In this bulletin:

• Afghan blasts kill 13 people, including NATO soldier
• Afghan bomb kills six Canadians – BBC
• German Man, Translator Freed in Afghanistan
• Taliban adopt deadly Iraqi tactics
• Dion wants Afghanistan mission to end in 2009
• Military deaths raise questions about Canada’s Afghan mission
• Layton wants byelections to focus on Afghan mission
• Jonathan Kay on Afghanistan, our six dead, and Jack Layton's disgraceful response
• Hundreds of families displaced by floods, livelihoods lost
• Afghan village balances life between warring sides
• Two-Tier Afghan Forces Envisioned
• Kunduz custom revenue more than doubles
• Tajikistan asks NATO to help with Tajik-Afghan border protection
• Turkey to contribute to Afghan judiciary
• New clashes at Pakistan mosque despite surrender call
• Afghanistan’s media mavericks
• Americans celebrate July 4 with Afghan twist
• When love turns ugly
• US to hunt the Taliban inside Pakistan
• The Pakistan Time Bomb

Afghan blasts kill 13 people, including NATO soldier

Kandahar (AFP) - A suicide attacker blew himself up at a police gathering in southern Afghanistan, killing nine people including a boy, while a NATO force soldier died in a separate blast.

The two attacks occurred as a German national and his driver abducted a week ago in the southwest of the country were released, officials said, but the extremist Taliban denied being responsible for their capture.

The suicide attack blew off the ceiling of a room at the highway police command in the southern town of Spin Boldak, near the border with Pakistan, where a lunch was being held to welcome a new district police chief.

"Police were eating lunch when a suicide attacker entered the room and detonated himself," said police officer Bismullah Khan from the scene.

The highway police commander, Lal Jan, was killed along with his 12-year-old son and seven others, most of them policemen, southern Kandahar provincial police chief Sayed Aqa Saqib said.

The new Spin Boldak district police chief, the area's criminal investigation police head and district attorney were among 11 wounded, he said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but similar attacks have been carried out by the Taliban movement, which launched an insurgency soon after being driven from power by a US-led coalition in late 2001.

The insurgents did however say they were behind Thursday's bombing that killed a soldier with NATO's International Security Assistance Force in the southeastern province of Paktika.

Two other ISAF soldiers were wounded when a bomb hit their vehicle, the 37-country force said, without releasing the nationalities of the casualties.

The attack took to 106 the number of foreign soldiers killed in Afghanistan this year, most of them in combat.

It came a day after six Canadian troops and a translator were killed in a similar blast in Kandahar, where the Al-Qaeda-backed Taliban took up arms in the early 1990s and seized power in 1996.

In a third attack Thursday, a roadside bomb struck a vehicle in northeast Kunar province, leaving dead a civilian woman and two men and wounding two other people, including a nine-month-old baby, police said.

The German foreign ministry said, meanwhile, the freed German national and his translator were handed over to ISAF.

"He was freed with the help of police, he is in good health," interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told AFP of the German national without providing details.

The two men went missing last Thursday while driving on the main highway that links Kandahar city to Herat in the west. Afghan officials said they were abducted in southwestern Farah province.

"I cannot tell you who had kidnapped them but it was an abduction," Bashary said.

The governor of Farah, Ghulam Mohaidin Baluch, said earlier Thursday the abductors, who he said were Taliban, had told elders they would release the German for 40,000 dollars.

But the Taliban denied involvement. "This is not our work," spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP. "This could be the work of criminal groups who kidnap for money."

The men were captured near where two French aid workers and three of their Afghan colleagues were abducted in April and held by Taliban for several weeks before being released in stages.

The Taliban have beheaded several of their captives in an insurgency that has grown steadily over the years, despite the boosting of the number of mostly Western troops here to about 50,000 at present.

Afghan bomb kills six Canadians – BBC

Six Canadian Nato soldiers and their Afghan translator have been killed by a bomb blast in southern Afghanistan, military officials have said.

The seven died when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb in the southern province of Kandahar. The blast was the deadliest attack against Nato forces since six Canadian soldiers were killed on 8 April.

A total of 66 Canadian soldiers and a diplomat have died since the country sent troops to Afghanistan in 2002. "Clearly, they have managed to kill six great young Canadians today, which is an absolute tragedy," said Canadian Brig Gen Tim Grant.

The bomb struck a vehicle travelling as part of a convoy south-west of the city of Kandahar.

British, Canadian and Dutch troops operate in the volatile southern province which was the birthplace of the Taleban and remains a stronghold for their forces.

The BBC's Charles Haviland, in central Afghanistan, says at least 30 Taleban fighters were killed in clashes with International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) troops earlier this week according to the city's governor, although Isaf has not confirmed the figures.

Correspondents say that fighting in recent months has been among the most violent since US-led troops overthrew the Taleban in 2001. More than 100 foreign soldiers have died in Afghanistan so far this year, mainly in combat.

German Man, Translator Freed in Afghanistan

By VOA News - 05 July 2007

Afghanistan's Interior Ministry says a German national and his Afghan translator who were abducted in southwestern Afghanistan have both been freed.

The two men went missing last week. It is not clear why they were kidnapped. German officials say the man was not working for the German government, a relief agency or the media.

Elsewhere, officials in southern Afghanistan say a suicide bomber has blown himself up at a checkpoint in the town of Spin Boldak Thursday killing five police officers.

On Wednesday, six Canadian soldiers and an Afghan interpreter were killed by a roadside bomb, also in southern Afghanistan. Canada has about 2,500 troops in Afghanistan as part of a NATO force. The Canadian mission ends in February 2009.

Taliban adopt deadly Iraqi tactics

6 Canadian soldiers and interpreter die as insurgents use powerful bomb against Canada's strongest troop carrier

GRAEME SMITH - From Thursday's Globe and Mail July 5, 2007 - KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Six Canadian soldiers and their interpreter died yesterday as the Taliban continued to launch bold attacks inside zones considered mostly pacified, shifting their tactics toward the kind of bombings that have proved devastating in Iraq.

About a dozen military vehicles, Canadian and Afghan, were driving west along a gravel road after finishing a search of a village about 20 kilometres southwest of Kandahar city, when a powerful bomb detonated at 11 a.m. local time.

The explosion engulfed an RG-31 Nyala troop carrier, a vehicle manufactured in South Africa and specifically designed with a boat-like hull to withstand mine blasts. It's the Canadians' strongest vehicle against roadside bombs, but the insurgents have recently been wiring up bigger caches of ordnance and more sophisticated-shaped charges into their so-called improvised explosive devices, breaking through even the best armour.

"We're not perfect and we do miss some, as we have seen today," said Brigadier-General Tim Grant, the top Canadian commander in Afghanistan. "But the battle against the Taliban and the battle against their choice of weapons, IED, is successful."

This year, 19 Canadian soldiers have been killed by IEDs, and only one has died under direct fire from insurgents. In total, 66 Canadians and one diplomat have been killed in Afghanistan since 2002.

The Taliban's increasing use of roadside bombs has also taken a toll on civilians, Brig.-Gen. Grant said. "They have managed to kill six great young Canadians today, which is an absolute tragedy," he said. "The other part of this is that they're killing lots of Afghans. They're attacking the weak, they're killing women, they're killing children, they're killing policemen. These are not the tactics of anything other than terrorists."

Such terrorism has proven effective, however. Police in Kandahar reported 13 officers killed and 14 sent to hospital during a single week last month. Seven more Afghan police died in a roadside bombing in nearby Zhari district on Monday. Humanitarian workers say their operations have been squeezed by the increasing dangers in districts outside Kandahar city.

