In this bulletin:

• Better health care for Afghan children
• On the frontline of health care in Afghanistan (Feature)
• Germany's Merkel resists calls to deploy troops to south Afghanistan
• Taliban behead Afghan man and woman, police say
• At least 25 Taliban reported killed in Afghanistan
• New mullah in Arghandab district wants Canada to stay in Afghanistan
• AFGHANISTAN: Displaced families in Farah need urgent help
• Afghan Koran distributor arrested
• Afghan democratic institutions still weak: US
• Poll finds TV, radio among trusted Afghan institutions
• The War on Poppy Succeeds, but Cannabis Thrives in an Afghan Province
• Kabul comeback
• Pakistan was in bed with Taliban: Durrani
• Al Qaeda, Taliban exploited Waziristan pact to regroup: General Ehsan
• US strategy vis-à-vis Afghanistan and Pakistan

Better health care for Afghan children

By AMIR SHAH, Associated Press, Nov 4

KABUL, Afghanistan - Close to 90,000 children who would have died before age 5 in Afghanistan during Taliban rule will stay alive this year because of advances in medical care in the country, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Sunday.

The under-5 child mortality rate in Afghanistan has declined from an estimated 257 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2001 to about 191 per 1,000 in 2006, the Ministry of Public Health said, relying on a new study by Johns Hopkins University.

The U.N. and aid agency Save the Children both hailed the advances in health care in Afghanistan.

"This is certainly very positive news," said the U.N. spokesman in Afghanistan, Adrian Edwards. "To come from such low life expectancy to see this improvement does appear to be an indication that the work on the health sector here is beginning to pay off."

Karzai, surrounded by children at a news conference in Kabul, thanked international aid organizations and Afghan health workers for the work they've done to raise health standards. He said 89,000 children will be saved each year because of the improved health care.

Still, Afghanistan continues to face severe problems. Health Minister Mohammad Amin Fatimi said 250,000 children under age 5 die every year, mostly from malnutrition, diarrhea, tuberculosis and malaria.

Child immunizations have risen dramatically in recent years, and newly trained volunteer health workers are helping treat pneumonia among villagers in remote areas, said Tariq Ihsan, a deputy director with Save the Children.

But Ihsan said the youngest children make up the bulk of the country's high child mortality rate.

"My feeling is that we really need to look at this very carefully, because the children who are dying now could be the newborns," Ihsan said. "Many newborns are dying because they don't have access to immediate health care. I think that's a real challenge for Afghanistan. They need to ask, 'Are we saving enough newborns?'"

Deaths of Afghan children who don't reach their first birthday have dropped from 165 per 1,000 in 2001 to 129 per 1,000 today, a drop of some 22 percent, Edwards said.

Afghanistan's child mortality rate, from birth to age 5, has been among the worst in the world. Only Sierra Leone, with 283 child deaths per 1,000 live births, Angola (260) and Niger (259) ranked below Afghanistan at 257, UNICEF said in a 2006 report.

By comparison, the United States has eight under-5 child deaths per 1,000 births. Singapore and Iceland, with three childhood deaths per 1,000, topped the rankings.

The UNICEF report noted that, like Afghanistan, most of the countries with the worst child mortality rates have suffered from armed conflict.

Fatimi, the health minister, said 85 percent of Afghans now have access to basic health care — a marked improvement from the past. A U.S.-led invasion in 2001 toppled the Taliban militant movement from power.

On the frontline of health care in Afghanistan (Feature)

KANDAHAR CITY, Nov 1(Pajhwok Afghan News): Sharifa Seddiqi is a most unusual woman. Not only is she the sole female surgeon in Afghanistan's war-ravaged southern province of Kandahar, she also runs the main hospital in the region. This is not a job for the faint-hearted. Kandahar's Mirwais Hospital serves a population of three million in what remains one of the most insecure and violent areas of the country. It is also where women continue to suffer particular repression in a resolutely traditional society.

Of course a woman in Afghanistan faces great challenges, especially in becoming a professional, admits 38-year-old Dr Seddiqi, wearing a loose black robe and a long white shawl covering her head. But I was lucky that my family always supported me. I'm proud to now have such an important job. Even getting to work in the morning can present a challenge. With all the suicide bombs and explosions, I do sometimes fear that I will be killed, that I will be in the wrong place at the wrong time, remarks the doctor. But I can't be a prisoner in my own house because of that.

As hospital director, Dr Seddiqi works closely with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which has been supporting Mirwais Hospital for the past 11 years. After rehabilitating the surgical department, the ICRC extended its support to the entire 380-bed facility, recently signing a five-year agreement with the Ministry of Public Health to implement a package of reforms.

Together we are essentially aiming to raise the standard of hospital services to a nationally agreed level, and to ensure that there is both the necessary equipment and expertise to meet patient needs in the future, says Dr Seddiqi. We have already achieved a lot, but as you will see, there is still a long way to go.

After a round of meetings and dealing with administrative matters, Dr Seddiqi's morning typically entails a tour of the wards. Passing huddles of women shrouded in the traditional full-length burka, waiting anxiously outside an operating theatre, the doctor remonstrates with a group of four armed policemen guarding their wounded colleague. She asks them to leave their weapons outside. They refuse. This is a problem, sighs the doctor.

Armed men from all the fighting groups around here tend to wander in and out of the hospital and it makes people nervous. But we are building a new security fence which will help to really demilitarise the compound, the doctor points out.

At the men's intensive care unit, the doctor checks the new arrivals. These include two men with gunshot wounds, sustained in a burglary, and a six-year-old boy with blast marks over his face and chest, his hands and feet badly injured, after he picked up an explosive device that he found in his yard. Car accidents usually account for the vast majority of surgical patients, notes Dr Seddiqi. But at times we get a lot of war-wounded, both military and civilian, including mine injuries.

