Articles found Feb 4, 2012
35 killed as militants attack Pakistan checkpoint
By Saud Mehsud, REUTERS
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DERA ISMAIL KHAN, PAKISTAN - Militants attacked an isolated army checkpoint in Pakistan’s restive northwest on Saturday, with at least 35 people killed in the initial assault, subsequent crossfire and a rocket attack on a house, officials said.
The Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility, saying the attack was in response to a U.S. drone strike in neighbouring North Waziristan last month in which two commanders were killed.
The Pakistani military and pro-government militias have since 2009 regained territory from the Pakistan Taliban, who once controlled land a few hours’ drive from the capital of Islamabad.
The militants attacked the post at Lakki Marwat early on Saturday.
A security official said 12 militants and 13 soldiers were killed in the clash. Two bodies had suicide bomb belts on them.
“Cross-firing between militants and security officials continued for four hours,” one source said.
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Afghanistan: The challenge of 'good' vs 'bad' militias
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Gunmen in northern Afghanistan want the Karzai government to make their local unit an official part of the security force that will take over after US withdraws.
By Scott Peterson, Staff writer / January 11, 2013
Kunduz, Afghanistan
As two Afghan farmers tell it, they are part of the "good" militia in their northern province: unofficial armed men who protect schools, families, and farms, and have chased Taliban insurgents away.
They are not part of the "bad" militia, they say, that since 2010 has especially traumatized parts of Kunduz Province by forcibly extracting "taxes" from villagers, and engaging in killings and rape – all in the name of fighting insurgents themselves.
Now these traditional gunmen want the Karzai government to make their local unit an official part of the 350,000-strong Afghan security forces that will take over after US combat forces withdraw by the end of 2014.
But as President Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai meet today in Washington, such militias – both good and bad, and neither of them under government control – present a challenge to the future stability in Afghanistan.
Kunduz represents a blend of unofficial and official security forces in Afghanistan, where well-connected militia chiefs have been reluctant to disarm or cede influence. Here, the legacy of the decade-long fight against the Soviets in the 1980s has persisted, thwarting government efforts to extend its reach throughout the country.
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Afghanistan: Taliban may be 'weak,' but fear remains
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As President Karzai discusses his country's future with President Obama in Washington, many Afghans continue day-to-day fight against extremist intimidation on the ground.
By Scott Peterson, Staff writer / January 10, 2013
Kabul and Kunduz, Afghanistan
The television is always tuned to the news channel at the police station in Kunduz, northern Afghanistan.
When the screen shows the images of a suicide bombing at another police headquarters elsewhere in Afghanistan, officer Said Sarwar Husaini turns up the volume to hear the report. The TV shows black smoke billowing from a station just like his; frantic Afghan police are both victims and rescuers.
While Afghan President Hamid Karzai meets US President Barack Obama during a high-profile visit to Washington this week for strategic discussions about Afghanistan's future, the Afghan officer represents part of a real fight for Afghanistan that is playing out at ground level and highlights just how much grip the Taliban still has over Afghans – and also, how little.
"Yes, there are lots of threats, but as police we are used to danger," says Mr. Husaini, the Kunduz police spokesman, of the risks of being a member of Afghanistan's 350,000-strong security forces in the midst of an insurgency that has foiled US and Western forces after 11 years of war.
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Back in Afghanistan, Karzai shifts tone on US troop immunity (+video)
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Failure to agree on an immunity deal in Iraq ensured that US forces pulled out completely by the end of 2011, further diminishing America's influence there.
By Scott Peterson, Staff writer / January 14, 2013
A diplomatic dance has commenced between the United States and Afghanistan over a US request for legal immunity that would enable a contingent of American troops to stay on beyond 2014.
Failure to agree on an immunity deal in Iraq ensured that US forces pulled out completely by the end of 2011, further diminishing American influence there despite toppling Saddam Hussein in 2003 and fighting a bloody counterinsurgency to backstop the governments that followed. Now, observers are watching to see how Afghanistan will handle the issue, which would determine just how many soldiers stay past a 2014 deadline for withdrawal of combat troops.
