In this bulletin:

• Afghanistan says "Taleban" captured in Pakistan are ordinary people –
• Afghan president condemns U.S. airstrike
• Probe into Afghan bombing deaths
• Pakistan gives US forces location of Al-Qaeda plot suspect
• 'Taliban' Source Suggests Al-Qaeda Trained London Plot's Operatives on Both Sides of Afghan-Pakistani Border
• Air Terror Mastermind In Afghanistan?
• Afghan spy chief urges Pakistan action on enemies
• Soldier killed in Afghan fighting
• Canada, NATO quietly talking with Taliban
• Commander Says NATO Passing Test in Afghanistan
• Foreign fighters swell Taleban's ranks
• Boomer's family starts Afghan fund
• Dist police chief among six killed in Farah
• Afghanistan for strategic ties with India - United News of India
• CIA worker guilty of Afghan abuse
• AFGHANISTAN: Hepatitis B kills more than 11,000 people annually
• Kabul surfs the 3G internet
• Pakistan’s Leader Faces Increasing Political Challenges

Afghanistan says "Taleban" captured in Pakistan are ordinary people –

KANDAHAR (AFP 08/18/2006 ) - Nearly 60 suspected Taleban arrested in Pakistan and handed to Afghanistan were actually ordinary citizens and they have been released, a governor said Friday.

However most of a second group of 33 men extradited to Afghanistan Thursday did appear to have links with the Taleban militia that is fighting the government, Kandahar provincial governor Asadullah Khalid said.

Pakistani security forces arrested the first batch of 57 men a month ago saying they may be Taleban guerrillas. They were handed over to Afghan authorities in the southern province of Kandahar last week.

'We interrogated them after they were handed over to us last week,' Khalid said. 'Not even a single one of them is Taleban,' he told a news conference in Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taleban and focus of its insurgency.

The men were just ordinary refugees living in the Pakistani city of Quetta, he said. They had all been released, he said. Some of the men told AFP that Pakistani authorities had taken blood from them before sending them across the border. It was unclear why this was done.

Khalid said that intelligence officials suspected however that most of the second batch of 33 that arrived Thursday could be affiliated to the religious movement forced out of government in late 2001.

Afghan officials have accused their eastern neighbour of not doing enough to stop Taleban guerrillas launching attacks against the Afghan government and foreign troops here from Pakistani soil.

Islamabad denies the claims. The recent arrests follow months of pressure from the US-led coalition and NATO forces in Afghanistan on Pakistan.

Afghan president condemns U.S. airstrike

Kabul (AP 08/18/06) - President Hamid Karzai condemned a U.S. airstrike Thursday that Afghan officials said killed 10 border policemen. Sixteen other people died in violence around the country, including an American soldier slain by a Soviet-era land mine.

The U.S. military said it was investigating the airstrike in southeastern Afghanistan, but believed it had struck insurgents fleeing the scene of an attack on U.S. and Afghan troops.

Two suicide bombers targeted U.S. and NATO troops, seriously wounding one American soldier and killing an Afghan civilian. A purported spokesman for the Taliban said it would launch more such attacks in the future.

Afghanistan is going through its worst period of violence since the U.S.-led invasion that ousted the hard-line Taliban regime in late 2001 for hosting Osama bin Laden.

Karzai said he was "shocked and angered" by the airstrike in southeastern Paktika province. "I have repeatedly asked the coalition forces to take maximum caution while carrying out operations and I want that incidents like this must not be repeated," he said in a statement.

Gen. Abdul Rahman, Afghanistan's deputy chief of border police, said a coalition airplane killed 10 policemen in two trucks. No one survived the strike.

The U.S. military released a statement saying it was looking into the report but it believed an aircraft had destroyed two trucks that soldiers on the ground said were involved in an insurgent attack on a U.S.-Afghan patrol. An Afghan policeman was killed and coalition vehicle damaged in that clash.

Karzai has urged restraint on the part of coalition forces operating in areas where civilians live. In April, clashes pitting U.S., Canadian and British troops against insurgents left 13 Afghan civilians dead.

In Paktika province on Wednesday, a U.S. military vehicle hit a Soviet-era land mine, killing one soldier, the military said, ruling out enemy action.

On Thursday, a suicide bomber drove an explosives-packed car into a joint U.S.-Afghan army convoy on the main Kandahar-Kabul highway in Kandahar province, seriously wounding one U.S. soldier, officials said.

A purported Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility for the attack and said the bomber was Afghan.

Militants will continue with "suicide bombings, guerrilla warfare and ambushes" against the U.S. and their allies in Afghanistan, said Qari Yousaf Ahmadi, a self-described Taliban spokesman who contacted The Associated Press by telephone.

In nearby Uruzgan province, another suicide bomber targeting a NATO patrol instead killed one civilian and wounded six others, a NATO spokesman said.

The Afghan Interior Ministry said eight police were wounded, four seriously, in an attack by a bomber wearing explosives strapped to his body.

The coalition also said U.S. soldiers killed eight militants during a firefight near eastern Kunar province's capital of Asadabad.

