In this bulletin:

• President Hamid Karzai Visits Badakhshan Province : Attends a Memorial Service for a Mass Grave
• Pakistan, Afghanistan plan for tribal gathering
• President Hamid Karzai Discusses Avoiding Civilian Casualties
• AFGHANISTAN: Some 1,600 displaced after US air raids
• NATO vows to avoid civilian casualties
• Civilian killings threaten Afghanistan's future
• British Soldier Shot Dead In Afghanistan
• Denmark announces first combat death in Afghanistan
• Hungarian soldiers in Afghanistan extend stay
• Azerbaijan to double Afghanistan force - official
• French hostage deadline approaches but still no contact: Taliban
• Donor pledges to ARTF cross $2 billion mark
• When things got ugly in Ottawa, Kabul extended an olive branch
• The pact on detainees
• Canadian officer testifies abuse of one Afghan detainee reported to military
• Subject: AFGHANISTAN: Interview with James Appathurai of NATO about Afghan detainees
• And torture doesn't end with monitoring
  Martin approved a detainee policy
• Good news in Afghanistan
• Demand Increases for Women to Join Afghan Police
• Putting Afghanistan back on the map

President Hamid Karzai Visits Badakhshan Province : Attends a Memorial Service for a Mass Grave

Date of Release: 03 May 2007 - Arg, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, returned to Kabul this afternoon after his visit to Badakhshan province where he attended a memorial service held in the honour of a mass grave that was recently unearthed in Qorogh desert.  

Rosary beads, pens, notebooks, barbed wires, chains, shackles, hand cuffs and shoes found at the site near Qorogh desert are indicative of sheer cruelty of the crimes committed against those who had been buried in this mass grave.

A memorial service was held at the site of the grave which was attended by President Hamid Karzai, Ustad Burhanuddin Rabbani, Member of Parliament, Nematullah Shahrani, Minister of Hajj and Religious Affairs, Monshi Abdul Majid, Governor of Badakhshan Province, elders, and the families of the victims.

Addressing this memorial gathering, the President said, "I felt very sad when I heard the news and was very impatient to visit this mass grave to pray to God for the souls of these martyrs."

"These bones and remains of our people uncovered at this mass grave have littered Afghanistan's plains and deserts which are reminiscences of the times when our innocent people were buried alive in mass graves."  

"When I heard the news, the sound of gunshots reverberated in my ears and I pictured my innocent countrymen lying dead in a mass grave and their voices were being stifled."

"The martyrs of Qorogh desert are the Afghan nation's martyrs who represent our feelings and emotions. They were murdered because of the Soviet invasion and internal treason."

"Throughout the country every family has an orphaned child, and there are many mothers who mourn the death of their children. It is very unfortunate that Afghanistan is still suffering. One tyrant is gone, another has come. Today, our people are still being killed. Though Afghanistan was saved and become independent but its sufferings have not ended yet."

"In order to keep the memories of our martyrs alive, we must remain united and continue to live in harmony. We should hold our martyrs in high regard and learn lessons from these tragedies. Today, our people are still suffering at the hands of foreigners who are abetted by internal treason."

     "Afghanistan will only achieve sustainable peace when the Afghan people chop off the hands of foreigners who meddle in our internal affairs. We must support the families of these martyrs by providing them better education and health services."

"We must provide health services to those mothers who live in the most inaccessible parts of this province. Justice should be done, but we should not take revenge."

The President allocated 5 million Afghanis for the construction of a memorial monument, a mosque, and a museum.

Addressing development in Badakhshan province, the President said, "I hope that development projects will be implemented in this province in a balanced manner. With the completion of Keshm-Taloqan road, the construction of Keshm-Faizabad road will start. During my recent visit to China, I discussed with Chinese authorities the construction of a highway between Afghanistan and China."

Also, the President informed the people of the survey of Kokcha River, and assured them that this project will start in the near future.

President Hamid Karzai, Ustad Burhanuddin Rabbani, and Nematullah Shahrani jointly laid the foundation stone of the memorial monument at the site of the mass grave in Qorogh desert.

 Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President

Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

Pakistan, Afghanistan plan for tribal gathering

May 4, 2007

KABUL (Reuters) - Pakistan and Afghanistan, intent on ending a blame game over the Taliban insurgency, have drafted plans for their presidents to jointly address a gathering of tribal elders, intellectuals, writers and politicians.

Visiting Pakistani Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao said Islamabad had nominated around 350 prominent figures to attend the first ever jirga, or tribal council, to be held with representatives from both sides of the disputed border.

"This is a novel experience because we have not had such a joint jirga before, ever," Sherpao told reporters ahead of a meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Friday. "Hopefully we will be able to have a major impact as far as the situation in both countries are concerned."

No date or agenda has yet been finalised for a gathering that would have to take place under blanket security, as both Musharraf and Karzai are assassination targets for al Qaeda-linked militants.

An Afghan spokesman said his government would propose its representatives after receiving the Pakistani list.

The Taliban have drawn most of their support from the Pashtun tribal lands straddling the rugged border, and Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has voiced fears that the insurgency could turn into a "people's war" unless grievances were addressed.

Relations between Musharraf and Karzai have deteriorated over the past two years, as they traded barbs over who was most at fault for a resurgence of the Taliban that has resulted in the worst violence since U.S.-led forces ousted the Islamist militia from power in late 2001.

President George W. Bush encouraged his two key allies in the war on terrorism to bury their differences during a meeting in Washington at which the idea of a joint jirga was first floated.

Ties had remained strained however, and last month Musharraf said Pakistan should quit the coalition if he and his security agencies were not trusted by their allies.

During a meeting in Turkey this week, however, the Afghan and Pakistani presidents agreed to start a new chapter, and Sherpao's visit aimed to carry forward the process.

"The focus is on peace in Afghanistan because it is Pakistan that benefits from peace in Afghanistan," said Sherpao, who narrowly survived a suicide bomb attack that killed 28 people in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province last Saturday.

President Hamid Karzai Discusses Avoiding Civilian Casualties

Press Release -  Date of Release: 02 May 2007 - Arg, Kabul – H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, held a special meeting with representatives of NATO and Coalition forces to discuss how best to avoid civilian casualties.  

The President told NATO and Coalition commanders that the patience of the Afghan people is wearing thin with the continued killing of innocent civilians. Civilian deaths and arbitrary decisions to search people’s houses have reached an unacceptable level and Afghans cannot put up with it any longer. All national and international security forces must work in co-ordination with each other and make every effort to avoid civilian casualties.

The meeting focused largely on establishing mechanisms for avoiding civilian casualties during anti-terrorist operations, ensuring greater coordination between the Afghan and NATO/Coalition forces, and forbidding unauthorised house searches.

The President instructed the Afghan Defence Minister to work with NATO and Coalition forces on establishing an effective mechanism for avoiding civilian casualties, and to report the outcome of his work back to him.

The meeting was attended by Afghan Vice Presidents, Minister of National Defence, Minister of Interior, National Security Advisor, Director of NDS, United Nations Special Representative for Afghanistan and Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), NATO’s Senior Civilian Representative, Commander of NATO Forces in Afghanistan, United States Ambassador to Afghanistan, and the European Union's Special Representative for Afghanistan

Released by the Office of the Spokesman to the President - Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

AFGHANISTAN: Some 1,600 displaced after US air raids

SHINDAND, 3 May 2007 (IRIN) - Almost 1,600 families have been displaced and many others need urgent humanitarian assistance two days after US war planes bombed several villages in the Shindand district of the western province of Herat, Afghan officials said. Reports of displacement follow claims that up to 60 civilians may have died in the fighting.

