Taliban – Page 2

Nato ends its war in Afghanistan as Taliban continues to grow

December 29, 2014 by Nasheman

Event carried out in secret due to threat of Taliban strikes in Afghan capital, which has been hit by repeated bombings.

Photo: EPA/CPL JANINE FABRE / ISAF

by Al Jazeera

NATO has held a ceremony in Kabul formally ending its war in Afghanistan, officials said, after 13 years of conflict and gradual troop withdrawals that have left the country in the grip of worsening conflicts with armed groups.

The event was carried out on Sunday in secret due to the threat of Taliban strikes in the Afghan capital, which has been hit by repeated suicide bombings and gun attacks over recent years.

On January 1, the US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) combat mission will be replaced by a NATO “training and support” mission.

“Resolute Support will serve as the bedrock of an enduring partnership” between NATO and Afghanistan, US Army General John F Campbell told an audience of Afghan and international military officers and officials, as well as diplomats and journalists.

He paid tribute to the international and Afghan troops who have died fighting in the conflict saying: “The road before us remains challenging but we will triumph”.

The closing of NATO’s combat mission comes at the end of the country’s deadliest year during the war, which saw at least 4,600 Afghan soldiers and police killed and many other civilian deaths.

About 12,500 foreign troops staying in Afghanistan will not be involved in direct fighting, but will assist the Afghan army and police in the battle against the Taliban, who ruled from 1996 until 2001.

When numbers peaked in 2011, about 130,000 troops from 50 nations were part of the NATO military alliance.

‘Milestone for US’

Obama called the ceremony “a milestone for our country.”

“Now, thanks to the extraordinary sacrifices of our men and women in uniform, our combat mission in Afghanistan is ending, and the longest war in American history is coming to a responsible conclusion,” he said in a statement.

Obama thanked the troops and intelligence workers who served in Afghanistan, crediting them with “devastating the core al-Qaeda leadership, delivering justice to Osama bin Laden, disrupting terrorist plots and saving countless American lives”.

“We are safer, and our nation is more secure, because of their service.”

But, Obama warned, “Afghanistan remains a dangerous place, and the Afghan people and their security forces continue to make tremendous sacrifices in defence of their country.”

Sunday’s ceremony completes the gradual handover of responsibility to the 350,000-strong Afghan forces, who have been in charge of nationwide security since the middle of last year.

Al Jazeera’s Jennifer Glasse, reporting from Kabul, said that Afghans were very concerned with the complete pullout, citing a security vacuum and political instability as the main threats as heavy fighting rages across the country.

“The government has also failed to name a cabinet, so it is not just the lack of security that is a concern, but also political instability”.

Notes from the field: Al Jazeera’s Jennifer Glasse reports from Kabul

There was a lot of mingling before the ceremony among Afghan officials, military officers, ambassadors, and diplomats from more than a dozen countries. It was a gathering befitting NATO’s largest and longest ever coalition.

In the blue and white gymnasium on ISAF’s main headquarters, a small brass military band played in the corner as US General Joseph Campbell rolled up the green flag emblazoned with ISAF for the International Security Assistance Force, he has commanded since August.

He unfurled a green flag with RS on it – the new colours as the military call them, of the NATO Resolute Support force that takes over on January 1.

The changeover marks the end of the 13-year long NATO combat mission. But about 5,500 US forces will remain in Afghanistan outside the NATO mission, carrying out counterterrorism operations.

In total, that puts about 17,000 international troops in Afghanistan in 2015.

The head of the Afghan Army, General Sher Mohammad Karimi says his forces will miss ISAF, and all the resources NATO offered. “ISAF had everything,” he told me. “We are limited. We do not have enough equipment to get rid of the IEDs [improvised explosive devices, or roadside bombs] or equipment to give us early warning, but still we are doing better.”

But Afghan forces continue to take punishing losses with more than 4,600 killed this year, and thousands more wounded.

The speeches acknowledged the sacrifices made. Afghanistan’s National Security Adviser Mohammad Hanif Atmar said, “We will never forget your sons and daughters who have died on our soil. They are now our sons and daughters. Afghan and Coalition personnel have spilled their blood to ensure a brighter future for our country and to bring peace to the world.”

No one here thinks peace will be easy. After 13 years and more than a trillion dollars spent in military and humanitarian support, Afghanistan is still in a perilous position.

It’s heavily dependent on foreign aid, and the Taliban and other groups that oppose the government continue to battle Afghan forces on a number of fronts.

The mood at the transition ceremony was one of deep camaraderie between allies who have come a long way, but recognise there is still a long way to go. Not necessarily a mission accomplished – more a mission continued.

Schools in Kashmir issue advisory after Peshawar attack

December 20, 2014 by Nasheman

Fearing Peshawar-like attack across disputed Himalayan state of Indian administered Kashmir, prominent schools here on Friday issued advisory, issuing guidelines to the students and parents on dealing with such situations.

Srinagar: Fearing Peshawar-like attack across Jammu & Kashmir, prominent schools here on Friday issued advisory, issuing guidelines to the students and parents on dealing with such situations.

