Afghan National Army of 42nd infant ray battalion carry the Afghanistan and de fence ministry's flags during a graduation ceremony at the Kabul Military Training Center, Afghanistan on Sunday, Sept. 25, 2005. Over 600 officers, soldiers and non- commissioned officers of the 42nd infantry battalion of Afghan National Army graduated after getting over 10 weeks of training in Kabul. (AP Photo/Mudsadeq Sadeq)

President Karzai Express Sorrow for the Death of Five US Service Members in a Helicopter Crash - 25 September -2005 Presidential Palace, Kabul –

H.E Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is saddened by the death of five U.S. service members killed in a helicopter crash near Deh Chopan, Uruzgan province.

The President, on behalf of the people of Afghanistan and the Government,expressed his heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and thepeople of the United States of America.

Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

US Chinook crashes in Afghanistan – BBC

A US helicopter has crashed in southern Afghanistan, killing all five crew on board, the US military has said.

The CH-47 Chinook helicopter came down during an operation near Daychopan, in the southern province of Zabul. US ground forces are at the scene.

Afghan officials say the helicopter had dropped off troops and was returning to base when it crashed. There is no indication of hostile fire, the US military said. An investigation and recovery operations are under way.

A US military statement said the aircraft was "returning from a mission in support of an ongoing operation at the time of the crash". "There is no indication of enemy involvement in the crash."

Abdul Latif Hakimi, who claims to speak for the Taleban, told the BBC: "We brought the helicopter down with an anti-aircraft rocket." President Hamid Karzai said he was saddened by the deaths.

A spokesman for the governor of Zabul, Gulab Shah Ali Khil, told the BBC the coalition forces were conducting an operation in the Mara area of Daychopan district. "This was not a regular operation. They did it because they got some intelligence and went there. The crash took place as they were coming back. It happened between 09:00 to 09:30 this morning."

Several helicopters have crashed in Afghanistan this year, including two US military Chinooks. In late June, insurgents shot down a Chinook near the Pakistan border, killing all 16 troops on board.

And in April, 15 soldiers and three US civilians were killed when their helicopter got caught up in a sandstorm while returning to Bagram airbase.

In August, 17 Spanish soldiers lost their lives when their Cougar helicopter crashed near Herat in what was believed to be an accident. There are about 20,000 US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan fighting Taleban and other militants.

More than 1,000 people, most of them suspected insurgents, have died in violence linked to militants this year. On Sunday, two suspected Taleban fighters were killed and two others wounded in southern Helmand province when the roadside bomb they were trying to plant exploded, officials said.

Three Taliban killed while planting a bomb in Afghanistan

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Sept 25 (AFP) - Three suspected Taliban insurgents were killed when a bomb they were planting in restive southern Afghanistan detonated prematurely, police said Sunday.

The three had been planting the bomb late Saturday on a road in Helmand province to target a police patrol, provincial police chief Abdul Rehman Jan told AFP.

"Two of them died on the site and the third one died in hospital," Jan said.

Helmand, on the border with Pakistan, is one of the provinces hit by an insurgency launched by the fundamentalist Taliban after they were toppled in a US-led operation in late 2001.

This year has seen the worst militant-related violence in Afghanistan since then with more than 1,000 people killed.

Early poll count shows Afghan opposition leader top- By Sayed Salahuddin - September 25, 2005

KABUL (Reuters) - With about a fifth of votes counted nationwide in Afghanistan's legislative elections, opposition leader Yunus Qanuni headed the field on Sunday in a race for one of 33 national assembly seats in the capital Kabul.

A preliminary count showed Haji Mohammad Mohaqiq, a factional leader and a close Qanuni ally, second, and Ramazan Bashardost, a French-educated technocrat who quit the cabinet last year complaining of a failure to deal with corruption, third.

All three served as ministers in the government of U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai, who easily won last October's presidential elections, but they have since become his opponents.

While the election commission said only about 20 percent of the vote had been counted, the figures so far in Kabul could still be indicative since votes from various parts of the city are supposed to be mixed together before being counted.

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

Qanuni he has predicted the Understanding Front will win half the seats in the 249-seat national assembly.

A senior Northern Alliance leader who helped U.S.-led forces topple the Taliban in 2001, Qanuni served as interior and education minister under Karzai. He has warned that his parliamentary bloc might not approve all of Karzai's cabinet.

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

About 6.8 million of Afghanistan's more than 12 million registered voters cast ballots on Sept. 18 for national assembly candidates and councils in 34 provinces.

The turnout was significantly lower than in the presidential vote, with analysts blaming the presence of warlords on the ballot and disappointment at the slow post-war reconstruction.

Kabul's turnout was only about 36 percent. Provisional results are expected by the first week of October and final, official results by Oct. 22.

First results trickle in from Afghanistan's landmark election

KABUL, Sept 25 (AFP) - Nearly a fifth of the ballots cast in Afghanistan's first parliamentary election for three decades have been counted, with the final results expected late next month, the election chief said Sunday.

The results already tallied made up 19 percent of ballots cast in the September 18 elections, said Joint Election Monitoring Board head Peter Erben.

