In this bulletin:

• Afghan 'suicide bomb kills four'
• Governor: Iraqis Coming to Fight in Afghanistan
• Thirty die in severe Afghan cold
• World pledges 10.5 billion dollars to rebuild Afghanistan
• Karzai returns from conference with fraction of funds he needed
• Afghanistan: Kabul Satisfied With London Conference Results
• Afghanistan raps European papers over cartoons of Prophet Muhammad
• NZ soldiers destroy opium in Afghanistan
• Afghanistan Urges Netherlands To Approve Troops
• Dutch Debate on Afghan Force Is Test for NATO
• New Afghan Islamic school to counter 'foreign extremism'
• Polio Eradicated In Two More Countries, But Not Afghanistan
• AFGHAN REFUGEES CONCERNED OVER CAMP CLOSURES IN PAKISTAN
• Afghan President to Visit Pakistan
• 'Open for Business'
• Afghan detainee free after six-year struggle
• Not Much Limelight for Afghan Actresses

Afghan 'suicide bomb kills four' B BC News 2 February 2006

A suicide bomber has killed himself and three others in the south-eastern Afghan province of Khost, police say. Eight others were hurt when a car packed with explosives blew up near a security checkpoint late on Wednesday.

Recent suicide bombings in Afghanistan have fuelled fears that militants hostile to the presence of US-led troops are copying Iraq's insurgents. Afghan officials blame the Taleban and al-Qaeda who they say find shelter in Pakistan, a charge Islamabad denies.

Local police officials says three soldiers were also hurt in the explosion. They were among Afghan and US soldiers checking vehicles. "Apart from the suicide bomber, three national army soldiers were killed," senior police official Mohammad Zaman is quoted as saying by Reuters. There were no casualties among the American soldiers.

The chief of security of Khost, Ghulam Nabi Salim, told the BBC that a group of Taleban along with foreign fighters had entered Afghanistan from Pakistan and apparently infiltrated into three south-eastern provinces, including Khost. The three provinces share their borders with Pakistan's tribal areas.

Last month, two suspected suicide blasts killed at least 24 people in Kandahar and Spin Boldak near the border with Pakistan. The BBC's Bilal Sarwary in Kandahar says security is visibly tight in and around the city following the recent attacks.

Provincial governor Assadullah Khaled told the BBC his forces had destroyed a "suicide network" operating in the area. He said they had seized more than 80 explosive devices which were to have been used in "terrorist" attacks.

President Hamid Karzai told the BBC's Have Your Say programme on Wednesday that dealing with "terrorism" was a fight for all mankind. Asked whether he thought Pakistan should be invaded to track down "terrorists", he said: "We should deal with terrorism wherever it occurs. Wherever they are trained. Wherever they are supplied...

"If it is occuring in Afghanistan we should go after them, to the sites where they are trained. If it is in other countries we should go there too... We should not stop short of any measures to free us of terrorism and make life safe for all of us."

The upsurge in suicide attacks comes as the US plans to hand more responsibility for security in southern Afghanistan to Nato allies. Attacks mainly in southern and eastern Afghanistan left more than 1,400 people dead in 2005 - the country's bloodiest year since US-led forces ousted the Taleban in late 2001.

Governor: Iraqis Coming to Fight in Afghanistan - , February 02, 2006

KABUL, Afghanistan —  Al Qaeda militants are coming from Iraq to fight in the insurgency in Afghanistan, a provincial governor said Thursday after interrogating an Iraqi caught sneaking into the country illegally.

Meanwhile, police said a homicide bomber disguised as a woman blew himself up at an army checkpoint in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing five Afghans, including three soldiers.

"There is a big group coming from Iraq," Nimroz provincial Gov. Ghulam Dusthaqir Azad said. "They're linked to Al Qaeda and fought against U.S. forces in Iraq. They have been ordered to come here. Many are suicide attackers."

It was not immediately possible to confirm the governor's comments with officials in Kabul. A spokesman for the U.S. military, Lt. Mike Cody, said, "We don't discuss detainees or intelligence matters."

Azad made the comments in a satellite telephone interview to The Associated Press from his office in the remote desert city of Zaranj after he questioned the Iraqi, who was identified as 35-year-old Numan din Majid from Diyala province, west of Baghdad.

Majid was arrested Monday in Zaranj, on the Afghan-Iran border, along with three Pakistanis, two of whom were believed to be militants from Kashmir, Azad said. They were all believed to have crossed into Afghanistan from Iran.

Thirty die in severe Afghan cold - BBC News 1 February 2006

At least 30 people have died due to severe winter conditions in Badakshan province in north-eastern Afghanistan. The head of the Afghan Red Crescent aid agency, Abuzar, told the BBC 15 people were killed when an avalanche hit five villages in Ragh district.

He said 15 others had died in the province from the cold weather. Local officials in Badakshan are waiting for helicopters to bring emergency aid, including food and medicine, he added.

The avalanche has flattened 150 houses in the five villages in Ragh district and the villages are totally cut off from the provincial capital of Faizabad, Abuzar said.

