In this bulletin:

• Security Council extends UN mission in Afghanistan one year
• U.S. calls on European allies to bolster troops for NATO mission in Afghanistan
• Taliban 'invite' 10,000 Uzbeks to Helmand
• Afghan army sweep kills 99 rebels in four days
• NATO forces shoot Afghan child, run over another
• Australian special forces likely to head to Afghanistan
• Marine unit ordered out of Afghanistan
• Pakistan Says 160 Killed In South Waziristan Clashes
• Dr Spanta met with the ECO Secretary General
• The Great Game revisited
• Musharraf at the Exit
• Pak-Afghan businessmen agree to boost cooperation
• CIDA contradicts Ottawa on funding Afghan monitor
• Symposium hears Afghan aid leaving rural areas behind
• 'End corruption to run drug cartels out of business'
• Afghan journalists face gravest dangers
• Afghanistan’s Wild West
• Computerised system at Herat airport
• Woman re-interprets Koran with feminist view

Security Council extends UN mission in Afghanistan one year

Sat Mar 24, - UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - The UN Security Council unanimously extended the mandate of the UN assistance mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) by a year and hailed its expanded presence in the provinces.

The 15-member body endorsed a resolution that also stressed UNAMA's role in promoting "a more coherent international engagement" in support of Afghanistan, which is facing mounting insecurity due to a resurgent Taliban-led insurgency.

The Council extended the mission's mandate through March 23, 2008, and welcomed UNAMA's "expanded presence in the provinces, through regional and provincial offices, which support efforts to coordinate and implement the country's economic reconstruction blueprint."

The resolution also urged Afghan parties and groups to engage constructively in an inclusive political dialogue and welcomed the successful conclusion of the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration process as well as the launch of the program of disbandment of illegal armed groups.

It stressed the importance of meeting the blueprint's benchmarks and timelines for progress on issues of "security, governance and development as well as the cross-cutting issue of counter-narcotics."

Earlier this month, the United Nations warned that, in a new blow to eradication efforts, Afghanistan's opium crop was likely to increase again this year after a record 50 percent jump in 2006.

A United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime report also pointed out clear links between the spiralling Taliban insurgency and the drugs trade in Afghanistan, which accounts for 90 percent of the world's heroin.

UN officials also say that insecurity in Afghanistan is restricting the delivery of assistance to needy people and undermining successes in building the post-Taliban country.

U.S. calls on European allies to bolster troops for NATO mission in Afghanistan

The Associated Press - Monday, March 26, 2007 - BRUSSELS, Belgium: The United States called on its European allies Monday to provide more troops to join other NATO nations fighting Taliban forces in southern Afghanistan. U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns appealed for restrictions on how and where the soldiers can fight insurgents to be lifted.

"There is a greater need for troops from Europe, for a greater degree of flexibility in how those troops are allowed to operate," Burns told reporters ahead of two days of talks with European Union and NATO officials.

Politicians in the United States, Canada, Britain and other nations with troops in the south have been annoyed by the reluctance of some European allies to commit extra soldiers to the 35,500-strong NATO force, in particular to be deployed to the Taliban's heartland.

"Caveats that limit the tactical deployment of European troops inside the country in our view should be lifted. All states should lift them," Burns said.

He said the United States had a total of around 27,000 troops in Afghanistan at present, and has offered US$11.6 billion (€8.74 billion) in new aid for the country.

The 27-nation European Union in February proposed a €600 million (US$780 million) package for Afghanistan, to focus on health, justice and rural development over the next four years, and EU nations agreed to set up a police training mission that could be deployed as early as May.

However, Spain, Italy, Germany and France, members of both the EU and NATO, have refused to budge under pressure to send more troops or to move existing forces in Afghanistan to help NATO's spring offensive against the Taliban.

Burns said both military might and a strong reconstruction aid plan were key to helping Afghanistan.

"In addition to military operations you really build peace through long-term economic humanitarian work, counter-narcotics work," he said. "So we need to do both and we can do better."

Taliban 'invite' 10,000 Uzbeks to Helmand

By Massoud Ansari, Sunday Telegraph (UK) - March 25, 2007

Islamic militants linked to Osama bin Laden have been offered a safe haven by the Taliban in Afghanistan, bringing them into conflict with British troops patrolling the lawless province of Helmand.

Uzbek gunmen, who fought a series of bloody battles last week with Pakistani tribesmen in the border region of Waziristan, where they had been living, have been told they should join the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan instead.

The move raises the prospect of a major upsurge in violence in Helmand, where 43 British soldiers have been killed in clashes with militants over the last five years.

The group of around 10,000 Uzbeks are led by Tahir Yuldashev, a close associate of the al-Qaeda terrorist chief, who is believed to be hiding out in the mountainous border area with his chief henchman Ayman al-Zawahiri.

The members of the Islamic Movement Union of Uzbekistan fell out with their Pakistani hosts after accusing some tribal leaders of acting as agents of the Pakistani government, which is under huge pressure from the US to crack down on Islamic militants. Pakistan government officials said that nearly 160 people, including 130 Uzbeks, were killed in the battle.

Taliban fighters intervened to broker a ceasefire but local officials have told The Sunday Telegraph that neither side is likely to back down. Taliban sources have revealed that they have offered the Uzbeks safe passage into Afghanistan in order to bring an end to the violence.

The militant group are wanted by the Uzbek government of President Islam Karimov and cannot return to their own country.

Lateef Afridi, a tribal leader and former national assembly member from the Frontier province, who is privy to details of the discussions, said: "These tribesmen are quite determined to flush them out. Given that these Uzbeks cannot be extradited back to their own country because they are all wanted there, one way they are considering to accommodate them is to send them to Afghanistan."

Mr Afridi said the Taliban felt compelled to give the Uzbeks a way out because if the battle continued between the local tribesmen and the foreign fighters, the Taliban elements would have to choose which side to back, unleashing further bloodshed. Another source added: "Both the sides are led by highly trained militants and if the fighting is not stopped, there will be massive killings."

