In this bulletin:

• Eleven Taliban, Six Police Killed In Afghanistan
• British soldier killed in Afghanistan
• Afghan president calls militants 'cowardly,' condemns deaths of children
• Truth is a casualty in Afghan fighting
• Karzai supports mosque assault
• Pakistan mosque raid was inevitable: Musharraf
• Afghan warlord urges Islamist revolt in Pakistan
• Al-Qaida has regained strength, US warns
• U.S. to donate 186 aircraft to Afghanistan by 2012
• Canada's role is shifting from fighting to training Afghan troops, says chief of defence staff
• Afghan elders praise Canuck soldiers
• Fallen soldier dedicated to his men and Afghan mission, family says
• Costly Park Project Puzzles Afghan Residents
• SCCI concerned over decreasing exports to Afghanistan
• Afghan Attorney General Criticized in Corruption Fight
• U.S. Afghan Fighter Sues News Agency
• Return of Hindu, Sikh refugees to Afghanistan opposed
• Music is in the air in Afghanistan

Eleven Taliban, Six Police Killed In Afghanistan

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

July 12, 2007 -- Air strikes were called in after a joint U.S.-Afghan patrol was ambushed in the southern province of Oruzgan today. The coalition says the clash left about 11 Taliban fighters dead.

In the eastern province of Khost, Afghan security officials say that a remote-controlled bomb went off near an Afghan police vehicle on joint patrol with NATO troops today, killing six police officers.

Khost Province police spokesman Wazir Badshah said five of the police officers were killed at the site, while the sixth died later at a NATO hospital. The southeastern Khost Province is a frequent stage of attacks linked to the Taliban insurgency.

Meanwhile, NATO says one of its soldiers was killed and two others wounded during an operation in the south. No further details were available.

British soldier killed in Afghanistan

Thursday, July 12, 2007 - LONDON (AFP) - A British soldier died from a gunshot wound sustained in an "enemy contact" in Afghanistan on Thursday, the defence ministry here said.

Two other soldiers were injured in the same operation in the troubled southern province of Helmand and are receiving medical treatment, it said in a statement.

The death brings to 64 the number of British troops to have died in Afghanistan since the successful US-led drive to overthrow the hardline Islamist Taliban regime began in November 2001.

"It is with much sadness that the Ministry of Defence must confirm the death of a British soldier from the 1st Battalion The Grenadier Guards near Gereshk in Helmand province, Afghanistan," the ministry said. "During an enemy contact, the soldier suffered a gunshot wound," it said.

"He was rapidly evacuated by helicopter and despite the very best efforts of emergency medical staff he was pronounced dead on arrival at the field hospital.

"Two other soldiers were injured in another part of the same operation and they are now receiving medical treatment."

The soldier's next of kin have been informed. Britain has around 7,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, rising to 7,700 in the coming months -- the second-highest contribution to the NATO force after the United States.

Britain's soldiers are based in Helmand, perhaps Afghanistan's most dangerous province, where Taliban insurgents are said to be teamed up with foreign fighters from Al-Qaeda and opium producers helping to finance the insurgency.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has signalled there will be no change of British policy towards the country and has warned of the dangers of withdrawing troops.

Thursday's death brings the number of foreign soldiers killed in Afghanistan to 110 this year. In 2006 a total of 119 foreign soldiers were killed in combat and non-combat operations.

More than 50,000 foreign soldiers under NATO and US-led command are fighting a bloody Taliban insurgency which has claimed thousands of lives so far.

Afghan president calls militants 'cowardly,' condemns deaths of children

RAHIM FAIEZ - Thursday, July 12, 2007 - KABUL (AP) - Calling militant attacks "cowardly work," Afghan President Hamid Karzai deplored a suicide bombing Wednesday that killed 12 children and accused the fighters of running from battle by donning women's clothing.

Speaking in a measured tone, Karzai said the purported "bravery" of militants consists of killing "innocent people and children." "Whenever there is pressure on them, they escape under a woman's burqa," said Karzai.

He did not explain that comment but could have been referring to past reports of Taliban militants in Afghanistan wearing the identity-concealing robe to flee detection. Also, more recently, Abdul Aziz, the leader of a besieged mosque in Pakistan, was captured last week trying to slip out dressed in a burqa and high heels.

Karzai called reporters to the presidential palace to condemn Tuesday's suicide bombing in Uruzgan province that killed 17 people, including 12 students. The attack in a crowded market wounded more than 30 people, including eight Dutch soldiers whom the attacker apparently had targeted.

"I pray to God that Afghanistan is soon freed from all this suffering," Karzai said, noting battles between western troops and Taliban militants were down this year but suicide and roadside bombings were up.

Meanwhile, the Defence Ministry spokesman said it is easy for Taliban fighters to falsely claim civilians were killed by western or Afghan military action and militants are forcing locals to lie to journalists.

"The enemy is threatening the local people to lie to the media," Gen. Zahir Azimi said. "They even give them telephone numbers of the different agencies to call them and tell them that, for example, 100 civilians were killed in an air strike by the coalition or NATO."

Azimi said if civilians don't do as ordered, the Taliban fighters will kill them. He said in one case in Sangin district of Helmand province air strikes destroyed two Taliban trucks but news reports later said 40 civilians were killed.

Karzai has repeatedly deplored civilian deaths caused by NATO or U.S. military action, saying more must be done to prevent such casualties. But military officials have recently begun claiming some reports are nothing but information warfare by the Taliban.