World pledges 10.5 billion dollars to rebuild Afghanistan

London (AFP ) - A major donors' conference for Afghanistan has ended with pledges totalling 10.5 billion dollars (8.7 billion euros) to rebuild the strategic Central Asian nation over the next five years.

Afghan Finance Minister Anwar-ul-Haq Ahady hailed the outcome of the two-day gathering of 70-odd nations, saying the funds would help his destitute country "realise our development strategy" after many years of bloody conflict.

Some 80 percent of the 10.5 billion dollars represents new money, with the remainder made up of outstanding portions of earlier pledges, added Ahady at the conference's conclusion in London.

"This level of commitment underscores the message that Afghanistan will remain a priority for the international community," said British Foreign Office Minister Kim Howells.

The United States pledged an extra 1.1 billion dollars in financial aid for the coming US fiscal year from October, slightly less than 1.2 billion dollars from the World Bank.

One billion dollars were pledged by the Asian Development Bank, 855 million dollars from Britain, 480 million dollars from Germany and 450 million dollars from Japan.

The European Union pledged 268 million dollars, Spain 182 million dollars, India 181 million dollars, the Netherlands 179 million dollars, Saudi Arabia 153 million dollars, Pakistan 150 million dollars and Norway 144 million dollars. France trailed well behind with 55 million dollars.

"I am confident that with continued support, we will be able to ensure a very democratic and tolerant society in Afghanistan and a market economy which hopefully will lead to prosperity for all in Afghanistan," Ahady said.

He dismissed suggestions that the money promised may not be delivered in full, stating that donor nations had an excellent record of making good on the pledges made at their last major conference, in Bonn, Germany in 2002.

Ahady also insisted that Kabul could be trusted with the money, and that Afghanistan adheres to the highest international anti-corruption standards.

The pledges following the signing Tuesday of a five-year pact between Kabul and its international partners aimed at helping Afghanistan defeat a resurgent Taliban and drug traffickers while building a new life for its people.

Chief among its proposals is a boost to security, particularly in the volatile south were NATO now is deploying peacekeeping forces, in order to create stability for economic and social development.

Other key elements of the Afghanistan Compact set out specific targets for improving governance, strengthening the rule of law and human rights.

"After four years of working together, the international community has shown an even stronger commitment for staying together with the people of Afghanistan," Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair earlier Wednesday hailed the Afghanistan Compact, telling parliament that its goals were essential in the struggle against global terrorism -- and as a model for Iraq.

"I think it's right to reflect on how important it is for the international community to help those countries (Afghanistan and Iraq) become different because when they were left in that failed state they were a threat to the whole of the world," he said.

Political observers stressed, however, the need for joined-up action to help cement democracy in Afghanistan, which has been plagued by three decades of foreign occupation, civil war and Islamic extremism.

Karzai returns from conference with fraction of funds he needed

The Independent Online By Kim Sengupta and Anne Penketh 02 February 2006

The conference on Afghanistan ended yesterday with Hamid Karzai's government receiving just a fraction of what it claimed was needed to rebuild the country.

At the same time there were fresh warnings over the dangers that British forces being sent to Afghanistan will face, and confusion over how to tackle the country's massive opium production.

The Afghan government had said that a minimum of $20bn (£11bn) was needed over five years. But the total promised aid at the end of the London summit was $10.5bn. However, since 20 per cent of that was "old pledges" on the table, the real figure was $8bn.

The United States was the biggest contributor with an offer of $4bn over five years while Britain said it will give $885m. Another $1.2bn will come from the World Bank.

The Foreign Office minister Kim Howells declared the conference - co-hosted by Tony Blair, the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan and President Karzai - a "great success". But the Afghan Finance Minister, Anwar al-Haq Ahady, expressed disappointment that the total amount of funding on offer fell short of his government's expectations.

Mr Ahady said he was confident that all the money pledged would be delivered. But privately Afghan officials expressed concern about possible delays. One official said: "How soon the money arrives will be extremely important. We have had elections and we have to persuade the people that the democratic system works. It would be very, very bad if we now cannot deliver on our promise.

"It is especially bad because we are now facing the biggest extremist [al-Qa'ida and Taliban] threat since the war." General Abdul Rahim Wardak, the Afghan Defence Minister, warned that the 6,000-strong British task force would be on the front line of the threat.

The British force will be mainly deployed in Helmand province, to counter a new offensive by a resurgent Taliban and al-Qa'ida, which has seen a hundred Americans killed in the past few months - the same number as British soldiers killed in the entire Iraq conflict. In particular, there has been a rise in the number of suicide bombings - hitherto relatively unknown in Afghanistan, but a popular weapon of the insurgents in Iraq.

General Wardak said: "We are facing a new phenomenon. They used to be mainly foreigners but now unfortunately there are some Afghans. They are religious fanatics. Suicide bombings are against our tradition, they are against our religious beliefs."

The general said there was widespread infiltration from across the "porous" border with Pakistan. He said the Pakistani government had claimed to have deployed 70,000 troops along the frontier but there appeared to be large swaths of the country that were beyond government control.

The Afghan government had reported a steady stream of foreign nationals, allegedly linked to al-Qa'ida and the Iraq insurgency, infiltrating across the border.

