In this bulletin:

• Big shop blast in Afghan capital kills 6
• Afghan suicide blasts kill three
• NATO identifies Afghan air raid victim as Taliban commander
• Afghan, Pakistani Officials Agree On Tribal Assemblies
• Members of Afghan Jirga Commission meets Foreign Minister
• Good Pak-Afghan relations key to security in Afghanistan
• 79 Afghan nationals arrested (The News Int.)
• Defeat Taliban with fair polls in Pakistan
• US - Afghan Strategic Partnership meeting took place
• Afghanistan better able to tackle Taliban this year: US diplomat
• U.S. Diplomat ‘Optimistic’ About Afghanistan
• BearingPoint wins $218M contract to aid Afghan rebuilding
• O'Connor meets with human rights director in Afghanistan
  Afghan rights chief says he can't monitor all prisoners' fates
• Afghanistan needs help to protect human rights: official
• NATO parliamentary team in Pakistan to discuss Afghanistan
• Afghanistan's Poppy Conundrum
• Kabul copes with lots of people, little water
• Reversing the Great Afghan Land Grab
• OVERNMENT MUST MEET GENDER TARGETS IN ORDER TO MAKE PROGRESS ON WOMEN’S RIGHTS - PARLIAMENTARIANS

Big shop blast in Afghan capital kills 6

By Zeeshan Haider – Reuters Wednesday, March 14, 2007

KABUL (Reuters) - A huge blast in an ammunition shop in the heart of the Afghan capital on Wednesday killed at least six people and wounded 10, officials said. A suicide attack killed six more in the country's southeast.

Several Kabul shops were razed by the early morning blast. Bystanders tore at rubble with their hands to haul out survivors.

"Two of my nephews were killed. We don't know what caused it but it was a loud and terrible explosion," a weeping Haji Qutubuddin said at the scene. "God knows better what was the cause."

An Interior Ministry spokesman said at least six people were killed and 10 hurt, and rescuers were combing the site looking for more dead or injured. "The blast occurred in a shop selling gunpowder and other ammunition for hunting rifles," said Ali Shah Paktiawal, Kabul police crime branch chief.

In southeastern Afghanistan, meanwhile, two suicide bombers killed six people in the town of Khost in an attack on a senior policeman, a provincial government spokesman said. The officer was wounded.

In the southern province of Kandahar, the Taliban heartland, rebels killed at least one policeman in an attack on a patrol. And in the northwestern province of Faryab, suspected Taliban militants riding motorcycles killed a district chief and wounded another in a drive-by shooting. One of the assailants was also killed when guards of the district chief returned the fire while other attackers fled.

The Taliban has vowed to step up suicide attacks across the country this year. NATO, meanwhile, has launched a big southern offensive in what analysts say is a crunch year for both sides.

Three Taliban suicide bombers killed two people and wounded a dozen on Tuesday in separate attacks in southern Afghanistan. A senior Taliban commander, Mullah Jamaluddin, was killed along with several of his followers in a ground and air strike in Helmand last week, NATO said.

Afghan suicide blasts kill three – BBC

Suicide bombers have killed at least three civilians and injured a number of others in three attacks in southern Afghanistan, officials say. At least three people and the bomber died in the deadliest blast, at Spin Boldak near Pakistan, officials said.

The other two blasts minutes apart in Helmand province injured two civilians. The two bombers died, police say. Southern Afghanistan is a stronghold of the Taleban and thousands of foreign troops are fighting them there.

The Spin Boldak attacker blew himself up among a crowd of people who had just crossed over from Pakistan. "The man entered from the Pakistani side and blew himself up as police tried to search him," Abdul Razzaq, chief of border security in the area, told Reuters news agency.

Earlier in Laskhar Gah, in Helmand province, an attacker blew himself up next to a convoy of an international aid agency. At least two Afghan civilians were injured in the explosion.

Half an hour later, close to the scene of the first attack, a second man with explosives strapped to his body was shot at while walking towards an Afghan army patrol in Lashkargah. His explosives went off and killed him - it is not clear if there were any other casualties.

The BBC's Alastair Leithead in Kabul says there have been a small number of suicide bombings in Lashkargah over the past year but they are relatively unusual.

Much of the violence in Helmand is due to fighting between the British troops and Taleban insurgents. Thousands of people have been displaced across the province.

Nato launched operation Achilles last week to target northern Helmand, in order to open up a safe route for a hydro-electric power plant development project to go ahead. Thousands of international forces are involved in the operation.

NATO identifies Afghan air raid victim as Taliban commander

Wednesday 14 March 2007 06:43

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said Wednesday the body of one of those killed last week during "precision air strikes" in southern Helmand province had been identified as a Taliban commander named Mullah Jamaluddin.

The attack took place in the Nowa Kalay area of Garmsir district soon after the alliance started its biggest-ever Operation Achilles in Helmand province, the ISAF said in a statement.

Jamaluddin was a joint deputy commander of Taliban forces in Garmsir district, the statement said, adding "Jamaluddin was a violent Taliban extremist commander responsible for regular attacks in Garmsir. "

Some 5,500 Afghan and ISAF troops, a majority of them British soldiers, started Operation Achilles last week in Helmand province, with the aim of cracking down on Taliban militants in the province and creating secure conditions to facilitate reconstruction and development. dpa

A fghan, Pakistani Officials Agree On Tribal Assemblies

March 14, 2007 -- Afghan and Pakistani officials have agreed to convene Pashtun tribal assemblies on both sides of their border in an effort to contain terrorism.

Delegates from both countries agreed after three days of talks in Islamabad today to work together on the basis of "mutual respect for each nation's national sovereignty and territorial integrity."

The delegates plan to meet again in April to finalize dates for the tribal assemblies, or jirgas.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf first agreed on a tribal approach against militancy during a meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington in September 2006.

Islamabad, which is concerned about possible territorial claims upon Pakistan's tribal border regions, opposes the idea of a single assembly of Pashtun tribal leaders from both sides of the border.