Meanwhile, suspected Taliban militants released 17 health workers unharmed, including doctors and nurse, who had been abducted earlier in the day in southern Kandahar province, said NATO spokesman Maj. Quentin Innis.

Taliban spokesman Ahmadi said insurgents commandeered the workers' minivan but did not kidnap the passengers, who he claimed fled into nearby villages.

In eastern Paktiya province, the provincial police chief said an air strike in mountainous Mutrekh village killed three people and wounded four late Tuesday. The U.S. military denied any coalition bombing activity in the area.

Probe into Afghan bombing deaths - BBC News / Friday, 18 August 2006

The Afghan authorities have launched an investigation to find out the identity of 12 people killed in a US-led coalition bombing raid on Thursday. The Afghan authorities initially said those killed in south-eastern Paktika province were policemen on patrol.

But a senior Afghan official told the BBC on Friday that the dead "might have been terrorists". The US military says it is confident the two trucks hit had been used in an earlier attack on coalition forces.

The BBC's Bilal Sarwary in Kabul says the latest deaths will increase pressure on President Hamid Karzai.

On Thursday, parliament approved new Afghan intelligence chief Amrullah Salehi, amid fierce criticism that Afghan intelligence being passed to coalition forces was inaccurate.

Mr Karzai was swift to condemn the raid on Thursday. He said: "I am extremely saddened by this tragic incident and I want an immediate investigation to find out what exactly happened.

"I have repeatedly asked the coalition forces to take maximum caution while carrying out operations and I want that incidents like this must not be repeated."

The US military responded by saying it was investigating reports that police had been killed and would "work closely" with the Afghan authorities.

On Friday a senior Afghan official told the BBC that "a second investigation has been launched to find out who the people are who have been killed. "They might have been terrorists," added the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

US and Nato forces are fighting the Taleban and its allies in Afghanistan, mainly in the south and east. US military spokesman Lt Col Paul Fitzpatrick said that the attack in Paktika followed a clash with "extremists" in the Waza Khwa district, in which one Afghan soldier had been killed and a coalition vehicle damaged.

In a separate incident, four civilians were killed in Paktia province on Tuesday night, Afghan officials said. The deaths occurred after US-led coalition forces came under attack in a village in the Samkani district near the border with Pakistan, provincial police chief Gen Abdul Rahman told the BBC.

The coalition forces returned fire and bombed the village from the ground and the air, killing four people and injuring four others, Gen Rahman said.

Pakistan gives US forces location of Al-Qaeda plot suspect

Islamabad (AFP) - Pakistan has informed US-led coalition forces that an Al-Qaeda kingpin linked to an alleged plot to blow up airliners is based in eastern Afghanistan, senior security officials said.

The Pakistani officials said the unnamed Al-Qaeda member of Middle Eastern origin was based in Afghanistan's volatile eastern province of Kunar, which borders Pakistan's militant-infested northwestern tribal areas.

The information came from the interrogation of Rashid Rauf, a Briton whose arrest by Pakistani agents in early August allegedly led to the uncovering of the conspiracy to bomb US-bound planes, they said on Friday.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, did not identify the militant but said he was on the level below the terror network's chief Osama bin Laden and deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri. "His area of operations is in Kunar," one of the senior officials told AFP.

The official said their information about his whereabouts was based on information provided by Rauf and added that "coalition partners" had been informed.

When asked if the US-led forces stationed in Afghanistan were chasing the individual, the Pakistani official said: "Obviously we are working very closely, and cooperation among the coalition partners is excellent." He would not divulge if there had been any progress in the hunt.

Afghanistan, which has quarrelled with its "war on terror" ally for months over militancy along their rugged and porous border, said Pakistan was trying to shift the blame.

"As we've said in the past, we believe that information coming from the Pakistani intelligence services is diversionary," said Daud Muradiaan, a senior advisor in the Afghan foreign ministry.

"We in Afghanistan believe that Afghanistan is no longer a safe haven for Al-Qaeda. As a result of ours and the international community's efforts, Afghanistan dosn't remain a safehaven for Al-Qaeda."

But Pakistani officials say that Rauf used members of the Islamic militant group Jamaatul Furqan -- blamed for a 2002 attack on an Islamabad church -- as a conduit to communicate with the Al-Qaeda operative.

Islamabad confirmed last week the arrest of two Britons and five Pakistani "facilitators" but has identified only Rauf. Security sources told AFP Friday that Rauf's father Abdul had also been detained in recent days.

Rashid Rauf was communicating with the Kunar-based Al-Qaeda contact, the official said but did not expain wether the communication was through human messengers or by phone.

Al-Qaeda leaders including bin Laden are said by Pakistani officials to frequently use couriers to avoid sophisticated electronic surveillance by Pakistani and US security agencies.

Mountainous, forested Kunar borders Pakistani tribal areas where US and Afghan officials have said they believe bin Laden and his henchmen are most likely hiding.