“Security and safety are primary concerns for all of us. All the children have the right to live in a secure environment. Being exposed to violence can have a negative impact on children’s health, sense of safety, security and their feelings about the future,” Principal at prominent Srinagar based Delhi Public School, Athwajan, Kusam Warikoo said in a communique issued to guardians. Warikoo asked parents to respected some guidelines by for ensuring “better security”

“No child will be allowed to board the bus without their Identity Cards. No electronic gadgets will be allowed in the school, if confiscated it will not be returned,” she wrote to them (parents).

The school authorities said that the students will be allowed only to carry their study material and their lunch in the school bag.

Similar communication has been issued by many other Srinagar based schools working under the aegis of CBSE.

Meanwhile Indian home ministry on Friday issued an advisory to all states and Union territories reiterating CBSE’s 2010 guidelines to schools on dealing with “terror” situations.

The standard operating procedures (SOPs), apprise the school management on how to deal with kidnappings outside the school gate, random firing from road outside the school, armed intrusions followed by hostage taking and explosive objects and seek regular mock drills at schools to test their preparedness against possible strikes.

A set of guidelines issued to the prominent schools across India has urged the authorities to remain vigilant and also use telephone connectivity from the gate, CCTV systems along the boundary and inside, walkie-talkie communication between guards, alarm system and a centralized public announcement system are some of the other requirements to make the school secure.

The government has said that the in the event of kidnapping of children at the time of arrival/departure, the guards must rush children outside inside the school and close the gates, besides asking vehicles carrying children to leave the area. Mock drills should be conducted to ensure that a system is in place to set off the alarm, alert the police and respond to medical emergencies.

“If there is bomb scare, children should not be allowed to collect in one place without properly checking the area,” a guideline booklet book issued by Indian home ministry said.

‘Outraged camp’

Many Kashmiri leaders are outraged and strongly condemned the Peshawar incident wherein the Taliban stormed a military-run school in northwest Pakistan and gunned down over 145 people, most of them children, in one of the country’s deadliest attacks in recent weeks.

Huriyat Conference (G) chairman Syed Ali Geelani while terming the attacks barbaric, said waging war against such elements is the duty of every Muslim.

Geelani said that there is no need to prove that those claiming to fight for Islam and are involved in such cowardly acts are in actual the biggest enemies of Islam and Muslims. He said that the attacks are inhuman and those involved in the incidents must be served the stern punishment.

Kashmir chief cleric and Huriyat Conference (M) chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq while condemning the killings of school children said that those involved in the cowardly acts cannot be the well-wishers of Islam and Pakistan. Huriyat Conference leader Shabir Ahmad Shah condemned the attack saying that the killings are tantamount of killing the whole humanity.

(With inputs from Authintmail)

Moazzam Begg on Peshawar massacre: All have lost moral high ground

December 19, 2014 by Nasheman

by Moazzam Begg

It’s not often that you’ll hear the Islamic Emirate (or the Afghan Taliban) condemning their Pakistani namesakes but that is precisely what happened on Tuesday when the horrific attack was carried out by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in the city of Peshawar, writes.

Family blood feuds were fairly common when I lived in Peshawar many years ago but would only extend to individuals within clans and tribes. Children may have been abducted for ransoms but killing was rare. Today, it’s all out, unrelenting war with no rules.

The lives of all our children are precious: children of ruthless politicians, children of torture victims, children of terror suspects, children of anti terror SWAT officers, children of drone operators, children of soldiers, children of judges, children of farmers and children of the homeless and hopeless.

The children of our friend and the children of our enemy are still innocent. That is why the Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) explicitly forbade targeting them, especially in times of war. Every law based on any aspect of human decency since concurs with this view.

The product of terror, torture and violence is more of the same. To end it we must we must stop regarding understanding and explanations as “justification.” Every crime has a motive, a mens rea behind it, even the most despicable ones.

“Sick and twisted act”

The deliberate killing of children in Peshawar was a twisted and sick act. But this sickness has developed as a direct result of indiscriminate killing of faceless terrorist suspects and their families.

Recent reports have shown how 26 children were killed as collateral damage in trying to unsuccessfully kill one man, namely Aymanal-Zawahiri. Countless other attacks have caused “collateral damage” in Pakistani’s war in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and beyond have lead to deaths of thousands. Statistics and testimonies are hard to come by because of fear of further targeting and woeful under-reporting.

I understand there is a difference between deliberately targeting children, which is the most abhorrent of acts I can think of (how can a man point a gun at a child and pull the trigger?) and the targeting of suspects knowing and accepting that children may be killed in pursuit of the latter. However, in both cases it is accepted by the perpetrators that children will (or are likely to) be killed.

When I was evacuating from Afghanistan in 2001 with my own children under heavy US bombardment thousands of innocent civilians, many of them children, were shredded to pieces by 15,000 lb “daisy-cutter” bombs, vacuum bombs, smart bombs, cluster bombs, tomahawk cruise and “hellfire” missiles. The victims were often identifiable only by the clothes their family members recognized or by body parts. Exact numbers of casualties are still unknown. There was never an outcry for their children.

