In this bulletin:

• Afghanistan detains 68 Pakistani nationals
• Taliban hold kidnapped Pakistan envoy to Afghanistan
• Pakistan vows to continue border fight against Taliban
• German held by US in Afghanistan
• Pregnant Spanish defence minister visits Afghanistan
• U.S.-Pak joint counter-terror strategy key to restoring normalcy in Afghanistan: Expert
• Taleban warn against possible prisoner executions in Afghanistan
• Afghan Supreme Court rejects calls for halt to executions
• Tremendous potential for agriculture in Afghanistan
• Germany pledges more aid to Afghanistan
• Turkey, US side by side in Afghanistan: Rice
• Assessing the overall security situation in Afghanistan
• Al-Qaeda adds muscle to the Taliban's fight
• Afghanistan moves to center stage
• AFGHANISTAN: NEW APPROACHES NEEDED TO DEFEAT INSURGENCY - EXPERTS
• Indian soap operas stir outrage in Afghanistan
• Keeping Canada in Afghanistan

Afghanistan detains 68 Pakistani nationals

Sat Apr 19 KABUL (AFP) - The Afghan army detained 68 Pakistani men soon after they entered the country over suspected ties with Taliban-linked rebels, the defence ministry said Saturday.

Prior to the mass detention Friday near the border in the southern province of Kandahar, the ministry received intelligence that a group of Pakistanis with possible links to "terrorists" was entering the region, it said.

"The army ... detained yesterday 68 unarmed Pakistani nationals. They are being investigated," the ministry said in a statement.

General Mohammad Zahir Azimi, chief spokesman for the ministry, told AFP the army had reports that dozens of Pakistanis linked to Taliban-led insurgents were entering the troubled region.

"We had intelligence reports that a group of Pakistanis possibly linked to terrorists were entering. When our units encountered these Pakistanis, they detained them to find out if they're linked to terrorists," he said.

Authorities were trying to determine if the men were linked to the Taliban or if they were workers or Pakistani traders.

"When they were detained, they had no travelling documents," he added. The border is porous and it is not uncommon for people to cross without documents.

Afghanistan, with the support of tens of thousands of foreign troops, is fighting a fierce insurgency led by remnants of the Taliban militia that was in government between 1996 and 2001.

Afghan authorities have long said the Islamic rebels have bases on the Pakistani side of the border that send militants, some of them Pakistanis, across the frontier to launch attack on Afghan targets.

Islamabad denies the allegations. There are also scores of Pakistanis working in Afghanistan as labourers, engineers and road workers.

Taliban hold kidnapped Pakistan envoy to Afghanistan

April 19, 2008 - DUBAI (AFP) - Pakistan's envoy to Afghanistan Tariq Azizuddin, who went missing in February, appeared on Saturday in a video aired by Al-Arabiya news channel in which he said that he was held by the Taliban.

"We were on our way to Afghanistan in our official car on February 11 when we were kidnapped in the region of Khyber... by the Mujahedeen (holy warriors) of the Taliban," said Azizuddin, according to an Arabic translation accompanying the video aired by the Dubai-based channel.

The Pakistani envoy said that he was held with his driver and bodyguard, and that they were living "in comfortable conditions and are looked after." Two men who appeared to be the other hostages sat next to Azizuddin, while three gunmen stood in the background.

"We have no problems. But I suffer health problems, like blood pressure and heart pain," said the bespectacled envoy who had a well-kept beard and appeared sitting on the ground in a hilly area dotted with shrubs.

Azizuddin called upon his government and Pakistan's envoys in Iran and China "to do all they can to protect our lives and to answer all the demands of the Mujahedeen of Taliban in order to secure our release."

Pakistan said recovering the ambassador was a top priority. "The recovery of ambassador Tariq Azizuddin has been a matter of high priority for the government of Pakistan. All possible resources are being used to make his early return to his family possible," foreign office spokesman Mohammad Sadiq said in Islamabad.

The envoy disappeared while driving back to the Afghan capital Kabul from Islamabad following a conference of Afghanistan's donors in Tokyo. Taliban militants are active in the tribal region where he went missing.

The chief administrative official in Khyber, Rasool Khan Wazir, said on the day that Azizuddin disappeared that security forces had seen the envoy's car driven at speed through a checkpost with "local people sitting in the front seat".

The day of his kidnap coincided with Pakistani security forces seizing the senior Taliban commander, Mullah Mansoor Dadullah in southwestern Baluchistan province, also bordering Afghanistan.

Pakistani forces have fought increasingly fierce battles against Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants in the tribal belt since 2003.

The Taliban who took power in Afghanistan in 1996 were ousted by a US-led invasion in November 2001 after refusing to hand over Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden following the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Taliban fighters are trying to topple the US-backed government of President Hamid Karzai and oust tens of thousands of foreign soldiers based there to fight them back.

Pakistani Taliban on Friday urged their newly-elected government to abandon President Pervez Musharraf's pro-US policy and enforce Islamic Sharia law in tribal areas of the country.

At a meeting, convened by the Pakistan Taliban Movement and attended by tribal elders, religious scholars and local MPs, senior Taliban leader Maulawi Faqir Mohammad said the Taliban were observing a ceasefire offered to the new government but they would continue their fight against US and allied forces in Afghanistan.

Pakistan vows to continue border fight against Taliban

By Farhan Bokhari in Islamabad - FT.com April 19 2008

A senior official in Pakistan's newly elected government has pledged to continue a military push in tribal areas on the Afghan border inhabited by members of Taliban and al-Qaeda in order to quash lingering concerns in the US about Islamabad's resolve in the war on terror.

In a Financial Times interview, Husain Haqqani, a US university professor designated by the new government as ambassador to the US, reaffirmed Pakistan's commitment to military action. "Our military strategy remains intact and will be augmented by a political and socio-economic strategy. There has been no talk so far of diminishing the military presence along Pakistan's border regions."

The victory by opponents of Pervez Musharraf, the pro-US president, in February's parliamentary elections, was seen by western diplomats as a negation of his policy on the war on terror that has involved placing more than 100,000 military troops in the border region to combat militants who have fought western troops in Afghanistan.

Western diplomats were alarmed by comments attributed after the election to Nawaz Sharif, former prime minister and an important figure of the new ruling coalition, seeking a "review" of Pakistan's conduct in the war on terror, in a statement widely seen as a conciliatory gesture to militant groups.

Another senior Pakistani official said Mr Sharif's initial enthusiasm for reversing the military push was dam-ped after he and other coalition leaders were briefed about the border situation by General Ashfaq Kiyani, chief of the army. "[Sharif's] keen interest to redefine the military push was tempered when he was given a reality check," he said. "Gen Kiyani's very candid assessment basically reminded many politicians that retreat was not an option."

Military experts say retreat from the border region would be dangerous as it would make Islamic militants feel empowered and perhaps more eager to launch attacks there.

Politicians of Mr Sharif's Pakistan Muslim LeagueNawaz (PML-N) said their leader still sought a detailed parliamentary review of the war on terror to raise issues such as the plight of people reckoned to have been detained by security services without formal charge.

