Articles found May 14, 2007
It’s hockey morning in Afghanistan
Tom Blackwell, National Post Published: Sunday, May 13, 2007
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KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- Dozens of Canadian troops stationed in the Afghan desert roused themselves in the middle of the night this week for some high-priority missions.
They weren't heading out to hunt Taliban or befriend local villagers and tribal leaders. That could wait.
They were up as early as 3:30 a.m. for Hockey Night in Canada and the Ottawa-Buffalo playoff series, beamed half-way around the world to this sprawling military base.
The cheering from one of two Canada Houses, the Canadian soldiers' recreation centres, could be heard 50 metres away as Ottawa took an early series lead over the Sabres Thursday.
The crowds were smaller Saturday - or Sunday morning in Afghanistan - with many of the troops out on patrol, but those left behind were almost as boisterous as the Senators went up 2-0 in their series.
"I'm what you call a hockey nut. I get up every time there's a hockey game, whether it's 3:30 or 4 o'clock," said Robert Jolivet of Ottawa, who installs armour plating on LAV III personnel carriers.
"When you play hockey all your life, it's part of you."
Having a chance to participate in the Canadian ritual 8-1/2 time zones from home "makes it easier for everybody. It's part of the morale," he said.
Cpl. Luis Diaz, an Ottawa native who is part of the Princess Patricia's Charlie company, showed up at 3:30 a.m. for the second Sabres-Senators match-up, an hour early, as it turned out.
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Key Taliban Leader Is Killed in Afghanistan in Joint Operation
By TAIMOOR SHAH and CARLOTTA GALL KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, May 13
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The man who probably was the Taliban’s foremost operational commander, Mullah Dadullah, was killed in a joint operation by Afghan security forces, American forces and NATO troops in Helmand Province, Governor Asadullah Khaled of the neighboring Kandahar Province said Sunday.
Mullah Dadullah’s body was displayed for journalists on Sunday morning in this southern Afghan city. The NATO force in Afghanistan confirmed his death in a statement issued in Kabul, saying that American troops had led the operation. There were various reports of the actual circumstances and day of the death.
Mullah Dadullah was one of the most wanted Taliban leaders, close to the leader Mullah Muhammad Omar, and with links to Al Qaeda, and was probably the most important operational commander.
While the exact number of Taliban fighters or the command structure are not known, military officials say he organized fighters, weapons, supplies and finances across much of southern and southeastern Afghanistan, the centers of the Taliban insurgency. He had been sighted in various places in the last nine months to a year, apparently moving into and out of southern Afghanistan from Pakistan border regions.
His death would cause a “significant blow to the Taliban’s command and control,” said Maj. Chris Belcher, an American military spokesman at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, the capital. He added that Mullah Dadullah “was a military leader, primarily in charge of the effort to recapture the city of Kandahar,” once the Taliban’s stronghold.
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Pakistan, Afghan troops exchange fire at border
Updated Sun. May. 13 2007 10:53 PM ET Associated Press
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ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistani and Afghan forces exchanged fire at their rugged border in their most serious skirmish in years.
Pakistan said it killed five Afghan soldiers in the fighting Sunday but Afghanistan said just two Afghan civilians died.
Tension has been running high between Afghanistan and Pakistan, its eastern neighbour, over controlling the 2,430-kilometre border and stemming the flow of Taliban and al Qaeda militants that stage cross-border attacks inside Afghanistan. Pakistan's move to fence parts of the disputed frontier has also angered Afghanistan.
Pakistan army spokesman Maj.-Gen. Waheed Arshad accused the Afghan army of sparking the two-hour gunbattle with "unprovoked'' fire at about six Pakistani border posts in Kurram Agency, a Pakistani tribal region opposite Afghanistan's Paktia province.
A Pakistan military statement said troops from its Frontier Corps returned fire and five Afghan National Army soldiers were killed. Arshad initially put the toll at six or seven and said three Pakistani troops were wounded.
"This was unprovoked and without any reason,'' Arshad said.
On the Afghan side, Defence Ministry spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi accused Pakistani forces of encroaching two to three kilometres inside Paktia province's Jajai district.
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Blast hits Western forces in Afghanistan, several hurt
14 May 2007 07:56:07 GMT Source: Reuters
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HERAT, Afghanistan, May 14 (Reuters) - A roadside bomb ripped through a vehicle in a convoy of Western troops as it passed over a bridge outside the Afghan city of Herat on Monday, wounding several soldiers, witnesses said.
