Cabul Correspondent

US agrees to let Afghan forces take lead in night raids

Kabul - The US army agreed on Sunday to let Afghan forces take the lead in night raid operations, which have remained a source of bitter tension between the Afghan president and his Western backers.

Under the new agreement, only Afghan forces are allowed to search residential houses and private compounds ‘if necessary, and as part of the conduct of special operations.’

The agreement said US forces will support only ‘as required or requested’.

Afghan Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak and Commander of the US and NATO Forces General John Allen signed the agreement in Kabul.

‘From today onwards, special operations are Afghanized and are being conducted by Afghan Special Operations Unit which includes defense and interior ministries, intelligence department in coordination with Afghan judiciary,’ Wardak said at the press meet.

‘Afghanistan’s government is taking all necessary measures to carry out all special operations in constitution’s framework, and to establish judicial, prosecution and investigative mechanism in accordance with current country’s law.’

The agreement is key to finalizing negotiations on a long-term strategic partnership agreement between the US and Afghan governments that will set the tone of American involvement after 2014 when NATO forces are set to leave.

Gen. Allen during the signing said the agreement would ‘mean that Afghan forces. not foreign forces. are now in the lead for two of the most critical aspects of maintaining Afghan security: capturing the terrorists that threaten innocent Afghan civilians. and keeping those terrorists behind bars where they belong.’

The agreement also stipulates that the Afghan government would establish ‘judicial, prosecution, and investigative mechanisms capable of issuing timely and operationally secure judicial authorizations to conduct special operations missions against persons who are reasonably suspected of meeting the criteria for prosecution or detention under Afghan laws.’

Until now, no such authorization was required.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has called for an end to night raids. NATO maintained such operations were key to capturing Taliban commanders.

Last week, in an interview with dpa, Allen said all night operations were conducted alongside Afghan commandoes.

He also said foreign troops on about 89 to 90 per cent of all their military operations are partnered with Afghan national security forces (ANSF) and Afghans lead about 40 per cent of all conventional operations.

The NATO-led military alliance says that almost 90 per cent of the operations see no shots fired. Last month, Allen told the US Senate that 2,200 night raids were carried out last year.

However, Karzai has remained skeptical about the night raids given the growing anti-Western sentiment among Afghan civilians.

Afghanistan has said the ‘Afghanization’ of night raids and the handing over of US-run prisons were pre-conditions for the strategic partnership.

A US Embassy spokesman in Kabul said that the agreement would pave the way for the partnership deal to be finalized before the NATO summit in Chicago in May.

‘We hope that with signing of both these agreements this prepares the way for realizing a strategic partnership with the government and people of Afghanistan,’ said Gavin Sundwall.

‘I can not comment on ongoing negotiations. We hope that we and the government of Afghanistan will conclude our negotiations before the Chicago Summit in May,’ he added.

An agreement was signed between Afghanistan and the United States last month on the transfer of prisoners and detention facilities to Afghan control.

Allen praised Afghan Special Forces saying they were courageous, capable and committed. ‘I can tell you first-hand that Afghanistan is well on its way to fielding the very finest special operations forces in the region,’ he said.

INTERVIEW: General predicts fierce summer fighting in Afghan east

By Subel Bhandari, dpa

April 5, KABUL - The commander of NATO-led foreign forces and US troops in Afghanistan said the war-torn country would see significant fighting in the east this summer.

“As I look to reduce the numbers of US forces, … I will use significant combat power in the east, anticipating we are going to have some good bit of fighting in the east this year,” US General John Allen said Wednesday in an interview in Kabul with German media.

He said, however, that next year would be the most critical for the military alliance since the US-led war started more than a decade ago because next year would be when Afghan forces take the lead in providing security to the Afghan people.

The general, who commands 130,000 NATO troops in the country, said that by the end of summer in 2013, the entire population of Afghanistan “will be protected by Afghan security forces in the lead.”

The training of Afghan forces would not conclude until the end of 2014 when foreign troops are slated to stop all their combat operations, Allen said.

Last year, the United States withdrew 10,000 of its soldiers, leaving about 90,000 there. It is scheduled to pull out 23,000 more by the end of September.

The US is currently negotiating a strategic partnership agreement with the Afghan government, which, among other things, is to determine what kind of American military presence, if any, would remain in Afghanistan after 2014.

One of the sticking points is night raids on Afghan homes conducted by US special forces. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has repeatedly demanded these operations be stopped.

NATO military officials claimed those raids remained one of the most successful strategies to weaken the Taliban insurgency.

Allen said all the night operations are now conducted in joint operations with Afghan commandos.

“So even though what had traditionally been US-only night operations, now Afghans are on those operations in sufficient numbers that by and large only Afghans will clear an objective,” Allen said.

The general said US special forces provide security around the objective “but the most important thing for the Afghan citizens and for President Karzai has always been that if you must enter a compound or if you must enter a home, that it should be an Afghan.”

“That is now the case in all of our operations,” he said.

Allen also said foreign troops on about 89 to 90 per cent of all their military operations are partnered with Afghan national security forces (ANSF) and Afghans lead about 40 per cent of all conventional operations.

“We want the ANSF to be in the lead,” Allen said. “We think that is the right thing to do. It is the ultimate symbol of sovereignty of Afghanistan.”

Officials said the numbers of Afghan police and army forces would reach 352,000 in the next couple of months as part of a build-up plan by the West, but serious challenges lie ahead in maintaining experienced, reliable security forces with attrition, illiteracy, corruption and drugs the most acute worries.

