Af-Pak -> Pak-Af Watch

[Virendra]

More filth coming out of the closet.

Yes, we killed Captain Saurabh Kalia: Pak soldier
http://zeenews.india.com/news/nation/ye ... 65757.html

New Delhi: Pakistan may have denied for long that Captain Saurabh Kalia, and five of his platoon members, were tortured and killed by its soldiers during the Kargil War of 1999, but a video that surfaced on the web has nailed the lie.

A video shot during a function of the Pakistani Army to felicitate Kargil heroes shows a Pak soldier reportedly admitting to killing Captain Kalia - former Pakistani interior minister Rehman Malik had claimed that Captain Kalia may have died in bad weather.

Detailing his exploits with the audience, Pakistani soldier Naik Bhule Khandan boasted about his ‘heroism’ and admitted that he and his fellow soldiers had killed Captain Kalia and five of his platoon members.
Bhule claimed that Kalia and others had crossed the Line of Control (LoC) into Pakistan and hence were shot dead.

"There was an attack on us from India on May 13, 1990. Six people from Indian side who were on a recce patrol advanced towards us. They wanted to capture our post and if they had succeeded they would guard the way going towards Leh." Bhule said.
"Their plan did not work out and instead we hunted them down," he added.

"When they came close we wanted to capture them but they started running away and then we started firing at them," he told the crowd.
"We shouted across the LoC to Indian forces to come and take away their dead soldiers. But their people never had the courage to take their dead bodies," he further said.

Captain Kalia and five other soldiers were captured by the Pakistan Army before the start of the war in 1999.

Captain Kalia of the 4 Jat Regiment was the first one to observe Pakistani troops on the Indian side of Line of Control in the Kargil sector.

He and five soldiers - Arjun Ram, Bhanwar Lal Bagaria, Bhika Ram, Moola Ram and Naresh Singh - were on a patrol of the Bajrang Post in the Kaksar sector of Jammu and Kashmir when they were taken captive by Pakistani troops on May 15, 1999.

They were tortured for weeks before being killed. Their mutilated bodies were handed over to India on June 9, 1999.
Autopsy reports had shown extreme torture including cigarette burns, ear drums pierced with hot iron rods and amputated limbs.

Captain Kalia's father NK Kalia has taken his son's torture-killing to the Supreme Court, saying Pakistan should be asked to apologise. He has also approached the United Nations Human Rights Commission asking it to probe his son's death as a war crime.

NK Kalia has been pressing the Defence Ministry, the Army Headquarters, the External Affairs Ministry and the Prime Minister's Office for over a decade to exert pressure on Pakistan to punish the Pakistani soldiers responsible for the act in violation of the Geneva Convention.
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Regards,
Virendra

[Pratyush]

Did this joker just confessed to a war crime??

[member_22872]

Kasab too confessed, Hafiz Saeed too confessed, so did Dawood. Indian lives are good for statistics. So what now?

[vishvak]

So are lives of defense personnel. Don't we hear that. And didn't mushy confess too post kargil war.

So what happened during post karfil talks and why were not the talks open? When it turned out that mobs on kargil heights are barbarians supported by pukistan why didn't 5-star circuit chattering mobs from India broke off the charade of talks and attack terroristan?

[Sushupti]

Afghan mujahideen 'owe Kashmir a debt'

http://m.aljazeera.com/story/2013920153418770798

[ramana]

X-Posting. Original by Philip.....

‘India must decide what role it will play as land power’
Sep 24, 2013 - Indranil Banerjie

Yossef Bodansky, former director of theUnited States Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare at the US House of Representatives, is an old South Asia hand, who had first warned of the Pakistan-China nexus in the 1990s.

He was also the first analyst to warn the world about Osama bin Laden and the Islamist terrorist network. Bodansky, who has written extensively on India and interacted with senior Indian officials over the years, believes that India has failed to take the strategic initiative that the post-Cold War period opened up and hence has witnessed a failure of its Afghan policy among others. Bodansky has been the director of research at the International Strategic Studies Association (ISSA), as well as a senior editor for the Defense & Foreign Affairs group of publications, since 1983. He stayed on as a special adviser to Congress until January 2009. In the mid 1980s, he acted as a senior consultantfor the US department of defense and the department of state. He is the author of 11 books —including Bin Laden: TheMan Who Declared War on America (New York Times No.1 bestseller & Washington Post No.1 bestseller), The Secret History of the Iraq War (New York Times bestseller & Foreign Affairs Magazine bestseller), and Chechen Jihad: Al Qaeda’sTraining Ground and the Next Wave of Terror — and hundreds of articles, book chapters and Congressional reports. Mr Bodansky is a director at the Prague Society for International Cooperation, and serves on the Board of the Global Panel Foundation and several other institutions worldwide.

Here he talks about India’s Afghan policy and geopolitical issues with Indranil Banerjie.

Q: How is India’s Afghanistan policy viewed in the West?

A: New Delhi needs to see the bigger strategic picture. What New Delhi needs to understand is that the world is changing and is finally starting to re-assert itself in the post-Cold War period. The interim period is coming to an end and a lot of countries are trying to search out a future for themselves.
India is trying to find a future through the BRICS but is failing to understand that the BRICS has strategic implications as well. Each BRICS member is seeking to find its geopolitical and geo-economic interests.
India needs to understand where it stands and until it does that its regional activities are meaningless. These regional activities are not an end in themselves and cannot take place in isolation.
BRICS nations are not equal; China and Russia are bigger. Russia has a clear place: it is part of the industrialised north world and one of the poles of the heartland states. China, on the other hand, is a land power that has been able to assert itself in Asia.
Question is what is India? India is a huge subcontinent; it is the focal point of the Indian Ocean, and together with China, one of the two big powers of Asia.
India has to decide first whether it is a continental power, a littoral power or a link between the two. India has to decide what role it wishes to play; nobody can assign India a role in global affairs. Thereafter, India needs to develop relations according to its chosen role. And India needs to initiate relationships depending on where it is going as a regional and a world power.

For instance, India cannot allow the Indian Ocean to be dominated by another power.The commerce between the Far East, Europe and the Middle East is crucial. Hence, either India choses to secure these Indian Ocean routes as a maritime power or else someone else will. If that happens then the third party that secures the Indian Ocean would have a vested interest in containing India. But whether India wants to be the dominant maritime power in the India Ocean is a decision that can only be made by New Delhi.

At the same time, India is also a land power with its northern part sticking into Central Asia. Now India also needs to decide what kind of role it wishes to play as a land power. India either has to make a deal with China on the latter’s terms or else it has to reach out to Russia or other powers to compete with China. There is no other alternative as China is the rising hegemon which is increasingly talking in terms of its historic empire that once ruled most of Asia.

India and Israel are two countries that have civilisations with political character going back thousands of years or as long as China’s. India’s civilisation will not accept China’s civilizational hegemony.
China knows this and that it cannot make a deal with India on its terms. Therefore, it seeks to stifle India and prevent it from rising. The troubles on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) serve to remind India who is the boss. To take on China, India would have to develop an assertive regional posture and challenge China and its regional alliances in Central and West Asia where the Chinese have a lot at stake. Russia is a potential ally but Russia will not do the job for India. India will benefit from co-operation with Russia which has an interest in containing China in West and Central Asia but much less interest in containing China in Leh and Srinagar.

To repeat what I was saying since the early 1990’s, India must carve for itself a regional strategic role and assertive presence. Once the West needs India strategically and economically, it will pay attention to, and recognise, India’s regional interests and aspirations (such as Afghanistan). Presently, India is passive and reactive —so what’s the point paying attention or doing something for India? In contrast —China is holding the West hostage by its economic leverage and won’t let the West forget for a second, and Pakistan —China’s preeminent protégé and proxy —is threatening to blow-up anything and everything as the region’s madman —so why pick-up fight with the two?

Q: Where does Afghanistan fit into this equation?

A: India needs to look at Afghanistan in terms of its grand strategic vision. Pakistan is a small country; it is an army with a failed state. One reason why Pakistan survives is because of China’s investments in its nuclear capabilities and its economy both aimed at stifling India. China can constantly divert India’s attention by making Pakistan do something or other like border firing, infiltrating terrorists or carrying out a spectacular terrorist strike.

India’s fixation on a zero sum game with Pakistan is meaningless. India needs to look at its policies with its western neighbours in terms of its grand strategy and not by being reactive. A lot of Indian activities in Afghanistan are aimed to give Pakistan a hard time. Nothing wrong with this —but strategically it is meaningless.

On the other hand, if India can work out a larger posture in Central Asia, Iran and the Middle East, preferably in conjunction with Russia, and also dominate the Indian Ocean till the tip of Africa, then it would also have a say in what is happening to the west of Pakistan.

The key question is: Will India be stifled by Pakistan, a subcontractor of China, which is the current situation, or will India stifle Pakistan at land and sea because India is the regional power that is stifling China and not just its agent Pakistan?