It is time to stop this cycle of uncontrolled rage and internecine violence that will only drive us to the pits of hell. Incessant calls for revenge each time need to be tempered with reflections on the consequences of what that means. There are no winners in this.

Instead, let the killers of these children look upon the faces of their victims and then ask themselves why they truly did it. Religion has nothing to do with it. If it had would the killers risk the eternal damnation Allah has promised for those who kill unjustly? For that is His solemn promise.

He may forgive those who repent if He wishes but how can the families of these child victims be expected to do such a thing? After all the killers couldn’t forgive, so why should they expect anything but retribution? So the vicious circle continues like the Pashtun code of badal (revenge – like for like) only in a more vicious, unremitting way.

Perhaps it cannot be stopped; its been going on for 13 years, but someone has to try. Let drone operators and pilots who drop bombs from thousands of feet on their victims see the carnage on the ground: indistinguishable body pieces in rural villages where poverty and illiteracy is still the greatest unacknowledged enemy.

Let them see what their hands have caused and how the circle of violence they began with the press of a button ended with the lives of mangled bodies of men, women and innocent children. Let the murderers of children look at the corpses of the young lives they snuffed out and remember how they killed innocence and destroyed their own hereafter in the process. Before they embark on the same road to disaster let those considering this path look closely at the faces of children in their own family.

War on terror

Before the “war on terror” Pakistan had a reputation for world-class corruption – from the government all the way to the cricket pitch and everything in between. After the war on terror this was followed by enforced disappearances, arbitrary detention, drone strikes and full scale military operations which led to unprecedented levels of extremism, terrorism, sectarianism and ultimately the targeting of schools and children.

It has descended to depths few could have envisaged before the war on terror started.

It was Pakistani Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) agents who, along with the CIA stormed into my house in Islamabad in the middle of the night and carried me away, hooded and shackled in front of my children and handed me over without any judicial process to the US military in 2002. The same was done to hundreds of others, for bounty money.

In Bagram CIA agents waived pictures of my children in front of my face as they beat me and threatened to send me to Syria or Egypt while a woman who I thought was my wife screamed in agony in the next cell. I would have done anything to stop them. At that moment my family and children were more precious to me than theirs’ were to them.

And they must’ve thought likewise. I sometimes overheard them talking to their kids, how they’d missed their birthdays because they were here in this Afghan hellhole [Bagram] interrogating scumbag terrorists like us.

The truth is that we all love our children and they (mostly) love us right back, the best of us and the worst of us. It is their innocence that reminds us often of our flaws, our guilt even. Tuesday’s killings were a stark reminder of that.

All who claimed the moral high ground have lost it, the ones who kill children in the name of democracy and the ones who retaliate in the name of Islam. The ideology doesn’t matter – not when the sacred is de-sanctified like this.

It is actions to end the cycle of violence, at least on the children, which are needed now more than anything. Otherwise words mean nothing.

Pakistan school attack: years of inaction on terror led to this atrocity

December 17, 2014 by Nasheman

Protestors gather in the wake of the attack. EPA/T Mughal

by Talat Farooq, The Conversation

The shock waves from a brutal terror attack that claimed the lives of more than 130 children in the northern Pakistani city of Peshawar are being felt around the world.

The Taliban assault, which began on Tuesday morning, has claimed the lives of at least 141 people. Across social media people expressed their horror and sympathy. From Pakistan to the UK, relatives of children attending the Army Public School were anxiously awaiting news.

The attack is being seen as one of the worst in nearly a decade of unabated violence in the country that has killed more than 55,000 Pakistanis – most of whom were civilians.

The Pakistani Taliban, or Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, has confirmed that it was responsible for the attack and said the school was hit in response to army operations that have been taking place in the tribal areas.

Background to the attack

Over the past six months hundreds of Taliban fighters have been killed since a full-fledged military operation called Zarb-e-Azbwas launched. This has involved bombing the North Waziristan and Khyber areas in a bid to stamp out insurgencies.

Zarb-e-Azb was launched on June 15 2014 after talks between the Taliban and the government failed and a terrorist attack on Jinnah International Airport in Karachi left 39 dead, including all 10 gunmen.

The operation has been regarded as successful so far. The main hubs of militant activity have been cleared from North Waziristan and Khyber. And last week, the army gave the go-ahead for civilian authorities to start returning more than one million displaced people to North Waziristan.

But while the military side of the operation has met its targets, the political contribution made by successive governments has been less than satisfactory. The Pakistan Muslim League, in power since 2013, has long argued that dialogue with the Taliban is the preferred option. But this has meant failing to take any real ownership of the war that was raging regardless.

Just days after Zarb-e-Azb started, protesters associated with the political party Pakistan Awami Tehrik were killed in a violent clash with the Punjab police in Lahore, setting the stage for major political turmoil.

The situation worsened as Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf party started to accuse the PML government of electoral fraud in the elections of May 2013. Since August 2014, the PTI has continued to carry out protests, sit-ins and shut-downs in major cities. For its part, the government has failed to seriously resolve the issue through meaningful negotiations.