Members of Afghan Jirga Commission meets Foreign Minister

ISLAMABAD, Mar 13 (APP): The Peace Jirga Commission of Afghanistan led by Pir Said Ahmad Gillani met with Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri here on Tuesday.

The Foreign Minister welcomed the members of the Afghan Commission and appreciated direct interaction between the Jirga Commissions of the two countries. He said that the positive outcome of the first meeting  augured well for the process of the Jirgas.  

Khurhid Kasuri emphasized that Pakistan had a direct stake  in peace and stability in Afghanistan and added that it  was Pakistan’s sincere desire that peace and stability and better understanding be created between the two countries.

The Afghan side expressed satisfaction over their discussions in Islamabad and two sides agreed that there should be more interaction between the intelligentsia and businessmen and people-to-people contacts of the two countries.

Foreign Minister Kasuri said that peace in Afghanistan would be a positive contributory factor in creating a land bridge linking Central Asia through Afghanistan to Pakistan and with the setting up of the Gwadar port to South and West Asia.

Peace in Afghanistan will help connect Central Asia to South Asia and it would prove a possibility of becoming a source of the hub for cooperation in trade, tourism and economic development. 

Both sides hoped that the Jirga process would finally lead to a better environment for peace, security and stability between the two brotherly nations.

Good Pak-Afghan relations key to security in Afghanistan

LONDON, March 13 (APP): The top police official of the Helmand province has said good relations between his country and Pakistan will go a long way in overcoming the security problems facing his province.

Speaking at a briefing at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office here on Tuesday, the Helmand Province Chief of Police Major-General Nabil Jan said both Pakistan and Afghanistan enjoy friendly relations but there were certain grey areas which require greater attention of the two governments.  The briefing was arranged by the FCO to highlight the assistance being provided by the British Police to develop both the proficiency and professionalism of policing services in the province bordering Pakistan.  

Jan said Helmand shares 163 kilometres of border with Pakistan and has a population of 1.5 million. He disclosed that 80 per cent of the population is illiterate which has helped the Taliban to exploit the situation and influence the minds and hearts of the people.

 The Helmand Police Chief said Taliban controls five districts in his area of jurisdiction but Afghan Army with the help of the NATO were engaged in ousting them from these areas.   

Referring to a deal with Musa Khel with Taliban, he said this was working fine until they realised that Afghanistan Government initiated development projects for the betterment of people. The Taliban, he added, opposed this development and resorted to killing people to scare them.

He claimed that 95 per cent of the people of Helmand opposed Taliban. Referring to poppy cultivation in his province, Jan said the authorities have destroyed some 700,000 acres of opium and under a recently launched campaign at least 80 per cent of the poppy fields would be wiped out.

Jan said drugs dealers and drugs lords were using Taliban to increase their trade but he was hoping that with the assistance of the international community the Afghan Government would be able to overcome the problem of poppy cultivation. He praised police reforms programme initiated by the British Government and said it would benefit Helmand Police in the long run.

79 Afghan nationals arrested (The News Int.)

QUETTA: Police on Tuesday arrested 79 Afghan nationals from different parts of the Turbat town during raids, officials told APP on the telephone. “They were arrested under the Foreigners Act, as they had entered Pakistan without legal travel documents. The police handed over these people to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) for further investigations,” they said.

Defeat Taliban with fair polls in Pakistan

Gulf News - 03/13/2007 By Benazir Bhutto

The recent unannounced visit of the US Vice-President Dick Cheney to Pakistan, in which he once again pressed President General Pervez Musharraf to stop tolerating Taliban-related activities, highlights what I have been saying for the past several years: My country, Pakistan, is facing a political crisis, not exclusively a military one.

I fully agree with the US President George W. Bush's clear statement in his 2006 State of the Union message in which he said:

"Dictatorships shelter terrorists and feed resentment and radicalism, and seek weapons of mass destruction. Democracies replace resentment with hope, respect the rights of their citizens and their neighbours and join the fight against terror. Every step towards freedom in the world makes our country safer, so we will act boldly in freedom's cause."

This statement accurately reflects the situation in Pakistan under the present military regime. We have read more and more frequently in the world press that Islamabad is unable or unwilling to stop the Taliban and Al Qaida from conducting activities in Pakistan's tribal areas.

They then cross the border to Afghanistan to tragically kill American and Nato troops who are trying to protect the democratically elected government in that country. The present regime's inability to successfully take on the Taliban and Al Qaida undermine the elected government of our neighbour - Afghanistan.

If elected prime minister of Pakistan in the election to be held later this year, I will end that protection of the Taliban and Al Qaida immediately. My party has the experience of dealing with militants and armed mafias.

In my first term in office, in the late 1980s, my government took on the narco barons. They were the predecessors of the Taliban and Al Qaida. They had irregular armies, weapons, rocket launchers and money, and hid in the tribal areas, where they launched attacks on the Pakistani government forces. But we tamed them.

When I took over as prime minister for the second time, in 1993, the Pakistan army had been called out in the port city of Karachi to battle ethnic militants who held the city hostage.

My government was able to mobilise the people, obtain good intelligence and wipe out the militant cells. We restored peace to Karachi and can restore peace to the tribal areas of Pakistan.

Initially, in 1993 and 1994, the Taliban gained a great deal of support in Pakistan. This was due to the fact that Pakistan has a 1,500-mile border with Afghanistan, and at that time our neighbouring country was in chaos. We needed some peace and stability along our border and not continual fighting along with millions of Afghan refugees pouring into our country.

After I was undemocratically ousted from power by president Farooq Leghari, who was backed by the army intelligence agency known as Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the ISI turned its attention to external relations. It provided support for the Taliban government in Afghanistan, believing it gave Pakistan strategic depth.