"Hundreds of houses have been destroyed and thousands of people need emergency relief," the director of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission

(AIHRC) in Herat, Ghulam Nabi Hakak, told IRIN on Thursday.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) and some other relief organisations are reportedly working on aid delivery. "Sixty metric tonnes of food items will be dispatched to the affected regions very soon and further aid will be delivered after assessments," said Rick Carsino, WFP's country director for Afghanistan.

Between 27 and 29 April United States Special Forces fighting with the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police killed more than 130 Taliban fighters in the Shindand district, a US military press release reported. During the engagement a coalition aircraft bombed targets and an AC-130 gunship was also called in. According to the military press release "there were no civilian casualties reported".

However, the government of Afghanistan and the United Nations has confirmed reports which say more than 45 civilians, including women and children, died as a result of US military operation in Shindand.

On Tuesday a UNAMA assessment team visited the area to investigate what UN Spokesman Adrian Edwards described as "possible indiscriminate use of force and possible civilian displacement". Edwards says the UN believes figures of up to 49 civilian deaths, including 18 women, are credible.

Others say the figure could be higher, according to AIHRC "about 60 civilians have been killed in the air raids". Bahauddin, a resident of Shindand, said "more than 100 people have been killed all of whom are civilians". IRIN cannot confirm these reports.

IRIN understands that the UN team visited bombed villages, including Polmakan. Sources described the village as "heavily bombed" with eight houses destroyed and with women sitting and crying saying that their children were still under the rubble.

People were still digging bodies out of the rubble of their mud-walled homes on Tuesday afternoon, a spokeswoman for the governor of Herat province confirmed, saying that 52 people were wounded.

Of those, at least 25 wounded individuals have been admitted in Shindand's only hospital, and six more with severe injuries have been taken to a hospital in Herat city, local officials said.

A truck driver from Zerkoh valley who arrived in Herat on Tuesday confirmed to an IRIN reporter that 25 wounded people were taken from Bakhtabad village to Shindand hospital, saying he was the driver who took them there.

While a press release by US forces in Afghanistan says the operation in Shindand was jointly conducted by US Special Forces - operating outside NATO command - and Afghan National Police, a police official in Herat denied the Afghan forces' involvement.

"Unfortunately the operation was not coordinated with us," General Shafiq, a police commander in Herat, contended. Major Chris Belcher, spokesman for Combined Joint Task Force 82, confirmed that US forces under Operation Enduring Freedom were in command during the engagement. He said other forces, including NATO/ISAF forces, joined in support, and that the Afghan police were also involved.

Major Belcher said the US forces were leading a joint reconnaissance patrol with the Afghan National Police when they were ambushed by around 80-90 insurgents on 27 April. They withdrew but were ambushed again when they returned on 29 April. On both occasions close air support was used.

He said US forces have no official reports of civilian casualties, and they conducted a battle damage assessment following the engagement. However, they are cooperating with ISAF and the Afghan government to investigate other reports of civilian deaths.

In another incident on 27 April US forces raided a house in the eastern province of Nangarhar in which six people were killed and three others, including a woman, have been taken away by the American soldiers.

Hundreds of people marched in the streets of Nangarhar, accusing US forces for killing civilians and using search tactics that harm peoples' cultural values.

Civilians are the major victims of armed conflicts in Afghanistan, prominent Afghan and international human rights watchdogs reported in April.

NATO vows to avoid civilian casualties

KABUL: NATO forces in Afghanistan vowed on Thursday to improve coordination with Afghan authorities to avoid civilian casualties, after a warning from President Hamid Karzai that his people were losing patience over continuing bloodshed. Nearly 60 civilians have been killed in raids by US-led coalition troops in the past week, Afghan officials say, sparking four days of anti-American, anti-Karzai protests.

“There’s absolutely room for additional coordination,” Lieutenant Colonel Maria Carl, a spokeswoman for NATO’s ISAF security force, told reporters asking about civilian deaths and Afghan concerns they were not involved in planning Western military operations. “We are seeking new ways, all of us in country - the government, the coalition, ISAF - to improve these processes.”

Protesters called this week for the removal of Karzai for failing to stop the civilian killings, which have come amid an upsurge in violence as the Western-backed government and the Taliban push for a decisive advantage in their battle for the country. reuters

Civilian killings threaten Afghanistan's future

Kabul (AFP) - Mounting civilian casualties in military operations against the Taliban are turning already wary Afghans against foreign troops based here and eroding the fragile support for President Hamid Karzai, analysts say.

After days of protests against allegedly innocent victims being killed by international troops, Karzai summoned top generals and diplomats to his palace Wednesday to reiterate years of complaints over blameless deaths.

"Afghans are human beings too," he told reporters afterwards. "What we are seeking is value to Afghan lives."

Soon after the meeting, Afghan and UN teams announced their investigations found that around 50 civilians were killed in days of ground fighting and bombing in a remote valley in the western province of Herat.

Also Wednesday, about 500 university students torched a flag in the eastern province of Nangarhar alleging six civilians were killed by US-led coalition troops on Sunday.

"With every civilian life lost, the Afghan people get more angry," said Sarah Holewinski, executive director of the Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict, which is based in Washington.

"The US military has a stake in avoiding that kind of resentment. They must now investigate incidents of civilian death following combat operations -- and they should ensure the Afghan people see them do it," she said in a statement.

There is a danger the mounting casualties will play into the hands of the Taliban movement's efforts against the government and foreign troops, said Nader Nadery, from the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission.

The extremists were toppled from power in 2001 by the coalition and are waging a campaign of violence and propaganda that tries to portray the international forces as "infidel" invaders and the government as a stooge of the West.

"Incidents causing civilian casualties will no doubt distance people from the international troops and their own government. It's dangerous," Nadery told AFP.

"It will also provide an easy tool for the Taliban to use against the progress achieved over the past five years," warned the rights activist.

And civilian casualties threaten to ruin public confidence in the grinding fight against the Taliban and its Al-Qaeda allies.

"Firstly it undermines the struggle against terrorists," said parliamentarian Shukria Barakzai. "Secondly such killings turn people against these troops," she said.

"Obviously the sense of support and cooperation will be replaced by hatred and desire for revenge. It makes it easy for the enemy to use this against us."

There is already simmering resentment among Afghans towards the 50,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan to help the fledgling government forces stabilise the fractured country.

Aggressive soldiers in bullet-proofed convoys regularly force traffic off the roads. They also burst into homes in the middle of the night to conduct searches despite repeated calls from Karzai to work with local authorities and respect Afghan sensibilities.

Anger towards the soldiers erupted into riots in Kabul in May last year after a coalition vehicle lost control and ploughed into civilians cars, killing a handful of passengers.

More recently there has been a steady rise in the number of civilians, including children, shot dead at checkpoints manned by foreign forces who opened fire after their warnings to vehicles to halt are ignored.

Last month a unit of US Marines was withdrawn from Afghanistan after being accused of opening fire indiscriminately on civilians after an ambush in Nangarhar province. About a dozen people were killed, including two children.

Karzai's government, widely accused of corruption and incompetence, is already "far short of gaining the real support of the ordinary people," said senior Afghan journalist and commentator Ikhpolwak Safi.

"When civilians die -- obviously not for a good reason -- and it is linked to his government, it will turn people against him," he said.

"Dropping bombs on villages because one individual has attacked them is not a wise thing to do. This is what the foreign troops have been doing," he said.

British Soldier Shot Dead In Afghanistan

LONDON, May 3, 2007 -- The British government says one of its soldiers has been killed in southern Afghanistan.

