In this bulletin:

• Afghan, coalition forces launch major anti-Taliban operation
• Afghan leader, Indian PM urge joint fight against terrorism
• Karzai: Pakistan working hard catch bin Laden
• Afghans must balance foreign policy: minister nominee
• Two more ministers avail their turn
• Beethoven Orchestra to record new Afghan national anthem
• U.S. Probes Stolen Files in Afghanistan
• Afghanistan Raids Drug Bazaar Near Pakistani Border
• Deadly H5N1 bird flu confirmed in third Afghan province
• A Call to Justice - An Afghan court hands down its first war crimes conviction, but are there any more to come?
• AFGHANISTAN: People in Faryab complain of torture and illegal taxes by warlords
• Pakistan hits 'militant hideout'
• A rush to the Taliban's call
• Allied to the problem
• No quick action on Iran seen in divided UN council
• Iran Could Make Bomb in 16 Days if Centrifuge Plans Continue, U.S. Says
• AFGHANISTAN: IOM assists return of Afghan professionals from neighbouring countries

Afghan, coalition forces launch major anti-Taliban operation

KABUL (AFP) - Thousands of Afghan and coalition troops backed by US and British warplanes continued strikes on a known insurgent area, in one of the biggest operations in Afghanistan in a year.

About 2,500 troops launched Operation Mountain Lion Wednesday with a series of predawn air and ground assaults in eastern Kunar province, in one of their biggest campaigns since the overthrow of the Taliban government in late 2001.

The US military said late Wednesday six insurgents were killed at the start of the assault, seen as direct retaliation to a new spring offensive launched by the Taliban with a stream of suicide blasts and other attacks.

The operation started in Kunar's Pech River Valley, "an area notorious for terrorist activity," the military said in a statement on Thursday. It aimed to "disrupt insurgents' activities, deny them sanctuary and prevent their ability to resupply."

Coalition air forces are providing 24-hour support, a separate air force statement said. F-15 Eagle fighter jets, A-10 Thunderbolt ground support planes and massive B-52 heavy bombers "are providing close-air support for troops on the ground who are rooting out insurgent sanctuaries and support networks," it said.

Royal Air Force GR-7 Harriers were also providing combat support and Global Hawk and Predator unmanned aerial vehicle aircraft were supplying intelligence and surveillance information.

"However long it takes to rid this area of extremist activity, we'll be there," said James Redmore, the command sergeant major of the US-led Task Force Spartan, one of several units involved in the operation.

About 1,200 Afghan army troops were taking part in the operation, defence ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi said, describing it as "one of the biggest operations over the past one year."

"The troops have not faced any major resistance so far," Azimi said. The strike was launched a day after a rocket hit a school in the Kunar provincial capital Asadabad, killing seven children and wounding 33 others and a teacher.

It was unclear if the rocket, which police said was fired from across the border in Pakistan, had been aimed at the school which was in a mosque near an Afghan army base and coalition compound.

Officials blamed the attack on the Taliban, who have been waging an insurgency against the new government since they were toppled in a US-led campaign in late 2001.

The Taliban's fugitive leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, warned in a statement last month that the insurgents would step up their campaign against the new government with enough suicide bombings to set the country "aflame".

In the past two weeks there have been regular suicide blasts, mainly in the south and east, but only a few people aside from the attackers have been killed.

On March 29 Taliban insurgents launched one of the biggest attacks in months on a coalition compound, storming a base in the southern province of Helmand in the early hours.

The battle that followed lasted several hours. Thirty-two Taliban were killed. Two coalition soldiers also died, four were wounded and an Afghan soldier was hurt, although the coalition said the possibility of friendly fire was being investigated. The latest operations are in response to the Taliban's new offensive, a European military official said in Kabul.

"They want to reoccupy the terrain and show the neo-Taliban that they do not have the upper hand," she said on condition of anonymity. "It is also a matter of reassuring the population."

Afghan leader, Indian PM urge joint fight against terrorism

New Delhi (AFP) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai ended a trip to India during which leaders of both sides called for a pooling of resources to fight terrorism and urged that Pakistan join their efforts.

Karzai, on his second visit to India in two years, won his host's backing for his efforts to counter terrorism in Afghanistan, said an official statement following talks between him and Indian Premier Manmohan Singh.

Singh suggested at a news conference Monday that New Delhi, Kabul and Islamabad pool resources to curb terrorism which he said was affecting all three countries.

"Terrorism today has acquired new dimensions and I find in our region even Pakistan is not immune from terrorism," Singh told reporters on Thursday.

Nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, which have fought three wars -- two over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir -- are involved in a slow-moving peace process to settle their differences.

"So, there is need for pooling our knowledge, our experience, our intelligence-gathering activities in this region to deal effectively with this menace," Singh said, winning approval for his views from Karzai.

"All of us in this region are affected. And I very much hope that all of us in this region will join hands to fight this menace," Karzai said.

In February Karzai's government gave Islamabad details of Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants, whom they said were based in Pakistan and were engineering the insurgency in Afghanistan.

Pakistan dismissed the information as outdated and "ridiculous" and President Pervez Musharraf alleged Afghan intelligence was influenced by India.

Afghan and foreign troops are battling remnants of the Islamist Taliban movement overthrown for failing to surrender Osama bin Laden following the September 11 attacks in the United States.

During the visit, India also promised Afghanistan an extra 50 million dollars in aid, boosting India's contribution to relief and rehabilitation to 650 million dollars. India and Afghanistan share longstanding historic and cultural ties.

New Delhi has been one of the main regional backers of Karzai after being a key supporter of Afghan opposition forces led by the Northern Alliance that helped oust the Taliban in 2001.

India said it will host the Second Regional Economic Cooperation Conference for Afghanistan in November. The conference will include the G8, Kabul's neighbours and international organisations.

Karzai, who brought with him a delegation of business officials, invited Indian investment in information technology during a visit to the southern high-tech city of Hyderabad on Tuesday.