Elements of the intelligence agency reportedly continue that alliance with both the Taliban and Al Qaida to this very day on the same premise - even if it means supporting fanatics. It is not a premise my party and I share. We believe that it's essential for Pakistan to support democracy in Afghanistan. We believe in democracy.

I am very proud to have degrees from both Harvard University and Oxford University. Although a deeply dedicated Muslim, I have grown to highly respect and cherish the finest in the Western traditions of freedom, equal rights for all, democracy, a free press, and the ability of all men and women to have economic opportunity and physical security.

My party - the Pakistan Peoples Party - won the most number of votes in the last election held in Pakistan, in October 2002, despite the fact that I could not go back and campaign as its chairperson. We are also aware that the party of the Musharraf dictatorship stole many of our votes in that 2002 election.

I shall contest in the election of 2007. Hopefully, the United States and other countries will prevail on the current Pakistani military dictatorship to hold fair and free elections open to all parties and all personalities, including myself and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

I hope I can return to my country without being arrested on trumped-up charges to hobble the opposition and give an unfair advantage to the very group under whom the Taliban have resurrected themselves.

We must transform our nation from a terrorist hiding place to one that is open, peaceful and prosperous. Free elections in Pakistan can make that happen.

Benazir Bhutto was prime minister of Pakistan twice. She is running again in this year's upcoming election as leader of the opposition Pakistan Peoples Party.

US - Afghan Strategic Partnership meeting took place

Posted On: Mar 13, 2007 – MoFA Kabul

The Afghan foreign minister Dr. Spanta received visiting US Deputy Secretary of State H.E. Eric Edelman and discussed a wide range of issues including regional cooperation, military and security assistance to Afghanistan, counter-terrorism and counter-narcotics. 

The United States led the International Coalition Forces in the war against terrorism and has the largest contingent of armed forces in Afghanistan. The United States is also the leading country assisting in the reconstruction of Afghanistan.

Following their meeting, the two sides took part in a joint press conference. 

Afghanistan better able to tackle Taliban this year: US diplomat

March 13, 2007 - KABUL (AFP) - Top US diplomat Richard Boucher said Tuesday there was "some confidence" Afghanistan and its allies will be better able this year to tackle the Taliban insurgency that was at its fiercest last year.

"We faced some dangerous and difficult enemies and we will face them again this year," Boucher, US assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian Affairs, told reporters after talks with his Afghan counterparts.

"But I think we face this year with some confidence because there are more policemen, more army troops, more NATO troops, more roads, more effective government, more prosperity and more opportunities than ever before."

The United States led the invasion that toppled the Taliban government in late 2001. It is the largest supporter of the post-Taliban government, with 27,000 troops here tackling the insurgency and instability.

It has spent 14.2 billion dollars in Afghanistan since 2001 and plans to spend 11.8 billion dollars more in the next two years, most of it on building and equipping the Afghan security forces.

"We understand that a stable, prosperous, democratic, open Afghanistan will change the destiny of the countries throughout the region and make the people of Afghanistan safer, and indeed people throughout the world safer," Boucher said.

The Afghan government agreed at the talks to step up work on fighting widespread corruption and Afghanistan's world-leading trade in opium, and on establishing the rule of law and security.

The talks were in the framework of the "US-Afghanistan Strategic Partnership" established last year.

U.S. Diplomat ‘Optimistic’ About Afghanistan

By CARLOTTA GALL - The New York Times Published: March 13, 2007

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 12 — The departing American ambassador to Afghanistan, Ronald E. Neumann, said Monday that he did not see the Taliban as the big threat it appeared to represent a year or two ago, and that he was leaving feeling “reasonably optimistic” about the state of the insurgency and the country’s progress.

“We spent a lot of last year worrying about this year,” he told a small group of journalists in the refurbished old embassy building, which reopened recently. “We will certainly face hard fighting in the south,” he said, “but I am going away feeling reasonably optimistic.”

More British and American troops had been supplied for the effort, he noted, providing the needed military support for the anti-insurgency effort, especially in the southern part of the country by fighters associated with the former Taliban rulers.

“We will see a hard fight,” Mr. Neumann said, but added, “We have the basics of what it takes.”

The Taliban, who were ousted in late 2001, mounted a strong comeback last year, leading to fierce fighting with American and NATO forces. The Taliban also appear to have joined forces with drug traffickers in Helmand Province in the south.

The NATO troops who took control of southern Afghanistan last year began a large offensive in the area early this month. Mr. Neumann said he did not believe that time was on the Taliban’s side. “I don’t see where the Taliban are going to increase,” he said.

Comparing the violence to that of Iraq, where he served in 2004 and 2005, he said there were no battleground cities in Afghanistan like Falluja that would require large-scale military operations to secure. In Afghanistan, “We are talking of protecting a town with 50 police,” he said.

“This does not tell me this is a 10-foot-tall movement,” he said. “It’s tough. It’s resilient. It’s dangerous. I just don’t see it as being that strong. It is still a race, but inch by inch the government is getting a little better.”

The ambassador said that the Afghan Army, which initially had been envisioned as a light force reliant on American allies, was being strengthened, with a goal of building it to 70,000 troops, and that it was being supplied with armored vehicles, aircraft and body armor.

The program to develop a police entity was two years behind that of the army, he said, but current plans also call for more support for the police. He said he was confident that Congress would approve the extra money needed for those efforts.

Of Pakistan, which has come under persistent criticism over the past year for its failure to stem cross-border infiltration by insurgents, he said, “We are getting more cooperation, and I think we need more cooperation.”

He said the Pakistani government should impose more control on the tribal areas along the Afghan border. “It will have to be done one piece at a time, and we need to help them bring control in the tribal areas,” he said, adding that he would like to see Pakistan pursue more Taliban leaders believed to be on its side of the border.

Mr. Neumann said people in Afghanistan and abroad should understand that it would take considerable time to see results in the country. It had taken four years to set up a military justice system for the Afghan National Army — from drafting the law to training legal personnel — before the army could hold its first court-martial, he said. Plans to train a civilian judiciary are proceeding, but the effects will not be felt on the ground even in a year’s time, he said.

