that candidates have been disqualified. Do you have any comment?

Spokesperson: There are all sorts of lists of candidate disqualifications being reported.Let’s be quite clear; all candidates are being monitored and any found to be in violation of electoral law are notified. This notification is done confidentially. There is a process happening here. It involves complaints being received. It involves the Electoral Complaints Commission making a decision on action in cases where complaints are verified. As we have told you, candidates can be disqualified throughout this process right up to the point where results are certified. Disqualifications become public only when they happen. This hasn’t happened yet.

Question: Up until now, no one has been disqualified?

Spokesperson: If you recall the process earlier this summer, a number of candidates were excluded from the list that went forward to the elections. If there are going to be [further] candidate disqualifications, the decision is not up to us. It is a matter for the Electoral Complaints Commission.

• Today’s guests

We have a busy slate today for guests. First is Samantha Aucock, head of Public Outreach with the Joint Electoral Management Body. She will be talking about the many public outreach activities taking place throughout the country.

Samantha Aucock, Head of Public Outreach, Joint Electoral Management Body

The Public Outreach Programme is responsible for the development and coordination of civic education and public information activities aimed at providing information to the Afghan population for the 2005 Wolesi Jirga and Provincial Council elections.

Our objectives again include delivering key elections [materials], which mirror the election process, and encourage and promote the participation of women in the process.

Besides the challenges of implementing a programme where there is a high level of illiteracy and geographical obstacles, in this campaign we face the challenge of a significantly more complicated election and shorter time period than that which preceded the Presidential elections.

Although the programme is based on similar methodology used in the Presidential registration and election programme, in recognizing the challenges of this campaign, it has expanded the number of civic education teams to conduct and coordinate public outreach activities in the field; and emphasizes both mass traditional and non traditional media.

Public Outreach consists of four main tools in order to reach the Afghan population:

Civic education activities – direct interactive activities with Afghan communities and distribution of materials; Mass media – public information – both traditional and non-traditional; Small grants programmes; a voter information centre.

The tools are used simultaneously to disseminate key messages developed within the campaign timeline as information is best understood when consistently disseminated from different sources .

In order to coordinate election message development and dissemination, the Public Outreach Programme has defined four campaign phases: the Candidate Nomination Phase; the Voter Registry Update Period; Polling; Counting and Results.

The Public Outreach Programme has developed and disseminated over 17 million civic education materials for general distribution. Materials address men and women, educated and illiterate, and respect religious and cultural traditions. Specific material was produced targeting women, the disabled, Kuchis and returnees. Materials included the production of posters, leaflets, and stickers.

Presently there are 1,850 civic educators employed, including 110 Kuchis civic educators to implement direct civic education activities. Civic education activities are implemented in partnership with the International Foundation for Election Systems (IFES) in the Central Region; and the Afghan Civil Society Forum (ACSF) in the other seven regions. Both IFES and ACSF were partner NGOs in the presidential civic education programme.

T o date civic educators have directly reached over 7.2 million voters through direct face-to-face activities. The second important direct activity involves influential members of the community, such as governors, and mullahs who mobilize their support and to encourage members in their communities to carry these messages back to their communities and encourage the participation in the process.

As we move closer to Election Day, civic educators are focusing on disseminating sample ballots, reviewing key election messages, polling procedures and most of all familiarize voters with the ballots.

A major component of the programme is dissemination through radio, television, billboards, newspapers, magazines as well as non-traditional public outreach methods such as mobile radio, theatre and cinema. The Public Outreach Programmes coordinates election messages to ensure that all media is consistently disseminating information in line with the campaign, according to a weekly message schedule.

Radio is the most important public information tool and consequently forms the largest part of the Public Outreach strategy. We produce a variety of programmes but also have specific programmes targeting specific audiences such as women and youth. Each week we produce several Public Service Announcements, round table discussions, dramas and daily Frequently Asked Questions.

In total we broadcast over 800 minutes a week – a cumulative amount of 10,800 minutes being aired a week. Public Outreach publishes three different types of information/ads (text-intensive, graphics-intensive, cartoon strips) produced every week; ads published in five daily newspapers, six weeklies, including Killid and Morsal magazines, the two highest circulations for Afghan magazines in the country. Outdoor billboards are also used. There are 57 billboards across the country.