Karzai: Pakistan working hard catch bin Laden - By UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL Published April 12, 2006

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said Pakistan is making serious efforts to capture Osama bin Laden. "Forces trying to capture Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan have had good intelligence but not the good luck needed for success," Karzai told reporters during his ongoing visit to India.
   
”If they find him there, I am sure they will hand him over in a manner that is in keeping with our fight against terrorism," Karzai said, playing down reports of a rift between him and Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf over the exchange of a list of around 100 Taliban and al-Qaida militants who continue to operate from Pakistani soil.
    
Karzai assured the Indian government of the safety for its citizens working in Afghanistan, saying the recent upsurge in terrorist violence showed the terrorists were growing desperate.
    
"I think they are getting desperate. Politically, they are defeated by the way people participated in the recent parliamentary elections in a big way," he said. Karzai advocated a tri-polar structure, involving Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, for regional advancement and economic growth.
    
"The tri--polar structure of cooperation among Indian, Pakistan and Afghanistan would release the best energy of this region and bring quicker progress and economic betterment to it," Karzai said.

Afghans must balance foreign policy: minister nominee

KABUL (Reuters) -  Afghanistan must have a balanced foreign policy, with good relations with the United States and India as well as immediate neighbors Pakistan and Iran, the nominee for foreign minister said on Thursday.

Rangeen Dadfar Spanta, named by President Hamid Karzai last month to replace Abdullah Abdullah, also said the thorny issue of the border with Pakistan, which has bedeviled relations for decades, had to be decided by the Afghan parliament.

"For averting conflicts, differences and dangers, I believe we have no other way, but to establish reciprocal and multi-sided interests with neighboring countries and the region," Spanta told parliament.

The lower house of the Afghan parliament, elected last September, will vote on all members of Karzai's cabinet after questioning them about their policies. Votes are expected later this month.

Spanta said balance in relations with countries in the region, such as Iran, could be achieved even while Afghanistan maintains a close relationship with the United States. The United States is Afghanistan's main foreign backer and has more than 19,000 troops in the country, helping to fight Taliban insurgents.

Afghanistan's relations with Pakistan deteriorated sharply in February following Afghan complaints that Taliban insurgents were able to operate from Pakistani soil.

Pakistan is battling militants on its side of the porous frontier and angrily rejected the latest Afghan complaints. Pakistan is also suspicious of blossoming ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan's old rival, India. Karzai has been visiting India this week.

Some analysts say the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which Afghanistan has never officially recognized, has soured relations since soon after Pakistan's creation from British India in 1947.

The border is known as the Durand line, after the British colonial administrator who drew it through ethnic Pashtun tribal lands in the late nineteenth century.

Although the international community recognizes the line as the international border, and Pakistan insists it is not up for debate, Afghanistan says the line unfairly divides the Pashtun people.

Asked to comment on the Durand Line, Spanta said it was not within his authority. "This is an issue for the National Assembly of Afghanistan ... and for Afghanistan's people to solve this issue," he said.

Afghanistan had to adopt a moderate position based on cooperation with Pakistan to fight militants who operate in the Durand Line region, he said.

Two more ministers avail their turn

KABUL, Apr 11 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Minister-designate for Economy Dr Mir Mohammad Amin Farhang and Minister-designate for Labour, Haj and Auqaf Niamatullah Shahrani on Tuesday apprised the parliament of their performance and plans before vote of trust.

Farhang listed his achievement as preparation of the five-year national development strategy which was approved in the London Conference, monitoring of reconstruction projects and compilation of NGOs code of conduct.

Farhang faced some tough questions from the MPs including government incompetence to make good use of the free market system, poor performance of non-governmental organizations (NGO) and the ministry poor monitoring, low creation of jobs opportunities, weak support to domestic industries and promoting national currency.

Answering a query, Farhang said free market was better for Afghanistan like other development countries, however the command economy had failed in most of the states.

The minister-designate said there were problems in introducing full free market system and it would take time to it replace the planned economy. He said domestic productions might come down in the free market system in a country like Afghanistan as it was witnessed to some extent in the past three years, but it was essential for the long-term.

He said the commerce ministry jointly with finance and commerce ministries were working hard to control imports and strengthen domestic products that are almost tantamount to zero.

Replying the question of joblessness, Farhang said: "It is not job of the labour ministry to find work for jobless and take them directly to the jobs, but we would study how to create jobs and prepare ground for it."

He added 1.5 per cent of the whole population was eligible workers of which 21.4 per cent are jobless. He promised to decrease the joblessness rate soon.

Regarding the question of NGOs' working quality, Farhang said creation of the code of conduct last year and forcing registration with the ministry was meant to have a close watch on their activities. He noted 445 NGOs had been registered and work on 271 was in process.

To his dual citizenship, the minister-designate said he had quitted the foreign citizenship six months ago. Farhang was first minister of reconstruction during the post-Taliban interim government and became minister of economy late 2004.

Minister-designate for Haj and Religious Affairs Niamatullah Shahrani presented report of his achievements and outlined his future plans.

He said the ministry had built 25 mosques, renovated 150 others, arranged Haj trips, regained some grabbed lands belonging to the ministry, sent dozens of Qaris abroad for international Quran recitation contests and fought against drugs, alcohols and violation of women rights.

Shahrani was criticised by MPs for wide corruption and embezzlement in Haj trips, trivial attention to building of mosques, seminaries and tombs. He asked the parliament to help him get back the lands of the ministry which have been grabbed by strongmen during the civil war and later years. He said 30,000 acres of the ministry's property had been got back and 20,000 was still used by others.

Shahrani said it was his ministry's priority to preserve historical tombs, mosques, freedom of worship and to promote religious schools in the country.

Regarding claims of corruption and embezzlement in the Hajj trip expanse,

Shahrani said detention and conviction of 15 officials of the ministry for involvement in embezzlement was a proof that the ministry was fighting against corruption.

He said reforms in the ministry's staff was still going on as 90 per cent has been completed. Shahrani stayed vice president during the interim government of President Hamid Karzai and was appointed as minister of Haj and Auqaf in late 2004.

