Les anglonautes

About | Search | Vocapedia | Learning | Podcasts | Videos | History | Arts | Science | Translate

 Previous Home Up Next

 

History > 2006 > USA > War > Afghanistan (I)

 

 

 

Capt. Al Goetz, at lectern, preparing for a memorial service Thursday at Fort Drum, N.Y.,
for soldiers who were killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan last week
 including Lt. Col. Joseph J. Fenty Jr. and Specialist Brian M. Moquin Jr.

Angel Franco/The New York Times        NYT        May 12, 2006

The News at the Base Was Bad, With More Likely to Follow        NYT        12.5.2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/12/nyregion/12base.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

Anti-U.S. Rioting Erupts in Kabul;

at Least 14 Dead

 

May 30, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 29 — A deadly traffic accident caused by a United States military convoy quickly touched off a full-blown antiAmerican riot on Monday that raged across much of the Afghan capital, leaving at least 14 people dead and scores injured.

Witnesses said American soldiers fired on Afghans throwing stones at them after the crash, though the United States military said only that warning shots had been fired in the air.

But the crash tapped into a latent resentment of the American military presence here, and violence radiated quickly through the city as rumors circulated that the crash might have been deliberate. Gunfire rang out as Afghan police officers and army soldiers tried to contain rioters who rampaged through the streets for about six hours, burning and looting a dozen offices, cars and police posts. By the end of the day at least 14 people were dead and more than 90 injured, hospital officials said. It was the bloodiest day in the capital since the fall of the Taliban in late 2001.

The Interior Ministry announced a nighttime curfew for the city for the first time in four years, from 10 p.m. until 4 a.m., and President Hamid Karzai called for calm on national television. "This country has been destroyed for years by rioters," he said, "and they are using this traffic incident as an excuse."

The speed and magnitude of the unrest was such that hundreds of police officers and soldiers struggled to contain the violence. The Afghan government and the American military authority issued statements promising full investigations of the accident.

It became clear the American military and the Afghan police and army had used their weapons to try to disperse the crowds. Scores of people were treated in hospitals for gunshot wounds.

A 7-year-old boy was among the dead, and two more schoolchildren were badly wounded, said Dr. Amin, the duty doctor at Khair Khana Hospital in the northern part of Kabul, who like many Afghans uses only one name. Four people died at the hospital, he said, and 60 wounded people were given first aid before being transferred to other hospitals.

Although the sudden explosion of violence may have been a reaction to the five deaths in the crash, it is a sign that Afghans are losing patience with the government and the foreign military presence in Afghanistan, residents said.

Ali Seraj, a businessman and a descendant of the Afghan royal family, contended that the American military showed a careless attitude toward human life that was becoming a growing problem, whether it was the bombing of villages in counterinsurgency activities in southern Afghanistan or car accidents in the capital.

"This type of attitude has created a great deal of mistrust and hatred," he said.

Just last week, President Karzai ordered an investigation of an American airstrike on a village near Kandahar in the south that killed at least 35 civilians. In another episode, the United States military said last month that it would investigate the killings of seven members of a family in an airstrike in Kunar Province in the east during an operation against insurgents.

On Monday, clashes began early in the morning when a truck leading an American military convoy smashed into 12 cars in rush-hour traffic as it went down a long hill from the Khair Khana pass just north of Kabul. Five civilians were killed and more injured in the multiple crash, a statement from Mr. Karzai's office said.

The United States military said in a statement, "A large cargo truck apparently experienced a mechanical failure." The statement continued, "This was a tragic incident, and we deeply regret any deaths or injuries resulting from this incident."

An angry crowd gathered and began stoning the American convoy, and the Afghan police when they arrived. "There are indications that at least one coalition military vehicle fired warning shots over the crowd," the United States military statement said. "We will determine the facts regarding the incident and cooperate fully with Afghan authorities."

Demonstrators and townspeople said the American troops had fired into the crowd as people gathered and started throwing stones.

One demonstrator, called Ahmadullah, was still shouting, "Death to Karzai!" and "Death to America!" hours after the initial event.

Demonstrators and townspeople also asserted that the American truck driver had deliberately rammed vehicles as he led the convoy from Bagram Air Base through outlying villages and then into the city. "The Americans came all the way from Bagram to Kabul and killed about 20 people along the way," said Fraidoon, a youth who was among the demonstrators.

He and other bystanders said up to a dozen demonstrators had been shot by guards as they tried to break into a British security company's compound in a downtown area.

Other protesters tried to reach the United States Embassy across town but were prevented by armed blockades of Afghan police officers and soldiers. Others attacked buildings in the commercial center of the city, and some marched on Parliament in the city's southwest, attacking a television company and pizzeria nearby.

By late afternoon the crowds had dispersed, leaving people to count the casualties and put out fires. The offices of the aid organization CARE International and the French nongovernmental organization known by the acronym Acted, a pizzeria, a Chinese guesthouse and a post office were among the buildings that were gutted by fire and ransacked.

Ground-floor windows of the newly opened Serena Hotel, Kabul's first five-star hotel, were smashed, and traffic police officers sat outside burnt roadside police posts. NATO troops evacuated diplomats and staff members from a European Commission compound downtown.

Mr. Karzai blamed opportunists and rioters for the violence. "Wherever you face these elements, do not let them destroy our home once again," he said.

In a sign of the political implications the event has for the government, the president promised to investigate the circumstances of the crash and to see that the Americans involved were punished if found to be guilty. He added that he had received a visit Monday afternoon from the United States ambassador, who had expressed his "deep regrets."

The demonstrators — overwhelmingly young men, even schoolchildren, carrying sticks and stones — were angry at the reports of deaths, but some also expressed frustration with the government, the police and the generally poor standard of living.

"Most of the demonstrators are people who have lost their jobs, and the government cannot provide the people with the basic necessities," said Mukhtar Ziayee, 33, a real estate salesman. "The people are disappointed."

But others were armed and intent on violence and robbery, residents said. Mohammed Arif Safajoy, the owner of the pizzeria that was attacked, estimated the rioters had done $50,000 damage there.

"This was just a demonstration in name," he said. "They were looters, these people who came to my restaurant." Among them were students from a nearby high school, and they carried off electric fans, dishes and antique ornaments, he said.

 

 

 

Hunger Strike at Guantánamo

MIAMI, May 29 (Reuters) — Seventy-five prisoners at the American naval base at Guantánamo Bay were on a hunger strike on Monday, joining a few who had refused food and been force-fed since August, a military official said.

Detainees are counted as hunger strikers if they miss nine consecutive meals, and most of the 75 reached that mark on Sunday, said a spokesman for the Guantánamo detention operation. Most are refusing food but continuing to drink liquids, he said.

Hunger strikes have occurred periodically since the first suspected Taliban and Qaeda fighters were taken to the base in 2002.



Ruhullah Khapalwak and Abdul Waheed Wafa contributed reporting for this article.

    Anti-U.S. Rioting Erupts in Kabul; at Least 14 Dead, NYT, 30.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/30/world/asia/30afghan.html?hp&ex=1148961600&en=19f215c33a2679a8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Kabul erupts as US troops fire on crash scene

 

May 29, 2006
Times Online 
By Simon Freeman and agencies

 

At least eight people were killed and another 100 injured after a United States military convoy crash in the Afghan capital Kabul set off violent anti-American street protests.

Reports suggest that three Humvees and three military lorries were involved in a road accident on the outskirts of the city during the morning rush hour.

A photographer for the Associated Press (AP) news agency at the scene said that the driver of one of the US cargo trucks lost control, apparently suffering faulty brakes, and ploughed into waiting traffic.

According to government sources, three people were killed in the crash which brought other drivers out of their cars. They began pelting the US convoy with stones as it attempted to drive away.

American troops are said to have opened fire, killing another four people. An investigation into this allegation has been launched.

The spontaneous protest sparked the worst rioting across the tense capital since the Taleban was ousted in 2001. Afghan police fired live rounds above the stone-throwing crowd as the US troops withdrew.

Shops were looted and cars burned, including police vehicles and a van belonging to an Afghan TV company. A reporter from AP described watching a civilian being dragged from his car and beaten.

Several buildings, including a police post and a sprawling compound belonging to the international aid group Care International, were ransacked. Computers were set on fire.

Around 2,000 people are said to have marched on the fortified palace of US-backed President Hamid Karzai shouting "Death to Karzai! Death to America!"

At least one person died as gunfire was exchanged between protesters - who were armed with sticks, knives and swords - and ranks of police attempting to seal off roads into the city centre.

Eyewitnesses told AFP that they had seen another man shot dead outside the Serena Hotel, a complex popular with Westerners and close to the presidential palace.

Bursts of automatic gunfire were also heard outside the US Embassy. Officials were moved to secure bunkers within the compound.

One of the protesters told AP: "These cowards [the US troops] opened fire into the crowd and killed them like sheep. First they drove into the people’s cars, destroyed them and then fired onto the people who were only throwing stones at them.

"They think Afghanistan is a playground where they can practise shooting."

Colonel Tom Collins, the US coalition spokesman, said he was aware of reports that US troops had fired in to the hostile crowd.

He said: "We will determine the facts regarding this incident and cooperate fully with the authorities. Compensation will be paid to those who are entitled to it."

The Afghan parliament broke off regular business and went into an emergency session to discuss the violence, calling for calm. The interior ministry set up a team to the area to establish the number of dead, reported to be as high as 30 by local media.

The Nato-led international peacekeeping force, ISAF, sent a helicopter to the scene but was asked to leave by Afghan police because it was further inflaming the protest.

By evening, most of the rioting had been stopped although there were sporadic outbursts of protest at the scene. A six-hour curfew was declared overnight.

In a televised address to the nation, President Karzai said that the unrest was caused by "opportunists and agitators". He warned that Afghanistan could not afford to allow internal enemies destroy the country.

“My wish from my countrymen is for them to deal seriously wherever they confront such elements and not allow them to destroy our home again,” he said.

The violence in the capital came as American sources told Reuters that more than 50 Taleban fighters had been killed in an airstrike on a mosque in the lawless southern Helmand province.

Amir Mohammad Akhundzada, the deupty provincial governor, said that several "Taleban leaders" were among the dead. Locals said that 16 civilians were among the dead.

The 1,500 British troops in Helmand have already encountered violent opposition from the resurgent Taleban thousands more are due to be deployed in the rebellious region in the next few weeks.

    Kabul erupts as US troops fire on crash scene, Ts, 29.5.2006, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2201720,00.html

 

 

 

 

 

4.15pm update

50 killed in Afghanistan air strike

 

Monday May 29, 2006
Staff and agencies
Guardian Unlimited

 

Around 50 Taliban fighters were killed in a US-led air strike in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province today, military and Afghan officials said.

Several Taliban leaders were among those killed in the pre-dawn attack in the Kajaki district, Amir Mohammad Akhundzada, the deputy provincial governor said.

"The Taliban were meeting in a mosque when the bombardment took place," Mr Akhundzada told Reuters. "More than 50 of them have been killed."

Major Quentin Innes, a Canadian spokesman with US-led troops in the south, said aircraft had dropped two 500lb bombs which had targeted a "compound" rather than a mosque.

The spokesman said the strike happened after a group of Taliban ambushed a troop convoy but did not inflict any casualties. "The group then fled into a compound ... and we estimate that up to 50 of the attackers may have been killed," he added.

A Taliban spokesman said no fighters had been killed and that all the victims were civilians.

US-led troops have carried out operations in rural areas of the south in the past two weeks, with the air strike taking the death toll to more than 370.

Most of those killed have been militants, but many civilians, dozens of Afghan security personnel and four soldiers have also died.

Before today's violence, up to 372 people, mostly militants, have been reported killed since May 17, according to military and Afghan figures.

Southern Afghanistan has seen some of the heaviest fighting since the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001 as US-led forces have responded to increased attacks from the Taliban in their former stronghold.

In a separate incident today, five Canadian soldiers were wounded in a gun battle after their convoy was ambushed by Taliban guerrillas in the neighbouring Kandahar province, a Canadian military spokesman said.

Meanwhile, thousands marched through the capital, Kabul, after security forces opened fire on protesters, killing at least seven Afghans and wounding 40. The clashes followed a fatal traffic accident involving a US military convoy.

A truck went out of control and crashed into a dozen vehicles, killing at least one person and injuring six. Afghans threw stones, smashing windows in the convoy vehicles, a US military statement said.

One of the US vehicles appeared to fire in the air. Afghan police also opened fire when they came to the assistance of the US troops.

It was unclear who was responsible for shooting into the crowd. Some eyewitnesses blamed the US troops, others blamed the police and some blamed both.

"There are indications that at least one coalition military vehicle fired warning shots over the crowd," a US military statement said.

A Reuters reporter at the scene saw one man shot dead and several wounded people being taken away, while rioters set two police cars alight.

At least seven civilians were killed during the protest, Karim Rahimi, a spokesman for the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, said.

The US said no troops had been hurt, and an investigation into the rush hour incident on Kabul's northern outskirts had begun.

By early afternoon, up to 2,000 protesters had gathered in central Kabul, some marching on parliament and some on the presidential palace.

Several hundred more congregated at an intersection leading to the heavily fortified US embassy, chanting "Death to America" and burning US flags.

"We don't accept Karzai any more as a president. We protest against him - death to Karzai!" Jaweed Agha, one of the protesters, shouted.

A few dozen people forced their way past a police cordon guarding the road to the US embassy and threw stones at vehicles carrying foreigners into the compound, prompting the occupants to fire into the air before turning back.

The protesters outside the embassy were later dispersed by police and Afghan army troops who fired into the air.

    50 killed in Afghanistan air strike, G, 29.5.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,1785358,00.html

 

 

 

 

 

Coalition strike in Afghanistan kills 5

 

Posted 5/27/2006 1:11 AM ET
USA Today

 

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A U.S.-led coalition strike on a militant training facility in Afghanistan's borderlands with Pakistan killed five suspected extremists, including senior Taliban leaders, the U.S. military said Saturday.

The military said that "key senior leaders of the Taliban network" were among the five dead in the late Friday strike on the site at the remote Qal'a Sak village, in Helmand Province.

No identities or precise numbers of the Taliban leaders killed were released. The military said the Taliban commanders have carried out attacks against coalition and Afghan army forces as well as Afghan officials and civilians.

Coalition forces said there were no civilian casualties in the strike and ground troops and destroyed war materiel at the scene, including machine guns and explosives. The coalition vowed further attacks.

"Enemy leadership will continue to be targeted so long as they pose a threat to the security and stability of Afghanistan," the military said in a statement.