Recent months have seen a wave of attacks by Afghan soldiers or police on foreign troops. Last month, Allen told the US Congress that 52 US troops have been killed and 68 injured in such attacks since 2007. This year, there has been a dozen such incidents with 17 fatalities.

“What I think our analysis is revealing is that something less than 50 per cent of those attack are actually Taliban attacks,” Allen said in the interview.

The other half was due to “self-radicalization” and other reasons but there is an “aggressive counterintelligence effort” under way in the Afghan forces to spot, assess and report incidents of either insurgent infiltration or radicalization in the ranks, he said.

Suicide bomb attack kills 13 people in northern Afghanistan

Kabul, April 4 - A suicide bomber on a motorbike blew himself up in a market in northern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing 13 people including four police officers and three soldiers with international forces, officials said.

The suicide bomb attack took place at a vegetable bazaar in Maimana, the capital of Faryab province.

Among those killed were also members of the international forces.

Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said that there were scores injured in a notorcycle bombing in the north.

The NATO-led alliance in a press statement said three soldiers were killed in an explosion in northern Afghanistan but refrained from saying whether it was the same suicide bomb attack in Maimana.

It also did not disclose the nationality of the soldiers.

Lal Mohammad Ahamadzia, the police spokesman for the northern Afghanistan police command, said that the Afghan victims included four police, two children, two women and two men were killed in the bombing.

Abdul Haq Shafaq, the provincial governor of Faryab where the incident took place said that a number of US soldiers along with the Afghan national police were talking to the locals in the city when the attack took place.

“Until now, we have a total casualty figure of 32 people in the incident that includes both death and injured,” he said, adding three American soldiers and one of their interpreters were also wounded.

He did not confirm the death of the coalition soldiers.

He said the coalition and the Afghan police were “roaming in the city for the past three days and the local authorities had warned them to avoid walking in the city among the civilians.” Abdul Haq Shafaq, Faryab’s governor, put the death toll at six civilians and 20 others wounded. “Three foreign troops and one of their Afghan interpreters were also wounded,” he said.

Lawmakers say several US soldiers involved in Afghan killings

Kabul - A shooting spree in Afghanistan that left 16 civilians dead a week ago was the work of a team of US soldiers, not an individual as has been reported, a member of the Afghan parliamentary investigative team told dpa on Sunday.

‘After our investigations, we came to know that the killings were not carried out by one single soldier. More than a dozen soldiers went, killed the villagers and then burnt the bodies,’ lawmaker Naheem Lalai Hameedzai told dpa.

But that account conflicts with statements from US officials, as well as with separate testimony from some people present during the attacks.

Hameedzai said the results of the probe by lawmakers has been presented to the legislature.

He also said the Afghan parliament had urged President Hamid Karzai to change the legal status of foreign soldiers deployed in the war-torn country.

The US has said one soldier carried out the dawn attack on a village in Panjwai district in Kandahar province. That soldier - identified as Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, 38 - is now in US military custody.

‘All the villagers that we talked to said there were 15 to 20 men (who) had conducted a night raid operation in several areas in the village,’ said Hameedzai.

‘One house where the incident took place is located in a village north of the base. The other two are in another village in the south of the base. There is at least four kilometres between the base and the houses.’

Hameedzai also said some of the Afghan women who were killed were sexually assaulted, according to the findings.

‘According to eyewitnesses, they could not confirm the rape. But the women’s clothes were torn,’ he said.

However, Kandahar governor’s media office said local elders refuted the claim, saying the lawmaker was ‘lying for political gains.’

Meanwhile, the parliament in Kabul urged Karzai to revoke an agreement that protects foreign troops in the country from facing legal proceedings in Afghanistan.

‘During our investigations, the Americans themselves told us that, because Afghanistan signed the military agreement, US soldiers could not be tried inside the country,’ parliamentarian Naheem Lalai Hameedzai told dpa.

‘We have passed a resolution unanimously to dissolve the military contract, and we have sent the resolution to President Karzai. He has not signed on it yet,’ Hameedzai said.

‘After the Panjwai incident, we have decided that we do not need any such contracts any more,’ he said.

Afghans have asked for a public legal proceeding in Afghanistan for the alleged murderer. But, according to reports, he was flown to the US over the weekend, while the investigations continue.

Military officials with the NATO-led international forces have said the legal status of international soldiers is regulated in the military technical agreement between Afghanistan and the international community and ‘very clearly regulates the responsibility for the legal handling of any activities of the international soldiers. ‘

The US and NATO officials have said they ensure that there will be legal consequences for the killings in Kandahar.

On Monday, the Afghan parliament issued a statement saying its patience was running out as a result of ‘the imprudence of foreign troops.’

The killings by the soldier have caused public outrage against the US.

Karzai on Friday expressed anger at the United States for not cooperating in the investigation into the Kandahar killings. He also said the killing was not carried out by one man and it was a deliberate and intentional act.

A day earlier, Karzai demanded that all security responsibilities be handed from foreign to Afghan forces by 2013 - a year ahead of schedule, which would be a serious blow to the NATO-led transition plan.

Turkish soldiers, Afghans killed in helicopter crash

Kabul - Twelve Turkish soldiers and at least two Afghan civilians were killed Friday when a helicopter belonging to foreign forces crashed into a house in Kabul.

The Sikorsky helicopter came down at 1025 am (0825 GMT), killing all 12 military personnel on board, the Turkish military high command said in a statement on its website.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at least five civilians on the ground had also died.

But a spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry said only two civilians were confirmed dead - two Afghan girls who were in the house on which the helicopter crashed - while a police officials said three others were also injured.

The accident marked the deadliest single day for the Turkish mission in Afghanistan, which comprises more than 1,800 soldiers, mostly in non-combative role.

