In this bulletin:

• Afghan defense minister appeals for more NATO support
• NATO seeks new Afghan push from summit
• Canada confident NATO will help its Afghan troops
• Behind Sarkozy's Afghan Troop Plan
• Danish soldier killed, three Germans hurt in Afghanistan
• U.S.-led coalition forces kill 'several insurgents' in southern Afghanistan
• US Army suspends suspect Afghan munitions deal
• Afghan army trainers 'victims' of ammo scandal
• UN's new Afghan envoy begins work
• 2,300 police trainers needed for Afghanistan
• Afghan committee plans to remove foreign army bases from Kabul
• 70 percent of Afghans without safe drinking water: government
• New hydrological station will help manage Afghan water resources – UN agency
• Helmand: Derided Police Turn Over New Leaf
• Why the Taliban now embrace the concept of suicide bombing
• Rep. Ellison: Public, media ignore Afghanistan
• AFGHANISTAN: Disappointed With Karzai, NATO
• Pakistan's new leaders tell US: We are no longer your killing field
• Afghan traders worried about worsening law and order in NWFP
• Delay in clearance of oil tankers leads to Torkham border tragedy’
• Pakhtuns' aspirations for peace

Afghan defense minister appeals for more NATO support
The Associated Press - Thursday, March 27, 2008

BRUSSELS, Belgium: Afghanistan's defense minister appealed Thursday for the leaders at next week's NATO summit to provide more support for his country's armed forces and said a stronger Afghan army would enable the Western alliance eventually to scale down its military mission there.

Abdul Rahim Wardak said he hoped the April 2-4 summit would reconfirm a long-term commitment to Afghanistan, but added that the faster Afghan forces are built up the sooner NATO will be able to start cutting its 47,000-strong force.

"We're asking the international community and everybody to accelerate the growth of the Afghan National Security Forces," Wardak said from Kabul. "Eventually, the more we are capable, it will allow the gradual reduction of the NATO forces."

The NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania, will adopt a "vision statement" setting out the alliance's long-term aims in Afghanistan and restating a commitment to support the country through the military mission against the Taliban and development funding.

Some NATO countries, such as France, are expected to announce an increase in their contribution to the NATO mission, including more training teams to work with Afghan forces.

Wardak appealed for NATO not to repeat the mistakes of the 1990s when Western powers cut back their support for Afghanistan after the withdrawal of Soviet troops and the country fell into civil war.

"We will need the help for a transitional period, then I think we can take our traditional responsibility to defend our country by ourselves," he said. "The time of that commitment will directly depend on the amount of support that we will be getting to accelerate the growth of the Afghan National Security Forces."

The Afghan army has around 50,000 troops and NATO is working to a target of training up to an additional 20,000 by the end of this year. Afghan Defense Ministry officials have said they would like to have up to 200,000 eventually.

"Eighty-thousand is too little," Wardak said. "The force requirements should be much higher than the force we have today."

After a lull in fighting during the winter, Wardak said he expects an increase in violence and that the Taliban will try attacks in previously quieter areas.

"They will try to spread the war to the west and the north," he said. He added however that the insurgents lack the strength to make large scale attacks and instead would rely increasingly on suicide attacks and roadside bombs.

Aside from training, he said priorities for the Afghan army included helicopters and transport planes to allow his forces to move more quickly around the country.

NATO seeks new Afghan push from summit

BRUSSELS, March 27 (Reuters) - NATO's leaders want next week's summit in Romania to resolve internal tensions over its mission in Afghanistan and commit more troops, signalling its willingness to stay the course there and defeat the Taliban.

Months of noisy infighting about troop levels, tactics and the refusal of some European allies to send soldiers into the fiercest fighting have overshadowed what alliance officials say is modest but real progress in security and reconstruction.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Wednesday he could come to the April 2-4 Bucharest meeting armed with an offer of more troops, as part of a wider move to bolster operations in the heartlands of a stubborn Taliban-led insurgency.

The scheduled presence of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is designed to show Afghan authorities are serious about tackling corruption and that the world body is ready to address deficits in its aid effort.

NATO allies are putting the final touches to a four-page "vision statement" aimed at bracing sceptical publics for the prospect of a continued Afghan presence -- with all the ensuing casualties and costs to national purses -- for years to come.

"This is going to take a consistent long-term international effort," Canadian Defence Minister Peter Mackay, whose country has threatened to pull its troops out next year unless allies provide more support, told a conference in Brussels this month.

NATO's move in 2003 to assume the U.N. mandate to provide security in Afghanistan, two years after the U.S.-led ousting of the Taliban, has thrust the 26-nation alliance into its toughest ground war in a Muslim land far from its Euro-Atlantic patch.

NATO officials now put the presence of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) at 47,000 -- nine times more than the 5,000-strong force of four years ago.

Yet the alliance remains entrenched in a bitter dispute between nations doing the bulk of the fighting and those in safer zones, with U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates raising the prospect of a "two-tiered" alliance.

Sarkozy left open where he would commit any new troops. NATO sources said they understood the choice was between sending them to the Afghan south to support the Canadians or -- more likely -- to east Afghanistan by the Pakistan border.

That, combined with Poland's announcement this month that it could add further troops, could allow some 1,000 U.S. Marines in that sector to be redeployed to the south and so avert the possibility of a damaging Canadian withdrawal.

But with countries such as Germany, Italy and Spain still reluctant to make major commitments to join the battle in the south, some analysts question whether NATO will be able to end the row over burden-sharing.

"You're going to see some efforts to try and get around some of that finger-pointing in Bucharest," said Julianne Smith, Europe programme director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

"(But) we still have a number of members inside the alliance that have failed to transform their military to cope with expeditionary operations," she said.

Last year saw record violence in Afghanistan, with nearly 6,000 killed -- a third of them civilians. Alliance officials say insurgents are relying more on suicide bombers and roadside bombs because efforts to take on ISAF directly have failed.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer hopes to seal a pact with President Vladimir Putin -- a summit guest -- for NATO troop and equipment transit routes via Russia to Afghanistan, plus more cooperation on tackling the Afghan narcotics trade.

With NATO keen to stress its long-term commitment to the country, there is no public talk of any date by which the alliance could start winding down its force and handing over operations to Afghanistan's fledgling security forces.

A U.S. document obtained by Reuters, with ideas for a "strategic vision statement" on Afghanistan to be unveiled at the summit, proposed a five-year plan with benchmarks such as completing the training of a 70,000-strong Afghan army and an 82,000-strong police force.

"The time of the (NATO) commitment will directly depend on the amount of support we get to grow our national security forces," Afghan Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak told reporters in a videoconference from Kabul on Thursday.

Canada confident NATO will help its Afghan troops

OTTAWA, March 27 (Reuters) - The Canadian government left little doubt on Thursday that NATO allies would send additional troops to southern Afghanistan, fulfilling a condition that Canada had set for keeping its own soldiers there.

Briefing reporters ahead of next week's NATO summit in Bucharest, officials said Canada's discussions with its allies over providing new troops and equipment were going well.