Nearly a dozen people were killed in fresh clashes Friday between police and Taliban militants on Friday, while a human rights group estimated that 34 civilians died earlier this week in a U.S. airstrike on a southern village — double the official toll.

Extending more than a week of stepped-up violence, Taliban rebels ambushed a police patrol in central Ghazni province Friday and the ensuing battle left 10 militants and a policeman dead, local police chief Abdul Rahman Sarjang said.

Another 13 insurgents and two police died Wednesday in a battle in southern Helmand province's Sangin district, said local administrator Ghulam Muhiddin. It took two days for news of the battle to emerge due to the remoteness of the battle site.

As many as 365 people, mostly militants, have died in an upsurge of violence since May 17, according to Afghan and coalition figures. Because of the difficulty of accessing the scenes of combat, those figures could not be confirmed independently.

Abdul Qadar Noorzai, the director of the Kandahar office of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, said Afghans who had fled their small village of Azizi told him that about 25 family members died in one mud-brick home and that nine others perished in the village's religious school, or madrassa, during a strike this week by U.S. warplanes.

About 11 civilians were wounded in total, he said, and villagers reported burying about 35 "unknown people" — meaning militants from outside their area.

The estimate of 34 deaths more than doubles the number of dead civilians given by the governor of Kandahar and President Hamid Karzai, who said that 16 people had died.

The U.S.-led coalition has said its estimate of civilian deaths was in line with the governor's. Sgt. Chris Miller, a coalition spokesman, said Friday he wasn't aware of a new estimate and that the coalition's remained the same.

Haji Ikhlaf, a resident of Azizi who was wounded in the attack, told The Associated Press earlier this week that villagers had buried 26 civilians.

The coalition has said up to 80 militants were killed, although 60 of those fatalities were unconfirmed. It appeared to be one of the deadliest airstrikes since U.S.-led forces ousted the hardline Taliban regime in late 2001.

Karzai has called for an investigation into the airstrike and on Wednesday urged the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan to make "every effort" to ensure civilians' safety.

The U.S. military has said it takes "extraordinary measures" to protect Afghan civilians, but that Taliban militants were firing on coalition forces from inside the villagers' homes, and that troops had the right to return fire in defense.

Noorzai said he hasn't been able to visit Azizi to take a survey of the civilian deaths because security forces surrounding the area won't let anyone in.

Militants have increased their attacks in the last several months across Afghanistan's southern and eastern regions near the border with Pakistan. The U.S. military says it has seen an increase in the number of Taliban fighters, particularly in the south.

    Coalition strike in Afghanistan kills 5, UT, 27.5.2006, http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-05-27-afghan-violence_x.htm

 

 

 

 

 

Karzai Visits Site of Battle Where Many Civilians Died

 

May 26, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 25 — President Hamid Karzai made a surprise visit on Thursday to Kandahar, his hometown in the south, to visit civilians wounded in an American bombing nearby on Sunday.

Thousands of villagers have fled their homes and sought refuge in Kandahar because of the airstrikes and some of the most intense fighting in Afghanistan since the American invasion in 2001.

The president's visit was fleeting, and security was heavy. (He narrowly survived an assassination attempt there in 2002.) Speaking to a gathering of Pashtun tribal elders, he promised he would bring security to the region.

"He told us not to be worried about the situation, that let's wait and see, and that we will bring security," said Hajji Agha Lalai Dastagiri, a member of the newly elected provincial council in Kandahar who was present at the meeting.

"He promised the people that he would build Afghanistan, that God would rebuild it, that the international community was with us, and they would build Afghanistan and bring security to this region," Mr. Dastagiri said. "People were telling him we really need security, but that we do not need foreign troops and helicopters and tanks anymore: we Afghans should take care of it."

Taliban insurgents have appeared in force in recent weeks across southern Afghanistan, apparently in an effort to derail the deployment by NATO as it prepares to take over from American forces in the region. Some of the heaviest fighting has taken place in Kandahar Province and neighboring Helmand, and scores of Taliban fighters and police officers have been killed.

But it was the bombing on Sunday night in which civilians were killed that has turned the fighting into a political crisis for Mr. Karzai and caused thousands of civilians to flee.

Two thousand to 3,000 people have left a ring of five villages where the fighting has been raging this week and have arrived in trucks and tractors in Kandahar City, said Rahilla Zafar, a press officer for the International Organization for Migration. "The Taliban are taking over village communities, and the people are scared," she said.

Her office, which is closing down its operations for displaced people this week for lack of funds, has suddenly found 156 families in a refugee camp nearby who are appealing for urgent assistance to move out of the region, she said.

Fighting continued Wednesday in the Panjwai district, just west of Kandahar, and coalition forces bombed the area again, the United States-led force in Kandahar said in a statement. Two suspected Taliban insurgents were detained.

In the evening, troops clashed with a "sizable force of Taliban, who retreated into a house and continued fighting," the statement said. "Artillery and air support was used to destroy the enemy. Sporadic fighting continued through the night. We have no assessment of Taliban killed or wounded."

The estimate of the civilian casualties Sunday continued to rise.

Abdul Qadar Noorzai, the head of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission in Kandahar, who has been compiling numbers from families arriving at his office, said at least 33 civilians were killed when American planes bombarded Tolokan on Sunday. That would be double the number first reported.

According to the villagers' accounts, 24 members of one family who lived in a large mud-walled compound died and 8 were wounded in the first bombing attack, Mr. Noorzai said. In a second bombing, of a religious school, nine civilians were killed and three wounded, he said.

Villagers also reported that they had buried 35 Taliban fighters who were killed in the attack, he said.

The broader humanitarian crisis also seems to be worsening.

The United Nations World Food Program warned Thursday that 2.5 million Afghans would go hungry this winter if donors did not finance a program for the most vulnerable communities suffering from poor harvests and drought. A lack of funds has already forced the organization to cut some supplies, and it may have to close its winter program entirely, ending food assistance to 450,000 schoolchildren and their families, said Anthony Banbury, the regional director for Asia.

He warned at a news briefing that failure to keep the program could turn the people against the government and the international community, and push them into the arms of insurgents.

"If people are going hungry, if parents cannot feed their children, they obviously are going to be very dissatisfied with the current situation," he said. "And they may be tempted or even forced to take extreme measures."

Sultan M. Munadi and Ruhullah Khapalwak contributed reporting for this article.

    Karzai Visits Site of Battle Where Many Civilians Died, NYT, 26.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/26/world/asia/26afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

U.S. Airstrike at Taliban Kills Civilians, Afghans Say

 

May 23, 2006
The New York Times
By RUHULLAH KHAPALWAK

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, May 22 — American planes in pursuit of suspected Taliban fighters bombed a village in southern Afghanistan on Sunday night and early Monday, killing 16 civilians and wounding 15, among them women and children, the local governor and villagers said Monday.

The American-led coalition said it had conducted a "successful operation" in the area, and had killed from 20 to 80 Taliban fighters in the bombing, which struck the village of Tolokan.

The governor of Kandahar Province, Asadullah Khalid, expressed concern over the civilian casualties after visiting the wounded in the Kandahar city hospital, but he also urged civilians not to allow Taliban fighters to take refuge in their homes.

"As they were chased by the coalition, the enemy hid in civilian houses, and as it was nighttime and difficult to tell who is enemy and who is civilian, unfortunately we have civilian casualties also," the governor said. "We are upset about the civilian casualties."

A coalition spokesman, Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick, said in a statement issued in Kabul, the Afghan capital, that he was aware of reports of civilian casualties, and that coalition forces were reviewing reports from the ground.

The fighting over the past week in southern Afghanistan, against rebels allied with the country's former Taliban rulers, has been the most intense since the United States intervened in the country in late 2001 against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Hundreds of suspected Taliban fighters have battled Afghan and coalition forces in several southern provinces, resulting in scores of deaths.

Fighting that began last Wednesday has been raging in the Panjwai district, about 15 miles west of the city of Kandahar. In the Sunday night operation, coalition forces, led by Canadian troops on the ground and supported by American planes, mounted their second operation in a week against a large Taliban presence in and near Panjwai, a military statement said.

"The purpose of this operation was to detain individuals suspected of terrorist and anti-Afghanistan activities," said the statement, issued from Kabul. "These individuals were active members of the Taliban network and have conducted attacks against coalition and Afghan forces as well as civilians."

The coalition encountered organized resistance and called in additional ground and air support, another statement said.

Planes started bombing close to midnight Sunday and continued for four or five hours into Monday, said residents of Tolokan.

Mohammed Rafiq, a 23-year-old farmer, said the bombs had caused enormous destruction. "I don't have anything left," he said.

Another farmer, Azizullah, 30, said three members of his family had been killed. "I was at home when the Taliban came to our village last night," he said. "After some time, U.S. planes came and bombed the Taliban, and they bombed us, too."

When he went out in the morning to go to the hospital, he said, he saw dozens of dead Taliban fighters on the ground, apparently killed in the aerial bombardment. Sixteen villagers were also killed and 15 were wounded, he and other villagers said. Fifteen wounded people were in the hospital, including an 8-month-old baby, doctors confirmed.

Another villager, Taj Muhammad, said two of his brothers had been killed, and others in his family were wounded. He said that when the bombing started, the Taliban were desperately trying to take shelter and were not trying to fight.

    U.S. Airstrike at Taliban Kills Civilians, Afghans Say, NYT, 23.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/23/world/asia/23afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

50 Taliban Rebels Are Killed in Afghanistan

 

May 22, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:08 a.m. ET
The New York Times

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) -- U.S.-led coalition forces killed about 50 suspected Taliban militants in an airstrike on a rebel stronghold in southern Afghanistan, a spokesman for the force said Monday.

The attack occurred late Sunday and early Monday on the village of Azizi in Panjwayi district, Kandahar province, said a coalition spokesman, Maj. Scott Lundy.

''It was against a known Taliban stronghold and we believe it resulted in about 50 Taliban killed,'' he said.

Local residents claimed scores of civilians had also been killed and wounded. Lundy said the coalition was investigating this.

More than a dozen villagers, many of them wounded, fled the area to the main southern city of Kandahar early Monday. At the city's Mirwaise Hospital, one man, with blood smeared over his clothes and turban, said insurgents had been hiding in an Islamic madrassa religious school in the village after fierce fighting in recent days.

''Helicopters bombed the madrassa and some of the Taliban ran from there and into people's homes. Then those homes were bombed,'' said Haji Ikhlaf, 40. ''I saw 35 to 40 dead Taliban and around 50 dead or wounded civilians.''

Another survivor from the village, Zurmina Bibi, who was cradling her wounded 8-month-old baby, said about 10 people were killed in her home, including three or four children. ''There were dead people everywhere,'' she said, crying.

A doctor, Haji Mohammed Khan, said he had treated 10 people from the village.

    50 Taliban Rebels Are Killed in Afghanistan, NYT, 22.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Afghan-Airstrike.html?hp&ex=1148356800&en=7de451baddd4c55f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Afghanistan Bomb Kills American and Wounds 2

 

May 19, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, May 18 — An American counternarcotics official was killed and two other Americans were wounded in a suicide bombing on Thursday in western Afghanistan, while heavy fighting between forces suspected of being Taliban insurgents and the Afghan police continued in two southern provinces, officials said.

The violence occurred amid increasing reports of many militants moving around rural areas. The fighting killed 13 police officers and possibly dozens of insurgents, officials said.

"We confirm that a U.S. citizen contractor for the State Department Bureau of International Narcotic and Law Enforcement, working for the police training program in Herat was killed in a vehicle-borne I.E.D. attack," said Chris Harris, a spokesman for the United States Embassy, using the initials for improvised explosive device. "Two other Americans were injured; one critically, and one has minor injuries."

Col. Ghulam Sarwar Haidari, the intelligence chief for the provincial police department in Herat, a western town, said the attack was a suicide bombing. He said the bomber, who wore a long beard but was not identifiable, drove his car, packed with explosives, into the Americans' vehicle, which was part of a three-vehicle convoy on the main road leading north from Herat.

In what appeared to be another suicide car bomb attack on Thursday, the driver and a civilian passing on a motorbike were killed near an American military base in Ghazni Province, south of Kabul, the capital, said Hajji Sher Alam, the provincial governor. Another civilian was injured, he said.

A Canadian military statement released on Thursday described fighting in Panjwai, near Kandahar in the south, in which a Canadian soldier was killed Wednesday. The fighting in Panjwai lasted all day and through the night as coalition and Afghan police officers and army forces entered the district against scores of militants who have been moving through the area for weeks, the Canadian statement said. It said 18 fighters suspected of being Taliban members had been killed and 35 others had been captured. Local residents had told Afghan security forces of 15 armed men hiding in a mosque who were among those captured, the statement said.

In a second statement released in Kabul describing the fighting, Maj. Gen. Benjamin C. Freakley, the American operational commander of coalition forces, was quoted as saying, "This well-organized, cooperative engagement was exactly the operation needed to restore security to Panjwai, where extremists have been intimidating and threatening the people."

Heavy fighting also occurred Wednesday in the neighboring Helmand Province, when militants attacked a police post in Musa Qala, a district in the main poppy-growing region in the northern part of the province. The police fought the militants off, said a spokesman for the provincial administration, Hajji Muhaiuddin Khan.

He said 50 Taliban fighters had been killed, but conceded the police had found the bodies of only 10 militants. Thirteen police officers were killed and six wounded, and 10 militants were captured, he said.

Sultan M. Munadi and Abdul Waheed Wafa contributed reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, for this article.

    Afghanistan Bomb Kills American and Wounds 2, NYT, 19.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/19/world/asia/19afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

Taliban raid on Afghan town kills 53

 

Thu May 18, 2006 3:47 AM ET
Reuters
By Mirwais Afghan

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Taliban insurgents launched a major attack on a town in the southern Afghan province of Helmand and 13 policemen and 40 Taliban were killed in nine hours of fighting, government officials said on Thursday.

In a separate incident, a suicide car bomber attacked a convoy in the western city of Herat, killing himself and an American, police said. The American was a civilian State Department contractor, the U.S. embassy said.

The Taliban attacked the southern town, Mosa Qala, on Wednesday evening and the fighting went on until early on Thursday, government officials said.

"Thirteen policemen were killed and six were injured," the Interior Ministry said.

"Forty people on the enemy side were killed," a ministry official said, citing a statement from spokesman Yousuf Stanizai.

The Taliban have stepped up attacks on foreign and Afghan government forces in recent months. The violence in parts of the country is the worst it has been since the hardline Islamists were driven from power in late 2001.

Helmand's deputy governor, Amir Mohammad Akhundzada, said it was the biggest attack in the province since the end of Taliban rule. Hundreds of Taliban were involved, he said.