According to iCasualties.org, a tally website for the international forces, only two Turkish soldiers had died, in a vehicle accident, before Friday’s incident.

The helicopter went down in the Bagrami district of Kabul city ahead of the start of Friday prayers.

The NATO-led alliance said there were no insurgent activities in the area at the time of the crash, while Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said the crash was probably caused by a technical fault.

NATO-member Turkey has limited its mission in Afghanistan to mostly patrolling and training. The majority of its soldiers are based around the capital.

Turkey has invested heavily in education and other development projects and Afghans do not hold resentment against their fellow Muslims.

Friday’s accident was the fourth, and the deadliest involving a helicopter in Afghanistan this year.

In August, 30 US troops died when a Chinook helicopter was apparently shot down by the Taliban in Wardak province, the deadliest such incident since the US-led war started in 2001.

Friday’s crash came amid growing tension between Afghanistan and it’s US and NATO allies.

In a blow to NATO-led transition plan, Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday demanded that all security responsibilities be handed from foreign to Afghan forces by 2013 - a year ahead of schedule.

The US later said it will remain committed to the Afghan-led political reconciliation and stick with the time frame that calls for international forces to shift to a support role in 2013 and hand over full security to Afghan troops in 2014.

Karzai angry with US for not cooperating in Afghan murder probe

Kabul - Afghan President Hamid Karzai during a Friday meeting with tribal elders and senior officials expressed anger at the United States for not cooperating in the investigation into the Kandahar killings, a local broadcaster reported.

‘In my people’s opinion, this was not carried out by one man and was a deliberate and intentional act,’ Karzai said, according to commercial broadcaster Ariana TV.

Last week, a US sergeant allegedly left the forward base in a village where he was stationed in Kandahar province and entered nearby Afghan homes, where he opened fire, killing at least 16 civilians.

‘We want this relationship with the world in a way in which Afghanistan’s honor and children are protected,’ the president said.

Karzai said that his government-appointed investigation team had not received any cooperation from the US forces in Afghanistan, asking the American soldiers for answers.

Karzai was meeting with a number of the elders of Panjwai district, where the US rogue soldier went on a rampage on Sunday, and his senior security officials.

The killings by the US soldier have caused public outrage in the country, while the parliament has said patience with foreign troops is exhausted, and the level of anger rose even higher when the soldier was flown outside Afghanistan on Thursday.

Hajji Abdul Samad, a tribal elder from Panjwai district who was in the meeting with Afghan president said that they do not want money for the killings committed by American soldiers.

‘We want them to be tried in Afghanistan, not in any other country,’ he said.

‘How is it possible that one person is involved in the killing of civilians,’ another tribal elder asked the president.

In recent weeks, the US has made many mistakes in Afghanistan giving rise to severe public outrage.

Last month, the burning of copies of the Koran by US soldiers at an army base prompted violent protests that left more than 30 Afghans dead. Before that, an undated video surfaced in January that showed US soldiers urinating on dead militants.

On Thursday, Karzai in a meeting with US Defence Secretary said that the international troops have to hand over all security responsibilities to Afghan forces by 2013, a year before NATO scheduled for transition of security.

The Taliban militants, who have been waging a bloody war against international troops in the country, also suspended talks with the US government that they had begun earlier this year.

US Suffers Double Afghan Setback

by Subel Bhandari, dpa -

Kabul, Mar 15 - The United States came under pressure from two Afghan fronts on Thursday, with President Hamid Karzai asking foreign soldiers to leave a year earlier than planned and angry Taliban insurgents suspending ongoing talks in Qatar. 

Both developments, which came on the day that U.S. Defence Secretary Leon Panetta was in Kabul, are major setbacks for Washington. Not only do they raise concerns about the NATO-led alliance’s Afghan transition plan, they also highlight the fallout caused by the US soldier’s deadly rampage in an Afghan village earlier this week. 

In his meeting with Panetta in Kabul, Karzai also called on foreign troops to leave Afghan villages and “not enter an Afghan house” in military operations. 

His request follows year-long calls for an end to Western night raid operation - the only sticking point remaining in a U.S.-Afghan strategic partnership agreement. 

A senior military official says Karzai should be careful about what he wishes for. 

“All the military gains could unravel. If the foreign troops are not allowed to enter Afghan houses and there are no night raids, what is their operation going to look like?” the official said on condition of anonymity. 

Another retired Afghan government official says Karzai might be making a mistake. 

“He might think he will gain a couple of (percentage) points in terms of popular support from Afghan voters. But it could seriously damage his relationship with the West while losing ground on the home front,” the official told dpa. 

“If foreign troops move out of the villages, the Taliban will come back, no doubt about it,” he says. 

Nevertheless, it appears that this week’s massacre by a US soldier of 16 Afghan civilians, most of them women and children, was the last straw for Karzai and many Afghans. 

On Monday, the Afghan parliament issued a statement saying its patience was running out as a result of “the imprudence of foreign troops.” 

Last month, the burning of copies of the Koran by US soldiers at an army base prompted violent protests that left more than 30 Afghans dead. Before that, an undated video surfaced in January that apparently showed US soldiers urinating on dead militants. 

The Taliban did not mention any of those incidents as the reason for their suspension of the talks in Qatar. Neither did they quit the process outright, insisting that the Americans first “show a willingness to carry out their promises instead of wasting time.” 

The announcement in January that the Taliban had opened an office in the Gulf state of Qatar had raised hopes of possible peace negotiations. 

Analysts and officials in Kabul are now speculating that the decision to suspend the talks might have been prompted by the West’s failure to satisfy their request for a prisoner exchange, which the Taliban call a “confidence-building measure.” 