Yesterday Afghan forces reported the arrest of an Iraqi and three Pakistanis at Zaranj, the capital of Nimroz province in the south. Earlier this week, five Bangladeshis were arrested in the same area. The provincial governor, Ghulam Dushtaqir Azad, said they had links with the Taliban .

The British Government has announced that British troops will be engaged in tackling Afghanistan's opium crop - the largest in the world. But the British troops will be under a Nato mandate, which does not include eradicating poppies. An international think-tank, the Senlis Council, has appointed a team of lawyers to ascertain whether British forces engaged in destroying poppy fields would be in breach of international law.

The Armed Forces minister Adam Ingram said yesterday that British troops will not engage in directly eradicating poppy fields, but they would support Afghan anti-drug operations. He said eradication without providing new sources of livelihood for the farmers would "breed resentment and anger towards Nato and the Afghan government. It will create conditions for greater resistance and insurgency with the warlords exploiting real grievances for their own malign advantage."

The conference on Afghanistan ended yesterday with Hamid Karzai's government receiving just a fraction of what it claimed was needed to rebuild the country. At the same time there were fresh warnings over the dangers that British forces being sent to Afghanistan will face, and confusion over how to tackle the country's massive opium production.

The Afghan government had said that a minimum of $20bn (£11bn) was needed over five years. But the total promised aid at the end of the London summit was $10.5bn. However, since 20 per cent of that was "old pledges" on the table, the real figure was $8bn.

The United States was the biggest contributor with an offer of $4bn over five years while Britain said it will give $885m. Another $1.2bn will come from the World Bank.

The Foreign Office minister Kim Howells declared the conference - co-hosted by Tony Blair, the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan and President Karzai - a "great success". But the Afghan Finance Minister, Anwar al-Haq Ahady, expressed disappointment that the total amount of funding on offer fell short of his government's expectations.

Mr Ahady said he was confident that all the money pledged would be delivered. But privately Afghan officials expressed concern about possible delays. One official said: "How soon the money arrives will be extremely important. We have had elections and we have to persuade the people that the democratic system works. It would be very, very bad if we now cannot deliver on our promise.

"It is especially bad because we are now facing the biggest extremist [al-Qa'ida and Taliban] threat since the war." General Abdul Rahim Wardak, the Afghan Defence Minister, warned that the 6,000-strong British task force would be on the front line of the threat.

The British force will be mainly deployed in Helmand province, to counter a new offensive by a resurgent Taliban and al-Qa'ida, which has seen a hundred Americans killed in the past few months - the same number as British soldiers killed in the entire Iraq conflict. In particular, there has been a rise in the number of suicide bombings - hitherto relatively unknown in Afghanistan, but a popular weapon of the insurgents in Iraq.

General Wardak said: "We are facing a new phenomenon. They used to be mainly foreigners but now unfortunately there are some Afghans. They are religious fanatics. Suicide bombings are against our tradition, they are against our religious beliefs."

The general said there was widespread infiltration from across the "porous" border with Pakistan. He said the Pakistani government had claimed to have deployed 70,000 troops along the frontier but there appeared to be large swaths of the country that were beyond government control.

The Afghan government had reported a steady stream of foreign nationals, allegedly linked to al-Qa'ida and the Iraq insurgency, infiltrating across the border.

Yesterday Afghan forces reported the arrest of an Iraqi and three Pakistanis at Zaranj, the capital of Nimroz province in the south. Earlier this week, five Bangladeshis were arrested in the same area. The provincial governor, Ghulam Dushtaqir Azad, said they had links with the Taliban .

The British Government has announced that British troops will be engaged in tackling Afghanistan's opium crop - the largest in the world. But the British troops will be under a Nato mandate, which does not include eradicating poppies. An international think-tank, the Senlis Council, has appointed a team of lawyers to ascertain whether British forces engaged in destroying poppy fields would be in breach of international law.

The Armed Forces minister Adam Ingram said yesterday that British troops will not engage in directly eradicating poppy fields, but they would support Afghan anti-drug operations. He said eradication without providing new sources of livelihood for the farmers would "breed resentment and anger towards Nato and the Afghan government. It will create conditions for greater resistance and insurgency with the warlords exploiting real grievances for their own malign advantage."

Afghanistan: Kabul Satisfied With London Conference Results

The London Conference on Afghanistan's future ended on 1 February with all the signs that it had achieved what organizers hoped. Participating countries pledged $10.5 billion in new reconstruction aid and to strengthen hobbled institutions in Afghanistan. But the conference also appears to have shifted a greater burden for the country's fate to the Afghan government -- and turned more attention to the plight of ordinary Afghans.

LONDON, 2 February 2006 (RFE/RL) -- If the London Conference opened in an atmosphere of cautious optimism, it arguably concluded on a higher note.
Afghan Finance Minister Anwar ul-Haq Ahady welcomed the international community's engagement and its pledges of support at the two-day gathering.
 
"We have been heartened by the kind of support we have received in more returns since yesterday, and we are very much impressed with the kind of support we have received in pledges in the past two days," Ahady said. Ahady also tried to dispel concerns that donor countries have not lived up to their pledges of aid.
 