We will also start broadcasting a three-minute cartoon explanation on polling procedures. We also have started a new TV programme called the Witness Programme where we have 4 TV teams travelling around the country recording /shooting the election process which is then broadcast on 10 daily programmes on RTA – the Witness Programme is extended to allow people to follow the election process and also to create a sense of participation of the Afghans in the process.

Non-traditional media is also used. We have two mobile radios per province. Vehicles equipped with a Mobile Radio Set play radio programmes and Public Service Announcements which are being broadcast on traditional media.

Seven mobile theatre groups, presenting a play on elections, including four road shows (with additional features), are being funded by The Asia Foundation and implemented through the Foundation for Culture and Civil Society and Sayara Media Communications.

A Mobile cinema project, implemented through Afghan film, where eight teams travel to different regions - in particular to districts where access to TV is limited - screen our election films and spots. Some screenings have had up to 2000 participants.

In order to provide Afghans with the unique opportunity to have their questions personally answered, a Voter Information Centre (VIC) has been set up in cooperation with Roshan, AWCC and Afghan Telecom. The VIC will allow Afghans to dial a three-digit number - 180 - to a help line, where trained operators will be able to answer their questions on the elections.

As to date, we have answered over 60 000 calls receiving up to 2500 calls a day. With elections being 12 days away – the public outreach drive is to disseminate key election messages with an emphasis on know-your-candidate and where to locate them on the ballot before going to the polls.

Spokesperson: Our other guest is Ahmad Zia Langari, a commissioner with the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission. He will speak on the participation of Afghans at a recent meeting at UN Headquarters in New York on the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities.

Ahmad Zia Langari, Commissioner, Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission

One of the major concerns of the government, the donor community, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is the increase of people with disabilities in Afghanistan. Over two decades of war, malnutrition, poor and inadequate health care services, lack of access to safe water and proper sanitation, bad living conditions, population growth, poverty, domestic violence, inter-marriage and the high rate of accidents all contribute to causing disability in this country. For this reason, disability issues will remain a major cause of concern for a long time to come.

It is estimated that there are about two million people living with disabilities in Afghanistan. Of these, an estimated 25% are war related and these people can and want to be important contributors to society. They do not want to be dependant and only [with help] can they become independent. This is part of their basic human right.

So far, there are two international instruments that deal with disability. These are the United Nations world programmes of action concerning disabled persons and the UN standard rules on the equalization of opportunities for persons with disabilities. However, member states felt that a number of issues relating to human rights were not adequately covered by these two instruments.

The general assembly therefore passed a resolution to establish a committee to develop a comprehensive and integral international convention on the protection and promotion of the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities based on social development, human rights and non-discrimination. This committee held its 6 th session in New York from August 1-12. The UNDP/NPAD (National Programme for Action on Disability) programme provided support for two afghan delegates to attend. I was one of them. We were accompanied by Phitalis Were Masakhwe, International Disability Advisor –Rights and Advocacy, and Rudy A. Rodrigues, Institutional Reform Advisor from NPAD.

This was the first time that Afghanistan was represented at an international forum and our presence sent a clear signal that our country is now prepared to accept its international obligations. It also demonstrated government commitment to addressing issues relating to disability. A total of 91 member states participated in these important deliberations. NGO/SPO’s, and specialized agencies of the United Nations also took part.

I would now like to briefly deal with some of the outcomes after which I will be glad to try and answer some of your questions. As things now stand the new convention has 25 draft articles and much of our deliberations centred on clarifying the many issues related to the draft. I will not go into details since the debate was lengthy, legal and technical in nature. In general terms there was broad agreement on language but there remains a divergence in views on some aspects of the draft articles.

Where general agreement was reached it was on a clear understanding that it was without prejudice to the ability of delegations to reconsider the draft articles at a later stage when the overall shape of the convention becomes clearer. It was generally felt that many of the draft articles that deal with economic, social and cultural rights would have to be progressively realized. But articles that cover civil and political rights would become immediately binding.

