In this bulletin:

• Karzai, International Delegation Meet Local Leaders from South
• INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP - NEW REPORT - Pakistsan’s Tribal Areas: Stop Appeasing the Militants
• Pakistan describes Karzai's accusations as "emotional"
• Pakistan denies Jirga differences with Afghanistan
• Six dead in Taleban suicide blast
• 'Terrorists' die in Afghanistan
• HRW Says War Criminals Control Government Posts
• Re-opening the door to the Taliban is inviting disaster
• AFGHANISTAN RISKS SLIDING BACK INTO CONFLICT WITHOUT SUSTAINED
  INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT, HEAD OF VISITING MISSION WARNS IN BRIEFING TO  SECURITY COUNCIL
• British minister blasts Dion on Afghanistan
• Duceppe threatens to topple government over Afghan mission
• Canadian ambassador says Afghanistan peace plan is a 'key step'
• NDP blasts Harper's association with warlord
• How Pakistan makes life easier for the Taliban
• Outsourcing the Afghan problem
• We can still win - in Afghanistan
• Afghan Ladies' Driving School

Karzai, International Delegation Meet Local Leaders from South

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty - December 12, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai is in Kandahar today, along with a large delegation of Afghan and international officials, for security talk with tribal elders and religious leaders from Afghanistan's volatile south.

The local leaders at the security conference are from the provinces of Zabol, Oruzgan, Kandahar, and Helmand -- areas where Afghan and foreign troops have seen a resurgence of Taliban violence during the past year.

Karzai's delegation includes his defense and interior ministers as well as members of parliament. The top NATO and UN officials in Afghanistan also are attending, along with ambassadors from the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, and Britain.

Karzai was scheduled to visit Helmand province after the security conference in Kandahar. (RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan)

INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP - NEW REPORT - Pakistsan’s Tribal Areas: Stop Appeasing the Militants

Islamabad/Brussels, 11 December 2006 : The Musharraf government’s appeasement of Taliban sympathisers has resulted in a base in Pakistan’s tribal areas that militants are using to stoke instability both at home and in neighbouring Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s Tribal Areas: Appeasing the Militants,* the latest report from the International Crisis Group, examines interlinked issues of governance, militancy and extremism in the Pashtun-majority Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). It identifies the challenges the government faces in wresting control of these areas and the stakes for the U.S. and other Western countries.

“Over the past five years, the Musharraf government has tried first brute force, then appeasement. Both have failed”, says Samina Ahmed, Crisis Group’s South Asia Project Director. “Islamabad’s tactics have only emboldened the pro-Taliban militants”.

Since 2001, Taliban and other foreign militants have found shelter in FATA, using it to regroup, reorganise and rearm. Afghanistan is experiencing the most deadly insurgent violence in five years, much of it staged and launched from the border regions. The Musharraf government’s failure to extend its control over and provide good governance to its citizens in FATA has enabled this militancy to flourish.

The government, which made deals with the pro-Taliban groups in April 2004 in South Waziristan and on 5 September 2006 in North Waziristan, has released militants, returned their weapons and agreed to let foreign terrorists stay on a promise to give up violence. This has given pro-Taliban elements license to recruit and arm, resulting in a serious increase in cross-border attacks against U.S., NATO and Afghan forces.

President Musharraf has been reluctant to take more consequential action in the tribal belt because his government depends upon support from radical religious groups and parties which sympathise with the militants. However, it needs to institute broad political and economic measures to curb extremism, beginning by integrating FATA into the Northwest Frontier Province, developing its natural resources and spurring agriculture. It should disarm militants, shut down their training camps, and prosecute those responsible for killing civilians and officials, while opening FATA to the media and human rights monitors.

The U.S. and the EU should make continued economic and diplomatic support to Musharraf contingent not only on such actions but also upon his allowing free, democratic elections in 2007. “The U.S. and Europe need to realise that democratic, civilian government, not military rule, is their best and natural ally against extremism and terrorism”, says Robert Templer, Crisis Group’s Asia Director.

“These border areas are still run under colonial-era laws that make their people second-class citizens in Pakistan. Unless the government institutes real democratic change, extremism and terrorism will quickly overtake the entire region”, says Ahmed.

Pakistan describes Karzai's accusations as "emotional"

DPA 12/11/2006 - ISLAMABAD - Pakistan on Monday dismissed accusations by Afghan President Hamid Karzai that "infiltrators from Pakistan and ISAF were killing Afghan civilians as "emotional".

Speaking to reporters in Islamabad, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tasneen Aslam said, "I'm no psychologist to say why Mr Karzai said so. It is an emotional statement."

Her remarks came after Karzai was reduced to tears Sunday during a speech in Kabul when he spoke of civilians being killed by terrorists from neighbouring Pakistan or NATO and US-led coalition forces during anti-terrorism operations.

She added, "We are also a victim of terrorism. Our views are very clear. We want to ameliorate the sufferings of people in Afghanistan," she said in reference to Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri's talks with Afghan leaders in Kabul last week.

Kasuri had made "comprehensive proposals" on convening the traditional jirga or consultative council of tribes living on either side of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border to stem the movement of Taliban insurgents, she said.

Aslam said an International Crisis Group report alleging that the Taliban enjoyed a safe haven in Pakistan's tribal belt was "absolutely baseless".

Reports issued by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the UN Security Council's mission to Afghanistan and ISAF had blamed the strife in Afghanistan on the domestic situation, she said.

