No need to enter from the street, NEAR NEW easy level access from the alley and the home 1,626 sf 3 Br., 2 ba on is on the route of the 0.66 acres east of P.A. Olympic Discovery Trail, Quiet tree. He wrote extensively in nearly every area of Syriac literature, including grammar. In he was ordained Jacobite Monophysite bishop of Gubos near Mulafryn.
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Users must also abide by the at all times. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan police say at least one suicide bomber has blown himself up inside a Western-style hotel in the Afghan capital.There was no immediate word on casualties, and streets leading to the Intercontinental hotel are blocked.Azizullah, an Afghan police officer who uses only one name, told The Associated Press at the scene that at least one bomber entered the hotel Tuesday night and detonated a vest of explosives.Jawid, a guest at the hotel, says the attack occurred as many people were having dinner in the hotel restaurant. He says he heard gunfire throughout the several story building.The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in telephone call to the AP.THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information.
Afghanistan's central bank governor Abdul Qadir Fitrat, a former official in the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and an adviser to the World Bank, fled Kabul in panic even as the Afghan government was about to question him in connection with the scandal.Fitrat, who enjoys permanent residency status in the US, announced his resignation while ensconced in the Virginia hotel and within two hours he was on air, interviewed by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty flashing his side of the story across the Hindu Kush mountain tops and valleys. His story, essentially, is that he is a whistle blower on the bank scandal rather than a fraudster and that he fears for his life because of testimony he gave to the Afghan parliament some two months ago in which he implicated by name certain influential people in the Kabul power structure. The heart of the matter is that this is not a mere bank scam. The accused include powerful figures in the Afghan power structure.
Where Is Guapos Near Mulafryn Region Map
The bank scam as such is not essentially dissimilar to practices common to many countries in the world, including such semi-developed countries as Turkey, the United Arab Emirates or Brazil, with shareholders of private banks misappropriating the banks' capital for business purposes. Why the US is making such a song and dance about the issue is the big question.There is nothing extraordinary here in terms of the political economies of most developing countries. As an ethnic Afghan - a Tajik from the remote Badakshan province - Fitrat certainly would know he was punching far above his weight when he took on the powers that be in Kabul.Now, with the tribunal verdict on the unseating of the Afghan MPs and the prospect of a radical change in the alchemy of the Afghan parliament looming large - most likely, resulting in a 'swing' in Karzai's favor - the American game is almost certainly up. And the US Embassy in Kabul did the right thing to instruct Fitrat to return to the pavilion in Washington. He has become what Graham Greene would call a 'burnt-out case'.What do all these shenanigans by the US add up to? One, it underscores that the US is not getting anywhere near to good results by arm-twisting Karzai to concede favorable terms of a strategic partnership agreement on the establishment of American military bases in Afghanistan. Trying to mould favorable opinion' in northern Afghanistan is very significant.
This is where Fahim and the Panjshiris come in. Fahim is proving to be a stumbling block for the Americans in two respects. First, his open support for Karzai frustrates the US attempt to destabilize the Afghan president and make him politically vulnerable.
Karzai has brilliantly forged an alliance with the two most important Tajik figures in the north - Fahim and Burhanuddin Rabbani (former president who heads the Afghan High Council for Peace and an important interlocutor with Pakistan).The Karzai-Fahim-Rabbani axis virtually closes the gateway for the US to the northern region. The US game plan is to somehow strike a deal with the Taliban on the basis of the southern Afghanistan regions being 'ceded' to them and as quid pro quo to the Taliban accepting the long-term US military presence in Afghanistan.It is a different matter that such a de facto partition of Afghanistan is the one development that Pakistan dreads most as it stokes the fires of Pashtun nationalism and will strike at the very heart of Pakistan's national unity. (Which explains the US strategy to keep Pakistan out of the loop and instead preferring direct talks with the Taliban leadership.)Equally, Karzai and his allies also oppose any de facto division of Afghanistan. The US factors in that Karzai has rapidly diversified his external relations and takes an active interest in regional affairs, which has enabled him over time to secure support from Russia, China and Iran - and from Islamabad (to an extent), the complexities of Afghan-Pakistan relations notwithstanding.