In the separate women's intensive care unit, there are a number of burns patients. A teenage girl with gauze bandages covering her legs is wheeled to the dilapidated bathroom to be washed. Sadly, we still see quite a lot of young women with big burdens in life who try to commit suicide by setting themselves on fire, deplores Dr Seddiqi. In a few cases it's the husbands who do this to the women for punishment, but most often it's the women looking for a means of escape.

Passing through the crowded pediatric ward, the doctor stops to talk to the mother of a severely malnourished 18-month-old girl. The emaciated child is held by her 10-year-old sister, who stays in the hospital to look after her when the mother goes out. The woman has six children and is pregnant again.

The problem is that many of these people are uneducated, poor and displaced by the conflict, explains Dr Seddiqi. The mothers often don't breastfeed for long enough, and then give only sugar and water to the babies. Those born at home are not vaccinated. Then when they fall sick, insecurity makes it very difficult sometimes to even reach the hospital.

Moving to the obstetrics department, the doctor arrives just as the expatriate ICRC obstetrician is trying to deliver a breech baby, calmly giving instructions to the throng of midwives, nurses and relatives around the bed.

The situation is critical: the 18-year-old mother is convulsing and semi-comatose; she has high blood pressure and a caesarean section at this stage would almost certainly kill her. An oxygen machine is eventually found and wheeled in. It does not work.

Swatting away flies in the heat and stench, the obstetrician finally manages to deliver the baby, a girl, and immediately rushes with her to the neo-natal room. With a midwife, she clears the baby's nose and mouth, and uses a hand-held device to pump in oxygen.

There are no respirators. But their frantic efforts are in vain: after several minutes the baby's heartbeat disappears completely and her lifeless form wrapped in a blanket and given to the grandmother.

At least in this case the mother will probably recover, says the obstetrician. And the fact the baby was a girl will make the loss somehow less tragic for the family. The mother will be expected to produce another child very soon.

Afghanistan's infant and under-five mortality rates are among the highest in the world, with an average of 1,000 children dying each day, according to UNICEF. This is partly because some 90 per cent of rural women are estimated to deliver babies at home without any medical care.

For those who manage to reach adulthood, the average life expectancy is just 42, according to the World Health Organisation. Diarrhoea, respiratory infections, malaria and malnutrition are the biggest killers. Afghanistan is one of the very few countries in the world where polio is still endemic.

With the ICRC's long-term investment and support, a lot has already been achieved, from improved hygiene and clinical practice to rehabilitation of the water supply and staff training. However, public expectation is sometimes unrealistically high, says Dr Siddiqi.

People expect change fast, without understanding the concept of capacity building in order to achieve sustainable results. What is the point of having fancy equipment that can't be maintained? We should strive for realistic standards in the Afghan context not a western context and remember that we are starting from zero, from a state of total collapse.

Of course there are still big gaps, says the doctor. Amongst our priorities for next year are to establish a reliable data collection system, which is still sorely lacking; to improve and expand the gynaecology and pediatric services; to further rehabilitate hospital infrastructure; and, not least, to refurbish the mortuary.

Back in her office, Dr Seddiqi is besieged by staff and visitors requiring her attention, and demanding immediate solutions to a multitude of problems. The doctor calmly delegates tasks, then firmly closes the door and pours herself tea.

I love my job, despite the stress, she smiles. And her biggest wish for the future? To have a child. But I still wouldn't forsake my work. There's still so much to do.

Claudia McGoldrick, ICRC Geneva-based Press Officer

Germany's Merkel resists calls to deploy troops to south Afghanistan

by Waheedullah Massoud, November 3, 2007 - KABUL (AFP) - Chancellor Angela Merkel said Saturday Germany would continue to focus its military efforts on northern Afghanistan, despite calls for its forces to move into the insurgency-hit south.

Germany is, however, ready to help out in the south if necessary, where other countries are under pressure, Merkel said during a surprise one-day visit.

It is her first trip to Afghanistan, where Germany has 3,000 troops in the international effort to fight extremists such as the Taliban.

"Germany has taken over responsibility in the north of Afghanistan and I think the most important (thing) is to pursue the efforts we have begun," Merkel told reporters after talks with President Hamid Karzai in Kabul.

The country is also contributing Tornado planes to carry out reconnaissance work in Afghanistan, she said.

And "whenever troops will need help in the south, we will of course provide help for the south," Merkel said, without making it clear what degree of assistance she meant.

"But I strongly believe that we should stick to our concept that has been worked out in order not to weaken our forces in the north," she said.

Germany has been criticised for keeping the bulk of its forces in the north while countries such as Britain, Canada and the United States face some of the most intense fighting in decades in the south.

Southern Afghanistan sees the worst of an insurgency led by the hardline Taliban movement that was driven from government in late 2001 for harbouring Al-Qaeda after the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

Violence has grown in the north but the area is free from the daily violence gripping the south and east.

Merkel said it was vital that Afghan security forces are trained so they are able to take control of the country's security.

"If there is a single aspect we should emphasise more right now, I think it would be to build up the police forces," she said.

The understrength and ill-trained police force is on the frontline of the insurgency, suffering the most attacks of all the security forces.

Taliban militants were in the past week able to force out the police in two districts in the west of the country. Karzai said operations were being planned to retake the districts in Farah province.

Germany's role in Afghanistan is controversial at home, with a survey last month finding that only 29 percent of Germans supported the mission here.

The German parliament nonetheless last month extended Berlin's military engagement in Afghanistan for a year, passing a new mandate that sets a ceiling of 3,500 troops.