The incident, part of rising violence in recent months following last year's bloodiest fighting since the Taliban were ousted in 2001, prompted the troops to briefly seal off the bridge.
One vehicle was badly damaged in the blast.
Both NATO and U.S.-led troops operate in Herat, regarded as one of a handful of safe areas in Afghanistan until recent weeks.
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U.K. Skynet-5A Now Operational over Afghanistan and Iraq
SatNews Daily LONDON, May 14, 2007
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Although it’s hard imagining the technophobic Taliban as adept at using computer keypads as they are with using Kalashnikovs, it’s precisely the anxiety that they might somehow be more techno savvy than they look that’s prompted the British to use their most sophisticated military satellite in Afghanistan.
Launched only this March, Skynet-5A is the UK’s most advanced military satellite—and is the highest power X-Band satellite in orbit. It is part of a $7 billion upgrade project by the UK Ministry of Defense (MoD) to improve communications between military command centers around the world.
Skynet- 5A is a next generation military satellite communications program to provide end-to-end, resilient, secure Beyond Line of Site communications services, including welfare, to the UK MoD and other non-UK MoD and multinational customers until 2020.
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Get out of Afghanistan and Iraq
By Patrick Seale, Special to Gulf News
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Afghanistan will be high on the agenda when Nato Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer visits President George W. Bush at his Texas ranch on May 20-21.
The message de Hoop Scheffer has to convey is sombre: Nato is losing the war against the Taliban. A fundamental policy review is urgently needed.
The most important new development is that the Afghans themselves, sickened by war and mounting civilian casualties, want US and other foreign troops to leave.
As President Hamid Karzai himself admitted Afghan patience with foreign troops is "wearing thin" five years after the US invasion. "It is difficult for us to continue to tolerate civilian casualties," he said at a press conference earlier this month.
On May 8, the Senate in Kabul approved a Bill that called for negotiations with the Taliban, a ceasefire, and a date for the withdrawal of foreign troops.
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Afghanistan president awaits high court ruling on foreign minister dismissal
Bernard Hibbitts at 6:50 PM ET May 13, 2007
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[JURIST] A spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai [official website] said Saturday that Karzai would await a Supreme Court [Wikipedia backgrounder] ruling on the legality of parliament dismissing government ministers before relieving Foreign Minister Rangeen Dadfar Spanta [official profile] after Spanta lost a no-confidence vote. A previous effort to oust Spanta on Thursday failed by a narrow margin, but parliament did vote that day to remove Repatriation and Refugee Minister Mohammad Akbar Akbar. Karzai, who accepted Akbar's dismissal, has asked the high court to decide whether parliament can force out a minister on a matter not directly related to his portfolio.
Both ministers came under fire for not doing more to oppose the expulsion of thousands of Afghan refugees from neighboring Iran [RFE/RL reports]. The refugees are now living in an Afghan border province but have no shelter. Some 2 million Afghan refugees remain in Iran
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Nine police officers killed in Afghanistan
May 14 2007 at 12:40AM
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Kabul - Nine police officers lost their lives in fresh attacks in Afghanistan on Sunday as a provincial governor said around 55 Taliban fighters had been killed in two battles near the Pakistan border a day earlier.
Eight police officers were killed when a hail of bullets ripped into their vehicle in a Taliban ambush in the western province of Nimroz, which is on the border with Iran, provincial governor Ghulam Dastgir Azad said.
Another police officer was killed in the eastern province of Nangarhar in a blast caused by a remote-controlled bomb, provincial police spokesperson Abdul Gahfoor said.
The attack was in the Bati Kot area where US-led coalition troops were accused of firing on civilians after a suicide bombing. They have admitted 19 were killed.
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Calgary man arrested in Afghanistan spoke of jihad, not suicide bombing: imam
PAT HEWITT The Canadian Press
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An Alberta imam says he spoke several months ago with a Calgary man he believes is the Canadian detained in Afghanistan and says the man talked about "helping his brothers and sisters in Afghanistan" by fighting the jihad, but didn't mention a suicide bombing.
In a report from Kandahar, CTV Newsnet quoted a written statement from Afghan authorities that alleged the Canadian admitted to planning to carry out a suicide bombing in Kabul. The statement also allegedly claimed the man's brother was the suicide bomber behind a Sept. 30, 2006 attack near the security gate of the Interior Ministry in Kabul that killed 12 people and injured at least 42.