All the 25 ministers nominated by President Hamid Karzai for the new cabinet must brief the parliament before they are voted for confidence and 12 ministers have so far presented their briefings.

Beethoven Orchestra to record new Afghan national anthem - (DPA) 13 April 2006

BONN, GERMANY - The Beethoven Orchestra in the former German capital Bonn is rehearsing the new Afghan national anthem preparatory to recording a definitive instrumental version of it next week, Deutsche Welle said on Thursday.

The German radio and TV corporation is supporting the project to create a new anthem for the Asian nation.

The anthem’s composer, Afghan-born Babrak Wassa, is to conduct the orchestra during the recording on Wednesday in Bonn, the city, which was the birthplace of classic German composer Ludwig van Beethoven.

Wassa, who has lived in Germany for 25 years, was commissioned by Afghanistan’s ministry of culture to write the music.

From 1978 he was head of music director for radio and television in the Afghan capital Kabul. Wassa, 58, left Afghanistan for political reasons in 1980 and is now a German citizen living near Cologne.

He said he aimed for a melody that was “simple and catchy” and also “optimistic.” The anthem’s lyrics, which Afghanistan’s government and parliament agreed on last autumn, celebrate the country as the homeland of many tribes.

U.S. Probes Stolen Files in Afghanistan - By DANIEL COONEY The Associated Press Wednesday, April 12, 2006

BAGRAM, Afghanistan -- The U.S. military said Wednesday it was investigating the sale of computer files with seemingly sensitive military data stolen from inside its headquarters in Afghanistan.

The flash-memory drives were taken by some of the hundreds of Afghans working as janitors, office staff and interpreters at the Bagram base, according to a shopkeeper outside the base who was selling them. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of fears he would be arrested.

Four of the drives, which connect to a computer's USB port and also are called pen, thumb or key drives, reviewed by The Associated Press on Wednesday contained personal letters and biographies of soldiers, lists of troops who completed nuclear, chemical and biological warfare training and the Social Security numbers of four U.S. generals and dozens of other officers.

News of the security breach was first reported by the Los Angeles Times on Monday. The paper said its reporter reviewed files containing classified military assessments of enemy targets, names of corrupt Afghan officials and descriptions of American defenses.

The shopkeeper showed a plastic bag containing about 15 flash drives and said they were on sale for between $20 and $50, depending on their memory capacity. He said he was not interested in the data stored on them.

U.S. military spokesman Lt. Mike Cody said the matter was being investigated and that the military takes "operational security seriously."

"We will not comment in detail on these reports, but the circumstances are being reviewed," he said. "More information will be provided as it becomes available."

Military investigators Wednesday were scouring the market in search of the drives. Asked if they have found any, one soldier, who declined to give his name, said, "We are looking. That's all I can say."

Afghanistan Raids Drug Bazaar Near Pakistani Border - Voice Of America
11 April 2006

Afghan authorities say three members of the country's anti-narcotics squad have been wounded during a raid on a notorious opium and heroin bazaar near the border with Pakistan.

Local police say four suspected drug dealers were arrested during the operation by the Afghan Special Narcotics Force Monday in the town of Bahram Chah in Helmand province.

They say the forces also seized and burned about 1,000 kilograms of opium, and they discovered an underground bunker filled with heavy weapons that were later destroyed. It was the squad's second raid on the bazaar in a week. The first netted 75 kilograms of opium resin and one suspect.

Afghanistan is the world's largest producer of opium. President Hamid Karzai has vowed to wage war on the drug trade. Last year, he presented an eight-point plan to eradicate poppy production.

Deadly H5N1 bird flu confirmed in third Afghan province

KABUL (AFP) - The H5N1 strain of bird flu deadly to humans has been confirmed in a third province in Afghanistan.

Tests in Italy confirmed that H5N1 was found in birds in the central province of Logar, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation said. The strain has also been found in Kabul and in eastern Nangarhar province on the border with Pakistan.

No human cases of the disease have been reported in the country. Authorities last month dismissed fears that three children from the same family who died in western Ghor province had been infected by the virus.

The H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed more than 100 people worldwide since 2003, mostly in Asia.

Outbreaks of H5N1 were also suspected in central Parwan province and Herat in the west, the FAO said. "We need to do further testing," spokesman Assadullah Azhari told AFP.

Initial reports that H5N1 was found in Laghman province were found to be false after further testing in Italy, Azhari said. The broad H5-type virus was meanwhile confirmed in five other provinces, he said.

About 11,000 birds have been slaughtered to control the spread of the disease, said Azizullah Usmani, head of the agriculture ministry's veterinary department.

Most were domestic chickens and turkeys being kept in backyards, he said. About 85 percent of the Afghan population live in close contact with poultry, officials have said, with most rural families having several chickens.

Usmani said no new cases of the disease had been confirmed in Kabul in the past week, suggesting it was coming under control.

A Call to Justice - An Afghan court hands down its first war crimes conviction, but are there any more to come?

Institute For War and Peace Reporting By Mohammad Jawad Sharifzada and Salima Ghafari in Kabul (ARR No. 210, 11-Apr-06)

During almost three decades of war, Afghanistan has seen more than its share of human-rights abuses. Mass graves have been found in northern, eastern, and central parts of the country, and horrific tales abound of massacres and widespread rape, robbery, and torture.

So it comes as no surprise that there are frequent calls to bring the perpetrators to justice. But so far, only one senior official has been convicted of crimes against humanity. And the crimes of which he is accused occurred before the country descended into years of civil war.

Assadullah Sarwari, 65, who headed Afghanistan’s intelligence department from 1978 to 1979 under the communist regime, was found guilty of executing a large number of Afghans without proper trial. He was sentenced to death by a lower court on February 23. His case is now pending appeal.

Sarwari was a prominent figure in the communist-backed regime set up after the Soviet invasion in December, 1979. He went on to become, in turn vice president, deputy prime minister and minister of transport in the administration of Babrak Karmal.