The more than 5,700 people who stood in the elections were barred from running under the banners of the country's nearly 80 political parties, making it difficult to identify a trend from the early results announced Sunday.

The candidates stood for 249 seats in the national assembly and for places on 34 provincial councils.

Erben said the vote count was on track and would be completed next week. There would be a two-week complaints period before the final results were released on October 22, he told reporters.

"We do need to prepare ourselves for the fact that more than 5,000 candidates will lose this election and that we'll have many accusations from the ones who lost," he said.

Asked about complaints that had already been lodged with the commission, Erben said several "suspect" ballot boxes had been put aside for investigation.

"They only represent a couple of percent of the votes," he said, adding he was confident "that these elections will comply with UN election standards." Election officials said there had been some evidence of ballot boxes being stuffed with votes.

Erben said the election body, run by Afghan and UN officials, had also slightly raised its estimate for the turnout of the poll to 54 percent, or 6.8 million voters, after analysing nearly all the voting records.

Of this 43 percent were women, he said. Afghanistan sets great store by the number of women who voted after the hardline Taliban regime, toppled in late 2001, forced women out of public life.

The turnout was well below the 67 percent for the October 2004 presidential election that put Hamid Karzai into office. But the poll was another key step in a process to bring democracy that was adopted in December 2001.

Some of the parliamentary candidates are former commanders during the country's quarter-century of war, or affiliated to these warlords or to prominent politicians. Most of them are largely unknown.

Political observers say the future parliament will be dominated by two blocks -- the former commanders and representatives of Karzai's dominant Pashtun ethnic group -- with a minority of independents and communists squeezing in.

After the Afghan vot e - Toronto Star Editorial - 9/26/05 

Whatever the shape of Afghanistan's parliament once the votes are tallied in last week's election, President Hamid Karzai will continue to need help building his army, disarming warlords, tracking down insurgents and protecting aid workers.

That is what the 1,500 Canadian troops headed there hope to help accomplish in the coming year. It is a mission that carries high risks. Already, seven Canadians have died. With our commandos actively hunting down Taliban and Al Qaeda insurgents, more casualties are bound to follow.

That said, Canada has a responsibility, post-9/11, to help 28 million Afghans break with the terror-friendly Taliban, and get their Islamic republic up and running.

The troops are part of it. So is $600 million in Canadian aid, as is Ottawa's diplomatic support.

But Prime Minister Paul Martin's government can help the Afghans in another way, and at the same time ease the risks our troops face.

He can lobby President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, forcefully and publicly, to crack down on those Pakistanis who finance the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and provide sanctuary. As well, Martin can urge our European allies to supply troops to replace the thousands of Americans who pull out next year.

The Taliban insurgents who are staging attacks in areas Canadian troops will be patrolling obtain refuge, supplies and training in Pakistan's Baluchistan and North-West Frontier provinces. Some in Pakistan's own Inter-Services Intelligence directorate are thought to be helping them.

While Musharraf is moving to strengthen Pakistan-Afghan border controls to thwart cross-border attacks, he has yet to root out the deeper problem in Pakistan itself. Until he does, the insurgency will rage on.

Martin should remind him that Canada's support for Pakistan in the World Bank and International Monetary Fund ride on this.

At the same time, the Canadian Forces can't pick up all the slack as U.S. troops are drawn down. Martin must press other allies to do more.

This will test the Martin minority government's diplomacy, every bit as much as the mettle of Canadian troops, at a time when it is distracted by trying to survive.

But with the safety of our troops in the balance, Martin must use every lever he has, to lighten their task.

Vote count completed in Zabul, Nimroz; Bamyan JEMB chief resigns

KABUL, September 25 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Vote count in Zabul and Nimroz provinces was completed on Monday as a senior JEMB official tendered resignation in Bamyan while another was suspended on fraud charges in Nangarhar.

JEMB regional chief in Zabul Qudratullah said the counting process ended today and the final results had been sent to Kabul. But a top JEMB official Peter Erben told a news conference here that ballot count in Zabul and Nimroz would be completed in the coming two days.

Speaking to Pajhwok Afghan News Qudratullah said 16 ballot boxes were counted on the last day while one suspected box was sealed. He said the JEMB would declare the results on a prescribed day.

Qahir Wasefi, JEMB regional chief in Kandahar, told Pajhwok Afghan News counting had been completed in Nimroz. He did not give further information but said it would be released later.

Earlier, some 18 candidates from Zabul demanded re-election in the province. The demand was made during a joint press conference in Kandahar on Sunday afternoon.

Meanwhile, chief of the provincial electoral office in the central Bamyan Daud Shujazada has resigned after widespread complaints of rigging and fraud from the candidates. In a chat with this news agency, Shujazada said he had resigned in face of mounting complaints from candidates and their observers regarding the counting. "I stepped down due to lack of transparency and incorrect counting," said Shujazada.

Elsewhere in Nangarhar, an election officer was suspended on charges of fraud during the counting. JEMB's liaison officer in Jalalabad Mia Malang Qaderi said he was suspended after complaints by candidates and their observers. The official was accused of drawing an extra mark on ballot papers to prepare a case for their rejection.