Al-Qaeda was once hosted by Afghanistan's hardline Taliban regime, but its members fled across the rugged frontier after the invasion of Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

In January Al-Qaeda's chief of operations in Kunar, Abu Obaidah al-Masri, was said to have died in a US airstrike on a village in the Pakistani tribal zone of Bajaur, directly across the border from Kunar.

The missile attack targeted but missed Zawahiri, while four other militants including a close relative of the Egyptian were killed along with up to 18 civilians.

US-led coalition troops are still battling an ongoing insurgency by Taliban and Al-Qaeda-led militants across southern and eastern Afghanistan, including in Kunar.

A coalition soldider died in a clash in Kunar on Thursday, while eight "extremists" were killed there on Wednesday, they added.

'Taliban' Source Suggests Al-Qaeda Trained London Plot's Operatives on Both Sides of Afghan-Pakistani Border - RFE/RL 08/17/2006 By Amin Tarzi

An unidentified individual with connections to the neo-Taliban has claimed that Al-Qaeda trained as many as 10 youths -- seven of whom held British citizenship -- in camps on either side of the Afghan-Pakistani border, the Tokyo-based daily "Asahi Shimbun" reported on August 16.

The source said the youths in question received "VIP treatment" and were always accompanied by members of radical Pakistani Islamist parties. The trainees were in the area for about a year, and initially received indoctrination on the Pakistani side of the border before receiving training in combat and explosives on the Afghan side of the boundary.

Members of the group of "spoke very good English and spoke Urdu as well," "Asahi Shimbun" quoted the source as saying. "They were very well-behaved Islamic youth." Islamabad has alleged that the U.K. bomb plotters received training at Al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, while Kabul has rejected that claim, countering that terrorist camps are operating on Pakistani territory.

Air Terror Mastermind In Afghanistan?

Pakistan: Al Qaeda Operative Who Planned Attacks Hiding In Afghan Mountains - ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 18, 2006

(AP) Pakistan has told the U.S. military that an Arab al Qaeda operative who masterminded the London jetliner terror plot is hiding in mountainous terrain in northeastern Afghanistan, an intelligence official said Friday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the investigation, said the al Qaeda member is believed to be moving between Afghanistan's Nuristan and Kunar provinces, which border Pakistan.

The information was obtained by interrogators questioning a British suspect in the plot to blow up trans-Atlantic passenger planes, Rashid Rauf, who was arrested in eastern Pakistan and is regarded as a key figure in the foiled plot.

The information has already been shared with the British and coalition forces operating in Afghanistan, the official told The Associated Press.

The official did not provide the nationality of the wanted al Qaeda operative, but said he was a close aide to Egyptian-born al Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri. Detained terror suspects have told interrogators al-Zawahri likely approved the plan to blow up passenger planes leaving London for the United States, the official said.

Several hundred U.S. forces from the Fort Drum, N.Y.-based 10th Mountain Division are based in Kunar and Nuristan provinces hunting al Qaeda fighters and supporters of Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

Rauf was in touch with al-Zawahri through a courier from Afghanistan who would cross the porous, mountainous frontier separating Afghanistan and Pakistan to deliver messages, the official said.

The official said the Arab al Qaeda mastermind has developed links with several Pakistan-based militants, including Rauf. U.S. officials were not immediately available for comment.

Rauf, who officials claim once belonged to the outlawed Pakistani militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed, is among at least seven people detained in Pakistan in a roundup that helped foil the plot. Some 23 people have also been detained in Britain in connection with the plan, including Rauf's 22-year-old brother Tayib.

The Afghan-Pakistan border has long provided sanctuary for Afghan insurgents allied to Hekmatyar and the toppled Taliban regime, along with foreign fighters belonging to al Qaeda. Al-Zawahri and al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden are believed to be hiding in the region.

Afghan spy chief urges Pakistan action on enemies

KABUL (Reuters 08/17/2006 ) - Pakistan is the main source of Afghanistan's insecurity, the country's intelligence chief said on Thursday, adding that there could be no peace here if the war against Islamic militants was not shifted to include Pakistan.

In the strongest comments by an Afghan official yet, director-general of intelligence Amruallah Saleh said enemy training sites and organisational and financial resources all lay inside Pakistan.

"Pakistan has not given up its interference and aggression," Saleh told parliament's lower house, which is considering his renomination as intelligence chief.

Saleh conceded there were shortcomings in the Afghan government, but said the source of insecurity lay on the other side of the Durand Line dividing Afghanistan from Pakistan.

"As long as the war against terrorism is not extended openly and seriously from Afghanistan, we cannot restore full security in our country," he said.

"The enemy's organisation set-up, the enemy's financial resources, the enemy's training sites and all it has, lie on the other side of the Durand Line where our arms can't reach."

Fighting in Afghanistan is at its worst since a US-led coalition drove the hardline Islamist Taleban from power in 2001. Most of the increase has been in the south and east, the Taleban's heartland bordering Pakistan.

Both Islamabad and Kabul are major US allies in its war on terrorism, but they have exchanged harsh words in recent months over the campaign against the Taleban, once supported by Pakistan, undermining already long uneasy ties.