International commitment remained high, however, and there were no signs of donor fatigue for Afghanistan, he said. Even though nations have been slow to meet their commitments to provide soldiers for the NATO peacekeeping force, none of the countries were talking of pulling out. “Inch by inch we are seeing more commitment,” Mr. Neumann said.

The Afghan government is also slowly moving in the right direction, he said. The new Parliament has been a generally positive addition, and there have been some improvement in the situation with provincial governors, some of whom were warlords who were seen as more powerful than President Hamid Karzai.

BearingPoint wins $218M contract to aid Afghan rebuilding

Baltimore Business Journal - 2:22 PM EDT Tuesday, March 13, 2007

by Jeff Clabaugh

BearingPoint, which has been working on economic reconstruction programs in Afghanistan since 2002, won a new contract from the U.S. Agency for International Development worth $218 million.

USAID's Afghans Building Capacity Program is one of the largest single contracts awarded to date by the U.S. government for rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan.

Under the contract, McLean, Va.-based BearingPoint will continue to help with economic, education, infrastructure and health consulting in Afghanistan, where it works with the Ministry of Finance. The new contract runs through 2012.

BearingPoint (NYSE: BE), also a consultant to the Iraqi government, has delayed full financial reports while it corrects accounting errors. The company said in a preliminary statement last month its 2006 losses narrowed to as much as $214 million and revenue rose as much as 10 percent to $2.65 billion.

O'Connor meets with human rights director in Afghanistan
Edmonton Journal - Wednesday, March 14, 2007

KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan - Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor says he’s reasonably confident local human rights officials in Afghanistan will be able to monitor the treatment of Taliban suspects captured by Canadians and handed over to Afghan authorities.

O’Connor made the comment after finally having his eyeball the eyeball meeting with Abdul Noorzai, head of the Afghanistan human rights commission in the country’s four southeastern provinces, including Kandahar.

“He’s a very honest man, he’s really dedicated to human rights,” said O’Connor. "We will watch with time, we learn with time how things occur. I guess some of the proof will be if, down the line, they find something wrong in the Afghan system we will wait to see if they tell us. We have separate sources too, unofficial sources, that tell us what’s going on and we will be able to compare these things.”

He wouldn't reveal what those unofficial sources are.'

O’Connor offered Noorzai help in keeping track of detainees to make sure they are not abused by Afghan authorities after being transferred by Canadian soldiers.

“If some of our detainees are moved to let’s say a detention centre 50 kilometres from here and he can’t get there we will help him get there we will give him the transportation to get him there and support him," said O'Connor.

Like many of the country’s institutions, Afghanistan’s human rights commission works on a shoestring budget. However, O’Connor said he didn’t want to give the group money for fear that would taint its impartiality.

He had been hoping to meet Noorzai since arriving here for a surprise visit on Sunday — but the meeting was cancelled on Monday when Noorzai couldn’t make it. O’Connor invited Noorzai to the main Canadian base at Kandahar Airfield on Wednesday where the two toured Canada’s detainee transfer facility where Taliban suspects are held for up to 96 hours before being handed over to Afghan’s version of the FBI. O’Connor flew out of Afghanistan shortly after the meeting.

Afghan rights chief says he can't monitor all prisoners' fates

Last Updated: Tuesday, March 13, 2007 - CBC News

The leader of a human rights group in Afghanistan says his organization lacks the ability to fully monitor the fate of Taliban suspects handed over by Canadian soldiers to the Afghan government.

The director of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission for the Kandahar region, Abdul Noorzai, signed an agreement with Canada last month to monitor and report on any abuse of detainees.

Noorzai said security is an issue for his staff, who must travel into dangerous areas to do their work. He also noted that his staff is small for the amount of work they must do — he only has five people to directly review complaints, visit jails and meet with more than 1,000 prisoners.

Canadian Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor was to have met with Noorzai in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, on Monday to discuss monitoring prisoners captured by Canadian soldiers and handed over to Afghan authorities. That meeting was rescheduled for Wednesday.

"Gordon O'Connor wants to look this man in the eye and ask him if he's going to do the job Canada wants him to do," CBC reporter Laura Lynch said from Kandahar on Tuesday.

The talks were cancelled at the last minute because Noorzai, who said he only found out about the meeting on Sunday, couldn't make it. He was in a neighbouring province.

Noorzai told Lynch on Tuesday that there is abuse and torture in Afghan jails. He also said he has no official complaints that any Taliban suspects handed over to the Afghan government by Canadian troops have been abused.

Last Sunday, O'Connor said he wanted to meet Noorzai to "look him in the eye" and ensure the agreement works.    

Earlier this month, O'Connor said the International Committee of the Red Cross monitored the treatment of prisoners handed over by Canadian soldiers and would report any abuses to Canada, but the ICRC has said that isn't the case. The Red Cross reports directly to the Afghan government.

Canada's Military Police Complaints Commission is investigating allegations that on 18 occasions, troops handed over prisoners knowing they would be abused.

Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association lodged the complaint that prompted the investigation.

Afghanistan needs help to protect human rights: official

National Post, Canada 03/13/2007 By Graham Thomson with files from Agence France-Presse

KANDAHAR - Taliban suspects captured by Canadian soldiers and turned over to Afghan authorities are at the mercy of a corrupt, unprofessional police force divided by tribal squabbling and noted for abuse, says a human-rights official in southern Afghanistan.

"We don't have the professional police, we don"t have the professional intelligence for doing investigations," said Abdul Noorzai, the southern Afghanistan director of the country's independent human rights commission. "There are personal grudges, there are tribal problems, tribal disputes. This is why we don't have the professional force that can do the real investigations."

Those inquiries are crucial to prove whether people captured by Canadian troops are indeed Taliban fighters and not innocent civilians caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. In either case, prisoners are sometimes subject to abuse and torture, according to Noorzai.