Tribal elders over the weekend claimed 108 civilians were killed in a bombing in Farah province but no officials have backed up those claims. The governor of the northeastern Kunar province said 27 civilians were killed by NATO military action late last week.

On Thursday, a roadside blast hit a police patrol in eastern Afghanistan, killing five officers and wounding another, an official said.

The attack happened in Yaqoubi district, in Khost province, said Wazir Pacha, a spokesman for the provincial police chief. The victims were part of a joint U.S-Afghan patrol, Pacha said. No U.S.-led coalition troops were injured in the morning blast.

A joint Afghan-U.S. convoy came under attack in Paktia province Wednesday, sparking a fight that killed two police and four Taliban, said Ghulam Dastager, deputy provincial police chief.

In Helmand province, Afghan and U.S.-led coalition forces killed eight suspected Taliban on Tuesday, the Ministry of Interior said.

Violence has spiked in Afghanistan in the last six weeks. More than 3,200 people, mostly militants, have died in insurgency-related violence this year, The Associated Press estimates, based on numbers from Afghan and western officials.

The UN World Food Program said, however, it has resumed food deliveries to the volatile south and west. The agency had suspended shipments in the region on May 28 because of attacks on its vehicles along Afghanistan's southern ring road.

"While there are still major problems, getting trucks moving again along the major ring road is an important breakthrough for our operations, particularly in the western region where WFP has been unable to distribute promised food to tens of thousands," said Rick Corsino, WFP director for Afghanistan.

The agency still faces insecurity and on Friday four WFP-contracted trucks with armed escorts were attacked in the southwest.

Truth is a casualty in Afghan fighting

By Sylvie Briand

KABUL: The issue of civilian deaths in Afghanistan is itself becoming “battleground” with truth often a casualty, showing the difficulty of establishing facts in a war fought in often remote areas.

And even when claims prove unfounded, the damage has already been done to the image of the international forces, which are already regarded with suspicion by Afghans wary of foreign intervention — a sentiment the Taliban tries to inflame.

The battle of the tolls — often impossible to verify independently — has been stepped up as fighting has intensified this summer with major clashes in which civilians have been caught in the crossfire of soldiers and militants.

In one recent example, residents of a remote district in the eastern province of Kunar claimed last week that 35 civilians were killed in air strikes, including one on a funeral, by Nato’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

The police said the following day that 25 were dead. ISAF, sensitive to civilian casualties after a series of incidents in June that Afghan officials said cost dozens of lives, has rejected the charge and insisted only a “significant number” of rebels were killed.

The interior ministry sent a team to the remote area in the mountainous province to investigate. At the other end of the country, in the western province of Farah, the head of the provincial council Abdul Qadir Daqiq said at the weekend residents reported 108 civilians were killed in international force air strikes.

Asked again the next day, he could confirm only three. The commander-in-chief of ISAF, General Dan McNeill, said at the weekend that sometimes tolls reported by Afghan officials are exaggerated “for whatever reason, for disinformation,

misinformation or simply people failing to do an accurate account.” But the “collateral damage” attributed to the international forces — true, false or even just rumours — has “the same negative impact on public opinion,” said analyst Fahim Dashty.

The damage is done abroad as well as at home, he said, with many of the 37 nations contributing troops to ISAF already alarmed by the scale of the fighting.

Some Afghan officials push up the numbers because of their own hostility towards the foreign troops or sympathy for the Taliban, said author Ahmad Rashid, a Pakistani expert on Afghanistan.

But President Hamid Karzai, while rebuking ISAF and the separate US-led coalition, has not criticised “Afghan officials who inflate the number of civilian casualties,” Rashid said, perhaps a sign of lack of control.

That is not to say the international forces are not at fault. The ISAF contributing nations are to blame for not sending enough troops and relying on air power to “get rid of the Taliban as quickly as possible,” Rashid said.

Between 350 and 400 bombs are being dropped a month, most of them sophisticated precision munitions, according to ISAF. About 600 civilians have been killed this year, just over half by Afghan and international troops, says the UN, which stresses the difficulty of getting an accurate account in the absence of

independent investigators on the ground.

The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission says it is stretched as claims of civilian casualties pile up. “We have not yet been able, for this reason, to send people to Farah and Kunar,” commissioner Nader Nadery said.

The UN spokesman in Afghanistan, Adrian Edwards, said journalists should exercise “great caution.” “We have ourselves serious doubts about some of the recent initial figures and information being provided to the media,” he told reporters.

“The risk we see is of the truth being lost, to be replaced instead by propaganda or exaggerated for reasons to do with false compensation claims.”—AFP

Karzai supports mosque assault

Daily Times, Thursday, July 12, 2007

KABUL: Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Wednesday supported Pakistan for attacking the Taliban-style militants of Lal Masjid and urged the Pakistani government to crack down on all radical religious groups there.

Karzai has long complained that Afghan Taliban rebels have safe havens in Pakistan from which they are able to direct attacks inside Afghanistan. Pakistan denies the charge, but the accusations have strained relations between the neighbours. “We fully support the government and the nation of Pakistan for the campaign that is going on against terrorism,” Karzai told a news conference.

“(But) our expectation is that this campaign becomes more real and...this campaign also covers those individuals who come from Pakistan and kill Afghanistan’s sons,” he said at his palace here. Karzai said such steps by Pakistan would strengthen ties between the two nations and would put an end to misunderstandings between them.