Fighting was continuing as security forces battled the insurgents as they withdrew, Akhundzada said, adding there had been some civilian casualties but he did not know how many.

British troops are in charge of security in the province but no foreign soldiers were involved in the battle, he and the Interior Ministry said.

The Herat provincial police chief said earlier a suicide bomber had attacked a military convoy and the dead American was a soldier. An Afghan soldier and interpreter had been wounded, he said.

But U.S. embassy spokesman Chris Harris said it was a civilian convoy and the dead American was a civilian training Afghan police.

 

CANADIAN KILLED

The Taliban focused their attack on Mosa Qala on government offices and police stations and many shops in the town's market caught fire during the battle, Akhundzada said.

The town, 470 km (300 miles) southwest of the capital, Kabul, is about 40 km (25 miles) north of the province's Sangin district, the scene of frequent clashes between Taliban and foreign and government forces.

A Taliban commander, speaking by telephone, said 30 policemen had been killed. Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency Taliban had captured the town but later withdrew.

The recent surge in violence comes as NATO members are sending reinforcements to boost their peacekeeping force from 9,000 to 16,000.

With about 23,000 troops, the United States now has its largest force in Afghanistan since its military involvement began in October 2001.

A Canadian woman soldier was killed in neighbouring Kandahar province on Wednesday, hours before Canada's parliament narrowly backed a two-year extension of Canada's Afghan mission to February 2009.

The U.S. military said 18 Taliban were killed and 26 captured in the fighting in Panjwai district, 25 km (16 miles) west of Kandahar town.

The Taliban were ousted by U.S.-led forces in late 2001 after refusing to hand over Osama bin Laden, architect of the September 11 attacks on the United States.

(Additional reporting by Yousuf Azimy)

    Taliban raid on Afghan town kills 53, R, 18.5.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-05-18T074729Z_01_SP4924_RTRUKOC_0_US-AFGHAN-VIOLENCE.xml

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Mourners preparing for a service at the chapel at Fort Drum.
It took two days for the names of soldiers killed in Afghanistan to be released.

Ángel Franco/The New York Times        nYT        May 12, 2006

The News at the Base Was Bad, With More Likely to Follow        NYT        12.5.2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/12/nyregion/12base.html
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The News at the Base Was Bad,

With More Likely to Follow

 

May 12, 2006
The New York Times
By JOHN KIFNER

 

FORT DRUM, N.Y., May 11 — When word came last Friday that a big Chinook helicopter had tumbled off a knife-edge ridgeline in the mountains of Afghanistan, killing 10 soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division, everybody at this sprawling base feared the worst for their loved ones.

Maj. Thomas T. Sutton, as Rear Detachment Commander, the officer left behind to care for the soldiers' families, was one of the few who knew just how close to home the news would strike. From the helicopter's manifest, he was certain that among the dead was one of the Third Brigade's most promising leaders, his boss, neighbor and friend, Lt. Col. Joseph J. Fenty Jr.

But by the strict rules of the Army, he could not tell anyone — most important, not Colonel Fenty's wife, Kristin, who had given birth to their daughter, Lauren, only last month — until the bodies were positively identified. The process took nearly two days — two days in which Major Sutton had to keep his terrible news a secret.

"This was a huge burden for me," he said. "This was very unusual, because in this case the news was out, but no one has the details."

Death in the Army comes with its own strictly honored rules and rituals. And at this base near the Canadian border, the latest round of death has provided a window into the close-knit, mutually supportive world of today's all-volunteer military, a world unknown to most Americans even though hundreds of thousands have cycled through Iraq and Afghanistan, many for second or third tours.

In recent years, the Army has organized what it calls Family Readiness Groups, a support structure for families that mirrors the military organization, with the wives of the commanders at, for example, company and battalion level heading a committee of those units' soldiers' wives. Much of their work involves coping with the Army's forms and regulations on pay, housing and other matters, as well as providing a social network, particularly important when the soldiers are deployed.

But their duties also include helping the base cope with death, of which there has been plenty in recent years: the division has had 38 soldiers from Fort Drum killed in Iraq and now 21 in Afghanistan; 11 soldiers died in a helicopter crash in training here on March 11, 2003.

And more bad news is likely to come. As the Army's most-deployed division, the 10th Mountain has its First Brigade in Iraq and its Third Brigade in Afghanistan, a total of 10,494 troops. Its Second Brigade is just back from training in California and is heading for Iraq this summer.

"No one likes to talk about death," Major Sutton observed. But at meetings with the families in December, before the Third Brigade left, there was frank talk of the procedures followed for a fatality — including a listing of close friends — along with discussions of military paperwork, winter driving and a forthcoming dance.

For Major Sutton, a boyish-looking Rutgers graduate and his wife, Amy, who supervises the F.R.G.'s, as the support groups are known in Army style, it was time to put those painful procedures into effect.

"I do a lot of the 'green-suit' stuff," he likes to say, "but she has the skill sets to deal with the families."

News of the helicopter crash was on cable television channels early Saturday morning.

"All the calls started coming in," Major Sutton recalled. "Mothers, grandmothers, sisters, literally from all over the world. Hour by hour, people were calling back" for more information.

By Saturday evening, Major Sutton had notification teams in dress- green uniforms standing by in a number of locations. But, in the steep terrain where the helicopter crashed, it was not until Sunday morning that the last two bodies were recovered and identified, and the ordered, formal process could go forward.

The helicopter had fallen around 8 p.m., Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick, the division's spokesman, said by telephone from Afghanistan. With six crew members aboard, it was picking up a group of nine soldiers operating an observation post on the ridge in Kunar Province as part of Operation Mountain Lion, which is aimed at driving the Taliban out of the northeastern border region.

Colonel Fenty, commander of the Third Squadron, 71st Cavalry Regiment, and three of his troopers had just boarded the Chinook when it tipped and plunged into the ravine, exploding into fire and burning beyond all recognition. The Army is investigating the cause but says no enemy fire was involved.

"It was steep and rugged terrain, 60-degree drops to the left and the right, Colonel Fitzpatrick said. "It was completely catastrophic. It took two days to complete the arduous task of recovering the bodies."

As darkness fell, the remaining soldiers and nine more from a nearby ridge secured the area, Colonel Fitzpatrick said, and the next day a recovery team, including marines and an Air Force parachute-medical-rescue unit, was assembled to bring the bodies out by rappelling down cliffs and climbing back up.

The hard task of notifying Colonel Fenty's wife fell to Lt. Col. Michael Howard, an officer of equal rank and a close friend of the family, who strode to her door in the dress green uniform the wives dread. "I heard the scream," recalled Major Sutton, who was standing nearby. "The crying, the wailing. 'No, why?' Then a total breakdown."

Colonel Howard was reluctant to speak of his role, but said "before I left the home, there were five women there. As soon as we passed the news they were there fast."

Among the women were the three that Mrs. Fenty had listed on her readiness form as her closest friends: Christina Cavoli, whose husband commands an infantry battalion; Andrea Bushy, whose husband is an artillery commander; and Gretchen Timmons, whose husband was Colonel Fenty's executive officer, or No. 2. Amy Sutton was there, too. Mrs. Fenty had headed the squadron's F.R.G.; now it was she who needed support.

They all live close together in two-story grayish frame houses on the base, in a section of winding streets set aside for majors and lieutenant colonels, and they socialize often — dinner parties, walking dogs, taking children to the school bus. With the soldiers deployed, it looks like a neighborhood of women and children.

"Forward, it's brothers-in-arms," Major Sutton said. "That's who you fight for. It's the same thing here. It's sisters, that's who will come to the rescue. They'll set up camp in her house and do her chores and protect her."

Military families move frequently but bond quickly, Ms. Cavoli said, adding that the support network is "a system that's familiar, that they can plug into very readily. Typically, we don't have serious bad news to deal with."

Colonel Fenty had built the cavalry squadron — a new formation in an Army reorganization that relies on integrated brigade combat teams — from scratch, officers here said. With about 500 troops, it is smaller than an infantry battalion of around 800 and is designed primarily for reconnaissance. The troops liken it to scouts in the old West and have adopted black Stetsons and spurs.

"We're the eyes and ears of the brigade," said Capt. Al Goetz, the rear detachment commander. "Whether you're on a horse or a donkey, a Humvee or a Bradley, the job hasn't really changed. We're like dragoons. In reality, we're really dismounting a lot in Afghanistan. We're not afraid to get off those vehicles."

Captain Goetz was finishing writing a eulogy on Thursday morning for a midday chapel ceremony honoring Colonel Fenty and the three others from 3-71 Cavalry. Closed to outsiders, it was being videotaped for Lauren Fenty to see when she is old enough.

Colonel Fenty seemed, at least at first, a very private man, Captain Goetz said. But "he was very concerned about his families," he said.

    The News at the Base Was Bad, With More Likely to Follow, NYT, 12.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/12/nyregion/12base.html?hp&ex=1147492800&en=6682b0a70fffafa1&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

US says strike near Afghan border kills 4 militants

 

Mon May 8, 2006 4:18 PM ET
Reuters

 

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A U.S. air strike killed four suspected Taliban or al Qaeda fighters close to the Afghanistan-Pakistan border on Monday, the U.S. military said.

U.S. ground troops later found the guerrillas dead and captured a fifth, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Fitzpatrick said at the U.S. military base at Bagram outside Kabul.

The attack was launched after U.S. and Afghan forces spotted a group of suspected militants loading a truck with rockets stored in a cave in the Bermel district of Paktika province, less than 1 km from the border with the Pakistani tribal region of South Waziristan.

The air strike came on the heels of criticism by a senior U.S. official of Pakistan's efforts to stop Taliban fighters crossing into Afghanistan to attack U.S. and Afghan forces.

"We called in air support and struck that truck," Fitzpatrick said. "We sent a ground force to the cave and found four dead enemy combatants and captured one combatant."

Pakistani security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, had earlier said the attack had taken place inside Pakistani territory, but Fitzpatrick said the U.S. forces used satellite positioning data to confirm the target's location.

"It was close, it was within a kilometer or so of the border, but it was clearly within Afghanistan," he said

"During this operation we were in contact with Pakistani military forces on their side of the border. They knew what we were doing," he added.

However, three men wounded in the U.S. airstrike were brought for treatment to the Pakistani bordertown of Angoor Adda, and according to the Pakistani officials' version they had been mining for minerals in the nearby mountains.

Pakistani military and government spokesmen could not be immediately contacted.

Pakistan does not allow foreign forces to operate inside its territory, and the government is sensitive to criticism that it has already gone too far in helping the United States.

It has deployed close to 80,000 troops in the border areas and they have killed more than 300 militants in neighboring North Waziristan since mid-2005. It has lost more than 50 soldiers in the fight against foreign al Qaeda militants and their supporters among the local tribes.

Henry Crumpton, the U.S. State Department's coordinator for counterterrorism, said in Kabul on Saturday: "Has Pakistan done enough? I think the answer is 'no'.

"Not only al Qaeda, but Taliban leadership are primarily in Pakistan, and the Pakistanis know that," Crumpton said, adding that eliminating militant safe havens in Pakistan's tribal lands was crucial.

Crumpton's comments were a rare public admonishment of Pakistan by a member of the U.S. administration, and were a sign of growing frustration with the Taliban's resurgence since late last year. A Pakistani spokesman dismissed his remarks as "highly irresponsible".

    US says strike near Afghan border kills 4 militants, R, 8.5.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-05-08T201814Z_01_SP130614_RTRUKOC_0_US-SECURITY-PAKISTAN-USA.xml&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-L3-Top+NewsNews-9

 

 

 

 

 

10 U.S. Soldiers Are Killed in Afghan Helicopter Crash

 

May 7, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 6 — Ten American soldiers were killed when their helicopter crashed Friday in eastern Afghanistan, near the Pakistani border, the United States military said Saturday.

The crash took place close to a landing zone and was not caused by hostile fire, a military spokeswoman, Lt. Tamara Lawrence, said. The bodies were being recovered Saturday, she said, and an investigation into the cause was under way.

The soldiers were among 2,500 coalition and Afghan forces taking part in an offensive operation in a remote part of Kunar Province, about 150 miles east of the capital, Kabul. Insurgents are known to be based in the region, and the military has been flying soldiers into high mountain ridges there to cut off escape routes.

Forces of the Taliban and Al Qaeda have joined mujahedeen groups in the area who are loyal to a renegade commander, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. The insurgents have been attacking coalition and government forces, mostly with remote-controlled mine explosions on the mountain roads. Four United States soldiers were killed there on March 12.

Kunar has been one of the most dangerous areas for the United States-led coalition and Afghan forces. It is across the border from a Pakistani region that Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, are thought to visit from time to time.

Friday's crash brings to 25 the number of American soldiers killed this year in Afghanistan, where a coalition force of about 20,000 is active. In 2005, 84 American service members were killed, the highest number in any year since military operations began in Afghanistan in 2001.

A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, claimed responsibility for Friday's crash when he was reached by telephone, saying Taliban fighters had shot down the helicopter, a Chinook transport. "Whenever we shoot them down, they announce it as a technical problem," he said of the coalition forces. "This is their propaganda." But Lieutenant Lawrence said Saturday that so far there was no indication of hostile fire. People on the ground at a landing zone near where the helicopter crashed as well as people aboard other aircraft in the air at the time of the crash did not see any signs of fire, she said.

Insurgents used shoulder-held rocket-propelled grenade launchers to shoot down two American military helicopters last year. One helicopter was carrying 16 people, including eight Navy Seal commandos, and went down in Kunar Province in July. The second, with five American crew members on board, was shot down in September in Zabul Province, in southeast Afghanistan.

In the Zabul crash, the United States at first said hostile fire was not involved, but investigators later confirmed that the helicopter had been shot down.

At a news briefing in Kabul on Saturday, Henry A. Crumpton, the American coordinator for counterterrorism, said he believed that Mr. bin Laden was hiding on the Pakistani side of the border. "We are very confident that he is along the Afghan-Pakistan border somewhere," Mr. Crumpton said while on a visit to Pakistan and Afghanistan. He said there was "a higher probability that he is on the Pakistan side, but no guarantee of that." He added that Pakistan was still not doing enough to deny Taliban forces sanctuary in Pakistani border areas.

"Not only al Qaeda, but Taliban leadership are primarily in Pakistan, and the Pakistanis know that," he said. "It's something we have to help the Pakistanis work through because it cannot remain a safe haven for enemy forces."

    10 U.S. Soldiers Are Killed in Afghan Helicopter Crash, 7.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/07/world/asia/07afghan.html?hp&ex=1147060800&en=1083832635dfbd7e&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Britain Takes NATO Command as Afghanistan Mission Grows

 

May 5, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 4 — Britain took command of the NATO peacekeeping force in Afghanistan on Thursday, in preparation for the expansion of its role into the turbulent southern and southeastern areas of the country in what a NATO representative called the alliance's most challenging operation to date.