Karzai is able to tap into the profound disquiet in these regional countries over the prospect of long-term US military presence in the region.What makes the Kabul Bank affair a matter of utmost importance to the US is that it sees the scam as a handle to weaken Fahim, who, incidentally, was a top leader of the erstwhile Northern Alliance, which was supported by Russia, Iran, India and Tajikistan.The cat-and-mouse game between Karzai and the US has finally burst into the open with Fitrat's escape to Washington. Karzai has already alleged that the core issue in the Kabul Bank scam is that Afghanistan lacked the necessary banking experience to oversee the institution and allowed itself to be guided by 'foreign advisers'. Clearly, Fitrat, having been the central bank governor, had a good view of what was going on in the Kabul Bank until the scam sailed into view, piloted by the US Embassy in Kabul.
Finally, if the IMF-US game plan is to somehow get Karzai removed from power and to have him replaced by a surrogate ruler with some previous World Bank experience, that is not going to work - even if he is an ethnic Pashtun. The paradox is that there is yet another party today who is involved in the question of who rules Afghanistan beyond 2014 - the Taliban.The IMF and the US should see the writing on the wall when half a dozen suicide bombers walk into the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul and NATO aircraft and troops have to be brought in to counter their invasion. Ramana wrote:I dont understand the obligatory ref to past incidents which obscure the current one. No need fro context when its not there.To give an equal equal. Many good things can be obtained from it.(1) point to GOI - how it quietly digested the kick. The Kabul gov should do so too and not bee too harsh on Talebs.(2) Backdoor negotiations are going on to the extract the good Taleban. Hey Kabul gov take this as a warning not to derail the process.(3) The Talebs are simply throwing a bargaining indicator.
Should be taken in that spirit. Ramana ji,that desi college politics should also show the details of the criteria for inaction. Lets say two competing student orgs are fighting, and one groups students have ambushed another groups students - and in the process non-activists in the class got hit too. College authorities will only take steps against that particular group which does not have the favour of the ruling regime, subject to following further criteria(a) if the ruling regime itself wants that action be taken against its own student group to eliminate someone from the local level of its own party(b) if the ruling regime want no action taken against any group - because it eyes some of the heroes from the other group for recruitment into its own - if the heroes have proved their utility as good bulldogs.I think you can now apply this to the AF situation. CRS ji, just to add to what Ramana said.
Keep in mind how split paki's are. Its imploding slowly while we continue on our march.
Why unite them? They are literally butchering themselves.There are foreign powers there who have got in position to split Pak if it continues and are doing our dirty work. We are just playing good boy and its working as more in the US are now questioning Pak.War is easy to start, but when you want out, the other side has to agree and it may not be on your terms. Saddam found out the hard way and a few years after the war with iran he was telling King Fahd he wished he listen to his advice.Of course Iran unified and the iranian leadership grew even more powerful as everyone united against Iraq.We will do the necessary to Pak when the time is right, that gap doesn't open up very often, but when it does we'll probably take it.Although, I do feel we should have reacted covertly. Shyamd ji,The more we koochie kootchie with paks the following can be the outcome: (Please note that in the recently concluded FS and Siachen meetings nothing concrete was established except to meet again. Love these chai biscoot sessions!)a) That one TFTA = 10 SRDE. Happened during the 65 and 71 wars, a good psychological advantage.b) With PA under tremendous pressure that they cannot deliver, adds masala to that view.Konfuscious konfounded is the name of the game.
Wheels within wheels! But yes, at an opportune moment we should have the political will to ruthlessly take advantage of the situation.