"We expect to meet our goals, but I don't feel comfortable speculating on when our allies are going to make their intentions known," said Sandra Buckler, spokeswoman for Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

On the recommendations of a task force headed by former Liberal Deputy Prime Minister John Manley, Canada has stipulated that 1,000 new troops must be sent to the Kandahar region to reinforce the 2,500 Canadians based there. If they are not, Canada has pledged to end its mission in February 2009.

Two other conditions are that the Canadian operation be provided 1with helicopters and drones.
"We're very confident that we're on track to meet all of our commitments," Buckler said without elaborating.

Canadian officials traveled to Paris last month to lobby the French government, and President Nicolas Sarkozy announced on Wednesday that France would send more troops to Afghanistan, but he did not say where.

Buckler would not confirm speculation that French and possibly Polish troops would go to eastern Afghanistan and free up U.S. Marines to be deployed in the violent Kandahar area, where the Canadians are stationed.

Behind Sarkozy's Afghan Troop Plan

By Bruce Crumley/Paris - Time

During a 45-minute speech in London on Wednesday, French President Nicolas Sarkozy let slip perhaps the worst-kept secret in Europe: He's planning to send significant troop reinforcements to the NATO mission in Afghanistan. But while Paris' long-anticipated decision to bolster the alliance's struggling counterinsurgency mission will please the U.S., Britain and Canada, which had been urging their NATO partners to do more, Sarkozy's announcement has prompted some unexpected grumbling in France. Strange as it may sound, some commentators are warning that by expanding France's exposure in a war considered just by a majority of French people, Sarkozy may wind up undermining public support of that mission.

"The French will back troop deployment to combat zones and will tolerate significant death counts as an occupational military hazard," notes political commentator Gilles Delafon. "What they won't tolerate are soldiers being sent to their deaths because officials didn't have a real strategy or plan for how to win the conflict. And that looks to be the case with this new deployment to Afghanistan."

Sarkozy is expected to commit, during next week's NATO summit in Romania, to send an additional 1,000 ground troops to Afghanistan. Those new troops — possibly accompanied by up to 200 special forces soldiers — would join France's current contingent of 1,600. But while those currently in Afghanistan patrol the relatively calm area of Kabul and its surrounds, most or all of the new units are expected to be sent to the south of Afghanistan, where the reformed Taliban and their allies have become particularly strong. Indeed, deaths among Canadian combat personnel in the area have been so high that Ottawa had threatened to pull its military from Afghanistan if NATO allies did not contribute reinforcements. That call echoed U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates' scolding of under-represented alliance members last month, when he warned that NATO "must not, can not, become a two-tiered alliance of those who are willing to fight and those who are not."

So up stepped Sarkozy, who in his London speech explained his decision by warning, "We can not accept a return of the Taliban and al-Qaeda to Kabul. Defeat is not an option to us, even if victory is difficult." Few in French politics or public opinion disagree with that view. "Afghanistan is still linked in the French mind to the response to 9/11.... [and] is still widely seen here as the right war," says Franois Heisbourg, a military expert and special adviser to the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Paris. "Most criticism in France about Afghanistan was about how long it took us to get there."

That may change, however. Heisbourg notes that since the late 1970s, positive French public opinion of the nation's military has reinforced wide — and extremely rare — political consensus on the funding and use of French forces. It is that public and multi-party support that has left France's troops better funded and more frequently dispatched to international crises or conflicts than other European forces, which have generally shrunk for lack of funding and political support. Heisbourg notes, however, that sending new French troops into an increasingly chaotic Afghanistan without a clear victory plan could eventually create the kinds of doubts in public opinion that could make the use and funding of the military a point of political jousting once again. Delafon says it already has.

"The Socialist opposition is already reminding people of Sarkozy's campaign comment that he didn't favor sending additional French forces because he couldn't see how it would be 'decisive,'" Delafon notes, adding that few analysts see how a modest reinforcement of 1,000 soldiers could possibly prove "decisive" now. "The problem is, this is a political move following through on Sarkozy's pledge to improve Franco-American cooperation. Making a political decision on a military matter, and without a clear military strategy for victory behind it, carries very significant political risks. First, the French public may sour on an Afghanistan going from bad to worse. Second, accusations already flying of Sarkozy being a poodle of U.S. foreign policy may start to really stick."

It's probably for those reasons that has Sarkozy conditioned the troop augmentation to NATO acceptance of a French plan he said will "allow the Afghan people and its legitimate government to build a peaceful future". Sarkozy isn't saying publicly what such a plan would involve, or how it might reverse the setbacks suffered by NATO. But the contents of that plan may well decide the fate of French involvement in Afghanistan.

Danish soldier killed, three Germans hurt in Afghanistan

March 27, 2008 - KABUL (AFP) - A Danish soldier was killed and another wounded and three German troops were also hurt in attacks in Afghanistan blamed on insurgents linked to the Taliban movement, military officials said.

Danish forces were on patrol Wednesday in the southern province of Helmand province, a hotbed of Taliban activity, when they came under fire, said a spokesman with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

"Regrettably as a result of the firefight one Danish soldier was killed and another was wounded," British Lieutenant Colonel Simon Miller told AFP.

In the far north two German soldiers were seriously injured and a third slightly wounded when a blast struck their vehicle near the city of Kunduz overnight, Afghan officials and the German military said.

The two seriously wounded would be evacuated to Germany soon, a spokesman for the military command centre in the eastern German city of Potsdam said.

Kunduz governor Mohammad Omar told AFP the blast was caused by a remotely detonated roadside bomb but this was not immediately confirmed by the German military.

"It was the enemies of peace in Afghanistan," Omar said. The term is most often used to refer to Taliban-linked militants. ISAF in Afghanistan did not immediately have information.

The Taliban were in government between 1996 and 2001 when they were removed for harbouring Al-Qaeda. Their attacks largely focus on the southern and eastern areas bordering Pakistan, where rebels' command and control structures are said to be based.

But there has also been violence in the north, sometimes blamed on other radical factions, ethnic groups or criminals. Germany has around 3,200 soldiers mostly deployed in a relatively peaceful northern Afghanistan. Three were killed in a suicide blast in Kunduz in May.

The country has been under pressure by NATO allies to send combat troops to southern Afghanistan, where the insurgency has been most deadly, but Berlin has said it plans to continue its focus on reconstruction in the north.

Denmark is one of the countries in the volatile south with around 550 troops in Helmand, where Taliban attacks are regular and the rebels are tied into a booming opium trade.

ISAF draws its 47,000 troops from 39 countries. It is helping the Afghan government restore security in the face of an insurgency by the Taliban, who were in government between 1996 and 2001, and push development.

More than 30 international soldiers have been killed this year, most of them in hostile action.

U.S.-led coalition forces kill 'several insurgents' in southern Afghanistan

The Associated Press - Friday, March 28, 2008

KABUL, Afghanistan: U.S.-led coalition forces killed several Taliban militants after coming under attack in volatile southern Afghanistan, a coalition statement said Friday.

The troops were searching for a Taliban insurgent involved in weapons trafficking in Helmand province when militants opened fire Wednesday with machine guns, hand grenades and rocket-propelled grenades, the coalition said.