A second tribal leader said the local and Afghan Taliban forces had already approached the Uzbeks and asked them to continue their jihad in Taliban-dominated areas in Afghanistan, in a bid to "reinvigorate their campaign of violence against Nato troops". They have been offered safe passage to either Kunar, Paktia or Helmand, where British troops are braced for a spring offensive from the Taliban.

Britain has announced plans to raise the UK military presence in Afghanistan to more than 7,000 troops. But the presence of a new wave of heavily armed guerrilla fighters is likely to leave troops stretched further and strengthen calls for an even greater military presence.

For Pakistan, forcing out the Uzbeks has the advantage of undermining support for Osama bin Laden.

His deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has been spotted in Waziristan several times. If the local tribesmen succeed, it will deny bin Laden one more safe haven for his associates, according to one western diplomat.

The Uzbeks are believed to have killed more than 1,500 local tribesmen in the past two years and are blamed for kidnapping others.

Mr Afridi said: "The partial ceasefire was achieved only for a time being, when the Taliban leaders intervened, but it did not give both the parties enough time to carry out the dead. The corpses and broken limbs of the dead are scattered all over the area."

Afghan army sweep kills 99 rebels in four days

Kabul (AFP) - NATO warplanes called in by the Afghan army bombed and killed 19 militants in southern Afghanistan, taking the toll from a four-day operation to 99, the defence ministry said Monday.

The 19 were killed in the southern province of Helmand on Sunday, it said in a statement. The Afghan army launched the sweep of the Gereshk area of the province on Thursday, the second day of the Afghan new year.

Operation Nawrozi (New Year) is the first large operation launched by Afghan forces with NATO air support but not ground troops. The fiercest clashes were on Thursday and left 69 militants and seven policemen dead, Afghan officials said.

The ministry said nine suspected militants were also arrested in the Gereshk area Sunday, two of them carrying the bodies of their dead comrades. The forces also seized light weapons, rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and land mines.

Helmand has seen some of the biggest attacks on militants this year, with officials admitting that parts of the province are in the control of militants allied with traffickers of Afghanistan's world-topping opium crop.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) launched a separate operation in the province three weeks ago called Achilles. It says "several Taliban extremists" have been killed but will not give numbers.

Taliban are being prevented from moving reinforcements into the area from bases across the border by increased Pakistan army patrols, ISAF commander for southern Afghanistan, Major General Ton van Loon, said Sunday.

Officials say the Afghan-led operation in Helmand shows the growing capacity of the Afghan security forces which are being built from scratch with international help costing billions of dollars.

Afghanistan's army and air force was destroyed during the 1992-1996 civil war that was ended with the take-over of the extremist Taliban regime, itself toppled in 2001.

NATO forces shoot Afghan child, run over another

Fri Mar 23, KABUL (AFP) - A distraught Afghan father buried his 12-year-old son Friday after the boy was shot in the head by NATO troops in the latest in a series of civilian deaths involving international forces.

The NATO force admitted to the shooting late Thursday but said its soldiers had fired in self-defence after a civilian van had ignored verbal warnings to not approach a security cordon around a broken-down armoured vehicle.

Confirming the killing, the Afghan interior ministry said the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops opened fire on a vehicle "which apparently tried to overtake the troops or may be the car was too close to the troops."

But the boy's father, named only Zemarai, denied trying to overtake the convoy while driving seven of his relatives home after visiting family.

He also said he had been several hundreds metres (yards) away and was not aware of warning shots, which troops are required to fire before taking aim.

"All of a sudden they opened fire at our vehicle," he said angrily from his home, filled with wailing mourners for the funeral of young Zaryalai.

"The first three bullets hit my car and the fourth one hit my 12-year-old son on the side of his head," the father said, his voice breaking with emotion.

The boy made no sound and Zemarai only realised the child was dead when he stopped the vehicle.

The incident was on the eastern route out of the city, a road which sees most of the suicide attacks in Kabul as foreign troops frequently used it.

The force, nervous of suicide attacks, has used the media and notices attached to their vehicles to warn other vehicles to keep their distance after dozens of civilians have been killed in similar incidents.

Meanwhile, ISAF said in a statement late Thursday that one of its convoys had hit and killed a child in the eastern province of Khost. The child had darted out from the side of the road, it said.

In a statement after the incident in Kabul, the 37-nation alliance said it "deeply regrets the loss of life and injury to civilians."

"It is unknown why the vehicle failed to stop when clear signals were given, and a full and thorough investigation into the circumstances of the incident has commenced."

In one of the worst incidents involving civilians and foreign forces this year, eight people were killed when US troops opened fire after a suicide bombing near the eastern city of Jalalabad March 4.

The US-led coalition said the civilians were killed in the attack and subsequent gunfire, but witnesses said they were all killed by the foreign forces. The results of an investigation have yet to be announced.

Australian special forces likely to head to Afghanistan

Sun Mar 25, SYDNEY (AFP) - Australia is close to committing special forces soldiers to Afghanistan to counter an expected Taliban spring offensive, Defence Minister Brendan Nelson said Sunday.

Nelson said it was likely that elite Special Air Services (SAS) troops would be sent to southern Uruzgan province, a former stronghold of the fundamentalist Taliban regime.

"We believe there is a need. We think that the Taliban will be mounting a very strong offensive shortly," he told Australian television. "We are very close to making a decision about it."

Canberra, which currently has 400 soldiers in the Central Asian nation, pulled a 200-strong SAS contingent out of Afghanistan in September.

Nelson said he had spoken Saturday to defence force head Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, who was in The Hague to discuss troop deployments to Afghanistan with Dutch officials, and the government was close to recommitting SAS troops.

"We believe we have satisfied and settled the command and control arrangements that are necessary for us to do the job," he said. "And if we do redeploy, and I think it's likely that we will, it will be a special forces task group."