Push them into a faster downhill skiing is the best policy. Yes, of course we took care of Pakistanis earlier too - for what they did in he lead up to their 'nation' in 1946-47, and again in 51, and again in 53, and again in 58, 63, 66, 67, 70-71, 72, 75. Before 47, they were doing it on people from communities not worthy of having human rights in British India, and after 47 they were doing it on those very same communities still not worthy of having human rights. The Hindus of Bengal and the Sikhs of Punjab, and the Hindus of Kashmir.
In Mumbai, some people died, of course. But have to look at the context. Isnt this the city that allowed the Shiv Sena to rise? Isnt this the city that targeted a saccha Mussalman - who was merely doing honest business towards prosperity - having come from a deprived minority community background - and succeeded by the dint of his merit to become an international - nay multinational enterprise now most likely controlled from the Gulf? That enterprise which has on a sideline, given such an edge to India's soft-power projection through cinema? That Gulf which we need so desperately as otherwise we would drop down to '.
rate of growth again'? And to make it impossible for such a kind gentleman not to leave the shores of India?
That city has done many a crime! Surely this legitimate biting back or reprisal should not be avenged! That is not the 'h.' ethos which crawls into the base of our national foundation onlee when reprisals are being talked about!We should promise that we will take revenge - in the indefinite future! Time is the ultimate destroyer of things - only in this the 'Hindu' concepts are good! Wait for time to do its job!
Ramana wrote:CRS, You didnt have the benefit of going to desi college where you see student politics first hand. I know it looks like an apology of inaction but if its inaction by choice instead of due to helplessness, then its a policy move.I submit the GOI not resorting to force has set the US and TSP fighting each other. The Abortabad raid would never have happened in earlier times. TSP's perfidy is so obvious that the US was forced to conduct the raid for their own interests.No doubt about it.
But US & TSP are conducting their operations in an optimal manner, i.e., solving a constrained optimization/minimization problem. In US case it is to maximize its benefits killing as many 'bad guys' targeting whites.
In TSP's case, it is minimizing material losses as it gubos to US demands. But in both case the key constrain is not to let TSP's relative strenght visa vi India be depleted so much that TSP can't be a pain in India's arse.
Thats what AfPak is all about. Pakistan: Policy vignettes.Indian Relations: Pakistan's counterterrorism efforts do not satisfy India, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said 29 June. Singh said groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed are linked to the Islamic State of Iraq. He said he would visit Pakistan if there were a solid goal for the visit.Afghanistan Relations: Pakistani Defense Minister Mukhtar said 29 June that he does not know where Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar is hiding.
Senior US military commanders told the US Congress this week that Pakistanis were ignoring U.S. Requests to find Omar, but that they knew he was in Pakistan.US Relations: Pakistani Defense Minister Mukhtar also said that Pakistan did not face any threat from its eastern border and that Pakistan has asked U.S. Forces to leave Shamsi air base. Mukhtar said that payments from the coalition support fund had stalled and that the time had come to re-evaluate the policy in the war.Iran-Afghanistan Relations: Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said June 29 that the Iran-Afghanistan-Pakistan summit would be held in Islamabad in December, IRNA reported.Comment: Shamsi, located in Baluchistan, had been used to support drone operations for about five years according to media reports. Before that, starting in 2001, it was used as a support base for US military operations in Afghanistan. The US evacuated it in April 2011 after Pakistan ordered operations to cease, according to the Pakistan Military Review. Mukhtar's display of ordering the US out of Shamsi appears to be political theater.Nevertheless, US-Pakistani relations are in the process of change and will not be close for a generation or longer because the US and its armed forces humiliated the Pakistan Army.
Mukhtar confirmed that Pakistan's foreign policy is undergoing review in light of the 2 May attack that killed bin Laden. The shift is manifest in building closer ties to Iran as well as strengthening ties to China. The Afghanistan connection almost certainly signifies a revived Afghan policy that ensures Pakistan will be involved in the post-US reconstruction of Afghanistan.After the US military departs Afghanistan, it will remain either as a strategic threat or asset for Pakistan. Three years is not too soon to begin rebuilding the long term Pakistan investment in Afghanistan. By Ahmed RashidThe daring night-time raid on one of one Kabul’s best-known hotels by Afghan militants on Tuesday underlines once again how much depends on the secret talks with the Taliban.