Canada already helps train Afghan police officers and army soldiers but it needs to do more, said Noorzai. He will make a plea to Canada for more help when he meets with Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor on Wednesday at the main NATO base at Kandahar Airfield.

This will be the much-anticipated meeting "to look the man in the eyes" that O'Connor trumpeted on Sunday but that was abruptly cancelled on Monday when Noorzai couldn't attend.

The meeting, and its cancellation, sparked headlines due to O'Connor?s recent political troubles over the uncertain fate of Taliban suspects handed over to Afghan authorities. O'Connor had insisted the Red Cross would monitor the conditions of the detainees on behalf of Canada but he then had to backtrack when he realized he had his facts wrong.

Instead, the detainees will be monitored through a new agreement between Canada and Afghanistan's independent human rights commission. O'Connor said he wants assurances from Noorzai that he can do the job.

However, like most organizations in Afghanistan, Noorzai's group is underfunded, understaffed and inexperienced. It has a skeleton staff to keep an eye on human rights issues in four of Afghanistan's troubled provinces, including Kandahar. Noorzai said will ask O'Connor for more assistance to protect the rights of Afghans.

"We need the world community support in all of these things. Without world community support, it's impossible," said Noorzai through an interpreter in an interview with Global News. "All of these things I would like to discuss with the defence minister."

O'Connor made a point of rescheduling the meeting and having it at Kandahar Airfield. The two men will also tour a compound where Taliban suspects captured by Canadian soldiers are questioned before being handed over to Afghan authorities.

Canadian authorities won't discuss whether they have any suspects in the compound, but it's believed to be empty at this time. O'Connor spent Tuesday with Gen. Rick Hillier, the chief of defence staff, meeting Canadian soldiers at forward operating bases in Kandahar province.

Meanwhile, southern Afghanistan continues to be a troubled region. Three suicide bombers attacked in separate incidents on Tuesday leaving four people dead and about a dozen wounded.

The deadliest attack was in the border town of Spin Boldak, where a man with explosives strapped to his body blew himself up in the middle of a crowd of people who had just crossed over from Pakistan. There were two suicide bomb explosions minutes apart in Lashkar Gah, capital of the southern province of Helmand. One coalition soldier suffered minor injuries. No Canadians were involved in the incidents.

NATO parliamentary team in Pakistan to discuss Afghanistan

A parliamentary delegation from NATO member states arrived in the capital Islamabad Wednesday for talks with Pakistani authorities on the security situation in Afghanistan. From correspondents in Islamabad, Pakistan, 14 Mar 2007 - ( www.indiaenews.com)

A parliamentary delegation from NATO member states arrived in the capital Islamabad Wednesday for talks with Pakistani authorities on the security situation in Afghanistan.

The delegates are expected to hold a series of meetings over four days focusing on Pakistan's role in the war against terrorism and steps taken to strengthen border control.

There is mounting pressure on Pakistan from coalition partners and the Afghan government to intensify its efforts to check cross-border movement of suspected Taliban militants.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf asserts that responsibility of security along the 2,560-km frontier also falls on the Afghan army and international forces. The government in Islamabad claims that Pakistan's contribution to the fight against Taliban and Al Qaeda elements is greater than any other country.

Afghanistan's Poppy Conundrum

This year’s eradication campaign in Helmand seems to be accomplishing little except beefing up support for the Taleban. By IWPR trainees in Helmand (ARR No. 245, 13-Mar-07 )

The start was impressive enough - television footage showed distraught farmers and tough-looking police. Tractors made determined runs over two-foot high opium poppy plants. Afghan government officials issued sweeping declarations that this time, there would be no compromise.

After last year’s failed eradication campaign and the ensuing record-breaking harvest, 2007 was supposed to be the year Afghanistan finally moved away from its headlong race to become a narco-state.

The results, however, look all too familiar. Within days, village councils had come to agreements with police on the price they would pay for their poppy crop to be saved. Farmers pooled resources to buy off the eradicators.

With the harvest just weeks away, Helmand’s 2007 yield may make even last year’s bumper crop pale by comparison.

Afghanistan produces close to 90 per cent of the world’s opium, the raw material from which heroin is made. Helmand is the undisputed centre of the poppy industry, last year accounting for 42 per cent of the country’s record harvest.

“I have not even seen the eradication teams,” said one farmer in Nadali district, where the campaign kicked off in mid-February. “I gave money – 500 afghani [about 10 US dollars] per jerib [2,000 square metres]. The whole village got together and gave the money to the elders, and it was they who approached the police.”

The farmer, who asked that his name be withheld to protect him from retaliation by government authorities, added, “Those who pay money don’t have to worry. That is as sure as the sun shines. Now that I know how to protect my poppy, I will grow even more next year. I will keep on growing it until the government fulfils its promises to the people.”

Others tell similar tales, although the amounts paid in bribes vary. One farmer said that his family was paying close to 3,000 afghani per jerib.

Helmand province’s deputy governor Haji Pir Mohammad voiced the official sense of optimism about this year’s effort to destroy the crop.

“We will eradicate 50 per cent of the poppy in Helmand province this year,” he said, saying that by March 3, three weeks on from the start of operations, an area of 10,000 jeribs or 2,000 hectares had been cleared.

But it is a race against time. According to officials in the provincial agriculture department, Helmand has more than 100,000 hectares of land planted with opium poppy this year. In the month remaining before harvesting begins in early April, the present eradication rate of 600-700 hectares per week suggests that the outcome will only be a fraction of the 50 per cent target cited by the deputy governor.

Security is also an issue. In districts under Taleban control, eradication teams have little chance of success.

“No has destroyed my poppy and no one will be able to destroy it,” said Hamidullah, a farmer in Musa Qala, which fell to the Taleban in early February. “We are not paying the Taleban, but they tell us, ‘As long as we are here, no one can destroy your poppy’. “This year we have grown more than ever.”