Lt. Gen. David Richards assumed command in a short ceremony at which he issued a warning to insurgents that he intended to build a strong security force with NATO and American forces under a unified command. General Richards took charge immediately of 9,000 troops of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force stationed here in the capital and the northern and western parts of the country, where their focus is on supporting reconstruction activities. By the end of July, he will assume command of NATO and other forces in southern Afghanistan, adding combat operations against insurgents.

The arrival of some 6,000 NATO troops in the south will allow the United States to reduce its force of 19,000 troops by 2,000 to 3,000 in August. American forces will remain in the border provinces of eastern Afghanistan and are expected to come under the NATO flag by November, giving General Richards command of the military force across the country.

"It will be NATO's most challenging ground operation ever," Hikmet Cetin, the alliance's civilian representative in Afghanistan, said at a news briefing after the ceremony. "NATO cannot afford to fail in Afghanistan, for the whole world and the whole region."

He said the alliance was sending its elite force, the Allied Rapid Reaction Corps, to take on the task.

"As we know, security in the south and southeast is still borderline," he said. "NATO will be challenged, but as NATO is ready for this challenge, it will not be discouraged. We will do what is needed for success."

The departure of American troops from southern Afghanistan has already raised concerns among Afghans there as they face an increasingly violent insurgency. General Richards, who has led British peacekeeping forces in East Timor and Sierra Leone, sought to reassure them.

"I am more than confident the skeptics will be proved wrong," he said, asserting that the number of foreign troops in southern Afghanistan would double with the arrival of NATO forces; that the number of Apache helicopters available to them would increase; and that American aircraft would remain in support of NATO troops.

The new British commander promised to use military force against those who continued to oppose the Afghan government by violent means. He also said he would collaborate closely with the military command in Pakistan to deny the insurgents sanctuary.

General Richards also spoke of the Afghan government's efforts against opium poppy growers, saying that NATO forces would not be directly involved in poppy eradication.

Mr. Cetin said he was also planning to visit Pakistan. "Without the cooperation of the whole region, we will not have stability," he said.

NATO does plan to do some things differently, General Richards said. At a news briefing after the ceremony, he said NATO would not hold detainees, nor would it hand them over to American detention facilities, but would pass them to the Afghan law enforcement agencies under a carefully monitored system.

Asked if his troops would continue to raid houses, which has upset Afghan civilians, he said that while he would not prohibit his troops from searching a house, he was advising that if there were any doubts about the necessity, they should not do so.

    Britain Takes NATO Command as Afghanistan Mission Grows, NYT, 5.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/05/world/asia/05afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

Taliban Threat Is Said to Grow in Afghan South

 

May 3, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

TIRIN KOT, Afghanistan, April 27 — Building on a winter campaign of suicide bombings and assassinations and the knowledge that American troops are leaving, the Taliban appear to be moving their insurgency into a new phase, flooding the rural areas of southern Afghanistan with weapons and men.

Each spring with the arrival of warmer weather, the fighting season here starts up, but the scale of the militants' presence and their sheer brazenness have alarmed Afghans and foreign officials far more than in previous years.

"The Taliban and Al Qaeda are everywhere," a shopkeeper, Haji Saifullah, told the commander of American forces in Afghanistan, Lt. Gen. Karl Eikenberry, as the general strolled through the bazaar of this town to talk to people. "It is all right in the city, but if you go outside the city, they are everywhere, and the people have to support them. They have no choice."

The fact that American troops are pulling out of southern Afghanistan in the coming months, and handing matters over to NATO peacekeepers, who have repeatedly stated that they are not going to fight terrorists, has given a lift to the insurgents, and increased the fears of Afghans.

General Eikenberry appealed for patience and support. "There has not been enough attention paid to Uruzgan," he said in a speech to the elders of Uruzgan Province gathered at the governor's house in Tirin Kot, the provincial capital. "I think the leaders, the Afghan government and the international community recognize this. There is reform coming and this year you will see it."

The arrival of large numbers of Taliban in the villages, flush with money and weapons, has dealt a blow to public confidence in the Afghan government, already undermined by lack of tangible progress and frustration with corrupt and ineffective leaders.

This small one-street town is in the Taliban heartland, and the message from the townspeople was bleak.

Uruzgan, the province where President Hamid Karzai first rallied support against the Taliban in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks, is now, four years later, in the thrall of the Islamic militants once more, and the provincial capital is increasingly surrounded by areas in Taliban control, local and American officials acknowledge. A recent report by a member of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan shown to The New York Times detailed similar fears.

The new governor, Maulavi Abdul Hakim Munib, 35, who took up his position just a month ago, controls only a "bubble" around Tirin Kot, an American military officer said. The rest of the province is so thick with insurgents that all the districts are colored amber or red to indicate that on military maps in the nearby American base. Uruzgan has always been troublesome, yet the map marks a deterioration since last year, when at least one central district had been colored green, the officer said.

"The security situation is not good," Governor Munib told General Eikenberry and a group of cabinet ministers at a meeting with tribal elders. "The number of Taliban and enemy is several times more than that of the police and Afghan National Army in this province," he said.

Uruzgan is not the only province teetering out of control. Helmand and Kandahar to the south have been increasingly overrun by militants this year, as large groups of Taliban are reportedly moving through the countryside, intimidating villagers, ambushing vehicles, and spoiling for a fight with coalition or Afghan forces.

Insurgents also have the run of parts of Zabul, Ghazni and Paktika Provinces to the southeast, and have increased ambushes on the main Kabul-Kandahar highway.

The Bush administration is alarmed, according to a Western intelligence official close to the administration. He said that while senior members of the administration consider the situation in Iraq to be not as bad as portrayed in the press, in Afghanistan the situation is worse than it has been generally portrayed.

Asked about the surge in Taliban activity in southern Afghanistan, a Pentagon spokesman, Bryan Whitman, said: "We have seen Taliban activity fluctuate from time to time." The British-led NATO force taking over from the American troops in the south "has well-equipped, well-led and fully prepared forces to operate in this challenging environment and deal with any threats," he added.

He noted that the United States would continue to be the largest contributor of troops to Afghanistan, and would continue to have primary responsibility for counterterrorism operations and for training Afghan Army units, even with NATO taking over in the south.

In one of the most serious developments, some 200 Taliban have moved into the district of Panjwai, only a 20-minute drive from the capital of the south, Kandahar, Mr. Karzai's home city. The police and coalition forces clashed with them two weeks ago, yet the Taliban returned, walking in the villages openly with their weapons, and sitting under the trees eating mulberries, according to a resident of the district.

The resident, who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals, said the Taliban had been demanding food, lodging and the Muslim tithing, zakat, from villagers. Their brazenness and the failure of the United States-led coalition to deter them is turning public opinion about the effectiveness of the government.

For the first time the Afghan government has sent 500 men of the newly trained Afghan National Army to the neglected province. The official police force of Uruzgan is 347 strong, with 45 men deployed in each of the five districts, but far fewer actually turn up for work. American officials estimated armed Taliban in the province numbered from 300 to 1,000 men. The governor estimated there were 300 armed insurgents in each district.

The Taliban are warning the people to expect more attacks, the shopkeeper, Mr. Saifullah, told General Eikenberry. "During the day the people, the police, and the army are with the government, but during the night, the people, the police, and the army are all with the Taliban and Al Qaeda," he said.

Another man, Rahmatullah, told the general that his brother had been arrested by American forces and the raids and house searches had made the young men take to the hills to join the militants. "Release my brother and the tribal elders will persuade the young men to come back home and stop fighting," he said.

"The unemployment rate is very high and the people of Uruzgan are very poor," said Mullah Hamdullah, the elected head of the provincial council.

Unsure of the strength and commitment to fight of the incoming NATO forces — with British, Canadian, Dutch and Australian contingents — Afghan provincial officials, who stand first in the Taliban's firing line, have demanded that Mr. Karzai provide them with hundreds more police officers and weapons.

The governors of Uruzgan and Kandahar both said in interviews that they have lobbied the president for a force of 200 police officers for every district — four times current numbers — and to provide more resources to equip and supply them properly.

In a recent strategy review, Mr. Karzai agreed to increase the government presence in the frontline provinces, his chief of staff, Jawed Ludin, said. "We are increasingly hearing this, that there only 40 officers per district, and half of them are protecting the district chief as bodyguards, and the other half are on leave," he said.

A deputy minister of the interior, Abdul Malik Siddiqi, told the gathering that the government had a plan to send 200 to 250 police officers to each district of Uruzgan, and to find resources to equip them and pay their salaries.

General Eikenberry expressed caution about the idea, warning that there were not enough trained officers to send to the area, and more important, a lack of good leaders to control those police forces.

Uruzgan has suffered from a lingering Taliban presence and its forbidding terrain, which has made security and governing extremely difficult, resulting in neglect from the central government, he said. There has been no police reform or training here, no presence of the Afghan National Army and virtually no development, he said.

General Eikenberry is hoping to turn things around this year with new and better local leaders. "Now we see a lot of those conditions changing," he said, in an interview in the cockpit of the C130 military plane on the way to Uruzgan. Replacing the governor, and police and intelligence chiefs, should allow for reform and better governance, he said. Some 500 men of the national army have been deployed in the province and the police should receive better resources.

Hopes are pinned on Maulavi Munib, an educated, religious man from eastern Afghanistan, who was deputy minister of tribal affairs of the Taliban government. He is starting from scratch since the former governor sold all his vehicles, including police vehicles, and all the arms and ammunition owned by the province.

Governor Munib's past brings an added complication, since he remains listed by the United Nations Security Council sanctions committee as a wanted member of the Taliban leadership, which technically bars any government from providing financial, technical or military assistance to his province.

The Afghan government has formally requested that he, and three other former Taliban officials, including two members of Afghanistan's new Parliament, be removed from the list, a process that demands the agreement of all Security Council members, but Afghan officials said Russia remained opposed to the proposal.

    Taliban Threat Is Said to Grow in Afghan South, NYT, 3.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/03/world/asia/03afghan.html?hp&ex=1146628800&en=0692a5a972d58a3a&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Karzai's Holiday Pardons Set an American Free

 

May 1, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 30 — An American imprisoned here after being found guilty of running a private jail and torturing detainees was released Sunday under a presidential pardon.

President Hamid Karzai granted an early release to Edward Caraballo, 44, an independent filmmaker from the Bronx, and to all other prisoners with less than a year to serve. Mr. Caraballo had served 21 months of a two-year sentence. The pardons were in honor of two national holidays, the Prophet Muhammad's birthday and Afghanistan's defeat of Communism.

Mr. Caraballo was convicted in 2004 along with two other Americans, Jonathan K. Idema, known as Jack, and Brent Bennett, former members of the United States military. All three were arrested at a house in Kabul where Afghan security forces said they found Afghan detainees and signs of interrogations. Mr. Idema and Mr. Bennett, who are serving longer sentences of five and three years, respectively, remain jailed.

"I am not trusting it until it happens," Mr. Caraballo said Sunday from the prison, hours before getting on a plane. He said that American Embassy officials and the Afghan prison chief had first told him he was to be released Saturday, telling him to get ready to leave that afternoon. "I am ready for it," he said of the shock of going from an Afghan prison to the United States. "I just want to get back and see my daughter."

Mr. Caraballo had been trying to convince Afghan authorities of his innocence by distancing himself from Mr. Idema and Mr. Bennett. He said he was a journalist who had been filming Mr. Idema's group and was not involved in its activities. His original sentence of eight years was reduced on appeal last year.

A convoy of vehicles from the United States Embassy escorted Mr. Caraballo to the airport. An Afghan airport official said the embassy had asked that reporters be prevented from speaking with Mr. Caraballo.

During the trial, Mr. Caraballo was given little chance to state his case. The court found all three men and four Afghan employees guilty of involvement in the detention and torture of eight Afghan detainees. Several of the detainees were witnesses at the trial.

Mr. Caraballo said his release was expedited after he narrowly escaped a lynching during a prison riot.

All three Americans were imprisoned in Pul-i-Charkhi, a sprawling Russian-designed prison in Kabul with 1,000 inmates, some of them suspected of links to the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Suspected members of Al Qaeda attacked prison guards on two occasions and then tried to reach the Americans, apparently in attempts to kill them.

In continuing violence, three Afghan soldiers were killed Sunday by a remote-control roadside bomb, Reuters reported. Three other Afghan soldiers were wounded in the blast, which took place in Helmand Province, in the south.

On Sunday morning, the body of an Indian engineer kidnapped with his Afghan driver on Friday afternoon was found beheaded beside the main highway in southern Afghanistan, Afghan officials said. A Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.

The Taliban had set a 24-hour deadline for the Indian government to withdraw all Indian workers and diplomats from Afghanistan in return for the kidnapped man's release.

The engineer, identified only as Mr. Surayanarayan by his employer, the Roshan telephone company, was killed when he tried to escape Sunday morning, Taliban officials said. "When he tried to escape, the mujahedeen shot him in the back," Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, the Taliban spokesman, said in a telephone interview. "We wanted to negotiate and give more time, but it happened suddenly."

Mr. Ahmadi denied that the engineer had been beheaded but added that "irresponsible fighters" could have done it. He said the Afghan driver would be released unharmed.

Ruhullah Khapalwak contributed reporting for this article.

    Karzai's Holiday Pardons Set an American Free, NYT, 1.5.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/world/asia/01afghan.html?hp&ex=1146542400&en=f207f6c7b909b8ce&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Afghan Bomb on Road Kills 4 Canadians

 

April 23, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 22 — Four Canadian soldiers were killed Saturday when their vehicle was blown up by a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan, Canadian military officials said.

The explosion hit their patrol in the mountainous Shah Wali Kot district of Kandahar Province, where Canadian troops took over from American forces last month and where complaints about their actions had started to emerge from villagers.

Three of the soldiers were killed instantly, and the fourth died at a military hospital after being evacuated to Kandahar, a Canadian military spokesman, Maj. Quentin Innis, said by telephone.

The explosion, detonated by a technically advanced remote controlled device, was probably the work of an insurgent cell, he said.

The Canadian soldiers had mounted a large operation in Shah Wali Kot, beside Afghan Army and police forces, to make their presence known, meet the villagers and search for insurgents and explosives.

That operation has run into trouble. An Afghan youth hit a Canadian soldier in the head with an ax in March in a nearby village, Shinkay, about seven miles from where the bomb attack occurred Saturday. The soldier is still in the hospital, in a coma; the Afghan youth was shot dead by other soldiers at the time.