Speaking in a measured tone, Karzai said the “bravery” of militant fighters was killing “innocent people and children”. “Whenever there is pressure on them they escape under a woman’s burqa,” he said. Agencies

Pakistan mosque raid was inevitable: Musharraf

Islamabad (AFP) - Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said Thursday in an address to the nation that the raid on Islamabad's Red Mosque was "inevitable" because it was a centre for extremism.

"I am sad over the loss of lives in the operation but it became inevitable for Pakistan," Musharraf said, in his first comments since the assault this week that left at least 86 people dead, most of them militants.

He said the mosque and its adjoining girls' Islamic school had been "freed from the hands of terrorists."

Military ruler Musharraf, wearing a dark suit and tie instead of his army uniform for the speech on state television, also urged the country's thousands of Islamic schools or madrassas to preach moderation.

"I ask the people who run these schools, the religious scholars, I appeal to them to please teach the true values of Islam and in their minds take away extremism," he said.

"I pray that may Allah save Pakistan from terrorists and extremists and their evils and put us on the road to moderation."

Musharraf paid tribute to the troops and security forces who took part in the raid and the preceding eight-day siege, adding: "I salute them for what they did for our beloved country."

Afghan warlord urges Islamist revolt in Pakistan

Kabul (AFP) - An Afghan warlord fighting US and NATO forces on Thursday condemned the Pakistani army raid on the Red Mosque and called on Muslims there to revolt against the US-backed government, a spokesman said.

Veteran Islamic fighter Gulbuddin Hekmatyar charged that Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf "attacked the mosque to please (US President George W.) Bush," according to Hekmatyar's spokesman Haroon Zarghon.

"We strongly condemn the brutal killing of innocent students by the Pakistani army in the Red Mosque," said the spokesman for Hekmatyar, the one-time leader of the anti-Soviet Hezb-e-Islami and a former prime minister.

"Musharraf martyred the students to please Bush." Zarghon said Muslims were now left with no choice but to fight the "infidel powers" and their puppet governments, like Musharraf's.

"Today all Muslims around the world are oppressed by infidels, at the top the US. The Islamic movements started by Muslims around the world will result in real Islamic governments, in Palestine, in Pakistan, in Afghanistan.

"This is an imposed crusade war by Bush and his allies, but gone are the days they have dreamt of. Muslims now will unitedly stand for their rights."

In this week's raid, which ended a week-long standoff with radicals in the central Islamabad mosque compound, 75 militants and 11 soldiers died in two days of fierce fighting, the Pakistani army said Thursday.

Zarghon said Hezb-e-Islami wishes a "Pakistani Muslim nation's revolt against the Musharraf regime" but said Hekmatyar's faction had no intention of getting involved militarily.

"We voice only our political support to them," he said. "We already have a mission here to finish in Afghanistan. Our country is invaded and there are 50,000 foreign troops here. We cannot extend any military support."

Meanwhile, Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi declined to give an official reaction to the crisis in Islamabad.

"I cannot give you a reaction since we are busy in Afghanistan. We have little information on what exactly happened in the Red Mosque," he said.

Asked if the Taliban would support the Islamist circles in Pakistan in their stand against the Pakistani government, Ahmadi added: "We have no interest in interfering in other countries' affairs.

"We cannot extend our war experience physically to them by training them, but they can copy our tactics of suicide attacks and roadside bomb attacks -- just as we did from Iraq."

Al-Qaida has regained strength, US warns

By MATTHEW LEE and KATHERINE SHRADER, Associated Press - July 12, 2007

WASHINGTON - A new threat assessment from U.S. counterterrorism analysts says that al-Qaida has used its safe haven along the Afghan-Pakistan border to restore its operating capabilities to a level unseen since the months before Sept. 11, 2001.

A counterterrorism official familiar with a five-page summary of the document — titled "Al-Qaida better positioned to strike the West" — called it a stark appraisal. The analysis will be part of a broader meeting at the White House on Thursday about an upcoming National Intelligence Estimate.

The official and others spoke to The Associated Press on condition they not be identified because the report remains classified.

The findings suggests that the network that launched the most devastating terror attack on U.S. soil has been able to regroup despite nearly six years of bombings, war and other tactics aimed at dismantling it.

The threat assessment focuses on the terror group's safe haven in Pakistan and makes a range of observations about the threat posed to the United States and its allies, officials said.

Counterterrorism officials have been increasingly concerned about al-Qaida's recent operations. This week, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he had a "gut feeling" that the United States faced a heightened risk of attack this summer.

Still, numerous government officials say they know of no specific, credible threat of a new attack on U.S. soil.

Al-Qaida is "considerably operationally stronger than a year ago" and has "regrouped to an extent not seen since 2001," the counterterrorism official said, paraphrasing the report's conclusions. "They are showing greater and greater ability to plan attacks in Europe and the United States."

The group also has created "the most robust training program since 2001, with an interest in using European operatives," the official quoted the report as saying.

At the same time, this official said, the report speaks of "significant gaps in intelligence" so U.S. authorities may be ignorant of potential or planned attacks.

John Kringen, who heads the CIA's analysis directorate, echoed the concerns about al-Qaida's resurgence during testimony and conversations with reporters at a House Armed Services Committee hearing on Wednesday.

"They seem to be fairly well settled into the safe haven and the ungoverned spaces of Pakistan," Kringen testified. "We see more training. We see more money. We see more communications. We see that activity rising."