"I am pleased to say that, actually, almost all of our donors who have pledged [in the past], they have delivered on their pledge," Ahady said. "This is a misperception that money was promised and it was not delivered."
 
Vote Of Confidence?
Wahidullah Shahrani, Afghanistan's deputy finance minister and an economic adviser to President Hamid Karzai, stressed after its conclusion that the conference represented an international vote of confidence in the Afghan central government.
 
"We are very satisfied with the outcome of this important conference for two main reasons. The first is that the international community recognized during this conference that the government of Afghanistan is in a position to take the ownership and to come with the initiative, and would lead the nation to determine and implement its development strategy," Shahrani said.
 
Shahrani also emphasized the conference's commitment to back his government's National Development Strategy, which sets out plans for ensuring security, governing more effectively, and safeguarding citizens' rights.
 
Shahrani echoed vows from other Afghan officials to devote greater attention and resources to improving the lives of ordinary Afghans He also highlighted recent achievements in the continuing effort to recover after decades of war.
 
"Right now, we have got 6 million children back to the schools; almost 75 percent of the people across the country have got access to basic health services," Shahrani said. "We have completed a number of key highway or road projects. They will create opportunities for economic activities. We have an agreement with the Asian Development Bank that we can bring electricity from Uzbekistan."
 
Welcoming Aid
Shukria Barakzai is another member of the Afghan delegation to the London Conference and a member of Afghanistan's new national parliament. She secretly educated women when such education was banned under the hard-line Taliban regime, and said on 1 February that the aid flowing from the conference would do wonders for her country.
 
"Really it's more than enough, I think. It's a big help for Afghanistan," Barakzai said. "As an Afghan, I am very happy it can transform our country, and of course, the agenda and the arguments was very useful. It's made our government to be more active."
 
Barakzai said the structure of the Karzai administration's National Development Strategy will make the government more accountable and foster closer coordination with the international community.
 
Barakzai said top-down improvements to the justice system and law enforcement are important. But she added that the country's long-suffering population needs to see visible improvements like new roads and schools.
 
"[People's] priorities, it's something normal: security, peace process, democratic process, and, of course, the schools, roads, shelter, factories. That's all very important," Barakzai said. "That's the Afghan people's needs. We need a new map, we need a new timetable, we need a new policy. The parliament also is working as a kind of observer for law."
 
...But Should Countries Do More?
But even as delegates to the London Conference dispersed and headed for home, at least one voice emerged to suggest that the international community is not doing enough for Afghanistan.
 
Fazel Beria is from the Afghan Association of London and has represented Afghanistan in international negotiations. He said that if measured by what Afghanistan has done for the world, the aid has been insufficient.
 
"The world was an unsafe place with all of those terrorist camps in Afghanistan, with Osama bin Laden and the Taliban government. Now they are not there," Beria said. "And if the Afghan people are participating with the world to destroy those bases, we are actually contributing much, much more to the world [by] providing security, and in return we are getting very little."  
Beria suggested that even a "little" more could make an enormous difference.

Afghanistan raps European papers over cartoons of Prophet Muhammad –

(Kyodo Feb. 2) _ Afghanistan strongly condemns the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in European newspapers, which has caused outrage in Islamic countries, Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said Thursday.

"I strongly condemn such action which is an insult to beliefs of millions of people in the world and in Afghanistan," Abdullah said at a news conference.

Abdullah, who just returned from a conference on Afghanistan in London, said such acts can give an excuse to extremists to undermine dialogue and good relations between civilizations.

The cartoons were originally published in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper last September in Denmark and reprinted last month by the Norwegian evangelical newspaper Magazinet in the name of defending free expression.

The 12 drawings published included one showing the Prophet Muhammad wearing a turban shaped as a bomb. Islamic tradition bars any depiction of the Prophet, favorable or otherwise.

The drawings caused anger among many Islamic countries. Saudi Arabia as the world's leading Islamic country recalled its ambassador to Denmark and initiated a boycott of Danish goods. Palestinians burned Danish flags and demanded an apology.

In many other Islamic countries, thousands denounced the caricatures during Friday prayers. Currently, Denmark has deployed more than 100 troops in Afghanistan as part of NATO's peacekeeping mission.

NZ soldiers destroy opium in Afghanistan - New Zealand Herald 02.02.06

New Zealand soldiers working on the reconstruction of war-torn Afghanistan have destroyed nearly two tonnes of opium. The troops are part of the New Zealand Defence Force Provincial Reconstruction Team (NZPRT) in the Bamyan province.

The 1746kg of opium resin was seized by the Afghan national drugs police from caves near Bamyan before it could be smuggled across the Afghan border and processed into heroin, said the defence force.

Its destruction was supervised by New Zealand police superintendent Tom Ireland, who is based in Bamyan with the NZPRT as mentor to the local police chief.

The resin was like a dense black tar rolled into large balls and was destroyed by fire inside the New Zealand compound. Defence spokeswoman Major Denise MacKay said Bamyan residents watched the destruction from outside the compound.