A PML-N legislator said Mr Sharif "felt . . . the war on terror needs to have a more humane face. You can't have people disappearing and we carry on as usual."

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan claims hundreds of Pakistanis have disappeared since Is-lamabad joined the US-led war on terror.

German held by US in Afghanistan

By FRIEDER REIMOLD, Associated Press Sat Apr 19, 7:59 AM ET

BERLIN - U.S. authorities in Afghanistan have been holding a German citizen in custody since early January over accusations that he was on a U.S. base without authorization, Germany's Foreign Ministry said Saturday.

A ministry spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity that Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is in contact with the U.S. on the issue and is working to secure the release of the German, a man of Afghan origin.

He said that German Embassy staff in Kabul have been able to visit the man. The ministry did not give further details. U.S. military officials in Afghanistan did not immediately comment.

The weekly Der Spiegel, which did not cite sources, reported that the man — whom it identified as Gholam Ghaus Z., 41 — had traveled to Kabul to visit relatives and was arrested as he tried to buy a razor at a U.S. military supermarket.

Pregnant Spanish defence minister visits Afghanistan

Sat Apr 19, HERAT, Afghanistan (AFP) - Spain's newly appointed Defence Minister Carme Chacon, who is seven months pregnant, made a brief visit to insurgency-hit Afghanistan Saturday to meet Spanish troops, an official said.

Chacon, appointed six days ago, was scheduled to spend only a few hours with the soldiers based in the western city of Herat, a Spanish information officer told AFP.

She was briefed by Spanish commanders about their work as part of a NATO-led force helping Afghanistan fight the Taliban, the officer said. Spain is among 40 nations serving in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

The minister was also given a rundown of Spain's work as the head of the Badghis province reconstruction team -- one of several military-civilian units set up around the war-torn country.

She toured a Spanish-run hospital at the Herat base, where she met Spanish patients, and was due to leave in the afternoon, said the officer, who asked to not be identified.

About 750 Spanish soldiers work alongside Italian troops in Herat, where the Italians are in command, and there are another 200 in Qala-e-Now, capital of neighbouring Badghis province, where Spain is the lead nation.

Spanish national radio RNE reported that 37-year-old Chacon, Spain's first woman defence minister, was accompanied by her gynaecologist and a medical team.

Her unannounced visit to Afghanistan came only six days after she was appointed in the new government line-up of Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.

U.S.-Pak joint counter-terror strategy key to restoring normalcy in Afghanistan: Expert

(ANI) 18 April 2008- Coalition efforts in Afghanistan have suffered from a disjointed and poorly coordinated approach among the different NATO contributors and an overall lack of resources to achieve mission objectives.

In the light of this, the United States and Pakistan are believed to be seriously considering a joint strategy to improve coordination in dealing with terror elements in Afghanistan.

According to an analysis by Lisa Curtis of the Heritage Foundation, the United States has begun to deploy an additional 3,200 Marines to Afghanistan, raising the total U.S. force level to about 32,000.1

Curtis says these reinforcements will help to blunt the expected and traditional spring offensive by the Taliban-led insurgency, which has grown stronger in recent years.

According to Curtis, both Washington and Kabul need greater cooperation from Pakistan and the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in controlling the border.

"It is particularly important that the United States, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and all coalition forces carry out a unified and integrated strategy and reject separate deals with the Taliban leadership," Curtis says.

The victory of a secular Pashtun party in the province bordering Afghanistan in the February 18 general elections, she says provides an opportunity to isolate Taliban and al-Qaeda elements in Pakistan's Tribal Areas.

Coalition forces have won every major battle with the Taliban and the other insurgents, which lack the firepower, to stand against the superior military strength of U.S., NATO, and Afghan forces.

Targeting Taliban leaders could have a cumulative debilitating impact because charismatic leadership plays an important role in Afghan war fighting and politics.

Yet these tactical victories have not amounted to a strategic knockout, in large part because the insurgents are free to retreat and regroup in sanctuaries across the Afghan-Pakistani border in the Pashtun tribal belt of Pakistan.

Tackling the Taliban/al-Qaeda threat in Pakistan's Tribal Areas will require a multifaceted effort that includes close U.S.-Pakistan coordination and cooperation, large-scale economic assistance, precision military operations against terrorist leaders, a comprehensive effort to undermine the extremist ideologies that drive the various groups in the region, and a new political arrangement that incor­porates the region into Pakistan proper.

The new Pakistani civilian government "needs to work hand-in-hand with the Pakistan military to carry out a multifaceted campaign to uproot the international terrorist threat and deny al-Qaeda and the Taliban sanctuary in these critical border areas," she concludes.

Taleban warn against possible prisoner executions in Afghanistan

Text of report by private Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency

Kandahar, 18 April: The Taleban have asked the UN, the EU and human rights societies to prevent executions in Afghanistan.

After reports suggesting that the Supreme Court has issued death penalty to 85 prisoners, the Taleban today released a statement, and the Afghan Islamic Press [AIP] releases as it is due to its importance.

The demand and warning of the Islamic Emirate on executing and martyring of innocent prisoners by Kabul officials

1. Sometimes back, a number of our imprisoned mojahedin were brutally and cruelly martyred by Kabul officials. Now, rumours on the likely execution and killing of the innocent prisoners are once again being heard.

The Kabul administration is trying to justify the execution of the death penalty on them in the name of criminals and deceive the people. The fact is that 70 per cent of them are the mojahedin captured for their struggle to free their soil and bring an Islamic government by using their language, p! en and weapon.

The Islamic Emirate first emphatically calls on the Kabul administration and its foreign supporters, especially the judges and the prosecutors, to avoid such cowardly acts and not martyr the innocent Taleban.

2. As such acts cause a very terrible enmity and unpleasant disagreements and hatred among the people, the MPs in the lower and upper house of parliament, who are calling themselves the representatives of the people, must pay attention to their responsibility in this respect and make serious efforts to prevent that.

3. We seriously ask the UN, the EU, the ICRC and human rights institutions to take serious steps to prevent such a cruel act of the mass killing of innocent prisoners.

4. As the media activists and reporters have immense responsibility in this respect, we call on them to discharge their obligations in this respect and protect these innocent people.

5. The Islamic Emirate very explicitly warns that it will not rem! ain indifferent to such un-Islamic, anti-Afghan and inhuman act and wi ll take action with full strength and might against all those sides involved in this unlawful act. The Islamic Emirate has launched a serious inquiry in this respect.

By the Leadership Council of the Islamic Emirate

According to reports, President Hamed Karzai has endorsed the decision of the Supreme Court issuing death penalty to 85 individuals, but a number regional and international human rights institutions have seriously criticized the human rights condition in Afghanistan.

Fifteen people were also executed last year in Afghanistan, prompting serious criticisms.

Afghan Supreme Court rejects calls for halt to executions

Excerpt from report by privately-owned Afghan Ariana TV on 18 April

[Presenter] Afghanistan Supreme Court has rejected the US-based Human Rights Watch's appeal to President Karzai to halt death sentence for more than 100 Afghan prisoners.

The Supreme Court says the justice system in Afghanistan has the capacity and authority to process the death penalties for those convicted of major crimes.