Now a little bit of information on some of the draft articles. Article 15 deals with full enjoyment by persons with disabilities. This includes freedom of choice and the implication here is that people with disabilities cannot be institutionalised, regardless of the disability and they must have a say in all matters relating to their health and welfare.

Article 17 is on education. Here the committee noted that education laid the foundation for participation by persons with disabilities in society as a whole and thought their lives and that inclusiveness was one of the main themes of this article. It was generally felt that all children with disabilities should be mainstreamed and be permitted to attend regular schools and that all schools including those in the smallest villages must cater to the special needs of children with disabilities. This means that school teachers, counsellors and psychologists would need specialized training. Accessible technologies and reasonable accommodations would be made available to ensure the full participation of children with disabilities. Many delegates felt that education was never ending and therefore not confined to pre-school, primary and university only.

Article 19 deals with accessibility. This article is not just about accesses to buildings. It also relates to accessibility to information. It deals with eliminating obstacles to the built environment, to transportation, information and communication technologies, so that people with disabilities can live independently and participate in all aspects of daily life. To facilitate this would require the provision of assistance and intermediaries, including guides, readers and sign language interpreters.

Article 20 deals with international cooperation. It was recognized that this was a vital factor as it plays an important part in assisting developing states to implement this convention. Some delegates expressed concern that state parties may be able to use this provision as a justification for non-implementation of the convention.

Article 25 is on monitoring. Perhaps one of the main articles of the convention because without monitoring, complaints could not be verified and therefore state parties could not be held accountable.

Afghan voters offered telephones, TVs and turbans

KABUL, Sept 5 (Reuters) - Afghans are being given telephones, televisions and turbans by candidates seeking their votes in Sept. 18 elections, residents said on Monday.

The parliamentary and provincial elections are the last step of an international plan meant to restore democracy and stability to Afghanistan after 25 years of conflict, nearly four years after U.S.-led forces ousted the Taliban.

"I told him we were 50 people and we would vote for him and he said he would pay $10 for each person," one resident of the northern city of Mazr-i-Sharif told Reuters, referring to an election candidate.

"He gave me a mobile phone as well, to keep in touch," he said. Other residents in the north said they had been given televisions or cassette recorders, and some had been promised cash for putting up a candidate's picture in their car window.

About 5,800 candidates are running in the elections.The rules say candidates for the lower house of parliament, known as the Wolesi Jirga, or House of the People, cannot spend more than 750,000 afghanis ($15,000) during their campaign.

Candidates running for a seat on one of the councils that will be set up in all 34 provinces cannot spend more than 375,000 afghanis ($7,500).Some candidates have been travelling to villages in their provinces, slaughtering animals and throwing feasts. As well as a good meal, villagers are often offered cash or a new turban in exchange for promising support on election day, a resident of the eastern town of Khost said.

Prayer beads and prayer mats are also common gifts, said a resident of the central town Ghazni. Some candidates invite village elders to their provincial capital for an expenses-paid holiday, a resident in the west of the country said.

But it's not only voters who are being courted, a resident said. One candidate was said to have offered rivals large sums of money to drop out of the race and back him instead.

An election commission official said any candidate was free to lodge a complaint if he thought a rival was behaving unfairly.

Young Afghan candidates fighting intimidation_ (AFP)7 September 2005

KABUL - Zahra has had a death threat, Ahmed is too poor, and Amadullah does not have the connections.

It is not easy to be a young candidate in the parliamentary elections in Afghanistan, where intimidation and vote-buying are rife.

Their accounts of the difficulties they face in campaigning for the September 18 polls, shared during a meeting in the capital Kabul, highlight the rocky road the war-ravaged country must travel to reach democracy.

For a start, they have to stand up to the influential and often ruthless former mujahedeen fighters who are doing everything they can to hold on to power.

“A month ago I was given a death threat. They told me that I am a girl and that I cannot stand,” said Zahra Sahet, 22, president of a public education group and candidate for northern Balkh’s provincial parliament.

“Last Saturday a white car tried to run me down and hit me in the leg before driving off,” she said, adding “the mujahedeen are still creating fear in the provinces.”

“Nearly everyone has told us of intimidation, that they feel in danger and cannot campaign normally,” said Haseeb Houmayoon, one of the organisers of the Kabul meeting.