The threat assessment comes as the 16 U.S. intelligence agencies prepare a National Intelligence Estimate focusing on threats to the United States. A senior intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity while the high-level analysis was being completed, said the document has been in the works for roughly two years.

Kringen and aides to National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell would not comment on the details of that analysis.

"Preparation of the estimate is not a response to any specific threat," McConnell's spokesman Ross Feinstein said, adding that it probably will be ready for distribution this summer.

Kringen said he wouldn't attach a summer time frame to the concern. In studying the threat, he said he begins with the premise that al-Qaida would consider attacking the U.S. a "home run hit" and that the easiest way to get into the United States would be through Europe.

Several European countries — among them Britain, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands — are highlighted in the threat assessment partly because they have arrangements with the Pakistani government that allow their citizens easier access to Pakistan than others, according to the counterterrorism official.

This is more troubling because all four are part of the U.S. visa waiver program, and their citizens can enter the United States without additional security scrutiny, the official said.

The Bush administration has repeatedly cited al-Qaida as a key justification for continuing the fight in Iraq.

"The No. 1 enemy in Iraq is al-Qaida," White House press secretary Tony Snow said Wednesday. "Al-Qaida continues to be the chief organizer of mayhem within Iraq."

The findings could bolster the president's hand at a moment when support on Capitol Hill for the war is eroding and the administration is struggling to defend its decision for a military buildup in Iraq.

The threat assessment says that al-Qaida stepped up efforts to "improve its core operational capability" in late 2004 but did not succeed until December of 2006 after the Pakistani government signed a peace agreement with tribal leaders that effectively removed government military presence from the northwest frontier with Afghanistan.

The agreement allows Taliban and al-Qaida operatives to move across the border with impunity and establish and run training centers, the report says, according to the official.

It also says that al-Qaida is particularly interested in building up the numbers in its middle ranks, or operational positions, so there is not as great a lag in attacks when such people are killed.

"Being No. 3 in al-Qaida is a bad job. We regularly get to the No. 3 person," Tom Fingar, the top U.S. intelligence analyst, told the House panel.

The report also notes that al-Qaida has increased its public statements, although analysts stressed that those video and audio messages aren't reliable indicators of the actions the group may take.

U.S. to donate 186 aircraft to Afghanistan by 2012

By Sayed Salahuddin - Thursday, July 12, 2007

KABUL (Reuters) - The United States will provide six helicopter gunships to Afghanistan's fledgling air force in August this year, part of a plan to supply 186 aircraft to the country, the head of the Afghan air force said on Thursday.

The shipments, which will come in several batches to be completed by 2012, do not include jet fighters for the country where U.S. soldiers form the bulk of NATO and coalition troops in the fight against Taliban insurgents.

"We will be supplied with 186 aircraft, such as reconnaissance planes, helicopters, helicopter gunships and fixed-wing planes," General Abdul Wahab Qahraman told Reuters.

"America will provide us with all these aircraft and we are engaged in discussions about it, but we will not have jet fighters before 2012 and God knows what happens after that."

Washington will donate the aircraft to Afghanistan as part of its multi-billion dollar assistance effort, Qahraman said.

By 2012, Afghanistan will have full control over all of its air bases, except for Bagram, the major former Soviet base north of Kabul which is the hub for U.S.-led troops in the country.

The United States also sponsors the training of 4,550 Afghan air force personnel such as pilots and engineers. The six helicopters to arrive in August will arrive from the Czech Republic, Qahraman said.

The Afghan Air Corps will be supplied with Russian built MI-17 transport helicopters, and MI-24 and MI-35 attack helicopters similar to those used against Afghan mujahideen during the 1979-1989 Soviet occupation, a U.S. general said.

"They are quite reliable and their performance in this environment at high altitude and high temperature is very good and their reliability is very good," said Major-General Robert Durbin, the U.S. officer in charge of training Afghan forces.

Afghanistan's army disintegrated in 1992 after the overthrow of the Soviet-backed government by Western-funded mujahideen groups.

The country's air force, army, police and security agencies had until then been trained and equipped by the Soviet Union. Now the United States and other allies are helping rebuild, train and equip Afghan forces.

Afghanistan has more than 120,000 members of the armed forces now and the training of its army will be completed by 2008. NATO and U.S.-led troops say they will withdraw their troops from Afghanistan once its own security forces are able to stand on their feet.

There are some 50,000 foreign troops stationed in Afghanistan, battling the Taliban and their Islamic allies. U.S.-led troops invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and overthrew the Taliban government after it refused to hand over al Qaeda chief, Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the September 11 attacks.

Canada's role is shifting from fighting to training Afghan troops, says chief of defence staff

July 12, 2007 - Bruce Campion-Smith, Toronto Star

OTTAWA –Canada is shifting its Kandahar mission from combat to training to prepare the Afghan army to shoulder more of the fighting, a move expected to reduce Canadian casualties, Gen. Rick Hillier says.

By this fall, as many as five battalions of Afghan troops will be operating in Kandahar province under the mentoring of Canadian troops, a significant infusion of strength that sets the stage for the country's own military to help quell the deadly insurgency.

"The focus goes from us in the lead with very little support until now from them to them in the lead," said Hillier, the chief of defence staff.

He was speaking a week after six Canadians were killed in a bomb blast near Kandahar, raising Canada's toll to 66 soldiers and diplomat Glyn Berry against a backdrop of increasing questions about the country's future role in Afghanistan.