A Wolesi Jirga candidate Abdul Majid told Pajhwok Afghan News the accused official invalidated his votes by drawing an extra tick on them. Majid further said the official was caught red-handed while noting 15 instead of 20 in the vote counting list.

Afghanistan has brief chance to turn opium from heroin to medicine

Kabul (AFP) - Afghanistan only has a small window of opportunity to divert its billion-dollar production of opium away from heroin and towards the manufacture of legal painkillers, the head of a drugs think-tank says.

But the fragile country needs to act fast, with drugs cartels poised to take root, Emmanuel Reinert, executive director of the Paris-based The Senlis Council, told AFP on Sunday.

"I think there is one window of opportunity and this window will be closed in a year or so," he said. The group will on Monday present the findings of a study into legalising Afghanistan's opium production and using it to make medicine at a conference in Kabul expected to draw government and farmers' representatives among other groups.

Afghanistan is the world's leading producer of opium, producing 87 percent of the world's supply used to make most of the heroin on Europe's streets.The product, harvested from poppies, is also the war-shattered nation's main source of income, accounting for between 40 and 60 percent of its gross domestic product.

Both the United States and the UN have warned the country is in danger of becoming a narco-state unless it stems its opium production.But eradication programmes funded by international donors have only made a slight dent in output which has dropped by an estimated two percent over the past year.

With Afghanistan vulnerable as it tries to rebuild after decades of war, the country is ripe for the emergence of drug cartels that would entrench the dependence on opium, Reinert said.

"It's why we are doing this with a sense of urgency. If this market is getting organised, if you have some kind of merger and acquisition going on in the provinces with some major players, it will be very, very difficult to overcome that later on."

There was still time to change this course by legalising opium production and channeling it towards the world's unmet and growing need for painkillers, he said.

Reinert admitted however that the Afghanistan government was cautious. This was because it did not want to alienate the international donors on which the country relies, with Britain yet to endorse the idea, he said.

In March Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali ruled out the possibility of legalising Afghan opium production saying it would be to difficult because the sector was a key component of a murky underworld.

"The money which is being made from drugs finances crime, terrorism, and also using this money some groups form private militia," he said.

Reinert said there had however been an "evolution in attitude"."There is an incredible shortage of morphine and coedine in a number of countries, including neigbouring countries, and so you have a huge possibility and I think a number of countries are starting to see that," he said.

According to the International Narcotics Control Board, six of the world's richest countries consume 80 percent of the world's morphine and coedine, which are also made from opium, while 80 percent of the world has access to only six percent.

"There is obviously an incredibly large amount of unmet need for painkillers, for treatment of cancer, HIV/AIDS treatment," Reinert said.

"Millions of people in Latin America, in Africa, in Russia, in China are dying in pain because they don't have access to these medicines and because the system is overregulated right now."

He warned that the policy of eradicating poppy fields, on which farmers survive, would be at the expense of Afghanistan's search for democracy and peace after 25 years of conflict and under the harsh rule of the fundamentalist Taliban regime ousted in late 2001.

"It would eat right at the nexus of the building of this nation and farmers, if they see planes spraying their fields, they will go back to the Taliban, to the local commanders.

"The effect will be exactly the contrary to what everybody wants to see here," he said.

Afghanistan not ready for legal opium – minister- By David Brunnstrom

KABUL, Sept 25 (Reuters) - Afghanistan, the world's biggest producer of illicit opium and heroin, is not ready to adopt a controversial proposal to use its opium to help ease a global shortage of painkillers, its counter-narcotics minister says.

The Senlis Council, a Paris-based non-governmental organisation, has suggested licensed Afghan opium production could be used to produce morphine and codeine and is to a launch a feasibility study on the proposal in Kabul on Monday.

Speaking to Reuters on Sunday, Counter-Narcotics Minister Habibullah Qaderi said he was happy for Senlis to do studies, but it was too early to consider such a proposal when Afghanistan was still struggling to cut massive illegal production.

"As far as the licensing at this moment is concerned, I am saying no," he said. "I'm not in favour because it jeopardises the whole of our effort ... There would be anarchy in this country now. It would create a lot of problems."

Qaderi said internationally backed efforts to control drug production had led to a 21 percent reduction in the area under opium cultivation, but there was still a long way to go.

The area sown with opium poppies was 103,000 hectares (255,000 acres) this year compared with 131,000 hectares (325,000 acres) last year.

Afghanistan is the world's main source of opium and its refined form, heroin, producing 87 percent of global supply. Qaderi questioned the timing of the Senlis report.

"We don't want to confuse the Afghan people, because the Afghan people would be confused, because while the government on the one hand wants to control and stop cultivation, we are talking about licensing. "I think it's too early to talk about licensing."

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has also rejected the Senlis Council proposal, saying it risked creating confusion among farmers and raising false expectations.

Senlis has estimated the worldwide shortage of morphine and codeine at about 10,000 tonnes of opium equivalent a year, while Afghanistan produces roughly 4,000 tonnes of opium a year.

However, the UNODC, while conceding there is a shortage of narcotics for medical purposes, says lawful production of opiates worldwide had considerably exceeded global consumption in the past years and could be increased should demand increase.