Nelson said he would discuss additional deployments with US Defence Secretary Robert Gates and other defence ministers when they meet in Canada next month.

"We are in Afghanistan because Afghanistan is the crossroads to a modern and a free world," Nelson said. Australia first sent troops to Afghanistan in late 2001 following the September 11 attacks on the United States.

A 33,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force is deployed in the country to tackle a growing insurgency by supporters of the former Taliban regime and to expand the influence of the weak central government.

Marine unit ordered out of Afghanistan

Associated Press Fri Mar 23, By ROBERT BURNS AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON - Marines accused of shooting and killing civilians after a suicide bombing in Afghanistan are under U.S. investigation, and their entire unit has been ordered to leave the country, officials said Friday.

Army Maj. Gen. Francis H. Kearney III, head of Special Operations Command Central, ordered the unit of about 120 Marines out of Afghanistan and initiated an investigation into the March 4 incident, said Lt. Col. Lou Leto, spokesman at Kearney's command headquarters in Tampa, Fla.

It is highly unusual for any combat unit, either special operations or conventional, to have its mission cut short. A spokesman for the Marine unit, Maj. Cliff Gilmore, said it is in the process of leaving Afghanistan, but he declined to provide details on the timing and new location, citing a need for security.

In the March 4 incident in Nangahar province, an explosives-rigged minivan crashed into a convoy of Marines that U.S. officials said also came under fire from gunmen. As many as 10 Afghans were killed and 34 wounded as the convoy made an escape. Injured Afghans said the Americans fired on civilian cars and pedestrians as they sped away.

U.S. military officials said militant gunmen shot at Marines and may have caused some of the civilian casualties.

President Hamid Karzai condemned the incident, which was one among several involving U.S. forces in which civilians were killed and injured.

Leto, the spokesman at Special Operations Command Central headquarters, said the Marines, after being ambushed, responded in a way that created "perceptions (that) have really damaged the relationship between the local population and this unit." Therefore, he said, "the general felt it was best to move them out of that area."

Gilmore said the Marine company would complete its overseas deployment with the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, which is the larger unit it sailed with from Camp Lejeune, N.C., in January, but it will no longer operate in Afghanistan.

Of the four Marine Special Operations Command companies that have been established since the command was created in February 2006, the one ordered out of Afghanistan was the first to deploy abroad, Gilmore said. By September 2008 there are to be nine companies operating as part of two special operations battalions, he said.

For years the Marines resisted creating special operations units, arguing that would run counter to their philosophy of viewing all Marines as elite fighters and not singling out elements as special. But former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld pressed them to establish a separate command — the Marine Special Operations Command — to train and equip forces for the multi-service Special Operations Command.

There are about 25,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, mostly conventional combat forces and support units.

Pakistan Says 160 Killed In South Waziristan Clashes

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty - March 23, 2007 -- The governor of Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province says 160 people have been killed this week in battles between Pashtun tribesmen and foreign Al-Qaeda militants near the Afghan border.

Governor Ali Mohammed Jan Aurakzai says 130 militants from Uzbekistan and Chechnya have been killed and more than 60 have been captured. He says 25 to 30 tribesman have died in the clashes since March 19 near Wana in the semi-autonomous tribal region of South Waziristan.

Aurakzai, a former general in Pakistan's military, says tribal fighters continue to hunt another 200 foreign Al-Qaeda militants who have scattered in the mountainous region.

Aurakzai says Tahir Yuldashev, the leader of the militant Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, was in the area when the fighting started. But Aurakzai would not comment on what might have happened to Yuldash. (AFP, AP)

Dr Spanta met with the ECO Secretary General

Posted On Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Mar 25, 2007

The Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, Dr. Rangin Dadfar Spanta met with the Secretary General of Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO).

 The Secretary General praised the achievements of Afghan government besides the challenges and hurdles on the way of this government. He hoped that the continuation of international community’s commitment and improvement of national institutions will ease the way to further successes.

The Great Game revisited

The Economist 03.25.2007- India and Pakistan are playing out their rivalries in Afghanistan

IT is easy to miss the Indian consulate in Jalalabad. Tucked away on a back street with no flag, it is just a large walled compound protected by bored Afghan guards. There is little obvious activity going on inside. Consular staff say their main job is to issue visas--about one a day, mainly for Afghans seeking medical treatment in India--and to collect exam papers from applicants for scholarships at Indian universities. "There is a lot of time for reading," concedes one official. At the end of 2002 India reopened four consulates in Afghanistan.

Pakistan?s reaction to the Indians' arrival in Jalalabad and Kandahar recalls that of America when Soviet "advisers" turned up in Cuba in 1961. This is no Cuban missile crisis; tensions between India and Pakistan have eased these days. But Pakistan accuses Indian spies of whipping up secessionist sentiment among ethnic Pushtuns in Pakistan and financing a secessionist insurgency in Baluchistan. It also sees an ethnic-Tajik faction prominent in the Afghan government as anti-Pakistani Indian stooges. Whatever their basis in fact, Pakistan?s anxieties make matters worse for Afghanistan. As seen from Kabul, they help explain why Pakistan is at best tolerating and at worst actively helping the reviving Taliban in its insurgency against the government and its NATO allies. The extent of militant activity in the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan was highlighted this week by fighting between rival groups in South Waziristan, in which at least 100 people were killed. Such areas on the Afghan border provide a rear base for the Taliban.

Some outsiders sympathise with Pakistan's worries. Barnett Rubin, a regional analyst, told a committee of the American Senate this month that Pakistan's concerns about India were one of its "legitimate interests" in Afghanistan. Abdullah Abdullah, a former Afghan foreign minister seen in Pakistan as an Indian "client", promises that his country will never use its friendship with India to harm Pakistan's interests. But Afghanistan, he says, needs Indian aid, and "Pakistan can't veto that."