Members of a family from Gumbad, the village where the Canadians are based, said Saturday in a telephone interview that the bombing had been organized by villagers who were angry about what they described as inappropriate treatment during searches.

One elder, whose family asked that he not be identified for fear of reprisals, denounced the Canadian troops for bringing dogs into the village mosque and peoples' homes, and for conducting intimate body searches.

"I am an educated person, and I know a bit about how they do things, but I am getting angry when they are bringing dogs to my mosque and to my house," the elder said. "I also feel like attacking them with an ax, but I lack the courage."

Major Innis said that the Canadian force had not received such complaints from villagers, and that the sophistication and cost of the bomb was such that it was unlikely to have been set by them.

    Afghan Bomb on Road Kills 4 Canadians, NYT, 23.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/23/world/asia/23afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

Renewed fighting in Afghanistan

 

Updated 4/19/2006 10:42 PM ET
USA TODAY
By Tom Vanden Brook

 

Fighting between allied forces and Afghan insurgents has spiked in 2006 as the Afghan government tries to widen its control over the country 4½ years after U.S. forces ousted the Taliban regime.

The latest surge in fighting started last month, when the Taliban announced a spring military offensive aimed at destabilizing the U.S.-backed government of President Hamid Karzai. U.S. and NATO forces have vigorously fought the Taliban and increased their pursuit of other insurgents and drug traders, said Lt. Col. Todd Vician, a Pentagon spokesman.

Late Wednesday, a huge explosion rocked the capital city, Kabul, near the diplomatic area where the U.S. Embassy is located. Embassy spokesman Lou Fintor told the Associated Press that the explosion appeared to have been caused by a rocket. An Afghan security contractor was wounded.

The increased fighting is a sign "the Taliban and al-Qaeda have regrouped to a troubling extent," said Ted Galen Carpenter, a military expert at the Cato Institute, a think tank in Washington. The Taliban, a fundamentalist Islamic faction, led Afghanistan until the U.S. invasion in October 2001.

Other signs of more fighting:

•Afghan insurgents are using many more improvised explosive devices (IEDs), which are the largest killer of U.S. troops in Iraq. Wednesday, two Canadian soldiers were injured by a roadside bomb in the southern province of Helmand, and two U.S. troops were injured Tuesday by an IED in Zabul, another southern province.

"We're starting to see some tactics, techniques and procedures that you could draw a conclusion that may have come from training in Iraq," Maj. Gen. Benjamin Freakley, commander of the Army's 10th Mountain Division in Afghanistan, said last month.

•U.S. airstrikes in Afghanistan almost tripled in March compared with March 2005, Pentagon records show. That roughly matches the increased fighting, Vician said.

U.S., Pakistani and Afghan military officials met in Pakistan on Wednesday to discuss the increased IED threat.

Vician said Taliban fighters seem to be testing NATO troops who are taking on an increased role there. There are about 23,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan and about 9,000 from NATO and other nations.

Anthony Cordesman, a defense expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said relatively low U.S. casualties may offer a false sense of success while much remains at stake. In Afghanistan, 223 U.S. servicemembers have been killed, compared with 2,379 in Iraq.

The Taliban and al-Qaeda resurgence is in part because of the U.S. shift toward Iraq in 2003, Carpenter said.

"We may have had an opportunity to deal a death blow to the Islamic fighters in Afghanistan at that time, but if we did, we missed that opportunity," Carpenter said.

Contributing: Wire reports

    Renewed fighting in Afghanistan, UT, 19.4.2006, http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-04-19-kabul-blast_x.htm

 

 

 

 

 

US-led forces probe Afghan civilian deaths

 

Mon Apr 17, 2006 1:23 AM ET
Reuters
By Sayed Salahuddin

 

KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led coalition forces have launched an investigation into the deaths of seven Afghan civilians during an offensive against Taliban and other militants in the east of the country over the weekend, a statement said.

Coalition forces used warplanes and artillery to flush out a group of eight to 10 suspected insurgents from a house and a cave in Kunar province, the U.S. military said in a statement late on Sunday.

"After the battle, coalition forces determined that civilians had been caught in the fire. Initial reports indicate that seven civilians were killed and three were wounded near the fighting," it said, adding an investigation was underway.

Residents of Kunar said that 10 civilians were killed in Saturday's bombing by U.S.-led troops.

The operations in Kunar and in the southern province of Kandahar were launched after a surge of attacks on Afghan and foreign forces since the Taliban announced a spring offensive last month.

The U.S. military said a separate investigation had been launched after the Afghan National Police reported it had suffered casualties, possibly due to friendly fire, during an operation with U.S. forces against the militants near Kandahar.

"We are investigating the incident and we will work jointly with the government of Afghanistan to determine the events that took place during this fight," Brigadier General David Fraser, commander of the multinational brigade for the south, said in a statement on Monday.

Afghan forces and coalition helicopter gunships had killed 41 militants in a fierce battle during a raid on a suspected Taliban hide-out in Kandahar province, the governor said. But the Taliban denied the claim.

U.S.-led troops overthrew the Taliban government in Kabul after its leaders refused to hand over al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, architect of the September 11 attacks on the United States.

Afghans say thousands of civilians have been killed in the coalition operations against the insurgents since then.

    US-led forces probe Afghan civilian deaths, R, 17.4.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-04-17T051332Z_01_ISL127228_RTRUKOC_0_US-AFGHAN-VIOLENCE.xml

 

 

 

 

 

Dozens Reported Killed in Attack on Taliban

 

April 16, 2006
The New York Times
By RUHULLAH KHAPALWAK and CARLOTTA GALL

 

SARTAK, Afghanistan, April 15 — Afghan security forces, backed by American helicopters and Canadian soldiers, fought a large number of Taliban rebels in a battle on Friday that ran through several villages in Afghanistan's southern Kandahar Province, officials said Saturday. The fighting was some of the heaviest in months, and dozens of rebels and six Afghan policemen were reported killed.

The rebels have emerged in large numbers in recent weeks, moving through villages across the southern regions as their leaders have announced a spring offensive against foreign forces and their Afghan government allies. Before that, large concentrations of Taliban fighters had not been seen for months, as the militants switched last summer to the guerrilla tactics of roadside bombs and suicide attacks.

Friday's operation was largely an Afghan one, part of new tactics under the Canadian command, which took over from American troops in Kandahar Province in February. After reports came in that rebels were concentrating in western Kandahar, Afghan police and some Afghan Army units went into the area at dawn on Friday, backed by American Apache attack helicopters and supported on the ground by a company of Canadian troops.

The Afghans fought for three hours before calling in support, said Lt. Col. Ian Hope, commander of the Canadian force in Kandahar, who was at the scene. Canadian troops provided a cordon to block the escape of the Taliban rebels, he said. The American helicopters, according to villagers, fired on farmhouse compounds, wounding civilians, damaging homes and killing animals.

The governor of Kandahar Province, Asadullah Khaled, said in a news briefing on Saturday that 41 rebels had been killed. Six Afghan policemen were killed — including four thought to have been killed by fire from the American helicopters — and nine police officers were wounded, Afghan officials and villagers said. At least one Afghan woman was killed in the cross-fire and two more civilians were injured, villagers and doctors at a Kandahar hospital said. No coalition soldiers were hurt.

Villagers confirmed that a large group of Taliban fighters had suddenly appeared several days ago. In a telephone call from his base at the Kandahar airfield, Colonel Hope said that the Taliban group was 50 to 60 strong, and that the police were still hunting for remnants of it in the villages. The group represented just part of the Taliban guerrillas who had moved into western Kandahar Province, he said.

The first large groups of rebels emerged last month in neighboring Helmand Province. One group attacked a coalition base in the poppy-growing district of Sangin last month, forcing a battle that killed an American and a Canadian soldier. The Taliban group from that attack may be the same one that arrived in the past few days in the Panjwai and Zhare districts of Kandahar, near the fighting on Friday, Governor Khaled said.

Villagers who were caught in the cross-fire on Friday in the village of Sartak confirmed that many Taliban had come into the area several days earlier, but said that they had not come into the village itself. They angrily denounced the police and the coalition for coming to fight them in the village and causing civilian casualties and damage to homes.

Muhammad Nasim, 40, a farmer and father of nine, said American helicopters fired on his farmhouse compound and peppered the fields around. At least four rockets hit the compound, killing some of his animals but not hitting the room where his family was taking shelter, he said. "I am a poor man, and I built this room with a lot of difficulty, but the Americans came and destroyed it," he said. Mentioning President Hamid Karzai, Mr. Nasim said, "Karzai promised us development; instead they are bombing us."

Another villager, Hafizullah, 35, who uses only one name, said his sister Bibi Pari, 19, had been shot dead by the police as she fled across a wheat field with his two children. As she fell in the field, the children, a boy of 12 and a girl of 5, crawled on their stomachs until they reached a neighbor's house, he said.

Zaher Shah, 21, was shot in the stomach as he rose from his prayers at the village mosque at midday. "There were hundreds of Taliban moving around the area," he said. "I saw 30 to 40 Taliban one day. They had heavy machine guns and very new Chinese Kalashnikovs," he said.

He said the Taliban had visited the mosques in the region, although not their village, and asked people to bury any fighters killed in battle so the "infidels" would not take their bodies.

Ruhullah Khapalwak reported from Sartak for this article, and Carlotta Gall from Kabul.

    Dozens Reported Killed in Attack on Taliban, NYT, 16.4.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/16/world/asia/16afghan.html?hp&ex=1145246400&en=3ae69817a65618be&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Afghan Forces Hit Taliban Hideout, Kill 41

 

April 15, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:06 a.m. ET
The New York Times

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) -- Afghan security forces backed by coalition helicopters attacked a suspected Taliban hideout in southern Afghanistan, setting off an intense gunbattle that killed 41 rebels, a provincial governor said Saturday.

Six Afghan police officers also died in Friday's fighting in Sangisar, a town 25 miles southwest of Kandahar, said Asadullah Khalid, the provincial governor.

''Acting on intelligence reports that Taliban have gathered in Sangisar to plan an attack in Kandahar, we launched this operation Friday and the fighting continued from morning to evening,'' he said.

Taliban forces have threatened to step up attacks against coalition and Afghan soldiers during the warmer spring and summer months. Coalition forces have been particularly disturbed by an increase in suicide attacks.

    Afghan Forces Hit Taliban Hideout, Kill 41, NYT, 15.4.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Afghan-Fighting.html?hp&ex=1145160000&en=2cbb34fb1a2c956c&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

US-led troops in air attack on Afghan militants

 

Fri Apr 14, 2006 11:58 AM ET
Reuters

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Six Taliban guerrillas were killed in an air strike by U.S.-led troops in eastern Afghanistan on Friday after blasts elsewhere in the country killed three policemen and wounded two British troops.

The air strike was carried out in Kunar province as part of Operation Lion launched on Wednesday to flush out militants from the area, officials said.

Afghanistan has seen a surge of attacks on Afghan and foreign forces since the Taliban announced last month they had launched a spring offensive.

Three policemen were killed on Friday when a remote-control bomb hit their truck on a main road outside the southeastern town of Khost, said provincial police chief Mohammad Ayoub.

Earlier, two British soldiers from a NATO-led peacekeeping force were among three people wounded in suicide car-bomb attack in Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital of the southern province of Helmand.

None of the wounds were life threatening, a British spokeswoman said.

The attacker died as he rammed his car into a vehicle near the entrance of a base used by foreign troops, said senior provincial official Mahaiuddin, who uses one name. The Taliban telephoned Reuters to claim responsibility.

Last week, a suicide bomber wounded three Americans at the same place, and on Monday three British soldiers were wounded by a roadside bomb in Helmand.

The Taliban have been running an insurgency since being ousted by U.S.-backed forces in late 2001.

Elsewhere on Friday, foreign and Afghan forces, backed by air support, launched an offensive against Taliban fighters hiding in Maiwand district of Kandahar province, said Rahmatullah Raufi, a senior Afghan National Army commander.

Jet fighters pounded the area, and fierce fighting was underway. Fleeing villagers said they saw plumes of black smoke rising and the main highway linking Kandahar to western provinces was also cut.

At least on Afghan soldier was killed in the fighting, a provincial official said.

In central Uruzgan province, U.S.-led troops and Afghan soldiers killed two insurgents and captured two, who the U.S. military said had been recruiting suicide bombers.

(Reporting by Sayeed Ali Achakzai, Mirwais Afghan, Kamal Sadaat)

    US-led troops in air attack on Afghan militants, NYT, 14.4.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-04-14T155755Z_01_ISL5160_RTRUKOC_0_US-AFGHAN-VIOLENCE.xml

 

 

 

 

 

Afghan battle probed for possible "friendly fire"

 

Tue Apr 4, 2006 2:59 AM ET
Reuters

 

KABUL (Reuters) - An investigation has been launched into an Afghan battle last week in which an American and Canadian soldier were killed and five men wounded to determine if any were hit by their own side, the U.S. military said on Tuesday.

A joint U.S., Canadian and Afghan team will investigate the March 29 battle in the southern province of Helmand which began when a large group of Taliban insurgents attacked a foreign military base.

"The investigation will determine all the facts and circumstances surrounding the incident, including whether any of the casualties may have resulted from friendly fire," the U.S. military said in a statement.

As well as the two deaths, a U.S. soldier, three Canadians and an Afghan soldier were wounded in the battle.

The U.S. military gave no further details of the investigation.

The battle on Wednesday last week was the biggest in Afghanistan for months and came on the same day the Taliban announced they had launched a spring offensive in their campaign to oust foreign troops.

U.S.-led forces, backed by aircraft, killed 32 of the Taliban attackers, the U.S. military said.

Four Canadian soldiers were killed and eight wounded in a friendly-fire incident near the southern town of Kandahar in 2002 when a U.S. F-16 fighter mistakenly bombed the Canadians while they were on a training exercise.

The United States has more than 19,000 troops in Afghanistan battling Taliban insurgents in the south and east.

Canada has 2,300 soldiers in Kandahar where it commands a multinational task force.

    Afghan battle probed for possible "friendly fire", R, 4.4.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-04-04T065845Z_01_ISL176618_RTRUKOC_0_US-AFGHAN-VIOLENCE-INVESTIGATION.xml&archived=False

 

 

 

 

 

Two foreigners, 3 Afghans killed in blast

 

Tue Mar 28, 2006 6:05 AM ET
Reuters

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A roadside blast in Afghanistan on Tuesday killed five people, including two foreigners, a provincial governor said.

Taliban guerrillas, who have been battling foreign troops and the Western-backed government since their ouster by U.S. and Afghan opposition forces in late 2001, claimed responsibility for the blast.