The soldier and his fellow troops were involved in a battle in Garmsir, Helmand Province, with up to 10 Taliban fighters. The death brings to 54 the number of British troops killed in Afghanistan since 2001. A Danish soldier shot in Helmand on Sunday (April 29) has also died, becoming the first Danish combat death in Afghanistan.

Denmark announces first combat death in Afghanistan

COPENHAGEN: Denmark’s armed forces said it had suffered its first combat loss in Afghanistan after a soldier who was seriously injured in the war-torn country last weekend died in a Copenhagen hospital on Thursday.

The victim was shot in the throat when rebels attacked his unit in southern Helmand province last Sunday as it headed to join a NATO operation against the Taliban set to begin the next day.The injured soldier was evacuated by helicopter to a field hospital before being flown to Denmark. “This is the first soldier killed in combat in this country,” a spokesman for the Danish armed forces said.

Three Danish soldiers died in an accidental explosion in Kabul in March 2002.

Spanish reinforcements: Meanwhile, a Spanish military commander in Afghanistan said Spain should send reinforcements to Afghanistan to help put out growing Taliban violence in the west of the country.

“The greater the military presence, the easier it will be to guarantee security,” Colonel Miguel Garcia de las Hijas, chief of general staff of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) in western Afghanistan, told El Pais. afp

Hungarian soldiers in Afghanistan extend stay

By: All Hungary News - 7-05-03 16:31:00

Hungarian forces posted in Afghanistan will stay longer than initially planned, reports fn.hu. The Hungarian peacekeeping force dispatched to Afghanistan in October 2006 comprises 190 soldiers and six civilians engaged in rebuilding the northern region of the country, Baglan. They were to return home September 30, 2008.

The Hungarian government has decided to extend the mission despite increasing resentment among Afghans toward foreign soldiers. However, hostility is found mainly in the more dangerous southern regions.

The request to extend the mission came from Defense Minister Imre Szekeres who wants to ensure completion of civilian projects initiated by Hungary. The force has been tasked with stabilizing the area, providing humanitarian services and coordinating rebuilding projects. Szekeres arrived in Afghanistan Thursday to review Hungarian civilian projects in Baglan.

While the government is yet to make an official announcement, the decision is considered final because it Parliamentary approval is not required, according to fn.hu. It remains unclear how much longer Hungarian forces will remain in Afghanistan.

Azerbaijan to double Afghanistan force - official

BAKU, May 3 (Reuters) - Azerbaijan said on Thursday it would double the size of its peacekeeping force in Afghanistan to 44.

"Azerbaijan intends to increase its military peacekeeping contingent in Afghanistan as the country's contribution to international efforts aimed at strengthening security in this country," said Azeri Foreign Ministry spokesman Khazar Ibragim.

He said that the Caspian nation had no plans to boost the number of its troops in Iraq and Kosovo.

Oil-producing Azerbaijan participates in NATO's "Partnership for Peace", a programme of NATO help for partners in revamping their armies and other defence reforms. NATO sends humanitarian aid to Afghanistan via Azerbaijan.

Neighbouring Georgia has it will raise from 850 to 2,000 the number of its troops serving in the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and wants to strengthen its peacekeeping effort in Afghanistan.

French hostage deadline approaches but still no contact: Taliban

Kabul (AFP) - The Taliban said Friday it had not been contacted about its demands for the release of a Frenchman and three Afghans it has held for a month, reiterating its position on foreign hostages was "clear."

The deadline for its demands -- the withdrawal of French troops or release of Taliban prisoners -- is due to expire on Saturday. No precise time has been given.

"The deadline is drawing closer every moment," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP. "The French government and the Afghan government not only has not accepted our demands, but they even have not tried to contact us. The situation is unclear and blurry."

Spokesmen for the extremists said Thursday their council of leaders would decide what to do should the demands not be met.

Asked Friday if this could include killing them, Ahmadi said: "The policy of the Taliban movement regarding the foreign hostages is clear: if our demands are not met, we will act based on our policy that we have implemented with foreigners so far."

Taliban militants have beheaded several Afghan hostages whom they have accused of spying; they have also executed several Turks and Indians. The only killing of a Westerner they have claimed responsibility for was that of a British engineer in 2005.

The movement threatened last month to kill an Italian hostage, who was eventually released in exchange for five Taliban prisoners. His Afghan driver and interpreter were beheaded.

Ahmadi said the organisation the group worked for, Terre d'Enfance (A World For Our Children), had asked for the release of Frenchman Eric Damfreville "under no conditions," as a French woman captured with them was freed April 28.

Celine Cordelier, abducted with the men in the southwestern province of Nimroz, was freed with a letter restating the Taliban demand that France withdraw its 1,000 troops serving with a NATO-led force.

"We told them (Terre d'Enfance) that they must make that request from the Afghan or French government. We released the French woman on grounds of mercy and good intentions," Ahmadi said Friday. The group said last Saturday it had extended by a week its ultimatum for the men because France was busy with the May 6 presidential election.

President Hamid Karzai said days later his government was doing what it could to free the four men. "We are in close coordination with France, we are doing everything in that regard," Karzai told reporters.

His administration has been widely criticised for handing over last month five Taliban prisoners in exchange for the Italian journalist, who was held for two weeks.

Critics said the move increased the risk of kidnappings by militants and others groups wanting prisoners freed, or by criminal groups who could "sell" their captives on or demand ransom.

Less than a week after the Italian was freed, a medical team that included Afghan doctors and nurses was captured in southern Afghanistan. The Taliban has said it has demanded certain prisoners in exchange for the five.

Donor pledges to ARTF cross $2 billion mark

KABUL, May 1 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Predictable, disciplined and coordinated finance through the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF) is necessary to allow Afghans to take responsibility for their future and build modern state institutions, the World Bank has said.

Ahead of an annual meeting of ARTF donors, the bank said on Tuesday, pledges from 25 countries to the World Bank-administered ARTF - set up in May 2002 - had crossed the $2 billion mark.

Without the extraordinary generosity of these budgetary contributions by the international community, it would have been far harder for Afghanistan to build upon the opportunity of peace that broke out in 2001, said Praful Patel, World Bank vice president for the South Asia region.

With this money Afghanistan has seen a stable and predictable government for the first time in two decades, a government that is able to present credible strategies and also to translate strategy into better services with real a development outcome, he observed.

ARTF's recurrent window finances salaries and wages of about 220,000 non-uniformed civil servants, over half of whom are working outside Kabul. It has financed the governments operating and maintenance expenditures outside of the security sector, including bulk purchases of essential supplies.

The Afghan government will continue to need external finance to ensure that essential basic services are maintained, said Alastair McKechnie, World Bank country director for Afghanistan.

The ARTF is the best instrument we have to support salary payments in critical services such as education and health and it is absolutely vital that donors extend their support the Fund. Significantly, it also promotes better reporting and accountability mechanisms that will help build accountably of the state.

The Fund also committed $405 million to priority investments, which has financed projects in areas such as microfinance, telecommunications, road construction and community development.

For instance, it has helped establish 15 microfinance institutions with a network of over 224 branches in 22 provinces, with nearly 311,600 loan and savings clients. It has also helped improve the telecom sector. Eight out of 100 Afghans now have access to a telephone, compared to less than one out of 100 in 2002

Administered by the World Bank, the ARTF is governed by a management committee consisting of the United Nations, the Asian Development Bank and the Islamic Development Bank

When things got ugly in Ottawa, Kabul extended an olive branch

BRIAN LAGHI , DANIEL LEBLANC and GLORIA GALLOWAY - With a report from Campbell Clark – Globe and Mail 5.4.07

OTTAWA -- The Afghan government approached Canada to rejig a deal for the handover of detainees as Ottawa faced a maelstrom of criticism last week, sources have told The Globe and Mail.