Most of Germany's troops are part of the 37-nation, NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) but it also has about 200 with a separate US-led coalition.

While in Kabul, Merkel also met with the UN special representative, Tom Koenigs, and the commander of ISAF, General Dan McNeill.

She then travelled to the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, where she met some of the 1,400 German troops based there and was again questioned by Afghan journalists about whether her soldiers would be sent south.

"We don't have any plans to do this," she said.

The insurgency has grown in strength year on year, despite the presence of more than 50,000 international troops under NATO or US command, with military officials reporting increasing numbers of foreign fighters on the battlefield, including from Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

Around 5,000 people have been killed so far this year, most of them rebels, according to a tally based on official statements.

More than 190 foreign soldiers have also lost their lives this year. A Dutch soldier was killed in a bomb strike in the south on Saturday, while a coalition force soldier, whose nationality has not been released, and an Afghan trooper were killed in the same area on Friday.

Taliban behead Afghan man and woman, police say

GHAZNI, Afghanistan, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Afghan police have found the beheaded bodies of two Afghan civilians in Ghazni province, southwest of the capital Kabul, the provincial police chief said on Saturday.

Taliban insurgents have beheaded dozens of people in Afghanistan in the last two years, accusing them of aiding the pro-Western Afghan government and foreign forces the hardline Islamist insurgents are battling to oust.

"We were informed by local residents that the bodies of a man and a woman were found beheaded in the Rashidan district," said Ghazni police chief Ali Shah Ahmadzai. "The Taliban kidnapped them from the same district three days ago.

"The Taliban insurgents accused them of spying and providing information about the Taliban to foreign and Afghan forces in the area," he told Reuters.

But a Taliban spokesman denied any involvement in the killing and said it might have been the result of tribal enmity.

"It must have been the work of the Taliban militants," said Ahmadzai. "The Taliban kill people by beheading, no one else."

So far this year, Afghan authorities have found about 15 beheaded bodies of Afghans in Ghazni province.

Further south, a Dutch soldier was killed by a bomb in the province of Uruzgan, the Dutch military said on Saturday.

At least 25 Taliban reported killed in Afghanistan

Sun Nov 4, KABUL (AFP) - Afghan and international security forces killed 25 Taliban in an area of southern Afghanistan that has witnessed days of deadly clashes, officials said Sunday.

The 25 were killed Saturday in an operation by Afghan police and soldiers from the US-led coalition in the troubled province of Uruzgan, the interior ministry said in a statement.

"The bodies of the dead were left at the battlefield," it said, adding that a Taliban commander was seriously hurt.

The operation was in a district next to some of the most volatile parts of southern Afghanistan, a focus of a bloody Taliban-led campaign launched soon after the extremists were removed from government six years ago.

The coalition announced separately that its troops, teamed up with Afghan security forces, had repelled an attack Friday on a military base in Uruzgan province.

"There were some casualties to the enemy," a coalition spokesman told AFP without providing details.

Two foreign soldiers, one of them a 21-year-old Dutch national, were killed in Uruzgan in incidents on Friday and Saturday.

The Netherlands has around 1,650 soldiers in Uruzgan, while there are also several hundred Australian troops in the province.

The coalition also announced it had killed several insurgents Saturday in the southern province of Helmand -- an area where several British troops have taken the lead in NATO-led operations.

Warplanes were called in after rebels tried to ambush soldiers around Musa Qala district, the centre of which has been in Taliban control for months and is considered a rebel base.

The Taliban overran two districts in neighbouring Farah province in the past week: officials have said they are preparing operations to take them back.

The Taliban insurgency has grown steadily in the past years, with daily attacks over summer which are expected to drop off as winter approaches. More than 5,000 have been killed this year, most of them rebels.

In other violence blamed on the Taliban, a bomb exploded near the border with Pakistan early Sunday, killing a school headmaster who was returning from prayers, police said.

New mullah in Arghandab district wants Canada to stay in Afghanistan

By Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press, Sat Nov 3 - KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - When it comes to his views on Canada's presence in Afghanistan, it's like father like son for the new mullah in the Arbhandab district north of Kandahar city.

Arghandab has been the site of heavy fighting involving Canadian and Afghan security troops as the Taliban sought to gain a foothold in the area with the death last month of Mullah Naqib, a former warlord who was an enemy of the Taliban.

"With what's going on right now in the district of Arghandab is not good and in this situation the Canadians must stay right here for a long time," said Kareemullah Naqibi, recently named by President Hamid Karzai as his father's successor.

"And with the acute situation in Kandahar city, I think that the Canadians should stay a long time too," said Naqibi, speaking through an interpreter to reporters in Arbhandab. "I do not say the exact time whether it's one month, two months or three months. They must stay because the security situation is not good right now."

A force of about 300 Taliban tried last month to gain control of Arghandab, lush farmland of grape and pomegranate orchards which would have provided the group with easy access to its former stronghold.

Naqibi blames himself for allowing a leadership vacuum and not acting sooner to solidify his position in the region.

Kandahar Gov. Asadullah Khalid told reporters that the Taliban understimated the support the govenrment had in the area. He said the Arghandab people provided valuable information and with the action if ISAF, the Afghan National Army and the Afghan National Police the Taliban were pushed back in two or three days.

"They cannot come back because we have strong civilian support," he said. "We have reports that they went to the mountains but we will follow them. They are not in Arghandab anymore but wherever they are, we will follow."

The governor said the Afghan people are grateful for the Canadian presence but noted it is a two-way street.

"They are also here to fight against terrorism. It is not just an Afghan fight and you are lucky because you are able to defend against your enemy thousand and thousands of miles far away from your country."