The two foreigners, two Afghan guards and an Afghan driver were killed in the blast in the western province of Farah, said provincial governor, Izatullah Wasifi.

Wasifi said he did not know the nationality of the foreigners or their company.

A representative of the American company USPI, which provides security for road construction projects, said the dead men worked for his firm.

The representative, who declined to be identified as he was not authorized to speak to the media, said one of them was a South African.

Violence has intensified in Afghanistan in recent months just as the United States is hoping to trim its force of about 19,000 troops in Afghanistan by several thousand, and as NATO members are sending about 6,000 more.

In a separate incident, two suicide bombers were killed when one of their bombs went off prematurely, police said.

The pair were killed while walking along a road on the outskirts of the southern city of Kandahar, which has been hit by a wave of violence in recent months, including suicide attacks on foreign troops.

"We've established that the two were suicide attackers and were killed prematurely by their own bombs because of some technical fault," provincial police chief Maalik Wayezi told reporters.

He said he did not know the identity of the two or their target, but he suspected they were members of the Taliban or Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda.

Britain, the Netherlands and Canada are sending troops to the volatile Afghan south, where the Taliban and allied militants are most active, to take over more responsibilities from U.S. forces.

    Two foreigners, 3 Afghans killed in blast, R, 28.3.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/NewsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-03-28T110525Z_01_ISL32903_RTRUKOT_0_TEXT0.xml&related=true

 

 

 

 

 

Afghan Christian convert is freed

 

Tue Mar 28, 2006 7:26 AM ET
Reuters
By Sayed Salahuddin

 

KABUL (Reuters) - An Afghan Christian convert who faced a possible death sentence for abandoning Islam has been freed, the Afghan justice minister said on Tuesday, after Western pleas for the man's religious freedom be respected.

Abdur Rahman, 40, was jailed this month for rejecting his faith. Judicial officials said he could have faced trial under Islamic sharia law stipulating death as punishment for apostasy.

"I can confirm that he was released," said Justice Minister Sarwar Danish. "He is not in detention. I do not know if he is with his family or where, but he has been acquitted."

Danish said he could not comment on the legal grounds for Rahman's release. Judicial officials had raised questions about his mental state and said he had to undergo psychiatric tests.

Rahman's whereabouts had to be kept secret to ensure his safety, officials said.

Afghanistan's Western-backed government has been seeking a face-saving way out of the crisis, satisfying Western pleas for the man's freedom while appeasing conservative clerics at home who have been demanding Rahman be punished.

The United Nations has been working with President Hamid Karzai's government on a solution and said on Monday Rahman had requested asylum abroad, and it was hoped one of the countries involved in the controversy would accept him.

A U.N. spokesman confirmed Rahman was free but declined to say where he was or if he had found a country to take him.

U.S. embassy spokesman Lou Fintor welcomed the release and said arrangements regarding Rahman's welfare were being handled privately.

Protests by conservatives who had demanded implementation of Islamic law were expected, a security official said. A group including clerics and a former prime minister said last week the government risked rebellion if it caved in to Western pressure.

Karzai has made no public comment on the affair.

 

APPEAL FOR CALM

Rahman became a Christian while working for an aid group helping Afghan refugees in Pakistan 15 years ago. He later lived in Germany before returning to Afghanistan.

He was detained after his relatives told authorities he had converted to Christianity following a dispute involving two daughters. Relatives later said Rahman had suffered from mental problems although he denied that.

"Since he's sick, they've released him," said one relative who declined to be identified. "It's good. It's the right thing."

But the release was condemned by some Afghans.

"If the government doesn't kill him, people in all provinces will demonstrate," said one young man, Mujibur Rahman. "All Muslims will be anti-government."

Another Kabul resident, Abdul Samad, said an example should have been made.

"People will follow this guy, seeking asylum and getting money from the West. We asked the government to execute this man at a public stadium as a lesson to others," he said.

About 1,000 protesters marched through the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif on Monday chanting "Death to America" and "Death to the convert Abdur Rahman".

Afghanistan saw violent protests last month over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad published in European newspapers, and last year over a magazine report that U.S. military interrogators had desecrated the Koran.

The Taliban, battling U.S. and other foreign troops since their overthrow in 2001, issued a fatwa, or religious decree, saying Rahman must be killed, said a Taliban commander.

The United States appealed for calm.

"We understand the sensitivity of this case and urge everyone to remain calm and resist efforts to exploit the situation," Fintor said.

    Afghan Christian convert is freed, R, 28.3.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-03-28T122609Z_01_ISL23026_RTRUKOC_0_US-RELIGION-AFGHAN.xml&archived=False

 

 

 

 

 

Fighting in Afghanistan kills U.S. service member

 

Posted 3/25/2006 10:50 AM Updated 3/25/2006 5:35 PM
USA Today

 

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan and U.S. troops backed by American aircraft fought suspected Taliban Saturday in southern Afghanistan, leaving one U.S. service member and seven militants dead, officials said.

An American service member and an Afghan soldier also were wounded in the fighting in Helmand province's Sangin district, the U.S. military said in a statement. The region is a hotbed of insurgency and the booming drugs trade.

Afghan army commander Gen. Rahmatullah Raufi said seven suspected Taliban rebels were killed, while several others fled.

U.S. war planes dropped 11 guided bombs on about 20 militants involved in the clash, the U.S. statement said, adding that an assessment of militant casualties was ongoing.

"There are known Taliban extremists in the Sangin district and the Afghan National Army and coalition forces will continue to attack these enemies of Afghanistan until the district and province are safe and secure," U.S. commander Maj. Gen. Benjamin C. Freakley said.

The wounded troops were evacuated to a coalition base for treatment, the statement said.

The American's death brought to 222 the number of U.S. service members killed in and around Afghanistan since the ouster of the Taliban in 2001.

Fighting has spiked in southern Afghanistan in the past year, leaving swaths of it off-limits to aid workers and raising concerns for this country's fragile democracy.

    Fighting in Afghanistan kills U.S. service member, UT, 25.3.2006, http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-03-25-afghanistan-us-service-member_x.htm

 

 

 

 

 

Preachers in Kabul Urge Execution of Convert to Christianity

 

March 25, 2006
The New York Times
By ABDUL WAHEED WAFA

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 24 — Preachers used Friday Prayer services to call for the execution of an Afghan Muslim who converted to Christianity, despite growing protests in the West. The conversion of the man, Abdul Rahman, 15 years ago was brought to the attention of the authorities as part of a child custody dispute.

The Bush administration and European governments have strongly protested the case as a violation of religious freedom. But Mr. Rahman has drawn a strong reaction in Afghanistan, too, and for many hardline clerics, there is no greater offense than apostasy.

One speaker, Maulavi Habibullah, told more than a thousand clerics and young people gathered in Kabul: "Afghanistan does not have any obligation under international laws. The prophet says, when somebody changes religion, he must be killed."

He and others demanded that the country's political leaders and judges resist international pressure.

Germany's chancellor, Angela Merkel, told reporters on Friday that she had been assured by President Hamid Karzai in a telephone call that Mr. Rahman would not be executed, The Associated Press reported.

A senior government official said Mr. Rahman, 41, would be released from jail soon, Agence France-Presse reported. The agency did not identify the official, who added that there would be a top-level meeting on the case on Saturday.

The dispute has exposed the contradictions in Afghanistan's Constitution, which promises freedom of religion on the one hand, and on the other declares Islam supreme.

Sheik Asif Muhsini, a Shiite cleric, emphasized that the Constitution says, "No law can contradict Islam and the values of the Constitution."

The case has fueled feelings here of an assault against Islam, coming after reports of the possible desecration of the Koran in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in 2004 by American soldiers and, more recently, cartoons published in Europe that mocked the Prophet Muhammad.

    Preachers in Kabul Urge Execution of Convert to Christianity, NYT, 25.3.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/25/international/asia/25convert.html

 

 

 

 

 

US ups pressure in Afghan Christian convert case

 

Thu Mar 23, 2006 6:49 PM ET
Reuters
By Saul Hudson

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Washington increased pressure on Afghanistan on Thursday to end the prosecution of a man facing possible execution for converting from Islam to Christianity -- a case that has stirred international protests and angered President George W. Bush's evangelical supporters.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told President Hamid Karzai by telephone the United States wanted Afghanistan, where U.S. troops are fighting anti-government Islamic extremists, to show it respects religious freedom by resolving the case quickly.

Her call to the close U.S. ally came a day after Bush vowed to use U.S. leverage over Afghanistan to make sure Abdur Rahman's right to choose his religion was upheld.

Under the pressure, which was reinforced by several U.S. allies supporting Afghanistan with aid and troops, Karzai has pledged Rahman would not be executed, according to the Canadian government, which was also in contact with the Afghan president.

A judge has said the man was jailed for converting and could face death if he refused to become a Muslim again. Afghanistan's judiciary reiterated on Thursday it would not bow to outside pressure.

But the United States, which has more than 20,000 troops in Afghanistan, urged Karzai to intervene.

"We have raised it at the highest levels ... and we have raised it in the strongest possible terms," Rice told reporters after the call. "We look forward hopefully to a resolution of this in the very near future."

Rice, who noted the United States was founded by immigrants fleeing religious persecution, did not answer a question asking if Karzai assured her Rahman would not be executed.

State Department officials, who for days have emphasized the case was up to the Afghan government to resolve, could not say if Rice raised the issue when she met Afghanistan's foreign minister on Monday.

 

CONSERVATIVE CONCERN

U.S. Christian conservatives, a key support base for Bush, have become increasingly vocal as the Bush administration has failed so far to have the man freed.

"It's deeply disturbing that this incident is taking place in a country that America continues to protect and defend," the American Center for Law and Justice, a conservative group that often focuses on Christian issues, said in a statement.

The Bush administration initially responded less forcefully than governments such as Italy and Germany.

Bush first spoke in public about the case on Wednesday -- days after it won wide media attention and stirred outrage among his supporters.

Bush has been criticized for reacting slowly in recent months to other controversies, such as a port management deal with a Middle Eastern company.

The case is also sensitive for Karzai. He depends on foreign troops to battle Taliban and al Qaeda militants, and on aid to support the economy, but also has to take into consideration the views of conservative proponents of Islamic law.

Death is one of the punishments stipulated by sharia, or Islamic law, for apostasy. The legal system is based on a mix of civil and sharia law in Afghanistan, where 99 per cent of its more than 25 million people are Muslim.

A possible compromise solution, hinted at by Afghan officials, is for the convict to avoid further punishment on the grounds he is mentally ill.

That would not satisfy the United States.

"We think that it is important for the Afghan people that this issue of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, which is enshrined in the Afghan constitution, be reaffirmed," Rice's spokesman, Sean McCormack, told reporters.

(Additional reporting by Sayed Salahuddin in Kabul, David Ljunggren in Ottawa)

    US ups pressure in Afghan Christian convert case, R, 23.3.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-03-23T234845Z_01_ISL307059_RTRUKOC_0_US-RELIGION-AFGHAN.xml&archived=False

 

 

 

 

 

UN council presses Afghanistan to rein in Taliban

 

Thu Mar 23, 2006 4:30 PM ET
Reuters
By Irwin Arieff

 

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council, alarmed by rising violence in Afghanistan, pressed the government on Thursday to counter a growing threat from the Taliban and other illegal armed groups.

A resolution adopted unanimously by the 15-nation council also urged U.S.- and NATO-led forces in the war-torn central Asian nation to keep helping the authorities address the threat to stability and security posed by extremist groups.

The resolution, which extends the U.N. assistance mission in Afghanistan for a year until March 2007, expresses "concern at the increasing threat to the local population, national security forces, international military and international assistance efforts by extremist activities."

It urges the Afghan government and international supporters to "continue to address the threat to the security and stability of Afghanistan posed by the Taliban, al Qaeda, other extremist groups and criminal activities."

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in a progress report submitted to the council earlier this month, said a sharp rise in suicide bombings and attacks on schools in Afghanistan underscored the challenge facing the Kabul government as it struggled to become a viable democratic state.

Taliban guerrillas have been fighting the government since their regime was ousted from power after the September 11 attacks,

But Annan's report said attacks by anti-government fighters had soared since mid-2005 and continued unabated throughout the winter, in contrast to previous years, when they tapered off during the harsh cold season.

The U.N. mission supports and advises the Afghan authorities on economic and political development, justice reform, humanitarian aid and anti-drug programs, with 189 international employees, 795 local staffers, 12 military observers, 8 civilian police officers and 29 U.N. volunteers.

    UN council presses Afghanistan to rein in Taliban, R, 23.3.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/NewsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-03-23T212958Z_01_N23297187_RTRUKOT_0_TEXT0.xml&related=true

 

 

 

 

 

2 Years After Soldier's Death, Family's Battle Is With Army

 

March 21, 2006
The New York Times
By MONICA DAVEY and ERIC SCHMITT

 

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Patrick K. Tillman stood outside his law office here, staring intently at a yellow house across the street, just over 70 yards away. That, he recalled, is how far away his eldest son, Pat, who gave up a successful N.F.L. career to become an Army Ranger, was standing from his fellow Rangers when they shot him dead in Afghanistan almost two years ago.

"I could hit that house with a rock," Mr. Tillman said. "You can see every last detail on that place, everything, and you're telling me they couldn't see Pat?"

Mr. Tillman, 51, is a grieving father who has refused to give up on his son. While fiercely shunning the public spotlight that has followed Cpl. Pat Tillman's death, Mr. Tillman has spent untold hours considering the Army's measurements, like the 70 yards.

He has drafted long, sometimes raw, letters to military leaders, demanding answers about the shooting. And he has studied — and challenged — Army PowerPoint presentations meant to explain how his son, who had called out his own name and waved his arms, wound up dead anyway, shot three times in the head by his own unit, which said it had mistaken him for the enemy.

"All I asked for is what happened to my son, and it has been lie after lie after lie," said Mr. Tillman, explaining that he believed the matter should remain "between me and the military" but that he had grown too troubled to keep silent.

As the second anniversary of the death of Corporal Tillman, once a popular safety for the Arizona Cardinals, approaches, Mr. Tillman, his former wife, Mary, and other family members remain frustrated by the Army's handling of the killing but for the first time may be close to getting some of the answers they so desperately seek.

After repeated complaints from the Tillmans and members of Congress contacted by them, the Army is immersed in a highly unusual criminal investigation of the killing, and the Defense Department's inspector general, which called for the criminal investigation this month, is looking separately into the Army's conduct in its aftermath.

Senior military officials said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had expressed outrage to top aides that the Army was having to conduct yet another inquiry into the shooting, prolonging the family's anguish and underscoring the failure of the Army's investigative processes to bring resolution.