But in an exclusive interview with the Star yesterday afternoon, the general sketched out - literally - the makings of an exit strategy.

"A picture speaks a thousand words. But of course, I'm a Newfoundlander so I use a picture and a thousand words," he joked as he hunched over his office table.

Using a blue fountain pen, the general filled two sides of a piece of paper with drawings to illustrate the evolution of Canada's mission.

It showed how Canada's priority in the country would shift from fighting to training to development work.

And it laid out the make-up of the Afghan force in southern Afghanistan – a force that was non-existent just last year – and how Canadian units known as operational mentor liaison teams will help show the fledgling troops the ropes.

For the last six months, Canadians have worked with one of the battalions and the reports from the field are encouraging, Hillier said.

"This battalion has actually come an incredible long ways. Our soldiers were telling me it's like looking in a mirror and seeing their own tactics and drills and skills being implemented by these guys," he said.

Hillier had high praise for the Afghan troops, who he says have won the respect of local citizens. "They're very professional. ... They've actually been very successful in most operations against the Taliban," he said.

There are two Afghan battalions – with upwards of 1,000 soldiers each – now in southern Afghanistan. A third battalion is due to graduate from the training academy in Kabul next Tuesday and is expected to be on the ground by Aug. 1, Hillier said. Two more battalions could arrive this fall.

In addition to the new battalions, the Afghan army is also building up the units required to support troops in the field, such as a brigade headquarters, engineers, artillery and logistics. The Americans have pledged billions of dollars in aid to equip the Afghans with gear like armoured Humvees.

Hillier called it a "night-and-day shift" compared to a year ago, when Canadians were appealing to the Afghan military to join the fight in southern Afghanistan.

"I believe that by spring ... this organization will be very capable. It won't be perfect. It won't be stand-alone. But it will be ready to help play a huge role that essentially has not been played at all until now by themselves," he said.

"This is incredibly different and positive than the conditions we were in last September ... and it bodes incredibly well," he said.

While building up the Afghan army has long been a key element of Canada's Afghan strategy, the plan has taken on new impetus in recent weeks. Hillier travelled to Kandahar in June to discuss it with Canadian commanders as well as Afghan officials.

"We were not doing much until very recently in the training part to help development of the Afghan national security forces," he said.

Hillier's comments come as political debate over the mission heats up and Canadians remain divided over Canada's role in the troubled country.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said that any military mission past February, 2009, when the current commitment expires, will be determined by a "consensus" in Parliament. There's talk that Harper may hold a free vote in the House of Commons to determine the shape of that future mission.

The Prime Minister even told a Calgary radio station this week that he has no desire to prolong the combat mission in Kandahar.

"I think Canadians are expecting that if we're in Afghanistan after 2009, it would be a new mission," Harper said.

Hillier wouldn't discuss the future of the mission past 2009, but did note that stabilizing Afghanistan will take years.

"This is not a short-term process. We've known that all along. ... That mission will go on past February, '09 and Canada may or may not play the same role, a different role," he said.

"Canada has been through several evolutions of the mission in Afghanistan since 2002. ... It doesn't mean that because we're doing something now we're going to continue doing that forever. The government will make those decisions," he said.

Hillier said the fact that Canadians are divided on the mission, "reflects the fact that we're not doing yet enough to explain to Canadians all the incredibly good things that are going on.

"If they did have that explanation, we'd have 75 per cent or more support," he said .

Afghan elders praise Canuck soldiers

KANDAHAR By CP - Chaos created by international troops roaring through Kandahar City on military convoys needs to be controlled, Afghan elders said yesterday -- and they're counting on Canada's military to helm the job.

The elders applauded Canadian efforts to make connections with civilians on the ground.

A presentation made by Canadian soldiers to compensate their families won the respect of several local elders who say Canada should teach other international forces to respect Afghan customs.

"We know that when a suicide bomb hits a Canadian convoy, the Canadians aren't going to start shooting at everyone on the streets," said Kandahar's provincial governor Asadullah Khalid. "But we must be able to say that of other forces as well."

Fallen soldier dedicated to his men and Afghan mission, family says

CanWest News Service , Wednesday, July 11, 2007

The family of Capt. Matthew Dawe remembered the fallen soldier Wednesday as a dedicated military man who believed in the cause he was fighting for in Afghanistan.

"You can well imagine that it has been very difficult and it will continue being difficult for years to come. But I know that Matthew went there because he wanted to go there," said the soldier's mother, Reine, at a news conference in Kingston, Ont.

She recalled how her 27-year-old son, who was married with a child, was injured leading up to his deployment and sped through his rehabilitation so that he wouldn't miss out on the mission.

"He was absolutely distraught because there was a possibility that his men would go there without him," she said. "There was no question that for him, there was a duty to be there."

Dawe was killed July 4 along with five other Canadian soldiers and an Afghan interpreter when their vehicle was blown apart by a massive improvised explosive device. Dawe was a captain in the 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, based in Edmonton. Cpl. Jordan Anderson, Pte. Lane Watkins and Cpl. Cole Bartsch, were also from the Edmonton base, Capt. Jefferson Francis was from CFB Shilo, Man., and Master Cpl. Colin Bason was a reservist from New Westminster, B.C.

Dawe was the youngest of four sons, all of whom followed in their father, Peter's, footsteps and joined the military. The elder Dawe is a retired lieutenant-colonel and former teacher at the Royal Military College in Kingston. Like their brother Matt, two of the other Dawe sons have also served in Afghanistan.