Under a deal, the insurgents would have handed over a US soldier held since 2009 in exchange for five top insurgent leaders currently incarcerated at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. 

Last week, the prisoners were supposed to have been transferred to Qatar. However, there has been tremendous pressure in the US against any such move. 

In a statement, the Taliban blamed the “shaky, erratic and vague standpoint of the Americans,” who they say had failed to fulfill a previously agreed memorandum of understanding. 

“The fact that the Taliban suspended and not ended the talks means they will resume it,” a diplomat said of the statement. 

Karzai asks NATO to leave by 2013; Taliban suspend talks

Kabul/Berlin, Mar 15 - Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday asked visiting US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta to anticipate handing over all security responsibilities from foreign to Afghan forces by 2013.

‘Both sides have to work together to complete the transition process of security from international troops to Afghan forces in 2013, instead of 2014,’ Karzai was quoted as saying in the statement.

‘We are ready to take over all security responsibilities for the country,’ Karzai said.

During the meeting, Karzai also asked that all foreign soldiers be pulled out of Afghan villages. The request comes days after a US soldier allegedly went on a rampage and killed 16 Afghan civilians, many of them women and children.

Only on Wednesday, NATO’s ambassador to Kabul, Simon Gass, had rejected calls for an early withdrawal of troops. ‘I don’t think speeding up transition would be of help,’ he said.

On Thursday, NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu reacted to Karzai’s remarks, stressing the military alliance’s commitment to handing over security responsibilities to Afghans ‘as soon as practically possible.’

She added that the NATO summit in Chicago on May 20-21 would ‘map out how we intend to complete the transition process successfully and responsibly.’

Meanwhile, the Afghan Taliban movement said it had suspended all talks in Qatar with the United States, due to what was described as the ‘shaky, erratic and vague standpoint of the Americans.’

‘A memorandum of understanding, which was agreed upon earlier, was not yet fulfilled when an American representative presented a list of conditions in his latest meeting with the Islamic Emirate. These conditions were not only unacceptable, but also in contradiction with the earlier, agreed-upon points,’ the Taliban said in a statement.

The Taliban refer to themselves as the Islamic Emirate, the name of their regime when they ruled Afghanistan before being ousted from Kabul in the 2001 US-led invasion.

The insurgents announced in January that they were opening an office in the Gulf state of Qatar in order to start a dialogue with the international community.

In their latest statement, the Taliban said the political office in Qatar was for the sake of reaching an understanding with the outside world and particularly for the exchange of prisoners with the Americans.

They also said they will not restart talks with the US ‘until the Americans clarify their stance on the issues concerned and until they show a willingness in carrying out their promises instead of wasting time.’

Western governments that have been sending soldiers to Afghanistan for more than a decade have said they plan to pull out of the south Asian country by the end of 2014.

However, a growing number of politicians in Europe and the US have been questioning the NATO-led mission. At the same time, there are ongoing concerns that Afghan national security forces are not yet ready to take up the challenge of fighting the Taliban on their own.

Despite deep opposition in Germany to the nation’s military presence in Afghanistan, the Defence Ministry in Berlin gave a lukewarm reaction to Karzai’s call for an early withdrawal of international troops from his country.

A German Defence Ministry spokesman pointed to the planned 2014 withdrawal of NATO alliance troops, saying: ‘We have an agreement in the alliance, and it stands.’

However, officials in the Defence Ministry also believe that, for the withdrawal to be completed by 2014, it would need underway at least a year beforehand.

Karzai’s comments to Panetta came as hundreds of Afghans gathered in a southern city to protest the weekend killings.

‘The protestors are shouting anti-American slogans,’ said Hekmatullah Kochi, spokesman for the 404 Police Corps, a regional Afghan police headquarters. ‘They say they want the Americans to leave the country.’

The protest took place in Qalat, the capital of Zabul province. It borders the volatile province of Kandahar, where the US soldier allegedly killed 16 Afghans, mostly women and children, while they were asleep in their homes.

The protest was peaceful, Kochi said.

Afghans have expressed anger over the killings, which came just days after foreign soldiers caused an uproar by burning sacred Islamic texts. Many have demanded a public trial in an Afghan court.

The suspect has been in US military custody since surrendering on his return to his base after the rampage and was flown to Kuwait on Wednesday.

Afghan lawmakers have also said their patience with foreign troops has run out.

Panetta was on a two-day visit to Afghanistan to try to contain the fallout from the recent incidents.

US, German defence chiefs visit Afghanistan; blasts kill 9

by Subel Bhandari and Hares Kakar, dpa 

Kabul - Questions about the continuing role of international forces in Afghanistan against the backdrop of diminishing local support predominated Wednesday during separate and unannounced visits by the US and German defence chiefs.

The visits came just days after 16 Afghans were shot dead allegedly by a rogue US soldier. They also came against the backdrop of two explosions in the country’s south that killed nine people Wednesday, officials said.

US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta met with Afghan officials in the southern province of Helmand on Wednesday in Shorab military camp, the provincial governor’s office said. There was a brief disturbance when a car burst into flames on the runway of a military base as Panetta’s plane was preparing for landing, according to British press reports.

The BBC and the Press Association said the driver of the vehicle was injured and was being treated at the Camp Bastion hospital, the main British base in southern Helmand, where US troops are also stationed.

‘At no point was anyone on board Panetta’s plane at risk,’ the BBC quoted a spokesman for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) force as saying:

Panetta is also scheduled to visit Defence Minister Rahim Wardak and President Hamid Karzai during his two-day visit, an Afghan official said. Karzai’s office could not be reached for confirmation.