Faced with this pressure, candidates have called on the election commission, run in large part by the United Nations, and the Afghan government to “enforce respect of elections laws without exception.”

Their demands are simple but the reality is not.Less than two weeks ahead of the vote to fill about 670 national and provincial assembly seats, the election commission admits it will not be able to ensure there will be an independent monitor at every polling station.

It has also excluded only 11 of the 5,800 candidates for links with militant groups, while a UN study has estimated at least 16 percent should be disqualified for such ties.

“These people have blood on their hands but the UN has allowed them to stand because they are powerful. With their money, they are going to parliament,” said Ahmed Farid Zafar, 26, a tailor and candidate for the national assembly from southern Kandahar province.

A lack of money is another handicap for many of the younger candidates, who make up between 10 and 20 percent of those standing in the election and say they want to “serve and bring change” but provide no detailed programmes.

“A number of young candidates have told us that voters they meet ask them how much they pay compared to the others,” said Sediq Sediqqui, another organiser.

“Powerful candidates close to the authorities use government money or equipment for their campaigns and buy the chiefs of tribes, who tell everyone to vote for them,” said Bismillah Afghanmal, 32, a former policeman and candidate for Kandahar’s provincial parliament.

Another obstacle is the political ignorance of the population, who often follows their tribal chiefs and traditionally have little faith in younger people.

“The great majority does not even know what this election means. Some think that they have to vote again for the president,” said Zahra Sahet.

“I spend my time explaining to people what a parliament is for. I don’t even have time to explain my ideas,” said Amadullah Nazer, 27, a Kandahar candidate for the national assembly who says he is not well connected enough to have much influence.

He thinks the elections should be pushed back for a year so the public can be educated about what they mean.

The only optimist at the Kabul meeting was Sawid Naser Ayoubi, 21, a candidate for the provincial council of Herat in the west.

“I am very rich and my father is the head of the tribe. I have the support of 20,000 people,” he said, insisting that he would never offer bribes for votes.

“Definitely it is the rich and well-known people, in power for the past 20 years with the results we know, that are going to get through,” organiser Sediq Sediqqi said. “But it is the same thing everywhere, even in the West.”

Indo-Pakistan Rivalry In Afghanistan Intensifies_ By M B Naqvi 06 September, 2005 Inter Press Service

KARACHI , Sep 2 (IPS) - Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai's fervent wish for improved regional cooperation among India, Pakistan and his own country, expressed during the Indo-Afghan summit at the beginning of the week, may be doomed to remain just that, given the state of sub-continental rivalry.

Karzai's fervent wish, made at the Kabul summit on Aug 28, was calculated towards improving regional relations, especially his demand that Pakistan provide transit facilities for better Indo-Afghan trade and road links.

The context was Pakistan's well-known position reiterated recently by the Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz that India's transit trade to third countries (including Iran) would be linked to satisfactory progress on the Kashmir dispute.

This throwing of cold water on Afghan hopes has a clear reference to history as observers and analysts here would readily testify.

Afzal Mahmud, a retired career diplomat traces the ''running acrimony'' between India and Pakistan to the days when Afghanistan stood out as the ''sole country that voted against Pakistan's entry into the United Nations in 1947.''

''Governments in Kabul have always been to close to India and through the decades between the 1950s and 1970s Indian diplomacy has sought to drive a wedge between Afghanistan and Pakistan,'' said Mahmud in an IPS interview.

But, equally, said Mahmud, Pakistan played a cold war game by ''cultivating Afghanistan's Pashtun tribes (that are close to Pakistan's Pashtuns) and created a lobby of their own.'' Pashtuns form about ten percent of Pakistan's 165 million people.

''The ups and downs of this Pak-Afghan cold war have been marked by several bloody incidents, beginning with 1956 when Pakistan's Jalalabad consulate was set on fire by Afghan mobs. Since then many Afghan attacks have taken place on Pakistan's consular offices, not excluding the Pakistan embassy in Kabul, on which several attacks were mounted at different times,'' Mahmud said.

The Indo-Afghan summit in Kabul on Aug 28 was therefore viewed in Pakistan with particular interest. During the summit, India, which had already given Afghanistan 500 million US dollars for reconstruction, extended another 100 million dollars as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh sought to take Indo-Afghan ties to a new high.