The troops responded, killing several insurgents and wounding a woman who was not involved in the hostilities.

"A coalition forces medical specialist immediately tended to the wound, ensuring she was stabilized before transporting her ... to a medical facility for further treatment," said coalition spokesman Army Maj. Chris Belcher.

Helmand, the biggest opium poppy-producing region in the world, has been the front line of the bloodiest fighting between international security forces and Afghan insurgents in the recent years. The attack Wednesday occurred in Kajaki district.

More than 8,000 people were killed in the insurgency in 2007, the deadliest year since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

US Army suspends suspect Afghan munitions deal

WASHINGTON (AFP) — A defense contractor reportedly led by a 22-year-old has been suspended from doing business with the US government for allegedly supplying Afghan security forces with old Chinese-made munitions in violation of its contract and US law, officials said Thursday.

Until an investigation has been completed, AEY Inc. and its president Efraim Diveroli, have been suspended from future contracting with any US government agency, according to officials and army documents obtained by AFP.

Diveroli was notified in a letter March 25 that he had been suspended because he provided certificates declaring the ammunition was made in Hungary, "when in fact the majority of the ammunition was manufactured in the People's Republic of China between 1962 and 1974," according to the document.

Using Chinese-made ammunition violated the terms of the contract, the notice of suspension said. Army officials said it also violated a US law that prohibits arms purchases from China.

In January, investigators inspected munitions stored at a bunker in Afghanistan and found that 14 of 15 containers of 7.62-caliber ammunition supplied by AEY Inc. were manufactured in China, the army memo said.

The army's Criminal Investigation Division is conducting an investigation into procurement fraud, an army official said.

The army memorandum, which was prepared by its legal services agency, said making false or misleading statements was punishable by fines or up to five years in prison.

Representative Henry Waxman, chairman of a House committee that oversees government contracting, scheduled a hearing into the matter for mid-April.

The New York Times, which first disclosed the problems with the contract, said AEY Inc operates out of an unmarked office in Miami Beach, Florida.

Diveroli, it said, was 19 years old when he became president of AEY Inc in 2005 and began bidding on an array US government munition contracts. The company, which was founded by his father in 1999, has eight employees, the army said.

Between March and December of 2007, the army placed orders for more than 223 million dollars worth of munitions with AEY, according to the army memo.

Most of it was ammunition for AK-47 rifles and light machine guns, and grenades for rocket-propelled grenade launchers, the memo said. The Times said the ammunition AEY provided was more than 40 years old and in decomposing packaging.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the army was looking into the origin of the munitions and complaints about substandard packaging of the munitions delivered to Afghanistan.

US military officials in Afghanistan stated "no safety incidents were reported and (there were) no reports of any ammunition that has malfunctioned associated with this particular contract," he said.

"That said, there is some concern with the packaging of the ammunition that's not in accord with the type of standards that we would like to see and would expect in the performance of this contract," he said.

The Times said the contractor had worked with middlemen and a shell company on a US list of entities suspected of engaging in illegal arms trafficking.

It also raised questions about how the army vetted AEY, a previously unknown defense contractor whose principle officers had little experience in army procurement.

In 2005, the year Diveroli became president, AEY was awarded 59 contracts valued at 7.2 million dollars, primarily by the Defense and State Departments, according to the army memo. In 2006, it was awarded 48 contracts valued at 2.4 million dollars, it said.

The big step up came in fiscal 2007 when it was awarded 29 government contracts valued at 201.7 billion dollars.

"This extreme increase in the value of AEY's government contracts can be attributed to the award of ... a requirements type contract to provide non-standard ammunition to the Afghan National Police (ANP) and Afghan National Army," the memo said.

Afghan army trainers 'victims' of ammo scandal

Written by www.Quqnoos.com - Thursday, 27 March 2008 17:35

Company's contract cancelled for providing 40-year-old ammunition to national army A SENIOR member of the international force tasked with training Afghan security troops has said his team are the “victims” of a scandal that involves the sale of out-dated ammunition to the Afghan National Army.

The chief spokesman for the Combined Security Transition Command (CSTC) in Kabul said the force had received ammunition that was more than 40-years-old and did not meet the required safety standards.

The ammunition, which arrived in decomposing packaging, was sold to the US army by a company in America run by a 22-year-old man whose vice-president was a licensed masseuse.

The company, AEY Inc, rapidly became the biggest supplier of munitions to Afghanistan’s army and police force, with a US federal contract worth $300 million.

The 7.62mm bullets, sold to the army by AEY and used by the ANA and Afghan police in their AK-47 assault rifles, come from the aging stockpiles of the old Communist bloc.

And tens of millions of the rifle and machine gun cartridges come from China, according to an article published in the New York Times yesterday (Thursday), which revealed the extent of the scandal.

“We are the victims here. We are just the customers. Some of the ammunition we received from does not meet the standards that we want to see,” Lieutenant Colonel David G Johnson told Quqnoos.com.

Although he said that neither the ANA nor Afghan National Police had reported any safety incidents caused by the ageing ammunition, he did say that rusting or dented rounds could misfire.

He said it would not be “unrealistic” to inspect every single one of the hundreds of millions of bullets currently used by ANA and ANP forces on the battlefield in Afghanistan.

“There are quite possibly rounds that are faulty but we won’t know until we receive a report of a safety incident,” Lt Col Johnson said. A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence refused to comment on the scandal, saying that it would have to speak to the American before it could say how long it had known about the ammunition.

The US army was unavailable for comment at the time this article went to press. Lt Col Johnson said that the CSTC had alerted the US army about its concerns at the end of 2007.

But it has taken the army until now to suspend AEY from any future contracts

with the American government. AEY is also under investigation by the US Department of Defence’s inspector general and by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, after complaints were made about the quality and origins of ammunition it provided, and allegations of corruption.

CSTC, which is made up of a number of international stakeholders, is responsible for training and equipping the ANA, which is expected to number 70,000 soldiers in the near future.

UN's new Afghan envoy begins work

By Alastair Leithead, BBC News, Kabul

The new United Nations special envoy to Afghanistan, Kai Eide, has arrived in Kabul to take up his new post. The former British politician Lord Paddy Ashdown was blocked from taking the job by President Hamid Karzai.

"I'm not Paddy Ashdown, but don't under-estimate me," Mr Eide said in remarks to the BBC. He will attend a Nato summit in Bucharest next week which will be dominated by the international efforts in Afghanistan.

Mr Eide arrived at Kabul International Airport in a small United Nations plane from Dubai and made a brief statement.

He talked of bringing new direction and change to the international efforts in Afghanistan and made reference to a report released this week about the ineffectiveness of aid.

More money must be spent in the country on what the government wants, he told a news conference.

"One of the issues that has been highlighted is the need for better coordination," Mr Eide said. "The Afghan government has asked for that for a very long time and we have to respond in a better way than we have managed so far."

Mr Eide, a Norwegian diplomat, has been travelling to and from Kabul for the past five years.

The former British politician and High Representative in Bosnia, Lord Paddy Ashdown, was initially lined up for the UN special representative job, but his appointment was blocked by President Karzai in January.