The approach came April 25, after the conclusion of a particularly raucous session of Question Period and just before Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor blurted out at a foreign affairs committee meeting that a deal between the government and Afghanistan was at hand. It was the third day running that the Tories had faced a pummelling in the House of Commons.

"The Afghan government talked to us, and then Gordon said we might have a deal," said a source. "It was after QP, before committee." The source would not say who in the Afghan government made the approach.

The agreement that emerged included a series of enhancements in the protection of detainees transferred by Canadian soldiers to Afghan control. The detainee issue has been controversial, especially after Mr. O'Connor was obliged to apologize for misleading the House on the issue and after the emergence of government documents in which references to torture and poor treatment of detainees had been blacked out.

Mr. O'Connor's dramatic announcement came as the Prime Minister's Office began taking a more active hand in the issue. The PMO stepped in after a series of ministerial contradictions over torture allegations and who was assigned to monitor the detainees.

A source within the government said the mixed messages originated with bureaucrats in both the Department of National Defence and the Department of Foreign Affairs. The issue has been made more difficult to co-ordinate, he said, because of the fact that Afghanistan is halfway around the world and the mission requires input from a number of different departments.

By that same Wednesday, the Prime Minister's Office demanded that it be provided with accurate information from all departments.

From that point on, the PMO and the Privy Council Office have handled all the messaging because, as the government official explained, they are the only ones that can co-ordinate a broad range of material across different branches.

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, Brigadier-General Tim Grant checked in on the same day with Afghan authorities to follow up on a Globe and Mail investigation into the treatment of detainees in local jails.

That same day, Mr. Harper was clearly emboldened as he launched his toughest attack against the Liberals and the other opposition parties for raising the issue.

"The fact of the matter is this: The real problem is the willingness of the Leader of the Liberal Party and his colleagues to believe, to repeat and to exaggerate any charge against the Canadian military as they fight these fanatics and killers who are called the Taliban. It is a disgrace," Mr. Harper said to a roar of applause from the Conservative caucus in the Commons.

But even after that point, the normally focused communications from the Conservatives seemed to be in disarray, with the Prime Minister and at least five other ministers answering questions on the matter.

On Sunday, Government House Leader Peter Van Loan told CTV's Question Period that "we have yet to see one specific allegation of torture." On Monday, one of his cabinet colleagues, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day, said Correctional Service Canada officials tasked with helping improve Afghanistan's jails were told by two prisoners that they had been tortured.

When Mr. Van Loan was asked after the Conservative caucus meeting Wednesday to explain where his messaging had originated, he remained completely mum. Instead, he grinned broadly at reporters and ducked into his office.

Mr. Day has been equally silent in recent days on the matter outside of the House of Commons. When the Public Security Minister wanted to speak to reporters this week about the RCMP's handling of DNA testing, he did so only on the condition that he not be asked questions about Afghanistan.

Yesterday, as the deal was reached, Afghanistan's ambassador to Ottawa, Omar Samad, could not confirm the moment the deal was clinched, but praised the result of the long negotiations.

However, another official familiar with the agreement told The Globe that it was approved in Ottawa Tuesday, then sent to Kabul to be signed. The Afghan government accepted all parts of the new arrangement without objection, the source said.

In Vancouver yesterday, Mr. Harper seemed baffled as to why the story was still making headlines. "Why has the story gone on? I'm not sure we've heard any new information beyond the unsubstantiated allegations from a handful of former Taliban prisoners," he told reporters. "Apparently the opposition has little else to do these days than attack the good work that the Canadian troops are doing."

The new supplement to Canada's agreement with Afghanistan on the transfer of people detained by Canadian soldiers contains a number of provisions not included in the arrangements other countries, such as Britain and the Netherlands, have made. Among them:

Paragraph 7 In order to facilitate ongoing access and capacity building projects by the Government of Canada, the Afghan Government will hold detainees transferred by Canadian Forces in a limited number of facilities.

Paragraph 8 The AIHRC [Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission] and officials of the Government of Canada will have full and unrestricted access to detention facilities where detainees transferred by Canadian Forces are held.

Paragraph 9 During such access, representatives will, upon request, be permitted to interview detainees in private, without Afghan authorities present.

Paragraph 10 In the event that allegations come to the attention of the Government of Afghanistan that a detainee transferred by the Canadian Forces to Afghan authorities has been mistreated, the following corrective action will be undertaken: the Government of Afghanistan will investigate allegations of abuse and mistreatment and prosecute in accordance with national law and internationally applicable legal standards; the Government of Afghanistan will inform the Government of Canada, the AIHRC and the ICRC of the steps it is taking to investigate such allegations and any corrective action taken.

The pact on detainees

The globe and mail editorial - Friday, May 4, 2007

Canada has a new agreement with Afghan authorities over the treatment of
prisoners handed to them. It is a very good agreement, equal to those
obtained by the governments of Britain and the Netherlands in most ways, and
superior in two significant ways -- a requirement that the Afghan government
investigate allegations of abuse to international standards of justice and
in consultation with the Canadian government and human-rights monitors, and
an assurance that Canada or its representative may interview detainees in private. This latter clause especially comes perilously close to usurping Afghan sovereignty, illustrating the lengths to which that country's government was prepared to go to keep Canadian soldiers on the ground there. From a Canadian standpoint, then, it is satisfactory. All the safeguards required have been provided, and then some.

The question now is whether the agreement is worth the paper it is written on.
To date, every promise made by Canada, and by Afghanistan, on the treatment
of detainees has proven illusory. For a year, Defence Minister Gordon
O'Connor misled Parliament over the role of the Red Cross in monitoring
detainees. Then assurances that representatives of the Afghanistan
Independent Human Rights Commission were able to safeguard the human rights
of the prisoners on Canada's behalf turned out to be untrue.

These were serious failures which have undermined public confidence in a
critical mission. Afghan officials have been duplicitous, making extravagant
claims of adherence to the Geneva Conventions and offering covenants for detainees to be "treated humanely," and then engaging in all manner of abuse and torture in their medieval lockups. As an illustration of just how serious Afghan governments are about their undertakings to the international community, consider that Afghanistan ratified the United Nations Convention Against Torture in 1985, when under communist rule, and remained a party to it even under the Taliban.

Human-rights reports have repeatedly cited abuse of prisoners in Afghanistan
under the government of President Hamid Karzai. It is evidently too much to
expect that a country which until 2001 was inured to barbarism would
suddenly become the poster nation for universally protected rights
standards, especially given that it is in the midst of a bloody civil war
against a great evil. But every effort must still be brought to bear on the
Karzai government to improve its record.

Canada cannot get into the business of warehousing suspected Taliban, and
the prisoners should not be transported to this country. But there is more
that Canadians can do beyond crossing their fingers that Afghan officials will break with national tradition and uphold agreements that seek to end the practice of torture. This country could, as Amnesty International has long argued, urge its partners in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to work with the Afghans to establish a detention facility, run by Afghans but under the tutelage of Western experts, as a model for the country's nascent justice and correctional system. The ultimate goal of the mission to Afghanistan was
always meant to be nation-building. What better lesson for an emerging
democracy than adherence to human-rights standards and the rule of law.