The resin took 12 hours to destroy after it was placed in a wood-fired pit and 160 litres of waste diesel and oil was added to increase the heat of the fire, she said. New Zealand has 94 defence force personnel in the NZPRT in Afghanistan, part of an overseas deployment of 504 personnel in 21 countries.

Afghanistan Urges Netherlands To Approve Troops - RFE/RL

Afghan officials visiting The Hague called on the Netherlands to contribute troops for NATO's planned expansion of activities in southern Afghanistan, AP reported on 30 January. Dutch policymakers have wavered over their December decision to send up to 1,400 troops as part of an expanded NATO force in Afghanistan, where U.S. troops are withdrawing as the neo-Taliban insurgency is picking up.

Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, addressing the Dutch parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, said Afghanistan is making progress in terms of stability but still needs help. "You should be proud of your contribution because it is a success story," said Abdullah, who pleaded for further Dutch support of NATO operations. "But the story is not over." Abdullah stopped in The Hague on his way to London's two-day donor conference on Afghanistan. MR

Dutch Debate on Afghan Force Is Test for NATO - By Molly Moore Washington Post Foreign February 2, 2006

THE HAGUE, Feb. 1 -- To Dutch lawmaker Bert Bakker, a plan to send 1,700 of his country's soldiers into one of Afghanistan's most dangerous provinces looks like an operation "with a high risk of exploding in our face."

He fears Dutch soldiers being tarred like American troops for sending captives off to secret prisons, he said in an interview. He worries that the Afghan mission could agitate restive Muslim immigrants at home. And he is convinced his country's soldiers are being dispatched on a mission impossible.

On Thursday, Bakker will lead a fight in the divided Dutch parliament to keep his country's troops out of the force that NATO plans for southern Afghanistan.

An overwhelming defeat in parliament could bring down the Netherlands' coalition government. But the debate is more than a Dutch political brawl; it has become a test of the transatlantic alliance's efforts to find new missions and credibility in the post-Cold War era, and a referendum on President Bush's war against terrorism.

U.S. officials consider the vote a crucial measure of allies' willingness to share the risks and costs of stabilizing troubled nations and combating terrorism.

"It has been a long debate, but I think there's a growing awareness in both the public and the parliament about how important this mission is not only for Afghanistan but for NATO and all of us," said Chat Blakeman, charge d'affaires at the U.S. Embassy here.

"If NATO takes itself seriously, we need to be an organization that's relevant," said Gen. Dick Berlijn, the Netherlands' top military commander. "We need to be able to respond quickly to any crisis without 1 1/2 years of long debates."

In London, delegates from nearly 70 nations and international bodies pledged $10.5 billion to help Afghanistan fight poverty, improve security and crack down on the drug trade, officials said at the end of a two-day conference on the nation's future, the Associated Press reported.

The Dutch debate comes as NATO is attempting to assemble a new rapid-reaction force drawn from member nations for deployment to international trouble spots.

In signs of the importance of the Dutch decision, high-level lobbyists came calling in The Hague this week: U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan met with Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende. U.S. Marine Gen. James L. Jones, the top NATO military officer, met with members of parliament in a closed session. Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah and Defense Minister Rahim Wardak were among a score of witnesses Monday at a day-long hearing before a key parliamentary committee.

Senior Dutch government officials who favor participation in the NATO mission were encouraged Wednesday when the leader of the country's biggest opposition party, the Labor Party, hinted that he was softening his opposition to the deployment.

NATO has about 9,000 troops in Afghanistan, operating as the International Security Assistance Force. Most are in relatively stable northern and western areas of the country, where they conduct peacekeeping patrols and take part in reconstruction. Now the alliance is proposing to send 6,000 additional soldiers to parts of the south where the Taliban and al Qaeda insurgency is focused.

The plan is for those troops to operate separately from the primarily U.S. combat units fighting in Uruzgan and other southern provinces under the name Operation Enduring Freedom. More than 250 Dutch special forces personnel now work with American counterparts fighting insurgents.

If the deployment is approved, the Netherlands would send 1,500 to 1,700 troops for the NATO mission. That would include the forces who would take part in reconstruction projects, as well as airmen and crews for Apache helicopters and F-16 fighter jets assigned to help protect the reconstruction teams.

British, Canadian and Australian forces are also scheduled to participate in the NATO-led reconstruction effort in southern Afghanistan.

As the Netherlands debates the proposal, suicide bombings and other attacks have rocked rugged Uruzgan province, where Dutch troops would be deployed. It is a stronghold of the Taliban and the home ground of its leader, Mohammad Omar.

Critics of the mission say that even if the Dutch force's primary mission is reconstruction -- the building of schools and digging of wells -- it will inevitably be drawn into combat with the insurgents.

Opponents also express concern that Afghans will not make a distinction between U.S. forces fighting Taliban insurgents and NATO troops whose primary mission is meant to be humanitarian.

"The two operations will always be blurred," said Bakker, a leader in the left-of-center D66 party, which is part of the governing coalition but opposes the deployment.