Karzai touched upon the ongoing efforts for Indo-Pakistan entente and hoped it would expand into the future and by this he involved Pakistan in the evolving equation.

On the one side Karzai affirmed that a good Afghan-Pakistan relationship existed but tactfully avoided mention of the less than friendly argument between U.S. and Afghan officials, over renewed Taliban attacks from Pakistan territory especially on foreign targets in Afghanistan.

In his own deft way, Karzai underlined the importance of friendship between Pakistan and India in improving regional cooperation that could improve Afghanistan's chances of reconstruction after the devastation wreaked by decades of cold war and post cold war conflict.

Afghanistan has always been a part of foreign great power rivalry and even if the dramatis personae have changed Kabul remains at the centre of different 'Great Game' conflicts of whatever shape and scope.

Today's great powers are either already in Afghanistan as in the case of the U.S. and its allies or on Afghanistan's door step and among these may be counted China, Russia, India and Iran.

Pakistan regards itself great enough to have a say in Afghanistan's being and becoming. Although today's Great Games are subsumed in a number of bilateral rivalries or cold wars that need recognition.

There is the up and coming cold war between those well-entrenched (in Afghanistan) and the incipient challenge from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation that groups together Russia and China with several Central Asian republics. Also important are the interests of India and Iran that would seem to be opposed by Pakistan.

The origins of Pakistan-Afghan and Pakistan-India cold wars in and over Afghanistan arise from the attempts to create lobbies and areas of interest within Afghan society by both India and Pakistan.

Pakistan enjoys a degree of advantage because of affinities between Afghan and Pakistani Pashtuns. At least 10 percent of Pakistan's 165 million people are Pashtun but concentrated in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Balochistan.

Pashtuns have always played a political game of their own. They neither alienated Kabul nor allowed Pakistan to be seriously hurt by Afghanistan's proposal for an independent 'Pakhtoonistan' as a zone of independence or as an autonomous part of Pakistan for Pashtuns living on the Pakistani side of the British-drawn, Durand Line that presently defines the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

Although what Kabul really wants was never entirely clear, Pakistan-Afghan tussles have always centred around the very legitimacy of the Durand Line going back to the days of Pakistan's creation from larger India. Kabul has questioned and many Pakistani Pashtuns continue to question today the validity of the Durand line.

Kabul has always shown interest in the rights of Pashtuns in Pakistan and it is now Pakistan's turn to question what the Afghan Pashtuns plan now that they feel less than well-adjusted in the new regime imposed by the U.S. on Kabul. With elections around the corner these issues have only grown sharper.

But Islamabad's interest is not loudly articulated. It is widely suspected by outsiders that Pakistan wants a say in Afghanistan through its Pashtun lobbies that seem unhappy with Karzai's Afghanistan.

As of now, India enjoys support in Kabul from not only Karzai and his cabinet but many political elements that fought the Taliban, especially the Northern Alliance that was supported by Iran, the U.S. and its allies and continues to be friendly towards India.

And this is where Pakistan is suspected by Kabul of playing a spoiler's game. Without Pakistan's willing support, the Karzai government cannot consolidate itself, nor can it adequately defend Afghanistan from renewed attacks by the Taliban. Many Afghan officials and ministers as well as U.S. officials, accuse Pakistan of not restraining the Taliban.

As Sultan Jilani, a noted commentator on Afghan affairs here, said, ''The Pakistan, Afghanistan and India triangle would always be a troubled one. Apart from the superpower and quasi-superpower (Russia), there are others (China and Iran) which have their fingers in the pie''.

Karzai, added Jilani, is ''quite right in thinking that improvement of India-Pakistan relations would be the key to solving various Afghanistan problems''.

It was with the help of Pakistan, that Washington could oust the Russians presence in Afghanistan but this has been at a very high cost.

''The Moscow-propped regime collapsed spectacularly but then various warlords took over. This was because Pakistan could not control the various anti-Soviet warring factions and they all became warlords and divided themselves along ethnic and ideological lines", Jilani observed.