Pakistan denies Jirga differences with Afghanistan

Islamabad, Dec 11, IRNA - Pakistan said on Monday that it has no differences with neighbouring Afghanistan on the formation of proposed Jirga or council of elders, that will discuss ways to end violence in Afghanistan.

The Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri in his last week visit to Kabul gave comprehensive proposals regarding formation of Jirga, Foreign Office Spokesperson Ms. Tasneem Aslam said in her weekly briefing in Islamabad.

Pakistan understands that the Afghan side will be handing over its proposals today to our Ambassador in Kabul.

To a question regarding the visit of the Foreign Minister to Afghanistan, Ms. Tasneem Aslam said he has discussed whole gamete of bilateral relations with his Afghan counterpart including overall relations, prisoners exchange, education scholarships and trade and other aspects of our ties.

She said it was in the context of quarterly meetings agreed between the two Foreign Ministers and the next meeting will be held in the next quarter in Islamabad.

She said that the Foreign Minister held detailed, candid and open discussions on all issues and talked about perceptions on both sides on various issues besides ways and means to bring down violence.

Regarding President Hamid Karzai's speech on Afghan television that he can not stop infiltration from Pakistan, the spokesperson said terrorism is a problem in the region and due to Afghan problem Pakistan has also been suffering from this phenomenon since long time.

She said, We are also victim of terrorism and facing it with bravery and courage having a determination to curb this menace.

Answering another question she described a report issued by international Crisis Group regarding cross border violations, the spokesperson drew the attention on a report issued by the

International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan which says that cross border violation on Pak-Afghan border has drastically been down during the last two months.

U.S-INDIA DEAL: About India-US nuclear deal, Ms. Tasneem Aslam said Pakistan's position on the accessibility to nuclear technology is very clear as Islamabad has genuine energy requirements and Pakistan should have access to nuclear technology to meet its needs.

She said that Egyptian Foreign Minister will also visit Islamabad next week and he will be discussing almost all these issues with Pakistani Foreign Minister.

Six dead in Taleban suicide blast

BBC News / Tuesday, 12 December 2006

Six people including four security personnel have been killed in a suicide blast in the office of the governor of the Afghan province of Helmand.

The governor was thought to be in the building but escaped injury. The Taleban say that they carried out the lunch-time attack and were targeting the governor. Eight other security personnel were also injured.

The Taleban have named the bomber and say he was from Helmand province, which has seen increased violence this year.

The BBC's Alastair Leithead in Afghanistan says that the suicide bomber got into the building in the provincial capital, Lashkar Gah, before detonating explosives strapped to his body.

Our correspondent says the governor has been the target of numerous earlier assassination attempts. In October, an attempt on his life by a suicide bomber resulted in the death of a British Royal Marine in Lashkar Gah.

The governor had recently been told he was going to be sacked, although the decision had not been formally announced.

Britain's Sunday Times newspaper said that the decision to remove him came from US pressure, because of his key role in holding truce talks with the Taleban in Musa Qala district.

His policy was publicly criticised by the Americans as "giving in" to the militants. The majority of British troops are based in Helmand province, where they are involved in heavy fighting with the Taleban.

'Terrorists' die in Afghanistan

BBC News / Tuesday, 12 December 2006

Four suspected terrorists have been killed during a raid by Afghan and US-led troops in eastern Afghanistan, coalition forces said. A 13-year-old girl was also killed in the raid in Khost province early on Tuesday, a coalition statement said.

However, another report says the dead men had opened fire because they thought the troops were thieves breaking into the house. Violence in Afghanistan is at its worst since the fall of the Taleban in 2001. An eight-year-old girl was also wounded during the raid, the coalition said.

The US-led coalition statement described the dead men as "suspected terrorists" who refused to comply with "verbal warnings" to surrender and fired upon the troops.

The incident happened when the security forces raided a house at Darnami village and requested the people to surrender peacefully, the statement said.

Security forces had "credible information" that the place was a refuge for "terrorist facilitators who posed a serious threat to peace and stability in Afghanistan," coalition spokesman Col Thomas Collins said.

Some 4,000 people are believed to have died this year alone in the Taleban-led insurgency - about a quarter of them civilians.

Suicide attacks and roadside bombings, particularly in the south and east, are an almost daily occurrence.

HRW Says War Criminals Control Government Posts

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

December 12, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Human Rights Watch today urged Afghan President Hamid Karzai to establish a special court to try cases against warlords who are accused of carrying out war crimes in the past 25 years.

Brad Adams, the Asia division director of Human Rights Watch, told RFE/RL today that the Afghan government and its international backers since 2001 have "pursued a counter-productive policy" of relying on war criminals, human rights abusers, and drug- traffickers, instead of prosecuting them.

"We've done research and several highly placed members of the current Afghan government and legislature have been implicated in war crimes during the fighting in Kabul in the early 1990s. Prominent among the people who were responsible for this were [parliamentarians Abdul Rabb al Rasul] Sayyaf, [Muhammad Qasim] Fahim, [Burhanuddin] Rabbani, [Minister of Energy] Ismail Khan, [Army Chief of Staff Abdul Rashid] Dostum, and [current Vice President Karim] Khalili. All of them are in positions of authority now,” Adams says. “And all of them are facing allegations of [continuing to carry out] human rights abuses now in the present. Other people that we've identified as possible war criminals are Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, hiding out somewhere in southeastern Afghanistan, and Taliban leaders such as Mullah Omar, Mullah Daudullah, and Jalaluddin Haqqani."