A strong Canadian military contingent will remain in Arghandab for at least a few more days according to the second-in-command for Canada in Joint Task Force Afghanistan.

"The insurgents came down in the Arghandab district to knock at the door and we made sure that the door was closed," said Col. Christian Juneau. "When they come back again the door will still be closed."

Col. Juneau said what was interesting about this encounter with the Taliban is some members of the local population in the region took up arms in support of the government.

The fact that a large force of armed men showed up in the region isn't something Juneau was about to dwell upon.

"If you look behind you, look at some of the coverage the trees and fields provide. It's difficult to detect that. They came in and we kicked them out and they left, at least some of them left, using that coverage," he finished.

About 50 Taliban soldiers died in the attack and an equal number were wounded.

There were about 300 members from the Canadian Battle Group involved in the military operation, along with 350 Afghan soldiers, 200 Afghan police as well as 33 U.S. mentors and 12 Canadian soldiers who work with the Afghan army.

In other words, the two sides really weren't evenly matched. "You don't take a knife to a gunfight," observed Lt.-Col. Thomas Ritz, the commander of the U.S. police mentoring team dryly. "We swept them from the battlefield," he added.

The Taliban were greater in number than previously reported said Lt.-Col. Shirin Sha Kowbandi, commander of the Kandak 21 battalion of the Afghan National Army.

"They had a plan to take Kandahar city too and we with the help of Canadian friends. We gave a lot of casualties to the Taliban forces," he said. "The amount of the Taliban were probably about 600 and we killed more insurgents."

Col. Ritz said the cooperation in coaltion forces working with Afghan security bodes well for the future and should send a message to the Taliban.

"What we did in this operation together was seize the initiative from the Taliban and took the fight back to the Taliban," Ritz said. "We're going to meet them again and we're going to defeat them again. And wherever they are we're going to find them."

The Canadian military effort has been focused almost entirely on the Panjwaii and Zhari districts over the past few years and the regions, west of Kandahar city, have been the site of bloody battles involving the Canadian forces.

Arghandab is likely the next area that Canada will be focusing in he said.

"Eventually we would like to focus our efforts somewhere else and this is an option, obviously," Juneau said. "We just would like to expand that inkspot that we have developed in the Zhari-Panjwaii districts."

AFGHANISTAN: Displaced families in Farah need urgent help

KABUL, 4 November 2007 (IRIN) - Hundreds if not thousands of recently displaced people in southwest Afghanistan are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance and protection, displaced families and provincial aid workers told IRIN on 4 November.

Due to insecurity, there are no reliable figures on the exact number of people who have abandoned their in the Gulistan and Bakwa districts of Farah Province and sought temporary refuge in other parts of the isolated province.

However, Aleem Siddique, a spokesman for the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan UNAMA), said "about 500 families might have been displaced" as a result of fighting.

Afghan officials, including President Hamid Karzai, have acknowledged that Taliban insurgents have overrun at least two districts in Farah Province.

Immediately after Afghan government forces lost control of Gulistan District on 2 November, insurgents reportedly executed several civilians accusing them of being government spies, the Afghanistan Interior Ministry (MoI) and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a joint statement on Sunday.

"This is an intolerable outrage designed to terrorise the local population," read the MoI-ISAF press release.

Provincial officials say the recent spate of violence across southern, south-western and central-western Afghanistan has been exacerbated by numerous foreign fighters who have joined and supported Taliban rebels.

"Foreign fighters in particular have been cruel and have widely committed violence against the local populace," said Gulam Nabi Hukak, head of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) in neighbouring Herat Province.

Hukak accused Taliban fighters and their foreign supporters of "repeated and deliberate" violation of international humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions in their fighting tactics. No Taliban spokesman was immediately available for comment.

As the clashes continue, many families have spent days on the move without aid. "Our children are hungry and we live in the open air," said one displaced man who had come to Farah city in search of food for his family.

Gulam Rasoul, provincial head of the Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS) in Farah, conceded that no aid had been delivered to displaced families, at least by ARCS.

"We do not have adequate resources to assist needy people," Rasoul told IRIN, adding that the province's response capacity was weak and not in a position to meet the current needs of the displaced.

With an intensifying insurgency and widespread criminal activities, Farah is inaccessible to the UN and aid agencies.

The UN, nonetheless, is working with provincial authorities to identify and assist conflict-affected people in the province, said Siddique of UNAMA.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the UN and ARCS have repeatedly requested all warring parties, particularly the Taliban, to allow aid workers access to all vulnerable people in volatile and conflict-affected areas.

So far, Taliban rebels have not responded to these pleas and aid workers' access has remained restricted.

Afghan Koran distributor arrested

By Alix Kroeger, BBC News, Kabul, Sunday, 4 November 2007

The distributor of a new translation of the Koran has been arrested after complaints from religious scholars that the new edition was un-Islamic.

Former journalist Ghows Zalmay is also the spokesman for Afghanistan's attorney general. He was arrested on the border on Sunday while trying to flee into Pakistan.

Demonstrators protested in two Afghan provinces against the new translation of the Koran into Dari, one of Afghanistan's two official languages.

Religious scholars are outraged at the new edition of the Muslim holy book.

They say that it is un-Islamic, that it misinterprets verses about alcohol, begging, homosexuality and adultery.

They also complain that it does not contain the original version in Arabic as a parallel text for comparison.

Both houses of the Afghan parliament have held emergency debates. Senators have called for Mr Zalmay and the translator, himself a mullah, to be punished.

One said Mr Zalmay was "worse than Salman Rushdie", whose book, The Satanic Verses, caused widespread outrage in the Islamic world. Another said Mr Zalmay was under the protection of a foreign security company.