The New York Times quoted Panetta as saying that the killings of the civilians were a horrific part of the decade-old conflict in Afghanistan.

‘War is hell,’ he told reporters on the plane to Afghanistan. ‘These kinds of events and incidents are going to take place, they’ve taken place in any war, they’re terrible events, and this is not the first of those events and it probably will not be the last.’

‘But we cannot allow these events to undermine our strategy,’ he added.

US President Barack Obama echoed the sentiment in Washington as he hosted British Prime Minister David Cameron. He said the two country’s forces ‘are making very real progress’ in Afghanistan.

But the two noted that the entire mission could be derailed by incidents like Sunday’s murders, the recent unintentional burning of copies of the Koran or an attack earlier this month that left six British troops dead.

‘Recent days have reminded us just how difficult this mission is,’ Cameron said.

‘We will not give up … We can help insure that Afghanistan is capable of delivering its own security without the need for foreign forces.’

Obama concurred, saying the US was not planning to quicken the pace of the drawdown of its forces in Afghanistan.

‘In terms of pace, I don’t anticipate at this stage that we’re going to be making any sudden additional changes to the plan that we currently have.’

German Defence Minister Thomas de Maiziere also arrived in Afghanistan Wednesday and met with Karzai and his Afghan counterpart.

The defence chiefs trips come ahead of a NATO summit in May, at which the contributing nations to the international forces in Afghanistan are scheduled to map out the years following the 2014 withdrawal.

De Maiziere said the scheduled 2014 deadline for withdrawing troops from Afghanistan was still the target.

A military official told dpa on Wednesday that the NATO-led coalition was still investigating the shooting spree.

‘The investigation is still ongoing. We are collecting evidence. No formal charge has been made yet,’ Colonel Jimmie Cummings, a spokesman for the international coalition forces, said.

A trial would be under US law, he said, though it could take place in Afghanistan.

The legal status of international soldiers is regulated by an agreement with the Afghan government.

Meanwhile, a bomb hidden in a motorbike in the southern city of Kandahar on Wednesday killed an Afghan intelligence officer and injured two others, the provincial governor office said.

The explosion occurred near a local intelligence department in the capital of the province of the same name.

Hours later, a roadside bomb struck a civilian vehicle in neighboring Helmand province, killing all eight passengers, the provincial governor office said in a statement.

‘The vehicle is completely destroyed and we are unable to identify the bodies,’ said Daud Ahmadi, spokesman for Helmand’s provincial governor. The explosion took place in Marja district at around noon.

Karzai condemned the killings in Kandahar and Helmand provinces calling them ‘heinous acts carried out by enemies of the people of Afghanistan who do not want people to live in peace and security.’

Afghan Disdain for US Forces Never far From Surface

By Subel Bhandari and Hares Kakar, dpa 

Kabul, Mar 13 - Sayed Khalid is a shopkeeper in Kabul who likes to talk with his customers. Since Sunday, he said, the topic has revolved around the “Kandahar massacre.” 

One U.S. soldier allegedly walked out of his base before dawn and shot dead 16 Afghan civilians, most of them women and children, while they were sleeping in their homes. 

The soldier then surrendered himself to U.S. military authorities. 

“I don’t believe there was one soldier,” the 34-year-old said, echoing a widespread belief among Afghans. “I think there was a group of people when they committed this barbaric act.”

“We may need foreign forces for security, but we also feel insecure because of them,” Khalid said. “You see them when they move around the city. Their weapons are pointed at the Afghan civilians.” 

A 2011 Asia Foundation survey found that “76 per cent of Afghans would have some level of fear when encountering foreign troops.” 

Joshua Foust, an author and political analyst, said a “deep frustration, anger, and an unwillingness to give the US the benefit of the doubt” persists among the Afghan people and government. 

It is hard for them to express their frustration with U.S. policy and actions any other way, he notes. But that does not stop Afghans from suggesting more radical policies. 

“Maybe they should be here under a law and framework and a duration. But most importantly, there should be a powerful law to prosecute such crimes,” Khalid said. 

Another Afghan said “nothing but execution” would be appropriate for the U.S. soldier. 

“That American should be punished with the death penalty. And we have to watch him being executed,” Baba Khan said. 

U.S. Defence Secretary Leon Panetta on Tuesday said the soldier, if found guilty, could face the death penalty. However, despite calls for Afghan trial, U.S. officials have said the soldier will be prosecuted according to U.S. law. 

Khan, a 60-year old shoemaker, also said the Taliban were “almost better than these people.” 

“They murder and burn people in the night while the children are still in their blankets.” 

“At least the Taliban did not burn our children at night. Whatever the Taliban did, they did during the day, to adults,” Khan said, referring to the thorny topic of night raid operations on Afghan homes by the U.S. forces, the kind that bear some similarities to the Kandahar killings. 

“During the Taliban, at night, we slept in peace,” he said. 

Many Afghans say these kind of incidents benefit the Taliban insurgents. Waheed Muzhda, a former Taliban government employee said it “will only help Taliban to make themselves stronger and recruit more in their rank.” 

“It weakens the US allies and internationalizes the Taliban movement as people’s movement for freedom.” 

Khalid, the shopkeeper, said he does not want the Taliban to come back to rule. But “I am 100 percent sure that the Taliban are benefiting from these kind of killings and attacks,” he said. 

He also said the Taliban can “now claim a moral high ground to launch a jihad against the foreign forces who are acting like invaders.” 