Afghanistan is indeed in no position to spurn Indian help. The Indians have promised $750m in aid, compared with Pakistan's $150m, though Pakistan argues its true contribution includes the cost of policing the border and of playing host to more than two million Afghan refugees.

Afghanistan's ties with India have long been friendlier than those with Pakistan. The Afghans once laid claim to Pushtun tribal areas in Pakistan and still refuse to recognise the Durand Line, the frontier drawn up by British colonial officials. For their part, Pakistan's governments have tried since the early 1970s to counter Pushtun nationalism at home by promoting the pan-Islamic extremism that has been so destabilising in Afghanistan.

Moreover, Pakistan still sees Afghanistan as "strategic depth" into which its forces might withdraw in the event of war with India. This may be outdated: because of advances in air-to-air refuelling; because both India and Pakistan now have nuclear weapons; and because they are trying to make peace. But Pakistan still wants influence in Afghanistan. It knows that NATO will not stay for ever and wants friends there when it leaves.

To date, Pakistan's best friends in Afghanistan have been the Taliban, now despised in Kabul, where many people blame Pakistan for all manner of ills. In contrast, Indian films and shows are popular, and several thousand Sikhs, the remnant of a once mighty trading community, continue to live in parts of the country.

India has an obvious interest in a stable Afghanistan. It hopes the country will one day accommodate transmission lines bringing electricity from Central Asia, as well as a pipeline for oil and gas from the region. There are two competing gas-pipeline projects: "TAPI", running from Turkmenistan via Afghanistan to Pakistan and on to India; and another from Iran through Pakistan to India. Instability in Afghanistan is a big impediment to the first, but America opposes the second. For now, Pakistan refuses to allow Indian goods to cross its territory. But India also hankers after direct trade routes with Central Asia.

A Chinese-Pakistani joint-venture port at Gwadar in Baluchistan, which had its ceremonial opening this week, is matched by an Iranian-Indian venture to develop the "free port" at Chabahar in the Gulf of Oman. Both would require road links across Afghan territory. Indian engineers are currently connecting Afghanistan's ring road to the Iranian border. The Indian press blamed the abduction and killing in 2006 of an Indian engineer working on the project on Pakistani intelligence, after the Taliban denied involvement.

Pakistan would also benefit from Afghanistan's becoming the land bridge between India and Central Asia. But until a final resolution of its dispute with India, its calculations will be more cynical. Afghanistan is no longer, as it was under Taliban rule, a client of Pakistan. But "an unstable Afghanistan is the second-best option to a stable one ruled by your friends," says Mr Rubin. "Both are certainly preferable to an Afghanistan ruled by your enemies."

Musharraf at the Exit

The Washington Post – 03.24.2004 By Ahmed Rashid

LAHORE - In the rapidly unfolding crisis in Pakistan, no matter what happens to President Pervez Musharraf -- whether he survives politically or not -- he is a lame duck. He is unable to rein in Talibanization in Pakistan or guide the country toward a more democratic future.

Since March 9, when Musharraf suspended the chief justice of the Supreme Court, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, public protests have escalated every day -- as has a violent crackdown by the police and intelligence agencies on the media and the nation's legal fraternity.

The legal convolutions about Chaudhry's dismissal boil down to one simple fact: He was not considered sufficiently reliable to deliver pleasing legal judgments in a year when Musharraf is seeking to extend his presidency by five more years, remain as army chief and hold what would undoubtedly be rigged general elections.

Musharraf's desire to replace Chaudhry with a more pliable judge has badly backfired. After just 10 days of protests, lawyers around the country have made it clear to the senior judiciary that they will not tolerate further legal validations for continued military rule or tolerate Musharraf remaining as president. At least seven judges and a deputy attorney general have resigned in protest.

Across the country, in law offices, in the media, among the opposition parties and other organized sections of civil society, the feeling is growing that Musharraf will have to quit sooner rather than later. After eight years of military rule it appears people have had enough.

Moreover, Musharraf is losing control of three key elements that have sustained his rule but are now either distancing themselves or turning on him completely. The first is the ruling Pakistan Muslim League Party, which has acted as the civilian appendage to the military but faces an election and knows that going to bat for the unpopular Musharraf will turn off voters. Party leaders and cabinet ministers are already distancing themselves from him.

The second element is the country's three intelligence agencies, which are at loggerheads over control of Musharraf, Pakistan's foreign policy, its political process and the media. Military Intelligence and the Inter-Services Intelligence are military agencies, while the largest civilian agency, the Intelligence Bureau, is now run by a military officer. Ironically, Inter-Services Intelligence, the most powerful agency in the country, has been the moderate element urging Musharraf to open up the political system to the opposition parties. The other two agencies are the hard-liners and are urging Musharraf to adopt even tougher measures.

The third loss for Musharraf has been the unqualified international support he has received since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Anger in the U.S. Congress and media, and particularly among members of the Republican Party, toward Musharraf's dual-track policy in Afghanistan -- helping to catch al-Qaeda members but backing the Taliban -- is making it difficult for President Bush to continue offering Musharraf his blanket support.

That was the tough-love message that Vice President Cheney delivered to Musharraf in Islamabad last month: Unless Musharraf goes after the Taliban, the Bush administration can no longer protect him.

Any loss of Western support will be critical to the army, which is on an arms-buying spree and depends on annual U.S. military aid of about $300 million. Musharraf has balanced the pro- and anti-American factions in the army's officer corps, but if both sides see him as a lame duck, unable to deliver the goods or stabilize the country, their support will dwindle.

Musharraf is now too weak to pursue policies that could keep his back-stabbers in check, restore his credibility at home and abroad, and pursue his agenda of remaining in power for the next five years.

It is far better that he revert to the promise he made when he seized power in 1999: to return the country to democracy. His best course of action would be to say he is not a candidate for president, hold free and fair elections, allow the return of exiled politicians, restore full political rights and gracefully depart with his legacy, which is considerable, intact.