Asked whether this represents an "Iraqization" of the conflict, Lieutenant-Colonel Jean Trudel, who serves as chief of staff for the Canadian headquarters in Kandahar, shook his head.

"Not particularly," he said. "It indicates a loss of control by the insurgents."

Canadian troops faced insurgents in the farmland southwest of Kandahar city last year in the largest battles Afghanistan has witnessed since the collapse of the Taliban regime. Those fights have taught the Taliban that it's fruitless to openly confront the Canadians, Lt.-Col. Trudel said.

"The fact that we've lost a lot of soldiers from IED attacks indicates a success, in the sense that our conventional operations have succeeded against the Taliban," the chief of staff said.

The identities of four of the dead soldiers were released late yesterday afternoon. They are: Corporal Cole Bartsch; Captain Matthew Johnathan Dawe; and Private Lane Watkins, all of 3rd Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry based in Edmonton; and Master Corporal Colin Bason, a reservist from The Royal Westminster Regiment based in New Westminster, B.C.

On Wednesday morning, the identity of another dead soldier was released: Corporal Jordan Anderson, 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.

At the time of the blast, the military convoy was about 1½ kilometres southwest of the village of Salavat, returning from a mission as part of Operation Luger, a cordon search for suspected insurgents. Military officials described the mission as led by Afghan troops, but house searches remain highly unpopular with conservative Afghans. Homeowners frequently accuse Afghan forces of stealing during their searches.

"It was a cordon and search operation that we conducted," Brig.-Gen. Grant said. "They had gone into a small village. Our intelligence had pointed us in the direction to determine if there were Taliban operating in that area."

Dusty flatlands and rocky outcrops southwest of Kandahar form the eastern edge of Panjwai district, which the military believes it pacified months ago. The Afghan government's main representative in the area, a provincial councillor named Haji Aga Lalai, fled the district with his family last summer. He hasn't yet moved back, but a district shura, or council of elders, was re-established this spring and Canada's Provincial Reconstruction Team has poured money and projects into the area. The northeastern corner of the district is dominated by the Alokozai tribe, an ally of the government.

"Our assessment still is that this part of Afghanistan, the Panjwai area, is one of the safer areas in the province," Brig.-Gen. Grant said.

"Its neighbouring district, Zhari, is not as safe and we know we have security problems in that area." The provincial government said 33 Taliban were killed in pitched battles that swept through Zhari district earlier this week.

"Panjwai, though, is an area we are comfortable travelling in," Brig.-Gen. Grant said. "We have great relationships with the local elders, the district leadership and the people on the ground. While this is an area the Taliban operate in, they do not operate freely."

Dion wants Afghanistan mission to end in 2009

Updated Wed. Jul. 4 2007 - CTV.ca News Staff

Opposition leaders expressed serious misgivings about Canada's Afghanistan mission on Wednesday, after reports emerged that six soldiers had died in a roadside bomb explosion.

"The prime minister has said that he needs to have a consensus in order to extend the mission beyond February of 2009," said Liberal Leader Stephane Dion. "This consensus will never exist.

"You know what is the views of the other parties and what is the view of the official Opposition. So the prime minister should say that right away. "It should have been done weeks ago."

In an earlier press conference, NDP Leader Jack Layton urged Prime Minister Stephen Harper to do what Canada is best known for -- initiating a peace process that will not only help stabilize the region but will also help scale back the military operations in Afghanistan.

"A comprehensive peace process must include all combatants, all elements, all countries involved in the region with international leadership," Layton said in Ottawa.

"Canada is an expert in this area. We used to be known globally for our expertise in this area. I believe it's time for Canada to get back on that path and begin to carve out with those many nations who are concerned about what is happening in Afghanistan, and Afghan leadership, to adopt a new strategy."

Since 2002, 66 Canadian military personnel have lost their lives in Afghanistan, along with one diplomat.

The six Canadian soldiers who died Wednesday were killed by a roadside bomb 20 kilometres from Kandahar. They were traveling in a RG-31 Nyala armoured vehicle with an Afghan interpreter when they were hit. The interpreter was also killed.

Retired Maj.-Gen. Lewis MacKenzie said that casualties must be accepted if Canada believes in the importance of the Afghanistan mission.

But he added that unless NATO offers Canada more support in southern Afghanistan, the chaotic region where Canadian troops have endured much of the fighting, then the mission should not be extended.

"If NATO doesn't get off its butt and countries that aren't participating don't start showing up in numbers, and start increasing the number of troops in the south ... then I won't be at the head of the line in 2009 saying we should stay," he told CTV Newsnet.

Layton said Canada should not be focusing on military operations at all, because the fighting is only fueling Taliban support and civilians are paying for it. So far, 270 Afghan civilians have been killed during the military operations.

If Canada doesn't start implementing peace instead, Canadians could be stuck in an extended role in Afghanistan that is escalating day by day, he continued.

"What is happening now is working for the Taliban, not against them," he said. "In other words, we're seeing growth of support of the Taliban because of these airstrikes, the escalation of war and the death of civilians. That's why comprehensive peace process involving all of the countries, involving all of the players has got to be initiated."

The Afghan mission will be a priority issue for the NDP in the next federal election, Layton promised.

"Any time Canadian soldiers are killed, Canadians are thinking of their families and comrades and supporting our troops," said Layton when asked about the latest casualties.

"This simply underlines, with this escalating death toll of the soldiers and of civilians in Afghanistan, that this mission is going in the wrong way."

With a report by The Canadian Press

Military deaths raise questions about Canada’s Afghan mission

CanWest News Service , Wednesday, July 04, 2007

OTTAWA -- How many is too many? That is a question Canadians are asking themselves in the aftermath of six more soldiers' deaths in Afghanistan on Wednesday. Sixty-six soldiers and one diplomat have now died since the boot of a regular Canadian soldier first touched Afghan soil in early 2002.

So, with all this carnage, is it time to bring the troops home?

Canadian politicians are asking themselves that question, too, and while the answers may vary depending on the colour of their party stripes, all of the country's political combatants are united by one imperative: How their stand on the war in Afghanistan translates into votes at home.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper wants Parliament to reach a consensus on whether to extend the mission beyond February, 2009, the Liberals want NATO put on notice that Canada is done with combat operations by then, the NDP wants Canada's 2,500 troops brought home immediately, and the Bloc Quebecois is vaguely calling for a "recalibration" of the mission's focus from combat operations to development.

As news of the deaths of six more Canadians was emerging Wednesday, NDP Leader Jack Layton was already making a political pitch about the war in Afghanistan. With byelections looming in five ridings -- including three in traditionally war-weary Quebec -- Layton positioned those votes as a referendum on the Afghan mission.

"The choice is going to be very clear: They can vote for parties that got us into this mission, extended the mission or who want it to go on for another two years, or they can vote for the NDP," Layton said.

Layton is playing a cynical brand of domestic politics on the backs of Canadian soldiers by putting forth the "rather foolish and unsupportable" premise that Canada could walk away from its 25 NATO allies and 11 other international partners in Afghanistan without serious long-term consequences, said Douglas Bland, chair of the defence management studies program at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

Bland said the Taliban insurgency is aware of the ambivalence within Canada, and that "reckless people" like Layton are playing to it for partisan purposes. The insurgents, he said, are emboldened to attack Canadian soldiers to weaken the country's resolve.