Canadian officer testifies abuse of one Afghan detainee reported to military

Mike Blanchfield and Andrew Mayeda , CanWest News Service - May 03, 2007 - OTTAWA Afghan police beat up a prisoner given to them by the Canadian Forces, according to the first evidence of abuse of a detainee transferred by Canada to Afghanistan which emerged Thursday in documents filed in the Federal Court.

Col. Steve Noonan, a former task force commander in Afghanistan, disclosed the incident in a sworn affidavit filed with the court as part of the governments response to a legal challenge by Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association to stop all further transfers of detainees by the Canadian military to the Afghan government.

Noonans disclosure comes after repeated denials by the Conservative government that it had no specific examples that any detainee transferred by Canadian troops to Afghan authorities was later subject to abuse or torture. The detainee issue has mushroomed into a major political problem for Prime Minister Stephen Harper and several of his Conservative cabinet ministers.

Harper continued Thursday to dismiss allegations of prisoner abuse and blamed his political opponents for making it an issue.

This is based on nothing more than a handful of unsubstantiated allegations from Taliban prisoners and I think, quite frankly, it has detracted unnecessarily from the good work Canadian men and women are doing in the field in Afghanistan under dangerous circumstances, the prime minister told a news conference in Mission, B.C.

But court documents, including a transcript of Noonans cross-examination earlier this week, already filed in Federal Court revealed that a prisoner captured by Canadian troops was abused by the Afghans.

In this case, the CF learned that the detainee had been beaten by the local ANP, Noonan said in his affidavit, using the acronym for Afghan national police. When we learned of this, they approached the local ANP and requested that the detainee be given to them.

The Afghans turned the prisoner over to the Canadians who then gave him to provincial Afghan police authorities.

When Amnesty lawyer Paul Champ tried to get more details on the incident when it happened, what injuries were sustained, whether the Afghan police were charged federal lawyer J. Sanderson Graham shut down all further questioning of the incident citing national security interests.

It threatens Canadas national security to know when the Canadian Forces observed local Afghan national police beating a detainee that they transferred to that unit? Champ asked. We object to any questions on this incident generally, Graham replied.

Citing reports by the U.S. State Department, the United Nations and Canadas Foreign Affairs Department, Amnesty and the civil liberties association have charged that detainees transferred by Canada to the Afghans are subject to torture in its prisons, and that the transfers should be halted. They also question why the military does not build its own prison camps for detainees.

In a surprise twist, Thursdays hearing was adjourned because court was told that the Canadian and Afghanistan governments had signed a revision of their prisoner transfer agreement earlier that morning.

Justice Michael Kelen announced the key details of the agreement that expands on the controversial December 2005 deal originally signed by Canada and Afghanistan.

Under Thursdays amended deal, Canadian officials will be granted unrestricted access to all Afghan prisons, where its prisoners are transferred, and they will be able to conduct private interviews with prisoners away from the eyes of their Afghan jailers.

What happened this morning is a major development; it probably wouldnt have happened if this court case wasnt happening, Kelen said from the bench before adjourning the hearing.

The court challenge will continue at a yet-to-be-determined date, once lawyers from both sides have had a chance to cross-examine relevant witnesses on the amended agreement signed in Kabul.

Earlier this week, Champ grilled Noonan about why Canadian troops do not build their own prison camps in Afghanistan given that the military has a published manual that gives detailed instructions of how to do this.

Noonan said the military had a concern that running their own camps would force them to redirect large numbers of troops to running such a facility.

The other concern that we do have is that without proper training, without experience in it, the execution of that may go wrong as has been evidenced in my understanding of of, for example the Abu Ghraib situation, Noonan testified, referring to the scandal that rocked the U.S. military in Iraq three years ago over its abuse of inmates at the Abu Ghraib prison it operated in Baghdad.

Our folks have not been exposed to, historically, nor have been for at least my generation to the holding of detainees or prisoners of war, either one, in our generation, Noonan added. We dont know the risk the lack of knowledge that we have in the actual conduct of it is significant.

Meanwhile, Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay said Thursday the enhanced agreement with the Afghan government was better than the original version signed by the previous Liberal government in December 2005.

We have done what was asked by others of Canadians. We are going to see that that is implemented by the Afghan government, MacKay said. Senior Liberals downplayed their partys role in negotiating the original agreement to transfer detainees to Afghan authorities.

The Liberals said Thursday they have never denied crafting the original deal, which was signed in December 2005 by Gen. Rick Hillier, Canadas chief of the defence staff.

The issue is not about what happened in 2005, said Liberal defence critic Denis Coderre. He said the embarrassment over the issue has been caused by the Conservative governments failure to improve on the agreement and ensure the Geneva convention banning torture is respected.

Omar Samad, Afghanistans ambassador to Canada, said Thursdays amendments now give Canadian officials more access to his country’s prisons than any other NATO country.

Samad pledged that after being ravaged by a generation of war, Afghanistan would with help of Canada and its allies rebuild its institutions and get rid of systemic abuse in its prisons.

This process has started getting rid of lawful activities and will continue, Samad said in an interview.

But the head of Amnesty International Canada said that the new deal did not go far enough to stop abuse in Afghan prisons. You dont prevent torture in country where it is rampant and systematic, as it is in Afghanistan, by sending in monitors on an occasional basis. It simply doesnt work, said Alex Neve. Ottawa Citizen

Subject: AFGHANISTAN: Interview with James Appathurai of NATO about Afghan detainees

CTV - May 03, 2007 07h45 - I met a variety of soldiers who are pissed off, they're angry that these allegations have detracted from the over all mission here. The focus back in Canada specifically on the enormous amount of good that's being done.

Seamus: His troops main join a little ball hockey but Canada's top soldier is in Kandahar defending his decision to sign a controversial prisoner exchange agreement with the Afghanistan government in 2005. The deal did not include the monitoring of detainees. Chief of defense staff rick hillier says that Canada is working with Afghan officials to investigate allegations that prisoners were abused in Kandahar jails. Joining me now from brussels is Canada specsman James Patharai. Thank you very much for joining us.

Thank you.

Seamus: First of all, as soon as these allegations of detainee abuse came out last week, the NATO secretary general took a very active role in supporting an investigation, as did our foreign affairs minister, Peter MacKay. Can you tell us where the investigation is right now.

Well, you're quite right, the secretary general, like Minister MacKay, considers these allegations to be important. We are there to protect fundamental human rights, by the way, that's something enshrined in the Afghan constitution, so we have a meeting of minds with President Karzai over this. The secretary general immediately asked his senior civilian representative to go into the ministry of justice, to go and see the Afghan independent human rights commission, and express our concern about this. The Afghans are now investigating. We are, of course, supporting that. I know that Minister MacKay also believes that this is the right thing to do, so let's see where the investigation goes.

Seamus: And I know the NATO secretary general had some discussions with Minister MacKay on this issue. You were there. What can you tell us about that meeting?

Well, I can tell you Minister MacKay raised this twice in the last week, once at a meeting of NATO foreign Ministers where he raised Canada's concerns about these allegations, and I can tell you there was resonance around the table when he raised this, because many other foreign Ministers feel the same way. Then he raised it again with the secretary general here in brussels at an open forum where the secretary general, like Minister MacKay, stressed the point that Afghanistan needs help to build a justice system. This is a country that emerged from 30 years of brutality, the whole country was brutalized and all the people were brutalized and I'm not exaggerating I think when I say that. They now have to build a system from nothing. They need a prison system, they need a justice system. We have to help them do that. I know Canada is doing it. Many NATO nations are doing it. But when we look at these allegations, we have to keep it in context, without making excuses. But at least understanding the context.