It is in the interest of the United States to support such an exit strategy. The military can no longer counter the phenomenal growth of Islamic extremism in Pakistan through offensives alone. What the country needs is greater political consensus and a popularly elected government, and to replace the extortions of the mullahs with the return of day-to-day parliamentary politics. The army created a political vacuum in which extremism has thrived. Pakistan needs a return to civil society and government.

Pak-Afghan businessmen agree to boost cooperation

PESHAWAR, Mar 24 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Businessmen from Afghanistan and Pakistan signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to serve as 'ambassadors of peace' and promote trade and investment between the two countries.

The MoU was signed by head of the Afghanistan International Chamber of Commerce Azarakhsh Hafizi and Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) president Liaqat Ahmad Khan in Peshawar on Friday.

The business communities resolved to become 'ambassadors of peace' between the two brotherly countries and announced to set up a joint chamber of commerce and industry to promote bilateral trade.

The proposed Afghan - Pak Chamber of Commerce and Industry (APCCI) is meant to further the development of bilateral economic relations by providing regular forum to businessmen from both countries to meet, discuss and explore opportunities in trade, investment, transfer of technology and furtherance of all other economic activities.

Speaking on the occasion, Azarakhsh Hafizi, who was also nominated as APCCI co-chairman, said Afghan businessmen were more interested in trade with their Pakistani brethren than any other nation of the world. He, however, said that despite their desire, circumstances were such that they had to trade with countries other than Pakistan.

"Even mineral water in Afghanistan arrives from France despite Pakistan's ability to provide the same at very low cost. Likewise, we have enormous amount of iron but Pakistan opts to get it from other countries," he said.

Hafizi said Afghanistan was forced to trade in a number of edibles with European countries, which were not even liked by its people.

Senator Illyas Bilour, the founding chairman of the APCCI, termed the development as a milestone for the trade between the two countries. He said the business community in Pakistan laboured to develop good relations with the neighbouring countries and establishment of Indo - Pak Chamber of Commerce and Industry in 2000 was an example in this regard.

CIDA contradicts Ottawa on funding Afghan monitor

PAUL KORING - From Friday's Globe and Mail

Canada has not funded the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission for years, despite the government's insistence that it plays a vital role in safeguarding captives transferred by Canada to Afghanistan's notorious prisons.

The detainee issue has already ensnared Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor in its coils -- he was forced to apologize in the House on Monday for misleading MPs on the issue -- and now the question of funding is further complicating the Conservatives' story.

Government House Leader Peter Van Loan said Monday, that "the government of Canada has funded the Independent Human Rights Commission to the amount of $1-million."

Mr. Van Loan did not mention that the $1-million was given five years ago by the previous Liberal government. "No new money has been issued to AIHRC by CIDA" since 2002, Greg Scott, a spokesman for the Canadian International Development Agency, said in an e-mailed reply to The Globe and Mail.

On Monday, Mr. Van Loan and Mr. O'Connor were keen to explain that the AIHRC could monitor detainees, thus meeting Canada's obligations under international law to make sure they weren't abused, tortured or killed in Afghan custody.

Mr. O'Connor had just apologized to Parliament for misleading MPs about the role of the International Committee of the Red Cross in informing Canada about the fate of transferred prisoners.

During a raucous Question Period, as Mr. Van Loan defended both Mr. O'Connor and the arrangements with the AIHRC, he made no mention that the $1-million was old money.

"It is inappropriate, obviously, for the Department of National Defence to be the source of those funds. It is elsewhere in the government from which the funds have been produced," Mr. Van Loan said.

But Michael White, a spokesman for Mr. Van Loan, said yesterday the minister knew it was an old transfer.

Mr. O'Connor said last week that the Defence Department would not provide any money to AIHRC.

"I think it would be improper to give them any money because it would appear that this is not an unbiased organization," he said during a visit to Kandahar where he met the commission's director, Abdul Noorzai, who briefed the minister on the organization's funding and staffing woes.

Still, Mr. O'Connor told the House on Monday that the AIHRC was "capable of following up on prisoners and reporting any possible abuse."

Unlike other major NATO nations fighting in southern Afghanistan, including Britain, the Netherlands and Denmark, Canada didn't retain any right of detainee follow-up in its transfer pact with Afghanistan. And unlike those countries, which also named the AIHRC as a key monitoring agency, Canada did not provide any funds.

Britain and Denmark both pledged more than $1-million, the Netherlands nearly $600,000. CIDA staff say Canada promised nothing, but the AIHRC's annual report shows that it expected $2,211, although nothing was forthcoming by the end of January, 2007.

Now doubts have emerged over another of Mr. O'Connor's assurances in light of a letter from senior Defence and Foreign Affairs officials.

Two assistant deputy ministers told MPs in December that Canada had been notifying the AIHRC of the names of transferred detainees for months. But in a March 15 letter revising their statement, they wrote that Canadian Forces didn't pass along any of the names of transferred detainees. "No notifications, in fact, took place," until last month, the two assistant deputy ministers wrote.

Colleen Swords, assistant deputy minister of international security at Foreign Affairs, and Vincent Rigby, assistant deputy minister (policy) at National Defence jointly wrote the letter to "to clarify one portion of our testimony."

In short, the two layers of protection to transferred detainees, repeatedly cited by Mr. O'Connor over the past year, have both proved flawed.

While Canada has provided prisoners' names to the ICRC, that organization is prohibited by long-standing convention from reporting back to Canada on the fate of detainees in custody.

Mr. O'Connor had repeatedly and incorrectly claimed otherwise. On Monday, he apologized and admitted he'd been wrong. Meanwhile, Canada didn't provide the names of transferred prisoners to the AIHRC, despite now saying that group has had a crucial role in safeguarding their fate.