"I think Mr. Layton is attempting to create an anti-war issue. He's trying to create a situation that will get him some support and some votes. Obviously that's why he's talking about Quebec, with the troops going over."

The Royal 22nd Regiment from Valcartier, Que., begins its deployment of 2,000 troops to Kandahar later this month.

On Wednesday, Liberal Leader Stephane Dion reiterated his party's latest position on Afghanistan - that Canada should immediately serve notice to NATO of its intention to withdraw from combat operations by February 2009, so that the alliance has time to find a replacement country.

Dion criticized Harper over his decision in May, 2006, to call a snap debate on extending the mission to February 2009. Dion voted against the extension, as did three-quarters of the Liberal caucus. But the two-dozen Liberals who supported the extension enabled the motion to pass. The exposure of divisions among Liberals left Harper looking decisive.

In fact, there was no need for the vote: Canadian prime ministers don't need the permission of Parliament to send troops to war, sign treaties or conduct any other foreign policy business.

"I think the prime minister tried to have [it] both ways," said Dion. "Traditionally it's a decision of the executive, where to send the troops."

Dion said last year's six-hour debate pales in comparison to the months of thoughtful consideration that occurred in the Dutch parliament before it approved its deployment of 2,000 soldiers to southern Afghanistan last year.

"You don't take this kind of decision in six hours, unless you have an emergency," he said. "But there was no emergency."

Still, Dion said he welcomes Harper's decision to hold a further debate on extending the mission beyond February 2009 and to seek a consensus within Parliament. He argues that by that time, Canada will have been on the front lines of heavy fighting for three years, and can walk away, head held high, with little negative impact on its NATO membership or international standing.

Bland disagrees. "That would be the termination of our NATO alliance," he said.

As for the Conservatives, Bland says they are not doing enough to explain to Canadians that there is a credible end game to the mission -training enough Afghan soldiers and police to provide their own security so that international troops can leave.

"They need to get out there and say that more clearly to people because it seems to be a reasonable strategy."

Layton wants byelections to focus on Afghan mission

CanWest News Service , Wednesday, July 04, 2007

OTTAWA - NDP Leader Jack Layton wants the upcoming yelections in five Canadian ridings to be a referendum on Canada's military involvement in Afghanistan.

Layton urged Canadians to vote for the NDP because he said it is the only federal political party that is opposed to the deployment of the country's 2,500 soldiers in Afghanistan.

Layton said the military mission in Afghanistan is a failure because too many civilians are being killed and the Taliban is growing in strength.

"Today I'm calling on the prime minister to take a leadership role and to add Canada's voice in telling both the Bush administration and the North Atlantic council of NATO that the level of Afghan civilian deaths is unacceptable and that indiscriminate and deadly air strikes have to be stopped," Layton told a press conference in Ottawa.

The issue of civilian deaths dominated the agenda at an international conference on governance in Afghanistan held in Rome earlier this week.

Layton said Prime Minister Stephen Harper is not helping to build the conditions for lasting peace in Afghanistan. "He's fueling the conditions for an escalating war," Layton said. "That's not what Canadians want."

Layton predicted that Canada's involvement in Afghanistan will be an election issue the next time voters go to the polls, which for some Canadians could be this fall in the five byelections.

"The choice is going to be very clear. They can vote for parties that got us into this mission, extended the mission or who want it to go on for another two years, or they can vote for the NDP," said Layton.

The NDP has said for months that it does not want to see Canada's troops fighting a combat mission in southern Afghanistan and holds the position that Canada should focus its efforts on reconstruction and development.

During a press conference on Parliament Hill, Layton did not provide specific details of how a "de-escalation" of the military mission could be achieved without allowing Afghanistan to fall back under the control of the oppressive Taliban regime.

Jonathan Kay on Afghanistan, our six dead, and Jack Layton's disgraceful response

National Post – 07.05.07: Jack Layton didn't waste any time in handing the Taliban a propaganda victory yesterday. No sooner did news reach Canadians shores about the death of six of our soldiers than the NDP leader again urged an end to Canadian military operations in Afghanistan. Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, Mr. Layton declared that "This simply underlines, with this escalating death toll of the soldiers and of civilians in Afghanistan, that this mission is going in the wrong way."

Mr. Layton symbolizes why the West may just lose the battle against militant Islam: As soon as our enemies draw blood, he reflexively raises the white flag higher, offering to withdraw from whatever part of the world the jihadis happen to be targeting.

In this respect, Mr. Layton is a sad symbol of what has become of leftist politics: The same bleeding hearts who once urged Western politicians to help the world's poor and afflicted now run for the exits when peacemaking and nation-building turn tough. In the case of Afghanistan, in particular, this defeatism is grimly ironic coming, as it is, from a politician who postures as the champion of gay rights and feminism: But not for the presence of brave NATO troops, the country would fall into the hands of Medieval theocrats who behead homosexuals and treat women like Burka-clad dogs.

The best way to honour the memories of the six fallen Canadians is not by issuing cynical calls to scuttle the mission for which they died. Rather, we must renew our efforts to defeat the Taliban and ensure that Afghanistan does not once again become a base for global terror, as it did in the years leading up to 9/11.

In the short run, this means providing more protection for our troops. NATO soldiers do an outstanding job in combat encounters with Taliban gunmen: When the two sides meet on the battlefield, it is not uncommon for dozens of Taliban to be killed without any friendly casualties. Our troops are far more vulnerable, however, when they travel through the Afghan outback in convoys that can be attacked with suicide bombers or — as was the case yesterday — hidden roadside explosives.

The United States, Netherlands and other NATO countries have countered this Taliban tactic by avoiding the roads as much as possible; instead, they use helicopters to move troops and supplies to forward operating bases. But Canada, having sold its seven twin-rotor Chinooks to the Dutch in 1994, doesn't have any large helicopters in Afghanistan. Our government has ordered 16 new Chinooks — but those won't be available till 2011.

Until those helicopters arrive, Canada must acquire the use of helicopters from other NATO powers. Canadians soldiers are paying with their lives for our lack of air power.

Secondly, NATO must do a better job protecting Afghan civilians. On this issue, we must concede that Mr. Layton has a point: Recent reports suggest that stray NATO bombs are killing more civilians than are the Taliban. As well as being inhumane, this tragic lack of precision discredits NATO's good works in the country, and acts as a recruiting tool for the Taliban.

Thirdly, we must acknowledge that the Taliban are not an independent fighting force, but part of a larger regional Islamist uprising extending into Pakistan and Indian-held Kashmir.

This uprising has been gaining steam since the government of Pakistan signed a series of “peace” deals with insurgents in the country's lawless tribal areas, where many Taliban recruits and munitions originate. A Pakistani Interior Ministry document obtained by The New York Times last week concluded that Pakistan's security forces in North-west Frontier Province, which abuts the badlands on the Afghan border, were being overpowered by the Taliban and allied local militia. Without "swift and decisive action," the rest of Pakistan could be at risk, the authors found.

This grim finding highlights the challenges our troops will continue to face: So long as the Taliban have a safe harbour in neighbouring Pakistan, we will never completely be able to eliminate the scourge of terrorist attacks in Afghanistan. But it also demonstrates how important our mission is: The battle for Afghanistan is not an isolated struggle that the West can take or leave — as Mr. Layton would have Canadians believe. Rather it is part of a critical fight that will determine whether a great swathe of Central Asia is to be ruled by men of the 21 Century — or the 7th.