Sarwari was arrested in 1992 when mujahedin factions overthrew the Soviet-backed Najibullah regime. Jailed on charges of conspiring against the mujahedin government, he was taken to the Panjshir Valley by the forces of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud. He spent almost a decade there, without trial, and was brought to Kabul only after the fall of the Taleban regime in 2001.

Late last year, the government of President Hamed Karzai approved a plan to investigate allegations of human rights abuses committed during Afghanistan’s decades of war. Sarwari's case was the first in what many hope is a long line of prosecutions.

No one disputes that the communist regime was guilty of its more than its share of brutality. But numerous other figures, including former warlords who played leading roles in the vicious internal battles of the Nineties, have also been widely accused to human-rights abuses.

Some of these figures occupy important posts in the current government. So many are asking why Sarwari has been singled out. “The [other] accused war criminals hold posts in the government,” said Abdul Basit Bakhtiari, the judge in the case. “That prevents them being brought to trial. There are other people as well who, if we were to take action against them, would be able to destabilise the country’s security.”

Bakhtiari told IWPR that Sarwari had been tried for mass murder. The accused had no lawyer, so was forced to defend himself. The trial had previously been twice postponed because of lack of legal representation and it was unclear why the defendant did not have counsel in the final proceedings

After almost 14 years of waiting, the one-day trial was something of an anti-climax. According to media reports, witnesses were allowed to present hearsay evidence and Sarwari was given no opportunity to confront his accusers.

People whose family members had been killed or disappeared under the communist regime were allowed inside the courtroom, and emotional outbursts were frequent.

Sarwari’s defence was simple - he was just doing his job. “I and the intelligence organisation were very active in providing security for our citizens,” he told the court. “We discovered more than 300 plots, as a result of which the lives of thousands of citizens were saved. I believe that in the past I worked for the benefit of my country and my people.

“The government at that time was like a machine, and I was a part of that machine. I was just performing my duties,” he added. But that argument did not sway the judges.

“After several hours of testimony from witnesses who had been tortured by Sarwari or whose family members were killed by him, we handed down a guilty verdict and sentenced him to death,” said judge Bakhtiari.

IWPR was not allowed access to Sarwari. International human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have pointed to irregularities in the trial, terming the process “flawed” and calling for the verdict to be set aside.

Sarwari’s major crime, say some analysts, is that he is not backed by any powerful faction. That allowed his opponents free rein to attack him.

“There are many criminals in the cabinet and in the parliament who have power over people’s lives,” said political analyst Mohammad Qasim Akhgar. “The government’s attitude towards criminals is as inconsistent as its other policies. Since Sarwari is not supported by any powerful groups within the country, or by any foreign nation, his political opponents can put him on trial.”

Sarwari has many enemies among those who now hold power in Afghanistan. He is a former communist and a Pashtun, both factors that put him in opposition to the powerful group that surrounded the late Ahmad Shah Massoud, the commander whose power base lay in the ethnic Tajik Panjshir Valley.

Massoud, who was assassinated just two days before the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, has become something of a cult figure in Afghanistan. His trusted deputy, Younus Qanuni, is now speaker of parliament.

Gul Rahman, president of the Afghanistan lawyers’ union, concedes that there were other factors at play in the Sarwari trial. “There is no doubt that personal, political, linguistic and tribal rivalries exist in our country and have had an influence on Sarwari’s trial,” he said.

Political analyst Zahoor Afghan asserted that Sarwari was unable to have a fair trial because of problems within the legal system. “Afghanistan’s judiciary has not been able to maintain its neutrality,” he said. “The system is still political, and all the judges are under the control of political parties and groups. And those in charge of the judiciary have no education in law.”

Owing to Afghanistan’s status as an Islamic republic, it is quite common for judges to have only attended a madrassa or religious school, or at best, to have received some higher-level training in Sharia law. Few have a formal legal education.

Lal Gul, head of the Afghan Commission for Human Rights, expressed doubts about the independence of the judiciary. “Judges are under pressure,” he said. “When we send a case to court, judges refuse to accept it, saying, ‘the accused is a powerful figure and I cannot call him in’.”

But the deputy chief justice in the Supreme Court, Abdul Malik Kamawi, rejected allegations of political pressure. “Afghanistan’s judiciary has tried many criminals against whom it received complaints. Sarwari is not the first. And there has been no pressure from anyone,” he said.

Sarwari’s lone status as a convicted human rights violator is not due to any outside influences, he added. “We have not received any official complaints against anyone else,” said Kamawi. “If we do receive complaints, they will be tried.”

People on the street expressed general cynicism over the Sarwari trial. “Sarwari has no power, no money, and no guns, so it's easy to bring him to trial,” said Samiullah, 31, who lives in Kabul’s Taimani district. “It would take real heroism to bring someone to justice who is in the cabinet or the parliament.”

Shahwali, 51, agreed, “If Sarwari had men and arms like other criminals, not only would he not have been tried, but [President Hamed] Karzai would have named a street after him.”

Mohammad Jawad Sharifzada and Salima Ghafari are IWPR staff reporters in Kabul.

AFGHANISTAN: People in Faryab complain of torture and illegal taxes by warlords - Source: IRIN

MAIMANA, 12 April (IRIN) - Sitting in a small restaurant in a busy bazaar in Maimana, capital of Afghanistan's northern Faryab province, Abdul Hadi, 36, worries out loud over the fate of his family in Kata Kala village, some 80 km away.

"I don't know what will happen to my family after I fled 13 days ago," lamented Abdul Hadi, after a local warlord tried to extract a US $1,200 illegal tax on some land he had sold.

"Two armed men grabbed me from my house and placed me in a dark room for five hours," Hadi alleged. "The commander of the armed group demanded that I pay up or accept staying in jail," Hadi claimed, adding he was only released on condition of paying the gunmen when other villagers intervened. "I left the home and fled because I cannot pay that amount of money," he explained.