Gary Comerford, a spokesman for the inspector general, said the Army Criminal Investigation Command was "dealing with events leading up to the death, and we're looking at anything after that." Though Mr. Comerford did not say so, that could include the possibility of a cover-up, the Tillmans said they had been told by the inspector general's office.

No one wants answers more than the Tillmans. But by now, they said, they have lost patience and faith that any Army entity, even the Criminal Investigation Command, can be trusted to find the truth.

"I am sitting here on my own, going over and over and over this for two years," Ms. Tillman, 50, said in a telephone interview. "The whole thing is such a debacle. I am beyond tears. It's killing me."

Like her former husband, she has spent days reading the files, researching the episode, calling members of Congress, even trying to contact some of the soldiers involved. She criticized the military, as well as the news media, for failing to get to the bottom of what occurred, leaving her family, in essence, to figure it out themselves.

All of it, her former husband said, has even left him suspicious of the military's central finding in their son's case so far: that the killing was a terrible but unintentional accident.

"There is so much nonstandard conduct, both before and after Pat was killed, that you have to start to wonder," Mr. Tillman said. "How much effort would you put into hiding an accident? Why do you need to hide an accident?"

An examination by The New York Times of more than 2,000 pages of documents from three previous Army administrative reviews reveals shifting testimony, the destruction of obvious evidence in the case and a series of contradictions about the distances, the lighting conditions and other details surrounding the shooting.

Seven Rangers have received administrative disciplines — a pay cut, a loss of rank or a return to the rank-and-file Army — but the criminal inquiry is for the first time examining whether the soldiers broke military law when they failed to identify their targets before firing on Corporal Tillman's position. The earlier reviews found that a chain of circumstances and errors had led to the deaths of Corporal Tillman and an Afghan soldier fighting alongside the Americans.

A senior Pentagon official briefed on the criminal investigation, who was granted anonymity because he was not permitted to speak publicly while the new investigation was under way, said it would delve into highly sensitive areas.

"The balance that investigators now have to wrestle with is how much of a crime-scene approach they can take — nearly two years after the fact — into the fog of war, where soldiers were making decisions in milliseconds," the Pentagon official said.

Mr. Tillman spoke bluntly and angrily one afternoon here as he waded once more through the Army reports, the charts, even the details in his son's autopsy. He knows the smallest of details by heart — where his son was supposed to be standing, which way the sun was setting, what the Ranger ducking beside his son heard him call out last — and ticked them off unemotionally as he flipped through the worn reports.

Mr. Tillman's small office, though, belies his hardened shell. His trash can, pasted with orange and green paper, was a grade school project of Pat Tillman. So was the wooden pencil holder nearby, shakily carved with the letters N.F.L. A blurry photograph in a frame showed Pat Tillman at age 2, marching off toward a lake with his signature confident stride.

"At this point I don't believe that the facts of this case are going to come out without the serious threat of jail time hanging over some folks," Mr. Tillman said.

The Tillman family's first glimmers of distrust began in the month after Corporal Tillman was killed, at the age of 27, on April 22, 2004.

Within hours, military officers came to the family home here, the same house where Corporal Tillman had grown up. No one mentioned, though, that the shooting had been at the hands of his colleagues. Even Corporal Tillman's younger brother Kevin, who served in the same Ranger unit and was in a vehicle far behind the shooting and did not see what had happened, did not learn the truth for more than a month.

Instead, eight days after Corporal Tillman's death, Army officials awarded a Silver Star and issued a news release that seemed to suggest that he had been killed by enemy fire during an ambush.

At the end of May, as the rest of Corporal Tillman's unit was returning to the United States, the Army notified the family of what it believed really happened. In the months that followed, in private briefings for the family, the Army assured the Tillmans that a thorough investigation would be made and that those responsible would be disciplined.

"They said they'd take care of it, and I believed them," Mr. Tillman said.

Corporal Tillman's platoon of the Second Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, began the day that he died dealing with a minor annoyance in the southeastern part of Afghanistan where the soldiers were conducting sweeps, the Army records show: one vehicle would not start.

The platoon split into two parts so that half the team, including Corporal Tillman, could go on to the next town for sweeps while the second half could tow the disabled vehicle to a drop-off spot.

But both groups ended up in the same twisting canyon, along the same road, without radio communication. And after the sounds of an enemy ambush, three Rangers in the second group wound up firing at members of the first group — at an Afghan soldier who was fighting alongside Corporal Tillman, and then at Corporal Tillman.

The Army's administrative reviews that followed, parts of which have been described previously in other newspapers, including The Washington Post and The San Francisco Chronicle, have left the Tillman family with more questions than answers, they say. Some of those involved in the shooting have provided shifting accounts of what happened, the records show.

The decision to split the unit into two convoys, for example, was a crucial, and perhaps fatal, one. Brig. Gen. Gary M. Jones, who led the most recent of the three Army reviews, concluded that the decision was a result of "miscommunication" among several officers.

But at least one Army officer, the records show, changed his sworn statements about which supervisor had actually ordered the split and what conversations had occurred before the order was given.

Even the soldier who conducted the military's first review of Corporal Tillman's death — in the hours and days immediately afterward — expressed concern about the changes in the accounts.

That soldier, whose name, like many others, was redacted from the Army files provided to The Times by Mr. Tillman, said he believed Rangers had changed their versions of what happened and were not receiving the "due just punishment" for what he concluded was "gross negligence."

The stories, he said in a sworn statement as part of General Jones's subsequent review, "have changed to, I think, help some individuals."

"The other difficult thing, though, was watching some of these guys getting off with what I thought was a lesser of a punishment than what they should've received," the soldier who conducted the first inquiry said.

Among a number of conflicts in the descriptions of what happened, some Rangers said that in the dusk they could see nothing more than "shapes" and "muzzle flashes" even as Corporal Tillman tried to tell his colleagues who he was, waving his arms, setting off a smoke grenade signal and calling out. Others said they had seen and aimed for the Afghan fighter, his "dark face" and his AK-47.

After the shooting, the Rangers destroyed evidence that would be considered critical in any criminal case, the records show. They burned Corporal Tillman's uniform and his body armor.

Months later, the Rangers involved said they did not intend to destroy evidence. "It was a hygiene issue," one soldier wrote. "They were starting to stink."

Another soldier involved offered a slightly different take, saying "the uniform and equipment had blood on them and it would stir emotion" that needed to be suppressed until the Rangers finished their work overseas.

"How could they do that?" Mr. Tillman said. "That makes no sense."

The family still wants to know, he said, what became of Corporal Tillman's diary. It was never returned to the family, he said.

Ms. Tillman said her family could not rest until they knew what really happened. All of it, Ms. Tillman said, has left her wondering what other families who have lost service members in Iraq and Afghanistan may really know about the circumstances. In addition to Corporal Tillman, at least 16 service members have died in Afghanistan and Iraq as a result of shootings or bombings by fellow Americans, and none of the deaths, so far, have led to criminal convictions.

"This is how they treat a family of a high-profile individual," she said. "How are they treating others?"

Col. Joseph Curtin, an Army spokesman, said the Tillmans deserved answers.

"We deeply regret their loss," Colonel Curtin said, "and will continue to answer their questions in a truthful and forthright manner."

Monica Davey reported from San Jose for this article, and Eric Schmitt from Washington. David S. Cloud contributed reporting from Washington.

    2 Years After Soldier's Death, Family's Battle Is With Army, NYT, 21.3.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/21/politics/21tillman.html?hp&ex=1142917200&en=afa52cbd1ddda78b&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

4 American Soldiers Killed in Afghan Blast

 

March 13, 2006
The New York Times
By SULTAN M. MUNADI

 

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 12 — Four American soldiers were killed in a roadside-bomb explosion in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, and two suicide bombers in a car blew themselves up next to the vehicle of the chairman of Afghanistan's upper house of Parliament here in the capital, killing at least two people and wounding at least seven others, officials said.

The Afghan official, Sebaghatullah Mojadeddi, escaped serious injury. He said he believed that the suicide attack was the work of Pakistan's intelligence service.

The American soldiers killed by the roadside bomb were trying to clear a road for civilian traffic, said the American commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan, Maj. Gen. Benjamin C. Freakley, who called the attack reprehensible.

"The extremists that initiated this senseless attack create a significant danger and threat to the Afghan people," he said in a statement released by the United States military.

Mr. Mojadeddi, who served as Afghanistan's president in 1992, met with journalists two hours after the suicide bombing. His hands were heavily bandaged. He said he had been on his way to the Parliament building when a car drew up alongside his armored vehicle and exploded.

"The fire and smoke came into my vehicle and some of the windows of my car broke also, but no one was killed, thank God — only two of my bodyguards and my driver were slightly wounded," he said.

An old man, who witnesses said was a yogurt seller, was among the dead. A 12-year-old girl was also killed, the witnesses said. Mr. Mojadeddi's car and his aides' car were thrown on their sides, and the windshields were blown out.

Reports of the numbers of dead and wounded in the suicide bombing varied. Gen. Abdul Jamil Kohistani, chief of the criminal unit in Kabul's police department, said four people had been killed and three wounded on the road, in addition to those in the cars.

Dr. Sayed Muhammad Amin Fatemi, the minister of health, said that six people had been wounded and that four of them had been hospitalized. One of the wounded was a man of about 70, and one was a boy of 13, he said.

Mr. Mojadeddi, who is from a leading religious family, is one of the most influential members of the government.

He was one of the leaders of the fight against the Soviet occupation in the 1980's and is the leader of the Peace and Reconciliation Committee, which works to persuade fighters allied with the country's former Taliban government to give up their armed resistance.

He blamed Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence for the attack, based, he said, on information from "different channels," and he seemed to cast blame on President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, too.

"The Pakistani government and I.S.I. are the big enemies of Afghanistan," he said.

He said that his peace commission had succeeded in persuading 1,300 people to end their opposition to the government and that Pakistan was opposed to that. "I.S.I. doesn't want stability and peace in Afghanistan," he said. "They want us to be poor and to be in need to them."

Tasneen Aslam, spokeswoman for Pakistan's Foreign Office, condemned the attack but rejected Mr. Mojadeddi's accusations, calling them "baseless and unfounded."

President Hamid Karzai said also he had no doubt that the attack was organized by foreigners, and he promised a full investigation.

"We received intelligence two months ago that plans were under way to attack important figures, including attacks on myself," he told reporters at the presidential palace. During a visit to Pakistan last month, Mr. Karzai handed Mr. Musharraf intelligence files on Taliban members who he said were living in Pakistan and involved with suicide bombing cells and planning insurgent attacks in Afghanistan. He asked Pakistan to do more to stop such attacks. Mr. Musharraf later described much of the intelligence as "nonsense" and denied that Pakistan was working to undermine Afghanistan.

Mr. Mojadeddi said he had been warned that he was a target and had blackened his car's windows for security.

In a separate attack, eight workers — four Albanians and four Afghans — for a German sanitation company, Ecolog, were kidnapped Saturday in southern Afghanistan, officials said.

The workers were kidnapped in Helmand Province, said Asadullah Khalid, the governor of Kandahar, a neighboring province. A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, speaking by telephone from an undisclosed location, claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.

Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Quetta, Pakistan, for this article, Ruhullah Khapalwak from Kandahar, Afghanistan, and Abdul Waheed Wafa from Kabul.

    4 American Soldiers Killed in Afghan Blast, NYT, 13.3.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/13/international/asia/13afghan.html

 

 

 

 

 

Bush Makes Surprise Stop in Afghanistan on Way to India

 

March 2, 2006
The New York Times
By ELISABETH BUMILLER

 

NEW DELHI, Thursday, March 2 — President Bush made a surprise five-hour visit to Afghanistan on Wednesday to meet with President Hamid Karzai and to see for the first time the country created after the United States went to war against the Taliban in retaliation for the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In a news conference with Mr. Karzai in Kabul, Mr. Bush said he remained confident Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, and Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, would be captured. They are believed to be hiding in Pakistan. "It's not a matter of if they're captured or brought to justice, it's when they're brought to justice," Mr. Bush said.

He deflected a question about the increasing violence in Afghanistan by militants believed to be linked to Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and played down the possibility of announcing a nuclear agreement with India on a visit to New Delhi. At least 50,000 demonstrators in New Delhi protested his visit throughout the day, before he arrived Wednesday night. Additional protests occurred in Calcutta and other Indian cities.

On Thursday morning, Mr. Bush was welcomed to India in a majestic ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan, or President's House, the Lutyens landmark of colonial India. Mr. Bush inspected a phalanx of India troops and then headed for the banks of the Yumna River to lay a wreath at the memorial to Gandhi, the founder of modern India.

A nuclear pact would help India with power for its enormous civilian energy needs while allowing it to keep its nuclear weapons. "This is a difficult issue," Mr. Bush said, speaking in the garden of the presidential place in Kabul, with Mr. Karzai at his side. "It's a difficult issue for the Indian government. It's a difficult issue for the American government."

He added: "Hopefully we can reach an agreement. If not, we'll continue to work on it until we do."

In response to a question about Iran's nuclear ambitions, Mr. Bush said "the most destabilizing thing that can happen, in this region and the world," would be for Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon and he would work with allies to prevent that.

Mr. Bush's stop in Afghanistan, the first by an American president since Eisenhower visited in 1959, occurred on the way to a three-day visit to India and Pakistan. White House officials, who had planned the stop for two months, kept it secret for security reasons. They told reporters aboard Air Force One after a refueling stop in Shannon, Ireland, that they were en route to Afghanistan.

Mr. Bush landed at Bagram Air Force Base 27 miles north of Kabul shortly after noon Afghanistan time. He and his wife, Laura, stepped off Air Force One in brilliant sunshine, with the snow-capped Hindu Kush Mountains in the background. Security was extremely tight, with streets around the palace closed for the visit and helicopters hovering over the center of Kabul all day. Mr. Bush arrived in Kabul from Bagram in a heavily guarded flotilla of helicopters. Two door gunners aboard the helicopter carrying White House reporters fired machine guns on an unknown target as the helicopter flew low over the barren countryside, The Associated Press reported.

Once in Kabul, Mr. Bush had meetings and lunch with Mr. Karzai, then joined him at the news conference. Later, Mr. Bush cut the ribbon at a ceremonial opening of the United States Embassy, which was already operating, and spoke to American forces at Bagram. About 19,000 American troops are in Afghanistan.

"It is in our nation's interest that Afghanistan develops into a democracy," Mr. Bush said at the embassy. "It is in the interests of the United States of America for there to be examples around the world of what is possible. It is possible to replace tyrants with a free society in which men and women are respected, in which young girls can go to school and realize their full potential, in which people are able to realize their dreams."