It is high time that India starts thinking of where it is going as a global and not regional power or just another Third World country. Once it does that then its policies vis-à-vis Pakistan and Afghanistan should be adapted into its lager overall policy.[/b]

Q: Does Washington accept Islamabad’s view that New Delhi is using Afghanistan to de-stabilise Pakistan?

A: Yes. Obama’s Washington is even more hostile to New Delhi than Islamabad. Today, India is using Afghanistan to get at Pakistan. But that is not strategy; it is just another pissing match. It is irrelevant in global terms. From the US point of view, India’s insistence in being in Afghanistan interferes with its aims to hand over Afghanistan to Pakistan and China.

Q: But why would the United States want to do this?

A: Why not? If we make a deal with Pakistan, the Taliban will not shoot at our troops and we can leave peacefully. India, on the other hand, does not play a role as a global power so why should we take it seriously.

Q: A number of US commentators in recent times have suggested that Pakistan’s obsession with Afghanistan can be resolved if the Kashmir issue is sorted out once and for all with India. Do you believe that a Kashmir “solution” will end Pakistan’s preoccupation with Afghanistan?

A: Obama’s Washington wants Kashmir resolved in Pakistan’s favour —Afghanistan or no Afghanistan.

India is so passive that the United States feels it can pressure India to make concessions in Kashmir so that the US can get a better deal with Pakistan. Kashmir should not be on the menu but it is. Large swathes of Siberian territory owned by Russia are claimed by China but the United States never dares to tell Russia to cede any territory to China so that the US gets a better economic deal with China. But the state department does think that India can be pressured to compromise on Kashmir and thereby secure a better deal for Washington with the Pakistanis. Such a thing would be inconceivable if India was a world power. When Pakistani terrorists attacked the India parliament, the United States told India that it dare not attack Pakistan. India has brought this upon itself by being passive. It is fighting for crumbs in Afghanistan.

Q: Why has the US been reluctant to accept a greater Indian role in Afghanistan?

A: We want China (that can help with Iran) and its proxy Pakistan.

Q: Is the view that Washington is prepared to cut a deal with Pakistan and the Quetta Shura at any cost credible?

A: Yes.

Q: Despite being aware that Pakistan has directly or indirectly aided the insurgency in Afghanistan, Washington seems to be going out of its way to cede control of south and eastern Afghanistan to Pakistan. What precisely is the strategic thinking behind these moves? And do you believe that such a move will stabilise Afghanistan and Pakistan?

A: This is what Pakistan wants and this is what will make China happy.

Q: Do you believe that Washington will pull out all troops from Afghanistan by 2014 if the Bilateral Security Agreement with Kabul is not signed within the next few months?

A: Obama wants Zero Troops. He’ll withdraw if he can whatever the excuse.

Q: Would a small contingent of about 10,000 US troops and air force elements be able to stabilise Afghanistan with the help of the Afghan security forces post 2014?

A: Well over 1,00,000 troops failed. So why should 10,000 have any impact? If any soldier remains —it will be a symbolic gesture.

Q: The Pakistan government despite promising all help to President Karzai to re-start the peace process have decided not to release pro-talk Taliban leaders such as Mullah Baradar. They have released a total of about 26 low level Taliban and claim they have done their bit to facilitate talks. Do you believe that the Pakistani establishment will allow direct talks between the Taliban and the Kabul regime?

A: Karzai is a nobody that everybody—including Obama’s Washington —knows by now. Who cares what Karzai was told or promised? Pakistan (the ISI) is building a regional network based on tribal and “Taliban” chiefs that will control most of Afghanistan. The ISI already does so for all intent and purpose.

Q: India has helped Afghanistan with a number of developmental projects but has publicly espoused a “keep our heads down” policy in Afghanistan. Do you think this policy has worked?

A: No. The Afghans are not masters of their own destiny. India’s efforts failed to convince the US that it has a legitimate role in Afghanistan. It has been a near total waste.

Some thing to chew about. Indian efforts have not been a total waste. They have re-built some goodwill after the GOI's total support of the old Najibullah govt and the Taliban wilderness years.
And all is not lost. By and large most victims of terroist strikes are treated in hospitals built by India. I havent seen any reports of US hospitals treating victims.

It was to please the US that India did not agree to supply lethal weapons to Karzai forces.

However bottom line is MMS policy of total supplication to US interests has not helped.

[SSridhar]

^ Yossef Bodansky has torn to pieces the utterly wayward Indian foreign policy. He has been brutally frank. He has reflected accurately and exactly what many have been saying in BRf.

[vishvak]

Price of peace to be paid by Afghans and Indians.

[pankajs]

Xi signals greater role for China in Afghanistan

China has signalled its intention to play a greater diplomatic role in the lead-up to the 2014 withdrawal of U.S.-led NATO forces from Afghanistan, as the war-torn nation’s President, Hamid Karzai, held talks with the top Chinese leadership.

Chinese President Xi Jinping told Mr. Karzai China was ready to deepen political, economic and security support as he described 2014 as “a key year” for the nation’s future. As a sign of its intent to play a leading diplomatic role in bringing countries in the region together, Mr. Xi said China had decided to host, next year, the fourth ministerial meeting of the Istanbul Conference, which was initiated by regional countries in 2011.

Despite Mr. Xi signalling China’s widening diplomatic ambitions, analysts say Beijing is, however, unlikely to significantly alter its cautious approach with regard to providing financial and security assistance in the near-term.

The Chinese government on Saturday said it would provide a modest 200 million Yuan (around $32 million) grant to the Afghan government this year. The joint statement issued on Friday said China would provide assistance “within the realm of its capabilities”.

Andrew Small of the German Marshall Fund’s Asia Program, who has extensively studied China-Afghan relations, said Beijing was likely to “continue to move forward very carefully until it’s confident that there’s a political and security environment in which it feels comfortable about expanding its economic presence”.

“Even then,” he told The Hindu, “it’s not going to vastly increase aid or its security training. These numbers are still very small, as are the aid figures”, with the shift in policy so far “more about a considerably increased level of diplomatic involvement.”

“Heading off India-Pakistan security competition in Afghanistan is one of China’s primary concerns, alongside the prospect that the country becomes a base again for Uighur militants [the Turkic minority group in China’s western Xinjiang region],” Mr. Small told The Hindu. “China’s close relationship with Pakistan naturally sets them up to cooperate there but Beijing doesn’t want to see Pakistan playing a spoiler role in Afghanistan again and is privately communicating these expectations to them.”

Friday’s talks were, however, largely focused on two older issues the countries have been grappling with recently, rather than the question of the country’s future: China’s investment in the $ 3 billion Aynak copper mine, which has struggled to take off on account of security concerns; and Beijing’s concerns on terrorism. Reflecting the importance of the issues, the two senior officials accompanying Mr. Karzai were the national security adviser and the minister in charge of mines.

The joint statement said both sides had agreed to sign a treaty on extradition, reflecting China’s concerns on Xinjiang, as well as to “intensify exchanges and cooperation in the security field by way of jointly combating transnational threats including illegal immigration, and trafficking in persons, arms or drugs, among others”.

[SSridhar]

Xi signals greater role for China in Afghanistan

. . . As a sign of its intent to play a leading diplomatic role in bringing countries in the region together, Mr. Xi said China had decided to host, next year, the fourth ministerial meeting of the Istanbul Conference, which was initiated by regional countries in 2011.

The 'Istanbul Conference' excluded India and China would continue to follow the same policy under the guise of 'heading-off India Pakistan security competition in Afghanistan'. Pakistan has largely succeeded in projecting India's influence and presence in Afghanistan as a threat to its security. This is a Pakistani position since Independence. It shows Pakistani paranoia. The British have for long been a supporter of this Pakistani paranoid position, as they did in various other issues and created this monster called TSP.

[member_23692]

Look at this recent interview below with Karzai on BBC. While on the face of it, it would seem like Karzai is an idiot, but then if you read it carefully, it is very profound and I found myself agreeing with Karzai more and more. By the end of the interview I actually developed respect for Karzai, despite my utter hatred towards anything Taliban or Islamistic. This guy, Karzai is a true Afghan patriot, who has a clear view of where Afghan interests lie, despite him constantly living under threat of assassination and despite real prospects of him living under that threat for the rest of his life. I am not saying that Karzai is not corrupt or that he is perfect, but If India had just a handful of patriots today, even as imperfect as Karzai, we would be in a much better place. He clearly sees that the West was there for their own interests instead of helping the Afghans. He has fought the Taliban, taken on the PAkis, taken on the West, all because he sees clearly where Afghan interests lie. Even among Afghans, most leaders have their own narrow regional, tribal or parochial interests. Karzai stands tall among them as a pan Afghan nationalist. As he has pointed out below, the West was in Afghanistan for their own interests, and the irony is that the West could not even protect or take care of their own interest, all because of their unwillingness to take on the Pakis, where the real problem resides. The West followed the policy of attempting to bribe Paki, instead of taking them head on, which has been an utter failure, a disaster for which they have paid and will continue to pay a heavy price. Now India is following the policy of bribing the Paki or appeasing it, and will pay an even more heavy price for it and it will be even more disastrous for India. The Americans and the British kept making the excuse that "no foreign power has been able to control Afghanistan", but it was not the Afghans, but the Pakis that defeated them this time, in fact it was a self defeat on the part of the West, a result of not taking on the Pakis directly and resolutely. Nevertheless, as self inflicted a defeat as it is, the end result is that at the end of the day, the Pakis and the Islamic extremists are the winners of this conflict, of this Western engagement in Afghanistan in the first two decades of the millenium.