The Human Rights Watch has issued a report, calling on Afghan President Hamed Karzai to halt death penalty for more than 100 prisoners which has passed the final court in Afghanistan. The report by the Human Rights Watch says the justice foundation in Afghanistan still do not have the required capacity to process death penalties. My colleague Nasir Ahmad has a report on this:

[Reporter] A few days ago, Afghanistan Supreme Court announced that more than 100 prisoners, who have been convicted of major crimes, such as murder, armed robberies, rape and kidnapping, have been sentenced to death by all three courts in Afghanistan.

According to Supreme Court officials, these cases are awaiting President Karzai's final endorsement. [Passage omitted: repeat]

[Spokesman for Supreme Court] The president has the authority to reject or approve the death penalties for the convicts. However, I would like to ensure that the decision has been quite fair and transparent. The claim by the Human Rights Watch about poor capacity in the justice system in Afghanistan is something unfair and unreasonable and we are very sorry to hear such claims. I would suggest that before making such claims on the capacity of our justice system, the Human Rights Watch has to launch an assessment to evaluate the capacity of our judicial system.

[Reporter] According to some experts, before processing the death penalties for the convicts, the government should get the justices departments rid of corruption. It is worthy to note that last year 15 prisoners had been sentenced to death. After president's endorsement 14 of ! them were executed and one of the convicts, known as Temor Shah, manag ed to escape. The government has not been able to find out on how the suspect managed to escape.

Most Afghans are pleased with the government's death penalty decision for those convicted of major crimes and believe that the government's serious actions against criminals will greatly curb crimes in the country.

Tremendous potential for agriculture in Afghanistan

Kabul (IRIN) 18 April 2008- Afghanistan would have great potential to ensure food security for its estimated 26.6 million people if donors invested in agricultural infrastructure and/or if the country's over 190,000 hectares of poppy were converted to wheat production, a senior official of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said.

"Afghanistan has a lot of potential to easily become food-secure, even food self-sufficient, owing to its rich soil and plenty of rivers," Tekeste Ghebray Tekie, said the FAO country representative, in Kabul.

Tekeste said rebuilding and developing the country's shattered agricultural infrastructure, particularly the irrigation system, was a prerequisite for food security.

"The impression one gets from outside is that Afghanistan is a mountainous, hilly country, that it does not grow any crops, but if you go to the west of the country, the south, north and northeast it's a food basket, it could even export food," Tekeste said.

Up to 70% of Afghans - about 18 million people - suffer from acute food insecurity due to poverty, drought and years of conflict, according to FAO and other aid agencies.

Meanwhile, over two and half million already vulnerable Afghans have been pushed into "high risk" food-insecurity due to a dramatic increase in staple food prices, particularly wheat flour, UN agencies reported.

Before the Soviet invasion in 1979, Afghanistan had 2.5 million hectares of irrigated land which has now dwindled to about 1.5 million hectares, mainly due to destruction caused by years of war.

While Afghanistan's cereal production, chiefly wheat, more than doubled in 2007 compared to 2001 - about 4.6 million tonnes - proper investment in the country's irrigation capacity would lead to another doubling of agricultural output. This would be more than the landlocked nation's requirements.

However, in the post-Taliban rebuilding and development drive agriculture has received only modest donor funding, experts say.

Though the main source of livelihood for about 70% of the population, agriculture has received only about US$ 300 million out of the $15 billion in international aid money spent in Afghanistan over the past six years, Oxfam International reported.

What aid money was spent on agriculture went on "short-term measures" which do not have "sustainable" effects, several American experts said in a report released in January by the Centre for Technology and National Security Policy at the US National Defence University.

Tempted to switch to wheat?

Afghanistan produces over 90% of the world’s opium, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Opium poppy is cultivated on about 193,000 hectares, and over 8,200 tonnes of raw opium will be produced in 2008, UNODC estimated in February.

While UNODC says poppy cultivation in Afghanistan is mostly driven by "greed", a leading US expert, Barnett Rubin of New York University, believes many poor Afghan farmers turn to poppy due to extreme poverty.

Whatever the motives for poppy cultivation, some experts, such as Nasrullah Abid of the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, say rising food prices may tempt some Afghan farmers to cultivate wheat instead of poppy.

According to FAO, the price per tonne of wheat has gone up from $157 in January 2007 to about $500 in April 2008.

"Given the illicit nature of opium poppy and also the government's counter-narcotics efforts, some farmers will consider wheat a lucrative alternative crop," said Abid.

"If you plant wheat in this area [poppy fields] - and if this is under irrigation - you'll get 2.6 tones per hectare, so automatically you're looking at over 400,000 tonnes of additional wheat.

If you use this land for high cash crops like vegetables, fruit or cotton, then the contribution to food-security will be enormous," FAO’s Tekeste said.

Germany pledges more aid to Afghanistan

Berlin, April 18: Germany has pledged to send more security training staff and increase its contributions to civilian reconstruction in Afghanistan.

(IANS) 18 April 2008- he number of German police training officers would be increased to 45 from the current 30, Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung said here after a meeting with the UN special envoy Kai Eide Thursday.

Jung said the number of military trainers had been doubled to 110 since August last year, and a further increase is planned.

Jung announced that Germany would increase its contributions to civilian reconstruction in Afghanistan to 140 million euros ($220 million) from 80 million euros ($127 million) previously.

By 2010, total contributions are expected to hit 900 million euros ($1,431 million). In his visit to Berlin, Eide also met German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Turkey, US side by side in Afghanistan: Rice

paktribune April 19, 2008

NEW YORK: The Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, has said that the US and Turkey are working side by side in Afghanistan to bring long-term peace, stability and prosperity in this war-torne country.

Addressing a luncheon meeting of the American Turkish Council, Rice asserted that both the countries would work together in this egard in Afghanistan. "I was just with my Turkish colleagues, including President Gul and Foreign Minister Babacan in Bucharest this week -- last week with our NATO allies to reaffirm our long-term commitment to Afghanistan’s success," she said.

"Turkey has been integral to NATO’s success in supporting the Karzai government, in limiting the Taliban’s influence, and in providing humanitarian and reconstruction assistance for the Afghan people," she said.

Observing that both the US and Turkey recognize that sustainable democratic development in Afghanistan is the key to sustainable peace, Rice said: "Turkey and the United States will continue to work together to defend and promote freedom and opportunity for the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kosovo."As President Bush has said, ’Freedom can be resisted, and freedom can be delayed, but freedom cannot be denied.’ Turkey’s own long legacy of advancing modern and democratic reforms as a Muslim majority society can inspire those throughout the broader Middle East and beyond who seek to meet their own national challenges democratically, she said.

On the recently concluded NATO summit in Bucharest, Rice termed it as a terrific summit from Afghan perspective. "The alliance issued a vision statement on Afghanistan that clearly commits the alliance for the long term in Afghanistan.

And I don’t mean military forces. Hopefully, the time will come in the relatively near future where Afghans can largely carry out security on their own." she said. At the same time, she said the global commitment needs to be there. "We have to remain committed to that country because, of course, the Taliban is a tough enemy," Rice said.