Adams says research by Human Rights Watch shows that Afghans are losing confidence in their central government and its backers because alleged war criminals are in positions of authority.

Re-opening the door to the Taliban is inviting disaster

Amin Saikal - Sydney Morning Herald December 12, 2006 - As security worsens in Afghanistan, especially in the south and south-east on the border with Pakistan, there is a growing view in NATO circles and the Government of Hamid Karzai that the time has come for some power-sharing with core Taliban figures. This view is also advanced by the majority leader in the US Senate, Bill Frist, and the Pakistani President, Pervez Musharraf. However, while superficially appealing, such a move could plunge Afghanistan into a wider conflict: it would prompt anti-Taliban forces to rearm to battle their extremist foe and its supporters.

The idea of reconciliation with the Taliban is not new. Karzai and the former US presidential envoy and ambassador to Afghanistan, the Afghan-born Zalmay Khalilzad, who share the Taliban's ethnic Pashtun background, floated it as early as 2003. The following year they offered amnesty to what they called "moderate Taliban" and invited them to join the political process. Although only a few Taliban took up the offer, it alarmed most non-Pashtun Afghans, who had suffered extensively under the Taliban's discriminatory, medievalist rule from 1996 to 2001. This obliged Karzai and many of his Pashtun advisers to go slow on the idea.

However, as the Taliban have fought back, largely because they were left to regroup and rearm as US forces focused on hunting Osama bin Laden as well as on fighting in Iraq, the picture has changed. The Karzai leadership and many of its international backers, especially the US and Britain, which have the largest troop deployments in Afghanistan and have sustained heavy casualties over the past six months, want to take the sting out of the Taliban's fighting capacity. They have begun obliquely to promote the idea of bringing even core Taliban figures on board.

As a first step, Karzai has appointed a number of supporters of the former Islamic resistance leader and now ally of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, to important positions in the Presidential Palace. In the past week he has also held a joint jirga (traditional assembly) of Afghan and Pakistani Pashtun tribes, which remain supportive of the Taliban along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. The idea is to appease core Taliban leaders. This is similar to what the US and Britain have done in Iraq in returning to government some of the Baathist supporters of Saddam Hussein.

If the Karzai Government enters a coalition with the Taliban, it will not only threaten the secure, stable and democratic Afghanistan promised by the US and its Afghan and non-Afghan allies, but also runs the risk of igniting a savage ethnic conflict. Afghanistan is a heterogeneous state, truly a nation of minorities. While the Pashtuns form the largest ethnic cluster, with extensive cross-border ties with Pakistan, the majority of the Afghan population is made up of non-Pashtun ethnic groups, which have cross-border ties with other neighbours of Afghanistan: Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

Historically, the Pashtuns, who are themselves divided into two main rival tribal confederations and many tribes and subtribes, imposed their political supremacy over other groups. The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s and the US-backed Afghan Islamic resistance to it helped to break this historical pattern. When Pashtun chauvinism, combined with extreme Sunni Islamism, peaked again under the Pakistan-backed Taliban, subjecting not only women but also most non-Pashtun Afghans to repressive policies, it was the latter who formed the United Front (the so-called Northern Alliance) and fought the Taliban and their al-Qaeda and Pakistani allies.

The United Front was led by Ahmad Shah Massoud, a leading resistance fighter during the Soviet occupation who was assassinated by al-Qaeda agents two days before the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the US.

After the toppling of the Taliban the United Front was dissolved and many of its followers agreed to disarm. A Taliban return to government would give non-Pashtun groups every reason to rearm. They would receive help from Afghanistan's northern and western neighbours, as well as Russia and India, which would view a Pashtun-led government that included core Taliban figures as detrimental to their interests. The outcome could be more bloody ethnic conflict, with forces of the US and its allies caught between various warring factions. No one should underestimate the wider regional implications of such a scenario.

Amin Saikal is a professor of political science and director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Australian National University.

AFGHANISTAN RISKS SLIDING BACK INTO CONFLICT WITHOUT SUSTAINED
  INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT, HEAD OF VISITING MISSION WARNS IN BRIEFING TO
                            SECURITY COUNCIL

UN news- Few could deny that Afghanistan was at a crossroads and facing a host of challenges, but, without determined efforts by its Government and sustained
international support over the long haul, there was no guarantee that the
country would not slide back towards broad conflict, the Security Council
heard today.

Reporting to the Council on the mission he had led to Afghanistan from 11
to 16 November, Kenzo Oshima (Japan) said the progress made in 2006 towards
realizing the vision set out in the Afghanistan Compact -- the five-year
framework for cooperation between the Afghan Government, the United Nations
and the wider international community -- had not been as smooth or rapid as
had been hoped.

He said efforts to improve governance and establish the rule of law had
been uneven, thwarted by pervasive corruption in governing systems, while
the Taliban-led insurgency had grown, alongside widespread insecurity in
the south and east of the country. Those factors, combined with the still
very fragile State institutions, had fed into the disappointment and
disillusionment of the Afghan people and begun to test their confidence in
their country’s nascent institutions.

After decades of conflict, Afghanistan had had to start its reconciliation
and reconstruction, not just from zero, but from “deep minuses”, he pointed
out. In such circumstances, the time frame and patience needed for national
healing and readjustment, as well as for the march forward, was different
from what would ordinarily be expected. Such progress would be neither
short nor linear, and there were bound to be “zigzags and ups and downs”.
The mission’s primary message had been two-fold: the commitment to
Afghanistan was unwavering; and the Afghanistan Compact remained the
central strategic framework for cooperation.

