Afghanistan: Taliban fighters killed by police
AKI - Adnkronos International
Kabul, 8 May (AKI) - Afghan police reportedly killed six Taliban fighters, among them two rebel commanders, in conflict in western Afghanistan on Thursday.
Early media reports quoted the provincial police chief Shah Jahan Noori as saying the Taliban-appointed governor for the western province of Ghor, Mullah Jalil, was among the victims.
Two policemen and a civilian were also wounded during the gunbattle that lasted for several hours.
He said about 10 militants had crossed into Ghor from the restive neighbouring province of Helmand.
On Wednesday afternoon, two American soldiers and one civilian were killed in an attack just north of the city of Khost, in eastern Khost province near the Pakistan border.
A second roadside bomb blast was also reported near Khost and a failed suicide bomb attack.
Taliban Takes a Cut
Bakhtar News Agency (Afghanistan) / May 8, 2008
The bulk of Afghanistan’s poppy production comes from the south, an area where Taliban insurgents wield considerable influence and over which Kabul has only partial control.
Security sources say the Taliban takes a 10 per cent share of poppy yields.
Christine Oguz, head of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in Afghanistan, says the opium trade in the south is flourishing due to a mix of powerful landowners, organized criminal networks, corrupt officials and a lack of law and order.
“They (the authorities) have to really focus on the laboratories because that is where you have the most value added. They are mainly in the border areas with Pakistan and some are mobile. It’s like a simple distillery. You can even have it on a truck,” she said.
The fight against drugs appears more successful in the north, in places such as Badakhshan, where anti-drug officers have been actively eradicating poppy fields for more than a year.
“More than 100 farmers have been jailed so far this year, they are locked up for a few days to a week. They are released only after they promise not to plant poppies again,” said an anti-drug expert, who asked for his name to be withheld.
Experts are now employing more sophisticated technology, such as satellite imaging, to search for poppy fields.
But the success at curbing opium cultivation in the north might be short-lived as farmers can easily return to planting poppies, which are up to 10 times more lucrative than other crops.
This might happen sooner rather than later due to a severe winter that killed off wheat crops and hurt farmers’ ability to provide for their families, Oguz said.
“People really need food in Badakhshan. It is a very food insecure place. If you can’t persuade the donor community to give more aid to Badakhshan, and I am talking of immediate short-term needs and long term development plans, they will definitely go back to opium cultivation.”
Although opium prices have come down because of over-production, Oguz said farmers could still grow and stockpile it as it can be kept for up to 20 years without going bad.
NATO appoints new civilian
representative in Afghanistan
Xinhua / May 8, 2008
NATO Secretary General Jaap de HoopScheffer on Wednesday appointed Fernando Gentilini of Italy as NATO 's senior civilian representative in Afghanistan.
Gentilini replaces Daan Everts of the Netherlands who served as NATO's second senior civilian representative in Afghanistan from August 2006 to December 2007. Following Everts' departure, MauritsR. Jochems of the Netherlands served as acting senior civilian representative.
Gentilini, 46, has a long career in the Italian Foreign Ministry. He served as European Union High Representative's personal representative to Kosovo in 2004 and most recently as deputy diplomatic advisor to the Italian prime minister since August 2006.
The senior civilian representative officially represents the political leadership of NATO in Kabul. He provides a direct channel of communication between the theater, the NATO headquarters in Brussels, and decision-making North Atlantic Council.
He also works closely with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, the United Nations and other coordinating bodies established by the international community and the Afghan government.
Afghan ambassador urges action
as schools torched, staff attacked
The Canadian Press / May 7, 2008
OTTAWA — Afghanistan's ambassador to Canada calls a rash of attacks on schools in his country an alarming bid to derail progress that demands action.
"We need to realize the gravity of this escalation," Omar Samad said Wednesday in an interview. "Some hard decisions have to be made as to whether we're going to allow our children and our teachers to be targets of terrorism."
"We need to figure out who supports such drastic attacks and who doesn't. And a decision has to be made as to who you reach out to and who you cannot reach out to. This is a test."
Samad said there have been several attacks on schools over the last two years and it's too soon to tell whether this year will be much worse.
A report published Wednesday cites 36 sabotage incidents in the last two months, including fire-bombings, arson, staff assaults and abductions. It said the security situation is so bad that nearly half the schools in Kandahar are closed some or all of the time.
Samad said the report sounds credible and that similar attacks are taking place along the Afghan border with Pakistan.
The London Times article also describes the mutilation of a school caretaker whose ears and nose were cut off because he collaborated with the Afghan government.
"This is part of a pattern of targeted attacks on institutions and certain groups of people in society to instill fear," Samad said.
"It is also politically motivated by those groups that do not want to see Afghanistan progress and its people live in peace and prosperity."
He blames 'ignorant' forces bent on dragging Afghanistan back to the days before Sept. 11 terrorist attacks when the Taliban ruled with an iron fist.
Eighty-three Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have died trying to help stabilize the country since the Taliban were overthrown in 2001.
In comments later Wednesday before the special parliamentary committee on Afghanistan, Samad again thanked Canada for such sacrifices.
"Your presence ... is at the request of Afghanistan and mandated by the United Nations to prevent extremists and terrorists to regain control of Afghanistan or use it as a base for other attacks."
Close to five million refugees have come home, more than six million boys and girls are in school and basic health care is spreading, he said. Economic growth continues, albeit slowly, in one of the poorest and most war-ravaged nations on Earth.
"Terrorism or violence perpetrated by extremist or criminal groups remains the top concern for Afghans," Samad said, citing "shifting regional complexities that cannot be ignored.
"We need to go to the source of insecurity and deal with the various aspects of it using a comprehensive and multi-faceted strategy supported by all entities."
Corrupt cash mostly flows from narcotics, arms trading, smuggling and a small number of fraudulent aid agencies, he said.
"On the narcotics side, we aim to further increase the number of poppy-free provinces and to reduce the poppy growing fields by at least 25 per cent in 2008-09," Samad said. The battle against the lucrative opium trade "can succeed through increased security, better governance" and, most importantly, alternative livelihoods for farmers, he stressed.
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