Seamus: Responsibility for detainees once they are traveled -- once they are transferred to Afghan officials -- are they the responsibility of NATO or are they the responsibility of the individual member nation that's responsible for transferring them?

First, when NATO nations detain Afghans, there are responsibility and that means NATO, as individual nations all together, we have a policy for that. We cannot detain anyone for more than 96 hours. We cannot detain anyone simply for intelligence gathering purposes, when we detain an Afghan, we always inform the international red cross or red crescent in this case. If and when we hand them over to anyone, it is always to the Afghans, it is a sovereign country so that we have no choice. That is the only thing that can be done to hand them over to the Afghans. But of course when we do that we inform the international red cross and red crescent that we have done it. There are no secret prisoners when NATO takes detainees.

Seamus: We interviewed retired major general Louis MacKenzie, who you know as the Canadian UN Commander in Sarajevo. He suggested that NATO perhaps should open up its own penetentiary, not a tasteful business, as he said, but something that perhaps NATO should consider doing just so the Afghans have a model from which to work off in order to develop their own penetentiary system that would be up to our standards, that would be up to NATO standards. Is that something that you think NATO may ever consider?

Well, NATO as an organization isn't in the penitentiary business. We do political military things. I see what he's saying, but I think we have to keep in mind a fundamental principle. We have helped Afghanistan create a sovereign country, with its own democratic process. They have elected their president, their parliament, their regional councils. They have a constitution which says that they will protect fundamental human rights and respect international law. I can tell you that president karzai behind closed doors has expressed to the secretary general when I was there his personal commitment to this. He has acted on it. We have to help the Afghans build their own country.

NATO countries are helping them do that. Training judges, training lawyers, training police. We are putting billions of dollars into training their police. And of course, that means prison, corrections officials, and I know that the Canadian government has invested heavily, continues to invest heavily in it. These are for the moment allegations. Let's see where it goes but let's invest in Afghanistan. That is our exit strategy over the long term, helping them stand on their even feet for the just militarily but also in this area. It's a very important area and I think we need no do more in that regard much

Seamus: And James, lastly, knowing that you're from Toronto and that you still manage to get some hockey energy incidence over there in brussels, you must have been particularly delight today see the Stanley Cup in Afghanistan.

Well, I -- I think it's great. Mine, I like playing hockey over here in Europe because in Europe I'm not as bad as I am relatively as I am in Canada but I've been to Afghanistan many times. I can tell you it's like a mirage to see Tim Hortons, to get an iced cappuccino when it's 54 in the shade which it was the last time I went but it would have been even more of a mirage to see not only the Stanley Cup but all those soldiers playing against NHL-ers so hopefully they will do it again the next time I'm there.

Seamus: Very good, James. Thank you very much.

And torture doesn't end with monitoring

By LEWIS MACKENZIE  - Thursday, May 3, 2007 – opinion

Public interest in the capture of insurgents by Canadian soldiers began in January, 2002, with the front-page story in this newspaper of restrained Taliban fighters being unloaded from the back of a U.S. Hercules by soldiers from our elite JTF2 unit. Confusion reigned at the time when prime minister Jean Chrétien assured the House of Commons that Canadians were not taking prisoners in Afghanistan. A few days later, it was acknowledged that we were. It was not surprising that the PM didn't know because in the interest of plausible deniability he probably wasn't told. What followed was politically driven, self-serving outrage over the fact we were turning detainees over to "Bush's army." The policy was changed and a new agreement was made to hand over prisoners to the Afghan authorities.

Every subsequent agreement regarding detainees has addressed the issue of monitoring their condition while in Afghan custody. This might sound good but, in reality, it's of little consequence as it would not stop the mistreatment of prisoners.

In 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006 the Canadian government - more specifically the Department of Foreign Affairs - received in-country reports on Afghanistan stating that prisoner abuse was prevalent throughout the myriad of Afghanistan's detention facilities. Further agreements were drafted and finalized by Foreign Affairs in close consultation with National Defence.

Much has been made regarding the last formal agreement signed in December, 2005. That agreement, too, resulted from extensive collaboration over several months between DFAIT and DND, involving several divisions in both departments. Bill Graham, then the Liberal minister of defence, and senior staff at the Privy Council Office signed and approved the document. Parliamentary records confirm that the agreement was signed in Afghanistan by General Rick Hillier, the Chief of the Defence Staff, on behalf of the Canadian government, and by the Afghan Minister of Defence on behalf of the Afghan government. It is important to note that the 2005 agreement specifically cited the Third Geneva Convention in dealing with the treatment of detainees and highlighted the role of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in this regard.

(Indeed, in the first three months of this year, the ICRC visited 34 detention locations in Afghanistan holding 6,955 detainees, following up on some 800 persons arrested in relation to the conflict. It is not clear, however, where those detained by Canada are being held.)

The current flap emerged when Minister of Defence Gordon O'Connor indicated in the House that the ICRC was keeping Canada apprised of the conditions in the Afghan prisons and their knowledge of any mistreatment of prisoners. In fact, a modest amount of such co-operation had taken place; however, it is not normally revealed in public lest the ICRC's effectiveness on the ground be compromised. The Minister's mistake was to share information with the House that is considered highly sensitive.

If we're serious about improving the situation for detainees and protecting our own reputation, we need to face some facts.

To start with, certainly, there is torture going on in some of the Afghan detention facilities. You don't change the interrogation techniques of the region in a decade, let alone overnight. Once you accept that, there are few practical options.

Currently there is a deafening call for enhanced visitation rights and monitoring of the Afghan facilities by coalition countries' representatives. Such a move would have little effect. It's too easy to hide torture from civilian agencies and live-in monitors could easily be duped. As well, the entire system would likely grind to a halt as it became jammed by every prisoner protesting his treatment. Many would beat each other in order to have the bruises and breaks to "qualify" for intervention by the monitors.

Then too, what happens if enhanced monitoring does confirm that torture is taking place. Do we admonish the senior officials in the institution? Do we try to convince Afghan President Hamid Karzai to remove them in spite of assurances from his own officials that there has been no torture? Do we cut off aid? Do we try to reclaim from the general prison population the detainees we turned over while other coalition partners leave the ones they captured there?

None of the above would be effective. The fact is that if enhanced monitoring fails to ward off torture, and it probably will fail, Canada does not have a problem - NATO does! Canada cannot and should not operate unilaterally. The alliance, which to date has avoided the problem, needs to mobilize its diplomatic component and stop leaving the problem with its militaries. There are any number of NATO members who are not even close to pulling their weight in Afghanistan who could work together and take over an existing Afghan detention facility and operate it as a model and example to the emerging Afghan police/correctional service. Not an ideal solution, but one that might just be necessary in the interests of letting political leaders, diplomats and military commanders return to the task of rebuilding Afghanistan.

LEWIS MacKENZIE, Retired major-general, first commander of UN peacekeeping forces in Sarajevo

Martin approved a detainee policy

Cabinet correspondence; Negotiations for transfer agreement with Afghans
CanWest News Service, with files from James Cowan, National Post - Thursday, May 03, 2007

OTTAWA - Former prime minister Paul Martin gave approval almost two years ago for then defence minister Bill Graham to negotiate a detainee transfer agreement with the Afghanistan government, say documents obtained by CanWest News Service.

The revelation, contained in Cabinet correspondence and Defence Department briefing notes, comes as the Harper government continues to face heavy criticism over its conduct of the Afghanistan mission and allegations that detainees were abused after being transferred to Afghan authorities.

The documents show that Mr. Martin, who has yet to speak publicly on the controversy, was briefed on the agreement more than six months before it was signed.