In the northern city of Taloqan 1,500 university students took to the streets in protest, while in the south-east province of Nimruz 1,000 local people, including several mullahs, took part in a demonstration.

The Afghan constitution enshrines freedom of expression, but for many Afghans that freedom has clear limits and they do not include making interpretive translations of the Koran.

Afghan democratic institutions still weak: US

Lalit K. Jha  - NEW YORK, Nov 1 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The United States Wednesday admitted Taliban were still a problem for Afghanistan and the international community. NATO was engaged in fighting them back in certain areas of the landlocked country, it said.

A State Department spokesperson told reporters in Washington: It is still an issue. It is still a problem. It is something that the Secretary (of State, Condoleezza Rice) watches very closely -- the situation in Afghanistan."

Sean McCormack said the US and the international community were busy building the capacity and strengthening democratic institutions in Afghanistan so that the people of the country could themselves take on Taliban and al-Qaeda terrorists.

"The point you want to get to is that you are not wholly dependent on individuals or the actions of one person; you want to build institutions that are durable, that can exist beyond the tenure of one individual or that are larger than one individual and serve the needs of an entire population, he observed.

He added: "That's where we want to get to. You have to go through these various stages, though, oftentimes where it is one person that makes a real difference. Sometimes when that person falters or unfortunate incidents like the one you describe occur, it's a setback.

"But you can't let that deter you from the overall mission to build these larger, more durable institutions, McCormack hastened to point out at his daily press briefing.

McCormack acknowledged that in many cases Afghanistan had very weak democratic governing institutions. "When they are undermined or in this case if they fall by the wayside, there's a danger. There's a danger that a vacuum gets filled by Taliban forces or other outside forces that are really seeking to undermine the strategic direction that President Karzai has put Afghanistan on.

For that reason, he maintained, the US-led international community was working hard to help build those institutions. "But it is a task that is going to take quite some time. It is certainly difficult work, but we have a good partner in the Afghan government.

Poll finds TV, radio among trusted Afghan institutions

02/11/2007 – IJN - A recent survey in Afghanistan found that more than half the people get their news from the radio – and that they trust the broadcast media more than politicians or the courts.

The Asia Foundation released the findings from its third annual public opinion poll in Afghanistan. The poll was the largest public opinion survey so far conducted in Afghanistan, and it was the first to include people from all 34 Afghan provinces.

The survey found that people most trusted the national army and national police, with more than 80 percent saying they had either a “fair amount” or “great deal” of confidence in them. After those came electronic media such as radio and TV, which had a confidence level of 74 percent. That compares to 39 percent who said they had confidence in political parties.

More than half the respondents – 54 percent – said they got their information mainly from the radio. About 26 percent said they got most of their information from TV, while 14 percent said they got it from family, friends and neighbors.

http://www.asiafoundation.org/Locations/afghanistan_survey2.html

http://www.asiafoundation.org/pdf/AG-survey07.pdf.

The War on Poppy Succeeds, but Cannabis Thrives in an Afghan Province

By KIRK SEMPLE, New York Times November 4, 2007

KHWAJA GHOLAK, Afghanistan — Amid the multiplying frustrations of the fight against narcotics in Afghanistan, the northern province of Balkh has been hailed as a rare and glowing success.

Two years ago the province, which abuts Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, was covered with opium poppies — about 27,000 acres of them, nearly enough to blanket Manhattan twice. This year, after an intense anti-poppy campaign led by the governor, Balkh’s farmers abandoned the crop. The province was declared poppy free, with 12 others, and the provincial government was promised a reward of millions of dollars in development aid.

But largely ignored in the celebration was the fact that many farmers in Balkh simply switched from opium poppies to another illegal crop: cannabis, the herb from which marijuana and hashish are derived.

As the Afghan and Western governments focused on the problem of soaring Afghan opium production, which hit record levels this year and remains a booming industry, cannabis cultivation increased 40 percent around the country, to about 173,000 acres this year — from about 123,500 acres last year, the United Nations said in an August report. And even though hashish is less expensive per weight than opium or heroin, the report said, cannabis can potentially earn a farmer more than opium poppies because it yields twice the quantity of drug per acre and is cheaper and less labor intensive to grow.

“As a consequence,” the United Nations report warned, “farmers who do not cultivate opium poppy may turn to cannabis cultivation.”

Many farmers in Balkh have done just that, officials and residents say, and the province now has one of the most bounteous cannabis crops in the country.

The plant is certainly not hard to find. It lines the main highways leading into Mazar-i-Sharif, the provincial capital, and is visible to passing drivers. The crop’s chief byproduct, hashish, is sold openly at many roadside fruit and grocery stands, particularly around Balkh, the ancient citadel town about 15 miles west of Mazar-i-Sharif.

Late on an October afternoon, Muhammad Ayud, 30, a kindly sharecropper, was finishing a day of work at the three-acre parcel he farms here in this poor village just outside the town of Balkh. His plot was covered by a forest of cannabis plants, some more than nine feet tall.

“This is nothing,” he said, gesturing toward the towering plants. “If you give it real fertilizer, you’d see how tall it grows!”

Last year Mr. Ayud’s parcel was mostly opium poppies. But his crop was wiped out by government officials during a campaign led by the provincial governor, Atta Mohammad Noor, who jailed dozens of growers for disobeying him and personally waded into several poppy fields swinging a stick at the flower stems.

Mr. Ayud, one of only two wage earners in his 16-member family, lost most of his expected earnings for the year, about $1,000, he said.

This year he planted cannabis instead, with some cotton as a fallback in case the government followed through on its promises to eradicate the illicit crop. It was a return to a family tradition, he said. His father and grandfather grew cannabis here.