Such incidents are not unusual in Afghanistan's troubled north. Ali Mohammad, 48, another villager living in Kata Kala, contends that he was imprisoned and tortured for 15 days by the same warlord when he resisted gunmen demanding money for his yearly crops.

"If I complain, I might be killed," Ali Mohammad noted, citing the government's failure to protect local citizenry from such actions.

But Hadi and Ali Mohammad both live in an area of Faryab where such actions have become largely institutionalised – with extortion and the threat of private jails now the norm.

"According to our reports, irresponsible gunmen are still torturing people in their private prisons and taking illegal taxes in remote districts of Faryab where the government's control remains weak," Habibullah, deputy head the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) in Maimana, told IRIN.

"Unfortunately, these warlords are supported and equipped by some high-ranking officials from inside the government," Habibullah claimed, adding: "To tackle this, the government should avoid employing human rights abusers and war criminals and strengthen the so-called disarmament process in the area."

Yet Arun Dhoj Adhikary, representative of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) in Faryab, said people hold arms for a number of different reasons, including political, criminal and insecurity.

"There cannot be a common disarming strategy. Each of these reasons will need different solutions," he explained. Many villagers living in Kata Kala interviewed by IRIN assert that the government has yet to take the necessary steps to ensure their safety.

Noor Mohammad, 60, says he was imprisoned three times in one week by gunmen before finally paying some $400 in illegal tax for purchasing four acres of land. "The commander warned me I would face a sound beating and even murder if I complain to anyone," he said.

Meanwhile, analysts believe that one of most significant reasons behind such brutal activities is the abundance of arms still in the hands of gunmen, making the country's already fragile stability all the more tenuous.

Despite millions of dollars spent by the international community for a nationwide disarmament campaign, many militia commanders are still holding stocks of weapons in their caches. There are reportedly still between 1,800 and 2,000 illegal armed groups across the country, which is a huge challenge for bringing stability, democracy and prosperity to the war-ravaged nation after over two decades of conflict.

According to the AIHRC, over 29 private jails run by warlords in different parts of the country have been closed already by the organisation since its establishment in 2002.

"There are still more than 10 private jails run by various warlords linked to some high-ranking officials involved in torturing people for a variety of reasons across the country," said Ahmad Shah Mirdad, an officer for the AIHRC's investigation and monitoring section.

Pakistan hits 'militant hideout' – BBC

At least seven people have been killed after Pakistani helicopter gunships attacked a suspected militant base near the Afghan border, the military says. Unconfirmed reports say a senior al-Qaeda suspect may have been among those killed.

It was the latest in a series of army operations against suspected militants in restive North Waziristan province. The military says around 250 suspected militants have been killed over the past month and a half.

"We have conducted a sting operation with the help of Cobra gunship helicopters," said chief military spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan.

He told the AFP news agency the strikes had "resulted in the knocking out of a military hideout" in Nagar village, six kilometres (four miles) south of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

"Some foreigners were killed," he added. Pakistani officials often use the term to refer to Arab and other militants they say are linked to al-Qaeda.

Unconfirmed reports say the target was Mohsin Musa Matwalli Atwah, an Egyptian who also goes by the name of Abdul Rahman al-Misri. He is wanted by the United States in connection with the bombings of its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

"We received a tip that Abdul Rahman al-Misri was hiding there and we conducted the raid," Pakistan's Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told Reuters news agency. "But there is no confirmation as yet about whether he was killed or not."

Atwah is described as a "senior explosives expert" by the CIA and figures in an FBI 'Most Wanted' list. Tens of thousands of Pakistani soldiers are deployed in the restive tribal region of the North West Frontier Province, to flush out pro-Taleban and al-Qaeda militants.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has warned foreign militants to leave the country or face being killed.

A rush to the Taliban's call - Asia Times Online By Syed Saleem Shahzad
4/12/06

KARACHI - The Taliban's spring offensive is in full swing, with almost daily attacks, including suicide bombings, in Afghanistan. More than 200 people, including 14 American soldiers, have lost their lives in the Taliban-led insurgency this year.

This toll - and the damage caused - is small in relation to the insurgency in Iraq, though the techniques applied have been modeled on those used by the Iraqi resistance. What the Afghan resistance lacks in expertise and sophistication, though, it is making up in numbers - to a scale not seen since the Taliban were driven from power in 2001.

Thousands of new volunteers are pouring into the mountainous regions on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan to

combat Pakistani troops on the one side and US-led allied forces on the other side. The volunteers include local Waziristanis from the North and South Waziristan tribal areas, Afghans and a small number Central Asian fighters. The vast majority, though, come from North West Frontier Province, Punjab and Karachi.

And in a significant development, many of these fighters would normally have joined in the struggle against Indian-administered Kashmir.

Thousands of jihadis who had fought alongside the Taliban against the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan before the US-led invasion of the country in 2001 subsequently joined with the the banned Jaish-i-Mohammed and Harkatul Mujahideen to fight in Kashmir. However, with India fencing the borders in Kashmir and the United States applying considerable pressure on Islamabad to stop the infiltration into Indian-administered Kashmir, the flow of jihadis has dried to a trickle, leaving them sitting idle.

The Taliban's recruitment drive for this summer's offensive, which started last year, targeted these jihadis, and many were persuaded to join the Taliban in North and South Waziristan. Apart from those belonging to the Jaish-i-Mohammed and Harkatul Mujahideen, fighters associated with the Lashkar-i-Toiba have also joined the Taliban in their thousands.

The Taliban have also targeted underground militias that sprang up in Pakistan after the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, with a total of about 50,000 fighters, many of whom received training in Afghanistan under the Taliban. These groups range from 20-2,000 people in each.

The battle from The Base (al-Qaeda) - Whether the Taliban inflict major losses on coalition forces this year or not, the International Islamic Front of Osama bin Laden has unleashed a battle from its new base - the "Islamic state of Waziristan" in North Waziristan (see The Taliban's bloody foothold in Pakistan, Asia Times Online, February 8).