Failure to act

There has been a consistent lack of sufficient political will and seriousness on the part of the government to fully implement Pakistan’s anti-terrorism laws. Not a single convicted terrorist has so far been punished even though Pakistan carries the death penalty for such crimes.

According to experts, a backlog of cases, the absence of a proper mechanism to monitor religious schools, the proliferation of mobile phones in prisons, over-reliance on witnesses rather than forensics by the police and a lack of information sharing between civil and military intelligence agencies are just some of the major weaknesses and problems encountered in Pakistan’s anti-terrorism investigations.

Institutionalised corruption and political interference has also seriously undermined the capacity of civilian law enforcement agencies to tackle the terrorist threat. The government administrations have therefore proved to be poorly equipped to cope with the demands of unconventional warfare and have failed to systematically dismantle sleeper-cells within the country.

This attack is likely to have serious repercussions within and beyond Pakistani territory. At the domestic level the public – already fed up with perennial energy crisis and rising inflation – is bound to lose whatever faith it may have had in the government’s current approach to tackling internal security threats. None of this bodes well for the democratic process in a country that has had 32 years of military rule since its creation 67 years ago.

Talat Farooq is a Research Associate at University of Birmingham.

Modi speaks to Sharif, says India stands firmly with Pakistan

December 17, 2014 by Nasheman

Pakistani parents react near the site of an attack by Taliban gunmen on a school in Peshawar on December 16, 2014. At least 130 people were killed in a Taliban attack on an army-run school in northwest Pakistan, officials said. AFP PHOTO/ A MAJEED

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi Tuesday evening spoke with his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif over phone and offered his deepest condolences for the dastardly terror attack on a school in Peshawar. He said India was ready to provide all assistance during this hour of grief.

The prime minister spoke to Sharif after the latter returned from a visit to the school where around 140 people, mostly children, were slaughtered by Taliban gunmen.

“India stands firmly with Pakistan in fight against terror. Told PM Sharif we are ready to provide all assistance during this hour of grief,” he tweeted.

External affairs spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin in a tweet posted the prime minister’s statement during his talk with Sharif, which said Modi condemned in the strongest terms the brutal terrorist attack in Peshawar.

Modi said the “savage killing of innocent children, who are the epitome of the finest human values, in a temple of learning was not only an attack against Pakistan, but an assault against the entire humanity”.

“At a time when the world is getting disturbingly accustomed to acts of terror, this terrible tragedy has shaken the conscience of the world,” he said.

“He said the people of India shared the heart rending pain and sorrow of the bereaved families and the people of Pakistan and stood with them in solidarity in this hour of immeasurable grief.

“He (Modi) also hoped that the children who had witnessed the horrific attack and loss of their friends would come through this trauma with counselling.”

Modi told Sharif that “this moment of shared pain and mourning is also a call for our two countries and all those who believe in humanity to join hands to decisively and comprehensively defeat terrorism, so that the children in Pakistan, India and elsewhere do not have to face a future darkened by the lengthening shadow of terrorism”.

Earlier in the day, Modi tweeted his condemnation, saying: “It is a senseless act of unspeakable brutality that has claimed lives of the most innocent of human beings – young children in their school. My heart goes out to everyone who lost their loved ones today. We share their pain & offer our deepest condolences,” he said.

(IANS)

Pakistan Taliban storm Peshawar school, 130 killed

December 16, 2014 by Nasheman

The feet of a victim of a Taliban attack in a school are tied together at a local hospital in Peshawar — AP

by BBC

At least 126 people, mostly children, have been killed in a Taliban assault on an army-run school in the Pakistani city of Peshawar, officials say.

Five or six militants are said to have entered the building. Five are reported to have been killed, at least one of them in a suicide blast.

The army says most of the school’s 500 students have been evacuated. It is not clear how many are being held hostage.

The attack is being seen as one of the worst yet in Pakistan.

The BBC’s Aamer Ahmed Khan in Islamabad says the killing of schoolchildren has caused unprecedented shock.

Thousands of Pakistanis have been killed in militant violence in recent years.

A spokesman for the militants says the school was targeted in response to army operations.

Hundreds of Taliban fighters are thought to have died in a recent military offensive in North Waziristan and the nearby Khyber area.

A student cries on a man’s shoulder, after he was rescued from the Army Public School – Reuters

Many of the casualties were reportedly caused by a suicide blast. At least 80 of the dead are said to be children.

The attack started at 10:00 local time (05:00 GMT). Mudassir Awan, a worker at the school, said he saw six people scaling the walls of the school.

“We thought it must be the children playing some game,” he told Reuters news agency. “But then we saw a lot of firearms with them.

“As soon as the firing started, we ran to our classrooms,” he said. “They were entering every class and they were killing the children.”

A school worker and a student interviewed by the local Geo TV station said the attackers had entered the Army Public School’s auditorium, where a military team was conducting first-aid training for students.

Locals said they also heard the screams of students and teachers. The dead are said to include teachers, as well as a paramilitary soldier.