''Pakistan tried to regain the initiative by producing Taliban (nearly synonymous with Pashtun) out of its hat and proceeded to making Afghanistan safe for Taliban. But India, Iran and Russia never allowed the Taliban to overrun the northern areas.

''Karzai's task now would appear to be to conciliate Russia, Iran and India in a way so as to be accommodated without detriment to the Pakistani interest of the Pushtoon community within Afghanistan that amounts to maybe up to 40 percent of the (29 million) population,'' Jilani concluded.

Right now, India is on a strong wicket because of Hamid Karzai's sympathy, because of the northern warlords' inclination toward Iran and India and because of Washington's restraint on Pakistan. ''The big thing for India would be free transit through Pakistan to Afghanistan and through there to Central Asia and Pakistan would not concede this without some compensatory benefit given by India on Kashmir. It must seem substantial and credible,'' said Afzal Mahmud

There are other matters where substantial concessions can be given by India, particularly water disputes. But that looks unlikely to happen according to both Mahmud and Jilani.

Afghan press criticizes Kasuri-Shalom meeting

KABUL: Afghan press has severely criticized meeting between Pakistan and Israeli foreign minister in Istanbul. Kabul based newspaper IRADA in its article writes that the Muslim world will strongly react to relations of any Muslim country with Zionist regime.

The newspaper says that Indo-Israel ties has forced Pakistan to build political ties with the Zionist regime. Palestinian circles have also condemned the meeting between Pakistani and Israeli foreign ministers.

Religious scholars of Palestine while condemning the meeting said that Pakistan was building ties with Israeli building ties with Israeli by leaving the defenseless Palestinians aside.

Let Afghan poppies bloom - Times, UK 09/06/2005 By Rosemary Righter_It is absurd that we spend billions destroying an opium crop that could provide pain relief to millions

ON SEPTEMBER 18 general elections in Afghanistan will mark the formal completion of that tattered country's transition to democracy. Stability is another matter. The turbulent foreground to these elections looks daunting, but the courage of the Afghans, their refusal to be intimidated, will defeat the Taleban campaign to derail the vote, as they did in last year's presidential elections. Their determination is shared by the West, which has deployed thousands of troops to protect candidates and election monitors.

More worrying still is the background, the field on which every Afghan battle for the future is fought. I mean field quite literally, or, rather, field upon field, stretching as far as the eye can see. Covering more than 100,000 hectares, Afghanistan's pungent, deadly, opium poppies dominate and distort every aspect of its economy, its politics and even its culture.

The drugs industry enriches warlords and pays their militias; holds poor farmers in thrall to opium-denominated debt; lubricates corruption and terrorism and illegally provides more than half the country's income. These poppies account for 80 per cent of illegal heroin consumption worldwide, making misery Afghanistan's only significant export. But for 350,000 very poor farming families, the poppy is also their only lifeline.

A report last week by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) observes that unless the poppy can be taken out of the equation in Afghanistan, "democracy may never come of age". Governments agree, and are pouring money into counter-narcotics programmes: $490 million this year alone, mostly from the US and the UK, and a further $1.3 billion pledged (not delivered) by the EU. Big money, up against bigger money. The industry is worth $2 billion to the Afghans and billions more along the supply chain to British dealers.

Kabul is trying hard, through presidential persuasion, improved law enforcement and civil as well as religious fatwas against drugs. The UNODC, which expects the area under cultivation to have declined this year by a fifth — from a record high in 2004 — bravely claims that the tide is turning, with "a kind of mass psychology, an aversion to opium cultivation, in the countryside". Perhaps. But this could equally well be a temporary "market correction " to an opium glut, which "success" in cutting cultivation will reverse. Because of perfect poppy weather this year, yields have soared anyway, leaving Afghanistan's share of production unchanged, at 87 per cent.

Experience elsewhere shows that farmers, who typically see no more than 4 per cent of opium revenues, would rather grow legal crops if they have the choice. But diversifying out of opium will take decades. You need to introduce not only other crops, but a new marketing infrastructure — and to have the power to destroy the barons who rule the drugs roost, power that the Afghan Government is unlikely to wield so long as opium is the robber king. The task has broken stronger governments.