The strategy is to expand this base further, to the provinces of Paktia, Khost, Helmand and Zabul in Afghanistan. In many villages of these provinces, as in North Waziristan, the Taliban have paralyzed the writ of the Afghan state and have formed their own administrations, which include a Taliban judiciary, police and system of taxes.

Although the Taliban have reached the Pakistani districts of Dera Ismail Khan and Tank, and shut down music centers, a decision to take over full control of these districts in North West Frontier Province has not yet been made.

In Taliban-controlled areas, neither tribal chiefs nor clerics have any say. Similarly, the six-party religious-political alliance, the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, has lost its influence. This much has been admitted by the Pakistani minister of interior.

On-the-ground contacts from North Waziristan tell Asia Times Online that as many as 27,000 fighters have grouped in the area. A new command has been formed, with all prominent faces being sent into the background. The new field commander is little-known, an Afghan named Maulana Sagheen Khan Zadran, 41. Of the fighters, about 3,500 are from Pakistani Punjab and Karachi and more than 10,000 from various districts of North West Frontier Province, while the rest are either local tribals or Afghan refugees.

The field commander of the Taliban in South Waziristan is Baitullah Mehsud. Though the exact figures for fighters in South Waziristan are not known, they are believed to run in the many thousands.

"This is the tip of the iceberg as thousands of mujahideen are waiting for the call. They are located in all seven tribal agencies and the rest of Pakistan. In addition to that, thousands of Taliban are still in Afghanistan, and once the Taliban movement gets momentum, they will be regrouped in their respective districts, like the Taliban are organized in North and South Waziristan, in the districts of Paktia, Khost, Helmand and Zabul," a contact said.

Asia Times Online has contacted top Pakistani officials, ranging from those in the Ministry of Information to the Ministry of Interior, the armed forces and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, informing them of this article and requesting interviews. None chose to respond.

A twist in the 'war on terror' - Since the attacks on the US on September 11, 2001, the US-led "war on terror" has been through many phases. The indications are that another major change is happening.

A key policy the Americans devised was to shut down war theaters, be they in the Middle East, South Asia or Africa, as they were perceived as breeding grounds for terror. Thus, after invading Afghanistan and Iraq, the US put considerable diplomatic muscle into twisting Pakistan's arm to ban all private militias, initiate dialogue with India and clamp down on militancy emanating from the Pakistan-administered side of Kashmir, as well as abandon Islamist leaders in Kashmir.

The results of this, however, have not been what the Americans wanted, for while a lot of the heat might have been taken out of the Kashmir struggle, the focus has shifted to Waziristan and Afghanistan.

Khalid Khawaja is a retired squadron leader in the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) and belonged to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in the 1980s. He wrote a critical letter to the late general Zia ul-Haq, calling him a hypocrite. Zia ordered his dismissal from the ISI and forced his retirement from the PAF. Khalid went straight to Afghanistan in 1987 and fought alongside the mujahideen against the Soviets.

While in Afghanistan he developed close and friendly ties with bin Laden. Khawaja's name resurfaced after the abduction and murder of US reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002. Asia Times Online asked Khawaja why people were giving up fighting in Kashmir and instead going to Waziristan.

"The feelings of disgruntlement among mujahideen emerged soon after September 11. Even a person like Maulana Fazl Rehman Khalil [chief of the Harkatul Mujahideen] once asked me in a private meeting why the mujahideen should [continue to] fight for the Kashmiri cause.

"The way the situation evolved in Pakistan after September 11, there was just no rationale for people to fight in Kashmir, simply because whatever Indian forces were doing in Kashmir against the Muslim population, Pakistani forces did even worse against Muslims in Pakistan," Khawaja said.

"Jihad is fought not for the sake of land. Jihad is fought when there is a question of faith and the enemy are attacking the faith. After September 11, the Americans attacked our faith. We fought against Soviet Russia for the same reason. Now the Americans have replaced Soviet Russia.

"Now when faith is under attack there is no difference of caste and creed. The collaborators are equally punishable, be it Pakistan or any other country. This is a global rule of mujahideen which is substantiated by clear religious decrees, be it Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan. After all, when [US President George W] Bush can say that you are with us or against us, what harm if the mujahideen make the same claims?" Khawaja said.

Saleem Hashmi, a spokesman for the largest indigenous Kashmiri liberation movement, the Hizbul Mujahideen, told Asia Times Online that with regard to the HM's strategic manpower, it is targeted at Indian-administered Kashmir.

Nevertheless, the situation on the ground tells a different story, and it is clear that that the Taliban have acquired a new and reliable supply of volunteers to feed the movement for many more spring offensives.

Syed Saleem Shahzad is Bureau Chief, Pakistan Asia Times Online. He can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com.

Allied to the problem - Hindustan Times PERSPECTIVES | Vikram Sood

At the end of a French delegation’s visit to Pakistan recently, the Pakistan Foreign Office put out its usual statement. It referred to Pakistan as an anchor of peace in the region and said that the leader of the French delegation, former Premier Senator (Francois) Poncet, had commended Pakistan’s role in promoting peace and stability. One does not know if this is a reflection of Gaul indulgence, Pakistan’s continued self-delusion or simply a Foreign Office sleight of hand. One thing it definitely is, is being elastic with the truth.

Soon after this, US State Department Assistant Secretary Richard Boucher, on a visit to Pakistan, commended America’s stalwart ally for arresting the maximum number of terrorists. But where else would you find the largest number of terrorists anyway? It is like showing surprise at finding kangaroos in Australia.

Since September 11, 2001, General Musharraf’s policy of riding two horses simultaneously — the one for war on terror and the other for supporting jehad — has needed extraordinary equestrian skills. One of the horses is likely to gallop away soon. There are signs of impatience and doubt in the West. Think-tanks like the Carnegie Endowment for Peace have begun to doubt Musharraf’s sincerity and feel that he is exploiting the war on terror for himself. It is not yet known whether the US has realised that Pakistan is part of the problem and not part of the solution. The more optimistic assumption is that there is realisation, but also helplessness, at the moment.