Mr. Ayud said he knew it was illegal to grow cannabis, but that it was the only crop that would produce enough profit to feed his family. “I don’t have anything else to grow,” he said. The difference in potential earnings is vast: cannabis can earn about twice the profits of a legal crop like cotton, local officials say.

Farmers in this region have cultivated cannabis for more than 70 years and, by the estimates of several Balkh residents, at least half the adult male population smokes hashish. Resinous, pungent and black, the hashish is sold in thin, palm-size sheets that resemble large tire patches and sell for about a dollar each. Hashish from this area — called Shirak-i-Mazar, or Milk of Mazar — was once prized by smokers around the world, though its primacy has since been supplanted by varieties from other countries.

Many farmers here, as elsewhere in Afghanistan, process the cannabis into hashish in their homes, then sell it to traffickers who come to their doors to pick it up. The best hashish is exported, residents here say, while the inferior stuff is consumed nationally.

Mr. Atta says he has a plan to eradicate cannabis next growing season. Farmers have begun to harvest their current crop, and officials say they do not want to destroy the farmers’ livelihood without giving them time to plant an alternative.

“Marijuana is not difficult to control, like poppy,” the governor said in an interview in October in his vast, opulent office in Mazar-i-Sharif. “It’s very easy to eradicate. It’s a very simple issue.”

But Mr. Atta said he was still waiting for the development money that the central government and international community had promised Balkh in return for ridding itself of opium poppies. The money — he puts it at more than $5 million; officials in the central government say it is closer to $3 million — is earmarked for a range of projects including rural development programs to promote farming alternatives to poppies and cannabis.

Mr. Atta cautioned that unless the money arrived promptly, he could not guarantee that the farmers would eschew poppies.

“It’s the responsibility of the central government and international community to improve the lives of farmers, which they aren’t doing,” he said. “Well, we’ll try our best to not let them grow poppy, but it’s going to cause problems.”

Many farmers around the town of Balkh suggested that forswearing cannabis might be harder than poppies. Not only are cannabis and hashish a more integral part of their customs, they said, but beyond cannabis there are no profitable alternatives.

The farmers said they would not grow cannabis only if the government provided an alternative source of livelihood, or improved the market for their legal crops.

“If, in the future, the government helps the farmers — and really helps — we will destroy all the poppy and cannabis,” said Hoshdel, 40, a well-weathered farmer in Khwaja Gholak who has nine children. “If they don’t help us, I swear I’ll grow it.”

Kabul comeback

MARCUS GEE - Globe and Mail - November 3, 2007

KABUL — Does beauty matter in a country torn by war?

That question confronted conservationists when they started rebuilding the renowned Babur Garden in Afghanistan's scruffy capital city. After all, the country has many more urgent needs. As Canadians know all too well, the south is a deadly war zone, and progress elsewhere has been halting at best since the U.S.-led assault overthrew the Taliban six years ago.

Even in Kabul, the biggest and most advanced city, only half the garbage is picked up every day, just one household in 10 has piped water and the air is said to contain more fecal matter than in any other city in the world, the consequence of having four million people and no sewage system.

Could Afghanistan and its backers really afford to spend time and money on recreating the horticultural vision of a long-dead Mughal emperor? “People said: ‘You guys are daft to be doing conservation when there is so much humanitarian work to be done,' ” says Jolyon Leslie, the urbane South African architect who directed the restoration for the Aga Khan Trust for Culture.

Deciding that a city does not live on bread alone, Mr. Leslie and his collaborators went ahead, and the result is a small miracle: a corner of loveliness in the heart of Kabul. Now open after more than $5-million (U.S.) of work, the garden – at 11 hectares, the size of 20 football fields – draws hundreds of visitors on Fridays, when Afghans begin the Islamic weekend. Families picnic under beech trees. Children chase each other on the lawns. Old men stroll up stone steps past cascades of water.

“It's a bit of a pressure valve, a release,” Mr. Leslie says. “People are still pretty jittery. They come for a little open, green space and fresh air.”

Those are in short supply in Kabul. Its population has grown nearly sixfold since the 1970s, as poor villagers migrate here to seek jobs and safety. Slum dwellings climb up the hills. The dusty streets are potholed or unpaved. The murky Kabul River is lined with garbage. Foreign embassies and military outposts surrounded with sandbags and razor wire lend an air of menace.

The garden is a reminder of what Kabul once was: a delightful city of colourful bazaars, tree-lined avenues and grand palaces and mosques. One of its glories was the garden, built in the early 16th century by Emperor Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur.

When warlords fought over the city in the 1990s, it fell into ruin as factions burned its stately buildings and cut its trees to deny cover to their rivals.

The Baghe Babur (Babur's Garden) became a symbol of Kabul's devastation. The Aga Khan, spiritual head of the world's Ismaili Muslims and a friend of the government of President Hamid Karzai, led the effort to fix it up. The German government pitched in. The hope was that the garden, restored to its former splendour, would become a symbol of the city's renaissance.

That now seems idealistic, given all of Afghanistan's troubles. Even so, if a fractious people such as the Afghans are to succeed, they will need more than new bridges and a better electrical supply. They will need a shared history and culture. Babur and his garden are part of that heritage.

Born in what is now Uzbekistan, Babur ascended to the throne of the little principality of Fergana two years after Christopher Columbus reached America. He was 12, and by the time he died at 47, he had conquered much of today's Pakistan, Afghanistan and northern India, laying the foundation of the Mughal empire, which would rule the region for more than 300 years and leave its mark in monuments such as the Taj Mahal.