Some of the detainees captured originally by Canadian troops are known to have been released. Mr. O'Connor has publicly referred to "revolving doors" in Afghan prisons where detainees are often freed for bribes. Other transferred captives, including three at the centre of an abuse investigation, can't be found.

Opposition MPs and human-rights groups have demanded that Canada renegotiate its detainee-transfer agreement to match the follow-up rights won by the British, Dutch and Danes.

Symposium hears Afghan aid leaving rural areas behind

Ottawa Citizen - 03/24/2007 By Mike Blanchfield

OTTAWA - Contrary to "rosy descriptions" given by Canada's government, virtually no reconstruction is taking place in rural southern Afghanistan because aid workers dare not confront a "traumatic" lack of safety, a leading U.S. academic said Friday.

"There is reconstruction around the city, Kandahar City, and then in places like Panjwaii and Zahari District," Seth Jones, a political scientist with the Washington-based Rand Corporation, told a major symposium on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"There is nothing, virtually nothing, that goes on anywhere else in the province. In other words, governance has not reached the rural areas of the south," he added. "The key point here is that basic government services have not reached most of the rural areas in Afghanistan."

Jones offered that assessment after spending two weeks in Kandahar in January, speaking to the military as well as aid officials from the government agencies of the U.S. and Canada, USAID and the Canadian International Development Agency.

Jones stayed at Kandahar Air Field, where Canada's 2,500 troops are based, and he travelled the province on what was his 12th trip to Afghanistan to conduct research for an upcoming book.

After speaking with USAID and CIDA officials, Jones said he learned "the security concerns are so traumatic in these areas that they do not get deployed."

Jones was a featured speaker at a symposium Friday sponsored by the Centre for Security and Defence Studies at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa.

Jones made it clear that he was "deeply impressed" with the work of Canadian troops, and that they are making development possible in areas under their control within Kandahar City and the Panjwaii and Zahari districts, where they have been particularly active -but nowhere else.

Jones's assessment appeared to contradict testimony Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay gave to the Commons foreign affairs committee Tuesday.

"Thanks to the skills of professionalism and courage of our soldiers, the nascent peace stretching over the country has now been extended to large parts of Kandahar province," MacKay told the committee.

MacKay, who spent several days in Afghanistan in January, said he has seen "real progress" but he did not specify whether that was in Kandahar or in the capital of Kabul, further north.

"Canadian assistance is providing food, water, and basic necessities. It's also going to schools, villages, and communities, to micro credit for individuals, especially women so that they can start small enterprises and businesses of their own. I've seen this progress myself ... on two trips that I made to Afghanistan, most recently in January," said MacKay.

NDP MP Alexa McDonough, who recently made her first trip to Afghanistan with a parliamentary committee, told Jones in a discussion that followed his presentation that his observations "more or less confirm what a lot of us have been desperately trying to get an answer to" from the government about the pace of reconstruction specifically in Kandahar province.

OTTAWA - Contrary to "rosy descriptions" given by Canada's government, virtually no reconstruction is taking place in rural southern Afghanistan because aid workers dare not confront a "traumatic" lack of safety, a leading U.S. academic said Friday.

"There is reconstruction around the city, Kandahar City, and then in places like Panjwaii and Zahari District," Seth Jones, a political scientist with the Washington-based Rand Corporation, told a major symposium on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"There is nothing, virtually nothing, that goes on anywhere else in the province. In other words, governance has not reached the rural areas of the south," he added. "The key point here is that basic government services have not reached most of the rural areas in Afghanistan."

Jones offered that assessment after spending two weeks in Kandahar in January, speaking to the military as well as aid officials from the government agencies of the U.S. and Canada, USAID and the Canadian International Development Agency.

Jones stayed at Kandahar Air Field, where Canada's 2,500 troops are based, and he travelled the province on what was his 12th trip to Afghanistan to conduct research for an upcoming book.

After speaking with USAID and CIDA officials, Jones said he learned "the security concerns are so traumatic in these areas that they do not get deployed."

Jones was a featured speaker at a symposium Friday sponsored by the Centre for Security and Defence Studies at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa.

Jones made it clear that he was "deeply impressed" with the work of Canadian troops, and that they are making development possible in areas under their control within Kandahar City and the Panjwaii and Zahari districts, where they have been particularly active -but nowhere else.

Jones's assessment appeared to contradict testimony Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay gave to the Commons foreign affairs committee Tuesday.

"Thanks to the skills of professionalism and courage of our soldiers, the nascent peace stretching over the country has now been extended to large parts of Kandahar province," MacKay told the committee.

MacKay, who spent several days in Afghanistan in January, said he has seen "real progress" but he did not specify whether that was in Kandahar or in the capital of Kabul, further north.

"Canadian assistance is providing food, water, and basic necessities. It's also going to schools, villages, and communities, to micro credit for individuals, especially women so that they can start small enterprises and businesses of their own. I've seen this progress myself ... on two trips that I made to Afghanistan, most recently in January," said MacKay.

NDP MP Alexa McDonough, who recently made her first trip to Afghanistan with a parliamentary committee, told Jones in a discussion that followed his presentation that his observations "more or less confirm what a lot of us have been desperately trying to get an answer to" from the government about the pace of reconstruction specifically in Kandahar province.

'End corruption to run drug cartels out of business'

KABUL, Mar 22 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), has said that corruption must be stamped out and borders strengthened to run emerging Afghan drug cartels out of business.

Most of the Afghan opium is exported either to Iran or Pakistan, said the UN officer, who described the region for drug traffickers as a new "golden triangle" of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Briefing journalists at the UN headquarters, he called for strengthened relations among the three countries to stem illicit drug trafficking.

The UN official, who briefed the Security Council on his agency's latest report on opium cultivation in Afghanistan, called corruption the "major lubricant" facilitating both the cultivation and trading of opium.

Acknowledging the financial incentives for harvesting illicit drugs, the director said:

"Robbing a bank is much more profitable than working for a bank." In this connection, he asked for provision of alternative livelihood for farmers engaged in opium production.