As Canada mourns, we should not let our sadness distract from this fact. Our soldiers died for a good cause.

Hundreds of families displaced by floods, livelihoods lost

PANJSHIR, 4 July 2007 (IRIN) - Almost a week after floods ravaged eight provinces in Afghanistan 26-28 June, aid agencies have started releasing their assessments of casualties and damage incurred.

According to a preliminary report by the UN Children's Agency (UNICEF), flash floods killed 113 people in six provinces, including six victims in Kabul. "A total of 688 houses have been washed away and 212 others have suffered partial damage," UNICEF said.

Panjshir and Kapisa provinces, in the north of the country, have been the worst affected areas, where floods killed more than 90 people on 28 June, the UN reported.

Afghanistan's National Disasters Management Authority (ANDMA) has described the damage caused by the floods and torrential rain as "disastrous".

"Thousands of hectares of farmland have been destroyed; dams and bridges have been damaged; hundreds of fruit trees have been washed away and many farm animals killed," an ANDMA report said.

UN agencies, government bodies, private foundations and several humanitarian organisations have delivered food and non-food relief items to flood-affected communities in Panjshir, Kapisa and Kunar provinces.

"We have [seen] an impressive humanitarian response to the crisis," said Abdul Matin Adrak, the director of ANDMA, on 4 July. However, people in several other flood-stricken locations have criticised aid bodies for shortcomings and inefficiency.

Some residents of southeastern Paktia Province, displaced by the floods, said they had not received any humanitarian relief for more than a week. Flooding has displaced hundreds of families whose houses are either completely destroyed or damaged.

A substantial number of displaced families now live in tents distributed by the Afghan Red Crescent Society. Others have sought refuge with relatives.

Sitting with his five children and his wife in a 5x3 metre tent in the Sarkano District of eastern Kunar Province, Shah Bahar cried over the loss of his house and property.

"I lost all the earnings of my life…I will not be able to recover what I have lost in the flood," said the 39-year-old man whose grocery shop had also been washed away.

In another affected province, Panjshir, displaced families live in tents set up near their destroyed or damaged houses.

Deedar Shalizai, the governor of Kunar, told IRIN on 4 July that people affected by the floods would require long-term assistance to ease their hardship and enable them to rebuild their livelihoods. "Many people will restart their lives from scratch," said Shalizai.

The government of Afghanistan has approved a bill, according to which families will receive 10,000 Afghani (US$100) for each dead person, ANDMA confirmed.

However, flood victims are unlikely to get government aid to rebuild their livelihoods. "The government may only help rebuild damaged schools, roads and other public properties," the director of ANDMA said.

In Kunar and Panjshir provinces children, who have not gone to school for over a week, play near the tents, now considered their homes.

No outbreaks of waterborne diseases, including diarrhoea, have been reported so far. However, Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health, in collaboration with UNICEF, has decided to distribute water purification tablets and 50,000 Oral Rehydration Salts sachets as a preventive measure.

Afghan village balances life between warring sides

By Nick Allen Jul 5, 2007 - Baylough, Afghanistan (dpa) ­ Afghan children stream from the cluster of tents that serves as the village school while police on a hilltop cover their walk home with an anti-aircraft gun trained down at the surrounding mountain passes and valleys.

It's an extreme measure but sadly necessary in a place where not even the combined efforts of the Afghan government and the US army can guarantee order.

Aware that any government-sponsored development and improvement in the quality of life threatens their influence over communities in the southern Zabul province, Taliban militants previously stopped pupils and destroyed their school books. They have also threatened retribution against families that subscribe to the classes in Pashtu language, mathematics, Islamic studies, reading, writing and drawing.

But still the children come. 'A lot of people had no interest in education before, but now the families are starting to realise its importance,' said school principal Mirza Khan Ali, who organizes classes for 650 kids in and around the village of Baylough.

Important for its bazaar that provides the district with essential goods, Baylough like many villages in this part of Afghanistan is caught between the wrath of the militants and the writ of the authorities in Kabul, which is enforced by the local police and a nearby US base.

The closer to the troops a village is located, the more loyal its inhabitants tend to be, says police chief Bashir Ahmad. But he also cannot help seeing state power as being defined by the 7-kilometre range of the hilltop gun, which occasionally erupts in the direction of insurgents spotted on the rocky landscape.

While absorbing the benefits of this pocket of security, the estimated 500 inhabitants of Baylough seem hesitant to fully embrace their protectors, lest the Taliban regain power.

Memories are still fresh of the abductions, rapes, beatings and plundering that occurred in the area as recently as three years ago, when the Taliban operated freely, in cahoots with local warlords, drug smugglers and a criminal and ruthless police chief that Ahmad replaced.

'We are neither on the side of the Taliban nor the government, we are neutral,' said store owner Abdul Mariam. 'I always stay in the village and don't go outside because its dangerous. If we go out we are afraid the Taliban will kill or kidnap us.'

The acting village elder, Abdul Razaq, sings the praises of the current police chief while asserting that nobody in Baylough has relatives in the Taliban.

The commander of the US base, Lieutenant Sean Westenberg, later raises an eyebrow at the claim, noting that Razaq's brother, who is the incumbent elder, was detained and sent for questioning after he and three other Baylough men were found near the source of a Taliban attack on his troops.

The locals may be painfully strung between the sides but they have to make their choice and stick with it, Westenberg argues. 'I'm sure they hate (the Taliban), they come down from the hills and take their food. But it's never going to change if they keep doing what they are doing,' he said.

Two Afghan government flags flutter on poles at a checkpoint on the edge of Baylough. Beside them farmer Mohammed Naeem stands at the spot where a militant booby-trap set for the police killed his 14-year-old daughter Roza as she was tending his flock of goats and sheep.

'The Taliban don't care about what happened to her,' he says, recalling the day a year ago when he watched his daughter die of her injuries. 'But I think there should be talks with these people so there can be peace and security in the country.'

Meanwhile, police chief Ahmad says education is the key. And he suggests that if people want to help the schools in his district they must send him more ammunition for his anti-aircraft gun. - Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Two-Tier Afghan Forces Envisioned

David Axe | July 05, 2007, Military.com

The South Carolina National Guard general in charge of a training task force in Afghanistan sees native forces evolving into a dual system combining large "static" local police forces and a small, highly mobile national army.

Brigadier General Robert Livingston, commander of Task Force Phoenix with 17 contributing nations, says that the new model for Afghan forces represents a change from previous thinking. "The initial emphasis was on the army, because of the intensity of the combat and the need to protect the border."

During that period, Afghan police were trained "in a central facility then returned to their homes - and not in sufficient quantity to fight the counterinsurgency fight we're fighting now."

As of last year, 60,000 Afghan soldiers and police had been fully trained, according to the Pentagon, compared to the several hundred thousand Iraqi soldiers and police who have been trained since 2003.

Now that the Taliban have mostly given up large scale assaults in favor of smaller surprise incursions and urban suicide bombings, lightly armed but more numerous police are a more useful defense than army formations. The police - which Livingston describes as a "stationary force" - would serve as tripwires for army redeployments. "The army is the mobile reinforcing force."

"Police get intelligence from the people around them," Livingston explains. "That will tell them where Taliban are massing, so we can maneuver in heavier forces - SWAT teams, if you will. The whole key to that piece is getting all the police districts fully operational in their communities so that the community feels comfortable talking to the police on a daily basis."

But the Afghan police aren't yet up to the task. "The emphasis has shifted to the police [but] we have some police districts that are not adequately equipped and not adequately trained."