A warrior with an artistic side, Babur loved gardens and built them all over his empire, giving exhaustive attention to their design and maintenance. One of the first was in Kabul, which he conquered in 1504: He set his garden on a site sloping down from a rugged hillside to the banks of the river. When he died in Agra, northern India, he asked to be buried in the garden “under the open Kabul sky.”

Recreating his garden was not easy. The team had to search for the original design because over the years the garden had been transformed by Babur's successors and later Afghan leaders. One of them built European-style fountains, another a series of buildings for his court. A Communist mayor put in a swimming pool. Nature did its work too. An earthquake in 1842 is said to have destroyed the massive 1.5-kilometre wall that enclosed the garden.

After excavating parts of the site and studying plans of similar gardens, Mr. Leslie and his team moved out the pool, restored Babur's bullet-pocked grave, built a series of water channels and ponds along the site's central axis and hired hundreds of local labourers to rebuild the wall. They also restored two historic buildings: the grand Queen's Palace at the garden's summit and the striking white marble mosque built in 1647.

Above all, they planted trees: walnut and almond, apricot and pomegranate, mulberry and black cherry, chinar and quince. The different species flower in sequence through the spring and summer, bringing a splash of colour to Kabul's sandy palette.

As someone who worked with the United Nations and other agencies in Afghanistan for more than 20 years, through both the brutal civil war and Taliban rule, Mr. Leslie is alive to the charge that restoring a garden is not a priority for Afghanistan.

“Putting a developmental glove on a conservation hand,” he took pains to involve the local community, hiring locals to do most of the work and keeping the garden open throughout to remind residents they were welcome. Also, a third of the project budget went to helping the slum dwellers in the surrounding hillside.

When foreign diplomats tried to rent space there for receptions and parties, Mr. Leslie turned them down, fearing that city residents would come to see the garden as a symbol of foreign occupation rather than a national treasure.

So, he says, “the original idea that this is just a foreigners' indulgence is well dispatched. People are very proud of the garden. They come up and say, ‘I used to come here with my grandfather.'”

And the place is a hit. Six times as many people visited in July as did the same month last year. People come not just to picnic, but to attend cultural events such as theatre festivals and recitals by traditional Afghan musicians – little touches of civilization in a country shattered by decades of turmoil and civil war.

Even the former warlords who now sit in the Afghan government are taking an interest. When they congratulate him on the restoration, Mr. Leslie says, he feels like replying: “Maybe you shouldn't have burned it down in the first place, mate.”

He has no illusions that the garden symbolizes Afghanistan's rebirth. Skeptical about the Western effort to rebuild the country, he is the co-author of a book titled Afghanistan: The Mirage of Peace.

Even in the green confines of the garden, Afghanistan's tensions can spill over: Families from hostile clans or ethnic groups sometimes exchange looks and curses that turn to fistfights. To keep a lid on things, security guards equipped with whistles and batons have been hired to patrol the grounds.

Babur was no stranger to violence, introducing cannon and matchlock rifles to his armies in order to slaughter his enemies with greater efficiency, but he also was a fine poet, a serious student of history and a naturalist who documented the flora and fauna of the lands that he conquered – an advocate of the idea that beauty matters.

His gardens were tributes to nature, a reminder of his conquests and a respite from the burdens of state. Not surprisingly perhaps, Kabul's is said to have been his favourite. The marble plaque on his grave, painstakingly restored by Indian craftsmen, reads:

“If there is a paradise on Earth, this is it, this is it, this is it.”

Marcus Gee is a Globe and Mail columnist and reports on Asia-Pacific affairs.

Pakistan was in bed with Taliban: Durrani

Washington, Nov 3 (ANI): Pakistan's Ambassador to US Mahmud Ali Durrani has conceded that "Pakistan was in bed with the Taliban when they were governing Afghanistan, but for an excellent reason.

"We always supported the government in Kabul, irrespective of who it was. But that's history now. We gave that up after 9/11, when we made a 180-degree switch because we found that was in our interest," Durrani further said.

The interview took place at what the journal calls "Pakistan's $17 million embassy on International Drive."

Pakistan has "almost licked" al Qaeda after the 9/11 attacks but everything changed after the US invaded Iraq, reviving al Qaeda, he told The Washington Diplomat, a publication focused on the diplomatic corps based here.

Durrani said global pledges made to Afghanistan had not been honoured, warning, "If you don't give them an alternative way of life, they will kill. This is the only thing they know."

There was also a growing nexus between al Qaeda and international drug barons.

He said as ambassador he had no problems with the administration or the public, but he had one with the media, which is getting the Pakistan story wrong.

Durrani accused the mainstream US media of "getting the story all wrong" when it comes to Pakistan's efforts to root out terrorism and Islamic extremism. He defended his country on the Daniel Pearl and Mukhtar Mai cases, the Daily Times reported.

He explained, "Danny Pearl goes to meet the bad guys and gets in trouble. Tomorrow night, walk into some bad neighborhood of DC, and you're also likely to get in trouble ... One rape in Pakistan?

There are more unreported rapes in the United States than the total number of rapes in Pakistan. If it happens in a village following some stupid custom, then people perceive that it's happening all over the country, Durrani said.

About US unpopularity in Pakistan, he said: "If today, you have a crowd of 1,000 people chanting anti-American slogans and somebody offers to give out US visas, 900 would definitely accept, if not all of them. Pakistani people like American values and the American system."

Al Qaeda, Taliban exploited Waziristan pact to regroup: General Ehsan

Washington, Nov 3(ANI): Former chairman of the Pakistan Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Ehsan ul-Haq has said that al Qaeda and Taliban militants exploited the 2006 Waziristan peace pact to regroup and carry out terrorist attacks both in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The agreement was signed on September 5, 2006 in Miranshah.