Afghanistan’s representative affirmed that the prevailing security
situation and the slow pace of development remained at the forefront of the
country’s challenges, stressing that accelerated social and economic
development was indispensable to overall success. Strengthening security
institutions was also critical, with the national army and police engaged
in challenging combat operations against remnants of the Taliban, Al-Qaida
and other extremist groups in the southern and south-eastern provinces.
Lack of modern equipment and logistical support was having a drastic impact
on the effectiveness of those security forces, and an improved security
situation required an infusion of resources.

He said terrorism was the gravest threat to security and prosperity, citing
the systematic attacks that continued despite the vigorous efforts of both
the Afghan Government and the international community. Cross-border
terrorists and extremists operating in Afghanistan received financial,
ideological and logistical support from outside Afghan territory. A more
robust and comprehensive anti-terrorism campaign not only served
Afghanistan’s peace and stability, but also benefited the stability of the
wider region and beyond. The Afghan Government planned to convene Jirgas on
security, comprising influential tribal and religious figures from both
sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, with a view to enhancing local
and tribal structures to eliminate terrorism.

Pakistan’s speaker rejected explanations for the security failure that
pointed fingers across the border at his country. For one thing, the
Taliban were an Afghan phenomenon and the foot soldiers of the insurgency
were Afghans recruited within their own country; they were not sheltered,
trained or recruited in Pakistan, which, in fact, had made every effort to
prevent illegal border-crossings by deploying more troops along that
lengthy, difficult frontier than the total number of combined Afghan and
ISAF forces similarly deployed. Pakistan had proposed relocating refugee
camps to the Afghan side and was planning to return all refugees to
Afghanistan within three years. There could be no doubting Pakistan’s
sincerity and commitment to bring security to the border regions, but that
was a joint responsibility and the onus could not be solely on Pakistan.

He attributed the deterioration in Afghanistan’s security environment to
three major failures: a failure of governance, both at the centre and in
the provinces; a failure in reconstruction, specifically the lack of any
development in the south and south-east of the country, which was terra
incognita for the Kabul Government; and a failure of reconciliation, in
that a large section of the Afghan people, particularly the Pashtun, had
been left out of the power structures. Warlords ruled some provinces, and
the people, left completely without security, turned to anyone who could
provide it.

Norway’s State Secretary for Foreign Affairs also made a statement, as did
the representatives of Denmark, United Kingdom, Peru, United States, China,
Russian Federation, France, Finland (on behalf of the European Union),
India, Canada and Iran.

British minister blasts Dion on Afghanistan

CanWest News Service; Ottawa Citizen - Tuesday, December 12, 2006

OTTAWA - Britain's Foreign Office minister on Monday blasted new Liberal Leader Stephane Dion for calling for the early withdrawal of Canadian troops from Afghanistan, saying reluctant NATO allies need to "get real" about the threats posed there by terrorists.

Kim Howells, Britain's minister of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs, dismissed Dion's proposition he would try to negotiate an early end to Canada's commitment of troops to Afghanistan. Dion told the Ottawa Citizen in an interview last month Canada should negotiate the withdrawal of its troops "with honour" from Afghanistan before the expiry of the government's commitment in 2009 because the mission is not working.

"I'm not sure what withdrawing with honour would mean from Afghanistan quite frankly," Howells said after giving a speech at Foreign Affairs headquarters in Ottawa. "It seems to me the most honourable course would be to see that fight through," he added. "Because, believe me, al-Qaida won't withdraw with honour, they'll move into any vacuum that's left."

Dion voted against the two-year extension of the Afghanistan mission earlier this year and has accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper of blackmailing Parliament by forcing the vote on short notice.

Howells, who has made five trips to Afghanistan, also had tough words for some NATO countries that do not allow their troops to fight in the hostile south where the Taliban insurgency is centred, and where 36 Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have been killed this year.

Canadian, British, Dutch and American forces are fighting the Taliban in the south, while German, French, Italian and Spanish troops patrol the other, relatively more stable regions of Afghanistan.

At its recent Latvian summit two weeks ago, NATO struggled to find new troops from its 26 member countries and to convince some to lift "caveats," or restrictions, on their troops movements within Afghanistan. NATO countries were only able to offer another 500 troops, while some countries maintained their caveats, and agreed only to lift them in emergencies.

Without naming specific countries, Howells said the situation in NATO has created a two-tier level of risk.

"Because some troops have some uniforms on, they're allowed to die in Afghanistan E and other troops are not allowed to do that," said Howells.

"I think NATO should get real about that. All of the countries, they should be ready to support Canadians and support the British and support the Americans and others who are fighting in very, very dangerous parts of Afghanistan. There can't be a light war for some and a heavy war for others."

Howells made clear combat operations are inevitable and essential if the Taliban insurgency is to be pacified in southern Afghanistan.

He dismissed a common line of criticism - the one regularly submitted by some Liberals and the NDP - that NATO has placed too much emphasis on combat operations and should expend more resources on reconstruction.

"You can't do that if you've got Taliban and drug warlords shooting at you," he said, adding: "Canada would be letting us folks down" if it pulled its combat troops.

"We've got to do everything we can to reconstruct Afghanistan. But to try to pretend that there isn't a priority especially in the south to ensure that you've got security on the streets and in the fields and on the roads is a nonsense," he said. "You've got to have that security, and that means war fighting."