The U.N. body argues that licit production of opium would send the wrong message to farmers in Afghanistan, would be impossible to control, and would not offer a viable economic alternative.

The United Nations has warned that the country risks becoming a "narco-state" and the multi-billion dollar drugs economy is seen as the biggest threat to its long-term stability and U.S.-led nation-building efforts.

The UNODC says the opium cultivation area fell this year largely due to government efforts to persuade farmers to stop, including a threat to destroy fields, and low prices.

However, it says good weather boosted productivity of fields still planted with opium and total output of about 4,100 tonnes is down only 2.4 percent over last year.

Qaderi said Afghanistan needed to concentrate on improving rural infrastructure to provide farmers with alternative livelihoods and said a lot would depend on a continuation of international assistance to the anti-narcotics effort.

With the new planting season about to start, the minister said he was hopeful for a further fall in the area under cultivation after religious leaders in the key growing province of Kandahar vowed to support the government's campaign.

"I am hopeful we will have a further reduction," he said. "It can be the same percentage, hopefully, maybe more."

UK fails to stop Afghan heroin - By Severin Carrell The Independent (UK) -Published: 25 September 2005

Heroin from Afghanistan will flow into Britain for at least another 10 years despite a multi-million-pound effort to combat the trade, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.

Senior Western officials in Kabul have admitted for the first time that they are resigned to Afghanistan being a major source of heroin for at least a decade because the country's crippled economy is so dependent on the industry.

"There's no magic bullet," one senior Whitehall official said. "It's a long-term campaign over many years."

The war-torn country is the world's largest source of heroin, producing 85 per cent of the global supply, with a value estimated at $2bn (£1.1bn).

The UK was given the task of leading the global campaign to eradicate opium three years ago - chiefly because 95 per cent of the heroin used in Britain is from Afghanistan.

But progress in stopping poppy cultivation has been slower than expected, leading to intense criticism from US drugs enforcers.

In the four years since the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001, Afghanistan has produced more heroin than ever before.Earlier this month, the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke, conceded it had been far harder to combat the trade than expected. He said the UK will spend another £115m on its Afghan drugs campaign over the next three years, taking the total to £270m.

Last night Mike Trace, the Government's former deputy drugs tsar and now director of the Beckley Foundation Drug Policy Programme, said: "It worries me this position isn't being discussed with the profession and the public. If we want to get to grips with the drugs problem, we need a more open debate."

ADB voices concern over gas delivery: Turkmen reserves found short - By Khaleeq Kiani
Dawn (Pakistan)-September 23, 2005 issue

ISLAMABAD, Sept 22: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Thursday said the delivery of gas to India and Pakistan from Turkmensitan’s Daulatabad field might not be possible through $3.3 billion trans-Afghanistan pipeline, owing to lower than expected gas production.

However, it said the two countries would require three pipeline projects for gas import to meet their rising energy demand. The ADB has also floated the idea of gas import from Oman besides Iran and Qatar and expressed optimism about $7 billion Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) project.

The bank has been brokering the 1,700-km pipeline project since 2002, promoting it as a win-win example of regional cooperation— a pioneering effort to link gas-rich Central Asia with energy-deficient South Asia through Afghanistan.

The project, according to ADB’s original plan, was to bring clean fuel at competitive costs to India and Pakistan, much-needed transit fees to Afghanistan, and new markets for Turkmenistan.

A senior ADB energy specialist, Dan Millison, said: “Turkmenistan’s Daulatabad gas field has gross reserves of 1.4 trillion cubic meters of gas, but production forecasts are lower than expected, causing analysts to doubt that it can meet the proposed target of piping 30 billion cubic meters (BCM) of gas a year to South Asia”.

“The reserves information shows that Turkmenistan could supply enough gas for the first few years but then production is predicted to decline instead of increasing,” said Mr Millison.

He said Turkmenistan would need to find gas from other fields to meet pipeline design targets.

However, future demand for natural gas in South Asia is projected to be strong enough to require gas to be piped from both Turkmenistan and Iran, he said.

He said the reserves information released from Turkmenistan showed lower-than-expected gas deliverability for a proposed $3.3 billion pipeline project to carry gas from Turkmenistan via Afghanistan to India and Pakistan.

Meanwhile, a $7 billion scheme to pipe natural gas from offshore Iran to Pakistan and India is gaining momentum. This 2,700-km pipeline would cost more than double the Turkmen scheme, but leaves out Afghanistan, where security concerns remain, he said.

“However, with long term gas demand from India and Pakistan estimated at 50 BCM a year, there is a need for more than one pipeline,” said Mr Millison.

India already imports gas and demand will soar in the next decade. Pakistan, with its own reserves declining, is expected to begin importing gas after late 2008. In fact, projected demand in South Asia is so strong that there might be a need for a third pipeline from Qatar or Oman, he noted.

With the new gas reserves data in hand, as well as a draft security analysis report, the next step is for the project’s steering committee to meet and discuss inviting an international consortium of investors to build the pipeline.

Turkmenistan is one of the world’s largest gas exporters. However, although its 4.5 million people receive free gas, electricity and water, incomes are among the lowest in Central Asia and health and education services are declining.