Gunfire and loud explosions were heard as security forces hunted down the militants.

Ambulances have been carrying the injured to nearby hospitals. A helicopter is also in the area. Major roads in Peshawar in the city have been sealed off.

A doctor at the local Lady Reading hospital said many of the students were in “very bad condition”, with severe head wounds.

Frantic parents are gathering at hospitals to find out if their children are safe.

The school is at the edge of a military cantonment in Peshawar, which has seen some of the worst of the violence during a Taliban insurgency in recent years.

Many of the students were the children of military personnel. Most of them would have been aged 16 or under.

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who has just arrived in Peshawar, described the attack as a “national tragedy”.

The Pakistani opposition politician and former cricket captain Imran Khan condemned the attack as “utter barbarism”.

Afghan retreat echoes of Vietnam defeat

November 1, 2014 by Nasheman

by Finian Cunningham, Press TV

It didn’t quite garner the same media highlight, but nevertheless there was the unmistakable comparison this week between the evacuation of American troops from southern Afghanistan and the Fall of Saigon, South Vietnam, in 1975.

Both events mark embarrassing retreats by a failing American empire whose hubris always manages to deny reality until the illusion of power finally comes crashing down.

This week thousands of US and British troops were hurriedly airlifted from the giant military base known as Camp Bastion in southern Helmand Province.

It was a huge logistical operation involving a fleet of transport planes and helicopters landing and taking off over a 24-hour period.

The scene of hasty imperial removal from Helmand reminded one of the classic photographs taken in 1975 by UPI photographer Hubert Van Es, which captured American Huey choppers lifting hundreds of desperate personnel from off the rooftop of the CIA headquarters in Saigon ahead of imminent defeat by Vietnamese insurgents.

This week in Helmand the evacuating troops were the last of the US-led NATO force that has occupied Afghanistan for the past 13 years. At its peak, there were 140,000 American troops in the country with the second biggest contingency being the British, along with soldiers from nearly 50 other nations.

Now Camp Bastion has been handed over to Afghan troops and police, who will take over the daunting task of maintaining security across the country against a deadly resurgence of Taliban militants.

Officially, the US-led international force is to wind down its operation in Afghanistan at the end of this year, but some 10,000 American military and CIA will remain in the country in a “support role” to national security forces under a deal signed between Washington and the new Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

Just like the Fall of Saigon in April 1975, in which thousands of American personnel were scrambled out the country ahead of the Vietnamese victory, the retreat from Afghanistan this week signals another humiliating defeat for the warmongers in Washington.

Not only a humiliating defeat, but the end of a long and bloody chronicle of futile war. Thirteen years ago, the Americans invaded Afghanistan allegedly to topple a fundamentalist Taliban regime and eradicate an international source of terrorism led by Saudi al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

Tens of thousands of deaths later, plus trillions of dollars billed to the American taxpayers, the US troops are clearing out from a country that is left in worst shape. The American-installed government can barely maintain security in the capital, Kabul, never mind the surrounding regions. What’s more terrorism of the Al-Qaeda brand has spread internationally eliciting the deployment of even more American militarism abroad, and the ramping up of state security powers within the US and its NATO allies.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban are resurgent not only in their southern heartlands, but have taken over large parts of the east, west and north of the country, where they previously had little presence. Schools and other civic administration in these areas are now reportedly run, not by the US-backed government in Kabul, but by the militants.

Cultivation of poppy for heroin production – a main source of finance for the Taliban warlords – has reached an all-time high with over 200,000 hectares under cultivation. Nearly half of all Afghan poppy is harvested in Helmand Province, where US President Obama launched his much-vaunted surge of 30,000 extra marines in 2009-2010. Despite Washington spending $7.6 billion to curb poppy production, Afghanistan has emerged as the world’s biggest source of heroin, while drug addiction in the US is reportedly soaring.

On security matters, between March and August this year, nearly 1,000 Afghan troops and 2,200 police officers were killed in militant attacks. That represents the worst casualty rate for local forces over the past 13 years.

With the last of the US-led foreign forces pulling out this week, there is an ominous sense of the security levee bursting across Afghanistan.

If anything, the prognosis for Afghanistan is a lot worse than it was for Iraq where US troops beat a similar hasty retreat three years ago.

By comparison, Afghanistan has a much more active insurgency raging even as the Americans are pulling out. Iraq has gone on to descend into chaos, so the portent for Afghanistan would seem a lot worse.

Reuters news agency reported the view of US Marine Staff Sergeant Kenneth Oswood, who participated in both the Iraq withdrawal and this week’s evacuation from Afghanistan. He said: “It’s a lot different this time. Closing out Iraq, when we got there, we were told there hadn’t been a shot fired in anger at us in years. And then you come here and they are still shooting at us.”

The US marine added: “It’s almost like it’s not over here, and we’re just kind of handing it over to someone else to fight.”

More like handing it over to someone else to do the dying.

The “exceptional” Americans in Washington like to refer to their foreign interventions as “nation building.” Like Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, among dozens of other unfortunate countries to have hosted American “nation builders” over the past century, the people of these wretched lands have experienced Washington’s reverse Midas Touch. Far from turning to gold, everything Washington touches brings death and destruction.