As far as India is concerned, through no effort of its own, but through the efforts of Pan Afghan Nationalists like Karzai, the mere existence of a unified Afghanistan even with a little bit of Taliban mixed in, is India's best security bet, as expecting anything proactive and anything more from this corruption eaten, moth eaten, hollowed out and weak Indian ruling dispensation that goes by the name of Government of India is like living in a fools paradise.

http://news.yahoo.com/karzai-says-talib ... 00911.html

Karzai says Taliban no threat to women, NATO created 'no gains' for Afghanistan
Afghan President Hamid Karzai told this and more to the BBC in an interview out today.
Christian Science Monitor Dan Murphy 14 hours ago

Afghan President Hamid Karzai marked the 12th anniversary of the US-led NATO invasion of Afghanistan 12 years ago that dislodged the Taliban from power and ended up installing him as leader by saying that Afghan women have nothing to fear from a return of Taliban influence and that nothing has been really gained thanks to the foreign military effort in the country.

Karzai's remarks come as the clock is ticking on a so-called Bilateral Security Agreement to be inked between NATO and Afghanistan. If an agreement isn't reached, including guarantees that US forces won't be subject to Afghan law, all US troops will depart from the country at the end of next year. While there's still time for a deal to be reached, Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said in July that an agreement any later than October would make planning for an ongoing mission beyond the end of 2014 much more difficult.

But Karzai's comments today to the BBC's Newsnight weren't exactly outreaching, and makes one wonder if he's not interested in retaining the services of foreign soldiers. He's tried to use the drawn out negotiation over the BSA to wring more aid and weaponry out of the US, as well as far-reaching security guarantees. But with a war-weary American public and fights over the US budget deficit at home for Obama, walking away from Afghanistan becomes more likely with each passing day and insult tossed at the US and its partners.

Today Karzai complained that the US administration's descriptions of his government as an "ineffective partner" is because the US "want us to keep silent when civilians are killed. We will not, we can not."

He said that relations with the US soured because the US under President George W. Bush decided not to broaden the war to Pakistan in 2005. Instead of fighting "in the sanctuaries and training grounds beyond Afghanistan," Karzai said, "the US and NATO forces were conducting operations in Afghan villages, causing harm to Afghan people.


The Afghan President, asked if Afghan women should have any fear about a possible entry of the Taliban into government, answered: "None. Note at all."

Karzai also said most of the "big" corruption in Afghanistan was the work of foreigners, not Afghans, and that much of the money spent was used to "buy submissiveness of Afghan government officials to policies and designs that the Afghans would not have agreed to."

He also said the massive 12 year war effort has largely been a waste: "On security front, entire NATO exercise was one that caused Afghanistan a lot of suffering and a lot of loss of life and no gains because the country is not secure. I am not happy to say there is partial security because that is not what we’re seeking. What we wanted was absolute security and a clear cut war against terrorism."

Below is a transcript of the BBC interview I took down while listening (which can be watched here.) The interviewer's questions are approximations; Karzai's answers are his precise words.

KARZAI INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

Q: The country has come a long way in the last 12 years. Why do the Americans call “you an unreliable ineffective partner?”

A: Because where they want us to go along, we won’t go along. They want us to keep silent when civilians are killed. We will not, we can not.

Q: Did you get on with Bush better than Obama?

A: I had a very good relationship with President Bush in those beginning years there was not much of a difference of opinion between us. The worsening of relations began actually in 2005 where we saw the first incidents of civilian casualties where we saw that the war on terror was not conducted where it should have been, which was in the sanctuaries and the training grounds beyond Afghanistan, rather than that the US and NATO forces were conducting operations in Afghan villages, causing harm to Afghan people.

Q: Are you talking to the Taliban, personally?
A: Yes we are. Yes, we are. We have our whole system engaged in several directions to bring stability and peace to Afghanistan

Q: Is the goal to bring them into a power-sharing deal in government?
A: Absolutely. They’re Afghans, where the afghan president, where the afghan government can appoint the Taliban to a government job, they’re welcome we will do that. But where it’s the afghan people appointing people through elections to state organs then the Taliban should come and participate in elections. So to clarify this, yes as Afghans they are welcome to the Afghan government, like all other Afghans. Yes, as Afghans they are welcome to participate in elections as all other afghans.

Q: US/UK audiences might ask what was all this for then? 12 years fighting, lives lost, and the Taliban can just walk back in and be part of government.

A: Well the Americans have told us themselves in Washington in my last visit that the Taliban are not their enemies. That they will not fight the Taliban anymore.

Q: What are you talking about with the Taliban?

A: If the Taliban have reasons for which they can not come they must spell this out. If it is the Afghan constitution, they must come out and talk to us and allow the Afghan people and through the mechanisms that we have to amend the constitution.

Q: Gains for women are tenuous. By bringing the Taliban back aren’t you compromising those gains?

A: The return of the Taliban will not undermine the progress. This country needs to have peace.

Q: But you know where they stand with women’s rights. Are you willing to sacrifice women’s rights?
A: I’m willing to stand for anything that will bring peace to Afghanistan and through that to promote the cause of the Afghan woman better… there is no doubt about that. Even if the Taliban come that will not end, that will not slow down.

Q: So women in Afghanistan should not fear the return of the Taliban?

A: None at all. None.

Q: The bilateral security agreement. Let’s talk about that. That defines the US and Afghan relationship beyond withdrawal and if you push too hard they may not stay. Does that worry you?

A: Well if the agreement doesn’t suit us then of course they can leave. The agreement has to suit Afghanistan’s interests and purposes. If it doesn’t suit us and if it doesn’t suit them then naturally we’ll go separate ways… if this agreement does not provide Afghanistan peace and security the Afghans will not want it. That’s very clear.

Q: Britain has made a massive contribution already. Can you tell the British public what all these sacrifices were for because they don’t understand why they’re still here.

A: All the prime ministers that came were in office in the past 12 years have clearly stated that they’re here in Afghanistan to provide security to the West in order to prevent terrorism from reaching the west in order to fight extremism here. How much of that has been achieved is a question that the British government can answer alone.

Q: Can you assess for me the criticism and failings that were experienced in Helmand (a major combat focus for British troops in past years).

A: It’s not only Britain. On security front, entire NATO exercise was one that caused Afghanistan a lot of suffering and a lot of loss of life and no gains because the country is not secure. I am not happy to say there is partial security because that is not what we’re seeking. What we wanted was absolute security and a clear cut war against terrorism.

Q: Some would say your legacy has been tainted by Afghan corruption, it’s the third most corrupt country in the world. Is that the legacy you wanted?

A: No of course not. Our government is weak and ineffective in comparison to other governments we’ve just begun. But the big corruption the hundreds of millions of dollars of corruption was not Afghan, now everybody knows that. It was foreign, the contracts, the subcontracts, the blind contracts given to people. Money thrown around to buy loyalties, money thrown around to buy submissiveness of Afghan government officials to policies and designs that the Afghans would not have agreed to. That was the major (part?) of corruption.

Q: Finally, there isn’t a single living afghan leader. They’ve all been killed. Are you concerned about your safety when you leave office?

A: Not at all, I’ll be safe.

[member_20385]

http://dawn.com/news/1048279/why-the-ta ... stan-now/1

[Dipanker]

Dawn says:

Why the Taliban won’t succeed in Afghanistan now

[ramana]

Not just Afghanistan but neighbors are getting ready for uncertain future of the region after US troops pullout. Was listening to BBC report by James Kumaraswamy on plans in the region.

Kirgyz parliament passed a resolution to get the US Transit Base in Manas closed by June 2014 early enough to take over the place. BBC hinted it was under Russian angst at a US base in its backyard.

Meanwhile Tajikstan expects a surge of drugs smuggling via the main "Friendship" bridge built by US to facilitate truck traffic from Central Asia to Afghanistan. So EU has founded sniffer dogs training to root out local drugs from future Afghan travellers.

I think first thing the Islamists will do is send women in burqa and the dogs will be declared unIslamic and band rolls on.


One thing local analysts say there is uncertainty in the US plans post troop withdrawl and that is causing them to map out various scenarios which is too expensive for their limited resources.


I think this is where Systems Dynamic Mapping will allow at a minimum first order modeling of the different outcomes.


As the 2013 Chem Nobel Laureate Warfel remarked in a different context,"Instead of reading 50 books to understand the reactions using pen and paper, it is better to throw a simple model on a computer and build in complexity!"