More than 1,800 people have been killed in the Taleban-led insurgency, attacks by drug barons and in operations involving foreign forces this year, mostly in the south and east. The toll includes more than 80 foreign soldiers.

Saleh said his organisation had given Pakistan intelligence showing Taleban and other militants operating in Pakistan. "But until today, none of the training camps has been closed," he said.

New Delhi makes the same charges against Pakistan over support for militants fighting Indian rule in Kashmir. Pakistan denies supporting any militants.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have had a troubled relationship since Britain partitioned the subcontinent into India and Pakistan in 1947. Much of the trouble is over border disputes.

Pakistan used to be the Taleban's main supporter, but switched to become a major US ally in the war on terrorism after the Al Qaeda network, which Taleban sheltered, carried out the Sept. 11 attacks against the United States.

Islamabad is battling militants, most of whom fled from Afghanistan to Pakistan, and says it does all it can to curb cross-border infiltration. It also says there are people in President Hamid Karzai's government who want to spoil relations with Pakistan.

Karzai, who has led Afghanistan since the Taleban's fall, has also in the past urged the world to extend the war against the militants beyond his country's borders, but has held back from specifically naming Pakistan.  

Soldier killed in Afghan fighting - BBC News - 18 August 2006

US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan say one of their soldiers has been killed in fighting in the restive eastern province of Kunar. Another soldier was wounded in the clash which broke out after insurgents attacked a patrol on Thursday.

Militants have recently stepped up their insurgency against government and foreign forces in southern and eastern areas of Afghanistan.

There are more than 20,000 coalition troops in Afghanistan. More than 18,500 of these soldiers belong to the US. The identity of the dead soldier and his wounded colleague have not yet been disclosed.

A coalition statement said the coalition troops fired on the insurgents after their patrol was attacked. It was unclear whether the insurgents had suffered any casualties. On Thursday, the coalition forces said they had killed eight insurgents in Kunar after the militants attacked their troops.

The Taleban and forces loyal to the anti-government warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar are active in Kunar, on Afghanistan's north-eastern border. A Nato peacekeeping force has been deployed to help extend government control across the country, but is increasingly occupied with fighting militants.

Canada, NATO quietly talking with Taliban

KANDAHAR (Canadian Press 08/17/2006 By Terry Pedwell )- High-stakes talks involving Canadian and other NATO officials were underway Thursday that could see insurgents put down their weapons in a key Taliban stronghold in southern Afghanistan.

The clandestine negotiations, led by Afghan authorities but involving NATO intermediaries, were being held as hundreds of Taliban fighters amassed within two kilometres of a Canadian outpost west of Kandahar, preparing for battle.

The unprecedented talks are so sensitive that, officially, NATO insisted it was not in direct contact with Taliban leaders. "ISAF hasn't been approached by any faction of the Taliban," said Canadian Forces Maj. Scott Lundy, a NATO spokesman. "At this point, no official involvement."

However, intermediaries quietly got involved after Taliban leaders insisted on talks with NATO's International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, or other international facilitators, rather than with the Afghan government, The Canadian Press has learned.

"In fact, they are scared of the government," an Afghan official said of the Taliban leadership, on condition of anonymity. "Their requirements are to talk with (ISAF) or with the (UN). ... They trust these two organizations more than anyone else."

Lundy acknowledged NATO was at least aware that talks were going on. "There is a dialogue underway already with some Taliban in Kandahar province," he said.

Sources said as many as 1,500 Taliban fighters had converged by Thursday in three villages in Panjwaii, where Canadian soldiers have faced their biggest battles since taking a lead role in southern Kandahar province in February.

NATO officials said they believed the numbers to be much smaller, although they would not provide an estimate. While many of the Taliban had been recruited locally, they were being supported by insurgents mainly from Pakistan and also Saudi Arabia, sources said.

Four Canadian soldiers were killed and 10 others injured in Panjwaii on Aug. 3 during heavy fighting with Taliban forces. "The (Panjwaii) area is on high security alert," said an Afghan Interior Ministry official who didn't want to be identified.

Most civilians had already been evacuated from the villages of Pashmul and Zangawat, while local residents in Sheperwaan were told to leave their village immediately, said the official.

Since the death last week of Panjwaii's last Taliban leader, Mulla Ibrahim, the insurgents have broken into three factions, the sources said. Each of the groups — Usama, Taliban and Hikmat Yaar — has publicly proclaimed they will never reconcile with the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Privately, however, Taliban sources said they are open to overtures from the government through ISAF. ISAF requested their identities be withheld for fear that they could be killed by hardliners for even suggesting reconciliation was possible.

Asked about the talks Thursday, an Afghan government official expressed pessimism about their outcome. "Things are not going well," he said through a translator. "They are not ready to talk. They say they will never reconcile."

Southern Afghanistan has seen a surge in violence over the past few months, when nearly 900 people have been killed — most of them insurgents.

Canada has lost seven soldiers in the past three weeks alone, through fighting, bombing attacks and accidents. In all, 26 Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have been killed in Afghanistan since Canada deployed troops to the country in early 2002.