The grief was audible in the voice of Tara Dawe, who received the news of her husband's death on their son, Lucas's, second birthday.

"I have lost the love of my life and the father of my child and nothing can be said or done to change that," she told the news conference, "but a moment like this would have made Matt proud and that's going to help me to heal."

The couple met as students at the Royal Military College, where Matt excelled in academics, athletics and as a student leader. Those who knew him recall the fun-loving and intelligent soldier as a devoted family man, who often spoke proudly of his wife and young son.

Tara Dawe shared that same pride for her husband and his fellow soldiers as she delivered a "final message is to the boys in Afghanistan."

"I want to tell them and everyone how much I loved and supported Matt in his decisions and how much I love and support the boys overseas," she said. "I am OK. I will be here when you come home. All I ask of you is to stay focused, stay safe and come home proud of the job you've done."

Her father-in-law also offered high praise for Canada's soldiers, saying they're well-informed, professional and confident.

"They're the best in the world and it's not trite to say that. We have superb people," said Peter Dawe Sr.

He described the troops as "profound thinkers" who have thought long and hard about the mission they are carrying out in Afghanistan and who understand well why they are putting their lives on the line.

"I think it's because they come to the realization that they're doing it for Canada, that there's an honourable purpose to it," he said. "We're the best country in the world by every measure ... we are the place that is the epitome of freedom."

He acknowledged, however, that his son at times expressed feelings of anger and frustration about the mission. For instance, he felt betrayed by some of the very people he was trying to help, describing some local Afghans as "farmers by day and Taliban or killers by night."

"That is what is particularly frustrating about this mission - it's a guerrilla war. You really don't know who your enemy is," Dawe Sr. said.

Despite some frustration, the family said the young captain, whose funeral is Saturday in Kingston, never lost hope and was steadfast in his commitment to the mission.

Costly Park Project Puzzles Afghan Residents

LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan, July 10, 2007 (ENS) - A new park being laid out by the British-led reconstruction team in Helmand is supposed to provide a welcome respite from the heat and violence of this southern province - but residents are asking why so much money is being spent on leisure when the most pressing problem – security – is getting worse by the day.

The seven-hectare park will lie on the banks of the broad Helmand river, on the outskirts of the provincial capital Lashkar Gah, and will provide fresh air, fountains, flowers, picnic areas and recreational facilities for the city's estimated 100,000 people.

The work is being funded by the United Kingdom through the Provincial Reconstruction Team, PRT, in Lashkar Gah, which is headed by the British. But at US$700,000, the price tag is a bit steep for many in Helmand's capital to understand, especially when the security situation seems to be worsening day by day.

"Almost 80 percent of the work is complete," said Engineer Esanullah, head of the Helmand office of the Helping Afghan Farmers Organisation, HAFO, which began implementing the work in late March.

"The park is supported by DfID [Britain's Department for International Development]." The location of the park, on the other side of the Helmand river, has raised some eyebrows in the city. The area, known as Bolan, is largely off-limits for residents of Lashkar Gah, who fear the Taliban across the water.

Bolan is one of the richest opium poppy-growing areas in Helmand province, and becomes especially unstable at harvest time, when crop eradicators, farmers and the Taliban vie for influence.

In most people's minds, Bolan is more closely associated with explosions, kidnappings and killings than children's swings and flowerbeds.

"For two years now, there have been remote-controlled explosions on the main Bolan road," said Gul Mohammad, 35, a farmer. "I think mines will be laid in this park. That will keep people from going there."

"People are now being killed even inside Lashkar Gah," said Mohammad Ekhlas, 25, a shopkeeper in the city. "I don't think anybody will go to this park."

Amir Mohammad, 44, agreed, adding, "If the international community wants our country to be prosperous, they should first worry about peace and security. Then we can have parks."

Daud, 36, thinks it would be better to invest reconstruction money in creating jobs. "If the PRT is really interested in helping us, it would do better to set up a factory here to help the unemployed," he said.

While exact figures are hard to come by, some estimates put the unemployment rate at 40 percent or more. Most of those who do work are employed in the province's booming, but highly illegal, opium industry.

But Ghulam Nabi, the head of the regional agriculture department, says that the provincial government has made the park a priority because people really need it.

"This park is being built to international standards," he said. "We are very happy that we'll have this kind of park in Helmand, and I think people will come here from all over the place to enjoy themselves."

Ghulam Nabi noted that the park would be segregated, with some days of the week set aside for women, and others for men. The exact schedule has yet to be worked out.

"It depends on the security situation," he said. In this very traditional part of Afghanistan, there may be few takers for the women's park. Helmand's largely Pashtun population adheres to the older codes of behavior, which to a great extent restrict women to the home.

The instability in Helmand will deter many women from traveling to the park, as will the Taliban's hostility to women who behave in ways seen as unconventional – an attitude which sometimes translates into violence.

"I don't think this park is against Islam," said Mohammad Zaher, 60, who lives in Lashkar Gah. "The problem is that men are not accustomed to going to parks along with their women. And they won't let women go on their own."

Abdul Halek, 22, a resident of Bolan, agreed. "Although our house is very close to this park, we will never let our women go there," he said. "This park will be only for men."

But some younger people – women as well as men – are looking forward to having a place where they can relax outdoors.

"I really want to be able to go there with my family," said Malika, an eighth grade female student in Lashkar Gah.