Taliban, she said is an enemy which is not winning on the battlefield. This is why, she said it’s decided to do what terrorists do; it’s decided to kill innocent people instead. "That’s why you have the car bombs and the suicide bombs and those techniques, and the kidnappings. That’s a sign, to my mind, that they don’t want to take on NATO in military formations; they want to -- they want instead to kill innocent civilians," she said.

Assessing the overall security situation in Afghanistan

Source: International Crisis Group (ICG), Date: 17 Apr 2008

Speech by Nick Grono, Deputy President, International Crisis Group, DCAF - NATO Parliamentary Assembly Seminar on "Stabilising Afghanistan: Developing Security, Securing Development", 17 April 2008

I’ve been given the broad and challenging task of assessing the overall security situation in Afghanistan.

First let me by setting the context. The sad reality is that Afghanistan has suffered from sustained conflict for almost thirty years. The enduring paradigm is that of abusive power-holders preying on the local populations. The power-holders change – absolute monarchs, Afghan communists, Soviet military, mujahedeen, Taliban, and now re-empowered warlords -- but the problem remains the same: highly personalised rule, a culture of impunity, and the abuse of large sections of the population on ethnic, regional, tribal, or sectarian grounds.

The U.S. and its allies reinforced this pattern of grievance and impunity in 2001 and 2002 by outsourcing the fighting and stabilisation operations to discredited and largely disempowered warlords and commanders. When they entrenched themselves in their former fiefdoms, they reverted to their old practices of human rights abuse, corruption and drug production, working once again to build their own networks at the expense of central government authority.

The result is festering grievances and an alienated population that often has little faith in its leadership and offers rich pickings for insurgent recruitment.

Quick fixes, such as arming local militias, empowering discredited power-holders, making deals and giving impunity to extremists, don’t address these problems – they worsen them. The local population understands the hypocrisy of such policies, and knows that they will continue to be the victims of these power-holders.

So that’s the general context, but now let me focus more specifically on the security situation.

The figures

We hear lots of statistics thrown around regarding Afghanistan – troop numbers, aid promised and delivered, development indicators and so on. Usually these are used to try and establish some trends. I too am going to give you some figures, but with provisos.

Casualty and incident figures in Afghanistan are notoriously inexact and difficult to compile. Insurgency-related deaths are often in remote, inaccessible areas which insurgents have made all but off limits to independent verification.

And claims about casualties are often wildly exaggerated or significantly understated while categorisation as civilian/combatant is often contested.

Let me give just one example. On 12 April there was a suicide attack on a road construction team in Nimroz. ISAF issued a statement condemning the loss of two ‘civilian workers’’ lives and noted the death of two insurgents. A statement by the Taliban spoke of the death of ‘20 Indian engineers and puppet police.’ Later that day, Reuters reported the death of ‘3 Indian road engineers and an Afghan’. This took place in a provincial capital – so just imagine in the challenges of getting accurate figures about attacks in the districts.

But, even given these provisos, the headline figures are grim:

- The U.S. military said earlier this year that suicide bombings were up 27% in 2007 over 2006. But their incidence is also up a horrifying 600% over 2005; and all insurgent attacks are up 400% over 2005.

- The last Secretary-General’s report to the Security Council reported 8,000 insurgency-related deaths in 2007, of which at least 1,500 were civilians.

Humanitarian workers are increasingly targets. The Secretary General reported the looting of 40 convoys delivering food for the WFP in 2007, 130 attacks against humanitarian programs, 40 relief workers killed and another 89 abducted.

Making predictions for the coming year is fraught, particularly at the beginning of the traditional ‘fighting season’ of spring and summer in Afghanistan. However both UN [Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS)] and the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office’s (ANSO) reporting indicates that incidents so far this year are up compared to last year. (ANSO’s breakdown specifically shows this to include insurgency-initiated attacks, challenging the explanation that incidents are up solely because more international forces are there to tackle them.)

Attacks and casualties are of course not the only measure of stability: we’ve all heard of continuing record opium harvests in Afghanistan, which now provides 93% of the world’s opium supply. This is both a source and symptom of insecurity, possible only because large swathes of land are beyond the rule of law with most of the cultivation centred in the core areas of the insurgency. This continues to fuel both corruption within the Afghan government and sustain the insurgency.

Perceptions of security

So those are some of the headline statistics, but in an asymmetric conflict like the one we face in Afghanistan, perceptions are also vital. In Afghanistan’s case this means perceptions both in country as well as back in the capitals of the dozens of nations involved. As Thomas Hammes wrote, insurgents now use:

"all available networks – political, economic, social and military – to convince the enemy’s political decision makers that their strategic goals are either unachievable or too costly for the perceived benefit."[1]

That means that insurgents do not have to win -- they just have to not lose long enough to sap the population and the donors’ will.

Today there are different perceptions of security emerging in Afghanistan, with the international military often appearing to have a more optimistic take on the situation than international civilian actors. This is worrying, because it results in military and civilian efforts lacking strategic direction.

Last week a British NATO commander, having just returned from Afghanistan, was reported as saying there were 'real signs of progress' in the conflict in Afghanistan, and that NATO ‘works’ in Helmand.

And the President of the Red Cross said on 8 April during his visit to Afghanistan: 'There is growing insecurity and a clear intensification of the armed conflict, which is no longer limited to the south but has spread to the east and west.´

Of course, they may both be right – depending on what the are measuring, and on what facts they are basing their judgements.

The international military tell us that things are getting better on the security front - because they are winning every engagement. The charts show that 75 per cent of the country experienced less than one security incident per quarter per 10,000 people, with 70 per cent of the events occurring in just 10 per cent of districts.

However it’s important to understand that military statistics are subject to strict parameters – I understand that incidents counted are those deemed to be insurgency related and largely in areas in which they operate. For political and development actors general lawlessness – not just the insurgency – and a culture of impunity has a chilling impact on their ability to operate.

And while the Afghan army and international forces win in armed clashes, asymmetrical attacks such as suicide bombings, IEDs, hit and run attacks and kidnappings can make it harder to engage in development and political outreach. The fear created by just a few such attacks have an impact far beyond the immediate victims.

Such attacks are often portrayed as the ‘desperate last remnants of the Taliban’ – as they have been for several years now. But that is what guerrillas do and the Taliban have achieved a sense of momentum through such attacks, projecting themselves much more strongly than their actual numbers. The ultimate aim is to drive a wedge between the government and the people.

The recent approach of targeting Taliban commanders is probably the right one, but, according to recent testimony by Dave Barno, who at one stage led Coalition forces in Afghanistan, NATO still dropped 3,572 bombs in Afghanistan last year. Such use of air power would appear to contradict most counter insurgency approaches, but we understand that this is at least partly a symptom of the lack of boots on the ground. However it must be emphasised again that civilian deaths at the hands of international forces – whatever the reason -- feed the insurgent recruitment.