There are about 2,200 Canadian troops involved in military operations in Afghanistan under the NATO umbrella. In separate, unrelated incidents Thursday, two attacks were carried out in southern Afghanistan.

The first saw an American soldier injured when a suicide bomber attacked a U.S. military convoy about 15 kilometres south of Kandahar. Another suicide bomber struck a NATO patrol in Uruzgan province, north of Kandahar, killing one civilian and wounding six others. No NATO troops were hurt.

Commander Says NATO Passing Test in Afghanistan - By Al Pessin Washington
17 August 2006 - VOA

The commander of NATO forces worldwide says he is not surprised by the level of violence in southern Afghanistan, where his troops have been fighting insurgents for months and took responsibility for security at the end of July. During a news conference at the Pentagon, U.S. Marine General James Jones predicted a gradual improvement in the security situation in the region in the coming months.  

General Jones says Taleban insurgents, drug-traffickers and criminal gangs are testing NATO, as he expected they would.

"This is a strategic moment in the southern part of Afghanistan. It's a test of wills. Certainly the opposition is testing NATO to see if we in fact do have the will and the capability to stand and fight. And I think the evidence is so far that the answer is overwhelmingly yes," he said.

General Jones said in March that he did not believe insurgents in Afghanistan had the ability to "re-start an insurgency of any size and major scope." Since then, as warm weather returned to Afghanistan, there has been a significant increase in attacks by insurgents and criminals. In addition, NATO troops have tried to take the fight to the insurgents, challenging them in their strongholds.

But General Jones says he did expect some increase in violence, and he predicts that the situation will improve in the coming months.

"I believe that with the forces that we now have currently based in that particular section of Afghanistan that we will soon see an area that is going to gradually, over the next several months, become a little bit more stable," he added.

And the general says he does not believe NATO will have to send any more troops to Afghanistan to get the situation under control.

"We believe that the totals that we currently have planned are adequate and should be sufficient," said General James. "I don't see the need of asking nations for more contributions at this time."

General Jones says NATO has a reserve force ready to go to Afghanistan in case more troops are needed.

The NATO commander also said the international community and the Afghan government need to do a better job of fighting corruption and delivering services to the Afghan people. Without that, he says, military victories will not by themselves bring stability to the country.

Foreign fighters swell Taleban's ranks

By Michael Evans – The Times - Pakistan has been accused of failing to prevent men and munitions slipping across its border

HIGHLY trained foreign fighters are pouring back into Afghanistan across the Pakistani border to take on British and other Nato troops, military sources have told The Times.

Intelligence suggests that fighters from Syria, Egypt and Yemen have joined the Taleban in attacking the troops from the Nato International Security Assistance Force.

The recent assaults by the Taleban on British outposts in the north of Helmand province in Sangin, Musa Qala, Nowzad and Kajaki, were all believed to have been assisted by foreign fighters.

The sources said that they had their own casualty-evacuation system which made it difficult to keep tabs on the scale of their involvement.

However, documentary evidence from some of the bodies examined immediately after an attack had provided proof that the foreigners were a mixture of nationalities. One source said: “We know they are coming from Egypt, Syria and the Yemen and there may well be foreign fighters from other countries who are once again taking up the Taleban cause.”

The involvement of foreign terrorists is a sensitive issue because of the implication that Pakistan is failing to stop the flow of groups affiliated to al-Qaeda from crossing into Afghanistan. Officially, the Taleban and foreign fighters are all lumped together as “anti-coalition militia” or ACMs.

President Musharraf has put large numbers of troops on the Pakistan border, but intelligence shows that arms and fighters are being transited across the mountain routes into Afghanistan with impunity. “Much more pressure needs to be put on Musharraf to do more at the border,” one senior military source said.

There is also a constant flow of newly-trained Taleban fighters coming across the border after receiving combat instruction at the camps in Quetta in Pakistan. “We don’t have enough troops on the Afghan side of the border to stop and search all vehicles, and every day the jingly trucks [large colourful trucks with chains hanging down at the front] are driving across the border, probably filled with weapons,” the sources said.

The Taleban and foreign fighters are equipped with a range of weapons, including 107mm Chinese rockets, anti-aircraft guns, portable surface-to-air missiles, heavy machineguns and rocket-propelled grenades; and there is evidence of a recoiless rifle, like an anti-tank weapon, which can blow a hole in a wall from a mile away.

“It’s not accurate from that distance, but we’ve seen it being used although we don’t know precisely what weapon it is,” one military source said.

The concerns about foreign fighters were revealed as the fighting in Helmand province — where 4,000 British troops are based — and in other Taleban-dominated areas, has diminished over the past week.

Lieutenant-Colonel David Hammond, standing in as British forces commander, said that there were still sporadic attacks. “The enemy is still there but so are we,” he said.

Military sources said that the Taleban had taken so many casualties in the fighting that they needed to regroup and reconsider their tactics.

However, Colonel Muhiadeen, commander of the Helmand-based 3rd Brigade of the Afghan National Army which will be a 3,000-man force by the end of the year, said: “If it wasn’t for Pakistan, the Taleban wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

Boomer's family starts Afghan fund – CKNW 08/18/2006

COQUITLAM - The family of the Comox-based medic killed in Aghanistan one week ago has set up a fund in honour of Corporal Andrew James Eykelenboom.