The central government has sent out 600 police from the capital Kabul to work alongside 230 local forces to destroy poppy fields. Officials say the deployment of forces from outside Helmand should counter the ubiquitous corruption that sank previous eradication efforts.

But if local reports are anything to go by, this year will be no different from last. “They could send 600,000 police and it wouldn’t help,” sighed one local government official, who did not want to be named. Even the deputy governor acknowledged that the well-greased wheels of graft were operating smoothly.

“We have received some complaints,” said Pir Mohammad. “And we plan to send inspectors out to arrest those who are taking money. But we haven’t been able to catch anyone yet.”

Fazeli Ahmad Sherzad, chief of counter-narcotics for Helmand, described the urgent need to achieve results in the eradication campaign, which is being funded by Afghanistan’s interior ministry.

“We have more than 100 tractors and 50 motorcycles,” he said. “We have to do something. If we do not eradicate poppy, it will have a strong negative effect on the economy and on the military. US Assistant Secretary of State Anne Patterson has said that poppy benefits the Taleban and others who are against the government. They spend the money fighting NATO and Afghan government forces.”

It has now commonly accepted that the Taleban are using the proceeds of the drug trade to finance their efforts to unseat the Afghan government and drive foreign forces out of the country. But there is little hard evidence to support the claim.

Farmers, landowners and even drug traffickers say that they are not being forced to contribute to the insurgents’ war chest. “I see the Taleban walking around, but they don’t ask us to give them money,” said Janaan, a 28-year-old farmer in the Taleban-dominated district of Washir.

Traffickers also dismiss the Taleban connection. “We don’t give money to the Taleban, and we don’t ask them for protection.” said one drug smuggler, who did not give his name. “We have our own armed people to escort the drugs out of the country.”

The Taleban themselves deny the charge vigorously. “We are not telling people to grow poppy” insisted one high-ranking Taleban commander in Helmand province, who would not give his name. “We would never tell the people to grow anything that is haram [forbidden by Islam]. And if farmers give us money, it is because they support the jihad.”

The commander also denied that the Taleban were spearheading attacks on the poppy eradication teams. In the first few days of this year’s eradication campaign, several armed raids were mounted on police teams in Nadali and one vehicle was bombed, killing two policemen.

“It is the people who are doing that - we have no role in the eradication campaign,” insisted the commander. “We do plant bombs, and we do fight the government. That has nothing to do with poppy – we are fighting jihad.”

Whether or not the Taleban are profiting economically from the eradication campaign, they seem to be benefiting from the anger it engenders among those whose livelihoods are at stake. Given Helmand’s prominence as a poppy-growing centre, this seems to encompass a huge swathe of the population.

“If the government destroys our poppy, I will join the Taleban,” said the farmer from Nadali. Janaan, the farmer from Washir, was equally emphatic, saying, “I will join the Taleban, I will pay money, I will do whatever it takes to protect my poppy.”

Some farmers have been temporarily flooding their fields to keep out the tractors. When the eradication teams leave, they drain the water and continue growing their crop.

Much of the opium is processed in Afghanistan, and then smuggled out of the country as heroin or morphine. The main trafficking routes are Iran, Pakistan, and Tajikistan, and from there to Europe. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime UNODC, close to 90 per cent of the heroin sold in the United Kingdom originates in Afghanistan. If this year’s harvest is as high as is predicted, almost half of that will come from Helmand alone.

Even if they claim not to be funding the Taleban, the traffickers in Helmand seem to be getting on well with the insurgents. “I am a small-scale smuggler,” said one man, Rahmatullah. “I just buy poppy from farmers and sell it to bigger drug traffickers.”

Rahmatullah said he was not forced to give money to the Taleban when he operated in areas that they controlled.

“We don’t have a problem with the Taleban” he said. “If we give them money, we give by choice, like the zakat [tithe prescribed by Islam]. People support the Taleban. Why shouldn’t they?”

Another man, involved in the illicit trade on a larger scale, told a similar story. “We have no problems in the areas under Taleban control,” he said. “May Allah bless them.”


IWPR has recently begun a journalism training programme in Helmand province. This story was compiled from reports written by the trainees.

Kabul copes with lots of people, little water

The Christian Science Monitor - 03/12/2007 By Mark Sappenfield - Afghans see a possible livelihood in the city, despite its crumbling infrastructure.

KABUL - This is a city under siege, not from the Taliban, but from itself.
Kabul is home to 3.4 million people but has no public sewage system. Piped city water reaches only 18 percent of people. Daily power cuts last from dawn until 4 p.m. in the winter ? longer in the summer.

Once renowned for green gardens and quirky bazaars, Kabul is sinking under the weight of its own citizens. More than a million migrants have flooded into the capital city since the 2001 fall of the Taliban, seeking a job and a better life in the big city.

In all, the population of Kabul has nearly doubled in seven years, straining a metropolis still riddled by the bullet holes and bombed-out roofs of many years of civil war.

Larger than the next 10 largest Afghan cities combined, Kabul estimates its most basic needs require $55 million this year; its budget is $4.5 million. Residents complain, but they cope. Despite the smell of sewage and mile-long walks to get drinking water, Kabul finds ways to function.

Yet more than five years after the international community pledged to help rebuild this tattered capital, the hard work has hardly even begun.

"Thirty years ago, everything seemed to work here, but there were not the population pressures we see now," says Pushpa Pathak, an adviser to the Kabul Municipality. "And since then, there has only been destruction, not construction."

Thirty years ago, Kabul was a charming city of 750,000 that drew hippies and exotic travelers to its quiet streets lined with pines and poplars. By 1999, however, the population had hit 1.8 million, and from 1999 to 2004, the city grew at a rate of 15 percent a year, according to World Bank estimates.

The fall of the Taliban triggered a flood of newcomers ? both refugees returning from Pakistan and rural poor who saw few opportunities in Afghanistan's villages. Though Kabul's population growth has slowed during the past two years, it still lingers near 5 percent ? adding 150,000 people a year.