The Taliban cynically and publicly use such deaths in their propaganda – twisting concerns about civilian casualties, which they certainly have no regard for, back on the internationals -- declaring in one recent statement:

"The enemy has lost its morale and does not have the spirit to fight the mojahedin face-to-face. Therefore, arbitrary bombing raids have destroyed people’s homes and crops, and they think they can achieve victory by carrying out such acts. However, this will further increase Afghans’ sensitivities, resistance to and hatred of the enemy."[2]

Crisis Group has experienced firsthand the spread of the insurgency having always been proud of its ‘dust on its boots’ fieldwork but having to plan much more carefully for travel now. Central provinces such as Logar and Wardak, just a short drive from Kabul, are now the site of kidnappings and intimidation.

One translator we have used now travels to his home in the weekends with a cassette of Taliban songs in his car stereo in case he is stopped. Others with families further afield carefully divest themselves of all identification showing that they work with an international NGO -- including purging phone SIM cards and changing US dollars to local currency -- before they go on visits.

In Kandahar following the kidnap of an American woman and her driver, NGOs have withdrawn their international staff. On a recent visit the only foreigners working in town appeared to be the ICRC, the UN and some contractors. Even national staff at NGOs are restricted in how they operate, both in terms of geography and implementation – during the visit mentioned an Afghan, working with the government’s reconciliation programme, was shot dead during a weekend visit home to Panjwayi, just outside the city.

Often the response to these observations is that this is all happening in the dangerous south, and things are better in the north. And they are – but there are still widespread security problems in the north and north west too.

According to ANSO figures of 11 NGO deaths in 2008 – ten Afghans and one foreigner - three of those were in Kandahar, the rest in areas more regularly described as stable.

Similarly in 2007 of 15 NGO deaths – four internationals and 11 Afghans, one was in Kandahar in the south, one in Nangarhar in the east, six in the increasingly insurgency-hit southern provinces of Logar, Wardak and Ghazni – and the remaining seven in the north and north east.

This is partly because there are far fewer NGOs in the south, but also highlights the crime and political violence by armed groups and local powerholders seeking to flex muscles.

Herat in the west, routinely described as stable, has the highest rate of criminal kidnapping in the country according to the head of the National Security Directorate. In an alarming development such groups also appear increasingly linked in with the insurgency – two recent kidnappings in Kandahar and Herat are both believed to be criminal gangs tied in with insurgent outfits.

The decades of conflict have damaged the country’s social fabric, undermining state and traditional resolution mechanisms. Without the institutions to tackle grievances the result is chronic local conflicts – not all, or even most of it directly linked to the insurgency itself. In fact, a recent, nationwide survey by Oxfam, following on from our own 2003 work on peacebuilding, found that the leading cause of conflict in Afghanistan was not the insurgency, but water, land and tribal disputes, in that order.

Of course, it is not NATO’s responsibility to resolve such disputes. But their pervasiveness highlights the failure of the Afghan government and its international partners to implement effective community peace-building efforts.

Insurgents use such grievances to reach out to the disgruntled and disenfranchised and persuade to come over their side. The Taliban is not a standing army of ideological warriors, it has become a diffuse protest movement, its foot soldiers made up of both students from extremist madrassas in the Pakistan border areas along with the disillusioned and disenfranchised within Afghanistan.

So we have a situation in which the parameters by which it may have seemed easiest to track progress in Afghanistan - namely military engagements may actually be obscuring strategic shortcomings in what is ultimately a political struggle.

Defining success on the security front must be tilted towards community perceptions and behaviours. For it is local communities that will ultimately build a stable and secure state – not short term military victories.

We are never going to shoot the last insurgent and leave. The military are there to create a security umbrella to allow political and development work to take place and the strategic must take the place of the tactical.

When it comes to tackling the pervasive insecurity in Afghanistan, the Karzai government and the international community need to hold their nerve and focus on institution building rather than quick fixes. In particular this must be those institutions central to the rule of law and driving service delivery. It must be appreciated that this IS counter insurgency – by building such institutions we undercut Taliban legitimacy and their recruitment and support base.

So I will finish up here. I know this assessment has been somewhat gloomy, but it is important to remember that there is an incredible reservoir of hope and goodwill amongst the Afghan people which we must seek to tap and justify. The vast majority of people still support the presence of foreign troops and fear what will happen should they leave.

For the last few years now there has been talk of the ‘tipping point’. It has not come to that and the Taliban will not be marching into Kabul any time soon. But we need to be brutally honest about shortcomings now if there is to be decisive change. This is not supposed to generate hopelessness but rather act as a wake up call to promote action and greater resolve.

Al-Qaeda adds muscle to the Taliban's fight

By Syed Saleem Shahzad, Asia Times Online / April 19, 2008

KARACHI - From many hundreds, al-Qaeda now has fewer than 75 Arabs involved in the Afghan "war on terror" theater, but the group is more lethal in that it has successfully established a local franchise of warriors who have fully embraced al-Qaeda's ideology and who are capable of conducting a war of attrition against the coalition in Afghanistan.

In the years following the United States-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, al-Qaeda lost hundreds of members, either killed or arrested or departed to other regions. These included diehard Arab ideologues such as Mustapha Seth Marium (arrested) and commanders Abu Laith al-Libbi (killed) and Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi (arrested) .

And this month, news of the death in January of Abdul Hameed, alias Abu Obaida al-Misri, from Hepatitis B, was released to Western intelligence. He was a most-trusted aide of al-Qaeda deputy Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri and had been appointed by Osama bin Laden as the head of the khuruj (revolt) in Pakistan. He was in his mid-50s.

While al-Qaeda was suffering losses, Pakistan's tribal areas became increasingly radicalized, which al-Qaeda was able to tap into to reinvigorate the Afghan insurgency. When military operations chopped off its vertical growth, it grew horizontally.

This defied intelligence estimates, polls, analysis and strategic opinions. Former US secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld was of the opinion that by 2003, as a result of US military operations in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda had been destroyed as an organization and it was unable to strike against US interests.

However, the US National Intelligence Estimate report in July 2007 said al-Qaeda had regrouped and posed a threat to the US homeland. Recently, US President George W Bush also said al-Qaeda was a serious threat.

The year 2007 was important for al-Qaeda's development as several stand-alone Arab groups operating in Pakistan's tribal areas, including Libyans and Egyptians, either merged into al-Qaeda or made an alliance in which they would be subservient to al-Qaeda's command.

With al-Qaeda losing key members, a vacuum should have been created, but that did not happen, and another figure has emerged - Maulana Ilyas Kashmiri. He is a veteran fighter of the Kashmir struggle, groomed by Pakistan's Inter-Service Intelligence's India cell.

Islamabad's clampdown on activities in Kashmir and being arrested a few times disheartened Kashmiri, and he moved to the North Waziristan tribal area. He was soon followed by his diehard Punjabi colleagues and they made Afghanistan their new battlefield.

This year, a "crossbreed" of fighters - a combination of Arab command and that of Kashmiri, as well as an alliance with tribal warlord Baitullah Mehsud - is expected to spring some surprises in Afghanistan.

"The Taliban are tribal warriors. They only understand guerrilla operations as hit-and-run raids," a group leader for the Taliban-led spring offensive told Asia Times Online on the condition of anonymity.

"They are not familiar, for instance, with mopping operations. The new fighters who were trained for Kashmir are expert in these operations and this year this expertise will certainly make a difference in Afghanistan," the group leader said, in reference to attacks in which guerrillas hit a target and completely destroy it before they leave.