Presenting an assessment of the north and southern provinces in Afghanistan, he noted, while six of the centre-north provinces, potentially doubling to 12 by this summer, had been certified as drug-free, situation is out of control in the southern part of the country.

The expansive southern region, roughly half the size of France, collectively has 100,000 hectares of land under illicit drug cultivation and currently has the largest concentration of narcotics in the world, he said.

Afghan journalists face gravest dangers

By Tom Coghlan in Helmand - The Telegraph (UK) / March 23, 2007

It is a popular mantra among foreign reporters that you are only as good as the local "fixer" who works with you. As the rising risk levels in southern Afghanistan impose steadily greater limits for journalists trying to work in the south of the country the number of local Afghans who are prepared to risk a Taliban death sentence for working with foreigners has dwindled to a handful.

One of the best of them was working with Daniele Mastrogiacomo, a correspondent for the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, when he was kidnapped two weeks ago. The Italian was freed, but Sayed Agha, a gentle, witty and deeply likeable young man of 25, was executed in his presence. Sayed worked with The Daily Telegraph for two weeks in the southern province of Helmand in February, successfully fixing interviews. It was access quite impossible to achieve without the tribal connections and guarantees that a local man like Sayed was able to provide.

But with his work came a great level of risk. His willingness to take such risks is something that was hard to understand. I can only assume he found what he did exciting, and unlike many people in the south of Afghanistan he seemed to have a genuine liking for, and interest in, foreign "infidels". But while the journalist coming in accepts a level of danger, we can leave again for the safety of the capital Kabul. For men like Sayed, becoming known as someone who works with foreigners is a permanent threat to their lives.

Sayed was not ignorant of this, but nor did he ever attempt to limit what the reporters he worked with asked of him. When for instance we spent a day together following a poppy eradication team, it was only afterwards that he told me that he believed that his car would now be unusable in that district because it would be suspected of government connections. In rural Helmand few unfamiliar faces escape notice for long.

His powerful tribal connections and personal friendships with people within local Taliban groups offered a level of protection. But as he admitted himself, if the wrong people got hold of us, there would be nothing he could do.

Sadly it was the wrong people who took him, Daniele Mastrogiacomo and their translator two weeks ago. Mullah Dadullah Akhund is the best known and most feared Taliban commander operating in the south. He has been compared to the Iraqi insurgent leader Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi for his extremist beliefs, psychopathic savagery and love of self-promotion. It is a measure of Dadullah's character that Mullah Omar, the spiritual leader of the Taliban, sacked him as commander of Taliban forces in Bamiyan in 1998 because his behaviour towards the Shia Muslim Hazara people of the region, whom Dadullah considered heretics, was too brutal even for Omar's tastes.

Self-promoting DVDs of Dadullah leading his men into battle, posing with machineguns and personally beheading six men he accused of spying for the Afghan government have been floating around the south since last summer.

Dadullah and his cohorts chose to release Mastrogiacomo, which was very welcome news. But despite the efforts of Sayed's Afghan friends and family to intercede with Dadullah on his behalf, the Taliban announced last Friday that Sayed Agha had been beheaded.

That did not generate much in the way of news coverage, and it is sadly the case that most of the more than 1,000 journalists and those working with them to have been killed in the past decade have been uncelebrated local men working in hostile places.

Afghanistan’s Wild West

Herat, once the most stable of Afghan provinces, is now becoming increasingly dangerous, and analysts say not all the violence is sponsored by the Taleban.

Institute for War & Peace Reporting - By Sadeq Behnam and Sudabah Afzali in Herat (ARR No. 247, 23-Mar-07)

When Abdul Rauf, the head of the government revenue department in the western province of Herat, was shot dead at his home on the morning of March 18, family members disputed the police’s story that the murder was motivated by personal vengeance.

“Abdul Rauf had no enemies,” said Noor Ahmad Sultani, who believes relative was killed because of his job. “I think his death was connected with administrative issues. The gunmen were hired to kill him.”

He continued, “We have no faith in our security forces any more, because the situation has deteriorated to the point where people can be killed even in broad daylight.”

Herat, Afghanistan’s western jewel, has always been famed for its culture and architectural beauty. As the local poet Ali Sher Navoi remarked more than 500 years ago, “You can’t stretch your legs in Herat without kicking a poet.”

The city stands at the crossroads of history, bordering Iran and Turkmenistan. Because of its location, it has been buffeted by various ethnic and religious influences which, while giving the city a welcome air of sophistication, are now contributing to rising tensions.

In the past 12 months, more than 50 people have been killed and at least 100 wounded in suicide bombings and other attacks, and the normally complacent Heratis are starting to grumble.

“People have no guarantee even for their own lives,” said Shahjan Karimzada, a businessman who owns a soft-drink plant in the city. “How can we protect our factories and shops? There are armed robberies and murders almost every day, and the police aren’t able to capture the criminals.”

Karimzada said many companies had already shipped out of Herat because of the deteriorating security situation. “If this continues, there will be no more investment in Herat,” he said. “People are really worried.”

The Afghan government has sought to blame much of the violence on the Taleban-led insurgency. “Of course it’s the Taleban who are behind these crimes, because they oppose the government,” said Sayed Hussain Anwari, the governor of Herat.

But local analysts and residents are not convinced. “Herat contains jihadi elements who hate the government because they have lost their jobs,” said Muhammad Rafik Shaheer, a political analyst and head of the Council of Professionals, a non-government body in Herat. “We have recently witnessed a series of problems, including explosions, robberies, kidnappings and assassinations.”

The term “jihadis” applies to the various armed factions which emerged from the anti-Soviet mujahedin to fight first against each other in the early Nineties, and later against the Taleban. Many of their leaders are still prominent political figures.

According to Shaheer, Taleban activity in Herat province is at a much lower level than elsewhere in the country. “People who have designs against the government are able to cover their tracks, so everything gets blamed on the Taleban,” he said.