Mr Eide is holding a series of meetings in Kabul over the coming days, including an audience with President Karzai.

2,300 police trainers needed for Afghanistan

BRUSSELS, March 26 (Xinhua) -- Some 2,300 police trainers are needed for Afghanistan, said Maj. Gen. Robert W. Cone, who is heading international efforts to train Afghan police. He asked for help from the international community to fill the shortfall.

The police trainers are needed for a new initiative to further reform the Afghan police, the U.S. officer told Brussels-based reporters through video link from Afghanistan.

The initiative, called Focused District Development, aims to both reform the police and improve local governance, public works, and elements of the rule of law. "We need additional police trainers to assist us to broaden this program," said Cone.

The program is planned in 52 out of 364 districts for this year, he said. At present, seven districts have accomplished the program while training is under way in eight other districts. He said currently 1,300 police trainers are working in Afghanistan.

Cone said training the Afghan police is a much more complicated issue than training the Afghan National Army as police are more corruption-prone.

Afghan police officers also have competence problems as many of them were members of former militia and did not receive professional education. Cone, commander of Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan, said the Afghan National Army can reach full strength of 80,000 by March 2009.

Currently, the army is 51,000-strong and another 10,000 soldiers are receiving training. However, the army is not expected to be fully independent until2016 as capabilities, such as air support, are still lacking, he said.

Afghan committee plans to remove foreign army bases from Kabul

KABUL (AFP) — An Afghan parliamentary committee is working on a draft proposal to demand foreign forces move their bases out of central Kabul to ease congestion in the overcrowded capital, an official said.

Traffic in the densely-populated city is often gridlocked because of the presence of barriers that block roads in.

The situation compounds further by concrete anti-blast blocks positioned around foreign military basses, some of them in the heart of the capital.

"International forces should remove their military bases from the city centre to the suburbs," Kabir Ranjbar, head of the lower house's inspection and oversight on law implementation committee, said Wednesday.

"Their presence in the centre of the city has caused lots of problems for the people," he said, adding that his committee has begun work on a draft proposal to address the problem.

"We're working on a draft proposal for the government to persuade the international force move out their bases from the city centre," Ranjbar told AFP.

About 70,000 International troops operating under NATO and the separate US-led force are based in Afghanistan fighting a Taliban insurgency which has been in its deadliest phase since early 2007.

Ranjbar said the proposal will also include a suggestion that the troops stop patrolling the city which was hampering the traffic.

"I think there's no need for foreign soldiers to patrol the city. Now we have our own security forces to do the job," he said.

Ranjbar's committee in a similar demand said Tuesday it wanted other security barriers, including one around a five-star hotel attacked by the Taliban in January, to be removed.

The Taliban's attack on the luxury Kabul Serena hotel in January has seen even more barricades coming up, mostly around embassies, international agencies and even private business.

The Serena, where three foreign nationals were among eight people killed, has itself undergone a security overhaul, with sandbags placed at its gates.

The Taliban threatened after the attack to target more places popular with foreign nationals.

70 percent of Afghans without safe drinking water: government

March 26, 2008 - KABUL (AFP) — About 70 percent of Afghans do not have access to safe drinking water, a government minister said Tuesday at the opening of the first of a chain of hydrological stations to monitor water supply.

"Only 30 percent of people have access to the safe drinking water while in rural areas it's only 15 percent," Deputy Minister for Energy and Water Shojaudin Ziaie said at the event at Qargha dam just outside Kabul.

The Qargha hydrological station is the first of 174 to be erected across Afghanistan to measure water resources, including rainfall, as well as water quality and levels, Ziaie said.

The 6.8-million-dollar World Bank funded-project will help scientists collect data about water resources over a period of about two years.

After three decades of war, Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world and lacks basic infrastructure for its people.

It is also plagued by drought, with UN officials warning last month of new water shortages with winter rains and snowfalls not as heavy as necessary.

New hydrological station will help manage Afghan water resources – UN agency

UN News Centre - 26 March 2008 – The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has helped open a new hydrological station at a dam near the Afghan capital, Kabul, as part of its joint efforts with the country’s authorities to better manage water resources in Afghanistan.

The station, at Qargha Dam, is one of a network of 174 hydrological stations and 60 snow gauges and meteorological stations being erected around Afghanistan to measure water levels, precipitation, temperature and water quality.

The network of stations, a joint effort of FAO, the World Bank and the national Ministry of Energy and Water, is designed to assist in the planning of water supply, irrigation and hydropower projects, as well as in the mitigation of possible droughts and the operation of reservoirs.

FAO engineers attending yesterday’s formal opening stressed that Afghanistan – which is slowly trying to recover after decades of war and misrule – can have no food security without water security. A lack of reliable water supplies hampers Afghanistan’s rural economy and can lead to increased rural poverty.

FAO said that aside from the building of the new station, Qargha Dam itself went through partial reconstruction work. The dam serves as a popular recreation site for Kabul residents and also provides water for the western part of the city and for 2,000 hectares of land.

Helmand: Derided Police Turn Over New Leaf

Despite their tarnished reputation, the province's police have recently scored major successes.

Institute for War & Peace Reporting - By Mohammad Ilyas Dayee and Zainullah Stanekzai (ARR No. 286, 26-Mar-08)

Helmand residents are saying that the province’s much-criticised policemen are becoming more effective, breaking up several major criminal gangs and helping the people of this beleaguered corner of Afghanistan to feel more secure.

Helmand, the centre of the Taleban insurgency and the world capital of opium poppy, has more than enough problems without common criminals. But kidnapping gangs have been on the rise, with dozens of people abducted and held for ransom.

Doctors, small-time businessmen, boys on motor scooters - anyone who looks to have a bit of cash and no protection is fair game.

Over the past year, at least 30 persons have been abducted in Helmand province. Some were released after their relatives paid the ransom, but others were killed. The authorities here would not give exact figures on these deaths. It is also quite likely that the number of abductions is underreported, given the population’s traditional mistrust of the police.

But in February, Helmand police rounded up a gang of 17 alleged kidnappers in the village of Adam Khan in Greshk district. A week or so earlier, they arrested six in Lashkar Gah, and before that, a gang in Nawa.

The message has gone out to the local population: the police are doing their best to shed the image of rag-tag thieves and drug addicts that they have enjoyed up until now.

“May God grant the police a long life,” said Haji Talib, a businessman from Musa Qala district. He was freed by police when they raided the gang in Adam Khan.

“I was abducted along with my car,” he recounted shortly after his release, handcuffs still dangling from his wrists. “They stole my money, about six million Pakistani rupees (approximately 100,000 US dollars) and made me call my family and demand another 50 million afghani (1 million dollars). Otherwise, they said, they would kill me and sell my lungs and liver.”

Relieved that his ordeal was over, Hajji Talib was effusive in his praise for his liberators.

“Police can do anything if they are given the right orders and instructed properly,” he said. “I am very proud of [Police Chief] Mohammad Hussain Andiwal.”