Muzhda, who is now a security analyst, said Friday prayers are examples of Afghan civilians’ dislike for the foreign forces. “Mullahs in Kabul pray that the Jews and their supporters like the U.S. be eliminated from this country.” 

Khan said he could not look at the photos of the victims. 

“I tell you the Americans have to leave. They don’t care about anything here … No one can even touch them,” he said. “Yes I want them to leave immediately.” 

However angry people are, there have so far been no violent outbursts like those witnessed last month when anger bubbled up against the burning of copies of the Koran by US soldiers at an airbase. At least 30 Afghans and six U.S. soldiers died in that unrest. 

Foust said the killing by the U.S. soldier itself does not say much. 

“The world has psychopaths, and war can bring out the psychopaths in a terrible way,” he said. 

“But the muted reaction in Afghanistan says a lot: Afghans do not act terribly surprised, just angry and sad, when Americans kill civilians,” said Foust, who is a fellow at the American Security Project. 

“That says something very dark about how they perceive our presence there.” 

Soldier killed as insurgents attack Afghan investigators

Panjwai, Afghanistan, Mar 13 - An Afghan soldier was killed and three other people injured on Tuesday when insurgents attacked a delegation probing the killing of Afghan civilians by a rogue US soldier, officials said.

The high-level delegation, appointed by President Hamid Karzai, was meeting with villagers in a mosque in the Zangabad area of Panjwai district early Tuesday.

They were discussing the killing of 16 Afghan civilians, mostly children and women, by a US sergeant in the early hours of Sunday in the same district.

President Barack Obama promised Tuesday the US would conduct a full and serious investigation into the mass shooting.

‘The United States take this as seriously as if it were our own citizens and our children who were murdered,’ Obama said in brief remarks in the White House Rose Garden. ‘We’re heartbroken over the loss of innocent life.’

Obama said he had spoken with Ambassador Ryan Crocker and General John Allen, commander of the international force in Afghanistan, about the incident, which he called ‘outrageous and unacceptable.’

‘We will follow the facts where ever they lead us,’ Obama said. ‘Anyone involved will be held fully accountable with the full force of the law.’

The suspect has been detained by coalition forces, and US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta earlier indicated he could face the death penalty through the military justice system.

A soldier guarding the site of the killings was shot dead Tuesday and three others were wounded, including a bodyguard of the minister for tribal affairs, a security official who spoke on condition of anonymity said.

Explosions and gunfire shook the area for 15 minutes, forcing the delegation and an accompanying dpa reporter to head back to the provincial capital Kandahar city.

The delegation consisted of senior Afghan officials, including the chief of staff of the Afghan Army, Kandahar’s provincial governor and police chief, two of Karzai’s brothers, and Tribal Affairs Minister Asadullah Khalid, who is a special envoy for southern Afghanistan.

Karzai called the killing by the US soldier ‘intentional’ and ‘unforgivable’ and asked the US for an explanation.

Obama, who spoke with Karzai over the weekend, described the incident as not representative of the US or its military and said it would not affect the US strategy in Afghanistan.

His administration would continue to work toward drawing down US troops and handing over security responsibilities to the Afghans, he said.

The incident was the latest in a series that has caused resentment among the population. The Taliban vowed to avenge the civilians’ deaths.

‘We once again warn American savages that the Mujahideen will not be convinced by anything until we take revenge for the oppressed people,’ the militants said in a statement.

The soldier should be tried as a war criminal and executed by the victims’ relatives, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said.

‘We will kill and behead American soldiers in return for the murder of innocent countrymen,’ he was quoted in the statement as saying.

In the eastern city of Jalalabad, hundreds of students took to the streets early Tuesday in protest at the killings.

Security forces were deployed, but the protest was peaceful, said Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, the spokesman for the governor or Nangahar province, of which Jalalabad is the capital.

Protestors chanted ‘Death to America’ and ‘Death to Obama,’ and set fire to an effigy of the president, a local resident said.

The killings have caused widespread outrage in Afghanistan, and led parliament to pass a resolution saying the country’s patience with the foreign troops had been exhausted.

The unrest has not been as violent as last month, when at least 30 protesters and six US soldiers died as riots swept the country after US soldiers incinerated copies of the Koran.

NEWS FEATURE: Afghan relationship with the US has hit rock bottom

By Subel Bhandari and Anne Walters, dpa 

Kabul/Washington (dpa) - The murder of 16 Afghan civilians by a US soldier on a shooting rampage may have irreparably damaged the already fraught relationship between Afghanistan and its major ally and donor, the United States, analysts and officials said on Monday. 

The incident took place on Sunday morning in the volatile Kandahar province. Most of the victims were women and children.

The killing is, however, only the most recent in a series of mistakes committed by the US forces who are fighting a decade-old insurgency in Afghanistan. 

Deep public outrage was voiced once again on Monday as Afghan lawmakers issued a statement saying the tolerance and patience “against the imprudence of foreign troops has exhausted”.

Last month, the burning of copies of the Koran by US soldiers at an army base prompted violent protests that left more than three dozen people dead.  

Before the Koran incident, an undated video surfaced in January that showed US soldiers urinating on dead militants. 

Last year, photographs of US soldiers calling themselves the “Kill Team” and posing with the corpses of Afghan civilians as “war trophies” surfaced. 

Political analyst Joshua Foust said the US-Afghan relationship could not have gotten any more strained. 

“I think the relationship already had hit rock bottom. The killings just confirm that there’s almost nowhere further down the relationship can go,” he said. 

“The last three months have been punctuated by repeated incidents that offend and shock them - but because the relationship is already so bad I don’t see how it can get worse,” said Foust, who is a fellow at the American Security Project. “If anything, it might cause renewed calls for accelerating the withdrawal and transition.”