“The most worrying aspect of this is that the police and army also contain elements that are against the government. They have links with the opposition, and must be cleared out.”

Herat is no stranger to political ambition and ethnic tension. Ismail Khan, the strongman who controlled Herat on and off for decades, is a Tajik who clashed with a Pashtun commander, Amanullah Khan, before being removed from office and brought to Kabul as energy minister.

Iranian influence can be felt in the Shia community, and there has been some violence on religious grounds. Last year’s Ashura festival, the holiest day in the Shia religious calendar, was marred by violence that left at least six people dead.

But the kind of bloodshed that has become common in the south, including the increasingly frequent suicide attacks, was relatively rare in Herat until a year ago.

The worst incident to date came in September, when a suicide bomber struck outside Herat’s famous mosque, killing 11 and wounding 18. These attacks have been attributed to the Taleban, but some, including the local chief of police, accept that the blame may lie elsewhere.

“There are political groups besides the Taleban who are attempting to destabilise the situation in Herat,” said police spokesman Colonel Norkhan Nikzad.

He pointed to recent arrests in Herat province, in which police and intelligence forces rounded up six individuals suspected of bomb attacks. “One is a citizen of Pakistan, and the others are Afghans with no ties to the Taleban,” said Nikzad.

Perhaps most worrying, added the spokesman, is that some of the violence has been perpetrated by men wearing police uniforms. “We are trying to determine which groups they belong to,” he said.

Qari Mohammad Yusuf, a spokesman for the Taleban, has denied that the insurgent group had been involved in attacks on civilians. “Not every act of sabotage or terrorism is attributable to the Taleban,” he told reporters.

Sadeq Behnam and Sudabah Afzali are freelance reporters in Herat.

Computerised system at Herat airport

Herat city, Mar 22 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The first computerized machine for screening passenger luggage, was installed at Herat airport today, at a cost of $ 170,000, funded by Germany.

Sakhidad Ghaznawi, Chief of Herat airport expressed his pleasure over the installation of the new system. Speaking to Pajhwok Afghan News, he said "we had problems controlling passenger luggage and those will be solved by the new system".

The Herat airport runway, 2.5km in length and 40m wide, was rebuilt in a joint project between Italy and Spain last year.

Colonel Noor Ahmad Saghari, Media Officer for the Border Police of the Western Zone, said the new system will help Border Police do their job more effeiciently and make travel safer for passengers.

According to the Bonn Agreement, Germany pledged to equip and train Afghan National Police, whose strength is expected to reach 62,000, with an additional supporting force of 20,000. 60.000 Afghan National Police have already been trained. The Herat airport was built by the United State 48 years ago.

Woman re-interprets Koran with feminist view

Thu Mar 22, 2007 - By Manuela Badawy

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A new English-language interpretation of the Muslim Holy book the Koran challenges the use of words that feminists say have been used to justify the abuse of Islamic women.

The new version, translated by an Iranian-American, will be published in April and comes after Muslim feminists from around the world gathered in New York last November and vowed to create the first women's council to interpret the Koran and make the religion more friendly toward women.

In the new book, Dr. Laleh Bakhtiar, a former lecturer on Islam at the University of Chicago, challenges the translation of the Arab word "idrib," traditionally translated as "beat," which feminists say has been used to justify abuse of women.

"Why choose to interpret the word as 'to beat' when it can also mean 'to go away'," she writes in the introduction to the new book.

The passage is generally translated: "And as for those women whose illwill you have reason to fear, admonish them; then leave them alone in bed; then beat them; and if thereupon they pay you heed, do not seek to harm them. Behold, God is indeed most high, great!"

Instead, Bakhtiar suggests "Husbands at that point should submit to God, let God handle it -- go away from them and let God work His Will instead of a human being inflicting pain and suffering on another human being in the Name of God."

Some Muslims said the new interpretation strayed from the original. Omar Abu-Namous, imam at the New York Islamic Cultural Center Mosque, questioned Bakhtiar's interpretation.

"There is nothing to stop a woman from translating the Holy Koran. The translator should have good command of the Arabic language in order to convey it and translate it into other languages. I don't know if Dr. Laleh Bakhtiar has good command of Arabic," Imam Abu-Namous said.

"Maybe she is depending on other translations, not on the original," he said. Bakhtiar defended her work, telling Reuters she translated from the Arabic text and that she "reads and knows classical Arabic."

The New York imam also said the passage she is challenging speaks of when a woman wants a divorce, and only allows a man to "hit his wife, according to the Prophet, with a 'miswak,'" or a twig of a pencil's length, on her hand.

Arabic Language Professor at the American University in Cairo Siham Serry said her interpretation of the word "idrib," was "to push away," similar but slightly different from Bakhtiar's "to go away."

She said she agrees with the imam that 'miswak' means twig and that the Koran does not encourage the harm of women. But she also said that men can interpret that passage to justify their own behavior.

"How can you hurt someone by hitting her with a very small, short and weak thing?" she asked by telephone from Cairo. "But sometimes the interpretation of the Koran is according to men, and sometimes they try to humiliate the woman."

Bakhtiar writes in the book that she found a lack of internal consistency in previous English translations, and found little attention given to the woman's point of view.

In other changes to the text, she cites the most accurate translation of the word traditionally translated to mean "infidel" as "ungrateful."

And she uses "God" instead of "Allah," saying that God is the universal English term.

Bakhtiar has been schooled in Sufism which includes both the Shia and Sunni points of view. As an adult, she lived nine years in a Shia community in Iran and has lived in a Sunni community in Chicago for the past 15 years.

"While I understand the positions of each group, I do not represent any specific one as I find living in America makes it difficult enough to be a Muslim, much less to choose to follow one sect or another," she writes.

The new text is published by Islamic specialty bookseller Kazi Publications, which has a store in Chicago and online.

[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.]