[ramana]

Nightwatch, 8 October 2013

Afghanistan: In an interview with the BBC which aired on 7 October, President Karzai strongly criticized the NATO military campaign in Afghanistan. "On the security front, the entire NATO exercise was one that caused Afghanistan a lot of suffering, a lot of loss of life, and no gains because the country is not secure."

"I am not happy to say that there is partial security. That's not what we are seeking. What we wanted was absolute security and a clear-cut war against terrorism."

He also said the NATO leadership fought the wrong war. He said initially, relations with the US were good. "In those beginning years there was not much difference of opinion between us".

"The worsening of relations began in 2005 where we saw the first incidents of civilian casualties, where we saw that the war on terror was not conducted where it should have been."

Mr Karzai said the war should have been conducted "in the sanctuaries, in the training grounds beyond Afghanistan, rather than that which the US and NATO forces were conducting operations in Afghan villages, causing harm to Afghan people."


Comment: Karzai has only six months left in his presidency. His desire to leave a memorable legacy is the impulse for statements critical of the US-led NATO effort. To establish any kind of credibility in a post-NATO Afghanistan, he must not appear in talks with the Taliban to be a US puppet. Karzai came from the Taliban and must deal with them after the last Western soldier leaves, just as the Taliban have always predicted.

One particularly frustrating point that he and his generals have made repeatedly is that the US never attacked the leadership of the Taliban in Quetta or Karachi, their training sites and especially their logistics and financial resources which have been located in Pakistan since 2001. No serious military effort could succeed for long in Afghanistan while the Taliban found safety, thrived and flourished openly in Pakistan.


No experts have explained why the Afghan Taliban were never so much as harassed in Pakistan. No investigative journalists have discovered what secret deals were made with the Musharraf regime or the Pakistani intelligence services to keep it that way for 12 years.

The reasons are if any attack by US on TSP will lead to a defeat of the TSPArmy. Such a defeat would unravel the state for that is the glue that keeps TSP together for its a military camp with its adjunct camp followers.
A failure like that would put India on the top in the region.
So such an outcome goes against the US mantra of
- state stability
- no regional hegemon power
And add to the mix the status of TSP nukes.

All these preclude calling for accountability of TSP for the terrorism from within its borders.


But there is way.

[SSridhar]

It is ironic that the US mounted attacks on Libya and Somalia (in spite of serious setbacks there on earlier occasions) after the Kenya mall attack where less number of Americans died than in 26/11. And yet, the US played a very 'soft' role in TSP itself after 26/11. In fact, it has played a 'double role'. Most of the attacks on US Army personnel, bases and US embassy in Afghanistan have directly been traced to TSPA. And yet, the US has been very soft on TSP itself. Above all, OBL was under the direct custody of TSPA for 10 years and was found and eliminated in a TSPA cantonment. Karzai is justifiably angry.

[Prem]

Afghan Taliban allege Pakistan still keeping Mullah Baradar in jail
Mullah Barabar just got his reservation confirm for Hoor Darshan Trip

KABUL: The Afghan Taliban said on Wednesday Pakistan has not freed their former second-in-command, Mullah Baradar, as promised and that his health is deteriorating in prison.
Baradar is seen by many in Afghanistan as the key to restarting peace talks with the Afghan Taliban.
“Unfortunately he still spends his days and nights in prison, and his health condition in worrying. It is getting worse day by day,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said./b]
Earlier last month, Pakistan had released its most senior Afghan Taliban detainee Abdul Ghani Baradar, a senior official told AFP, in a move welcomed by Kabul who hoped it would encourage peace talks with the insurgents.Baradar, a one-time military chief often described as the militants’ former second-in-command, was the most high profile detained Taliban commander in Pakistan.
“Yes Baradar has been released,” Omar Hamid, a spokesman for Pakistan's interior ministry had told news agency AFP, without elaborating on the circumstances of the release.The Pakistani foreign office had also confirmed the release in a short statement.Afghanistan’s High Peace Council (HPC) had welcomed the release and thanked Pakistan’s government.“We welcome his release. And we thank the government of Pakistan that showed goodwill and answered positively to the request of Afghanistan government,” Mohammad Esmail Qasimyar, senior member of HPC, had told AFP.

[SSridhar]

From NightWatch for the night of October, 13, 2013

Afghanistan: US forces in Afghanistan captured a senior Pakistani Taliban commander, Latif Mehsud, during a military operation, a Pentagon spokesperson said on 11 October. Mehsud was forcibly snatched from an Afghan government convoy in Logar Province several weeks ago, enraging Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who viewed the operation as a breach of Afghan sovereignty. Kabul reportedly had been trying to recruit him to launch peace talks.

Comment: The reported US attack is the worst form of fratricide. Karzai was making progress in doing something Western leaders have not thought to do: making peace with the Pakistani Taliban so that they would help create a hostile environment for the Afghan Taliban who use Pakistan as a safe haven. Karzai is looking to the post-US environment and is trying to help shape it so that the Afghan government under different leadership survives. US forces appear to be operating under outdated, short term assumptions and in violation of their rules of engagement. Attacking an Afghan government convoy has never been permitted.

[devesh]

so both Karzai and US want to suck up to some form of Taleban. ultimately, this is turning out to be an intra-Islamic cat-fight to flesh out details of who gets biggest share of spoils. the fight is not about their goals of Islamic/shariah state or other broader objectives of Jihadis. it's simply about which faction gets to be "flag-bearer" of achieving those objectives.

[SSridhar]

There seems to be some consensus that the Taliban need to be accommodated in some capacity in the post-2014 scenario. India remained possibly the only country that opposed the Taliban totally and India got isolated. At one time, SM Krishna too agreed to the inclusion of Taliban. The fight is now between the pro-Pakistan Taliban group and somebody who gets the nod from Karzai. For the last two years or so, the US is playing every trick, in collusion with Pakistan, to make Karzai talk to the former group even as that group imposes conditions and behaves as though Afghanistan is already its Emirate once again. The axis of India- Iran - Russia is ineffective so far. China which stridently made anti-Taliban noises two years back at the tripartite Bangalore-meet of India-Russia-China is silently playing a deep game contrary to its earlier position. The odds are heavily stacked in favour of Mullah Omar and Pakistan.

[SSridhar]

The Many Roads to Kabul - Vivek Katju, The Hindu

Just read this article after I posted above.

A few years ago, Pakistan made an extraordinary proposal to Afghanistan regarding the extraction and marketing of Afghan mineral wealth which is, according to the United States Geological Survey, worth around $1 trillion. It suggested that an Afghan, Pakistani and Chinese consortium be established to undertake this activity. It was a serious and thought out proposal for it was made by a very senior Pakistani Minister. The Afghans were not certain if Pakistan had taken China on board before making the sounding but some in Kabul saw this as a manifestation of a Sino-Pakistan nexus on Afghanistan. The Afghans rejected the Pakistani idea altogether.

Needed, scrutiny

This episode holds a lesson for the Indian strategic community which is focussed on U.S. and Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan. This is unexceptionable but our security establishment should also pay close attention to China’s policies, both direct and along with Pakistan, towards Afghanistan as they may intersect Indian approaches and interests. A middle official level dialogue between India and China on Afghanistan has occurred but far greater scrutiny of Chinese actions is needed.

China has always looked at Afghanistan with caution and circumspection but never with indifference; it has actively but quietly pursued its interests in a country with which it shares a short boundary in the high mountains at the eastern edge of the Wakhan Corridor. On the Chinese approach in the 1960s, the American scholar Dupree notes, “the Chinese moved from behind the bamboo curtain to woo the Afghans socially, politically, and, in a lesser degree, economically.” During the Afghan Jehad against the Soviet presence in Afghanistan, the Chinese supported the Afghan Mujahideen. Barnett Rubin, an authority on the Afghan Jehad, writes, “the operation was not just a CIA operation; it was a joint operation of the CIA, the ISI, the Al Istakhbarat al-Ama (General Directorate) of Saudi Arabia. The Chinese were also involved (although they were and are rather discreet about this). These were four intelligence agencies that met every week in Islamabad. A lot of weapons from China went into Afghanistan as well but were not paid for by the Chinese.”

Ironically, the success of the Afghan Jehad invigorated China’s main internal security threat — Xinjiang’s Uighur militancy and quest for throwing off the Chinese yoke. In the 1990s, as the Taliban gained strength and territory in Afghanistan and as their alliance with the al-Qaeda deepened they began to give sanctuary and support to Central Asian Islamic militant groups and others including the Uighur groups. It is generally believed that a thousand Uighur militants came to Afghanistan but in 2003 a senior Chinese official gave this writer a much higher figure.

China turned to Pakistan to persuade the Taliban to expel the Uighur militants from Afghanistan. The “all weather friend” interceded; Chinese officials met senior Taliban leaders who made promises to rein in the Uighur militants. The promises were not kept. Following 9/11, the Taliban were ousted by the Coalition and Northern Alliance forces in November 2001. They retreated into Pakistan and the Uighur militants went with them.