To remedy this, the coalition has launched a stop-gap "auxiliary police" training program to provide basic law enforcement and combat training to local Afghan militias in remote provinces. The five-week course prepares and equips militia fighters to man checkpoints, search suspects and provide basic emergency medical care.

"It's a stop-gap method to get rudimentary training for outlying districts so that they can at least defend themselves. There will be further training down the road to convert them into actual, normal uniformed police."

Auxiliary police trainees bore the brunt of the fighting in a pitched battle with hundreds of Taliban in rural Uruzgan province two weeks ago. Dutch Lieutenant Colonel Gino Van Der Voet, commander of international forces in the province, praised the trainees' courage and stamina in that fight. But in spite their ferocity, they were badly outgunned by Taliban forces wielding rockets, mortars and machine guns.

Livingston says more and heavier weapons are on the way. Last week, Congress authorized $1.6 billion in assistance to Afghanistan including military aid to the army and police.

Kunduz custom revenue more than doubles

KUNDUZ CITY, July 2 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Revenue of the customs department in the northern Kunduz province has more than doubled in the second quarter of the current fiscal, compared to the correspondent period last year.

Shamsul Haq, general manager of the customs office in the city, told Pajhwok Afghan News on Monday their revenue had gone up to 38 million afghanis during the last three months of the current year from 14.6 million in corresponding period in 2006.

Most of the income accrued from trade in scrap, fruit and other goods between Pakistan and Tajikistan via the Sher Khan Port, Haq explained.

Scores of trucks - laden with a variety of trade goods and food items -cross the border on a daily basis between Afghanistan and Tajikistan at the bustling Sher Khan Port.

Tajikistan asks NATO to help with Tajik-Afghan border protection

DUSHANBE, July 3 (RIA Novosti) - Tajikistan has asked NATO forces to help it protect its national border with Afghanistan and combat drug trafficking, the country's foreign ministry said Tuesday.

The narcotics trade has become an acute problem for the impoverished Central Asian republic due to a continual flow of illegal drugs from neighboring Afghanistan, the world's largest supplier of heroin and opium.

The issue of Tajik-Afghan border protection was the main item on the agenda of talks between Tajikistan's Foreign Minister Khamrokhon Zarifi and NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in Brussels Monday.

The ministry said in a statement that Zarifi proposed considering using NATO potential to improve border and customs infrastructure among the 1,344-kilometer (835-mile) stretch of the border with Afghanistan.

NATO considers Tajikistan to be a reliable partner in the war against terrorism and in promoting stability in neighboring Afghanistan. The U.S. pledged earlier to provide nearly $14 million to bolster Tajikistan's border security and counter-narcotics programs.

Tajikistan hosts about 200 French troops and several aircraft that back NATO-led operations in Afghanistan.

Tajikistan's Foreign Ministry said in January that the NATO contingent would remain in the ex-Soviet Central Asian country until stability is restored in neighboring Afghanistan.

Turkey to contribute to Afghan judiciary

  Turkish State Minister Mehmet Aydın said on Tuesday that Turkey was willing to contribute to the establishment of the rule of law in Afghanistan. Speaking at an international meeting in Rome on Afghanistan, which was co-chaired by Afghanistan, Italy and the U.N., Aydın said Turkey was considering extending training to the Afghan Justice Ministry personnel.   ROME-Anatolia news agency

New clashes at Pakistan mosque despite surrender call

Islamabad (AFP) - Fresh clashes erupted at Pakistan's besieged Red Mosque, where "terrorists" were said to be holding women and children as human shields despite calls from its captured leader to surrender.

Firebrand cleric Abdul Aziz, who was seized on Wednesday trying to flee the complex in a burqa, said in a bizarre television interview wearing one of the garments that about 1,000 male and female students remained inside.

The pro-Taliban mosque has been under siege by troops and police since Tuesday when fierce street battles between its hardline devotees and security forces in the heart of the capital left at least 16 people dead.

"After coming out I saw the siege was massive and came to the conclusion that we should give up," he told state television. "The government has massive resources and I realised that people will not be able to stay inside for long."

Aziz appeared in a black burqa under which his bush grey beard was partly visible. The interviewer asked him to take off the veil, which he then lifted to show his face -- and a bemused smile.

The cleric later appeared in court charged with plotting terrorist attacks and kidnapping people, including seven Chinese nationals abducted by his students from an acupuncture clinic for allegedly running a brothel. He was later remanded in custody.

His brother, deputy mosque leader Abdul Rashid Ghazi remained holed up in the mosque. He refused to leave, adding: "We are not terrorists, so why should we lay down our arms?"

The tense standoff erupted in the afternoon in some of the heaviest clashes yet, with students opening fire on troops and hurling hand grenades, chief military spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad said.

US-built helicopter gunships flew low over the building. Security forces arrested eight "hardcore" militants who tried to escape during the clash, some of whom were blindfolded and told to take off their shirts following claims by the mosque that it had a squad of suicide bombers.

Earlier in the day troops blew up most of the wall surrounding the mosque and smashed in one of its doors with an armoured personnel carrier, witnesses said.

Religious affairs minister Ijaz-ul Haq said 30 "armed terrorists" were stopping others from leaving. The extremists were "using women and children as human shields," Islamabad administration chief Khalid Pervez said.

President Pervez Musharraf, a key US ally, had however ordered security chiefs not to raid the mosque yet to avoid casualties among women and children, a top government official told AFP.

"That is delaying the final push against the compound," he added. Ghazi and Aziz both denied that anyone was being kept against their will.

The mosque has two schools for male and female students attached to its compound in a leafy Islamabad neighbourhood and officials. Students range in age from pre-teens to their early 20s.

At least 50 students left the mosque on Thursday and were herded on to buses by police, but it was a trickle compared with Wednesday's exodus when about 1,200 fled.

The "rotten" body of a student killed in earlier clashes was brought out of the mosque Thursday and more were believed to be inside, a doctor at the state-run Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences told AFP.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown earlier telephoned Musharraf on Thursday to praise his efforts to curb militancy and terrorism, an official Pakistani statement said. Sources said the mosque crisis featured in the discussion.

Musharraf, who is already facing a political crisis ahead of elections later this year after ousting the country's chief justice, ordered the crackdown after the mosque tried to set up a Taliban-style justice system.

It has led a freelance morality campaign in Islamabad included the abduction of police officers and people accused of running brothels -- including the seven Chinese -- as well as raids on music and DVD shops.

Friction with the Red Mosque began in January when its female students took over a government-run children's library. In April the clerics set up an Islamic court that issued a "fatwa" or religious decree against a paragliding female minister.

Afghanistan’s media mavericks

By Rachel Morarjee - Financial Times (UK) July 3, 2007

If you know how to avoid the minefields, you can ski in Afghanistan between December and May, says Emmanuel de Dinechin, one of the three founders of Altai Consulting.

The firm’s Kabul headquarters is only three hours from skiing country, so many expatriate staff bring snow-shoes and skis to make the best of their time in the country.

“We don’t take stupid risks in our business operations or with our security but we want our staff to enjoy their time here,” says the 29-year-old Mr de Dinechin, looking out of the window at five Afghan employees seated among the roses in the firm’s garden while conducting telephone interviews for a US-funded health project.

Altai Consulting is a name familiar to most expatriates in Kabul, partly because of the speed with which Mr de Dinechin and his 33-year-old business partners Rodolphe Baudeau and Eric Davin have built the country’s biggest advertising firm and its only private-sector consulting firm. It is also, though, down to the flamboyant style of the French entrepreneurs.