"There were some unfortunate incidents," said Berlijn, the Dutch military chief, referring to abuses of prisoners at U.S.-run prisons at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in Afghanistan and Iraq. "We all have to deal with some of that negative fallout." But he added, "If we don't join the operation, it will give the Taliban another year to regenerate."

Dutch officials have imposed major conditions for taking part in the operation: No prisoners captured by Dutch soldiers would be sent to Guantanamo Bay, and Uruzgan Gov. Jan Mohammed Khan would be removed from office. Dutch officials allege that Khan, a militia leader, is corrupt and an obstacle to security.

Abdullah, the Afghan foreign minister, said here Monday that Afghanistan has agreed to the demands concerning prisoners. During the parliamentary hearing, however, Afghan officials provided no specific answer about Khan.

The Dutch debate is driven as much by internal politics as international military concerns. A majority of Dutch citizens oppose the deployment, according to opinion polls, though the gap has narrowed slightly in recent weeks.

The Dutch government and military remain in the shadow of the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, where in 1995 lightly armed Dutch troops acting as U.N. peacekeepers stood by as Bosnian Serb forces rounded up and massacred as many as 8,000 Muslim men and boys.

The Dutch government collapsed over the ensuing scandal, and subsequent governments enacted laws that encourage the kind of debates now underway over Afghanistan.

As the Netherlands approaches elections in 2007, Bakker's D66 party has led the opposition to the deployment. "It's a mixture of concern and party politics," said Rudy Andeweg, a political scientist at the Netherlands' Leiden University. "The party needs to do something to attract attention."

At various points in the debate, D66 has threatened to pull out of the government if it sends additional troops to Afghanistan. The loss of the coalition member could force the government's collapse.

New Afghan Islamic school to counter 'foreign extremism' – Jan. 25, 2006

KABUL  --   President Hamid Karzai laid the cornerstone on Tuesday for an ambitious new Islamic studies institute intended to keep Afghan religious students from studying abroad in schools influenced by extremists.

Karzai said that his government had decided on the project to the teach "real Islam" after hundreds of people inside and outside the country urged him to free Afghan religious students from foreign influence.

Thousands of Afghan youths study in religious schools, known as madrassas, in neighboring Iran and Pakistan where it is believed that they are influenced by Islamic extremists and convinced that they should join a "holy war" against the US-backed government that replaced the hardline Taliban.

"They asked me to provide Islamic education facilities in Afghanistan to teach real Islam and not as it is now [that is] used against our country and destroys their lives and their country," Karzai said.

"If Afghanistan trains its students outside because it does not have expertise and facilities for training doctors, engineers, economists and others, it is ok.

"But we have great religious scholars to train religious students," he said.

The president's chief of staff, Jawid Ludin, told reporters that the school would "teach Islamic studies in Afghanistan and limit and avoid extremists using religious students who study in neighboring countries".

Funded by the United Arab Emirates, the institute, named Sayed Jamaludin Islamic Studies Society after a famous Afghan scholar, will be built on a 4,200 square-meter (45,000 square-foot) campus.

Afghanistan has also completed an Arabic language studies center and is planning the country's first-ever Islamic studies university, education minister Noor Mohammad Qarqeen said.

Millions of Afghans fled to neighboring Pakistan after the 1979 Soviet invasion. Thousands studied in Pakistan religious schools, from where the ultraconservative Taliban emerged in the early 1990s.

The Taliban rose to control most of Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, when it was removed in a US-led campaign for refusing to surrender Osama Bin Laden, head of the Al Qaeda network.

Polio Eradicated In Two More Countries, But Not Afghanistan - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

February 1 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Polio has been stamped out in two more African countries Egypt and Niger leaving just four nations in the world where the deadly disease is still circulating. The World Health Organization, or WHO, said today the polio virus is still classified as endemic in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, and Nigeria.

WHO said the success in Egypt and Niger was the result of intense efforts to halt Africa's epidemic by speeding up the introduction of new vaccines into affected areas. A full year must pass without any new detection of the virus in a country before the WHO can declare it free of the disease, which can cause irreversible paralysis in a child within hours.

AFGHAN REFUGEES CONCERNED OVER CAMP CLOSURES IN PAKISTAN

QUETTA, Feb 2 Asia Pulse - Refugees expressed concern on Wednesday over the Pakistani government's decision to close two Afghan camps in Balochistan by the end of March. The authorities were determined to close the 20-year-old Gardi Zangal and Pir Alizi camps and had directed the refugees to leave the residential area by end of March.

Haji Toor Gul, a refugee at the Pir Alizi camp, told Pajhwok Afghan News the current decision would destroy their lives. "The Afghans living here are very poor and they have started small business around that would be damaged with their departing," he added. Another Afghan Haji Amanullah said very few refugees who had money would move to cities and would hire homes there, but those who had just started their business here had no other option but to stay.

In charge of the Afghan refugees at the Afghan consulate in Balochistan Imdadullah said they had talked with the representatives of the Afghan refugees in this regard. They would help the Afghans who wanted to shift back to Afghanistan or other places in Pakistan.

"We will first persuade the refugees to return to Afghanistan, as most of them cannot afford to live in the urban areas of Balochistan," he added. Those who didn't want to return home would be transferred to Mohammad Khel camp, he contended.