China went along with international efforts on Afghanistan after 9/11 but remained restrained in its public articulation on the Taliban and low key in Kabul after the establishment of the Hamid Karzai led Interim Administration. On his part, Mr. Karzai began to assiduously woo China, a courtship he has continued throughout his presidency. He visited Beijing in January 2002, ahead of his visit to India which came in end February of that year. Since then he has visited China on numerous occasions, including for four state visits; the last was a few weeks ago in September. Through these years bilateral ties have been upgraded: from “good neighbourly” to “comprehensive cooperation” to “establishing strategic and cooperative partnership.” Economic relations have been strengthened with the award of major projects in the mining and hydrocarbons sectors. Contacts in the security and intelligence sectors have intensified. A section of the Kabul elite is strongly supporting the Chinese connection and some have developed economic stakes in it. However, China’s relations with Pakistan, Pakistan’s connections with the Taliban and continuing Taliban sympathy for the Uighur cause complicate the relationship.

Over the past six years, Afghanistan has provided China with evidence of Pakistan’s actions to destabilise Afghanistan. Predictably the Chinese have simply ignored all the material given to them. In these interactions China’s focus has remained on the Uighur militants. Uighur militancy in Xinjiang has been vigorous and bloody over the past decade. China views Afghanistan, according to Chinese scholar Zhao Huasheng, “as an inescapable part of Xinjiang’s security.”

Two-pronged approach

China’s current approach towards containing Uighur militancy is two-pronged:

The effort with the Taliban to expel the Uighur militants from FATA continues. With this aim the Chinese have not criticised the Taliban on any count. Instead they have said that they are a durable political group and hence have followed the Pakistan line and supported a process of reconciliation between them and the Afghan government. The Taliban June statement assuring that they would not allow Afghan territory to be used against any country would have given satisfaction to China as it did to the U.S. in the context of the al-Qaeda.

Secondly, China has focussed on the development of Xinjiang as an industrial base and as a pole in the trade and transit networks it is putting in place in Central Asia and beyond. The Central Asian states have been co-opted in this grand design. Russia has not opposed it either. The prospects of economic benefits and an absence of ideological affinity have denied Uighur militancy sympathy in Central Asian countries except within Islamist groups in the region.

The ambitious Gwadar-Kashgar Trade and Transit Corridor Project which China and Pakistan will undertake has also to be seen in this context. The project which involves the development of the Gwadar port and which will no doubt eventually seek to enmesh Afghanistan has obvious geo-strategic implications for India as it goes ahead with Iran to develop the Chabahar port and its links with and through Afghanistan to Central Asia and beyond.

China is conscious of an inevitable element of competition between the two transit systems. Hence, it is paying close attention to the Chabahar port and developments in western Afghanistan, especially around the Indian-built Zarang-Dilaram Highway that connects the Chabahar port with the strategic Kabul-Kandahar-Herat Road.

The Aynak Copper mines will be developed by China at a cost of over $4 billion. The project envisages the construction of a railway to evacuate copper to Xinjiang via Tajikistan. It is currently stalled because of security concerns but it will eventually be built and will be a model for other mining projects that will be undertaken by China. All this will be designed to integrate a major part of the Afghan mining activity with the economy of Western China.

China takes a long-term view of its interests but pursues them relentlessly. It will do so in Afghanistan too. India has built a fund of goodwill in Afghanistan through the example it holds as a democracy as well as its popular assistance programme. With these assets it is well placed though it will have to navigate the next few years through the minefield of the consequences of the U.S. forces drawdown. In the long term, India will need to evolve new strategies to safeguard and advance its interests in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, it has to make a success of the Hajigak iron ore project and ensure that transport systems are established to move the product through Chabahar.

(The writer is a former ambassador to Afghanistan)

[SSridhar]

NightWatch For the night of 14 October 2013

Afghanistan: On 14 October, on the eve of the Muslim observance of Eid al Adha, Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar published his annual greeting for this occasion. Omar always uses his greetings for religious exhortation as well as political guidance.

Excerpts on political guidance follow. "Muslim brothers, We are celebrating these days of festivity of Eid-ul-Odha in a time that, at world's level, the Islamic Ummah as well as our country are facing many problems. On the one hand, the invasions, machinations and brutal activities of the enemies are continuing against the Ummah, on the other hand, the diseases of internal frictions, aversions, dispersion, betrayal and entanglement in the cobwebs of the enemies have reached the very fabric of the body of the Ummah . . . If God willing, the moment of victory is coming ever near with the passage of each day. Celebrate these moments by rendering thanks to Allah (swt) and service to your people. Thus we'll become eligible for more Divine blessing. My advice to all Mujahideen is to stand up to the enemy firmer than before; deal them a crashing blow and woo people to your side on an unprecedented manner, so that, we will attain the lofty goal of liberation of the country and an all Afghans -inclusive Islamic system, consisting of qualified individuals-a system for which we have been waging the holy Jihad for years on. . . . The Afghan people could not be enticed (also translated as deceived) by the current conspiracy of misleading people under the name of elections in the shade of the occupation in the country because those figures are active in these elections who are catering only to personal interests and the interests of the invaders rather than the Islamic and national interests. Even some of them are trying to distort the very principles of the sacred religion of Islam in order to reach the corridor of power and to please the non-believers. . . . The people know that some foreign stooges are playing with their destiny. The votes of the people have no value in the elections nor will participation benefit. Therefore, the Islamic Emirate rejects these elections and urges the people to avoid participation in them because this is only a drama being played by the invaders to attain their goals."

Comment: The greeting lacks the fire of some of his past statements and contains significant admissions of internal problems. Its fundamental message is for the body of believers to remain firm because victory is near - a reference to the drawdown of Western combat forces. Nevertheless, Omar is worried about the unity of the Taliban. In the opening paragraph he listed five "diseases" that have reached into the "very fabric" of the body of believers. In short, the core leadership is fractious. He implies that the prospect of elections in April 2014 is eroding loyalty. His attack on elections is weak - they won't count because the invaders remain in Afghanistan. His solution is trite - boycott them. The statement is significant for what it omits. It does not call for a national uprising to prevent elections. It does not encourage more violent attacks. It does not denounce or reject peace talks. Instead it provides guidance on "contacts with the world," as follows. "We have mandated the Political Office of the Islamic Emirate to maintain contacts with the world. If someone wherever, tend to open an office under the name of the Islamic Emirate, they will not represent the Islamic Emirate. Contact with non-representative individuals is a waste of time and would not benefit. Similarly, if someone rather than the official spokesmen of the Islamic Emirate and the responsible individuals of the Political Office, try to utter remarks about the policy of the Islamic Emirate or someone rather than the Political Office make contacts with the Opposition or any one expresses support for the elections under the name of the Islamic Emirate, they are not our representatives nor they have contact with us. These individuals turn to such acts only for self-reputation and material gains." Omar is concerned about false agents because he is open to talks - "contacts with the Opposition" -- but seems to be having trouble maintaining control of a fraying movement. He must have a clear channel for negotiations, but it is being occluded by poseurs and self-promoters. He might need to return to Afghanistan to prevent becoming marginalized by betrayals and factional splintering. His statement of concerns suggests the various peace initiatives and particularly the election process are undermining the integrity and the behavior of his followers.

[Prem]

Taliban commander was Afghan spy?

http://prairiepundit.blogspot.com/2013/ ... n-spy.html

He is second-in-command of one of the world’s deadliest terror groups, wanted by America for masterminding the 2010 Times Square bomb plot.Eight days ago, US special forces got their man, seizing Latif Mehsud, of Pakistan’s Tehrek-e-Taliban (TTP) while he was travelling in a convoy on a remote mountain highway in Afghanistan.The dramatic raid however, the details of which have only emerged now, was all the more daring because Mehsud was forcibly abducted while heading to a secret rendezvous with America’s allies in Afghanistan’s top spy network, the National Intelligence Directorate.If briefings from Kabul turn out to be true, Latif Mehsud was a prized asset for Afghanistan’s beleaguered spies.A former driver and personal assistant to Hakimullah Mehsud, the TTP’s leader, Mehsud has been cultivated as a double agent for the past two years. In recent months he has worked with Afghans even while he was wanted in America.The mission to seize the 30-year old amounted to a dramatic breach of trust among allies and its fallout could yet change the future of America’s deployment in Afghanistan.Aimal Faizi, the spokesman for Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, openly complained about the US tactics. “The Americans forcibly removed him and took him to Bagram,” he said.The sensitivity of Mehsud’s seizure forced John Kerry, the US secretary of state, to make a lightning dash to Kabul to talk down an incensed Mr Karzai.Once seen as America’s hand-picked ally, Mr Karzai has lately morphed into a ferocious critic. In the days following Mehsud’s capture, he launched his strongest ever attack on American record in his country.There is no indication of what value, if any the man was as an intelligence asset. If he were that important, wouldn't the US have known about him and kept him in the field? Karzai seems to be an unhappy man and is probably as inept a negotiator as Obama is.