Called Boomer's Legacy, the fund will benefit the women and children of Afghanistan. Eykelenboom's family says the 23 year old's mission in life was to help people as part of a genuine committment to others. Funeral services will be held this Saturday at the Comox Pentecostal Church.

Dist police chief among six killed in Farah

KABUL ( Pajhwok 08/17/2006) - A district police chief and five policemen were shot dead by suspected Taliban militants in the western Farah province on Tuesday.

The newly-appointed police chief of Gulistan district Nisar Ahmad was on way to Farah City, capital of the province have the same name, when his car was ambushed by a group of Taliban.

The officer and five constables died on the spot while four other policemen suffered injuries, said press office of the Interior Ministry in Kabul. The injured cops were rushed to hospital and their condition is stated to be out of danger.

Claiming responsibility for the ambush, purported Taliban spokesman Qari Yousaf Ahmadi said eight cops had been killed in the attack. Situated in the comparatively peaceful western zone of the country, Farah province is scene to scattered incidents of Taliban-related violence over the past two months. The militants had attacked headquarters of the Bakwa district of the same province on July 9 and claimed capturing the offices. But officials said their attack was repulsed by the police.

Two workers of a road construction company sustained injuries when they were attacked in the neighbouring Herat province. Sayed Abdul Wahab Qitali, chief of the Afghan Faizi Road Construction Company, told Pajhwok Afghan News their two employees were attacked in the Aab-i-Khurma area on Herat - Farah Highway.

Qitali said the workers were surveying the road for construction. The company is also responsible for security of the people working on the highway. Since their getting contract of the road construction, 22 security guards had been killed in attacks by 'enemies', a euphemism for Taliban, recalled the official.

Afghanistan for strategic ties with India - United News of India

K abul, August 17, 2006 - Emphasising that Kabul's relationship with New Delhi was not based on choice but a historical fact, Afghanistan Foreign Minister Rangin Dadfar Spanta said his country would like a strategic partnership with India.

Dr Spanta spoke of the commonalities between the two countries, the values the country shares with India and drew attention to his concerns about the terrorism threats facing his country.

Spanta, who took over as the Foreign Minister in April this year replaced the long standing Foreign Minister Dr Abdullah Abdullah. Dr Spanta is close to President Hamid Karzai, having earlier served as his senior adviser on international affairs.

His emphasis on close ties with India underlines Afghanistan's close relationship with India, which cuts across political, regional and ethnic differences.

"The relationship with India has a very substantial relevance for Afghanistan's foreign policy. I would like a strategic partnership with India. India is a stable democracy and Afghanistan is a young democracy. We have common values and goals," Dr Spanta said.

Speaking of the progress his country has made since 2001, he said considerable development had been made in the areas of democratisation, education and the establishment of a free and independent media.

Despite the major achievements, however, Afghanistan continued to face some major challenges from terrorism, narcotics, corruption and a weak state.

"After three decades of destruction Afghanistan continues to face partial destruction today because of interference behind our borders, terrorist activities, which sabotage our process of reconstruction and economic and social development," he said.

Spanta refused to name any specific country but made his allusion very clear by stating that one of the major problems facing Afghanistan was "the expansionist foreign policy of some countries who try to use terrorism as an instrument of foreign policy. We Afghans are not part of the problem but part of the solution."

He said, underlining the fact that the country had come a long way since the Taliban was ousted when Afghanistan was seen as a sanctuary for terrorism and terrorist groups.

Afghanistan's foreign policy was based on non-interference, equal partnership and peaceful coexistence.

The problem in the war against terrorism was that sources of terrorism were not identified and without the elimination of the sources of terrorism it was not possible to succeed against terrorism.

CIA worker guilty of Afghan abuse - BBC News, 17 August 2006

A former CIA contractor has been found guilty of assaulting an Afghan prisoner, Abdul Wali, who later died. David Passaro, 40, is the first US civilian to be charged with abusing a prisoner since the Iraq and Afghanistan wars began.

He was convicted of three counts of simple assault and one count of assault resulting in serious bodily injury, but was not charged over Mr Wali's death. Passaro faces up to 11-and-a-half years in jail.

He was found guilty in federal court in North Carolina of beating Mr Wali with a metal torch during questioning about rocket attacks on a US military base in June 2003.

Prosecutors said Passaro beat the prisoner so severely that he begged to be shot to end his pain. He died two days after the interrogation.

Passaro is said to have worked at the US military base in the north of Afghanistan, which was subject to frequent rocket attacks. Mr Wali was suspected of being involved in the attacks.

Another trial to determine the length of Passaro's sentence is expected in the coming weeks.