Following Barack Obama’s plan for a limited withdrawal of troops, hopes of a settlement that would allow a full and safe western troop withdrawal by 2014 depend on these negotiations.However, the recent leaks by government officials in Washington, Kabul and London are extremely dangerous and could scuttle the talks just as they enter a critical phase. I have followed in detail the many attempts at Afghan dialogue since 2005, hoping they would bring peace to a country that has known only war since 1978. These talks have largely been between president Hamid Karzai and the Taliban and only recently included Americans.At stake is not just peace for Afghanistan but the region, including a deeply precarious Pakistan.
The talks are premised on the realisation that neither a successful western withdrawal nor a transition to Afghan forces can occur without an end to the civil war and a settlement between the government and the Taliban, but also Pakistan, the US and the region.In an attempt to avoid further speculation, I am laying out the bare facts of the talks as western officials have described them to me. The first face-to-face meeting between Taliban leaders and US government officials took place in a village outside Munich on November 28 2010. It was chaired by a German diplomat. There were also Qatari officials whom the Taliban had asked to be involved. The talks lasted 11 hours.The second round took place in Doha, the Qatari capital, on February 15. Three days later Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, made the most far-reaching US public statement to date, saying: “We are launching a diplomatic surge to move this conflict toward a political outcome that shatters the alliance between the Taliban and al-Qaeda, ends the insurgency and helps to produce not only a more stable Afghanistan but a more stable region.’’The third meeting took place again in Germany on May 7 and 8.
All the same participants have taken part in the three rounds which have largely involved trying to develop confidence-building measures between the Taliban and the Americans, such as lifting sanctions from the Taliban, the freeing of Taliban prisoners and the opening of a Taliban representative office.On June 17, in a big step forward, the UN Security Council accepted a US request to treat al-Qaeda and the Taliban separately on a 13-year-old UN list of global terrorists. There will now be two separate lists and UN sanctions on al-Qaeda members will not necessarily apply to the Taliban, making it easier to take them off the list – a significant boost to the dialogue.Mr Karzai has been fully briefed after each round and has unstintingly supported the Taliban’s desire to hold separate talks with the Americans, even as his government continues its talks with the Taliban.
Pakistani leaders have also been briefed about the talks, but have expressed reservations about them.One US-German target is to mark the 10th anniversary of the 2001 Bonn meeting that set up the Afghan interim government with another meeting in Bonn, in which the Taliban will participate. This would formalise the process, but there is still a long way to go before the Taliban agree to this demand – all the more reason that the identities of interlocutors are kept secret.
Even so, some believe that the Americans are going about the talks too slowly.The process began when German officials, at the request of the Taliban, held their first meeting in September 2009 in Dubai. Germany has always been admired by the Afghans because it has stayed neutral – never taking sides in Afghan conflicts and even tried to mediate to end the 1990s civil war between the Taliban and opponents.The Germans made sure the interlocutors represented the Taliban Shura (its governing council), which is headed by Mullah Mohammed Omar. (The Americans have also taken pains to verify the authenticity of the Taliban.) The Germans held eight further meetings with the Taliban to build trust, before bringing in the Americans. The Germans have never doubted their role as facilitators – while the actual negotiations must take place between the US and the Taliban.Q atar has played a role because the Taliban wanted a Muslim country at the table and considered Qatar neutral. Qatar has never backed any of the regional countries who have taken sides in past Afghan conflicts, such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, India, Turkey or Iran. The next big steps would hopefully involve how both sides could reduce violence on the battlefield. At some stage the Taliban would have to admit talks are taking place, which they strongly deny at present.A former Taliban leader told me recently: “The fundamental problem is between the US and the Taliban and we consider the Afghan government as the secondary problem.’’ He added: “The talks we want must involve the international community and end with international guarantees.’’ If that is the case and the Taliban would like to see an orderly western exit, the media and governments must allow these talks to succeed.