Building an Afghan Army and Learning a Lesson in Patience- By ERIC SCHMITT
The New York Times September 25, 2005

JALALABAD, Afghanistan - American and international efforts to train Afghanistan's security forces began in 2002, about a year before a similar program for Iraqi soldiers and police officers. Yet the Afghan model seems to have lagged behind the troubled Iraqi program.

The reasons - like having to rebuild the Afghan Army from scratch and differing allied priorities related to developing a national Afghan police corps - say much about the very different circumstances each program has confronted, as well as how American trainers in both countries are trying to learn from one another's mistakes and successes, senior Army commanders said.

Training Iraqi security forces to replace American troops is the linchpin for the Bush administration's exit strategy for Iraq. Shoring up Afghanistan's fledgling security forces to prepare them to conduct counterinsurgency operations on their own has far-reaching implications for security here, too, particularly in many provinces and villages that still face violence from Taliban fighters.

By September, the Afghan Army had grown to about 26,000 troops and the Afghan police force to more than 50,000. In contrast, the Iraqi Army and special police forces have 87,300 troops, and the Iraqi police force has about 104,300 officers.

Lt. Gen. Karl W. Eikenberry, the top American commander in Afghanistan, defended the approach American and allied forces had used to develop the Afghan forces, saying trainers have had to overcome the lack of a professional army for the past 13 years, a 20 percent literacy rate among recruits, no barracks or modern equipment with which to start, and other hurdles.

"When you're trying to put the pieces back together again, you need a lot of time and a lot of patience," General Eikenberry said, noting that Afghan Army forces now operate in all regions of the country.

American commanders with experience in both Afghanistan and Iraq note that Iraq has a much higher literacy rate, more of a tradition of professional soldiering and vastly better infrastructure. On the other hand, they say, the effort here is carried out in a much less lethal environment and with people who are grateful for whatever aid they receive.

But senior American officers acknowledged in recent interviews here that the development of both the army and national police forces had stumbled at times.

Worries about persistent problems with logistics and other support for Afghan Army units in the field recently prompted General Eikenberry to slow the creation of new battalions, from about two a month to one. "One of the main vulnerabilities of the Afghan national army is their logistics system," said Maj. Gen. Jason K. Kamiya, the American commander of daily tactical operations here.

Other American advisers say the Afghans are making slow but steady progress. "They are fearless on the soldiering side, and they learn very quickly," said Col. Ron Welch, a Connecticut National Guard officer who is the senior American adviser to the Afghan Army in this region.

But Colonel Welch, a 27-year Army veteran from Waterford, Conn., said that it "would be a while" before the Afghan Army forces could operate without American assistance. "They don't have the ability to do close-air support, artillery support or med-evac flights," he said.

Here in Nangahar Province, just a few miles from the Pakistan border, that is an assessment with which even a senior Afghan Army commander in this region, Brigadier General Aminullah, who uses only one name, agrees. "We could not control a situation without Marine forces," he said. "We haven't gotten all the training we need."

A move to set up what American advisers call "partnering" between Afghan and United States units to encourage on-the-job training - a strategy commanders in Iraq have employed for two years - is just now starting here. The first joint operation between an American battalion and an Afghan one took place in early September in the northeastern province of Konar.

"This question of partnering is something we've now aggressively adopted," General Eikenberry said, "but perhaps we could have moved on that piece a little bit earlier."

But another program to have American military trainers live with and work alongside Afghan soldiers is more developed here than a similar one in Iraq. About 650 American military advisers now live and train with Afghan Army units. About three times that number of advisers are in Iraqi units, but the program did not become widespread in Iraq until a retired four-star Army general recommended it earlier this year to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Of greater concern to the Americans are the police forces, which suffer shortages of vehicles, radios and even basic weapons. Until early September, many police recruits were training with wooden rifles. "It's more or less a hollow force," said Maj. Gen. John T. Brennan of the Air Force, who oversees the police development effort. He said that the United States would spend $860 million this year to train and equip the police but that it would not be until late 2009 that the force was fully trained.

Under an international division of responsibility after the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan to oust the Taliban government, Germany has taken the lead in training the police but has mainly focused on churning out lieutenants and senior sergeants. Frustrated by the lack of progress in developing beat officers, the Pentagon stepped in this summer to expand the effort by adding a mentoring program using about 135 foreign civilian law enforcement veterans, and developing senior Afghan trainers.

Over all, the United States has spent more than $2.5 billion in the past two years on training, equipping and paying Afghan security forces.

American commanders say the training program is still a work in progress. Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus, who recently stepped down as the top American trainer in Iraq, spent five days in Afghanistan in early September, preparing a confidential critique of the Afghan train-and-equip program for commanders here and Mr. Rumsfeld.

General Petraeus was repaying a favor of sorts; early last year, General Eikenberry made an assessment of the Iraqi forces that General Petraeus used as a rough blueprint.

Taliban official held near Bannu- The News International (Pakistan) / September 25, 2005

BANNU: Personnel of the intelligence agencies and the police picked up an Afghan national in a village near here Friday night and some sources later described him as a wanted Taliban activist named Hameedullah. The sources said Hameedullah was shifted to Peshawar soon after his arrest for interrogation.