Unless we can lay hands on a tool that can cut this Gordian knot — now, not a decade or so from now — Afghanistan could relapse hideously into armed anarchy. Now consider this. The opium that the world is spending billions to destroy in Afghanistan is the basis of painkilling medicines, such as codeine and morphine, that are in desperately short supply throughout the developing world. Six rich countries consume 80 per cent of the available morphine, and developing countries only 6 per cent; the drug is either beyond their means or not available at all.

To bring supplies of opium-derived painkillers up to adequate levels at affordable prices, the pharmaceutical industry would need an annual 10,000 tonnes of opium produced under licence. Afghanistan illegally produces 4,100 tonnes. If, instead of burning the stuff, the world were to buy it in controlled conditions for medical purposes, millions of Aids and cancer patients who now die in agony could benefit from a drug whose mercies were known in ancient Mesopotamia. Afghan farmers would earn their money legally; tax revenues would improve; drugs warlords would be bypassed and the fall-off in the drugs trade would help to stabilise Central Asia. Afghanistan's entire crop, at today's prices, would cost about $650 million a year — less than the world proposes to spend on eradication.

The counter-drugs establishment is appalled. It would "send the wrong message", just when Afghans are getting hold of the idea that growing opium is wrong. The place is far too corrupt for legal cultivation to be made secure. India, one of the countries licensed to grow opium by the UN's International Narcotics Control Board, checks every stage in the process and has vastly more effective law enforcement, yet there is a thriving black market. Some Afghan ministers agree, and are scared stiff; but others, in Afghanistan and outside, see legal production as a "win-win" strategy.

The Senlis Council, a French drugs think-tank that will present an extensive feasibility study to a conference in Kabul on September 28, acknowledges the difficulties and says that the long-term aim should be to end Afghan opium production. It describes its proposals for licensed opium as no more than a "transitional" solution complementing rural development, and insists that its strategy would be carefully tested in pilot schemes.

Such caution may be good tactics — not least in winning over the US, whose pharmaceuticals industry could not touch the stuff without Congress's approval. The fact remains that opium is one of the few "banker" crops in the arid Afghan uplands. If it were possible to divert this dangerous industry into legal channels, the gains would be immense — for Afghans and for the poor who now suffer needless pain. Further ahead, Afghanistan could indeed switch crops: to genetically modified poppies, which, Australian research has discovered, could combat malaria and cancer but would be no use to drug addicts. A losing war could be turned into a winning experiment.

AFGHANISTAN: Housing for a million women planned

KABUL, 6 September (IRIN) - Mah Gul is a 40-year-old widow living with her four children in the dusty shell of a battle-scarred building in the Bari Khot district of the Afghan capital Kabul.

"I must get somewhere for my family to live, here there is no water, no windows even, it's worse than a tent and I have endured this for three years," she said.

She's one of countless impoverished women, who are forced to live in ruined houses or derelict public buildings due to a severe lack of shelter in post-war Afghanistan.

To begin to address the national problem, the Ministry of Women's Affairs announced on Tuesday in the capital that it was planning to build accommodation for at least 1 million vulnerable Afghan women in the city. Last month an agreement was signed with a German construction company to launch the countrywide project.

Noria Banwal, the director of economic development at the women's ministry, said the accord was signed after continual demands from women from all parts of the country for proper housing, in regular sessions where the ministry attempts to listen to the most pressing needs Afghan women have.

Lack of shelter is a huge issue in Afghanistan as millions of returned refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) slowly seek to pick up their lives, only to find their villages and streets destroyed. Many households are headed by women who suffer badly from poverty, discrimination and lack of opportunity.

House rents in the capital have rocketed in the post-Taliban era, partly fuelled by the arrival in strength of foreign NGOs, with an average family house now going for up to US $800 per month – a huge amount of money for most Kabulis.

Banwal added the scheme was the largest construction project in Afghanistan to date. Other key capital projects in the country include the Kabul to Kandahar road that has been blighted by security problems.

The government will provide land for the building work, the ministry said. The housing units - comprising three bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, and toilet – are likely to cost around $600 each and subsidies will be available to enable the most vulnerable to take advantage of the programme.

The new housing will be part of new municipalities that would include schools, kindergartens, shops, a park and a health clinic designed to serve 500 families.

[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.]