Andiwal came to Helmand province less than a year ago, with a mandate to reform the police. He told a large gathering soon after his arrival that a new era was dawning for Helmand’s law enforcement organisations.

“Let us forget about the past. I want the police to work well in the future. Do not forget our slogan: police are the servants of society.

I have spoken to the ministry of the interior, and told them that I will work in Helmand if you raise the salaries of the police. God willing, you will get higher salaries, but you need to work for the people and your communities,” he said.

Andiwal and his new policies have already made a significant difference in the province’s security, say residents.

“I was so happy when I heard about the arrests in Adam Khan,” said Bashar, a resident of Greshk. “Before this, we could only hope that the army would protect us. But now we see the police also can do such things. I am very proud of them, and I think that the police will get the support of the community if they catch thieves and other criminals.”

Helmand’s police force, like in much of Afghanistan, has been plagued by corruption, drug addiction, and inadequate training, which have hampered efforts at reform. One British officer, who was tasked with mentoring Helmand’s police force, remarked privately that the problems had seemed all but insurmountable. “We concentrated on training the traffic cops,” he said.

The poppy industry, which is by far the major economic activity in Helmand, had also fueled corruption. Farmers pay the police a negotiated rate to keep them from destroying their fields.

“The police have not come to my farm since I gave them 50 afghani per acre,” said Taza Gul, a farmer in Nad Ali district. In addition to large-scale corruption, the police often shake down residents for small sums.

Bismillah, a resident of Babaji village in Nad Ali, said that police checkpoints set up to ensure security have instead become yet another headache.

“One day we were out and had our women along with us. The police kept us waiting for over an hour, asking us for 100 afghani,” he complained.

The police have also earned a reputation as substance abusers; the drug treatment centre in Lashkar Gah has several officers who are trying to kick the habit. Many more are still using drugs, and still wearing their uniforms.

Police Chief Andiwal admits that there are problems. “We recently made a decision to discharge those who are using drugs,” he said.

Some of the problems are attributed to a lack of training, despite the high profile and generously funded programmes set up by the international community.

A training centre has been set up in neighbouring Kandahar, where recruits are taught the basics of law enforcement by Western officers and the US contractor DynCorp.

But, in Helmand at least, many would-be cops are not eager to spend time in the police academy, preferring to make a short-term killing and then get out. Nadir, an officer from Nad Ali, said he is not interested in a career with the police.

“This region is sometimes controlled by the Taleban and sometimes by the government,” he said. “What is the point in my studying in the academy?”

Ghafur, a police commander in Marja district, said that the force is so short of staff that they try to recruit directly, without sending the new officers to the academy.

“We do not have enough personnel to maintain security while some are off studying in the academy,” he said. “We need to use raw recruits.”

But Sawar, an 18-year-old graduate of the academy, recommended the training to all officers. He said recruits learn everything from how to properly use their weapons to how to conduct themselves professionally.

“Better training would do much to improve the image of Helmand’s police,” he added. Andiwal, too, insists that the recent run of success among the police was due to the training.

“We have not done much to better the lot of the police,” he told IWPR. “Their salaries are very low. But we have been successful in our training. It is the education of the police that has made the difference.”

Whatever the reason, Helmand’s police force has scored some major breakthroughs, both in actual arrests and in gaining the trust of the population. And support among the locals is key to combating crime, say officials.

“I can assure the people that we can get rid of these monsters if the community helps us,” said Andiwal. “All of our achievements were made possible by people, and if the people cooperate, we will have further successes.” Sher Zaman, an officer in the police headquarters in Lashkar Gah, agreed.

“We arrested that gang of [alleged] kidnappers in Adam Khan village because civilians cooperated with us,” he told IWPR. “People informed us of where they were, and we were able to take them. We can serve the community all the time, if they cooperate.”

But old habits die hard. “We would be much happier and work a lot harder if the government would raise our salaries to 10,000 afghani, ” said one officer in the Chan Jir area. “The new provincial police chief is very strict, and he wants to help people. But we have not been given new weapons or higher salaries. We do not have what we need.”

Nadir, who worked as a policeman for two years before he quit, also thinks that more pay would translate into better security for the people of Helmand.

“The major difficulty is salary,” he said. “When I was a policeman, salaries were very low, and I quit. Now salaries are about 5,000 afghani. Maybe if they boosted the pay even more, the police would work harder. And I would come back.”

Agha Noor Aka, a resident of Chan Jir, is happy with the modest pay hike, since his son is a police officer.

“My son has been in police force for ten months now,” he told IWPR. “At first, he brought nothing home at all. But now, once a month, he buys us sugar and candy. May God guide him!”

Adam Khan was not the only successful operation in recent weeks. Helmand police also rounded up a gang of six criminals in Lashkar Gah, in the Taleban-dominated Safian neighbourhood. Here, too, the cooperation of residents played a role.

“We had been after these people for a long time,” said one police commander, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “We found them because people who lived near them told us about their whereabouts, and we were able to arrest them.”

A similar operation in Nawa district also yielded a six-man gang of alleged kidnappers.

In early February, police were able to arrest two highwaymen who were using women’s clothing to disarm potential victims. They had already stolen one motorcycle, and were on their way to taking another one, when residents informed the police.

“We chased these men until nightfall,” said Andiwal. “Villagers helped us, and we found them in a local house, still dressed in women’s clothing.”

The arrest brought an added bonus: the police found a remote control bomb when they searched the house. The suspects told police that their older brothers were in the bomb-making business.

Even Helmand’s most sceptical residents are starting to believe in the police.

“I used to consider all government officials irresponsible, and had no faith that anyone could save me if I were abducted,” said Akram Kharoti, a resident of Nad Ali. “I never believed that police would bring thieves to justice. But now I am very happy. God willing, this country will be rebuilt if the police are active and work properly.”

Mohammad Ilyas Dayee and Zainullah Stanekzai are IWPR reporter trainees in Helmand.

Why the Taliban now embrace the concept of suicide bombing

GRAEME SMITH, The Globe and Mail, March 28, 2008

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- Suicide bombing used to be a subject of debate among the Taliban, as they struggled to decide whether the tactic was too extreme, but the frightening new reality in Afghanistan is that the radicals appear to be winning that argument within the Taliban ranks.

None of the 42 insurgents surveyed by The Globe and Mail were willing to express any reservations about suicide bombings when confronted by a researcher with a video recorder, and many of them boasted that they were ready to volunteer for such missions themselves.

Some Taliban have previously argued that it's cowardly to wear an explosive vest, because it prevents an insurgent from fighting his enemy face-to-face. Others suggested that the carnage among civilian bystanders that often results from a suicide blast alienates ordinary Afghans from the insurgency. A Taliban faction even took out an advertisement in one of Kandahar's weekly newspapers in 2006, blaming recent suicide bombings on foreign fighters and promising to stop the attacks: "We will punish them," the advertisement said.

A year later, in the same province, all insurgents surveyed said they disagree. Suicide attacks are endorsed by religious authorities, they said, and they represent the Taliban's equivalent of air power, a devastating weapon capable of carefully aimed strikes. Few of them blamed foreign jihadists for the attacks.