The trio met while backpacking in Tibet. “There were not many travellers in Lhasa in 1999, so it was a case of, ‘You’re French, I’m French, let’s have a beer’,” Mr de Dinechin says.

Mr Baudeau and Mr Davin arrived in Kabul in December 2001 to set up AINA, a media charity geared towards training Afghan journalists. Mr de Dinechin, who always had a fascination with Afghanistan, heard about AINA, then recognised the names of his backpacker friends and joined them in 2002. The trio left the charity in July 2003 and, looking for an opportunity to stay in Afghanistan, spotted a gap in the advertising market. Mr Baudeau had worked in marketing for L’Oréal, while Mr de Dinechin was a consultant with Monitor, a global consulting firm, and Mr Davin worked for Himalaya, a web design agency.

“There were companies coming in looking for communications firms and there were no billboards, there was nothing. The field was wide open,” Mr de Dinechin says. Their first client was Roshan, the country’s biggest phone company.

With a start-up capital of just $60,000, which they used to rent an office and buy computers and printers, they took Altai’s name from a central Asian mountain range and launched the business.

“You couldn’t start anything in France for $60,000. It’s nothing really – although it didn’t feel like nothing at the time,” Mr Baudeau says. Revenues have grown from $3.3m in 2005 to $4.1m in 2006 and the company is predicting growth of 7-10 per cent this year.

The beauty of the advertising business, Mr Baudeau says, is that the firm can grow as it adds clients to its roster without the need to invest heavily in equipment.

The three Frenchmen hired two other expatriates and 10 Afghans to begin working on advertising and communications for Roshan and have now built up staff levels to 25 permanent expatriates and 150 Afghans. They also have a network of Afghan freelance researchers across the country in fields as diverse as medicine and education, which they mobilise for surveys and consulting work.

Security restrictions prevent many international organisations such as embassies and the United Nations from meeting Afghans to conduct research or monitor projects. With a small number of Afghan and expatriate staff, Altai can take a more pragmatic and flexible approach to security.

Since becoming the local partners of JWT, the international advertising agency, in April 2004, the firm also has an international presence which has enabled it to add multinationals such as Nestlé and Western Union to its advertising books.

“People who are on the ground know us, but whether we would have got the big-name clients without the link to JWT is hard to say,” Mr de Dinechin says.

Altai’s consulting business grew in tandem with its advertising work, with the first project for the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) beginning in 2004.

A lack of iodine in landlocked Afghanistan had led to widespread disease and birth defects, so Unicef commissioned Altai to do a survey of private-sector salt factories and scout partners for public-private partnerships to make iodised salt.

“Almost none of the salt in Afghan bazaars had iodine in it, but now almost all of it does,” says Mr Baudeau, adding that the project resulted in the opening of 12 iodised salt factories.

Afghanistan has no other private sector consulting firms; there are two other firms doing communications and advertising, but neither draws on the resources of an international partner such as JWT.

“We can outsource work to their offices in Pakistan when we have too much and we can hire photographers at the top of the business, who have worked for clients like Pepsi and Diesel, to shoot campaigns in Afghanistan,” Mr Baudeau says.

He acknowledges that there are a range of difficulties facing entrepreneurs, from poor infrastructure to growing security concerns, but he still contends that it is an easier operating environment than France for entrepreneurs with a little flexibility and imagination.

“It’s a small paradise for entrepreneurs. There is so much business. Five of our staff have left to start up their own ventures, which is a lot for such a small company,” he says.

Altai’s success was built on a commitment to offer international standards of research and advertising in a country where few other people aimed so high.

“We hear a lot of people saying that you can deliver less because it is only Afghanistan, but we have taken the opposite approach. This country needs top quality strategic research and consulting now. Not in 20 years’ time,” he adds.

The glamour of the business enabled the three Afghan graduates to recruit staff who had Harvard degrees and backgrounds at McKinsey. “We’ve just taken on five people who have better degrees than us,” Mr de Dinechin says.

He concedes that two years ago, very few job applicants worried about the security situation in Afghanistan because the international media focus was on reconstruction and development.

Now, with bloodshed constantly in the headlines, he has to answer more questions when looking for recruits, and the firm no longer sends international staff to do research in the troubled south.

“I spent my 25th birthday in Kandahar but I rarely go any more,” Mr de Dinechin says.

Afghanistan’s tax regime is problematic for foreign business people – not so much because rates are high, but because it can be hard for them to know exactly where they stand.

“The debate at the moment focuses on the level of tax but our main concern is that tax rates should be predictable. You do not want to wake up one morning and find yourself presented with

a huge tax bill,” says Rodolphe Baudeau of Altai Consulting. Along with other incoming investors, Altai had been promised a three-year tax holiday when it was created in 2003. In 2005, though, the three partners found they had to pay back taxes, making it hard to draw up a business plan.

“Investors need to know the level of taxation of the business. The law is clearer now and we hope this improvement will continue,” says Altai partner Emmanuel de Dinechin, adding that back in 2003 they had been shown documents saying they would not have to pay tax when they set up the firm.

Starting a business has also become easier since the launch of the Afghanistan Investment Support Agency in 2004. “When we started you had to go to 20 different government offices but now there is a one-stop shop for incorporating a company,” Mr de Dinechin says.

Americans celebrate July 4 with Afghan twist
Wed Jul 4, 2007 4:16PM EDT - By David Fox

BAGRAM AIR BASE, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Thousands of American troops celebrated their 4th of July independence holiday in Afghanistan on Wednesday, far from home but treated to a feast of hotdogs, burgers, corn on the cob and ice cream.

"This is a special day for us and we will be celebrating across the country, wherever we are," army captain Meredith Noll said at Bagram Air Base, the vast and sprawling headquarters of the U.S-led, 50,000-strong international force in Afghanistan.

Since helping to topple the Taliban in 2001 in pursuit of Osama bin Laden after the September 11 attacks, the U.S. military has turned the Soviet-built base into something resembling a middle American military town -- complete with a mini shopping mall, fast food franchises and even a local radio station.

In a reminder of the violence still gripping the country nearly six years after the war began, six Canadian soldiers died when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle in southern Afghanistan, the deadliest attack on NATO forces in the country this month.

On Wednesday, senior commanders of the U.S. force hosted a 4th of July barbeque for fellow officers from other coalition partners as well as the Afghan National Army.

The Army's 82nd Airborne Division band played music based on the military role in U.S. history, starting with "The Battle Cry of the Republic", the rallying call of union soldiers during the civil war, and ending with "American Soldier", the hit country song by Toby Keith, composed in 2004 after the invasion of Iraq.

It was an unashamedly patriotic occasion, but even the Muslim Afghan guests did not begrudge the Americans their celebration -- although a few looked slightly bemused when an army chaplain led a brief dedication that was decidedly Christian in nature.

"The Americans are here helping us and for that we are grateful," said Abdul Jabbar Taqwa, governor of Parawan. "They are our guests and we must give them respect."

Lt. General David Rodriquez, Afghanistan East Regional Commander, said in an address that the U.S. was proud to be helping Afghanistan emerge from decades of conflict.

"Not surprisingly, we see a reflection of ourselves in Afghanistan's struggle," he said. U.S. troops have had a far easier time in Afghanistan than they have had in Iraq, although 407 Americans have been killed since 2001.

The U.S. military is heavily involved in reforming the Afghan National Army and its engineers are involved in many major road and bridge projects across the country.