And in the end when the American destroyers finally pack up and run, it is the people that remain who must pick up the pieces and actually begin the real process of national development. How easier it would be if Washington just kept its imperialist, predatory hands off others.

Finian Cunningham (born 1963) has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. He is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in journalism. He is also a musician and songwriter. For nearly 20 years, he worked as an editor and writer in major news media organisations, including The Mirror, Irish Times and Independent.

UK troops leave Afghanistan after 13 years

October 28, 2014 by Nasheman

British hand Camp Bastion base in Helmand to Afghan troops, in withdrawal that went unannounced due to security fears.

by Al Jazeera

British troops have ended combat operations in Afghanistan as they and US troops handed over two huge adjacent bases to the Afghan military, 13 years after a US-led invasion to topple the Taliban.

The troops handed over to Afghan forces on Sunday at camps Bastion and Leatherneck, in the southwestern province of Helmand. The timing of their withdrawal had not been announced for security reasons.

Their departure on Sunday leaves Afghanistan and its newly installed president, Ashraf Ghani, to deal almost unaided with an emboldened Taliban after the last foreign combat troops withdraw by year-end.

Leatherneck and Bastion formed the international coalition’s regional headquarters for the southwest of Afghanistan, housing up to 40,000 military personnel and civilian contractors.

After Sunday’s withdrawal, the Afghan National Army’s 215th Corps will be headquartered at the 28sq km base, leaving almost no foreign military presence in Helmand.

The US military leaves behind about $230m of property and equipment for the Afghan military.

This includes a major airstrip at the base, plus roads and buildings.

Camp Leatherneck resembled on Sunday a dust-swept ghost town of concrete blast walls, empty barracks and razor wire.

Offices and bulletin boards, which once showed photograph tributes to dead US and British soldiers, had been stripped.

Heaviest fighting

The British experienced their heaviest fighting of the Afghan campaign in Helmand, losing hundreds of soldiers.

Their presence was boosted in recent years by US troops as the UK wound down its operations.

In all, 2,210 US and 453 British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001, when the US-led coalition toppled the Taliban government shortly after the September 11 attacks.

“We gave them the maps to the place. We gave them the keys,” said Colonel Doug Patterson, a US marine brigade commander in charge of logistics.

General John Campbell, the head of coalition forces in Afghanistan, acknowledged Helmand “has been a very, very tough area” over the last several months.

“But we feel very confident with the Afghan security forces as they continue to grow in their capacity,” he said.

He said the smaller international force that will remain next year will still provide some intelligence and air support, two areas where Afghan forces are weak.

General Sher Mohammad Karimi, chief of staff of the Afghan army, said the Taliban “will keep us busy for a while”.

“We have to do more until we are fully successful and satisfied with the situations,” he said.

Source: AP

Only 4% of drone victims in Pakistan named as Al-Qaeda members

October 18, 2014 by Nasheman

CIA drones targeted but missed al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri in this strike in 2006 (AFP/Getty)

– by Jack Serle, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

As the number of US drone strikes in Pakistan hits 400, research by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism finds that fewer than 4% of the people killed have been identified by available records as named members of al Qaeda. This calls in to question US Secretary of State John Kerry’s claim last year that only “confirmed terrorist targets at the highest level” were fired at.

The Bureau’s Naming the Dead project has gathered the names and, where possible, the details of people killed by CIA drones in Pakistan since June 2004. On October 11 an attack brought the total number of drone strikes in Pakistan up to 400.

The names of the dead have been collected over a year of research in and outside Pakistan, using a multitude of sources. These include both Pakistani government records leaked to the Bureau, and hundreds of open source reports in English, Pashtun and Urdu.

Naming the Dead has also drawn on field investigations conducted by the Bureau’s researchers in Pakistan and other organisations, including Amnesty International, Reprieve and the Centre for Civilians in Conflict.

Only 704 of the 2,379 dead have been identified, and only 295 of these were reported to be members of some kind of armed group. Few corroborating details were available for those who were just described as militants. More than a third of them were not designated a rank, and almost 30% are not even linked to a specific group. Only 84 are identified as members of al Qaeda – less than 4% of the total number of people killed.

These findings “demonstrate the continuing complete lack of transparency surrounding US drone operations,” said Mustafa Qadri, Pakistan researcher for Amnesty International.

Pakistan drone strike deaths in numbers
Total killed	2,379
Total identified as militants	295
Total named as al Qaeda	84
Total named	704

When asked for a comment on the Bureau’s investigation, US National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said that strikes were only carried out when there was “near-certainty” that no civilians would be killed.

“The death of innocent civilians is something that the U.S. Government seeks to avoid if at all possible. In those rare instances in which it appears non-combatants may have been killed or injured, after-action reviews have been conducted to determine why, and to ensure that we are taking the most effective steps to minimise such risk to non-combatants in the future,” said Hayden.