Another improvement this year will be the introduction of new technology, and again credit for this goes to the Punjabi fighters. These include a mortar that is under a meter long and weighs only five kilograms, and silencers for AK 47s. The Punjabis believe such weapons will enable them to start special operations, such as targeted killings of high-profile enemies.

The strategy to cut the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO's) supply lines was the brainchild of the Punjabi fighters. They also chose Pakistan's Khyber Agency and the neighboring Afghan province of Nangarhar - most unlikely places for Taliban operations - as the focus of the spring offensive.

Wednesday's events in Khyber Agency are illuminating and could herald a new flashpoint in the "war on terror".

Local tribes were given money by the Americans to secure the area from Taliban activities. US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte recently visited Khyber Agency and met a few tribal elders. As a result, the tribesmen gave an ultimatum to the pro-Taliban Lashkar-i-Islam, as well as to the Pakistan government's representative in the agency, to leave the area.

Lashkar-i-Islam refused, leading to clashes with anti-Taliban forces supported by Pakistani troops. Fighting raged into early Thursday and involved heavy weapons, including missiles, rockets and mortars. Taliban contacts confirmed to Asia Times Online that this event will lead to a new round of attacks against Pakistani security forces.

In addition, the Taliban have escalated attacks on a highway being built in Nimroze (a few Indian workers were killed) which connects Afghanistan to Iran's Chabahar port. The only alternative remains the "doubly land-locked route" through Russia, which is a difficult if not impossible route for NATO supplies.

The Taliban have also suspended suicide attacks to allow political parties like the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz group), the second-largest party in the ruling coalition government, to counter US influence on military operations in Pakistan. The League is said to have a soft spot for militants. If the government succumbs to US pressure, the militants will resume the attacks. (The use of local tribes against the pro-Taliban militia in Khyber Agency is good enough reason to switch on the attacks.)

In a new round of violence in Pakistan, the death of Abu Obaida al-Misri could have been a blow. But under a new arrangement, Khalid Habib is the new man in-charge in coordination with an Arab and Ilyas Kashmiri - a formidable troika for the Pakistani security forces.

The militants often discuss the dwindling numbers of Arab fighters within their ranks, and in doing so refer to the Prophet Mohammad's saying that before the end of time battles, the Arab tribes will be reduced to minimum numbers. The militants take strength from this.

Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief.

Afghanistan moves to center stage
By M K Bhadrakumar – Asia Online

Three or four seemingly unconnected statements within the space of the past week, and the "war on terror" in Afghanistan acquires new shades of meaning. On Wednesday, Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad said during a visit to the holy city of Qom that the United States invaded Afghanistan and Iraq "under the pretext of the September 11 terror attack".

A day earlier, Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan, who was on a visit to London, publicly expressed skepticism over the conduct of the Afghan war by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). He warned that NATO is "courting disaster". On Monday, addressing a student gathering in Beijing's Tsinghua University, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf urged Chinese and Russian help in stabilizing Afghanistan. But in the ultimate analysis, it is 

the sensational revelation by erstwhile Northern Alliance leaders about their ongoing contacts with the Taliban that makes nonsense of the battle lines of the Afghan war.

The United States' monopoly of the Afghan war is beginning to come under serious public challenge. The "lameduck" George W Bush administration in Washington faces an uphill task to gain mastery over the equations developing on multiple levels.

Meanwhile, some questions arise. Are these statements and public stances essentially more prudent and prophylactic than provocative? Do they stem from a genuine concern in the region that the US is simply unable to forge ahead in the war? Or do they signify the stirrings of a concerted regional challenge to the US mission?

Ahmadinejad's statement is the first time that Tehran has questioned frontally at the highest level of leadership the raison d'etre of the US intervention in Afghanistan. He suggests that terrorism is the pretext rather than the reason for the US intervention. The Iranian leader alleges that the US intervention was more geopolitical. Considering that Iran (under former president Mohammed Khatami) had provided logistical support for the US intervention in Afghanistan in 2001, Wednesday's statement signifies an important rethink in Tehran. Ahmadinejad has implicitly absolved the Taliban regime of any role as such in the September 11 attacks on Washington and New York.

Compared with the nuanced Iranian statement, Babacan has taken a stance from the perspective of Turkey being a major NATO power. Babacan said in an interview with the London-based Telegraph newspaper that NATO is courting disaster by relying too much on force to defeat the Taliban. He distanced Ankara from the US counterinsurgency strategy by stressing that the shift to a "more militaristic approach would backfire and ultimately undermine the Afghan government".

Babacan forcefully rejected the US criticism that Turkey has refused to deploy troops in the troubled southern and eastern regions of Afghanistan. He insisted on the continued logic of Turkey's Afghan policy, which focuses on reconstruction activities aimed at "winning their [Afghans'] hearts and minds". Significantly, he warned that Afghans could "start to perceive the [NATO] security forces as occupiers" and that the situation would become "very complicated". But he, too, avoided any criticism of the Taliban as such.

Interestingly, Babacan made these remarks in an interview in which he underlined Turkey's growing alienation from Europe. Also, on Monday, another round of Turkish-Iranian consultations were held in Ankara regarding bilateral cooperation in regional security, which is already quite substantial.

Musharraf has gone a step even further. He expressed the hope that the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) could play a role in stabilizing Afghanistan. He added, "If the SCO can come along, then we would need to ensure that there is no confrontation with NATO." SCO comprises China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as full members and Iran and Pakistan as "observers".

Musharraf is famous for making impromptu remarks, but the fact that he made such a statement in Beijing merits attention. Pakistan has been seeking full SCO membership. The indications are that Beijing is, in principle, supportive of the Pakistani claim. Reports had also just appeared that Washington is pressing for an intrusive role to monitor the safety of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

Musharraf has virtually endorsed a call by Uzbekistan President Islam Karimov at the recent NATO summit meeting in Bucharest (April 2-4) to the effect that the "Six plus Two" format of the 1997-2001 period (with the "six" being the countries bordering Afghanistan and the "two" being Russia and the US), which aimed at bringing about intra-Afghan reconciliation between the Taliban and its opponents, be expanded into a new "Six plus Three" format that would now include NATO, along with China, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Iran, Pakistan, Russia and the US.

Moscow and Tashkent have a coordinated approach in this regard. Washington finds itself in a quandary to respond to the Uzbek offer of cooperation with NATO, which would mean virtual abandonment of alliance's plans to expand into the former Soviet republics of Ukraine and Georgia.

However, in a hard-hitting speech on Monday at Maxwell-Gunter air force base in Montgomery, Alabama, which was devoted entirely to the US strategy in Afghanistan, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice precisely invoked the great Cold War icons - George Marshall, Harry S Truman, George Frost Kennan and Dean Acheson. She sent a stunning message to Moscow that NATO's victory in Afghanistan is "not only essential, it is attainable".

Rice pointed out, "Successes in Afghanistan will advance our broader regional interests in combating violent terrorism, resisting the destabilizing behavior of Iran, and anchoring political and economic liberty in South and Central Asia. And success in Afghanistan is an important test for the credibility of NATO."