[ramana]

US seems to have an uncanny ability to arrest 'wanted' Taliban when ever they are talking to Karzai. There is a pattern so far with Mullah Barader and now Latif Mehsud.
Either they are trying to help TSP on their own or they get tipped by TSP to do the needful for them.

[Prem]

And the result is
Explosion at mosque kills Afghan governor: officials

http://www.dawn.com/news/1049909/explos ... -officials

KABUL: A bomb planted inside a mosque killed the governor of Afghanistan's eastern Logar province as he was delivering a speech Tuesday morning to mark the Muslim holiday of Eidul Azha, officials said. The explosion at the main mosque in the provincial capital of Puli Alam killed Governor Arsallah Jamal and wounded 15 people — five of them critically, said the governor's spokesman, Din Mohammad Darwesh. Jamal, 47, was a close confidant of President Hamid Karzai and served as his campaign manager during the 2009 presidential elections. He also served as governor of eastern Khost province until he was appointed to his current post in Logar in April. A high-profile target, he had survived a number of assassination attempts in the past, including suicide bombings. Tuesday's explosion took place as Jamal was speaking inside the mosque to worshippers gathered for one of Islam's holiest days, said Logar's deputy police chief, Rais Khan Abbul Rahimzai.
The bomb was planted inside the microphone in the front part of the mosque, said two officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. Jamal was recently in the spotlight following his revelation that a senior commander of the Pakistani Taliban was taken into custody by American forces in Logar province on October 5. US officials confirmed that Latif Mehsud, a leader of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, was captured by US forces in a military operation.At the time, Jamal told The Associated Press that Mehsud was captured as he was driving along a main highway in Mohammad Agha district. The road links the province with the Afghan capital, Kabul.

[ramana]

I wonder if Afghans were directing some of the TTP's sharmless activities against TSPA via Latif Mehsud?

[Prem]

I wonder if Afghans were directing some of the TTP's sharmless activities against TSPA via Latif Mehsud?

No, TTP is fighting for Islam in Pakistan.
Afraid,by arresting the Latif, the probability of Karzai's Assasination now real high and all the benefits to Talibans in the resulting Chaos.

[abhishek_sharma]

Portrait of an Afghan Assassin

[Prem]

US catches Afghan govt 'red handed' in plotting with Pakistani Taliban: Report
Paki Tampoon

The United States has caught the Afghan government secretly conniving with the Pakistani Taliban in an attempt to acquire a stronger position in a regional power game, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.According to the report, the “disrupted plan involved Afghan intelligence trying to work with the Pakistan Taliban, allies of al Qaeda, in order to find a trump card in a baroque regional power game that is likely to intensify after the American withdrawal next year, the officials said. And what started the hard feelings was that the Americans caught them red-handed.”The article comes just as a tripartite meeting between Nawaz Sharif, Hamid Karzai and David Cameron got underway in London, a meeting in which Karzai reportedly planned to push Pakistan into revealing the locations for Mullah Baradar.Afghan govt caught transporting Latif Mehsud to KabulTipped off to the plan, United States Special Forces “raided an Afghan convoy that was ushering a senior Pakistan Taliban militant, Latif Mehsud, to Kabul for secret talks last month, and now have Mehsud in custody.“Publicly, the Afghan government has described Mehsud as an insurgent peace emissary. But according to Afghan officials, the ultimate plan was to take revenge on the Pakistani military.”
The New York Times further reported that a “favorite complaint of Afghan officials is how Pakistani military intelligence has sheltered and nurtured the Taliban and supported their insurgency against the Afghan government.“Now, not content to be merely the target of a proxy war, the Afghan government decided to recruit proxies of its own by seeking to aid the Pakistan Taliban in their fight against Pakistan’s security forces, according to Afghan officials. And they were beginning to make progress over the past year, they say, before the American raid exposed them.”The raid and the Afghan anger resulting from it was reported in news months ago, but the purpose and other details behind the Afghan plan have only now come to light.Afghan officials claim that the Afghans thought they could “later gain an advantage in negotiations with the Pakistani government by offering to back off their support for the militants.”Aiding the Pakistani Taliban was, the Afghans say, an “opportunity to bring peace on our terms.”The New York Times acknowledged that the botched Afghan operation will now lend weight to Pakistani claims of militants in Afghanistan presenting Pakistan with a constant threat, claims which nobody in the international community previously heeded.“American officials said they were also worried that the Afghan actions would give credibility to Pakistani complaints that enemies based in Afghanistan presented them with a threat equivalent to the Afghan insurgency.”Karzai is reportedly furious at the US action, while a former Afghan official claims Afghans merely wanted a ‘mutually beneficial relationship’ with the Pakistani Taliban.“In the Afghan telling, the theft of their prized intelligence asset is an egregious example of American bullying, and President Hamid Karzai remains furious about it.”“Afghan officials dismissed American admonishments about the dangers of working with militants as the kind of condescension they have come to expect. No one in Karzai’s government was naïve enough to believe they could turn the Pakistan Taliban into a reliable proxy, said a former Afghan official familiar with the matter.“‘I would describe what we wanted to do was foster a mutually beneficial relationship,’ the former official said. ‘We’ve all seen that these people are nobodies — proxies.’”

[SSridhar]

US catches Afghan govt 'red handed' in plotting with Pakistani Taliban: Report
Paki Tampoon

First of all, Latif Mehsud was not involved in a clandestine, secretive mission. It was an open Afghan convoy that was transporting Mehsud when the Americans showed their 'bravery'. This was like Pakistan & CIA 'capturing' Mullah Baradar three years back when it was known to everybody that he was having talks not only with the Afghan government but also with UN Special Representative Kai Eide in Dubai. It was the Pakistani & American fear that some deal could be struck behind their back that led to the 'capture' of Baradar. Kai Eide said later that Pakistan was well aware of the on-going contacts with Baradar and yet decided to arrest him and keep him in Pakistan to abruptly thwart the dialogue.

In the present case, the Americans, in collusion with the Pakistanis, are trying to plant a story that the Afghan government was planning to take revenge on Pakistan through Mehsud. If Pakistan could talk to the TTP, why not Karzai whose country is suffering a great deal from trans-border terrorism ? If Pakistan could use the Afghan Taliban to destabilize, what is the problem if Afghanistan does a tit-for-tat even assuming that Karzai was planning to do something nasty in Pakistan through Latif Mehsud ?

[SSridhar]

Mullah Baradar Free to go Anywhere he Likes: Pakistan - The Hindu

Duplicitous liar, this TSP.

Released Taliban commander Mullah Baradar is a free man and can go anywhere he likes, Tariq Fatemi, special assistant to the Pakistan Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday. In response to questions on the sidelines of the seventh regional workshop for judges, prosecutors and police officers in South Asia on countering terrorism at Islamabad, Mr. Fatemi said that Pakistan was providing security to Baradar after his release last month but it was not going to escort him anywhere. He said the Government did not want any harm to come to Baradar.

Baradar was still in Pakistan, he added. Pakistan is going to take all necessary steps in the Afghan reconciliation process. He said no dates were yet finalised for Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s visit to Kabul. Pakistan has faced criticism from Afghanistan that Baradar was being kept in prison and not allowed to interact with anyone. The matter was taken up by Afghanistan president Hamid Karzai when he met Mr. Sharif in London.

An official statement on Mr. Karzai’s website said that during the fourth trilateral summit between Afghanistan, Pakistan and the UK on Tuesday, the leaders of the three countries discussed Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan’s peace process and agreed that a delegation of the Afghan High Peace Council will soon visit Pakistan to meet Mullah Baradar. The two sides also agreed to cooperate in elimination of terrorist sanctuaries.

Mr. Sharif accepted the invitation of President Karzai for an official visit to Kabul, and said he would visit Afghanistan within the coming weeks.

Baradar, a close associate of Mullah Omar, was freed last month to help peace negotiations with the Taliban in Afghanistan but there appears to be no headway in the talks after his release. The Afghan High Peace Council is mandated to carry out talks with the Taliban and Baradar was expected to play a key role. There are, however, different views on whether Baradar is still as powerful as he was before his arrest in 2010 and whether he can make a significant contribution to the peace process.

The Taliban has been quoted in news reports as saying that Baradar has not been freed.

[Prem]

US catches Afghan govt 'red handed' in plotting with Pakistani Taliban: Report
[In the present case, the Americans, in collusion with the Pakistanis, are trying to plant a story that the Afghan government was planning to take revenge on Pakistan through Mehsud. If Pakistan could talk to the TTP, why not Karzai whose country is suffering a great deal from trans-border terrorism ? If Pakistan could use the Afghan Taliban to destabilize, what is the problem if Afghanistan does a tit-for-tat even assuming that Karzai was planning to do something nasty in Pakistan through Latif Mehsud ?

Its signal for all parties engaged in AFPAK mess that US power will be used to levergae pro Pak andPro Taliban outcome in the conflict. This will split Afghanistan soon after they get Karzai in his sleep.