“Associated forces”

The Obama administration’s stated legal justification for such strikes is based partly on the right to self-defence in response to an imminent threat. This has proved controversial as leaked documents show the US believes determining if a terrorist is an imminent threat “does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on US persons and interests will take place in the immediate future.”

The legal basis for the strikes also stems from the Authorisation for the Use of Military Force (Aumf) – a law signed by Congress three days after the September 11 2001 terrorist attacks. It gives the president the right to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against those behind the attacks on the US, wherever they are.

The text of Aumf does not name any particular group. But the president, in a major foreign policy speech in May 2013, said this includes “al Qaeda, the Taliban and its associated forces”.

Nek Mohammed speaks at a Jirga three weeks before he died in a CIA drone strike (Reuters/Kamran Wazir)

It is not clear who is deemed to be “associated” with the Taliban. Hayden told the Bureau that “an associated force is an organised armed group that has entered the fight alongside al Qaeda and is a co-belligerent with al Qaeda in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.”

The CIA itself does not seem to know the affiliation of everyone they kill. Secret CIA documents recording the identity, rank and affiliation of people targeted and killed in strikes between 2006 to 2008 and 2010 to 2011 were leaked to the McClatchy news agency in April 2013. They identified hundreds of those killed as simply Afghan or Pakistani fighters, or as “unknown”.

Determining the affiliation even of those deemed to be “Taliban” is problematic. The movement has two branches: one, the Afghan Taliban, is fighting US and allied forces, and trying to re-establish the ousted Taliban government of Mullah Omar in Kabul. The other, the Pakistani Taliban or the TTP, is mainly focused on toppling the Pakistani state, putting an end to democracy and establishing a theocracy based on extreme ideology. Although the US did not designate the TTP as a foreign terrorist organisation until September 2010, the group and its precursors are known to have worked with the Afghan Taliban.

According to media reports, the choice of targets has not always reflected the priorities of the US alone. In April last year the McClatchy news agency reported the US used its drones to kill militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas in exchange for Pakistani help in targeting al Qaeda members.

Three days before the McClatchy report, the New York Times revealed the first known US drone strike in Pakistan, on June 17 2004, was part of a secret deal with Pakistan to gain access to its airspace. The CIA agreed to kill the target, Nek Mohammed, in exchange for permission for its drones to go after the US’s enemies.

The “butcher of Swat”

Senior militants have been killed in the CIA’s 10-year drone campaign in Pakistan. But as the Bureau’s work indicates, it is far from clear that they constitute the only or even the majority of people killed in these strikes.

“Judging by the sheer volume of strikes and the reliable estimates of total casualties, it is very unlikely that the majority of victims are senior commanders,” says Amnesty’s Qadri.

The Bureau has only found 111 of those killed in Pakistan since 2004 described as a senior commander of any armed group – just 5% of the total. Research by the New America Foundation estimated the proportion of senior commanders to be even lower, at just 2%.

Waliur Rehman talks to the Associated Press less than two years before his death (AP Photo/Ishtiaq Mahsud)

Among them are men linked to serious crimes. Men such as Ibne Amin, known as the “butcher of Swat” for the barbaric treatment he and his men meted out on the residents of the Swat valley in 2008 and 2009.

Others include Abu Khabab al Masri, an al Qaeda chemical weapons expert. Drones also killed Hakimullah and Baitullah Mehsud, and Wali Ur Rehman – all senior leaders of the TTP.

There are 73 more people recorded in Naming the Dead who are described as mid-ranking members of armed groups. However someone’s rank is not necessarily a reliable guide to their importance in the organisation.

“I think it really depends on what they are,” Rez Jan, a senior Pakistan analyst at the American Enterprise Institute think tank told the Bureau. “You can be a mid-level guy who is involved in [improvised explosive device] production or training in bomb making or planting, or combat techniques and have a fairly lethal impact in that manner.”

Rashid Rauf, a British citizen killed in a November 2008 drone strike in Pakistan, is one al Qaeda member who appears to have had an impact despite not rising to the organisation’s highest echelons.

He acted as a point of contact between the perpetrators of the July 7 2005 attacks on the London Underground and their al Qaeda controllers. He also filled a similar role linking al Qaeda central with the men planning to bring down several airliners flying from London to the US in the 2006 “liquid bomb plot”.

The Bureau has only been able to establish information about the alleged roles of just 21 of those killed. Even this mostly consists of basic descriptions such as “logistician” or “the equivalent of a colonel.”

Note: This story contains a clarification. 4% of people who have been killed by CIA drone strikes have been named and positively identified as members of al Qaeda by available records. Of the drone strike victims who have been named, 12% are identified as al Qaeda.

Former Taliban captive to Baghdadi: ‘Release him and take me’

September 8, 2014 by Nasheman

Aid worker David Haines.

– by Yvonne Ridley

We are fast approaching the anniversary of 9/11 … an event which always resonates deeply not least of all because it is also a reminder of the time I was held captive by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

I was working for the Sunday Express newspaper when I was sent to Pakistan to cover the impending war in neighbouring Afghanistan in the wake of the atrocity; unable to wait for the start of the invasion I sneaked in to the country wearing the all-enveloping blue burqa.