In today’s Pakistan, there are three main harsh realities. First, that the Baloch struggle is not about the three main tribes, the Bugtis, Marris and the Mengals, fighting for the preservation of their Sardari system. The struggle is about basic rights — economic and political — because the revolt is all over Balochistan and not restricted to these three tribal areas. The second reality is that the Waziristan area in the Fata belt, which was the launching pad for many of the campaigns in the jehad against the Soviets in Afghanistan, is today prime Taliban country — and only growing in depth and area. Third, Pakistan is getting ‘jehadised’, ever so incrementally; one may not notice it, but it is.

In Balochistan, there were four incidents on a single day, April 6. Between January and March this year, there were nearly 60 incidents of rocket attacks all over the province and at least 1,600 rockets were fired. In February, gas pipelines were disrupted 21 times, affecting supplies to the rest of the country. Nawab Akbar Bugti is a fugitive in his own province and has not returned to Bugti Fort for months. Akhtar Mengal is constantly harassed and Nawab Khair Bux Marri, along with his two sons, has been slapped with an arms and ammunition case. This is despite the fact that these leaders have from time to time, along with harsh statements, also said that the present struggle is not yet about secession but about provincial rights.

Reactions from Islamabad have been on expected lines — use of indiscriminate and excessive force, artillery, helicopter gun-ships and aircraft included. And finding that an ordinary Baloch was willing to die for the long-standing grievances of greater autonomy, prevention of ethnic identity from being swamped by the Punjabi outsiders, for the removal of military cantonments and a greater share in revenue and development, Pakistani authorities have begun to blame external forces. Iranian authorities, fearing that the US would want to use Balochistan to destabilise their country, may seek to pre-empt that. Pakistan’s military leaders are unable to admit that the hatred for Punjabi dominance is widespread and deep-rooted in the other three provinces. There have been suggestions for the trifurcation of Punjab around Bahawalpur, Multan and Rawalpindi. Thus, apart from solving Baloch problems, Punjab needs to be cut to size if Pakistan has to be saved.

The fear is that attempts to portray the present struggle as the selfish handiwork of a few misguided miscreants and attempts to destroy traditional Baloch society by abolishing the Sardari system without anything else in place, would leave the province in a vacuum to be filled by the Taliban alumni.

Waziristan, with its inhospitable terrain and warlike conservative tribes, the Waziris and Mahsuds, was the ideal launching pad in the jehad against the Soviets in the Paktia and Khost provinces across the border. Today, terrorists fleeing from Afghanistan have made south and north Waziristan their new Taliban country, using it to regroup and relaunch into Afghanistan. About two months ago, Tolo TV channel, run from Kabul by some liberal Afghans, had shown gruesome details of half a dozen bodies being dragged by a jeep through the streets of Mandrakhel. Another scene depicted severed heads and crowds chanting ‘Long live Osama bin Laden’, ‘Long live Mullah Omar’.

The fear is that the Taliban mindset and influence have begun to spread to the ‘settled areas’ of the NWFP. Areas like Darra Adam Khel provide home-made weapons and can turn in upto 400 weapons of varying kinds and calibre in a day. The Taliban are able to move at ease from Karachi to Darra to Peshawar to Quetta and on to Kandahar or Helmund or Jalalabad. Gulbuddin Hikmetyar, the ISI’s blue-eyed boy and now at peace with the Taliban, is back in business.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has more than once complained to Musharraf about Taliban’s transgressions, but Pakistan’s leaders continue to chase the dream of strategic depth in Afghanistan and are blinded to the fact that this is becoming their nightmare. Pushed to the wall, Pakhtoons of Afghanistan will claim that the Durand Line runs south from Attock along the Indus up to Dera Ismail Khan, while the Pakistanis would want to push this up to Kabul. Therein lie the seeds of future conflict.

Over the years, conventional wisdom has held that the NWFP and Balochistan were the more conservative societies and, therefore, more susceptible to religious fundamentalism, Punjab was the symbol of modernism. This is partially true and partially a myth perpetuated by the Punjabis. Both the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba and the rabid Sunni organisation, the Sipaha-e-Sahaba, have their birthplaces here. The largest number of blasphemy cases were reported from Punjab last year. Musharraf could not go to Lahore in March for the Basant celebrations because the mullahs declared the festival un-Islamic for its Hindu origins. Everyone blames the curriculum of the madrasas as being responsible for churning out jehadis in Pakistan. Yet mainstream schools continue to teach jehad to their students. Attacks on Christians and Ahmediyas have increased.

Waziristan is slipping out of control and of the 80,000 troops deployed earlier to control the situation, some have been diverted to Balochistan. US hi-tech surveillance systems and border teams helping in joint operations along the Afghan-Pakistan border, have been unable to pick up any important al-Qaeda operatives, but the locals move across freely. More troops are needed.

The Pakistani excuse to the Americans is that it cannot divert more troops from the eastern border given the situation with India. The only way this can be done is if Indo-Pak problems from Siachen to Sir Creek are solved, enabling Pakistan to disengage and re-deploy. In the interim, if the US could at least nudge the Indians to at least demilitarise Siachen and Kashmir, it could help in the war on terror.

No quick action on Iran seen in divided UN council

Iran's declaration that it has enriched its first batch of uranium is unlikely to spur the United Nations to act sooner than May on the question of Iran's nuclear ambitions, diplomats said on Wednesday.

Following Iran's announcement, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the council, which last month called on Tehran to suspend all enrichment work, would need to take up the issue again.

But several council members said the U.N. body had agreed in a statement last month to wait for further action until International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei makes his report at the end of April.

"When we have this report, we will react," French U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere told reporters. Nor did the Iranian announcement convince all council members that it was time to take a tougher line on Tehran.

"I think people are still talking about diplomatic efforts," Chinese Ambassador Wang Guangya said when asked whether China felt it was now time for the council to step up its efforts on Iran. Last month's council statement on Iran's nuclear work was nonbinding.

If ElBaradei reports at the end of the month that Iran has not complied with council demands, Western powers want the council to make the demand for suspension of all enrichment work binding under international law.