[SSridhar]

Peshawar High Court Questions Legal Grounds of Mullah Baradar's Release - DAWN

The chief justice of the Peshawar High Court on Thursday questioned on what legal grounds Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar had been released by Pakistani authorities.

Chief Justice Justice Dost Mohammad Khan raised the question during proceedings of the missing persons’ case here today being heard by a two-judge bench of the PHC.

The chief justice said it appeared Baradar had been released by the government under pressure from foreign agencies.

Mullah Baradar was arrested from Karachi in February 2010 in a raid by Pakistani and US agents.

Baradar, once the number two to Taliban supremo Mullah Omar, was freed from jail in September this year as part of efforts to kick-start Afghanistan’s peace process. Afghan officials believe Baradar could encourage Taliban leaders to seek a negotiated settlement to end the 12-year insurgency in the war-torn nation.

However, the PHC chief justice said today that the president or the prime minister do not have the authority to free prisoners without due process.

Khan said that the Afghan Taliban leader should have been presented in court before his release. He moreover ordered that the court be informed under which laws Baradar was first arrested and then released by the government.

During proceedings on Thursday, Deputy Advocate General Naveed Akhtar representing the provincial government submitted a list of 50 missing persons in the court.

The hearing was subsequently adjourned to December 10.

[Neshant]

India better be ready to wall itself off from these drugs from Afghanistan.

I would not be surprised if foreign intelligence agencies are trying to weaken Russia by pushing in a hoard of drugs.

Enforce a death penalty on all drug smugglers.

[Prem]

http://www.dawn.com/news/1054992/fazlul ... mar-report
Faz lullah’s appointment backed by Mullah Omar: report

ISLAMABAD: The selection of Mullah Fazlullah as the chief of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) could not have been possible without the backing of Mullah Mohammad Omar, chief of the Afghan Taliban, a report published in the Friday edition of The News International quoted sources as saying.Hailing from the Swat district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Fazlullah is the first non-Mehsud chief of the TTP, unlike Baitullah and Hakimullah Mehsud who hailed from the Waziristan region of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). Sources quoted in the story said the reason behind the decision was to avoid a possible split within the banned militant organisation. An interesting point of note is that the official announcement of Fazlullah’s appointment as the new chief was made over the telephone by TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid from Afghanistan. The underlying impression given by Shahid was that a meeting of the Taliban council (or shura) was held in Afghanistan as its last meeting held in North Waziristan was where a US drone strike had killed Hakimullah Mehsud. According to sources quoted in the report, the 17-member central shura held several sessions for three days to reach a consensus on appointing a new chief as up to six commanders were vying for the position. The deadlock was however broken by Mullah Omar, considered “Ameerul Momineen” by the TTP, who stepped in and named Fazlullah as the man for the job.Fazlullah is said to have a closer relationship with Mullah Omar than any other member of the TTP and carries a five million rupees bounty on his head which was announced by the Pakistani government.His appointment is considered a major win for the anti-talks proponents within the TTP as Fazlullah has been the most vocal member to oppose talks with the Pakistani government.

[ramana]

Two contrary op-eds from India both from Delhi:

Shows concerns but also confusion.

3
India shouldn’t get into Pak-Taliban-US huddle
Fri Nov 8, 2013 12:15 pm (PST) .

India shouldn’t get into Pak-Taliban- US huddle
Saturday, 09 November 2013 |
Swarn Kumar Anand | in Oped

http://www.dailypioneer.com/ columnists/ oped/india- shouldnt- get-into- pak-taliban- us-huddle. html

While the Pakistan Army and the Nawaz Sharif government seem to be on the same page pursuing the illusive peace with TTP, we need to be more careful as this ‘peace’ pursuit will only aid to our ‘imported’ terror woes

The assassination of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakimullah Mehsud in a US drone strike at a time when both the government and the military leadership showed rare consensus to pursue peace with the TTP has thrown a new challenge for the region. The incident is vital on three counts — first, its impact on the pace and direction of the Pakistan-Taliban peace talks; second, increasing pressure on Nawaz Sharif to perform a balancing act between anti-Americanism and improving the US-Pakistan relations; and third, implications for India, which is already struggling to make a workable strategy for the post-Nato Afghanistan. The first two have generated lots of opinions around the world, but the Indian perspective has been generally ignored, as indeed, there is no immediate impact on India.
But if we visualise a situation in the west of India in 2014, when the US-led Nato forces are planning to make an exit from Afghanistan, the ramifications for India will be enormous. As the Obama Administration looks to be in a tearing hurry to throw Afghanistan to the proverbial wolves, Pakistan, and pushing for negotiations with Taliban, which gave safe havens to 9/11 masterminds Al-Qaeda, there must a grave concerns for New Delhi about Islamabad cashing in on the reconciliation process in way that jeopardises our interests in the region. Moreover, Pakistan’s cosying up to Taliban will result in consolidation of the latter’s position and export of terrorism to India.
(Non)-State actors
Pakistan has never been well disposed towards its eastern neighbour since its inception, particularly after India’s successful effort in the creation of Bangladesh. Coming to terms with the bitter truth after their successive loss of face in three wars, the Pakistan Army and the ISI are now waging a proxy war against India, as it not only gives them excuses to hide behind the so-called non-state actors, it is also cost effective.
It has a long history of creating disturbances in India. And sadly they have able to influence some Indian youths to wage war against their own country. For example, Pakistan treated their Sikh citizens badly but managed to egg on the Indian Panjabi youth to rise against India for Khalistan. In Pakistani writings, Sikhs were termed barbaric, and their venerated gurus were ridiculed. But it goes to ISI credit that they could attract some members of Sikh community fight against their own country.
Similarly in Kashmir, the militancy and resultant ethnic cleansing could not have been possible without the concerted effort of the Pakistan Army and the ISI. In fact, non-state actors do not come from heaven; they thrive in Pakistan with the clandestine financial, military support from the State agencies.
It’s not only Kashmir where Pakistan’s state actors have been trying to let loose religious fanatics. Almost all terror attacks, whether it is the Parliament attack, 26/11, or the latest one in Patna, point the finger at Pakistan. Unimaginably, the Pakistani terror agencies have been able to penetrate in North-east as well. The chief of Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA), a militant outfit in Meghalaya, R Sangma in 2010 had claimed that the ISI and jehadi groups in Pakistan had offered it help to fight the Indian state.
The omnipotent Pakistan Army and the ISI are the products of Pakistan’s systemic flaws, whose another casualty is democracy. Moreover, the army needs to wage war against India to keep itself relevant in the politics which is hogged by anti-India sentiments. Nothing can happen in Pakistan without the prior approval of the army. Therefore, it is an open secret that the US is fed strategic information regarding its drone targets.
Can India trust America vis-à-vis Pakistan?
It will be great folly to believe that the selfish America will help India against Pakistan’s sinister design without extracting its pound of flesh. As for the US drone strikes in Pakistan and Afghanistan, the policy is narrow-minded as it targets only terror leaders not organisations. Moreover, these drones have not done India any good on purpose. The mastermind of 26/11, Hafiz Saeed, is roaming free. The US bounty of $10 million on Hafiz Saeed has proved a joke.
In fact, America’s connivance with the ISI was widely circulated in the US media. ISI allowed drones to attack anti-American militants on condition that their nuclear installations and terror camps targeting India will be spared from drone strikes. Now, if the US is worried about its diminishing influence in the Af-Pak region as Taliban is rearing its head, only America is to be blamed for the creation of the monster.
The biggest challenge India faces in the region has been thrown by Obama’s “peace talks with Taliban at any cost”. In a video message, available on social media sites, Al-Qaeda clerics have been seen spewing venom against India. While Al-Qaeda leader Ahmad Farooq vowed “to hasten our advance towards Delhi”, another cleric Asim Umar called on Indian Muslims to battle for Sharia rule. Yet another influential cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who is kept in high esteem by Taliban, has called on the jihadist to spread terror in Kashmir to create an Islamic state. But America does not listen, as these do not pose threat to their interests directly.
What should India do?
The Nation-State is an entity whose existence demands a realistic approach, which may not be considered ideal in other’s framework. We should pay Pakistan back in the same coin. Conventional wars grab attention of the global media; therefore proxy war is a better option. Until Pakistan pays through the nose, it can’t realise how non-state actors are controlled and directed by the state actors.
Second, India should use its diplomacy to ensure Pakistan-Taliban talks fail. We Indians are surprised why the government is taking U-turn on its policy towards Taliban, which represent a barbaric, radical version of Islam which is antithetical to the very idea of secular India. Taliban may not be concentrating on India as they are busy in consolidating their position, but they are not trustworthy. Indians have been witness to their behaviour in Kandahar during the negotiation to free the hijacked IC 814 aircraft.
Third, New Delhi should try to become a dependable, including militarily, ally of Karzai, so that Pakistan does not fill the vacuum created after the Post-Nato Afghanistan.
Lastly, India must deal with the Pakistan Army directly. Military rule in Pakistan makes the all-powerful Army more accountable in the eyes of the global media. Also it is impossible for it to indulge in covert operations and blame the government. Therefore, it’s imperative for Indian spy agencies to ensure that the military, particularly the Pakistan Army, regains power in the country.
(The writer is News Editor, The Pioneer)

and

6
America exits Afghanistan, trouble may come visiting India
Sat Nov 9, 2013 3:56 am (PST) .



America exits Afghanistan, trouble may come visiting India
AP
Srinagar, November 09, 2013


http://www.hindustantimes.com/ world-news/ america-exits- afghanistan- trouble-may- come-visiting- india/article1- 1149109.aspx