Zahra, 25, said she hoped the Bolan park would start a trend. "We need more parks in Helmand so that everybody can to enjoy them," she said.

Young men pay little heed to security risks and are desperate for a place to congregate with their friends apart from the dusty, treeless streets of Lashkar Gah.

"My friends and I will really enjoy this park," said Mahmud, 18, from Bolan. "We'll ask the government and the international community to make more and more of them."

{Published in cooperation with the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, IWPR.}

SCCI concerned over decreasing exports to Afghanistan

PeSHAWAR— Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) has informed Collector

Sales Tax Peshawar, Rashid Ahmad Bajwa of the growing concern of the business community about 450 million US dollars decrease in NWFP exports to Afghanistan that has shrunk to 26 percent only.

The NWFP Collector Sales Tax has assured to further expedite the re-fund on the exports to Afghanistan. He gave this assurance while meeting a delegation of the SCCI headed by its President on Friday. Chairman Standing Committee on Sales Tax of Sarhad Chamber, Zahidullah Shinwari, President Small Industrial Estate Kohat Road, Engr. Maqsud Anwar Pervez, Deputy Collector Re-Fund and Deputy Collector Headquarter and high officials of the Sales Tax Department were also present in the meeting.

SCCI delegation informed that during 2005-06 the total volume of exports to Afghanistan remained at $1.3 billion which shrunk to $600 million during 2006-07. Moreover, they went on to say that due to non-payment of sales tax refund and other related problems that resulted in a marked decline in the exports creating unrest among the trading community. The delegation presented suggestions and recommendations for the improvement in the sales-tax refund system.

The collector assured that all the errors in the system would be removed and the payment of sales-tax refund would be accelerated. He also issued on the spot directives on cases pointed out by Chairman Sales- tax Standing Committee of SCCI, Zahidullah Shinwari.—APP

Afghan Attorney General Criticized in Corruption Fight

by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson, NPR , July 11, 2007 · When Afghanistan's attorney general was appointed by President Hamid Karzai, he was given the task of cracking down on corrupt practices. Abdul Jabar Sabet declared it his jihad, or holy war. But critics say Sabet is a loose cannon who is failing to deliver.

Sabet said, "We have corruption because of the war that we had and because of the poverty that we have here and because of too much money that came to us all of the sudden from the international community."

When asked to clarify, Sabet said, "Temptation, poverty and war. "For example, prosecutors make an average of $60 a month. That's nothing. You people spend $60 some days on your parking."

Afghans had high hopes that the Pashtun lawyer from Montreal would end government corruption. But so far, Sabet's tenure has disappointed most Afghans. A recent survey found they view corruption as the worst in 30 years.

Critics add that Sabet's confrontational style has overshadowed his role as a crusader against corruption.

For example, they point to April, when Sabet arrested a newscaster from Tolo TV station for misquoting him. Or his ongoing dispute with a top Army general, who Sabet says tried to kidnap him and shot at his car. The general denies the kidnap claim, and says the shooting was in self-defense.

One vocal critic, Afghan Senator Mohammed Alam Ezedyar, says Sabet, who is a Pashtun, is racist — that he only targets Afghans from other ethnic groups.

"We're busy gathering votes for his impeachment," Ezedyar said in Dari. "Whoever has authority to do something and who wants stability in this country, should force him to step down."

Sabet dismisses such critics as nothing more than political rivals.

U.S. Afghan Fighter Sues News Agency

Thursday July 12, 2007, By LARRY NEUMEISTER Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) - A U.S. citizen once convicted of running a private jail in Afghanistan for terror suspects and torturing them has sued The Associated Press, alleging it engaged in defamation, libel and slander.

Jack Idema, a former Green Beret from Fayetteville, N.C., filed the lawsuit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan seeking at least $110,000 and other unspecified damages.

Idema, who listed a current address in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., was convicted of charges including torture and operating a private jail and was sentenced to 10 years in prison in Afghanistan in September 2004. He was later pardoned by Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and left that country in June.

In his lawsuit, Idema accused the AP of ignoring truths about his work in Afghanistan to generate a ``hot salient and torrid story of abuse in Afghanistan'' to compete with a CBS story about allegations of torture at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

He also accused the AP of reneging on promises not to publish photographs and videotaped images provided by Idema or his lawyers unless it obtained publishing rights from his licensing agent, Polaris Images.

Dave Tomlin, AP associate general counsel, said: ``The whole lawsuit is nonsense. The claims that reflect on the integrity and professionalism of AP staff are especially outrageous.''

According to the lawsuit, Idema had fought with the Northern Alliance against the Taliban after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and remained with the forces until June 2002, when he returned to the United States. He was not a member of the U.S. military at that time.

In April 2004, Idema was back in Afghanistan, working closely with U.S. and Afghan military and intelligence activities, the lawsuit said. He was arrested a few months later.

The U.S. military has said it accepted a prisoner from Idema before realizing he was an impostor and releasing the prisoner without charge. NATO peacekeepers have said they were duped into helping Idema on three raids.

Return of Hindu, Sikh refugees to Afghanistan opposed

NEW YORK (PAN): A Washington-based Hindu Human Rights advocacy group has urged the governments of Britain and Germany not to force Afghan Hindu and Sikh refugees to return to Afghanistan. The third annual report of the Hindu America Foundation HAF -- also urged the US to impress upon British and German Governments to stop involuntary deportation of Hindu refugees from these countries.