The researcher asked them if the suicide bombers "are only Afghans or are they foreigners?"

"They are sons of Afghanistan, and they are Afghans through and through," a fighter said. "They sacrifice their lives for their country."

A few of the Taliban seemed to acknowledge that it's a controversial means of fighting, but they claimed that such tactics are necessary against the overwhelming technological superiority of the foreign troops.

"Some people say that it is not good," an insurgent said. "But they don't know that against non-Muslims, it is very good, because they can stop any kind of attack but not these kinds of attacks." Another gave a similar explanation: "It is good to be used against the non-Muslims, because they are not afraid of fighting for five days against us but they are afraid of one bomber," he said. "I pray to God to make me able to do this."

The result of this shift in Taliban thinking has already become obvious in the number of suicide blasts. Afghanistan had never seen a suicide bombing before 2001, and the first such attack in the country - on Sept. 9, 2001, targeting Ahmad Shah Massoud, the famed rebel leader who was fighting the Taliban - was blamed on Arab extremists, not Afghans.

It does not seem likely that the sudden Taliban enthusiasm for blowing themselves up was driven exclusively by the insurgency's desire to kill more troops, analysts say, because so far the Taliban have proven themselves relatively incompetent at suicide bombing. A report for the United Nations in September found that, on average, more than three suicide bombers are required to inflict a single casualty on the international forces. "From a military point of view, this could be considered extreme failure," the report said.

But the act of sacrificing oneself has a symbolic value; suicide bombers are publicly demonstrating the ultimate level of personal commitment to an ideology. The Globe survey suggested that those who craft the Taliban's ideology, their religious leaders, have made an organized effort to prove suicide bombing is acceptable in Islam.

Several of the insurgents said they couldn't remember the specific reference to Islamic holy texts used by their teachers to justify the idea, but some made reference to a story about a Muslim army that existed in the seventh century, during the lifetime of the Prophet Mohammed.

"There is a story from the time of the Prophet," one insurgent said. "There were two companions of the Prophet, and ... they were attacking a place [where] the walls were high, so they could not jump over the wall." He continued: "One lifted the other over the wall and he died in the attack. He knew he would be killed, but it was his duty."

Turialai Wafa, former chief of staff to Kandahar's governor, said he has heard this justification before and it represents an incorrect view of Islamic teaching. A warrior who shows bravery in battle has nothing in common, he said, with somebody who breaks two major Islamic rules: committing suicide and attacking without first declaring intent.

"When one wants to justify an act of war to people - in Afghanistan's case, illiterate angry masses who cannot read but only hear what the mullahs and radicals are telling them - you can almost justify anything," Mr. Wafa said.

"The increase of suicide bombers recently has different causes, and one major one would be the lack of an alternative to express political opposition," Mr. Wafa added. "It takes either a strong resolve or absolute despair. My personal opinion is it's never, ever the strong resolve, but the absolute despair."

Rep. Ellison: Public, media ignore Afghanistan

March 26, 2008 - KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The war in Afghanistan is not a top issue in the U.S. presidential race because of a lack of interest among the American public and the media, a U.S. congressman said during a visit to the Afghan capital Wednesday.

Keith Ellison, a Democrat from the U.S. state of Minnesota, said he believes America's three leading presidential candidates are paying attention to the conflict in Afghanistan but the issue is not garnering wider interest.

"Either because of the public interest or the press, it's not a hot debate item, but I think it should be," Ellison said. "It's clear the focus in the presidential debate is on Iraq policy, but I wish the press would ask more questions about Afghanistan, what could or should be done to make sure Afghanistan's future is secure."

Ellison said he thinks that after the U.S. election in November any of the three top candidates — Republican John McCain or Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama — will pay more attention to Afghanistan than the Bush administration has.

Ellison is one of six U.S. congressional members who wrapped up a two-day visit to Afghanistan on Wednesday. The group met with President Hamid Karzai and U.S. Gen. Dan McNeill, the top NATO general in charge of the international military mission here.

Karzai told the group that terrorism continues to be a problem and that Afghanistan was in need of economic development, Ellison said. Karzai also said he supported elevating the status of women in Afghanistan. Most women still wear the all-encompassing burqa and have far fewer rights and opportunities than men.

Ellison is one of two Muslim members of the U.S. Congress. Ellison said religion did not play a role in the trip to the Muslim country.

The other members of the congressional delegation included Barbara Cubin, a Republican from Wyoming; Maurice Hinchey, a Democrat from New York; Betty McCollum, a Democrat from Minnesota; Jim Moran, a Democrat from Virginia; and John Tierney, a Democrat from Massachusetts. The group heads to Pakistan next to meet with political leaders there.

AFGHANISTAN: Disappointed With Karzai, NATO
By Anand Gopal - IPS

KABUL, Mar 28 (IPS) - The Shahr-e-now park in the centre of Kabul has seen better days. "It used to be really beautiful," Kabul resident Torialay says, "back during the early-90s. But after the Mujahiddin war (a civil war between warlords and commanders in the mid-90s that destroyed much of the city) it has never been restored."

"Look at this place," he says, waving his hand over a dusty lot filled with begging children and unemployed men. "The government and the Americans haven't done anything for us. And they haven't built roads or provided jobs. They've had six years to do it, but they haven't."

A growing number of Afghans are expressing dissatisfaction with the Karzai government and foreign presence in their country. With widespread corruption in government circles and a slow pace of reconstruction, support for ruling and foreign institutions are at an all-time low, experts say.

A recent report by the Senlis Council, an international think tank, says that "Kabul and the international community’s consistent promises of aid are simply not materialising in vast swathes of the country: in an already uncertain and tense environment, this sort of breach of trust breeds anger and resentment. Many Afghans are seeing no improvements in living conditions, and often they are seeing things grow worse."

An ABC news poll reports that the U.S.' approval rating in the country has dipped to 42 percent in 2007, down from 68 percent just two years ago.

"The foreigners do not help us," Kabul resident Zafar Nafisi, sitting on a curb in the park next to a shoe-shine boy, says. "They have spent billions of dollars in this country, but where has all the money gone? Why am I still sitting here in the park without a job?"

A new report by an umbrella group for non-governmental agencies operating in Afghanistan confirms this assessment. Of the 25 billion US dollars pledged for reconstruction, "just 15 billion dollars in aid has so far been spent," the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief (ACBAR) says, "of which it is estimated a staggering 40 percent has returned to donor countries in corporate profits and salaries."

"The reconstruction of Afghanistan requires a sustained and substantial commitment of aid -- but donors have failed to meet their aid pledges to Afghanistan. Too much aid from rich countries is wasted, ineffective or uncoordinated," the report goes on to say.

The United States has appropriated 127 billion dollars for military efforts in Afghanistan since 2001 and is currently spending nearly 100 million dollars a day and close to 36 billion dollars a year, according to aid agency reports. Yet the volume of all non-military international aid amounts to only 7 million dollars a day, ACBAR says. The agency reports that "in the two years following international intervention, Afghanistan received 57 dollars per capita, whilst Bosnia and East Timor received 679 dollars and 233 dollars per capita respectively."