The only way to do that is to respect the participants’ need for secrecy.Particularly dangerous has been the speculative naming by journalists of participants, endangering their lives at the hands of groups such as al-Qaeda, who want to sabotage the talks. Afghan efforts have always been undermined by governments in the region or extremists.
These talks are clearly no longer secret but their contents must stay private if the talks are to have any chance.The writer is author of Descent into Chaos and The Taliban. Even with Osama bin Laden dead, the nexus between the Pakistani state and a syndicate of Islamic extremists remains a threat. Pakistan’s military continues to support the Taliban, the Haqqani network and Hizb-e-Islami against coalition and Afghan forces.When the city of Herat fell to the Taliban in 1996, the Pakistani former intelligence official Sultan Amir Tarrar — better known as Col. Imam — was helping Taliban forces. He reportedly messaged headquarters: “Today Herat, tomorrow Tashkent.”Washington has considerable leverage that it has not used to optimal effect.
Pakistan relies on the United States and international organizations to remain solvent; its economy would be on the ropes but for a two-year $7.6 billion International Monetary Fund loan package. Coalition support funds from the United States alone are equal to about 25 percent of Pakistan’s defense budget.Should Pakistani intransigence persist, the United States will need a long-term strategy that manages the threat from Pakistan and embraces a broad multilateral effort to assist those Pakistanis who seek to transform their country. This would, in part, require the United States to maintain a military presence in Afghanistan to counter the terror threat and assist in preventing the victory of Pakistani proxies in Afghanistan. KABUL: A barrage of 40 rockets was fired into eastern Afghanistan from Pakistan on Friday, a senior official said, as the top border police commander for the region offered his resignation over the government’s response to weeks of attacks.General Aminullah Amarkhil, head of the border police in the eastern region, said he was not able to return fire and could not stand by as people were killed by the shells.“I have submitted my resignation to the Interior Ministry because I can’t see my people being killed by shells fired from Pakistan,” Amarkhil told Reuters. “I have promised my people here that the shelling would be stopped, but people are still dying because we have no order from the central government to respond,” he added.
The Afghan Foreign Ministry said in late June that four children were killed in eastern Kunar province by Pakistani artillery shells, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that Pakistan had fired 470 rockets over the border that month. It will be messy:Afghan war's deadly toll on US forces hasn't easedBy DEB RIECHMANN, Associated PressSaturday, July 2, 201107-02) 14:03 PDT KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -'Despite U.S.
Reports of progress on the battlefield, American troops were killed in the first half of this year at the same pace as in 2010 — an indication that the war's toll on U.S. Forces has not eased as the Obama administration moves to shift the burden to the Afghans.While the overall international death toll dropped by 14 percent in the first half of the year, the number of Americans who died remained virtually unchanged, 197 this year compared with 195 in the first six months of last year, according to a tally by The Associated Press.Americans have been involved in some of the fiercest fighting as the U.S. Administration sent more than 30,000 extra troops in a bid to pacify areas in the Taliban's southern heartland and other dangerous areas. Military officials have predicted more tough fighting through the summer as the Taliban try to regain territory they have lost.President Barack Obama has begun to reverse the surge of American forces, ordering a reduction of 10,000 by the end of the year and another 23,000 by September 2012. Military has not announced which troops are being sent home, or whether they will be withdrawn from any of the most violent areas in the south and east.Rear Adm. Vic Beck, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition in Kabul, said he couldn't comment specifically on the U.S. Death count, but noted that the casualties were unchanged despite the surge in forces.