In Ottawa, Foreign Affairs spokesman Rejean Beaulieu said yesterday he could not confirm any Canadian had been involved in the 2006 bombing in Kabul and added he was "not aware of this."
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Afghans display corpse of 'butcher'
Mullah Dadullah Lang; Slaying of Taliban's No. 2 a 'serious blow' to insurgents
Tom Blackwell, National Post Published: Monday, May 14, 2007
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KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Striking what they called a powerful blow against the Taliban insurgency, Afghan authorities and international forces announced yesterday they had killed Mullah Dadullah Lang, the group's second-in-command with a gruesome penchant for decapitation.
The coalition had reported one-legged Dadullah's death, prematurely, in the past. But to erase any doubt this time, the Governor of Kandahar showed journalists his blackened corpse, making a point of indicating the amputee limb.
The Mullah was a "brutal butcher," responsible for countless beheadings and other killings of Afghans and Western soldiers, said Governor Assadullah Khalid.
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Taliban leader Mullah Omar says jihad will go on
Updated Mon. May. 14 2007 8:27 AM ET Associated Press
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KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- The Taliban leader Mullah Omar said the killing of the group's top field commander "won't create problems" for the hardline militia, a spokesman said Monday.
Qari Yousef Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, told The Associated Press that Omar and other top Taliban leaders offered condolences to Mullah Dadullah's family over the killing by the U.S.-led coalition -- the first Taliban confirmation of Dadullah's killing.
Ahmadi read a statement attributed to Omar insisting that Dadullah's death "won't create problems for the Taliban's jihad" and that militants will continue attacks against "occupying countries."
Dadullah, a one-legged militant who orchestrated Taliban suicide attacks and beheadings, died of gunshot wounds after a U.S.-led operation over the weekend in the southern province of Helmand. Analysts called the killing the most significant Taliban loss since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.
Ahmadi said Omar and his council of top Taliban leaders decided against naming an immediate replacement for Dadullah.
"Mullah Dadullah was the commander of all the fighting groups. Now all of the mujahedeen will carry on his same type of jihad. They will carry out attacks just as Mullah Dadullah did in his life," Ahmadi quoted Omar as saying.
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Afghanistan under the microscope
TheStar.com May 14, 2007 Terry Copp
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Canadians are confused about the UN-sanctioned, NATO-led mission in Afghanistan. What is its purpose? Waging war on terrorism, opium eradication, nation-building, protecting Afghan civil society from the strictures of the Taliban or simply holding on and hoping for a miracle amid the catastrophe unfolding in Iraq?
These and other questions continue to be the subject of a series of workshops held in Waterloo, Ontario.
Wilfrid Laurier University's Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies, in partnership with the Centre for International Governance Innovation and the Academic Council on the United Nations System, is organizing a third attempt to come to grips with some of the many issues that challenge decision-makers.
Last December, 28 specialists – including Chris Alexander, Canada's former ambassador in Kabul who is now a UN Special Representative for Afghanistan; Ali A. Jalali, the reformist interior minister who served Afghanistan from 2003-2005; and Husain Haggani, author of Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military – met to debate broad strategic and security issues.
The workshop began with a presentation by William Maley of the Australian National University. His recent book Rescuing Afghanistan is basic reading for everyone who seeks to understand this complex country. Maley and 10 other participants have contributed essays to Afghanistan: Transition Under Threat which is being published this summer.
This week's workshop that begins today includes, among others, contributions from Lt.-Col. Simon Hetherington, who commanded the Canadian Provincial Reconstruction Team in Kandahar in 2006, and Ramesh Thakur, formerly of the UN University in Tokyo. The plan is to produce a report to be made available as a supplement to Afghanistan: Transition Under Threat.
What can Canadians expect to learn from such events? Foreign and defence policies have become major political issues and may well determine the outcome of the next election.
We need to examine our options on the basis of the best information available to us and the Waterloo conference will make an important contribution to a long overdue public debate.
Prior to 9/11, Canada had little interest in Afghanistan and when the Chrétien government opted to commit resources to rebuilding that country, it was widely seen as gesture to Washington after rejecting participation in George W. Bush's Iraq war.
Once on the ground in Afghanistan, successive Liberal governments embraced the 3D (development, diplomacy and defence) approach and Afghanistan became the focal point of Canadian external policy.
If Canada had stuck to its original commitment to Kabul, or opted for one of the calmer northern provinces, the mission would have attracted little attention and produced many fewer casualties.
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