Analysts also maintain that burgeoning insecurity adds to the general dissatisfaction with foreign forces. UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon reported recently that violence in the country went "up sharply" in 2007. Ban said there were over 8,000 conflict-related deaths and an average of 586 incidents per month, close to a 40 percent jump from 2006.

Large sections of the southern and eastern parts of the country are now inaccessible to aid workers, and criminal gangs are flourishing in the security-poor environment.

In the southern and eastern regions -- where fighting between coalition forces and the Taliban is particularly intense -- observers say the coalition troops' heavy-handed techniques are alienating many and fueling a Taliban resurgence. "The indiscriminate air strikes and the searching of innocent civilians' homes - if this continues it will make many people unhappy," government official Sadeq Mudaber says. A Senlis Council poll conducted last year found that 27 percent of villagers in rural southern Afghanistan openly professed support for the Taliban, up from just 2 percent in 2005.

For many Afghans, the dissatisfaction extends to the government. "I used to work for the government," Torialay says. "But I was laid off. Now I can't get a job -- if you want to get a government job you have to bribe someone, or you have to know someone."

Haroun Mir, deputy director of the Afghanistan Centre for Research and Policy Studies, says that corruption is endemic to all levels of government. At the top, he says, exist powerful figures who act as if they are above the law and feed a culture of impunity. At the bottom, poorly trained, compensated and motivated government employees incorporate bribery and other forms of corruption into their daily routine.

"Our judiciary system is so corrupt that there hasn't been a single person indicted for corruption," Mir says.

"I have to admit that the degree of administrative corruption in Afghanistan is high. I believe that the ongoing and widespread administrative corruption in the corridors of government is giving the Taliban a new lease on life," Afghan Vice President Abdul Karim Khalili recently told reporters.

Pakistan's new leaders tell US: We are no longer your killing field

Declan Walsh in Islamabad - The Guardian (UK), Thursday March 27 2008

The Bush administration is scrambling to engage with Pakistan's new rulers as power flows from its strong ally, President Pervez Musharraf, to a powerful civilian government buoyed by anti-American sentiment.

Top diplomats John Negroponte and Richard Boucher travelled to a mountain fortress near the Afghan border yesterday as part of a hastily announced visit that has received a tepid reception.

On Tuesday, senior coalition partner Nawaz Sharif gave the visiting Americans a public scolding for using Pakistan as a "killing field" and relying too much on Musharraf.

Yesterday the new prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, said he warned President George Bush in a phone conversation that he would prioritise talking as well as shooting in the battle against Islamist extremism. "He said that a comprehensive approach is required in this regard, specially combining a political approach with development," a statement said.

But Gilani also reassured Bush that Pakistan would "continue to fight against terrorism", it said.

Since 2001 American officials have treasured their close relationship with Musharraf because he offered a "one-stop shop" for cooperation in hunting al-Qaida fugitives hiding in Pakistan.

But since the crushing electoral defeat of Musharraf's party last month, and talk that the new parliament may hobble the president's powers, that equation has changed. Now the US finds itself dealing with politicians it previously spurned.

The body language between Negroponte and Sharif during their meeting on Tuesday spoke volumes: the Pakistani greeted the American with a starched handshake, and sat at a distance .

In blunt remarks afterwards, Sharif said he told Negroponte that Pakistan was no longer a one-man show. "Since 9/11, all decisions were taken by one man," he said. "Now we have a sovereign parliament and everything will be debated in the parliament."

It was "unacceptable that while giving peace to the world we make our own country a killing field," Sharif said, echoing widespread public anger at US-funded military operations in the tribal belt.

"If America wants to see itself clean of terrorism, we also want our villages and towns not to be bombed," he said.

US officials have long paid tribute to the virtues of democracy in Pakistan. But, as happened in the Palestinian Authority after the 2006 Hamas victory, policymakers are racing to catch up with the consequences of a result that challenges American priorities.

The US has long been suspicious of Sharif, whom it views as sympathetic to religious parties. Unlike Benazir Bhutto, whose return from exile was negotiated through the US, Sharif came under the protection of Saudi Arabia. But now Sharif's party, which performed well in the poll, is an integral part of the new government.

Yesterday Negroponte and Boucher travelled to the Khyber Pass in North-West Frontier Province, the centre of a growing insurgency. They met with the commander of the Frontier Corps, a poorly equipped paramilitary force that the US has offered to upgrade. The US has earmarked $750m (£324m) for a five-year development programme in tribal areas. At least 22 military instructors are due to start training the corps this year.

The timing of the American visit - before the new cabinet is announced - has offended Pakistanis. "It flies in the face of normal protocol at a time when public opinion is rife that they are making a last ditch effort to save Musharraf," said Talat Hussain, a prominent journalist.

It is unclear how Pakistan's foreign policy will be formulated in future. Musharraf's power may have been cut but the strong army is lurking in the shadows, and the coalition is wrangling over cabinet posts, including that of foreign minister.

Gilani must manage other tensions, particularly over whether to reinstate Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, the deposed chief justice who was freed from house arrest on Monday. Chaudhry has become a folk hero but is viewed with suspicion by Gilani's Pakistan People's party.

Afghan traders worried about worsening law and order in NWFP

By Jehanzeb Khan – Daily Times

PESHAWAR: Afghan businessmen at the Karkhano Market on Wednesday expressed concern over the deteriorating law and order situation in NWFP and deportation of Afghan refugees and said that they were becoming conscious of their relations with the local businessmen.

These businessmen migrated here when the situation deteriorated in their own country, but what’s bothering them now is where would they shift their businesses due to the deteriorating law and order in NWFP, they told Daily Times.

A majority of the shopkeepers in the multi-storey huge markets are Afghans, whom the local traders accuse of affecting their businesses. “We have more then 95 percent of the business here and still we are called refugees,” said an Afghan businessman.

He said they had faced problems here, but established business because they had no infrastructure left in their country.

“We have established our head offices here and set up factories inside Afghanistan, but a sense of insecurity has always struck our people that the Pakistan government might expel us from the country,” said Zarwali, an Afghan businessman.

Another businessman said, “We established around 500 shops and offices in the Karkhano Market, but neither are we registered with the government nor do we have any work permit.”

The Afghan businessmen are also worried about their existing stock inside Afghanistan and expect loot and plunder due to the law and order situation in their own country.

“We can neither shift our material to safer places nor have an alternative arrangement to save our items from destruction,” they added.

The main problem facing the Afghan businessmen is that they have established factories in Kabul with offices in Pakistan.

A majority of the relatives of Afghan traders are living in different countries. One trader said, “One of my daughters is in Canada, one in England and two brothers are in France. I have my business here, but my mother is in Afghanistan”.

The Afghan businessmen said it was their dream to see restoration of peace in their country so that they could continue their business in their own country. They agreed that they earn a lot in Pakistan, but still their business was considered illegal because they possess no permit and are not registered.

“We believe the government of Pakistan can seal our offices and stop our business whenever it wants, so a sense of insecurity always prevails among us,” the traders added.