In a May 27, 2005, letter from Mr. Graham to Mr. Martin, the then prime minister was told that Canada planned to negotiate an agreement with the Afghan government that spelled out "explicit undertakings" on how the detainees would be treated.

The same day as the letter, Mr. Graham "authorized the Canadian Forces to seek arrangements with relevant authorities on the transfer of detainees," according to a Defence Department briefing note. "The Prime Minister concurred with this approach on 10 June 2005," states the note.

The documents appear to debunk a growing narrative in Ottawa that General Rick Hillier, the Chief of the Defence Staff, acted on his own and without proper government supervision when he signed the controversial detainee deal on behalf of the Canadian government in Kabul on Dec. 18, 2005.

They also shed new light on how the former Liberal government crafted a deal that has become Stephen Harper's biggest political headache since becoming Prime Minister, sparking daily calls for the resignation of Gordon O'Connor, Minister of National Defence.

The May, 2005, letter states that Canada's new detainee policy "proceeds from the same premise" as strategic objectives approved by former prime minister Jean Chretien in November, 2001.

Mr. Chretien was the first prime minister to commit warships and special forces commandos to the U.S.-led war on terrorism, one month after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

The government planned to reach an agreement with Afghanistan under which detainees transferred by Canada would "be afforded treatment consistent with the standards set out in the Third Geneva Convention, regardless of the legal status of those detainees," the letter states.

The letter, also sent to former foreign affairs minister Pierre Pettigrew, assures that information on detainees "will be passed along in a timely way" to the International Committee of the Red Cross, "which has the mandate and resources to track Prisoners of War and detainees captured during armed conflict."

But the letter does not specify whether the ICRC will report back to Canada on the condition of the detainees. Mr. O'Connor recently apologized for misleading Parliament about the role of the ICRC. He said it was reporting back to Canada, when that was not correct.

On May 31, 2005, Mr. Graham and Gen. Hillier met Afghanistan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah to discuss the "possibility" of a bilateral "framework agreement," according to the briefing note.

On July 28, Gen. Hillier sent Mr. Graham a letter asking for his approval "to include language in a proposed Military Technical Agreement with the Government of Afghanistan concerning the Canadian Forces plans to negotiate a bilateral agreement on the treatment of detainees." Mr. Graham signed off on the plan.

In the House of Commons yesterday, the Conservative government faced another round of relentless questioning about its handling of the Afghan detainee issue. The government has faced criticism that it has exposed prisoners to torture in Afghan prisons after being transferred there by the Canadian military personnel, and that it has offered contradictory explanations about the issue.

Mr. Harper told the House yesterday that Gen. Hillier did not act on his own when he signed the agreement. "It is my clear understanding that any such agreement would have required the approval of the Liberal Cabinet ministers of the day."

Alain Pellerin, executive director of the Conference of Defence Associations and a retired colonel, said a "reliable source" had told him that the Department of Foreign Affairs had been intimately involved in the creation of the detainee transfer agreement. Indeed, the creation of the document had been the result of "intense collaboration" between the Department of National Defence and at least three different divisions within Foreign Affairs, Mr. Pellerin said.

"When you have to deal with a foreign nation, Foreign Affairs has the lead," he said. Meanwhile, in Kandahar, Gen. Hillier said he only signed the agreement after Foreign Affairs and the Defence Department controlled it.

"They shaped the agreement. I signed it, first of all because I was here in Afghanistan when it was ready to be signed, in the presence of the ambassador, who of course would have signed it if I had not been here," Gen. Hillier said, adding that he was asked personally by Afghanistan's defence minister to put his name to the agreement.

Gen. Hillier was well known to Afghan officials because he had commanded NATO forces in Kabul a year earlier.

Unlike similar agreements reached by the Dutch and British governments, the Canadian deal did not contain a guarantee that Canadian officials could follow up on transferred detainees.

The government has since negotiated a new agreement with Afghan authorities under which Canadian officials will have access to detainees after they are transferred.

Good news in Afghanistan

The Ottawa Citizen editorial, Friday, May 04, 2007

There is some good news out of Afghanistan about lives saved and hope regained. Despite the many problems that continue to make life a struggle in that country, mothers and babies are healthier than they were before the NATO intervention.

Any comparison with the Taliban era sets a low bar, of course. In those days, women had little access to doctors. If they managed to get appointments, the doctors might never actually examine them. It isn't easy to get a physical from behind a burqa.

Maternal and infant mortality are among the most important measures of development in any country. Where basic health services do not exist or are allocated in a discriminatory manner, mothers and babies die preventable deaths.

According to a Johns Hopkins University study, the infant mortality rate six years ago was 165 per 1,000 live births. Last year, the infant mortality rate was 135 per 1,000 births. In other words, fewer babies are dying each year in post-Taliban Afghanistan.

The number is still high. By comparison, Canada has an infant mortality rate of fewer than five deaths per 1,000 live births. Afghans have many challenges, but at least 20 per cent of pregnant women today are attended by skilled health workers compared with five per cent in 2003.

The fact that women are getting healthier in Afghanistan is a sign that women are also gaining more freedom. Things are getting better there -- not quickly enough by anyone's measure, but they are getting better. This study discredits any argument that under the Taliban there was at least order and stability. There's no justification for a regime that watched dispassionately as babies, and often their mothers, died in delivery.

Demand Increases for Women to Join Afghan Police

by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson - NPR (National Public Radio) May 3, 2007

The role of women in Afghan society is a complex one. Tradition and a conservative interpretation of Islam relegate most women to the role of subservient wife and mother. Daughters in Afghanistan are often sold or traded into marriage to strengthen tribal ties.

But the new, democratic Afghanistan is under pressure to give women the same opportunities that men have — such as allowing them to become police officers.

During the Taliban era, watching an action thriller about a karate-savvy, female detective could cost you your life. But these days, the heroine of the film Ghanoon (Law) is a role model to Nahid Rezaie.

She has no real Afghan women detectives to look up to. That's because Rezaie is the first female detective in her province of Bamiyan. The 23-year-old mother of three, who carries a handgun and wears a traditional veil, says she'd love to save the day like her fictional role model.

But on a recent day, Rezaie sits in a plywood office at police headquarters, interrogating a 50-year-old woman accused of hitting a neighbor. The suspect, Golshah, claims that she merely defended her daughter from a neighbor who hit her on the way home from school. The suspect's 14-year-old son, Jahan Mir, tells a different tale.

Rezaie, who addresses the boy in a motherly tone, orders him to tell the truth. The frightened boy stares at the detective, ready to burst into tears. He blurts out that his sister wasn't hit, only threatened after she cursed at the neighbor. He shyly confesses to pulling the neighbor's hair.

Rezaie takes the boy's thumb and presses it onto a red inkpad, then onto his statement that she's written down. She turns to his mother, her eyes narrowing. Rezaie orders Golshah to find a storeowner known to the family. He will serve as the Bamiyan equivalent of bail.

She tells Golshah that if she fails to show the next day, the storeowner will be arrested. Still, the suspect named Golshah sings the detective's praises. "Women know how to talk to women," Golshah says. "Men don't know how to talk to women. But I spoke the truth, no matter what she thinks."

Rezaie's ability to get to the bottom of the dispute is one of the things that makes Gen. Sayed Akbar Saeedi happy to have women in his department. The head of the provincial police force boasts that his eight female officers give him the highest percentage of women on any police force in Afghanistan.

"In Afghan society, where religious values dominate, it's no surprise to find reluctance over women becoming police officers," Saeedi says. "But in Bamiyan, most residents are liberalized because they lived abroad during the Taliban era. Bamiyan is also a center of police training, so girls we recruit don't have to go far from home."