He attributed the overall decline in the international toll to coalition progress on the battlefield, including the discovery of a rising number of militant weapons caches. He also said Afghan security forces are increasingly taking the lead, although recent violence has raised concerns about their readiness to secure their own country.' Military is rapidly expanding its aerial and Central Asian supply routes to the war in Afghanistan, fearing that Pakistan could cut off the main means of providing American and NATO forces with fuel, food and equipment.A senior U.S.
Defense official said the military wants to keep using Pakistan, which offers the most direct and the cheapest routes to Afghanistan. But the Pentagon also wants the ability to bypass the country if necessary.It’s either Central Asia or Pakistan — those are the two choices. We’d like to have both,” the defense official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid alienating Pakistan. “We’d like to have a balance between them, and not be dependent on either one, but always have the possibility of switching.”. Pashtuns in Pakistan, regardless of their spread, are still a visibly unassimilated ethnic group who proudly retain their culture.
The time for stepping into the mine field of AFG in favour of one faction of Afghans against another is now well gone. The time was just after 26/11. Nothing much could have been said by anyone except the usual growls by China and the Paki Occupation Government. It is three years too late now.Geography is an obstacle, needing Iranian as well as CAR cooperation to do anything substantial.
Mere training will not do - as is obvious. The Talebs are practically working on a Maoist principle of warfare. To counter them another insurgent movement is necessary - or tightening up the noose by 'sanitization' of areas in the only way the Afghans were ever sanitized. A foreign army getting involved in the process - if not an Islamic army - will be promptly called up at the international court of justice or be an Islamist like Q who becomes a personal thorn in western sides for atrocities along crimes against humanity. Ever wonder, why none of the Talebs are being charged at the so-called-international-court-for war-crimes?
Where Is Guapos Near Mulafryn Region 1
But if Indians get involved in countermeasures they will be liable to be charged.Tackling Talebs cannot be done through 'humanitarian' ways - because Talebs - by their ideology and practice are no longer humans, and therefore enjoy freedom of action that regular forces do not.AFPak is a joint problem, and mere training of Afghan national army of some sort, will no longer suffice. India can only think of destruction of Pak which is inseparably linked to securing the Afghan frontier and put up a semblance of a modernizing state on the rump southern AFG-FATA areas. ASADABAD: Up to 33 police and five civilians were killed in fighting after Taliban crossed over from Pakistan and attacked a remote region in eastern Afghanistan, an official said on Wednesday. Nuristan provincial governor Jamaluddin Badr said about 40 rebels also died in the two days of clashes that followed weeks of tit-for-tat allegations of cross-border attacks that have fanned diplomatic tensions. But, Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry contradicted the toll, saying 12 policemen had died and another five were wounded. Dozens of rebels who began crossing the border from Pakistan on Tuesday triggered the fight, Badr told AFP, attacking police posts in the Kamdesh district of Nuristan. “The report we have now from the area is that 33 border police and five civilians, two of them women, have been killed,” he said.
He said most of the dead rebels were Pakistan Taliban. The Interior Ministry said that “dozens” of rebels were killed in a clearance operation that lasted several hours, 12 of them Pakistanis.
“The situation in the border areas of Kamdesh district has returned to normal,” it said. The escalating conflict in the rugged border zone between Afghanistan and Pakistan has forced more than 200 Afghan families to flee so far. In a rare briefing to reporters on the activities of the usually secretive SOTG, Lt Col Grant (first name only for security reasons) said operations remained focused on Oruzgan provinces but more were being conducted in adjoining Helmand, Kandahar, Zabul and Daykundi provinces.'
We go where the intelligence tells us that the insurgents are working, or where they have moved to or where a potential safe haven is,' he said.' Before the spring offensive this year we were very conscious about making sure we developed our understanding of the intelligence picture as much as we could before we launched a very active campaign in early March to target as many of the leaders who were returning to the province after having a bit of a hiatus over winter.' Winter has traditionally been a time when Afghan insurgent forces rest up in preparation for the spring and summer fighting seasons.
But over the last winter, they received little respite.