After two days travelling in and around the Jalalabad district I was caught by members of what was described as the most evil, brutal regime in the world. However, compared to the Islamic State (ISIS), Mullah Mohammed Omar and his band of turban-wearing, bearded Taliban act like a bunch of choir boys.

Terrifying as it was, throughout my 10 days as a prisoner of the Taliban I was treated with courtesy and respect and, compared to the treatment subsequently meted out to those held in Guantanamo, Bagram and Abu Ghraib I have often reflected: “Thank God I was captured by the most evil, brutal regime in the world and not by the Americans!”

Now it is ISIS putting captives into orange boiler suits and reportedly water-boarding them and carrying out abuse on detainees using methods outlined in the CIA’s own handbook of torture. The sheer terror and revulsion invoked by the executions which followed are beyond words.

Sadly it appears George W Bush’s ill conceived War on Terror has made the world a less safe place especially for ordinary British and American citizens who work overseas in the volatile Middle East as aid workers, medics and journalists.

You can be sure that ISIS would never have emerged in Iraq if Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair had only listened to the people that voted them in to power. The legacy of their “shock and awe” in Iraq can be seen quite clearly today for what it is … a war based on lies over WMD. The war went on to become a spectacular failure causing the deaths of many and the creation of more than one million widows and orphans.

And now Iraq has morphed into a playground of terror for the self-styled caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and his military council that formulates all the group’s strategic decisions. It was they who must have agreed to sanction the beheading of two American journalists and now a Scottish aid worker is the next one being lined up for execution.

The bloody deaths of James Foley and Stephen Sotloff, have enraged the world and given fuel to the Islamaphobes who try and demonise Islam as a violent, aggressive and barbaric religion. As I, and the majority of Muslims around the world know, this is not the case.

Islam is a religion of peace and the behaviour of the Islamic State towards its enemies and its captives is at odds with what Islam teaches.

I know this to be the case because I studied the religion for two years after my own ordeal as a Taliban captive; subsequently I embraced Islam more than 10 years ago. Today I throw out a challenge to the Caliph and I am doing this on the basis of a verse in the Holy Qur’an from the chapter of an-Nisa, which roughly translated says: “He who intercedes in a good cause shall have a share in its good result, and he who intercedes in an evil cause shall have a share in its burden. Allah watches over everything.”

My personal intervention is with Quranic words and if Bagdahdi is the wise Caliph he promotes himself to be then he will accept my offer and it is this … release David Haines, the Scotsman in your custody, and I will take his place.

Why would I make such an offer? Well I am a person who is known for my word, so it is not an empty gesture or one made lightly, nor on the spur of the moment. As I write this I am in South Africa from where I took part in the recent launch of Cage Africa, a chapter of the London-based NGO Cage UK which is an advocacy group spawned from Guantanamo where around 150 men are still being held today without charge or trial.

So why would I, a Muslim, offer to swap places with a father-of-two who is not of the same Faith? I hear you ask. I am doing this for many reasons. Firstly, as an aid worker we are told he did a great deal to help Muslims during the Bosnia war and has devoted much of his life to helping others without concern over their faith, culture or nationality. This is, indeed, the true spirit of Islam where help is given freely to those in need and now I want to return the same kindness and compassion he showed Muslims.

Secondly, I’ve spent the last two days pondering over the photograph of him and his young child; it reminded me so much of my young daughter Daisy when I was taken into captivity 13 years ago this month by the Taliban. She is 21 and embarking on her final year at Newcastle University, a fine young woman of whom I’m very proud. While we share the unconditional love between mother and daughter, she doesn’t really need me as much as the child in the photograph needs her father.

Although I moved to Scotland barely three years ago this aid worker was brought up in Perth, more than an hour’s drive from my home in the Borders creating an affinity between us although we’ve never met. Finally, I have campaigned for the release of prisoners regularly since I supported Cage in those early days when Guantanamo opened for business. May be in some way I can highlight the injustices victims of the War on Terror are facing by making this exchange.

In many ways there are parallels between David Haines and the Guantanamo detainees … all are being held without trial or charge for nothing more than being swept up in the War on Terror or a by-product of it.

This offer of exchange is being made in the true spirit of Islam, a face of Islam unfortunately obscured all too often by the atrocities being carried out in the name of ISIS.

I don’t consider myself a brave person nor do I want to be a martyr. I enjoy the life I live with my wonderful husband very much but there comes a time when we have to make a stand for our beliefs and this is mine. The Prophet Muhammad once said that the duty of Muslims was to: “Visit the sick, feed the hungry and arrange for the release of the captive.”

I am told that every decision taken by Baghdadi is motivated by Quranic teachings so he should, as a person of knowledge, be well acquainted with the full meaning of Surah an-Nisa’s verse 85 I quoted earlier. It now remains to be seen if he is man enough to take up my offer and release the aid worker, a good person swept up in a conflict not of his making.

I eagerly await his response and beg him, in the meantime, to spare the life of David Haines and show the sort of wisdom and compassion the Taliban showed me.