"The implementation [of the agreement] needed to be better monitored," General Ehsan told editors and reporters at The Washington Times.

"Very early, the violations should have been taken notice of [so that the extremists understood] that even the smallest violations would not be tolerated," he added.

General Ehsan said that the poor implementation of the peace deal forced Pakistan to deploy nearly 100,000 troops to battle pro-Taliban militants in the region.

In time it became clear that the strategy had to be changed, he said, "but we still didn't want the onus of breaking the agreement to come on us. So the day [tribal leaders] said the agreement was broken, the army went in."

The agreement collapsed in early July when Pakistani commandos stormed the Red Mosque in Islamabad. Since then, more than 700 civilians and soldiers have been killed in suicide attacks, roadside bombings and rocket attacks, while a full-blown insurgency has erupted in parts of the NWFP, The Dawn reported.

General Ehsan said the army had no choice in sending troops into the northwest.

"We do consider extremism and terrorism to be the highest-priority threat to the security and well-being of Pakistan," he said.

Rejecting the claims that Pakistan is simply responding to pressure from the US by nailing down pro-Taliban militants, General Ehsan said, "We are looking at it primarily as to what is in the best interests of Pakistan."

It is critical for Pakistan to "get hold of its internal security environment," he added.

US strategy vis-à-vis Afghanistan and Pakistan

By Palvasha von Hassell - The News International (Pak) November 3, 2007

There is an astounding degree of ignorance in the West on the consequences for Pakistan of the U.N.-sanctioned invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. This holds true not just for the man in the street, who may be excused for his lapse, but for educated circles from professionals to politicians. Pakistan is perceived first and foremost as the country in whose territory elements of Taliban and Al Qaeda take sanctuary when hunted in Afghanistan, and where training camps for suicide bombers exist. Its leaders are good or bad to the extent that they help the US-led "War on Terror". The foreign forces in Afghanistan are seen as fighting extremists who are to be prevented from seizing power across the border in Islamabad and exercising control over the country's nuclear weapons. What this dangerously simplistic view blots out is the fact that it is precisely those Western forces that are supposed to obstruct the ascendancy of extremists in Pakisan that are creating the conditions there that is conducive to extremism

The extent of this conscious or unconscious lack of insight in those who claim to know better than others what is good for them can only be explained in terms of the fact that the educated Western person does not apply the same criteria in judging others as he would have others apply to him. That is, he is not prepared to accord people living in certain parts of the world the same rights as he himself enjoys. If he did, could not support his government's actions if it meant the violation of those people's human rights, such as civilian deaths, regardless of where and under what system they lived. Anti-Islam sentiment is so high in Europe that groups like the Taliban are seen as monsters that should be wiped out. What is overlookeed is that as soon as this task is taken up by the West, with all its killing of innocent civilians, the local population will side with the Taliban, or whoever opposes the invaders. That the sophisticated Europeans should be ignoring this simple psychological fact is testimony to the dangerous influence and attraction of the Bush administration's undeliberated militaristic approach to world politics.

Enlisted to assist in Washington's grand plan to establish its military presence in the region and Afghanistan in particular, the Pakistan Army has been forced to take military action against militants operating from FATA. This has had grim consequences, for the result has been a rising tide of anti-Americanism and resentment across all sections of the population. Some have been radicalized to the extent of blowing themselves up. The mushrooming of suicide bombings targeting government and security officials and causing hundreds of fatalities can be traced to the toppling of the Taliban regime in 2001. For Pakistan, this is a new phenomenon for which we have to thank the Western forces operating in Afghanistan.

The damage to the image of the army which has ensued as a result is regrettable. A country's army is there to defend its borders, not to gun down its own people. The badly-handled Jamia Hafsa affair added to its unpopularity, its actions read by Pakistanis of all hues as dictated by Washington, whether in Islamabad or in FATA. This erosion of respect for the army can have grave consequences for Pakistan's internal stability. It is remarkable how Pakistanis are expected to put up with being ordered around and killed if necessary to enable a misguided world power to achieve its ends next door. The only way to shock people into realizing the double standard that is involved in such expectations is to ask them how they would feel if, for instance, the German army were expected to take military action in, say, Bavaria, which would kill many Germans. Unthinkable, of course.

It is against these odds that Pakistan is supposed to attempt a new experiment in democracy. But are its future leaders to be answerable to their voters or to Washington? Pakistan is the land of the possible, and as this incredible drama unfolds in which exiled politicians return one by one to take their chances in the event of surviving a terrorist attack, one wonders at the resilience of this country and its people. How a general election is to be held in the prevailing security situation, however, is entirely unclear.

Meanwhile, amid daily reports of strikes against militants by the American-led coalition in Afghanistan, there are signs that the Americans might be looking for an exit strategy from the Afghan quagmire. At a meeting of NATO defence ministers in Holland called recently by Washington, the member nations were urged to provide, not more soldiers, but more military trainers for the Afghan army. NATO's only chance of success, it is believed, is to train native Afghan security forces to defend areas from which the Taliban have been driven and to which they might return. At the same time, Washington is encouraging dialogue between Taliban groups and the Karzai government. However, considering the span of time required to train an army large enough to ensure security in Afghanistan and eradicate poppy cultivation plus reconcile enough militants to matter, even if this were all possible in the first place, we are nowhere near peace on the Durand Line. Even the much-vaunted American multi-million dollar plan for socio-economic uplift of the tribal areas will only be part of the solution; economic well-being can never replace political empowerment, as the case of Saudi Arabia shows. The West's quest for long-term security in the region will remain unfulfilled unless the people of both Afghanistan and Pakistan are given the political freedom that democracy brings with it, even if it means an end to foreign interference.

[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.]