Rice coolly ignored the Russian-Uzbek offer of cooperation. Against the above background, this week's statement in Kabul by the top leadership of the erstwhile Northern Alliance (NA) merits close attention.

The NA leaders enjoy the support of Russia, the Central Asian states and Iran - and Turkey to an extent. Sayyed Agha Hussein Fazel Sancharaki, spokesman of these groups which now come under the umbrella of the United National Front (UNF), revealed to the Associated Press (AP) that former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani and the top NA commander from Panjshir, Mohammed Qasim Fahim (who also holds the position currently as a security advisor to President Hamid Karzai) have been meeting Taliban and other opposition groups (presumably, the Hezb-i-Islami led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar) during recent months for national reconciliation. He claimed these meetings have involved "important people" from the Taliban.

Indeed, Fahim (who was the chief of intelligence under the late Ahmad Shah Massoud) and Rabbani (who belonged to the original "Peshawar Seven" - mujahideen leaders based in Pakistan in the 1980s) would have old links with Hekmatyar and top Taliban leaders like Jalaluddin Haqqani. Rabbani told AP that the six-year war must be resolved through talks.

"We in the National Front and I myself believe the solution for the political process in Afghanistan will happen through negotiations," he said. Rabbani added that the opposition leaders would soon discuss and possibly select a formal negotiating team for holding talks with the Taliban. He found fault with Karzai for not pursuing dialogue with the Taliban. "I told Karzai that when a person starts something, he should complete it. On the issue of negotiations, it is not right to take one step forward and then one step back. This work should be continued in a very organized way."

It stands to reason that regional powers - especially Russia, Uzbekistan and Iran - will be watching closely the intra-Afghan dialogue involving the UNF and the Taliban. What gives impetus to this dialogue is apparently that the NATO summit in Bucharest came up with only small troop increments, which puts question marks on the viability and prospects of the NATO operations. But is that all?

These various strands can be expected to run concurrently for a while until some begin to outstrip others. It seems the geopolitics of energy are already taking an early lead. Musharraf last Friday aired with Chinese President Hu Jintao the topic of a gas pipeline connecting Iran and China via Pakistani territory; Iran is pressing for SCO membership; a gas cartel is about to take shape at the seventh ministerial meeting of the gas-exporting countries scheduled to be held in Moscow in June.

China's National Offshore Oil Corporation has confirmed that talks are indeed progressing on a US$16 billion gas deal involving Iran's North Pars gas field, close on the heels of the $2 billion agreement signed in March between the China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation and Iran for developing the latter's Yadavaran oil field.

A prominent expert, Igor Tomberg of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations at the Russian Academy of Sciences, wrote recently, "Iran and Russia should probably not compete against each other but rather join hands on the gas market. The Iranian president has more than once suggested to his Russian colleague that their countries coordinate their gas policies and possibly divide gas markets. Moreover, there could be an agreement under which Russia will continue to supply gas to Europe, while Iran will export its gas to the East. This would undermine plans to diversify supply to Europe, which heavily depends on the United States."

Afghanistan is a key hub of resource-rich Central Asia and the Middle East. To use the words from Rice's Montgomery speech, "Let no one forget, Afghanistan is a mission of necessity for the US, not a mission of choice."

M K Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for over 29 years, with postings including India's ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-1998) and to Turkey (1998-2001).

AFGHANISTAN: NEW APPROACHES NEEDED TO DEFEAT INSURGENCY - EXPERTS
Richard Weitz:

( Eurasia Net) 17April 2008Recent gains made by American troops in Afghanistan could easily be squandered, unless the international community redoubles its commitment to the strife-torn country’s political and economic reconstruction process. To promote success, two prominent security experts argue, counter-insurgency efforts in both Afghanistan and Pakistan should be closely coordinated.

Such were the findings of the two American civilian counterinsurgency specialists – Bruce Hoffman and Seth Jones - who recently returned from Afghanistan, where they spent time with the 82nd US Airborne Division, and visited four Afghan provinces bordering Pakistan. Jones, a political scientist at the RAND Corporation, and Bruce Hoffman, a professor at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, presented their findings during a briefing, titled “America's Counterinsurgency Conundrum: Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Quest for Stability,” held April 18 at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington.

Hoffman began by observing that “the lawless border between Pakistan and Afghanistan has, I think, become really America’s most acute foreign-policy challenge, even more so than Iraq.” He noted that, “every single major Al-Qaeda plot or attack since 2004 has emanated from precisely that area,” referring to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

“At least some 14 different terrorist and insurgent groups based in Pakistan regularly cross the border to target Afghan security forces, US military forces, and NATO military units stationed there,” Hoffman added.

American troops have made adjustments that are enhancing their chances of battlefield success against Islamic insurgents, Hoffman asserted. For example, American troops are now much more careful to limit the chances of civilian casualties in any given engagement. A high amount of collateral damage – a military term for civilian casualties – can bolster popular support for insurgents.

In Hoffman’s assessment, American military forces now “actually implement the three core principles of counterinsurgency: security, governance, and development – that is separating the population from the enemy, building the capacity of the Afghan government to address the needs of its own people, and facilitating reconstruction, development and economic growth.”

The main problem with the counterinsurgency efforts remained “inadequacies in resources,” Hoffman explained. He bemoaned the US “preoccupation with Iraq” that, he argued, is causing needed resources to be diverted away from the more strategically important Afghan-Pakistan theater of operations. To buttress his point, Hoffman stated that the US civil affairs planning office in Iraq was many times larger than its counterpart in Afghanistan.

Hoffman said there is “an enormous paucity of American civilian expertise – to ensure the permanence of this reconstruction process.” The best way to defeat Islamic militant groups, he added, is to get serious about building up Afghan governmental institutions and security forces. “The numbers and the competency available to train both Afghan security forces and government officials and the resources that we’re able today to devote to Afghanistan border on the anemic compared to the resources we are able to devote to Iraq.”

Jones suggested that the ability of the United States and NATO to achieve strategic goals is complicated by the fact that they confront a highly decentralized enemy. “What you actually have are multiple Talibans,” with varying loyalties, depending on their respective commanders and geographic locations. All groups, however, have a relatively easy time infiltrating the Afghan-Pakistani border and all seem to possess the ability to coordinate actions on either side of the border. Echoing Hoffman, Jones expressed the belief that that “certainly parts of the [Pakistani] government continue to provide resources and funding to groups that are fighting against the United States, NATO, even in Afghanistan.”

Given the improved US response to the insurgency in eastern Afghanistan, Jones argued that American troops needed to deploy in the country’s southern regions to “fill that vacuum” because “the East and the South almost have to be integrated into one front where the United States plays a predominant role.” At present, British, Canadian, and Dutch troops have the lead role in the South, which is a Taliban’s stronghold.

Both speakers urged the international community to treat the Islamic insurgency in Afghanistan and Pakistan as an integrated whole. Jones argued that, “while this war can certainly be lost in Afghanistan for the United States, it actually can not be won there, or at least can not be entirely won there.” Hoffman similarly warned that “both indigenous and foreign Islamic militants threaten not only nascent democratization and territorial integrity of Afghanistan, but also the very stability of future cohesion of nuclear-armed Pakistan.”