India
is bracing for more militancy in battle-scarred Jammu and Kashmir,
believing that fighters now focused on resisting US-led troops in
Afghanistan will shift toward the flashpoint with Pakistan.
Some say increased violence recently along India's heavily militarised
border with Pakistan proves that shift is already underway. As a result, India is increasing use of drones, thermal sensors and
foot patrols as it tries to catch out any battle-hardened militants
moving through the forested mountains near the frontier. At the same
time, India's troops have increasingly been engaging in skirmishes with
Pakistan' s military.
The United States' 60,000 troops will be halved by February 2014 in
Afghanistan and troops from the UK (7,900), Germany (4,400), Italy
(2,800), Poland (1,550) and Georgia (1,550) will all pull out by the end of 2014.
Rebels "are testing us. They're making their presence felt by
launching audacious attacks," an Indian army commander in Kashmir said
on condition of anonymity in line with army policy. "They have started
recruiting young people into their folds. They are training some of
these boys locally."
US officials and experts acknowledge there are valid concerns. Though the US government has not discussed such a risk publicly, the chief of
its forces in the Pacific says the US is increasingly discussing
terrorist movements with countries in the region.
"We are thinking about it more and more each day, and this includes
dialogue with our partners in India and Pakistan," admiral Samuel
Locklear told reporters in Washington this week.
Some Pakistani analysts believe the country' s army leaders have
little interest in rocking the boat now, raising the worrying
possibility that the recent violence was sparked by militants who have
gone rogue or are operating in cooperation with lower-level officials
sympathetic to their cause.

File photo: Indian army soldiers take position during a shooting near a military convoy on the outskirts of Srinagar. (AP Photo)
"We need to be vigilant, we need to be prepared and we need to be
alert for any such eventuality, " the Indian Army's Northern Commander Lt Gen Sanjiv Chachra said in a TV interview recently. "I think the
drawdown (of US forces in the region) will definitely have effect. As a
professional army we are keeping a tag of it."
Within India "there is widespread anticipation that Pakistan will
divert elements of Jihadi forces (in Afghanistan) to this side," GK
Pillai, a former Indian home secretary, said.
In the past, some rebels in Kashmir were either trained in Afghanistan or were Afghan nationals, India says.
"Our worry is not the number of militants," the Indian army commander said on condition of anonymity. "The worry is the quality of the people who are likely to come. They're battle-hardened, aggressive and smart.
They know the warfare."
This year's fighting between India and Pakistan has unusually
extended southward from the Line of Control to border areas that are not disputed by India. And while Pakistani troops in the past would fire
across the border to provide cover for infiltrating militants, such fire is now coming regardless of any rebels being present, according to
police chief Ashok Prasad in Kashmir.
"Even if we are mad, why should we be creating trouble at this point of time when we are in so much trouble ourselves?" said retired
Pakistani diplomat Riaz Hussain Khokhar, who served as ambassador to
India and as foreign secretary helped negotiate the 2003 cease-fire.
Pakistan is dealing with its own domestic insurgencies, a moribund
economy and fears that Afghanistan will implode when the US combat
mission ends. "There is no effort on the part of Pakistan to send in
militants at this point of time."
Pakistan' s Nawaz Sharif and India's Manmohan Singh agreed in September to work on reducing border hostilities.
But even as they spoke, their armies were lobbing mortar shells at
each other. The next month, the fighting spread to southern border areas that had been largely peaceful for a decade, prompting officials on
both sides to call it the most serious fighting in a decade.

File photo shows US troops during a patrol in Kandahar province in Afghanistan. (AFP Photo)

Both reports tell a tale that we should think about.

The US by killing the TTP leadership is doing the TSPA great favors. And that allows the TSPA to channel terrorists into India.That is the chain in place.

in a way its the old Cashemere proxy war of the 90s to make India sign the four letter treaties.

[CRamS]

I asked Uneven exactly the same question. If "regional piss" is your objective, why not send a drone missile and take out Hafeez pig, Dawood Ibrahim, and other pigLeTs just like you take out TTP Jihadis. As usual he ducked and said I should ask Obama. But of course, on anything India does, he has an opinion including believe it or not, why former army chief V.K. Singh's actions fuel "legitimate" anger in TSP.

[Philip]

Ramanna,you've hit the nail on the head! This the bargain/masterplan from 2014 onwards,to channel jihadis/talibs into J&K and India via Pak,in exchange for not imposing harsh Sharia and Islamic laws in Pak that will be reintroduced in Afghanistan after Kazai falls.

One book from the Pioneer's Consultant Editor Hiranmay Karlekar is "Endgame in Afghanistan,For whom the dice rolls".The book has been very well recd. in India,favourably reviewed by all the weeklies and experts,butnd UK for obvious reasons, is being suppressed in the US as it exposes their covert support to Pak and the ungodlies-"spare us but we have no objection if you go after India".The same game is being played out in Bangladesh.Karlekar has already written a book on BDesh ,"BDesh,the next Afghanistan".Both published by SAGE publications.Both are essential reading to understand the darkening clouds approaching India,from east and west.In the north,the Chinese are happily watching the Pakis and ungodlies and US mischief do its job of destroying India from without and within (IM,Naxalites).

PS:PaK has siphoned off billions of material aid.aka arms and munitions,meant for the NATO troops in Afghanistan as their supply convoys leisurely made their way through Pak before reaching Afghanistan.The same tactic that Gen.Zia used when the Af. Mujahideen were fighting the Soviets.An Indian expert once told me that he asked a high-ranked Sov. officer involved about their mistake in intervening in the country,when they were retreating from it.He agreed that it was a mistake,but laughed and said,"But just watch the Americans blunder their way in.They are so arrogant and have learnt nothing from Vietnam!"

Now what is India doing about the fast developing deteriorating situ. ? Almost nothing! Karzai has come a few times pleading for arms to fight the Talibs,as US aid is drying up.He needs his ill-equipped army and armed forces to possess modern weaponry to deal with the Paki proxies.The Pakis will also return leading the Taliban as they did before,being embedded in their military operations ,directing them as well as training them.We are dithering because MMS looks to Washington for foreign policy advice.Soniaji has abdicated all foreign policy to him,the latest being the decision, "to go, or not to go" to Colombo for the CHOGM,left solely to the PM. We ,that is the PMO,is actually scared sh*tless about giving Karzai arms as it will upset Pak!

[ramana]

Now what is India doing about the fast developing deteriorating situ. ? Almost nothing! Karzai has come a few times pleading for arms to fight the Talibs,as US aid is drying up.He needs his ill-equipped army and armed forces to possess modern weaponry to deal with the Paki proxies.The Pakis will also return leading the Taliban as they did before,being embedded in their military operations ,directing them as well as training them.We are dithering because MMS looks to Washington for foreign policy advice.Soniaji has abdicated all foreign policy to him,the latest being the decision, "to go, or not to go" to Colombo for the CHOGM,left solely to the PM. We ,that is the PMO,is actually scared sh*tless about giving Karzai arms as it will upset Pak!

Philip till US gets out doing nothing and ensuring no fractures in India is the best option.

By choosing a modern method of elections in an antediluvian society Afghanistan is set on path to a morass.
So no surety that post Karzai those weapons will end up where. And the training too could be used to find loopholes in Indian way.
When Afghanistan starts acting by themselves would be one marker.

[SSridhar]

I asked Uneven exactly the same question. If "regional piss" is your objective, why not send a drone missile and take out Hafeez pig, Dawood Ibrahim, and other pigLeTs just like you take out TTP Jihadis. As usual he ducked and said I should ask Obama. But of course, on anything India does, he has an opinion including believe it or not, why former army chief V.K. Singh's actions fuel "legitimate" anger in TSP.

CRS, Prof. Uneven ducked the question all right, but it is not for a lack of opinion. He did not want to tell you that openly. This idea of 'regional peace' is a non-starter and an unworkable paradigm because the region is / has been under the control of foreign powers. The regional peace or the lack of it is determined by the US itself (the UK once upon a time) and increasingly China. The India-Pakistan peace has, therefore, different connotations at different times. Since 9/11, it has meant that there should not be any border skirmish between the two 'nuclear armed neighbours' that could put American presence in the region in jeopardy. After 2014, the 'regional peace' could take on a different meaning depending upon the exigencies of circumstances.