Saeedi adds that he'd like to hire up to 100 policewomen. He says they are needed to handle crimes involving women, given that men refuse to let other men see female relatives.

That doesn't mean women are always happy to see Rezaie. Five months ago, she suffered a broken hand while trying to arrest a female suspect. Rock-throwing villagers also cracked the skull of Rezaie's husband, Mohammed Zahegh.

But it hasn't dampened his enthusiasm for her chosen career. He is a driver for the police force and often drives Rezaie to her cases. "I'm very happy, really," Zahegh says. "I hope she gets promoted. We may have been hurt that time, but we brought the suspect and everyone else in."

Rezaie says she wants to be the best officer in Bamiyan. She says she owes it to her people. Like most residents of this province, she is a member of Afghanistan's Hazara minority, Shiite Muslims descended from Mongol invaders.

"I want to break the stereotype of this province as being poor and unaccomplished," she says. "We may be poor, but we show that we have the will to serve."

New Zealand police officers who train Afghans in Bamiyan say they are impressed with the women's dedication. But as open as Bamiyan may be to having policewomen, conservative traditions do get in the way.

"Definitely one of the challenges is having them physically take part in some of the training," New Zealand police officer Claire Robertson says. "For example, drill [marching in formation] — some of them would like to do it, but it's almost frowned upon."

Robertson says it took a lot of negotiating to allow women to take part in drill. It's not considered a dignified activity for Muslim women in public.

Nor is physical fitness. Robertson says she had to clear the classroom of 28 male trainees so the women could exercise. Nevertheless, Robertson says Bamiyan's policewomen are impressive. She jokes that they are so good, she's almost out of a job.

Putting Afghanistan back on the map

KABUL (Online): Two things that have emerged from the ashes of the World

Trade Center are the urgent case of Afghanistan, the previously littleknown

country in which the Al Qaeda hijackers trained, and the Tribeca Film Festival.

According to the festival's executive director, Peter Scarlet, the two have been linked since September 11, 2001. "I've felt ever since arriving at TFF in 2002 that the fest's original mission - putting Lower Manhattan back on its feet economically and spiritually - encompassed the need to open our windows and our eyes to what's happening in the rest of the world," Mr. Scarlet said.

"Especially to a place like Afghanistan, to which we're forever tied by 9/11." This year's lineup reflects that bond - which is surely part bondage - more than ever.

The recent glut of Iraq documentaries shows (once again) that compelling stories spill out of war, but the Tribeca program suggests something more surprising: that Afghanistan, for filmmakers at least, has become the primary front. Security concerns have something to do with it - Mr. Scarlet noted that it has become more difficult to capture Iraq on camera "without risking the loss of several major body parts" - but so does an increasing sense that Afghanistan matters, which has become something of a party line among Tribeca officials. "Afghanistan is in trouble," festival programmer Nancy Schafer announced at a press conference last week. "We need to bring the spotlight back."

"Taxi to the Dark Side" brings an interrogation lamp. Directed by Alex Gibney,

who earned an Oscar nomination for his previous film, "Enron: The Smartest

Guys in the Room," this engrossing examination of American treatment of

suspected terrorists is one of the most talked about films at the festival. Mr.

Gibney's investigation of prisoner abuse begins at Bagram air base in

Afghanistan, the military detention center where a young Afghan taxi driver was

found dead in his cell in December 2002. Evidence later showed he was killed by

his American captor The film's inquest extends to Guantanamo Bay and to the

infamous corridors of Abu Ghraib, but Afghanistan, the original testing ground for America's war on terror, is its real starting point.

"Taxi" argues that when the U.S. military entered the country to put down the

Taliban, American values didn't make it over intact. The young, poorly trained

soldiers charged with extracting information from prisoners - a handful of whom

are interviewed here, in dramatic chiaroscuro lighting - were thrown into not only an alien land but treacherous moral territory, with superiors seemingly unwilling to guide them through it. The old rules didn't apply; the gloves, as Vice President Cheney memorably said, came off. But then what? According to the film's many interviewees, including those who served at Bagram, the Pentagon had no clear policy for detainee treatment - only, in the words of one legal expert, a "fog of ambiguity coupled with great pressure to bring results."

When that combustible mix exploded at Abu Ghraib, the collateral damage, both

in terms of human rights and public relations, was shocking - and Mr. Gibney has the footage to prove it. Beth Murphy's "Beyond Belief" couldn't be more different from Mr. Gibney's dry-eyed exposé, but it is no less dramatic, and a good deal less self-important.

There's something decidedly feminine about this emotional tale of two

September 11 widows and their counterparts in Afghanistan, but it is much more

than a woman's film. (That is to say, men should bring hankies, too.) It's

impossible not to be stirred by the "post-traumatic growth" of Massachusetts

residents Susan Retik and Patti Quigley, both of whom were pregnant when their

husbands boarded planes that crashed into the World Trade Center.

Somewhat reluctantly, the two women agreed to meet; they bonded instantly,

and organized a fund-raising bike ride from Ground Zero to Boston. The proceeds

supplied chickens - and a way of earning a modest income - to about 500

destitute Afghan widows. These two remarkable women did not, as Ms. Murphy's

wonderfully touching film illustrates, embark on this mission to escape their grief; their grief is wrapped up in it. "I have tried to turn this into something other than hatred," Ms. Quigley says of her loss. Visiting war-torn Afghanistan requires both mothers to leave their children behind, and the kidnapping of their liaison in Kabul gives them pause, but ultimately they meet their long-suffering beneficiaries.

When they do, the yawning gulf between two very different ways of life emerges with shattering clarity; but so does Ms. Retik's observation that "a mother is a mother is a mother." The homegrown documentary "Postcards From Tora Bora" also explores Afghanistan through contrasts. After 20 years in North America, narrator and co-director Wazhmah Osman filmed her return to the country of her childhood, which her family fled following the 1979 Soviet invasion.

Ms. Osman's home movies from Afghanistan, "the only tangible things left of my

past," depict women in skirts and dapper young men playing volleyball. It's a far cry from the ruin she revisits as an adult. In Kabul, Ms. Osman carries around a photo of the capital from the 1970's that stumps local cab drivers: The river it shows is now dry, the tall buildings carcasses. "Zolykha's Secret," the only Afghan-produced work in this year's festival, is a fantasy-tinged drama set in a remote village.

Written and directed by Horace Ahmad Shansab, this primitive film is poignant, if only because it makes the growing pains of the country's national cinema

painfully obvious. ("Osama," the elegant Afghan film that won the 2004 Golden

Globe for Best Foreign Film, was without a doubt a small miracle.) Mr. Shansab,

an American-trained filmmaker, financed the production himself and also tutored

most of the crew. His film's main virtue is its focus on life under the Taliban, a starkly austere portrait of which begins to emerge through the melodrama.

The battleground of Afghanistan also haunts the experimental Dutch film "Why

Didn't Anybody Tell Me It Would Become This Bad in Afghanistan." Director Cyrus

Frisch's first-person narrative - if it can be called that - was shot almost entirely on a cell phone, and the result is something between an impressionist rendering of Amsterdam and a Hans Hoffmann canvas in motion. More than anything else, this 70-minute document of a day in the life of a Dutch veteran of the

Afghanistan war reveals a state of mind terrorism has introduced to the West: the fragmented image, the trembling camera-phone, the vague sense of menace are

all part of it. Mr. Frisch's unconventional cinema may not be for everyone, but

this is that rare film in which Afghanistan really gets under your skin.

[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.]