But opposition to the U.S. presence is growing, particularly with the rising civilian death toll from fighting between foreign forces and the Taliban.

Over 300 have died this year alone -- most in airstrikes -- and protests calling for foreign troops to leave have taken place across the country.

For one marine forming part of an honor guard for Wednesday's Bagram festivities, his 4th of July celebration would take place next month when he returns home after a six month tour of duty.

"It's gonna be 10 years (in the Marines) next month and I'm outta here," said Sgt. Jimmy Jackson. "It's gonna be a real big party."

When love turns ugly

The Telegraph Group - Published: July 04, 2007, 00:00

It was a marriage likely to test even those with an unshakeable faith in love's power to bridge cultural boundaries.

When they met in Afghanistan soon after the overthrow of the Taliban, she was Debbie Rodriguez, a brassy 42-year hairdresser from Michigan on an improbable mission to set up a beauty school in Kabul.

He was Haji Sher Mohammad, a 30-year-old battle-seasoned commander with the Northern Alliance, who already had another wife and eight children.

Though neither spoke the other's language they married 20 days after meeting.
But four years on, following the publication of a bestselling book about her life in Kabul which is due to be made into a movie with Sandra Bullock in the lead role, the cynics have belatedly been proved right.

Rodriguez has fled Afghanistan amid threats of murder and kidnap, while several of the Afghan women who worked at the beauty school and whose private lives she documents in her book, have gone into hiding and are currently applying for political asylum within the United States.

Haji Sher, meanwhile, claims that his wife is reneging on a deal to pay him half of the profits from the book and film.

"We have a signed agreement for 50 per cent each," he told The Daily Telegraph, sitting on a chair in the deserted beauty salon, and glumly combing the hair of a mannequin.

He deserves half, he says, because the book was a "joint work", although he is not able to understand it because he cannot read English. However, he expresses the hope that they might use the money to buy a new home in Dubai together for "when the weather is cold".

"It depends on her conscience. She is still my wife, and in Afghan culture only death can separate us. I'm not sure what her culture says, but I will be delighted any time my wife comes back to me."

But Rodriguez has other ideas. "Sher is lying," she said. "At no time did he help me write the book. He told my ghostwriter a few stories about himself - that was about 30 minutes of work."

Rodriguez claims that her husband threatened to have Kristin Ohlsen, the book's ghostwriter, arrested in Kabul last month on trumped up charges of being a Christian missionary, which is a criminal offence in Afghanistan. The writer subsequently fled the country.

Since its foundation the beauty school has produced 170 trained beauticians. However, the book's account of their lives, complete with grim descriptions of enslavement and domestic violence, has caused a storm in Kabul.

Several of the terrified women have now applied for asylum to escape vengeful locals who accuse them of "bringing shame to Afghanistan".

Though she describes her husband as "more greedy than mean", Rodriguez said: "I knew that he had that power to just have me disappear. I knew that as an Afghan wife I have no rights and that my embassy could do nothing about this. So I was sleeping with the enemy and it was scary."

She also claims that as rumours of her new wealth swirled around Kabul, she received kidnap and murder threats from unknown sources and fled the country on the advice of Western security officials.

Haji Sher, who describes himself as a diplomat rather than a warlord, says that she left without paying the rent for the beauty school, and that he has had to sell his cars to keep it running and feed the women who work there.

The book allowed Rodriguez to address issues of great sensitivity in Afghan culture. In one chapter she describes helping a woman to fake her virginity for her wedding night, an issue with huge ramifications in a society where personal and family honour are paramount. Another describes a girl being sold off in marriage at the age of ten.

Rodriguez has promised to help those women she left behind with a fund made up from ten per cent of the profits. But her husband seems unlikely to get the reunion he appears to want.

"Am I married to Sher?" she writes. "Well maybe in Afghanistan but not in America, as far as I am concerned. "I don't believe that my marriage is legal here because he already had a wife. Not sure he knows this. You can tell him if you want. I am not going to."

US to hunt the Taliban inside Pakistan

Asia Times - 07/03/2007 By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - Since last September, North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces in Afghanistan have been pressing Islamabad for the right to conduct extensive hot-pursuit operations into Pakistan to target Taliban and al-Qaeda bases.

According to Asia Times Online contacts, NATO and its US backers have gotten their wish: coalition forces will start hitting targets wherever they might be.

Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf is expected to make an important announcement on extremism during an address to the nation in the next day or two.

The ATol contacts in Islamabad say that coalition intelligence has pinpointed at least four centers in the tribal areas of North Waziristan and South Waziristan on the border with Afghanistan from which Taliban operations inside Afghanistan are run. These bases include arms caches and the transfer and raising of money and manpower, the latter in the form of foot-soldiers to fight with the Taliban-led insurgency.

Operations inside Pakistan might be carried out independently by the United States, probably with air power, by Pakistani forces acting alone or as joint offensives. In all cases, though, the US will pull the strings, for instance by providing the Pakistanis with information on targets to hit.

Musharraf has apparently already told his military commanders, the National Security Council and decision-makers in government of the development.

Officially, both NATO and Pakistan deny any agreement on hot-pursuit activities. Major John Thomas, spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, told Asia Times Online, "The ISAF would not strike any targets across the border. That is not part of our mission. We work with the Pakistani government closely on cross-border issues. The ISAF does not have a counter-terrorism mission that I know of."

Similarly, the director general of the Inter-Services Public Relations of the Pakistani Armed Forces, Major-General Waheed Arshad, said NATO forces would not be allowed to intervene in Pakistani areas. He conceded that Pakistan is wary of growing extremism in the country, but said there is no threat of Talibanization.

"The Taliban are a problem for Afghanistan, not Pakistan. There are a few extremist groups operating in Pakistan and we have our own indigenous mechanism to counter them through law-enforcement agencies, and through paramilitary and military deployment," Waheed said.

Nevertheless, the ATol contacts are adamant that an agreement is in place for increased operations on Pakistani soil, given the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and US fears of al-Qaeda using Pakistan as a base for planning operations in the West. There are precedents.

Last month, US Central Intelligence Agency drones targeted a madrassa in North Waziristan, and 20 people were killed. CIA drones tried to take out al-Qaeda No 2 Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri in January 2006 in Bajur Agency. Zawahiri survived, but 18 people died. In December 2005, al-Qaeda leader Hamza Rabia was killed by a CIA predator aircraft in the town of Mir Ali, North Waziristan.

However, new operations, which could begin within weeks, if not days, are expected to be much larger in scale.

In recent meetings at both the policy and operational levels between Washington and Islamabad, it was acknowledged that Pakistan simply cannot control its border with Afghanistan. Pakistan has established numerous military posts in the tribal areas, but with distances of as much as 20 kilometers between them they can't stop the cross-border flow, especially given the rugged nature of the terrain.

On the Afghan side of the border, NATO and the Afghan National Army have also established posts, but they are even less numerous than on the Pakistani side and, given their isolation, are open to enemy fire.

While most of the Taliban's cross-border activity takes place from the Waziristans, it extends to Chaman, Zhob and Noshki in the southwest and Bajaur and Mohmand in the northwest.

In North West Frontier Province, the settled towns of Tank, Laki Marwat, Bannu and Dera Ismail Khan have all but been taken over by the Pakistani Taliban and they recruit from these areas. The circle is expanding up to the Valley of Peshawar, which includes Peshawar city and Mardan. However, the Taliban's influence in the Valley of Peshawar is still basic.