Duceppe threatens to topple government over Afghan mission

Monday, December 11, 2006 | 7:34 PM ET - CBC News

Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe threatened Monday to try to topple the Harper government over the mission in Afghanistan unless the current mandate is changed.

Duceppe warned he might table a no-confidence motion if the mission isn't "rapidly and profoundly" altered, with more resources put into reconstruction instead of fighting.

"We will not go along with an obtuse government that digs in its heels," Duceppe told a Quebec City audience.

"Because if nothing changes, we are certainly going to get stuck.

"If [Prime Minister Stephen] Harper refuses to make these changes, we won't hesitate to withdraw our support and, if need be, to defeat his government on the Afghan question."

It's unclear whether Duceppe would have enough support from the opposition to topple the government over the issue.

Forty-four Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have been killed since the Afghan mission began in 2002, with the majority of those deaths taking place this year.

Canada has more than 2,000 Armed Forces members in Afghanistan, with most of them stationed in the volatile southern part of the country. The Canadians have fought a number of pitched battles with Taliban forces, and have been using tanks in the region.

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion said he would wait to see the motion before making a decision.

He has criticized the strategy of the Afghanistan mission in the past, echoing Duceppe's remarks that there's too much emphasis on military action and not enough focus on reconstruction.

The issue has divided Liberals, who signed Canada on to the mission when they held power.

Last May, 30 Liberal MPs, including then leadership candidates Michael Ignatieff and Scott Brison, voted in support of a Tory motion to extend the mission by two years.

NDP Leader Jack Layton, who has called for troops to be withdrawn from Afghanistan by February 2007, appeared poised to support the motion.

"We have never had confidence in Mr. Harper's approach to this foreign policy matter," Layton said.

"We have said so and we have voted accordingly and it would not be a surprise to Canadians to have us continue on that path. We believe that change is needed here."

Canadian ambassador says Afghanistan peace plan is a 'key step'

By Bill Graveland December 12, 2006

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (CP) - In a country rife with human rights abuses, the Afghan government's adoption of a new action plan is an important step forward, said Canada's ambassador in the war-torn country.

"A task force will establish how to apply accountability mechanisms to bring those to justice who have committed crimes against humanity, war crimes and gross human rights violations," said Canadian ambassador David Sproule in a phone interview with The Canadian Press from Kabul.

While there is stability in the northern half of Afghanistan, the strength of the Taliban in the southern half of the country, primarily Kandahar province, has made the region a dangerous place. Members of the Taliban still instil fear in this part of the country with the use of "night letters" warning of reprisal and the release of DVD's showing the beheadings of Afghans who co-operate with NATO forces.

"It is a very key step the government has undertaken and reinforces a commitment to the universal values of human rights," said Sproule. The move is thought to be a first step to bringing to justice those responsible for years of human rights violations and war crimes in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai launched a plan Sunday, entitled "Action Plan on Peace, Reconciliation and Justice in Afghanistan," which is to be carried out in the next three years.

It stresses acknowledgement of the Afghan people's suffering, the strengthening of government institutions and the implementation of an effective accountability mechanism.

Sproule says keeping the Karzai government corruption-free is essential in strengthening the faith and support of the Afghan people.

"People need to be confident the taxes they pay will go forward for the public good. Corruption is one of those things that once it takes root it is hard to get out," he said. "We can't let it root any further and I think you're seeing some hopeful signs," he said.

Sproule said one safeguard will be a board that oversees all major appointments for both the judiciary and the administration to ensure people are hired based on merit, "and that they not have a tainted past that will bring into question their integrity in their jobs."

More than one million Afghans have been killed and millions of others forced to leave their country due to foreign invasion and civil war in Afghanistan since 1979. NATO forces are continuing to balance fighting Taliban insurgents and keeping peace among the Afghanistan's many tribes.

"This is extremely complex. There is no simple model you can haul out and say this is Afghanistan," said Col. Mike Kampman, 47, of Victoria, B.C, the Chief of Staff for NATO forces in southern Afghanistan.

"You have competing ideologies, tribal rivalries and you have competing interests between urban and rural," he added.

Karzai, speaking on the 58th anniversary of the UN's universal declaration on human rights, said his country has a decades-long history of limited rights, dating back from the Soviet invasion, to civil war and then the rule of the Taliban. Afghans fled the country as refugees, and women were "humiliated" by the Taliban, Karzai said.

During its rule from 1996 to 2001, the ultra-conservative Taliban regime banned girls from schools and did not allow women to leave the house without a male escort or without wearing the burka, a garment that covers the entire body.

NDP blasts Harper's association with warlord

Photo of PM with tribal leader draws fire - CAMPBELL CLARK From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

OTTAWA — The Conservative government should be red-faced with embarrassment that an Afghan warlord who shook hands as an ally with Prime Minister Stephen Harper last March has now admitted he sped the release of the main suspect in the killing of a Canadian diplomat, the New Democrats say.

Opposition politicians charged yesterday that the revelation shows there has been little progress made against corruption in Afghanistan and demanded that the Conservative government explain Canada's ties to the warlord, Mullah Naqib.

Canadian diplomat Glyn Berry was killed Jan. 15 in a suicide attack that also injured three Canadian soldiers. But the man the Afghan National Police arrested as the main suspect, Pir Mohammed, was released two days later.

The Globe and Mail reported yesterday that Mullah Naqib, the Alokozai tribal leader who holds sway in areas north of Kandahar, admitted intervening to speed the release of Mr. Mohammed, believing him to be innocent.