Yar Mohammad is one of them. He came here two years ago, unable to scratch out a life in the stony fields of the Panjshir Valley after his father and two uncles died fighting the Taliban. "I couldn't stay there, because I couldn't [find enough] work and it was hard to cover the expenses for the children," he says.

So he is here, trudging along the sloping, muddy street to his hillside home, his sun-blackened hands clutching a sloshing, 32-liter (8.5-gallon) container of water slung over his shoulder. Since there is no water at his house ? and he doesn't always have money to buy water from the tanker trucks that rumble up the hill ? he often spends 3-1/2 hours walking up and down the hill to fill seven containers of water at a government pipe. If that is closed, he has to go to another pipe two-thirds of a mile away.

The situation is a symptom of Kabul's chaotic growth. During civil war and Taliban rule, the city was first parsed among warlords and then ignored, creating an administrative void. Since the new government emerged six years ago, population surge has overwhelmed the city.

Some 80 percent of Kabul residents ? including Mr. Mohammad ? live in informal settlements never approved by any government authority. But at least even the poorest families have mud houses with doors and windows. "The housing stock is pretty good," says Soraya Goga of the World Bank.

But the municipal services for formal and informal settlements alike don't even meet 20th-century standards. About 9 of 10 Kabul residents live on unpaved paths or streets. One-quarter get their water from potentially polluted shallow wells. Two-thirds use underground vaults for sewage that must be periodically emptied.

Years ago, farmers came to take the waste for fertilizer. Now, as farmlands shrink and Kabul grows, the system has collapsed, and waste collects in the streets.

There are slow signs of progress. One foreign-funded $187-million program aims to bring the percentage of citizens with piped water to 30 percent. Another $468-million project will string power lines to Uzbekistan by 2009, easing power woes.

But there is no easy answer, either in the short or long term, say experts. Federal and local officials still fight over who runs Kabul, leaving the city in administrative gridlock. Moreover, the prize is a relatively small sum of money, since most business here is informal ? therefore untaxed ? and most aid is earmarked for security.

For a city essentially building its services from scratch, it is a daunting challenge. "In the formal areas, they were destroyed by war and never rehabilitated," says Ms. Goga. "In the informal areas, they never existed to begin with."

Up on the hillside, however, at least it is secure, and at least there are jobs. One man who declines to offer his name says he also came here after the fall of the Taliban. He has a home, and he owns a shop in town that sells construction supplies.

"We are a poor people, we are happy here," he says with a grin. More seriously, he adds: "In the small villages, there are sometimes rivalries. I am safe here."

Reversing the Great Afghan Land Grab

Years of war and lawlessness have left property rights hopelessly snarled up, and Afghans fighting mad as a result. Now a draft law aims to unravel the mess. By Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi (ARR No. 245, 13-Mar-07)

Muhammad Azim, 67, was a landowner before he left his native Baghlan province 20 years ago to escape the war between the Soviet-backed Afghan government and the mujahedin. He only came back two years ago, and was startled to find shops and houses dotting his two hectares of land in the provincial capital Pul-e-Khumri.

“My son-in-law illegally took the title to my land when I left,” he said. “Then when he left as well, the land was stolen by two [militia] commanders. They in turn sold it on to other people, who built houses on it.”

Azim said it was now proving almost impossible to reclaim his property, since at the time the militia members sold it on, the transaction passed as legal.

“The commanders controlled the city government and the courts,” he complained. “Now both those commanders are dead, killed in the wars. And there are a thousand deeds to my land. People have sold it to others, and those people to others still, and no one recognises me as the true owner.”

Azim’s tangled story is far from unusual in Afghanistan, where 25 years of war caused massive population dislocation, and property rights became blurred and forgotten as people came and went. Now refugees are coming back and looking for their lands.

But it is going to be difficult for Afghanistan’s government to undo the damage caused by successive regimes of the past, each of which tried to legitimise its rule by recognising land claims, often on shaky or false legal grounds. Some of the misappropriated land belonged to the government itself.

Noor Muhammad, a long-time resident of Kabul, owns a piece of land in Kart-e-Se, in the city’s northwest corner. Behind his house lay a tract of land that was set aside to be used as a kindergarten when President Najibullah was in power, prior to 1992. This land lay empty through years of civil war and then Taleban rule - until now.

“Some very powerful commanders have now seized the land,” he said. “People who saw themselves as symbols of the [mujahedin] resistance just took it, and now they have built skyscrapers on it.”

According to the government, more than 600,000 hectares of private and public land have been seized illegally during the last two-and-a-half decades of war. Minister of Urban Development Yousuf Pashtoon explained how illegally appropriated land can be divided into four distinct categories.

“Almost 70 per cent of it is public property that has been stolen by warlords,” he said. In addition, privately-owned land was appropriated by various strongmen as well as by whichever government happened to be in power. There were also cases where one arm of government illegally seized land belonging to another official agency.

“This is a disaster for Afghanistan,” said Pashtoon, saying the property situation is the main barrier to implementing a master plan for urban development, he added.

“We are struggling to return those lands to their rightful owners, but current laws in Afghanistan are not adequate for dealing with this problem. We need a new law,” he said. “We have already drafted a bill that would allow the restitution of unlawfully appropriated lands, and we have submitted it to the Ministry of Justice.”

This new law had to be designed with Afghanistan’s tangled history in mind.
“For example, say some property was appropriated by a warlord during the conflicts, and he received a clear title to from the courts of the day,” explained Pashtoon. “Or say that a parcel of land has multiple purchase deeds. The current law is unable to deal with this.”

The new law would provide for special courts which would dig through past documentation relating to disputed lands to determine the rightful owner.

The government may have a hard time getting the law passed. The legislature, which is dominated by many of the old-style mujahedin commanders, is opposed to any efforts to revise existing property arrangements.