Pakistan Says Bin Laden Is Isolated

Islamabad (AP) - Osama bin Laden is hiding out with a small core of mainly Arab supporters, and the al-Qaida leader now only sends messages by courier because his communications network has been destroyed, senior Pakistani military and intelligence officials said Sunday.

There have been no fresh clues to bin Laden's whereabouts, but he generally is believed to be in the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

"In our opinion, the reports on the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden are more speculative stories rather than based on accurate intelligence," said Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, chief spokesman for Pakistan's army.

Pakistan has deployed some 80,000 troops to its rugged border regions running along Afghanistan, fighting intense battles with al-Qaida-linked militants.

CBS' "60 Minutes" will report Sunday that Pakistani officials believe bin Laden may be hiding in Afghanistan, where he is protected by a very small number of people to keep a low profile.

A Pakistani intelligence official in the northwestern city of Peshawar, near the Afghan border, said bin Laden probably is accompanied by "dozens" of mainly Arab supporters. He spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the secretive nature of his job.

Security officials in Pakistan — Washington's front-line Muslim ally in the war on terrorism — also believe bin Laden's communications network has been destroyed.

"For a very long time there are no intercepts about Osama bin Laden giving instructions to his regional commanders, either through radio, telephone, satellite phone or the Internet," a senior security official said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the subject.

"If he is unable to give orders physically or otherwise, it clearly indicates that his communication has been severed."

In the past, bin Laden would be surrounded by up to 500 people, the Peshawar-based intelligence official said, adding that his communications network has been reduced to human couriers, where a message "changes several hands" between its point of origin and final destination. "This is a very slow and exposed way of communicating," the official said.

Security forces seized a letter from bin Laden during a raid in Rawalpindi in 2003 in which al-Qaida's then-No. 3 leader Khalid Shaikh Mohammed — a suspected planner of the Sept. 11 attacks — was captured. Mohammed is believed to have received the letter via the courier network, the official said.

Pakistani officials say more than 700 al-Qaida suspects, including senior figures like Mohammed, have been arrested.

Officials also say that information gleaned from al-Qaida has led to the arrests of militants outside Pakistan and helped prevent terrorist attacks abroad.

"The arrest of Naeem Noor Khan led to the arrest of a big gang ... ahead of the British elections," Sultan said, claiming that the people arrested in Britain planned to attack Heathrow Airport.

Last year, intelligence agents arrested Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan, 25, an alleged Pakistani computer expert for al-Qaida. A reported tip-off from Khan led to the arrest of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian on the FBI's most-wanted list for his alleged role in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa that killed more than 200 people.

There were media reports that Mohammed Sidique Khan — one of the suspected bombers in the deadly July 7 explosions in London — may have had ties with members of an alleged terrorist cell that matched information from Noor Khan's computer.

The trees that vanished: crisis in the Hindu Kush -The Independent (UK)-Published: 24 September 2005

The aromatic groves of cedar and pine that once covered Afghanistan are disappearing, cut down by smugglers. Justin Huggler reports from Kabul on a desperate struggle to avert ecological disaster.

On a clear day in Jalalabad, you can just see them, green against the distant mountains, some of the last cedars of Afghanistan. The mountains are the Spin Ghar range, home to Tora Bora where Osama bin Laden fought the last stand against the US-led invasion in 2001. But today, another war is going on up there, unnoticed by the outside world. This time the enemy is not the Taliban or Bin Laden, but smugglers. This is the war to save Afghanistan's last forests.

There is a beautiful scent that lingers in Afghanistan's cities, overpowering even the rotting garbage and open latrines. It is a sweet, aromatic scent, instantly recognisable. It is the smell of cedar wood burning.

An ecological disaster is unfolding in Afghanistan, under the noses of the international community who are trying to rebuild the country. Once, large areas of the country were covered with forests of cedar and pine, oak and fir but today there are just a few dwindling patches of forest left. Old photographs of Kabul tell their own story. Once, it was a green city of avenues lined with trees. Compare that to the rocky dustbowl familiar from television news pictures today. Today, just 2 per cent of Afghanistan is still forest, and conservationists are warning it is on its last legs.

It is not just a concern for ecologists. Wood is the main winter fuel in Afghanistan, and the experts agree it is fast running out. Huge areas of Afghanistan that were once forested have turned to desert. Foliage for livestock to feed on is disappearing, destroying the traditional lives of nomads who can no longer graze their flocks. Worse than that, the climate is changing. During the spring thaw, the trees used to hold back the snow on the mountainsides. Now, with no trees to hold it back, there are flash floods in the valleys.

It is not the fires and stoves of Kabul that are destroying Afghanistan's forests. Nobody would cut down trees as valuable as cedar just to use as firewood. The fuel is a by-product of the illegal trade in timber. When a tree is cut down, the trunk is smuggled across the border into Pakistan, and the smaller branches are cut off and kept as firewood.

The wood is smuggled out by donkey and mule across the same borders that the Taliban and foreign militants slip across to launch hit-and-run attacks on US and Afghan forces, before retreating back to the safety of the Pakistani border areas.