AFGHANISTAN: Hepatitis B kills more than 11,000 people annually

[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations] KABUL, 17 August (IRIN) - Afghan Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) officials estimate hepatitis B kills more than 11,000 people annually, with 7 percent of the country's population already infected. Sayed Bibi's family has been devastated by hepatitis B. "I have been suffering from this illness for the past three years and the same illness killed my mother. Now my elder son is also suffering from this sickness," Sayed, a mother-of-eight, said from her bed in the crowded room she shares with other patients at Kabul's only infectious disease treatment facility.

"At first I was only feeling mild weakness and abdominal pain but it slowly worsened and now my health is deteriorating by the day," Sayed said. "The disease [hepatitis B] has become a major health problem infecting an estimated 100,000 people annually in Afghanistan and resulting in considerable human loss," Abdullah Fahim, a MoPH spokesman, said. Hepatitis B is a viral liver disease that may be acute or chronic and can be life-threatening. Symptoms include fever, malaise, fatigue, jaundice, abdominal tenderness and elevated liver enzymes.

Sexual contact, shared needles or contaminated blood products could transmit the virus, experts said. The disease was spreading rapidly in Afghan communities and there were no proper measures in place to cope with the growing number of patients, health officials said. "The number of patients [with hepatitis B] referring here is increasing every day," Dr Murrad Mamozai, deputy director of the 200-bed Antoni infectious disease hospital in Kabul, the Afghan capital, said. Mamozai said nine of the 460 patients admitted to the facility with hepatitis during 2004 and 21 of the 540 patients admitted during 2005 had died.

Ministry officials said it had launched a vaccination drive targeting children aged under two, but conceded that due to a lack of funds it could not reach all those in need. "It is the first time in the history of the country that we are launching a hepatitis B vaccination drive where some 930,000 children will be targeted until the end of 2006," Fahim said.

Health officials said that low levels of awareness, millions of refugees returning from neighbouring countries and multiple uses of contaminated needles, particularly among drug abusers, were the main causes of the disease. "Lots of efforts are needed to raise the level of understanding and awareness among the communities regarding this deadly disease," Fahim said.

Kabul surfs the 3G internet - ComputerWeekly.com (UK) by Antony Savvas
Thursday 17 August 2006

There may not be peace in Afghanistan, but its capital at least is about to get 3G mobile coverage. Siemens Communications Group has been awarded a contract by New York-based Telephone Systems International (TSI) to set up a W-CDMA-based 3G network in Kabul.

The roll-out is on behalf of the Afghan Wireless Communication Company (AWCC), the mobile operator which is 80% owned by TSI. The Afghan government has a 20% minority share in the company.

In addition to 3G technology, Siemens will also supply 2G equipment to the mobile operator. Around 1.5 million people are said to use mobile telephony in Afghanistan, a market penetration of about 4%.

“Using the new wireless technology we will be able to connect more people to the communications network in Afghanistan quickly and easily,” said Dan Florentine, chief financial officer of TSI.

In addition to voice and mobile internet communications, TSI wants to deliver mobile TV to Afghanis, many of whom don’t even own their own traditional TV.

Pakistan’s Leader Faces Increasing Political Challenges

By SOMINI SENGUPTA The New York Times Published: August 18, 2006

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 14 — Nearly five years after Sept. 11 turned Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, into one of Washington’s most indispensable allies, he finds himself squeezed from many directions, leading to one of the most serious political binds of his nearly seven-year tenure.

His two main political foes, who undermined each other for years, are linking arms in an effort to restore civilian rule. Some erstwhile allies on the religious right, emboldened by spreading rage against General Musharraf’s pro-American stance, have stepped up their criticism.

Corruption scandals have dogged some of his partners, including the prime minister, Shaukat Aziz, who faces a no-confidence motion in Parliament next week. Inflation has increased. An ethnic insurgency in Baluchistan refuses to subside; Pakistan attributes it to unfriendly neighbors.

No one doubts that the president, who is also the army chief of staff, remains the most powerful man in Pakistan and enjoys the backing of the United States. “He still makes the political weather,” as one Western diplomat put it. But there are signs of weakness.

Last month a letter signed by a group of retired generals and government officials, including those who once worked with him, called for “the military’s disengagement from political power,” urging General Musharraf to shed his military uniform if he was to remain president.

In Washington there are also simmering concerns. A series of planned terrorist attacks with links to Pakistan as well as a sharp rise in crossborder Taliban attacks in Afghanistan have prompted renewed debate within the Defense Department about Pakistan, according to two people involved who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

They said that in particular, the sharply rising American casualty rate in Afghanistan had increased skepticism among some American military officers about the Pakistani intelligence service’s efforts to rein in the Taliban.

“There is an increasing view in the United States that Pakistan isn’t very helpful,” said one researcher involved in the debate, referring to frustration among some officers. “There are people who are really thinking twice about this relationship with Pakistan.”

At home, General Musharraf has been criticized for having little to show for his overtures toward India. Likewise, his post-Sept. 11 assault on suspected militants taking shelter in the tribal areas along the Afghan border, done at the behest of the Bush administration, has resulted in the capture of a number of leaders of Al Qaeda but also the deaths of hundreds of Pakistani troops and a mounting rage in the tribal areas.