Waheed Omer, political analyst and former spokesman for the Afghan president, said the lines between friends and enemies have never been blurred like this before. 

“Taliban and al-Qaeda do kill most of the Afghan civilians but the question is who you seek protection from if the gun that is supposed to protect you also turns against you,” Omer said. “For the moment, everything that is happening is in the strategic interest of the Taliban and al Qaeda and their masters.” 

Afghan and western military officials also say they are concerned with the growing number of these “missteps, offences” and the “mistrust, anti-US sentiments”.

Brigadier General Carsten Jacobson, spokesman for the NATO-led military alliance, said the “incidents and in particular the short distance between the incidents that we see in the recent weeks” were “a burden and are of concern.” 

An Afghan government official said the trend was more than worrying. 

“They keep making missteps and committing blunders. Sometimes, it’s their stupidity, other times, it’s craziness,” he said. 

“It poses a serious risk to development work, training and joint military operations, transition, strategic partnership agreement, and everything else,” the official said on condition of anonymity. 

The incident threatens negotiations on a US-Afghan strategic partnership agreement that will decide military involvement and civilian aid after the planned withdrawal of troops in 2014.

“You’d have to be under a rock not to think this is the worst thing that could have happened,” an unnamed official told the Washington Post.

The incident comes just days after agreement was reached on the handover of US-controlled prison facilities that had been a major point of contention in the agreement. 

Still, an agreement remains to be reached on whether forces can continue conducting night raids. 

The shooting has added pressure on the Obama administration to change course and withdraw troops earlier than planned.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll released on Monday showed 54 per cent of respondents think the United States should withdraw its troops from Afghanistan, and for the first time even members of the Republican Party, who have long supported the effort, are split on continued military involvement.

“I think it’s going to get substantially worse, not better,” Newt Gingrich, one of the Republican presidential hopefuls said in a television interview. “And I think that we are risking of young men and women in a mission that may frankly not be doable.”

In Afghanistan, the mood was aggressive on Monday. 

“For the US government, this is not even a crime as we have seen in the past,” said Waheed Muzhda, political analyst and a former Taliban government employee. “Afghan civilians don’t matter.”

However, Afghans now “believe that this is not a war on terror,” he said. “They believe this is a crusade against them for being Muslims.” 

Assadullah Khalid, an Afghan student said people were tired of mistakes made by the United States and its allies. 

“It is ridiculous that they get to keep on doing this and still boss around on their terms,” he said.

Afghan lawmakers say patience running out, Taliban vow revenge

by Subel Bhandari and Hares Kakar, dpa

Kabul - Afghanistan’s parliament said Monday that the nation’s patience and tolerance of foreign troops was running out, following the killing of 16 civilians by a US soldier on a shooting rampage the previous day.

Meanwhile Taliban insurgents, who have been waging a deadly insurgency for more than a decade, vowed to avenge the slaughter of civilians.

The incident occurred before dawn on Sunday when a US soldier, who has not been named, left his base and killed at least 16 civilians - mostly women and children - while they were sleeping in their homes in the Panjwai district of the volatile southern province of Kandahar.

‘Wolse Jirga (the lower house of parliament) condemns this brutal and inhuman act of American soldiers,’ the lawmakers said in a statement. ‘The tolerance of Afghan people against the imprudence of foreign troops has (been) exhausted.’

It said legislators had a duty to protect the life, property and honour of the country’s citizens.

More than half of the 249 lawmakers walked out of parliamentary proceedings in protest at the killings, officials said.

The parliament also demanded that the US government ‘punish the perpetrators of this incident as soon as possible in a public court in Afghanistan, with the participation of Afghan people so that it will be a lesson for all those who shed the blood of Afghans under any pretext.’

On Sunday, President Hamid Karzai called the killing ‘intentional’ and ‘unforgivable.’ He asked the US to provide clarification as soon as possible.

An Interior Ministry spokesman said they were investigating the circumstances surrounding the murder.

The Taliban insurgents, in a statement posted on their website, promised to ‘take revenge from the invaders and the savage murderers for every single martyr’ and punish them ‘for their barbaric actions.’

It called the US soldiers ‘sick-minded’ and ‘savages’ who had committed ‘blood-soaked and inhumane crime.’

The Taliban also called on international human rights groups ‘to help the Afghans in preventing such unjustifiable crimes by the American invaders’ and ‘to put them on trial.’

Last month, the Taliban claimed responsibility for several attacks including the deaths of six US troops killed by Afghan forces, as retaliation for the burning of the Koran by US soldiers.

A tribal elder in Panjwai district said the Taliban were inciting villagers to attack buildings and installations of the international forces and Afghan government in the area.

‘We are continuously in touch with the villagers and telling them that armed insurgents will infiltrate among them if they decide to protest, in which case the situation will go out of hand,’ Haji Agha Lalai Dastagiri said.

‘All of us tribal elders asked them to stay calm and we told them that their elders are talking to the Afghan government and the foreigners right now,’ he said.

Meanwhile, a NATO spokesman repeated the apology of the commander of the international forces and said the suspect would be tried for the killings.

Brigadier General Carsten Jacobson said international military forces would ensure that there were full legal consequences for Sunday’s killings and said, ‘prosecution will follow.’

Jacobson said the killing spree ‘in its dramatic proportion is a singular incident.’

He said wrongdoings, including those committed by soldiers in battle, had been prosecuted in the past, ‘be it in Iraq or be it here in recent years,’ but added that the legal process would take time.

‘In all the countries that form the coalition, the military is not mild on its perpetrators,’ Jacobson said.