Mr. Naqib, sometimes called Naqibullah, is an influential ally of President Hamid Karzai's Afghan government in the province of Kandahar, where Canadian troops are based. Mr. Harper met the mullah when he visited Afghanistan in March, and the two men were photographed shaking hands.

"That photo says it all," NDP foreign affairs critic Alexa McDonough said. "There ought to be a lot of red faces on the government benches, from the Prime Minister right through to his cabinet members. And there certainly needs to be a lot of tough questions asked about accountability around this shocking situation. If Canadians can't achieve any accountability, I guess it underscores why the mission is so deeply flawed."

Ms. McDonough said Mr. Harper and his ministers have refused to address the complexities Canadian troops and diplomats face in Afghanistan, including the government corruption that has frustrated authorities there.

Government officials from the Prime Minister's Office, the Department of National Defence and the Department of Foreign Affairs all declined to comment yesterday on the role Mr. Naqib played in the investigation into Mr. Berry's death.

A government official, who asked not to be named, said Mr. Naqib was introduced to Mr. Harper as a warlord who had been allied with the Taliban but was now supporting Mr. Karzai's government. The evidence against Mr. Mohammed is not conclusive.

How Pakistan makes life easier for the Taliban

Globe and Mail Editorial 12.12.06 - Pakistan's policy of appeasement toward the Taliban and their sympathizers taking shelter along the northwestern border with Afghanistan has played a major role in the dramatic upsurge of violence against Afghan and North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces and civilians. That has long been the view of commanders in the field and of the embattled Afghan government. Now they have been joined by the independent analysts of the respected International Crisis Group, a global think tank devoted to conflict resolution.

The Taliban use the safe tribal zone inside Pakistan to lick their wounds, regroup and rearm for fresh assaults across the border into southeastern Afghanistan. By and large, they are unhindered by Pakistani troops, provided they don't attack them as well. "The Musharraf government's ambivalent approach and failure to take effective action is destabilizing Afghanistan," the ICG report states bluntly.

President Pervez Musharraf reached peace deals with Pashtun elders in the lawless border districts of South Waziri-stan in 2004 and North Waziristan three months ago that give carte blanche to the resident Taliban and their supporters, who share tribal ties. Needless to say, those are not the written terms. On paper, the local clans, which provide the Taliban with fresh recruits, financial assistance and supplies, as well as a safe haven,have secured promises that restore the virtual autonomy they have enjoyed since the creation of Pakistan in 1947. The deals were brokered by a pro-Taliban groupthat has the largest influence in a six-party religious alliance that has thrown itspolitical support to Gen. Musharraf.

Government troops, which entered the rugged region for the first time three months after 9/11, have withdrawn from the towns and stopped harassing the tribesmen. In exchange, the latter promised not to cross the border to join the fighting against the Afghan and NATO forces. The amnesty even extends to "foreign fighters," most of whom have ties to al-Qaeda, provided they live peacefully.

That's on paper. In practice, the militants have continued their illicit activities unhindered. "While the army has virtually retreated to barracks, this accommodation facilitates the growth of militancy and attacks in Afghanistan by giving pro-Taliban elements a free hand to recruit, train and arm," the ICG says.

To strip the militants of their appeal, the ICG urges the Musharraf government to enact democratic political and economic reforms in the deeply impoverished tribal areas, where a colonial-style administration controls the purse strings and the political process, where opportunities are scarce and where desperate people have turned to weapons and drug smuggling. The report also calls on Islamabad to enforce the rule of law in the Waziristans, which means closing the training camps and dismantling the Taliban-type parallel policing and judicial structures set up by the militants.

For their part, Western governments should ratchet up the pressure on Pakistan to do its part to choke off the insurgency, because the safety of NATO and Afghan soldiers and the future of the democratically elected government in Kabul depend on it.

Outsourcing the Afghan problem

By M K Bhadrakumar Asia Times Online / December 12, 2006

Success, Fernando Pessoa wrote in The Book of Disquiet, consists in being successful, not in having potential for success. The summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Riga at the end of last month nonetheless reiterated what the Bonn conference also stated exactly five years ago - that the "war on terror" in Afghanistan was full of potential for success.

The NATO statesmen should have heeded Pessoa when he said, "Any wide piece of ground is the potential site of a palace, but there's no palace till it's built." Now NATO needs to trade its swords for plowshares and build a palace.

Hardly 12 days have passed since the Riga summit ended, but any glimmer of hope that NATO can be a builder is already vanishing. The United States has begun debunking the NATO decision to form a "contact group" on Afghanistan.

Richard Boucher, US assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, reacted after talks with NATO officials in Brussels that Washington would like to look "more carefully" at whether the international community needed "another group to sort of drive this process". Boucher argued that any contact group should meet Afghanistan's "real needs", and, therefore, he would be "asking more questions about what people think is needed than what this group would do". Clearly, at Riga, French President Jacques Chirac took everyone by surprise by his initiative on the "contact group", as he had not consulted Washington.

The administration of US President George W Bush will wait until next spring, watch the Segolene Royal-Nicolas Sarkozy political saga run its course in France, and see Paris embark on a course careering away from Chirac's policy of non-alignment. Meanwhile, the coming three to six months in Afghanistan are crucial for the United States. The entire US strategy for Afghanistan is reaching a tipping point. One last push is going to be made by the US to co-opt the Taliban into the power structure in Kabul. A degree of distancing from President Hamid Karzai is apparent.