The men in the front line of the struggle to save the trees are Frank Lefebvre and Alain de Bures of Madera, a small French NGO that works exclusively in rural and remote Afghanistan. The deforestation of Afghanistan is a disaster that started to unfold relatively recently, according to Mr Lefebvre, during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Soviet soldiers notoriously cut down Kabul's tallest tree, which had stood for hundreds of years, because they feared the mujahedin resistance could use it climb up and fire downwards on their advancing troops. In the years that followed, Afghanistan's forests were ravaged.

By a cruel irony, what is left of Afghanistan's forests are in some of the most dangerous parts of the country. The best preserved are in Nuristan and Konar, generally agreed to be the riskiest two provinces of Afghanistan in which to operate. In the recent parliamentary elections, they were the only two provinces where election monitors didn't go. Most Western NGOs won't set foot in them.

But they are dangerous for very different reasons. Konar, a region of isolated valleys against the Pakistani border, is a heartland of the Taliban. It has been suggested as a possible hiding place for bin Laden. In June, an American helicopter was shot down by the Taliban in Konar with 16 soldiers on board. It came down not far from some of the forest Madera is trying to save, says Mr de Bures.

But the province is very fractured. When four US Special Forces soldiers went missing in the province in June - the helicopter that was shot down was part of a rescue mission - three were killed by the Taliban. But the fourth was rescued by a shepherd whose village refused to hand him over to the Taliban. They are said to have issued a statement to the Taliban that, as long as women and children were alive to fight in their village, they would not hand over the wounded man to whom they had extended their protection according to the tribal customs of the region.

Nuristan, by contrast, is a place where even the Taliban were afraid to go. Made famous in the West by Eric Newby's A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, it is a fabulously remote land of high peaks and notoriously independent people. The Nuristanis, a distinct ethnic group with their own language and customs, who often have blond hair and green eyes, do not welcome any strangers interfering in their mountain fastnesses, and it remains the most inaccessible and undeveloped province in Afghanistan. There are almost no roads; some villages are almost 48 hours on foot from the nearest road.

Madera is only able to operate in these difficult regions because of Mr de Bures, a short, grizzled man who has spent decades in Afghanistan. He knew the former King of Nuristan, when the province declared independence during the Soviet occupation. He knows the tribes in Konar so well that he can travel safely where others would be in great danger. He comes alive when the subject turns to his beloved Afghanistan, he can talk for hours about the tribal intricacies of the region.

Nuristan is Afghanistan's one safe reserve of forest, according to Mr de Bures. "The Nuristanis look after the forest because they really understand that if the forest disappears, they will disappear with it," he says.

But Konar is a perfect example of the timber-smuggling problem in Afghanistan. Since the Soviets left, 25 per cent of the Konar's entire area has been deforested. The problem is that Afghanistan's richest forests lie on the border with Pakistan, next to the traditional smuggling routes. A piece of timber worth 500 Pakistani rupees in Afghanistan is worth 9,000 in Karachi. "We've been trying to explain to the people in Konar that cutting down the forest like this is not sustainable," says Mr Lefebvre, "but they just don't see it that way. If they need wood, they cut down the first tree they see."

The French conservationists are trying to educate the people of Konar about a sustainable timber trade. In such a sensitive region, they can do little more: outright interference would not be tolerated. "The smugglers are not supporting the Taliban at all," says Mr de Bures, "but they're not happy with the presence of the Americans because they can't do the timber trade properly. The problem with the Americans is that they see everything in black and white."

Most of the smugglers come from the famous and powerful border tribes of Pashtuns, such as the Mohmand and Shinwaris. These tribes are ferociously independent and the Taliban stay away from their homelands. The conservationists too have to stay away - they are not welcome either.

The fighting in Konar has put Madera's staff in constant danger, not only from the Taliban, but from US forces as well. "One of our staff got arrested and held for 24 hours by the Americans because they thought he was one of the Taliban," says Mr Lefebvre. Most of the NGO's staff wear Afghan dress in order not to attract attention in Konar. That protects them from the Taliban, but can make them suspicious to US soldiers.

Madera were forced to abandon their compound in Konar after US forces moved in next door. The organisation's staff had lived there peacefully for many years but, after American forces moved in, suddenly there were rocket attacks in the area.

Mr de Bures blames the Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs), teams of Western military forces who have been sent to the provinces of Afghanistan to help with the reconstruction. "But in Konar they don't do anything for the people," he says. "They are just police for the Americans." He says the PRTs are only there as a military tactic, to win hearts and minds - but they are failing even to do that in the hills of Afghanistan.

There have been some benefits from the US presence in Konar, says Mr de Bures. Because the timber-smugglers use the same passes to cross the Pakistani border as the Taliban and foreign militants, US forces are now patrolling the entire border and stopping timber smugglers as well as insurgents.

Better still, Mr de Bures says, the new Governor of Konar province, Asadullah Waffa, has clamped down hard on the timber-smuggling and recently brought it to a virtual standstill.

The illegal timber trade is already having a serious effect on the Afghan economy. Afghans still use wood where plastic or metal would be cheaper alternatives in the West. Door frames and window frames are wood, made to measure in the timber yards that dot every Afghan town. But the wood has become extremely expensive because so much is being diverted to Pakistan. A basic window frame - a flimsy affair with no ornamentation - costs $40 (£20), which is serious money in a country as poor as Afghanistan.