The situation in Afghanistan has improved considerably under the

government of President Hamid, but conditions are still not conducive enough for Hindu and Sikh minorities to return to their homes, Ramesh Rao of the HAF said. Referring to portions of the report on Afghanistan, Rao alleged Britain and Germany were forcing Afghan Hindu and Sikh refugees to return as, according to them, things had improved. But this is not the reality, he claimed.

There are no facilities to provide restitution and resettlements of fghan Hindus, were they to return from exile. The resurgence of the Taliban further renders the Hindu population vulnerable, the report argued. According to the document, Hindu temples destroyed by Taliban have not been rebuilt and several are occupied by Muslim groups leaving nearly no Hindu institutions or places of worship accessible to the minority. Existing Hindu temples and institutions in Afghanistan must be restored and rehabilitated, the HAF demanded. It said

Hindus did not send their children to public schools in Afghanistan for fear of persecution and ridicule.

Music is in the air in Afghanistan

By Jerome Louis

KABUL: Bombs and rockets may have reduced Afghanistan’s cultural heart to rubble, but it has not completely destroyed a people’s centuries-old love of classical Hindustani music.

Before the factional wars of the 1990s, the Kharabat, one of the oldest parts of Kabul, was synonymous with the country’s great musical traditions. Famed musicians like Ustad Qasimi who was awarded the title ‘father of the nation’ in 1919 for a famous ghazal, lived in the mudplastered homes of this historic neighbourhood.

Its owners fled the Kharabat when rival mujahiddin started pounding each other with artillery after driving out the Soviet army in 1992. Four years later, with the arrival of the radical Taliban fighters from seminaries, music was banned as un-Islamic. The ban was only lifted when the student militia was ousted by a US-led coalition in October 2001.

Five years later, the Kharabat has not been rebuilt but a handful of young Afghans, despite the lack of resources and at great hardship, are trying to keep the country’s musical traditions alive.

During the 30 years of war, Afghanistan lost most of its great musical masters. Musical instruments were destroyed; musicians were jailed or killed, and many fled into exile.

“Afghan musicians have suffered greatly as a result of conflict, displacement and neglect,” said sitarist Nassir Aziz who grew up in the years of the Taliban.

Today, young Afghan musicians like Aziz and the vocalist, Wali Fateh Ali Khan, have both inherited the knowledge of the great masters and are introducing new forms of expression into age-old traditions.

Until 2002, Aziz lived with his family in a refugee camp in Pakistan, teaching himself the sitar by listening to the recordings of famous musicians from India and Afghanistan like Mirzâ Abdolqâder known as Beidel (1644-1720).

“We love music very much,” he said, speaking for Afghan musicians with disarming candour. “Despite difficult conditions we are trying our best to practise music. We know full well that we have a very long way to go.”

Classical Hindustani music as we know it today was adopted in 1863 by Afghan king Amir Sheer Ali Khan to enhance the cultural status of his country. It

would have been a consequence of almost a decade of conquests and cultural exchanges between Afghanistan and India.

The common Indo-Afghan experience that led to contemporary North Indian classical musical forms and genres has its roots in the first Muslim conquest of northern India at the end of the 10th century.

Many of the conquerors were from southern Afghanistan, and themselves artists and poets or patrons of the arts and literature. Notable among these was Sultan Mahmood Ghaznavi (997- 1030). Firdausi Tousi’s (935-1020) masterpiece ‘Shahnama’ was composed at his request, and is considered a classic of Persian literature.

Both literature and artistic life was heavily coloured by the Islamic tradition of Sufism. The Sufi masters, highly spiritual, and deeply attached to personal forms of expression, very often assumed the function of spiritual guides to the monarchs of the time.

Also, they played a major role in the overall development of musical forms and expression by encouraging artistic exchanges with Indian artists and philosophers, in particular with many masters of the 16th and 17th centuries.

Abu Arrayhan Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Biruni (923-1048), the well-known Muslim scientist and philosopher, was among the early pioneers who, mainly through the nuanced application of the world-view of Sufism, narrowed the gap between the teachings of Hinduism and Islam.

In the 18th century, a new philosophical and devotional movement was born in India known as Bhakti, a non-dualistic movement of worshiping a formless god that has allowed a further osmosis between Hindu and Muslim artists and mystics.

It is in this unique context of common search for new aesthetic and artistic limits that classical Hindustani music grew.

One of the best known representatives of this osmosis is Amir Khushraw-e-Balkhi (1253-1325), the creator of the tabla and several ragas, as well as qawwali and khayal styles of singing and playing. Also, Mian Tansen in the court of the Mughul Emperor Jalaluddin Muhammad Akbar (1542-1605) who pioneered the khayal and dhrupad styles.

Among musicians of Afghan origin who have made substantial contributions to the development of classical Hindustani music is Ghulam Bandegi Khan Bangash, a forefather of the world famous sarod player Ustad Amjad Ali Khan. Bangash had moved from Ghazni to Gwalior in central India. He transformed the Afghan instrument rubab into the sarod, which belongs to the tube zithers of Indian tradition.

Instruments such as the tabla, sarangi, dilruba and sarod are used by musicians in both countries. Seddique Qiam, an Afghan classical music expert, said: “There is an inseparable link between Indian and Afghan classical musical traditions. So far we are not even able to say with certainty whether what we today refer to as classical Hindustani music belonged to India or Afghanistan.”

—Dawn/The IPS News Service

[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.]