At the same time, Afghanistan and India have been nipping at the general’s heels for not doing enough to crack down on militants who they say export violence to their respective countries. Religious radical groups continue to operate here, including those that have links with banned terrorist outfits.

They continue to be implicated in investigations of terrorism suspects half a world away, most recently the group Jamaat ud Dawa in the London airplane bombing plot. Even General Musharraf’s promise to reform radical madrasas, as Islamic religious schools are called, has yet to be fulfilled.

“There are new domestic eruptions, and he hasn’t yet drenched the fires on the foreign policy front,” said Najam Sethi, editor of The Daily Times in Lahore.

A Western diplomat here in Pakistan said, “Musharraf is in a weaker position than he has been in the past, no doubt about it.” The diplomat, who could not be identified by name because he was not authorized to comment publicly on the politics of this country, added, “There are constraints on him.”

But in Washington the official view remains strongly supportive. Richard A. Boucher, the assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, credited General Musharraf with having kept his promise to “break” with the Taliban and their Qaeda allies.

Although the Taliban have reorganized inside Pakistan, Mr. Boucher said, General Musharraf’s government is trying to gain control of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

“They’ve closed some camps; they’ve outlawed some groups,” he said in an interview. “You have to understand how deeply rooted extremism is in Pakistan.” Of the general’s cooperation with Washington, he added: “I think we’ve seen plenty. We certainly work with Musharraf.”

The coming months pose a big question mark. With elections expected before the end of next year, there is a concern among friends and critics alike: Will domestic politics further compromise his ability to drive through promised reforms?

For the sake of staying in power, political observers say, he must broaden his support. If he broadens it in favor of the right, his ability to crack down on religious extremists will be further compromised.

If he broadens in favor of the political left, he will be more able to carry out his promise to crack down on extremism, but will then have to embrace a political nemesis: Benazir Bhutto, leader of the Pakistan People’s Party, who lives in exile, having been convicted of corruption. She has signed a pact with Nawaz Sharif, the other main opposition party leader, also in exile, and his Pakistan Muslim League.

“He is getting increasingly isolated and cornered,” Lt. Gen. Talat Masood, now retired from the army and one of the signers of the letter, said of General Musharraf. “There is a genuine urge and demand in the country to revert to democracy and give a fair deal to all the parties.”

For his part, the president presented a lengthy defense of his record in a speech to the nation in late July — one that also revealed the breadth of his troubles. Addressing inflation, he announced that government shops would sell basic staples to the poor at controlled prices.

He said the domestic budget had more than doubled during his nearly seven-year tenure, he outlined a development plan for restive Baluchistan, and he rattled off how many tractors and motorcycles were being produced in the country. The economy has grown at an annual clip of 7 percent over the last three years.

He criticized India and Afghanistan for suggesting that his efforts to tackle terrorist groups were less than robust. And on the subject of religious radicals, he urged mosques to refrain from using loudspeakers, demanded that “hate material” not be circulated and urged government officials to “look at the problem and take it seriously.”

It was remarkably similar to, though far more tepid than, wish lists he has presented before.

General Musharraf’s promise of madrasa reform fell under renewed scrutiny in the aftermath of the London subway and bus bombings in July 2005. At the time, he promised to expel foreigners studying in Pakistani madrasas and he ordered his government to register all of the madrasas by the end of last year.

Resistance was swift, especially from the coalition of Islamic religious parties. The government has not persuaded all madrasas to register. It has allowed foreign students to remain, so long as they have permission from their home governments. Enforcement is daunting.

Even his fiercest critics acknowledge that some of his troubles are the doings of others. For instance, they say, India’s recalcitrance at his Kashmir proposals — principally his offer to soften the so-called Line of Control that divides the territory between the countries — has weakened his credibility at home.

Except for the release of prisoners and opening of transportation links, they argue, nearly every piece of the India-Pakistan peace agenda remains unresolved, from smaller territorial issues to the hardest nut of all: the fate of Kashmir.

“He has tried, he has failed, and the Indians share responsibility for that,” said one of the general’s most trenchant opposition critics, Aitzaz Ahsan of Ms. Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party.

Likewise, there are the tribal areas. No civilian government, Mr. Ahsan conceded, could have sent hundreds of Pakistani troops to face the Taliban — and die — in the hilly redoubts in the north, as General Musharraf did at American urging.

But his policy has helped to push the tribal regions further beyond the writ of the government and has not quieted the Taliban and their allies. The Pakistani government insists that it is trying its best to root out Taliban and that it is unfairly blamed for Afghanistan’s failure to expel them from inside its own borders.

There is another opinion: that five years after Sept. 11 and Washington’s weariness in Afghanistan, Pakistan has no interest in completely quelling the Taliban. It would not be in General Musharraf’s interest, the argument goes, to forever lose all political influence over Kabul.

“The Pakistanis saw their concessions as temporary,” argued Stephen P. Cohen, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “They have permanent interests in Afghanistan and are waiting for the U.S. to depart. Now that we are on our way out of Kabul, I can expect Islamabad to try to increase its support for its clients in Afghanistan.”

David Rohde contributed reporting from New York for this article.

[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.]