The lone US soldier who carried out the attack is under the custody of the US forces, according to officials.

The New York Times reported that he was a staff sergeant and part of a ‘village stabilization operation,’ led by US special forces, to develop close ties with village elders, organize local police units and track down Taliban leaders.

The US newspaper also said he was 38 and married with two children, and had already served in Iraq three times before coming to Afghanistan for the first time in December.

Jacobson said they were investigating how he had been able to leave the military base, alone, in utter darkness in such a volatile district.

‘The way that a soldier could leave a military base in the middle of the night in Panjwai is as much a question that has to be investigated as is the question how a murderer could leave the Afghan Interior Ministry after his shooting,’ Jacobson said, referring to two US military advisers who were killed last month inside the government building.

‘I take these two examples to show that these are details, important ones, to an ongoing investigations,’ Jacobson said.

The shooting incident came as tensions were already high, after US soldiers burnt copies of the Koran and other religious books in an army base last month, prompting violent protests that killed more than three dozen Afghans.

Six US soldiers were also killed, all by allied Afghan forces, in what appeared to be revenge attacks.

US soldier kills 16 Afghan civilians in shooting rampage

by Subel Bhandari and Hares Kakar, dpa

Kabul/Kandahar, Afghanistan, Mar 11 - A rogue US soldier killed at least 16 Afghan civilians, most of them women and children, while they were asleep in their homes in southern Afghanistan, officials said Sunday.

NATO apologized for the deaths, with General John Allen, the commander of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) saying he was ‘shocked and saddened to hear of the shooting incident.’

The US soldier involved had been detained, Allen said, adding that he was committed to ‘a rapid and thorough investigation.’

Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the murder as an ‘unforgivable crime.’ Nine children and three women were among the dead, he said, demanding that the United States explain the killings to the Afghan people.

A presidential statement also carried quotes from those who had family members killed in the attacks.

‘American forces have killed innocent people despite your continued calls to prevent civilian casualities,’ Haji Samad Aka told Karzai by telephone, according to the statement. ‘American soldiers oppress us.’

Another 15-year-old Afghan, identified as Rafiullah, who was shot in the leg, told Karzai that the soldier had entered his family’s home in the dark, woken his family up and opened fire on them.

A delegation had been sent to Panjwai district, Kandahar province, where the killings took place, to investigate, the palace said.

The attack comes just weeks after the burning of copies of the Koran at the Bagram airbase stoked anti-US sentiment and sparked major protests. More than three dozen Afghans and six US soldiers were killed when those protests turned violent.

General Allen said ISAF would fully cooperate with the local Afghan authorities to ascertain the facts. Whoever was found to have committed wrong-doing would be held fully accountable, he said.

The ‘appalling’ incident would not ‘impugn or diminish the spirit of cooperation and partnership we have worked so hard to foster with the Afghan National Security Forces,’ the US general said.

The unnamed soldier reportedly walked out of his base before dawn.

Tribal Affairs Minister Asadullah Khalid, who visited the site, said the soldier seemed to have gone to at least three houses and opened fire.

Unconfirmed media reports suggested the soldier might have been suffering from a nervous breakdown.

The US Embassy in Kabul was quick to say those responsible for the killings of Afghan civilians would be identified and face justice.

‘We deplore any attack by a member of the US Armed Forces against innocent civilians, and denounce all violence against civilians,’ the embassy said in a statement.

The Taliban also condemned the killings in a statement, calling it a ‘genocidal’ and ‘bloody-thirsty act’ by the ‘barbaric Americans.’ Panjwai district remains their stronghold.

Despite the killings, Karzai announced that Afghanistan would go ahead with the signing of a much-touted partnership agreement with the US in May, which will also determine military and civilian aid to the wartorn country beyond 2014.

But Afghan political analyst Prince Abdul Ali Seraj said the Taliban would most likely benefit from Sunday’s killings.

‘The Koran burning issue is still ongoing. This is going to help the Taliban and they will milk it for all its worth to turn the Afghan people against the coalition and the government,’ Seraj said.

‘The Afghan government has to act for the Afghan people. And it is very difficult to try and answer people when a person, crazy or not, kills their loved ones inside their homes,’ Seray said, predicting violent repercussions.

‘This is going to have a natural reaction in Afghanistan. We are dealing with people here who believe ‘eye for an eye and tooth for tooth.’

Afghan-US pact to be signed by May, Karzai says

Kabul, Mar 11 (dpa) – A much touted strategic partnership agreement between Afghanistan and the United States is to be signed ahead of a conference due to take place in Chicago in May, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Sunday.

“We have agreed on new conditions that will (allow us) to be ready to sign the strategic treaty act with the US before the Chicago summit (on Afghanistan),” Karzai said at a ceremony in Kabul marking International Women’s Day.

The treaty will also help determine military and civilian aid to the war-torn country beyond 2014. 

On Friday, the US and the Afghan defence ministries signed an agreement on the handover of prisons, one of two sticking points standing in the way of the pact being signed. 

The other source of controversy involves the night raids carried out by US-led forces on Afghan homes. On Sunday, Karzai reiterated that there will be no strategic agreement if NATO does not stop such operations. 

Karzai said his government also planned to hold separate talks on  future US military installations inside Afghanistan.

“The issue of military installations in Afghanistan that the Americans will use (after 2014) will not be included in the strategic pact. This time, we will only sign a general framework of the partnership,” he said. 

Karzai said several open questions remained, including on who would be ultimately responsible for such bases and how many soldiers would they host. 

The president also said that the US and its allies had agreed to contribute 4.1 billion dollars in annual aid for Afghan security forces after 2014.