Indian soap operas stir outrage in Afghanistan

Thu Apr 17, 2008 5:52am IST, By Jonathon Burch

KABUL (Reuters) - Indian soap operas with their tales of family drama and trysts among the rich and beautiful have transfixed Afghans brought up on turgid state broadcasts and under a Taliban ban on television.

But not everyone is a fan. Conservative Muslim clerics and some politicians are outraged by the soap operas aired hour-after-hour by more than a dozen private television stations that have sprung up since the Taliban were ousted in 2001.

Branding the programmes immoral and against Islamic culture, the critics have launched a campaign to press the private channels to pull the plug on the soaps.

At Friday prayers at Kabul's largest mosque, Enayatullah Balegh, an influential cleric and university teacher, told reporters he and his followers were adamant.

"We are 6,000 people in this mosque, our intention ... is to go and blow up all the TV antennas if they do not stop it," Balegh said in front of his congregation. "God is greatest, we are ready," the congregation chanted in response.

The clerics' campaign gained traction this month when some members of parliament, supported by the Ministry of Information and Culture, issued a declaration to private TV channels to stop broadcasting five Indian soaps. But the television stations appear defiant.

"It is against the media law," Masoud Qiam, a senior presenter for Tolo TV, told Reuters, referring to the declaration. "We will not stop the airing of the soap operas," he said.

Tolo is Afghanistan's most popular TV channel, broadcasting a mix of news and entertainment. It has had several brushes with conservatives over its fare.

"We don't consider any of the programmes against our culture. These are the most watched programmes that people like," Qiam said.

Conservatives object to the Indian soaps as they show men and women together, "immodestly" dressed women and the worship of Hindu idols.

The channels have made concessions, cutting scenes of Hindu worship and blurring areas of bare flesh. But that hasn't appeased the critics.

"These programmes have changed the behaviour of our women and children, we don't want them. All Muslims know that these things are not allowed in Islam," said Gullab Khan, who was attending Balegh's Friday prayers.

Afghan law forbids publication of material "contrary to the principles of Islam". Problems arise in the interpretation of the law.

Despite a wave of unprecedented freedom since the overthrow of the puritanical Taliban, Afghanistan remains a deeply conservative Islamic society.

But more and more Afghans are returning from exile, bringing back new ideas. A large youthful population, particularly in the cities, is eager for new ways.

Afghanistan has its own pop stars who sing ballads and folk songs, and even a rap star. The Afghan version of the American Idol talent show, put out by Tolo, was a sensation but it also raised criticism, especially when a woman came third.

President Hamid Karzai, who has a reputation as a liberal but has been under pressure from conservative forces over several issues including television, has stepped gingerly into the fray.

Trying to keep both sides happy in the run-up to a presidential election he is expected to contest next year, Karzai has insisted media freedom will be upheld but added that unsuitable material should not be broadcast.

"There will never be interference with media freedom but media freedom should be compatible with the culture of the Afghan people," Karzai told a recent news conference.

"We wish television to stop them," he said, referring to programmes "in contradiction with daily life". Most viewers don't see any contradiction.

"I like Tulsi a lot, my children like her a lot," said mother of six Dell Jan, referring to the main character in one of the most popular Indian soaps. It is broadcast by Tolo and it is one of five shows the conservatives want taken off the air.

"When the serial starts on TV we stop all work, even eating, and watch it. We love it, it's entertainment for the children."

Keeping Canada in Afghanistan

By Samantha Power – Canadian Media

The U.S. does not often look north to gauge its own security prospects. But over the past few months, Canada has been quietly embroiled in one of the most revealing political and international-security debates since the end of the cold war. It's a debate critical to the future of NATO. And its outcome may tell us a lot about the fate of the U.S.'s struggle against terrorism.

At issue is Canada's military role in Afghanistan. Canada is one of 26 NATO countries in the International Security Assistance Force, which is attempting to stabilize Afghanistan and neutralize the Taliban and al-Qaeda. But Canada is one of only a handful of NATO countries that have embraced the task of actual war-fighting. The Canadians, who have 2,500 troops on the ground, have suffered 82 fatalities, a death rate that is higher than the U.S. military's in Iraq. In an increasingly two-tiered NATO alliance, Canada occupies the fighting tier, alongside the U.S., Britain, Denmark and the Netherlands.

The Bush Administration has praised Canada's conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, for his commitment to the war. But its toll has unnerved Canadian citizens and opposition leaders. A recent poll showed that 47% of Canadians wanted their soldiers to leave Afghanistan immediately, and only 17% supported maintaining a combat role.

The Afghan war had broad public support in Canada in 2002, but is now seen as one front in George W. Bush's hugely unpopular "war on terror." The discontent also has deeper roots. Since World War II, when Canada sent more than a million troops to fight (and lost 45,000 lives), the country has stuck mainly to U.N. peacekeeping missions--a practice invented (as Canadians are fond of reminding visitors) in 1956 by Canadian Foreign Minister Lester Pearson. Having taken few casualties in the past half-century, Canadians have found it jarring to watch flag-draped coffins return to what can feel like a very small country. A public that has long seen its military as innocently patrolling the peace has had trouble adjusting to its forces engaging in a full-fledged, unconventional war.

Perhaps most important, Canadians do not see the Afghan conflict as directly relevant to their own security. Al-Qaeda has never staged an attack on Canadian soil. And although 24 Canadians were among the victims of 9/11 and terrorists were planning to blow up two Air Canada flights in the British terrorism plot of 2006, Canadians worry that fighting alongside the U.S. will increase--not decrease--the risk that they will become a target.

After a heated and long-overdue domestic debate, the Canadian Parliament last month voted to keep its soldiers in Afghanistan until 2011--with the provisos that Canadian forces be reinforced by 1,000 troops from elsewhere and that Canadian forces concentrate less on combat and more on training Afghan security forces. When finally consulted in earnest, Canadians concluded that the financial and human costs of the mission were in fact worth bearing, at least for now. That's the good news. The bad news is that unlike Canada, few other NATO countries have begun to grapple with the urgency of 21st century threats or the sacrifices needed to deal with them. The avoidance of these topics allows European politicians to shirk tough questions and deprives them of the opportunity to educate their people about the security and humanitarian stakes in Afghanistan and beyond--stakes that will need to be embraced if collective security arrangements are to remain more than notional.

The U.S. alone can't succeed in Afghanistan. But Canada's example shows that even our closest allies need to be convinced that the fight is theirs too. Before countries like Macedonia, Albania and Croatia gain admission to NATO, they should be reminded that membership carries responsibilities as well as rewards. NATO rules should be rewritten to ensure that countries that invest disproportionate military and financial resources (as Canada has done) should have some of their costs subsidized by the alliance. If a government does not want to send its troops to fight, it should still be obliged to contribute funding and civilian expertise, which remains in short supply.

There is no military solution to Afghanistan's woes any more than there is a military solution to Iraq's. But we'll probably face similar problems in the years ahead. Meeting the challenge will require Western democracies to rethink the identities and priorities they forged in a very different world.

Power is the author of Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World

[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.]