Delay in clearance of oil tankers leads to Torkham border tragedy’

By Daud Khattak – Daily Times

TORKHAM: The undue delay in the processing and clearance of custom documents for fuel tankers on the part of the Afghan Government and US authorities at Bagram is a major cause of arson and bomb attacks on the vehicles, transporters and officials told Daily Times.

Nearly a dozen fuel tankers that supply oil to foreign troops in Afghanistan were gutted as a result of two bomb explosions on Sunday night at a makeshift parking lodge at Torkham. More than 20 tankers – of the 70 parked there at the time of the blasts – were partially damaged.

Fuel tanker owners and drivers said more than 80 people were injured in the inferno. The fire was later overcome with the help of the Afghan police and fire brigade staff from the other side of the border.

Owners involved: While border officials did not rule out the involvement of outside militants in the bomb and rocket attacks on oil tankers in Torkham, they also alleged that some owners were deliberately blowing up the vehicles.

As the vehicles carrying oil to the landlocked country are already insured, the owners burn them by extracting the fuel at the mid-point of their journey, after selling the fuel destined for the NATO and coalition troops in Afghanistan. The owners then claim the insurance amount in return for losses to their vehicles, said an official who did not want to be named.

“None of the drivers or conductors have so far been killed as a result of bomb explosion at a fuel tanker,” said the official.

However, the fuel tanker owners rejected the allegations as baseless. They said four such incidents had taken place at this location (Torkham) in a year. “Several of our colleagues and relatives have been injured in the blasts,” said Mohammad Ishaq Shinwari, while standing beside a gutted oil tanker.

Tankers prefer to wait on Pakistani side: While Shinwari spurned the allegations regarding owners’ involvement, he agreed that the delay in processing customs documents from the other side of the border usually created a rush in the parking lot, which increased the chances of terrorist activity.

A senior official at the customs office on the border crossing said, on condition of anonymity, that the customs office on the Afghan side of the border had received a fax message from the US authorities at Bagram, the main US military base located some 35 kilometres north of Kabul.

The fax message contains the registration number and other details of a fuel tanker. Without the message the Afghan authorities do not allow a vehicle to pass through their territory.

The official explained that the oil tankers had to wait on the Pakistani side of the border until the fax message was received by the Gumrak (Afghan customs) from Bagram. The Gumrak then sends the same to the customs officials on the Pakistani side of the border crossing.

Sometimes, the fuel tankers have to wait between 15 and 20 days due to a delay in the fax message. The message directs the Afghan officials to exempt the fuel tankers from all kinds of checks on the route to their destinations, which are usually US or NATO bases in Kabul or other provinces of Afghanistan.

“We are ready to allow them to cross the border any time, but the tanker owners prefer to wait and stay on this side because they consider it more risky to wait until the reception of the fax message on the Afghan side of the border,” said the official.

Customs complex at Torkham under consideration: Asked about the construction of a customs complex at Torkham, the official said the suggestion was still under consideration, and that there were some problems with the procurement of land for the complex. He said meetings were being held between officials and tribesmen to work on the proposal.

Contacted for comments, tehsildar of Landi Kotal Niaz Amin Khan said that the Khyber Agency’s Political Agent had issued a letter to the Assistant Political Agents in Landi Kotal and Jamrud two days ahead of Sunday’s incident. The letter instructed the border authorities not to allow any fuel tanker to cross the Takhta Baig check post unless the officials received the fax message and its clearance documents from the Afghan Government and the US authorities.

The tehsildar said that a formal message had been passed to the APA Jamrud in this regard and that the fuel tankers would be parked at Takhta Baig, an area located two kilometres from Peshawar, until the arrival of their clearance documents from the Afghan side. The tehsildar said that although this would not completely avert bombing incidents or arson attacks in the future, it would help reduce the risks to some extent.

Pakhtuns' aspirations for peace

Abid Jan Razarwal - Mar 25, 2008

KABUL (Pajhwok Afghan News): The coming into power of Pakhtun nationalists, in the Pakhtuns dominated North West Frontier Province of Pakistan, sharing a long border with Afghanistan and suffering as a frontline province in the ongoing 'war against terror' is a referendum on rejecting fundamentalism, extremism and the culture of suicide bombing.

The overwhelming victory of Awami National Party, a continuation of the Khudai Khidmatgar Movement of Bacha Khan, in the recently held general election is a clear proof that elements of extremism, fundamentalism and violence were alien to Pakhtun society and were implanted in the Pakhtun heartland by external and internal conspirators to promote their vested interest in Afghanistan. When Pakhtuns were provided the opportunity they rejected the politics of hatred, violence and bombings and voted the philosophy of non-violence, brotherhood and fellow-feelings preached by Abdul Ghafar Khan, popularly known as Bacha Khan.

Head of the Regional Studies Center of Afghanistan, Abdul Ghafoor Liwal in an exclusive chat with Pajhwok Afghan News said Pakistani agencies were trying to prove Pakhtun as a violent nation, allying with Al-Qaeda but the recent elections showed that Pakhtun voted nationalists parties which are advocating democracy and peace.

"The statement of Asfandyar Wali Khan, chief of Awami National Party after the election in which he said a totally wrong picture of Pakhtun has been depicted to the world is of great importance," he opined.

He said in this statement there is a clear message that the present war has been imposed on Pakhtun from outside

"And must be an eye-opener for the new Pakistani government and also for outer world," Liwal added.

He said the ISI has still been playing its old game of grabbing millions of dollars international organizations on the name of 'war against terror' and pitting Pakhtun against each other in tribal areas.

When asked that what would be the impact of Asfandyar Wali Khan's statement on Pakhtun, Liwal said Pakhtun have now got enough political conscious and that was why they voted nationalists parties into power.

Writer and political analyst Asadullah Ghazanfar told Pajhwok Afghan News such elements to depict Pakhtun as terrorists were active both in Pakistan and Afghanistan and the statement of Afandyar Wali Khan was an attack on those elements.

He said Asfandyar wanted to convey to the world that Pakhtun was a peace loving nation and the war was being imposed on them.

When asked that the war was being fought on Pakhtun land then how the statement of Asfandyar would change the international approach, Ghazanfar said the victory of nationalist forces in the recent elections was a clear proof the statement of Mr. Wali.

Ghazanfar was optimistic that the ANP would implement its electoral agenda and would work for the betterment and prosperity of war-weary Pakhtuns.

"Pakhtun are the most peace-loving, hospitable and brave people in the world having centuries old institutions like Jirga for resolving disputes but as a part of the great game played by super powers they are being depicted to the world as terrorists," remarked Dr. Prof. Ayaz Khan, a professor of Physics in Peshawar. He however said the results of the 2008 elections made it clear to the whole world that Pakhtun were a peace-loving nation.

Jehangir Khan, a Professor of English in Tangi College told Pajhwok Afghan News on phone that despite the fact that Pakhtun are deeply religious but they have a tolerant and secular society. He sited several proverbs of Pakhto language including this one "Ka tha kafar ye kho za ma zegar ye" (Even if you are a non-believer but you are my beloved) which clearly depicted the pluralism and secular nature of Pakhtun society.

[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.]