"I can tell you with relatively good confidence that they will say 'all right, let's do it,' " President Hamid Karzai told CNN in an interview during a visit last week to the US. "And I'm sure that they will understand."
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Pakistani Taliban enter fray around strategic NATO routes
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Fighting between rival militant groups near the Khyber Pass has reportedly claimed more than 70 lives over the past week.
By Taha Siddiqui, Correspondent / January 30, 2013
Islamabad, Pakistan
Clashes between rival militant groups in the tribal region next to the Afghanistan border has reportedly claimed more than 70 lives since fighting broke out last week. The area lies near the Khyber Pass, a main route for NATO supply trucks to Afghanistan, making it pivotal to the US war effort there and to Pakistan's revenues.
Fighting flared after a third militant group – the Pakistani Taliban – moved into an area already being fought over by two other outfits and the Pakistani military. On the run from its traditional strongholds in another part of the tribal belt, the Pakistani Taliban recently pushed into key parts of the Khyber Agency in a bid to control lucrative trading routes and establish a firmer base of operations.
The fighting now pits the Pakistani Taliban and a local militant group against a pro-government militant outfit and the Pakistani military. The military has tried since 2009 to gain full control over such a sensitive area, but has had to settle for a divide-and-conquer strategy of pitting one set of militants against another. The arrival of the Pakistani Taliban, an implacable foe of the government, complicates this already delicate balancing act.
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Pakistan's Balochistan: Minerals, militants, and meddling
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Five points to understand about Pakistan's restive Balochistan Province.
By Mahvish Ahmad, Correspondent / January 31, 2013 Islamabad, Pakistan
Balochistan is a key province in Pakistan that is filled with natural resources as well as a volatile mix of Afghan Taliban leaders, anti-Shiite militants, and ethnic separatists.
Why is Balochistan important?
Balochistan is Pakistan's largest province in terms of size, and its smallest in terms of population. The province has always been seen as occupying a geo-strategic position. It has the country's longest coastline, with a lucrative deep-sea port at Gwadar in the south, and a shared border with Afghanistan and Iran. Balochistan also has extensive tapped and untapped resources, including copper, gold, oil, lead, and zinc.
The province has always been seen as a strategic asset, first by the British colonial power who saw it as a buffer zone holding off Afghan and Russian forces. Today, it is a key source of gas and minerals for Pakistanis across the country, and seen as a strategic transport route.
An on-going separatist uprising and the continued presence of Islamist groups in the north has made this strategic province especially restive.
Who are Balochistan's separatists?
A section of the province's ethnic Baloch are calling for the outright independence of Balochistan, after the 2007 assassination of Akbar Bugti, the head of the Bugti tribe and a former Interior Minister in the provincial government. The demands of the separatist Baloch have prompted the deployment of thousands of Pakistani troops across the province, who have been accused of extra-judicial kidnappings, torture, and killings of Baloch activists. Baloch separatists have also been accused of carrying out attacks against members of Pakistan's powerful Punjabi ethnicity as well as Baloch who take a more pro-Pakistan line.
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Boy and Girl Scouts in Afghanistan?
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An Afghan charity has worked to rejuvenate Afghanistan's coed Scouting program. It has 2,000 Scouts and more than 100 Scout leaders spread around the county.
By Jay Price, McClatchy Newspapers / February 4, 2013 Kabul, Afghanistan
PARSA, the group that got the clothes collected by Maryland Boy Scout John Ferry to the cave dwellers of Bamiyan, has worked to revive Scouting in Afghanistan since 2009.
PARSA is one of the country’s oldest charities, with programs to train teachers and social workers to deal with psychological issues in orphanages and schools, to help women start small businesses and to provide education to women and children who can’t attend traditional schools for various reasons.
It first got involved in Scouting as a way to instill values in older children it was training to help in orphanages, said Keith Blackey, PARSA’s Scouting adviser.
Now it has 2,000 Scouts and more than 100 Scout leaders spread around the county, and it’s emphasizing training more Scout leaders as a way to expand Scouting.
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