Officials of the UN Higher Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) said they would provide transport, food and potable water for those who want to go home. The Pakistani government has already closed two Afghan refugee camps in the North West Frontier Province. (Pajhwok Afghan News)

Afghan President to Visit Pakistan

ISLAMABAD, Feb 2 Asia Pulse - Pakistan's Foreign Ministry Wednesday announced that Afghan President Hamid Karzai would arrive in Islamabad on February 16. A statement released from the ministry said Karzai would be visiting Pakistan on an invitation extended by his counterpart Pervez Musharraf.

"This will be the first visit of President Hamid Karzai since the completion of Bonn process and opening of the new five-year reconstruction plan for Afghanistan," said the statement quoting Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri.

He said the two countries had exchanged a number of high-level delegations in the past which had strengthened the bilateral ties. He said Pakistan had offered to train Afghan military. Regarding the reconstruction of Afghanistan, Kasuri said his country had provided US$200 million so far. Trade between the two countries had reached $1.2 billion in 2005.

An official of the Foreign Ministry told Pajhwok Afghan News formal announcement of the visit would be made by Foreign Office spokesperson during her weekly briefing. Meanwhile, Press Attach at Pakistan's Embassy in Kabul Naeem Khan confirmed the visit but said its formal announcement would be made in a few days. (Pajhwok Afghan News)

'Open for Business' - By OMAR ZAKHILWAL and DON RITTER January 31, 2006 - WSJ

LONDON -- The gathering of donor nations for Afghanistan this week in London is all about securing the emerging nation's progress. However, yesterday's event, which brought together private businessmen and investors with the donor nations, might actually hold the real key to sustaining peace and stability in this country.

Although Afghanistan has come a long way since 9/11, a number of outstanding challenges still loom large. Most of these reflect the gap between political progress and progress in providing a better life for the people. Tangible peace dividends such as more jobs, housing, a decent diet, education and health care are not achievable over the longer term without an economy that produces its own wealth. And that wealth must be produced in a non-opium economy. Counter-narcotics efforts can only succeed if legitimate jobs and business opportunities can compete with poppy cultivation.

While economic policies are the final responsibility of the Afghan government, advice, capacity-building and technical assistance from the international community can help to establish favorable conditions for the development of a private-sector economy. Strong pro-market, pro-investment economic policies can be advanced by donors and Afghans alike. We do not have the luxury of time and need to get it right the first time.

With the creation of the Afghan Investment Support Agency, for instance, the government has taken a giant leap in the right direction. This "one-stop shop for investors" has eliminated the more than 30 separate bureaucratic steps that were previously necessary to get a company started. All this red tape of course contained a lot of potential for corruption and delay at every turn.

But much more needs to be done. Institutional transformation is still needed in key government bureaucracies to make them relevant to a modern economy. This would require new blood with needed skills and training and education for key employees. To attract and keep quality staff, some salaries will have to go up, while the government must trim excess personnel.

Afghanistan is a landlocked country but trade can make it a land bridge, or better yet, a hub for the vast Central Asian and South Asian markets. So far, the international community has performed well in investing in the transportation sector. But even to return to pre-conflict levels requires sustained financial commitment.

The unreliable supply of electricity is another problem for production and job creation in Afghanistan. Yet it is also an area of opportunity for donor nation investments, both public and private. The economy cannot be modernized and a better life for the people achieved without electricity. How to sharply increase electric power production looms high on the priority lists here.

Beyond deficits in transportation and electricity, we believe that the media-driven perception of the situation inside Afghanistan is another major hurdle to economic progress in this country. The risk perception is overblown and desperately needs correction. The markedly different experiences of business people who invest and work every day in most of Afghanistan need to get out to the public to attract more investors.

There are plenty of opportunities. The government is developing industrial parks and, where there were none only a few years ago, one can now find more than a dozen banks in the country. Target sectors include construction materials and mining, agro-processing, carpets and textiles, logistics and transportation (including packaging) and energy and mining.

It is about time for the international community to consider financing private sector projects just as important as financing public sector projects. Donors should also help connect Afghanistan's economic and business interests with those in their own country. This means assisting in a kind of "matchmaking" where foreign business people and investors can meet up Afghans.

In the words of Afghan President Hamid Karzai: "if you are an entrepreneur with a vision for exploring untapped opportunities, Afghanistan is open for business."

Mr. Zakhilwal is president and CEO of the Afghanistan Investment Support Agency. Mr. Ritter is a former U.S. congressman, investor in Afghanistan and senior advisor to the Afghan International Chamber of Commerce .

Afghan detainee free after six-year struggle (Sydney Morning Herald Feb. 2)

THE country's longest-held immigration detainee has been released from Villawood detention centre almost four months after he was cleared of war crimes allegations. The former Afghan diplomat Naqib Ahmed Noori, 47, was released on Tuesday night after six years and four months of incarceration.

Last week the Herald revealed his release had been delayed by the Department of Immigration despite Mr Noori having won all legal appeals against the Government's refusal to give him a visa. Mr Noori's lawyer, Mark Vincent, said he had been released at 8.15pm on Tuesday.