On the other hand, a pro-Taliban force named Tehrik-i-Nifaz- i-Shariat- i-Mohammadi (TNSM) has spread rapidly, and its influence ranges from Bajaur, Malakand, Swat Valley and Mingora. The TNSM sent 10,000 men to Afghanistan in 2001 to fight against the US-led invasion. The organization is dedicated to the enforcement of Islamic laws. Like the Pakistan Taliban, the TNSM uses scores of illegal FM radio stations as a propaganda tool, and its popularity increases with every passing day.

All these pro-Taliban/ al-Qaeda zones on the Afghan border have connections with the Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) in Islamabad, run by outspoken brothers Maulana Abdul Aziz and Ghazi Abdul Rasheed. The brothers are openly pro-Taliban and also run large Islamic seminaries for boys and girls.

The Pakistani establishment believes Aziz is in fact the new leader of all the Taliban and al-Qaeda assets spreading through northwestern Pakistan, especially the zone commanded by the TNSM. Aziz delivers lectures by telephone every evening to TNSM members.

Lal Masjid has had numerous high-profile run-ins and standoffs with the government, but Islamabad has never risked an outright confrontation, given the power and influence of the brothers and their standing in the jihadist world.

They can be expected to organize sustained resistance should NATO/US forces launch attacks into Pakistan. Some reports claim that about 70 suicide bombers are waiting to be unleashed from the mosque. But any attack on the mosque could set off a chain reaction all the way from Islamabad to the Afghan border and beyond, in the process throwing Pakistan further into turmoil.

At this point in the "war on terror", this is something the US does not want, at least not until it has had one more crack at rooting out the Taliban and al-Qaeda from Pakistan. Washington has paid Pakistan about $1 billion a year for the past five years for its efforts in tackling terrorism. Now the US administration wants more return on that money.

Musharraf already faces intense opposition over his suspension of his chief justice on charges of malfeasance. Both political and religious opponents are riding the bandwagon with a vengeance, especially as the country faces presidential elections this year.

Senior US officials, including John Negroponte, the deputy secretary of state, and Richard Boucher, the assistant secretary of state, recently visited Pakistan to spell out to opposition leaders that the US is still behind Musharraf, although it will support the participation of secular, democratic political parties in government.

This development occurred even as Washington voiced its dissatisfaction over Musharraf's performance with regard to the Taliban: it pointed to Pakistan's clear involvement in supporting the insurgency in Helmand province since last year.

Indeed, the US was even prepared to withdraw its support of Musharraf, who seized power in 1999, but after a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney to Pakistan, the general remains in favor. Cheney's office is believed to run the United States' Pakistan policy.

The reasons are probably twofold: the US needs Pakistan's support should it attack Iran (covert operations into Iran are reportedly already taking place from Pakistan), and the US is concerned over the revival of the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Pakistan.

With regard to the latter, the head of the US Central Command, Admiral William Fallon, followed up Cheney's visit, warning Islamabad that the US needs Pakistan's assistance and approval to confront the bases. He also made it clear that any delay on the part of Pakistan to allow NATO operations could result in another major terror operation in the West. And if that happens, Pakistan will face the music.

Musharraf has already agreed to take some prisoners from the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay (see Pakistan to help as the US's jailer, Asia Times Online, June 29). Now he's opening his doors to the United States' soldiers. It's a move fraught with danger for Musharraf and Pakistan, and one that could influence the direction of both the war in Afghanistan and the "war on terror".
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief.

The Pakistan Time Bomb

Washington Post - By Stephen P. Cohen Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf is widely viewed as a military strongman who should be pressed to hold free and fair elections this year. Both the characterization of Musharraf and the policy recommendation are misguided. Musharraf's problem is that he has failed to act swiftly and ruthlessly to set Pakistan's politics on a proper course, and he knows -- better than his critics -- that given the complexity of Pakistan's internal problems, the holding of free and fair elections might not check Pakistan's drift toward extremism.

Musharraf does deserve criticism for the deterioration of Pakistani civil society. About his only defense is that things were worse under his predecessor, the insecure Nawaz Sharif. Musharraf had a golden opportunity to set things right and develop a strategy that would build up civilian competence and allow for the army's retreat from governance. He missed it. After his coup he rejected advice that he impose emergency rule for a few months, meanwhile ordering the intelligence services to round up the extremists they had nurtured for years. But as a strongman Musharraf had a fatal flaw: He wanted to be liked.

Since then his actions as a politician and leader have been consistently flawed. He implemented a crazy scheme of local government that further destroyed Pakistan's civilian bureaucracy. He refused to allow former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Sharif to return to Pakistan and meet a real electoral test. And he fabricated a phony political party to provide the illusion of popular support. He also entered into alliances with the Islamists (only to betray them) and with a party responsible for rule by terror in certain areas of the country.

As a general, Musharraf got mixed reviews from his peers. As a politician, he has shown little talent. His one strength, until Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry defied him, was that his opponents were even less inspiring.

Musharraf's rule has not been without merit. Going against the views of army hard-liners, he lobbed one Kashmir proposal after another at the Indian government, putting it on the defensive. Under Musharraf, Pakistan's position has changed from insistence upon a plebiscite (something India will never allow) to one of several alternative arrangements, all designed to save face for Islamabad.

Musharraf did preside over economic reform, but the World Bank has pointed out that income disparities and rural poverty have both grown while the urban elite make money hand over fist. His treatment of the press has been retrograde. It is Orwellian for American officials to claim that Pakistan is on the road to democracy.

Musharraf receives unstinting American support because of his turnabout after Sept. 11, 2001, regarding support for the Taliban and al-Qaeda. No one doubts his sincerity regarding al-Qaeda; as he writes in his fanciful autobiography, these were the people who several times tried to kill him.

But there is room for skepticism about Pakistan's role with regard to the Taliban. Pakistani officials freely admit that their main concerns in Afghanistan are Indian penetration (which would mean encirclement for Islamabad) and Afghan President Hamid Karzai's dependence on New Delhi. Given this strategic compulsion, it is not surprising that Pakistan tolerates, if it does not directly support, the Taliban; it has no other instrument available to it than this Pashtun tribal hammer.

Whatever happens in coming days, we are not approaching the end of the "Musharraf system" in Pakistan. Even if he were forced out of the presidency and ceased to be army chief, his military colleagues would continue to rule from behind the scenes, finding a pliable politician or two to serve as their public face. Abroad, they might get tougher with India (what better way to unite Pakistanis than a crisis with New Delhi?), and they would try to fake it with the Americans regarding Afghanistan: They will not willingly give up their Taliban assets.

Perhaps such a second coming of the Musharraf system would work better with a military leader more perceptive than the ebullient but shallow Musharraf. But in the end, the army cannot rule the state of Pakistan by itself. Perhaps it will come to the realization that what it needs is a strategy for a systematic withdrawal from politics. This would involve heavy investment in the quality and competence of the civilian elite, a rebuilding of liberal Pakistan, and tough measures against defiant, radical Islamists.

The United States is paying lip service to a regime that is collapsing before its eyes and that may yet turn truly nasty. Washington treats Pakistan as if it were a Cold War ally, dealing only with its top leadership. The great danger is that this time around, Pakistan may not have the internal resources to manage its own rescue. If that is the case, then in years to come, a nuclear-armed and terrorism-capable Pakistan will become everyone's biggest foreign policy problem.

The writer is senior fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program of the Brookings Institution and author of "The Idea of Pakistan."

[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.]