Russia and China to date have opposed this step under Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter, fearing this could lead later on to sanctions or provide a legal basis for military action.

Wang stressed it remained Beijing's view that diplomacy was the best way forward and said the five permanent members of the Security Council -- the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China -- plus Germany planned to meet again soon "to discuss and take note of the situation."

Senior officials from these six nations have met periodically in recent months in search of a coordinated strategy on Iran, with mixed success.

State department spokesman Sean McCormack later said a meeting of the six would take place next week in Moscow. U.N. ambassadors from the six countries were meeting later on Wednesday in New York to confer on next steps, diplomats said.

"I do hope the Iranians will take note of the reactions and be more cooperative with the IAEA and also with the Security Council," Wang said. Talk of sanctions or military steps "will not be helpful under the current circumstances," he added.

President Bush on Monday dismissed as "wild speculation" media reports that Washington was planning for military strikes on Iran. He said force was not necessarily required to thwart Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in The Hague, urged all parties to "actively search for a diplomatic solution and to cool down the rhetoric and not to escalate."

Iran Could Make Bomb in 16 Days if Centrifuge Plans Continue, U.S. Says

April 12 (Bloomberg) -- Iran, defying United Nations Security Council demands to halt its nuclear program, may be capable of making a nuclear bomb within 16 days, a U.S. State Department official said.

Iran will move to ``industrial scale'' uranium enrichment involving 54,000 centrifuges at its Natanz plant, the Associated Press quoted deputy nuclear chief Mohammad Saeedi as telling state-run television today.

``Using those 50,000 centrifuges they could produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in 16 days,'' Stephen Rademaker, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation, told reporters today in Moscow.

Rademaker was reacting to a statement by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who said yesterday the country had succeeded in enriching uranium on a small scale for the first time, using 164 centrifuges. That announcement defies demands by the UN Security Council that Iran shut down its nuclear program this month.

The U.S. fears Iran is pursuing a nuclear program to make weapons, while Iran says it is intent on purely civilian purposes, to provide energy. Saeedi said 54,000 centrifuges will be able to enrich uranium to provide fuel for a 1,000-megawat nuclear power plant similar to the one Russia is finishing in southern Iran, AP reported. ``It was a deeply disappointing announcement,'' Rademaker said of Ahmadinejad's statement.

Rademaker said the technology to enrich uranium to a low level could also be used to make weapons-grade uranium, saying that it would take a little over 13 years to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon with the 164 centrifuges currently in use. The process involves placing uranium hexafluoride gas in a series of rotating drums or cylinders known as centrifuges that run at high speeds to extract weapons grade uranium.

Iran has informed the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency that it plans to construct 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz next year, Rademaker said. ``We calculate that a 3,000-machine cascade could produce enough uranium to build a nuclear weapon within 271 days,'' he said.

While the U.S. has concerns over Iran's nuclear program, Rademaker said ``there certainly has been no decision on the part of my government'' to use force if Iran refuses to obey the UN Security Council demand that it shuts down its nuclear program.

Rademaker is in Moscow for a meeting of his counterparts from the Group of Eight wealthy industrialized countries. Russia chairs the G-8 this year. China is concerned about Iran's decision to accelerate uranium enrichment and wants the government in Tehran to heed international criticism of the move, Wang Guangya, China's ambassador to the United Nations said.

AFGHANISTAN: IOM assists return of Afghan professionals from neighbouring countries - 12 Apr 2006 17:21:35 GMT

Source: IRINKABUL, 12 April (IRIN) - The International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Ministry of Afghan Diaspora and Experts (MoADE) on Wednesday launched a new stage of the Return of Qualified Afghans (RQA) programme, which will focus on return and recruitment of Afghan experts from neighbouring countries.

"Given the enormous need for qualified Afghans to return and to participate in the reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts of Afghanistan, the project aims at filling human resource gaps in Afghanistan's public sector, centrally as well as at provincial level," Richard Scott, chief of IOM's mission in Afghanistan, told a press briefing in the capital Kabul.

Through to the end of 2008, the programme will assist both Afghan public-sector employers in Afghanistan and Afghan specialists living in the neighbouring countries of Pakistan, Iran, India, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan by facilitating the recruitment of 210 highly qualified Afghan professionals, their return to Afghanistan and their job placements, according to the IOM in Kabul.

IOM Kabul will work closely with the Afghan authorities, and particularly with the MoADE, to identify the key sectors and positions that are crucial to the country's reconstruction and sustainable development plans, and that are unable to be filled by nationals already residing in the country. Particular attention will be given to human resources needs in the provinces, Scott added.

"This programme is dedicated to boost institutional capacity in the fields crucial for Afghanistan's development and reconstruction process, especially in its provinces outside of the capital Kabul," Mangal Hussain, minister at the diaspora ministry, told reporters at Kabul.

Afghan professionals currently living in neighbouring countries who are university graduates with documented proof of at least a bachelors' degree are eligible to apply for this programme, according to the ministry.

Afghan public-sector employers in Afghanistan in need of qualified personnel will be able to benefit by receiving staff through this programme. Additionally the participating experts' salaries will be supported for one year, as well as equipment being provided for their offices.

"Each of the male experts returning to the country would be provided with a salary of US $240 per month and each female expert would be provided with $290 a month for the one-year period," Hussain explained, adding the experts would also be provided with additional money to pay their rent.

The IOM started the RQA programmes in 2001. Supporting some of the most crucial fields of redevelopment, to date 753 Afghans have returned to Afghanistan from 29 countries using the programme's assistance to take up pivotal positions in the public sector, mainly in the Kabul province.

The current phase of the programme will focus more on provincial public institutions in other provinces which need qualified personnel. It will assist only those employers across Afghanistan who cannot find qualified staff locally, said Lorena Lando, the IOM programme manager.

"Each public-sector employer in Kabul or in the provinces will have to elaborate on why they need employees from abroad and how they are going to use the support of the programme," the diaspora minister added.

[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.]