At the news conference, Mr. Bush did not directly answer a question from an Afghan journalist about how long he expected American troops to remain in Afghanistan. "The United States is here at the request of an Afghan government, elected by the people." Mr. Bush said.

He did say, echoing the view of the Afghan government, that Pakistani militants were slipping across the border and causing violence in Afghanistan, and that he would raise the issue with the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, at their meeting on Saturday. "These infiltrations are causing harm to friends, allies, and cause harm to U.S. troops," Mr. Bush said. "And that will be a topic of conversation. It's an ongoing topic of conversation." In October 2001, the United States opened a bombing campaign to unseat the Taliban, which had harbored Mr. bin Laden. Despite a multimillion-dollar reward, Mr. bin Laden remains at large.

Mrs. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney had been to Afghanistan, but Mr. Bush had not. In 2003, Mr. Bush made a secret Thanksgiving trip to Baghdad, where he dined with American troops. But he did not hold an outdoor news conference, as he did Wednesday in Kabul.

Before Mr. Bush landed in New Delhi, tens of thousands of Muslims gathered at the Ramlila grounds, a field commonly used for political protests in the capital, and chanted, "Killer Bush Go Back!" Busloads of Muslims came from a 100-mile radius of New Delhi, heeding a protest call by Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, a political organization. "We came to register our protest against the Bush visit," said Rais Khan, a real estate agent. "He is the biggest terrorist."

The protest was peaceful and lasted three hours. Maulana Mahmood Madni, the general secretary of Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, capped the rally by telling the crowd: "Bush is destroying the world peace. He is the biggest enemy of Islam."

En route from Washington on Air Force One, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, echoed Mr. Bush as they tried to dampen expectations of an agreement on this visit on how to carry out a nuclear deal. "We've got a couple of issues that are important — and we'll keep talking about them — that remain unresolved," Ms. Rice said.

The original agreement, reached in July 2005 with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, would permit India to buy nuclear fuel and reactor components from the United States and other countries in return for inspections of its civilian program. India would retain its nuclear arms program, which would not be subject to inspections. Opponents say such an arrangement is meaningless because India would keep its nuclear weapons, while proponents say the deal would encourage India to scale back its nuclear weapons programs.

Either way, the deal cannot be carried out until India separates what is a highly integrated civilian and military nuclear program. The most contentious area of debate is India's prototype fast-breeder reactor, which is not complete. India is adamant that the reactor not be subject to international inspections, saying they would hamper research. But critics of the agreement say that the reactor would be a highly efficient producer of plutonium for nuclear weapons and that they are suspicious of India's intentions.

Hari Kumar contributed reporting from New Delhi for this article, and Aziz-u-Rahman Gulbahari and Abdul Waheed Wafa from Kabul.

    Bush Makes Surprise Stop in Afghanistan on Way to India, NYT, 2.3.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/02/international/asia/02prexy.html

 

 

 

 

 

Taliban Rebels Still Menacing Afghan South

 

March 2, 2006
The New York Times
By CARLOTTA GALL

 

LOY KAREZ, Afghanistan — When Haji Lalai Mama, the 60-year-old tribal elder in these parts, gamely tried to organize a village defense force against the Taliban recently, he had to do it with a relative handful of men and just three rifles. "We were patrolling and ready," he recalled.

But they were not ready enough. The Taliban surprised them under cover of darkness by using a side road. One villager was killed, and 10 others were wounded by a grenade. Two Taliban fighters were captured in the clash. The rest disappeared into the night.

The men at Loy Karez were exceptional in making a stand at all. Few in southern Afghanistan are ready to stand up to the Taliban, at least not without greater support or benefits from the Afghan government.

In fact, four years after the Taliban were ousted from power by the American military, their presence is bigger and more menacing than ever, say police and government officials, village elders, farmers and aid workers across southern Afghanistan.

American and Afghan officials have said for months that the Taliban are no longer capable of fighting large battles, and in their weakness have changed tactics to roadside bombings or attacking soft targets, like harassing villagers, killing teachers and burning schools.

Yet despite its evident military supremacy, the American-led alliance has not been able to root out the insurgency. And the Taliban's tactics have succeeded in sowing fear, nearly all here agree.

The militants have closed down some 200 schools through threats and burnings across the south of Afghanistan, and killed dozens of government officials, tribal elders and civilians over the last year. Commerce has sharply declined in Kandahar, largely because of the rash of suicide bombings in the last few months.

In the villages, people are asking foreigners and nongovernmental organizations not to come around anymore, not because they do not need the aid, but for fear of reprisals from the Taliban, aid workers and villagers said.

Some, like the local Afghan border police commander, Col. Abdul Razziq, 30, say the situation is reaching a pivotal point, at least in his area.

"People are fed up now with the Taliban," he said. "They don't let organizations come and builds roads, dig bore wells and build schools. People are fed up with them. I think now people have to fight them. How long can they tolerate this?"

The American military reacts quickly with overwhelming airpower when it encounters a Taliban group of any size, as it did recently in Helmand Province when local officials claimed 200 Taliban fighters were at large.

But until now, the Taliban, criminals and drug smugglers, who often work together, have had an easy time in Helmand because there has been virtually no security presence in the province, neither from the Afghan Army nor an international force of any strength, said Col. Henry Worsley, the commander of British troops.

The British are starting to arrive in Helmand as part of the new NATO force taking over command of southern Afghanistan this year. The local police are also short of resources and lack training, he said.

"They are clearly a threat," he said of the Taliban and their drug smuggler allies. "But they do have a fairly easy time of it now, and that's going to change."

British troops are planning extensive patrolling with Afghan forces, including patrols on foot and at night to improve security in the villages, he said.

American forces have not spent much time and effort on Helmand, the commander of the United States-led alliance, Lt. Gen. Karl Eikenberry, conceded in a recent interview. Yet the alliance has spent a lot of time and investment on the neighboring province of Kandahar, where the Taliban have also expanded their influence.

General Eikenberry does not accept the suggestion of failure. "The challenge is not that the enemy is strong, but after 25 years of warfare, that the institutions of the state are weak," he told a gathering of elders recently in Kandahar.

When greeted with speech after speech calling on America to use its influence on Pakistan to crack down on the Taliban operating across the border, he urged the Afghans to look in the mirror, telling them they have a role to play, too.

"The best strategy when we have a problem is to hold a mirror to yourself," he said. "It means building a government, getting a clean government that is not corrupt, stopping poppy cultivation, building the Afghan National Army and national police. That is the first step."

President Hamid Karzai also appealed to tribal elders at a recent gathering to help, acknowledging that the government cannot achieve anything without the cooperation of the people.

But in southern Afghanistan, the people seem to be waiting for cooperation from the government.

A police commander in Kandahar, Mullah Gul, who has been fighting the Taliban for four years, described them as the black sheep of the family. "They are a problem," he said, "but it is not something that we cannot handle among ourselves."

While villagers may not support the government, most are sitting on the fence, and only a few are actively helping the Taliban, police officials say. Villagers say they are caught in the middle, and receive little government support.

"We take them very seriously," said Jamal Khan, 24, a farmer from Nawa district in Helmand Province, said of the Taliban. "They come in the night to our village. We are not armed, and they ask for food and a place to stay. We cannot say anything. Then the government comes in the morning and says you gave a place to the Taliban. But what should we do?"

The school in his village was still in the process of being built, he said, but has become the bane of the villagers' life since armed men tried to burn it down. Villagers fought them off that time but came under fire.

"The district chief is telling the elders that we should safeguard the school, but the elders are saying we don't have weapons, we cannot fight with the Taliban," he said. Already teachers and pupils have stopped attending, he said, adding, "Soon they will burn the school, if not in a week, then in a year."

But there is evidence that at least some elders and others in the area, distrustful of a government that they say is corrupt and exploitative, are sympathetic to the Taliban. The elders from the Sangin district of Helmand, where American planes bombed recently, said they had joined the small number of Taliban fighters because the government officials preyed on them and robbed them.

"The Taliban are in the villages, among the people," said Ali Seraj, a descendant of Afghanistan's royal family and native of Kandahar, who contends that the government is losing the hearts and minds of the ordinary people.

With its corrupt and often brutal local officials, the government has pushed the people into the arms of the Taliban, said Abdul Qadar Noorzai, head of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission in Kandahar.

"These are uneducated people, they do not trust the government, they see no help coming to them, so the local people start doing things like the Taliban do," he said.

In Loy Karez, Haji Lalai, the tribal elder who led the stand against the Taliban, identified only four men who were Taliban sympathizers.

As for the two young men captured in the skirmish, they had only joined the Taliban commander, Abdul Samad, that day. They did not even have weapons, they said in an interview at the police station in Kandahar, where they were being held.

Poor, uneducated laborers from the border town of Spinbaldak, they seemed to have joined up without much persuasion.

"A friend said, 'Let's go and fight jihad,' " said Saifullah, 20, who sold shoes from a pushcart in the bazaar. "I did not want to go, but they made us go. We are uneducated; we did not understand."

Yet this motley group of six or seven was enough to scare the villagers. It was only when Haji Lalai, who has a reputation as a strongman, came back to live in the village that he girded it to stand up to the Taliban.

"We fought the Taliban and saved this land from the Taliban, so if the government does not help us and pay attention to us, then no one else will go against the Taliban," said Khudai Nazar, 32, a former policeman who joined Haji Lalai in his village defense force. "If they do talk to us, then the whole region will fight the Taliban."

    Taliban Rebels Still Menacing Afghan South, NYT, 3.2.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/02/international/02taliban.html?hp&ex=1141362000&en=a51daaa42ae5180a&ei=5094&partner=homepage

 

 

 

 

 

Militant Inmates Riot and Seize Control of Cellblock in Afghan Prison

 

February 27, 2006
The New York Times
By SULTAN M. MUNADI and CARLOTTA GALL

 

PUL-I-CHARKHI, Afghanistan, Feb. 26 — Prisoners in Afghanistan's main high-security prison, among them people accused of being members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, rioted and seized control of one cellblock on Saturday evening, battling with guards through the night, the Afghan authorities said Sunday.

Up to 5 prisoners were killed and 31 wounded as police guards opened fire to stop them from escaping when the violence began, a health worker at the prison said, based on information from the prison doctor. Sporadic gunfire could be heard outside the prison on Sunday.

The Afghan authorities moved in about 300 soldiers and seven tanks to surround the prison, near Kabul, the capital. The prison houses about 2,000 inmates, including 70 women. The prisoners include ordinary criminals and about 350 prisoners thought to be fighters for the country's ousted Taliban movement or for Al Qaeda. There are also three Americans, two former soldiers, Jonathan K. Idema and Brent Bennett, who were found guilty of running a private jail in Afghanistan, and a free-lance cameraman, Edward Caraballo, who was convicted with them.

Prison officials blamed Taliban and Al Qaeda prisoners for starting the riot, which began with a protest by prisoners over being required to wear uniforms. "They broke the locks of their cells and broke through a wall to the female section and entered the women's cells," said Muhammad Qasem Hashemzai, the deputy justice minister. The women, some of whom have children with them, did not seem to have been harmed, he said.

Prisoners could be seen behind the barred windows of Cellblock 1 on Sunday. They were hanging the light-blue new prison clothes out the windows on metal bedsteads and setting fire to them. Bullet holes pocked the windows of the cellblock from the shooting on Saturday night. The prisoners were shouting, "Long live Islam, long live the prisoners, death to Bush, death to Karzai," a reference to President Hamid Karzai.

The prison in Pul-i-Charkhi, a large pentagon-shaped prison built in the 1970's, became notorious during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan when tens of thousands of opponents were imprisoned and executed and buried in mass graves nearby.

The prisoners at Pul-i-Charkhi are demanding to speak to Sebaghatullah Mojadeddi, the chairman of the Peace and Reconciliation Commission, which negotiates the release of Taliban prisoners from American military custody, said Gen. Abdul Salaam Bakhshi, director of the prison.

They also demanded to speak with the head of the Supreme Court, Vice President Ahmed Zia Masud, the leader of Parliament and observers from the United Nations and its Human Rights Commission, he said.

"We are trying to negotiate," Mr. Hashemzai said. "They are not very well organized — everyone is saying a different thing." He added: "We want to solve the problem with negotiation. Otherwise, if we attack them, many of them will be killed."

Afghan officials have sometimes struggled to maintain control of the prisoners here. In December 2004, prisoners said to have been linked to Al Qaeda — an Iraqi and several Pakistanis — overpowered their guards and tried to escape. Four prisoners and four police officers were killed in the ensuing battle, and the police barely prevented the group from breaking into the cell of the American prisoners. Last month, seven prisoners accused of ties to the Taliban escaped during visiting hours.

This time prisoners broke up their metal beds and used the bars to smash windows and break out of their cells, General Bakhshi said. Then, police officers at the scene said, the inmates escaped from the cellblock and charged at the main gate, police officers said.

"We started shooting in the air first and they didn't care, then we had to shoot toward them directly," said one police officer, who did not want to be identified because he was involved in the shooting. "It was very dark and we didn't know if any of them were killed or wounded. We didn't know how many rushed us, but we knew it was out of control."

Hamidullah, 30, a health worker who was working in the prison late Saturday night, said he had been in contact with the prisoners and had given first aid kits and other supplies to one of the prisoners, a doctor.

"I didn't see any killed or wounded myself, but the prison doctor and some others are treating the wounded," Hamidullah said. The dead and wounded remain inside the cellblock, he said.

 

 

U.S. Defends Prison Practices

KABUL, Afghanistan, Feb. 26 (AP) — The American military on Sunday defended its detention of about 500 inmates at its main base in Afghanistan, saying they are treated humanely and provided the "best possible living conditions."

On Sunday, The New York Times reported that the inmates were held at the Bagram air base, north of Kabul, some for as long as two or three years without access to lawyers or the chance to hear the allegations against them.

Col. James R. Yonts, the American military spokesman in Kabul, would not confirm or deny whether inmates were held for up to three years, saying the secretary of defense sets the criteria for detention. But he added that all those held were at one time "enemy combatants" and that their status was regularly reviewed.

"We hold them for two reasons: to question them and get intelligence from them, or because they've committed violence against the coalition or the people of Afghanistan," he said in an e-mailed response to questions.

"We regularly review the status of the detainees, and if a detainee has no intelligence value and if we believe he will no longer attack the coalition or forces of the central government, we will release him. We regularly release detainees."

Sultan M. Munadi reported from Pul-i-Charkhi for this article, and Carlotta Gall from Islamabad, Pakistan.

    Militant Inmates Riot and Seize Control of Cellblock in Afghan Prison, NYT, 27.2.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/27/international/asia/27afghan.html

 

 

home Up