The New York Times spoke of the "unraveling of the Karzai government". Quoting unnamed Western diplomats, The Los Angeles Times reported from Kabul last week, "Popular support for the central government is faltering, and Western military allies are deeply divided over how best to combat the insurgency.

"On the other side of the fight, the Taliban [have] regained the strength to dominate large swaths of Afghanistan; government control is tenuous at best in at least 20% of the country ... The allies are well aware that simply killing large numbers of insurgents will not constitute a victory."

The earlier US criticism of the NATO policy of striking a deal with the Taliban in the Musa Qala district of Helmand province in September has now given way to a conscious attempt to justify the approach of striking local deals with the Taliban. "Musa Qala proved to be a very good deal. After the agreement, there were 34 days of calm," NATO's chief spokesman in Kabul said in justification. Karzai, who once voiced skepticism, too, felt compelled to defend the deal (see Rough justice and blooming poppies, Asia Times Online, December 7).

The clamor may have begun for an Afghan version of the James Baker-Lee Hamilton report of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group (ISG). Canada's newly elected main opposition leader, Stephane Dion, sharply etched the debate, "There's no use for us to try to kill the Taliban in every corner of every mountain and to risk the lives of our soldiers in this way."

Karzai must feel very lonesome. Nowhere is the shift in mood more evident than in the hardening of Pakistan's stance toward him. Islamabad no longer handles Karzai with kid gloves. The message from Islamabad is loud and clear: "The Taliban are winning the war and NATO is bound to fail. Karzai should see the writing on the wall. He should study the implications of the recent US congressional elections. America is not going to stay indefinitely in Afghanistan, and sooner rather than later Karzai will be left to fend for himself."

The Karachi daily Dawn warned last week, "This is, therefore, the time for the beleaguered Afghan president to try to be on his own and deal with his countrymen politically. Blaming Pakistan has not helped and will not serve Afghanistan's interests." Karzai tried to hit back in a last-ditch attempt to rally the support of Pashtun nationalists in Pakistan. But an unprecedented Pashtun peace jirga (tribal council) held in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), could not succeed in getting the hujra (symbol of Pashtun social and communal life) and the mosque to work together in rescuing the Pashtun from the Taliban's appeal.

Ironically, the star performer at the jirga was the figure who launched the Taliban in 1994 - Maulana Fazlur Rehman, leader of the radical Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam party that currently rules the two border provinces of Balochistan and NWFP. Pashtunkhwa (left-wing Pashtun nationalism) seemed to be losing the fight against the Taliban even before one got under way.

Again, Karzai's game plan to create a non-Taliban locus of Pashtun aspirations in the nature of calling jirgas of tribal leaders from Afghanistan and Pakistan to find a solution to the violence is running aground. Islamabad is pitching for jirgas restricted to tribal leaders, whereas Karzai seeks broad-based jirgas that will also include parliamentarians, local politicians and elected representatives, civil society and non-governmental organizations.

Karzai's intention in making the proposal on the jirgas was to turn the Afghan clock back to the innocence of the 1970s before the ideologically motivated mujahideen, charioted by political Islam, sidelined the traditional communities and then what remained was left to the Taliban to trample on. But Islamabad doesn't favor such revisionism in Pashtun power play. The Taliban will not allow it, either. The Taliban now threaten that unless they are invited to the proposed jirgas in their capacity as Afghanistan's "biggest political and military power", the entire effort will be pointless.

Karzai finds himself in a quandary. The Taliban's hint that they may consider taking part in the jirgas is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, like the proverbial camel and the tent, [1] the Taliban's very presence may overwhelm the jirgas - and Karzai himself in the bargain. Certainly, the Taliban have by far outgrown the institution of jirgas. Tradition, after all, must give way to the compelling modernity of political Islam. At the same time, the US may well envisage that the Taliban's likely willingness to tiptoe toward an intra-Afghan dialogue cannot be allowed to pass.

There is no clarity, even after the searing experience of the asphyxiation of secularism in Iraq, as to where exactly the Anglo-American coalition in Afghanistan stands with regard to this elaborate play of pantomimes battling out on the center stage of Pashtun politics. It doesn't even seem to occur that, in some ways at least, the discord over the Durand Line that divides Pakistan and Afghanistan is linked to the shadow play.

But from Islamabad's perspective, there is great clarity. It is Karzai who remains the problem. In recent days, Pakistan has ratcheted up the pressure on Karzai in the nature of two new proposals to "cooperate" with Kabul in checking the cross-border activities of the Taliban.

First, Islamabad declared that with a view to checking the Taliban's movements, Pakistan was "seriously considering" mining its porous borders with Afghanistan. Second, Islamabad wanted the Afghan refugee camps on the border to be relocated on the Afghan side and the 3 million Afghan refugees to be repatriated to Afghanistan during the next three-year period. Equally, a new stridency was apparent in the Pakistani stance during the annual debate on Afghanistan in the United Nations General Assembly in New York last Thursday.

Karzai's dilemma is acute. He may find himself elbowed out incrementally in the event of the Taliban embracing intra-Afghan dialogue. His best allies would be the Northern Alliance leaders, who shared his antipathy toward the Taliban. But Karzai was instrumental in cutting them ("warlords") down to size and systematically dispatching them to political oblivion. They no longer make worthwhile allies in balancing the Taliban. Even their erstwhile mentors of the 1990s have lost interest and drifted away. In fact, visiting Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri had a "frank and open" conversation last weekend with Younis Qanooni, the lone Northern Alliance survivor in Kabul. Pakistan's message would now be stark - "cooperate, or perish".