“The government is just trying to make itself look good by drafting such these bills,” said parliamentarian Alimi Balkhi. “It is not true that every case needs a new law. Most of these land cases are very clear. The government should have taken action over the past five years. They have missed a lot of chances. But a new law will not automatically solve the problem. They have to move slowly.”

Meanwhile, land grabs continue apace, and people still lack confidence in the judicial system as a way of protecting their ownership rights.

A resident of the northern Balkh province, who was afraid to give his name, told IWPR that his 2.4 hectares of land had been confiscated by militias controlled by General Abdul Rashid Dostum.

“I know the government cannot protect me. They cannot give me back my land, either. If I complain, I will just be killed,” he said.

The problem is that those in positions of power are often the same men who appropriated landholdings in past years. “If you try to get justice, the people you go to are the warlords. They extorted land yesterday - today they are the judges,” he said.

Atta Mohammad Noor, governor of Balkh, acknowledges the problem, but says that the central government is making things difficult. “I have returned thousands of hectares of property belonging to public and local organisations which had been extorted by the warlords,” he said. “But we still have a lot of problems. For example, a decision by a high-ranking institution, such as the Supreme Court, can force us to give up public property to a person who is not entitled to it.”

Disagreements among various branches of government have led to several very public squabbles.

Attorney general Abdul Jabar Sabet, who visited the northern provinces in October, said that close to three-quarters of all cases referred to his jurisdiction involved land disputes. “This is a tragedy,” he said.

In his seven months in office, Sabet has tried hard to rein in the resurgent warlords and has devoted a large chunk of his time to addressing the land issue.

During his northern trip in October, he accused Younus Moqim, the mayor of Mazar-e-Sharif, of misappropriating eight hectares of public land. The regional governor, Atta, defended the mayor - prompting a row between provincial and central authorities. Atta emerged the victor, sending Sabet back to Kabul with little to show for his efforts.

The land issue has been a thorn in the government’s side for years. In 2004, land disputes led to several bloody conflicts in Balkh province, with dozens of casualties.

Qayoom Babak, a political analyst in Balkh, has little faith in the law to remedy the situation. “Many of those who extorted property in the past are now in positions of power within the government,” he said. “They are members of parliament, they are governors, they are ministers. In short, they are the government. Can the government prosecute itself?”

Ordinary people seem to agree. “The judicial, legislative and executive branches of power are made up of people who have been involved in tens of thousands of crimes. So to whom can people complain to uphold their rights?” asked Naseer Ahmad, a student at Balkh University.

Pashtoon insists that the government is serious about trying to remedy the situation. “By drafting a new law on property rights, we are trying to return properties that have been misappropriated, no matter how difficult this proves. The property issue is just as bad for Afghanistan as the problem of corruption problem,” he said.

A militia commander in the north who has been unemployed since going through the United Nations-sponsored process termed Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration, said he was now facing some problems because of past land deals. He has been accused of misappropriating dozens of hectares of private land, and of bribing officials to authorise land purchases made at a very low price.

He denies these allegations and says he should not be deprived of legal possession on the whim of a court.

“I am not afraid that my land will be taken from me. I did everything legally,” he said angrily. “I purchased that land. It is not possible that one court approves a purchase deed, then another court comes along and annuls it.”

Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi is an IWPR staff reporter in Mazar-e-Sharif.

GOVERNMENT MUST MEET GENDER TARGETS IN ORDER TO MAKE PROGRESS ON WOMEN’S RIGHTS - PARLIAMENTARIANS

Today, responding to two reports released by UNIFEM and the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) regarding Child and Forced Marriage and Self Immolation in Afghanistan, Parliamentarians called on the Government to meet targets set in the London Compact to strengthen the numbers of women in civil service.

The Parliamentarians highlighted the need for female representation in civil service in order for government ministries to fulfil their role in monitoring the implementation of gender sensitive legislation and policy.

The issues of Child and Forced Marriage and Self Immolation were recently raised by Afghan NGOs at a conference held at the UNIFEM supported Resource Centre for Women in Politics at which over 70 parliamentarians from both the upper and lower houses of parliament were present.

ENDS

Notes to editors

• Women in Civil Service

An annex to the recently released budget for the year 1386 from the Ministry of Finance outlines the following percentages of women in Government Ministries:

• Only one government ministry has achieved male and female parity; the Ministry for Women’s Affairs with 50.5% female representation.
• The total percentage for women’s representation in government ministries is 12%
• Just seven government ministries have over 15% female representation.
• Seven government ministries have less than 5% female representation.
• The total percentage for the representation of women in the security sector is just 0.6%

• Child and Forced Marriage

On November 24 th 2005, representatives of 13 Government Ministries, the Supreme Court, Attorney General’s Office and Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission signed a Protocol for the Elimination of Child and Forced Marriages in Afghanistan.

Figures suggest that on average 43% of women were married under the age of 18 between 1987-2005 in Afghanistan. However a report by Medica Mondiale which was published in May 2004 included the results of a survey carried out amongst a random sample of educated people in Herat showing 28.5% of respondents were married before the age of 16 years and some as young as 7 years old. The report also notes that they found the incidence of child marriage amongst female prisoners to be much higher, at 60% in Kabul Women’s Prison indicating a link between child marriage and violence.

• Self Immolation

A recently released Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) report on this issue noted the following statistics for Self Immolation cases in the Southwest region of Afghanistan in the years 1384 and 1385

The AIHRC point to forced marriages, a lack of female economic independence, drug addiction, and the infiltration of customary practices from Iran as possible causes of such huge increases in cases in the majority of the provinces they surveyed.

UNICEF Afghanistan Statistics report - http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/afghanistan_afghanistan_statistics.html#0

Medica Mondiale e.V. (mm): Study on Child marriage in Afghanistan. May 2004 - http://www.medicamondiale.org/download/doku_report/mm_Child%20marriage%20report%202004_e.pdf

AIHRC report on Self Immolation, 7 th March 2007, p.4

[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.]