"He was absolutely delighted. He was ecstatic. His family were there to meet him and there were lots of tears and all round," Mr Vincent said. "Even the Villawood staff were wishing him well as they were unlocking the padlocks to let him out." Mr Noori returned to his home in Liverpool and spent yesterday with his family, Mr Vincent said.

"His wife drove him home with the children and this morning he walked the children to school and now he's having some time with his wife."

Mr Noori had been accused by Afghans in Australia of having tortured civilians as a senior member of the country's communist secret police, but won his long legal battle in his fifth court case in October.

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal found it was a case of mistaken identity, and the claim that he was a war criminal - which gave the Immigration Department grounds for refusing a protection visa - was wrong.

A spokesman for the Department of Immigration, Sandi Logan, said yesterday that Mr Noori's release had been held up by police and security checks.

Not Much Limelight for Afghan Actresses - By Gawhar Naikpai, IWPR-30. Jan.2006

Sadaf, 14, is a little girl with a big dream. "I would like to become a filmstar one day,” said the eighth grader at Rabia-e-Balkhi school in Kabul.
Although there are some job openings these days, there are few real opportunities for Sadaf to pursue her chosen career.

In conservative Afghanistan, acting is seen as a shameful career choice, especially for women. Would-be actresses have to run a gauntlet of disapproving friends and relations to practice their craft.

Parwin Moshtael, 40, a prominent Afghan actress, said she chose her career because she wanted "a chance to reflect the pains and sorrows of Afghan women”. But some members of her family have yet to reconcile themselves to hr decision.

Moshtael recalls how she was living with her married sister when she entered the acting profession. “My sister’s husband wouldn't even speak to me,” she said, adding that he warned her not to come home unless she wore a burqa to conceal herself from the neighbours.

“He used a lot of very bad words about actresses,” she said. One night, when she did not arrive home until nine because she had been appearing in a show, her brother-in-law locked her out of the house. “I moved out after that. Now I can't see my sister at all,” said Moshtael.

Some blame this kind of attitude on the Taleban, who not only imposed severe restrictions on women but outlawed most forms of entertainment as well. “The negative influences of the Taleban are still in people’s minds," said Abdul Latif Ahmadi, the head of the Afghan national film studio and a well-known director. "But we didn't have this problem at all in the Seventies."

Some religious leaders continue to oppose the idea of female actors. Abdul Qadir, who holds the title of “maulawi”, a high-ranking religious leader, and is also a member of Afghanistan’s Supreme Court, says Islamc precepts prohibit women from performing.

“Islam orders women to cover themselves with a veil,” he said. “So there is no way a woman can appear in movies or go out without this hijab, this covering.” Maulawi Ziaudin, who works in the Ministry of Haj, takes an even stronger view, saying, “Singing and song are corruption; the Prophet said that it is blasphemy to enjoy music. Based on this, women are not allowed to go on the stage or screen.”

Such attitudes may explain why producers and directors have sometimes had to resort to desperate measures when staging a production. Zalmai Noori, an actor on Afghan National Television, said he was required to disguise himself as a woman when no actress could be found to take a part.

“In the TV drama 'Taqarori' [Employment] the part called for a woman. We couldn't find an actress, so I had to play the part dressed as a woman. The next day I received a lot of insults because of this,” he said. At least one director gives some credence to the conservatives’ concerns about women joining the acting profession.

“I have to admit that the cinema did not always have a good reputation or environment,” said Mohammad Seddiq Barmak, director of the internationally acclaimed film “Osama”. “I must be frank – many men in the movie business exploited the actresses. The women were just objects for men’s lust.”

Latif bristles at such charges. “I categorically deny that Afghan cinema was polluted in such a manner,” he said. “Afghanistan’s cinema has always had a special purity.”

Saba Sahar, the head of Saba Film Studio who is not only an actress but also a police officer, agrees with Latif. “I have been in theatre and cinema for over 20 years and I have never seen anything bad in it,” she said. “The cinema and the theatre are sacred. I kiss the ground the theatre stands on. How could this environment be polluted?”

What the industry needs, said Sahar, is an aggressive information campaign by the film-makers' union. “This is the only way we will get families to allow their daughters to appear in movies,” said Sahar.

Those women who have braved censure and shame to become actresses do not seem to regret their choice. “Society needs actresses in the same way it needs female doctors, engineers and teachers,” said Breshna Bahar, who began her career after the fall of the Taleban.

Bahar has become extremely popular in Afghanistan due to her frequent appearances on television and the big screen. “I always wear a burqa when I go to the bazaar, otherwise people surround me and bother me,” she said. “I can never go to a public bath.”

Bahar said children follow her on the street, calling her by the name of various heroines she has played. “I don't really mind,” she laughed. “It's a sign of people’s respect for me.”

Still, it will take a lot of convincing to get some people to agree to women becoming actors. Abdul Tawab, 16, in the tenth grade at the Isteqlal High School, said that he would never let anyone in his family play a role in a movie. “Women were created to be at home, not for show,” he said.
Gawhar Naikpai is a freelance journalist in Kabul

[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.]