Karzai's sense of dismay is, of course, shared by some of Afghanistan's neighbors. The Russian Foreign Ministry in a statement cautioned the international community against the "inadmissibility of any flirting or deals with the Taliban". Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, during a visit to New Delhi last month, expressed concern about the Taliban's threat to regional security and stability. Indian intervention at the UN General Assembly debate in New York last week firmly rejected the raison d'etre of any deal-making with the Taliban and instead called for the use of force in eliminating the Taliban's support base.

These are hot words. For a variety of reasons, however, these regional powers are hardly in a position to object if an ISG-style "change tack now" mindset were to prevail in Washington over Afghanistan. They would have welcomed Chirac's initiative on the "contact group" on Afghanistan. They would have hoped that Washington stepped out of the sequestered, highly secretive US-British-Pakistani nexus at work. The Bush administration, on the contrary, might well have estimated that it had no choice but to "outsource" from Islamabad, if the potential for success in the "war on terror" in Afghanistan were to be actual success.

Note - 1. If the camel once gets his nose in a tent, the body will soon follow.

M K Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for more than 29 years, with postings including ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-98) and to Turkey (1998-2001).

We can still win - in Afghanistan

The Baltimore Sun 12/11/2006 By Cynthia Tucker

ATLANTA - Not only is there no path to victory in Iraq, as the Iraq Study Group has made clear, but there is also very little chance of preventing disaster. As the U.S. military withdraws - and it must - the civil war between Sunnis and Shiites will become more savage still, neighboring states will find themselves flooded with refugees, and Iraq will probably become the failed state that our policy was intended to prevent.
But the United States need not leave behind two failed states. We can still save Afghanistan; that's where we should concentrate our diplomacy and manpower. If we don't, that nation will continue to deteriorate until it is once again a caldron of violence and corruption, a haven for jihadists and narco-terrorists.

The ISG report made that point explicitly: "The longer that U.S. political and military resources are tied down in Iraq, the more the chances for American failure in Afghanistan increase."

Routing the Taliban was the righteous war that grew out of Sept. 11. The jihadist-warrior cult had offered safe harbor to Osama bin Laden, who planned the Sept. 11 attacks. The Bush administration had no choice but to mount an invasion of Afghanistan.

Unfortunately, neither the neoconservatives nor the traditional conservatives had much real interest in the remote, obscure country. They didn't think the use of U.S. military might on a primitive nation would inspire awe among other Islamists; they had no patience for nation-building; they weren't passionate about planting democracy there.

So before bin Laden was captured, before the Taliban were decimated, before the remote mountainous regions of Afghanistan were secure, civilian leadership at the Pentagon ordered the military to turn its attention and personnel to Iraq. Special forces operatives who might have located bin Laden were pulled out; troops and material were redirected. When Afghan President Hamid Karzai was elected, the White House declared victory and pulled back.

There are now about 21,000 U.S. troops and nearly as many troops from other NATO countries in Afghanistan. However, they have met stiff resistance from a resurgent Taliban and al-Qaida, which still have the run of the mountainous border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Though the Bush administration has declared Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf an ally in the war on terror, he has proved unable or unwilling to clamp down on insurgents.

Gen. Michael Hayden, director of the CIA, told the Senate Armed Services Committee last month that the Taliban and al-Qaida were waging a "bloody insurgency" in the east and south of the country. He noted that al-Qaida forces are using techniques in Afghanistan perfected in Iraq, including roadside explosives and suicide bombers. Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, head of the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency, told the committee that violent attacks this year had nearly doubled over 2005.

With no real law in effect, Afghan farmers reaped a record opium harvest this year, producing about 92 percent of the world's supply. Drug activity feeds not just jihadists movements but also violent narco-traffickers.

Despite its problems, Afghanistan can still benefit from U.S. military and diplomatic might. As the Pentagon pulls troops out of Iraq, it can beef up the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. (If we contribute more heavily, we might be able to persuade our NATO allies to do the same.) The insurgency can be quelled, if not eradicated.

And as stability takes root, nongovernment aid groups and charitable institutions will pour in, offering health care and educational and economic assistance. It may take decades to stamp out poppy cultivation, but it's worth a more serious effort than we've given it so far.

President Bush could still see a stable, pro-Western nation rise from the anger and anguish of 9/11. It just won't be Iraq.

Afghan Ladies' Driving School

Jacqui Taffel, reviewer December 12, 2006

Afghan Ladies' Driving School

A different, more personal portrayal of life in Afghanistan is presented here by BBC journalist Sean Langan as he visits the first driving school in Kabul to give lessons to women. This is a huge change for a country where, under Taliban rule, women were not allowed to show their faces in public, work or study, let alone drive.

The program's tone is casual at first, as Langan chats to the school's owner, the instructors (ex-Taliban fighters) and the women they teach. However, it soon becomes clear that, although women have more freedom than they did, their lives are still dominated by harsh restrictions. Laughing too loudly in male company, for instance, can bring censure. Many men also routinely beat their wives. No wonder so many of the women here say they don't want to get married.

Langan films his own footage and is able to establish real connections with his subjects, male and female. It's a fantastic piece of journalism that is not without humour, such as the scenes where he receives marriage advice or gets hit by a bicycle. It also covers the crucial Afghani elections and reveals how chaotic life remains in Kabul, where even if there's enough electricity to work a traffic light, the signal is ignored.

[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.]