The government is becoming increasingly concerned about the fuel situation. Temperatures in Kabul reached as low as minus 30C last winter, and most Afghans rely on wood as their only heating fuel. That is no longer sustainable, according to Ehsan Zia, the deputy minister at the Rural Redevelopment and Rehabilitation Ministry. "We have to find some alternative fuel," says Mr Zia. "We have to find some way of getting gas into Afghanistan for heating fuel."

It is ironic that before the 2001 war the US was lobbying hard for a pipeline across Afghanistan for gas from Turkmenistan but today Afghanistan is in serious need of gas.

"Even in Nuristan, you can see the difference," says Mr de Bures. "The ground used to be so thick with fallen branches that it was hard to walk. But now all the fallen branches have been scavenged. Those fallen branches were vital to protect the soil," says Mr de Bures.

With most of Afghanistan's forests already gone, the question looms: is the damage reversible? "To be honest with you, I don't know if it's reversible," says Mr Lefebvre. "We're just trying to save what's left."

Digital telephone facility extended to Ghor

CHEGHCHERAN, September 25 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The Afghan government has extended the facility of digital telephone to the western Ghor province where people were benefiting from satellite sets to communicate with other parts of the country.Director of communication department Abdul Qayum told Pajhwok Afghan News 26 connections had been given to government departments while one would be used by the public.

He said under the present scheme, about 5,000 digital telephone connections would be provided to people in Cheghcheran. This would provide them an opportunity of easy and cheaper service.

The exchange, having 042 code number, has been attached to satellite system. Presently two private companies are providing services to people across the country.

Nisar Ahmad, a resident of the city said they were faced with problems in contacting their relatives in other parts of the country and abroad. "But this would solve our problems up to a large extent." Many other residents demanded of the government to extend the Roshan and AWCC's service to the area.

Five Nigerian nationals held with fake US currency- Pajhwok Report

KABUL, September 25 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Five Nigerian nationals have been arrested with 1300,000 fake dollar notes in Kabul, security officials said on Sunday.

Spokesman for Interior Ministry Dad Mohammad Rasa told Pajhwok Afghan News in an exclusive chat the three foreigners were held on Kabul Airport Road while two others were arrested in Shahr-e-Naw.

The three had entered Afghanistan with legal business documents, he said, adding the detainees were being probed. However, he won't give further details.

India offers to work with EU-3 to end Iran nuclear standoff

New Delhi (AFP) - India has offered to work with the European Union to try to answer questions about Iran's nuclear programme but wants Tehran to show some flexibility on the issue, the foreign ministry said.

Nuclear-armed India joined the United States and European Union Saturday to vote for a resolution condemning Iran for not complying with its nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty obligations, during a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna.

"We intend to continue to work together with Iran as well as the EU-3 (Britain, France and Germany) to facilitate a satisfactory outcome" in further talks, a ministry statement said on Sunday.

"At the same time we have urged Iran to demonstrate some flexibility so that its friends can help in evolving a satisfactory outcome within the IAEA itself."

Twelve nations including Russia and China abstained while Venezuela cast the lone vote against the resolution scripted by the European Union, which has been holding talks with Tehran on its nuclear programme.

The IAEA refrained from reporting the issue to the UN Security Council at least until its chief Mohammed ElBaradei makes a new report on Iran's program -- probably in November.

The foreign ministry said India had voted for the resolution after the EU-3 agreed to accommodate its concerns, which included not referring Iran to the Security Council immediately.

New Delhi was also keen that "sufficient time should be given to the parties concerned to continue to engage in intensive consultations so that an outcome satisfactory to both Iran and the international community as a whole, could be evolved."

Iran denies it is trying to build nuclear weapons and insists it has a right to pursue a peaceful civilian nuclear program.

The Indian statement also denied links between its vote for the EU resolution and a India-US nuclear energy deal signed in July.

Some US legislators have said that if India does not support a US bid to refer Iran to the Security Council, the administration should freeze its landmark agreement to expand civilian nuclear cooperation.

The agreement to lift restrictions on India's access to sensitive nuclear technology can only be implemented if the US Congress amends certain laws.

German businessman accused of passing nuclear material to Pakistan

Munich (AFP) - A German businessman has been accused of smuggling material for enriching uranium to Pakistan between 2002 and 2004, according to Monday's edition of the weekly Focus.

The weekly said the man, identified as Rainer V. had been placed under criminal investigation by prosecutors in Munich for 23 alleged cases of infringement of the law on trade in weapons of war.

Based in Pullach, near Munich, he is accused of buying vacuum pumps, special ventilators and spare parts for mass spectrometers from the Pfeiffer Vacuum company of Hesse.

He is alleged to have shipped the material by air from Munich or by ship from Hamburg or Bremen to contacts in the Pakistani capital Islamabad or neighbouring Rawalpindi.

From there the equipment is thought to have been delivered to the Kashmir laboratories of Abdul Qadeer Khan, known as the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb, Focus said. In February last year Khan admitted illicitly exporting nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

[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.]