IWPR: The mayor of a city in eastern Afghanistan faces accusations that he has used his position to embezzle public funds. Afghanistan’s anti-corruption agency, the governor of Logar province, and former employees of the mayor all say they have proof that Ahmad Khan Ulfat acted illegally in a number of separate cases. Full story ...
PAN: A woman was shot dead in the Asqalan area of Kunduz City, raising the number of slain females to 14 in a year in the northern province, officials said Monday. Sayed Hussain Sarwari, the police spokesman, told Pajhwok Afghan News the killer of the 35 years old woman was yet to be identified. But her husband disappeared after the overnight incident. Full story ...
The Guardian: Afghanistan’s booming narcotics trade risks splintering the country into a “fragmented criminal state” if the government and its western allies do not step up efforts to tackle opium production, a senior UN official has warned. Opium farming in Afghanistan, the world’s main producer of the drug, hit a record high this year, with farmers harvesting a crop worth nearly 1bn USD (610m GBP) to them, and far more to the traffickers who take about four-fifths of the profit. Full story ...
PAN: Police have arrested a man who allegedly shot dead his wife and injured two other women as a result of domestic violence in northwestern Faryab province, an official said on Saturday. The man opened fire at his spouse on Friday night in Maimana, the provincial capital, killing her and wounding two other women of his family, the police chief said. Full story ...
The New York Times: In the Bost Hospital here, a teenage mother named Bibi Sherina sits on a bed in the severe acute malnutrition ward with her two children. Ahmed, at just 3 months old, looks bigger than his emaciated brother Mohammad, who is a year and a half and weighs 10 pounds. Full story ...
The Killid Group: Begging on the street has spawned a vicious practice: beggar mafia are renting children in Kabul, and drugging them with opium to ply their trade. Afghan cities are seeing Pakistani beggars in the summer. The government outlawed street-begging in November 2008 and set up a commission - made up of different government bodies and the Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS) - to end street-begging in the capital but it has not helped. Full story ...
The Washington Post: The White House’s push for another 10 years (at least) in Afghanistan — already the nation’s longest war — could make waves. The administration is pushing for a security deal with the Afghan government that would allow U.S. troops to stay there until “2024 and beyond.” Full story ...
The Diplomat: When American special forces plucked the second in command of the Pakistani Taliban from the hands of Afghan officials this October, they laid bare the extent of a largely covert war between Afghanistan and Pakistan that has been going on for several years. With a drawdown – perhaps even to zero – of U.S. troops from Afghanistan next year, the secret war might just become an open one. Full story ...
Newsmax: Fewer than 20 percent of Americans support the war in Afghanistan, making the longest conflict in the nation’s history the least supported war as well, a new CNN poll released Monday reveals. According to the CNN/ORC survey of 1,035 adults nationwide, 82 percent said they oppose the conflict in Afghanistan, up from 46 percent five years ago. Full story ...
PAN: Three journalists were killed, seven wounded and six others detained this year by the government, armed opposition and other circles in Afghanistan, a media advocacy group said on Monday. Thirty-four journalists were beaten and 26 others threatened and insulted during the period, NAI, which supports open media, announced at a press conference in Kabul. Full story ...
The Guardian: Whenever I read comments by politicians defending the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Predator and Reaper program – aka drones – I wish I could ask them a few questions. I’d start with: “How many women and children have you seen incinerated by a Hellfire missile?” And: “How many men have you seen crawl across a field, trying to make it to the nearest compound for help while bleeding out from severed legs?” Full story ...
The Killid Group: The Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce & Industries reports more than a quarter of manufacturing units have closed in the last two years. A Killid investigation. Azerakhsh Hafezi, in-charge of international relations at the Chamber, criticises the government for not having a proper programme to support domestic industrial production. "Factories are closing because the government does not have a programme to support ailing industries. Full story ...
U.S. News: Ahmed recalls driving to work through the streets of Kabul when he was stopped by a routine police checkpoint. The 33-year-old native of Kandahar moved to the capital city hoping to improve prospects for the nonprofit business he founded in his home town. He hadn’t yet updated his driver’s license from his old address, knowing that his refusal to pay the usual bribes at the local DMV would relegate his application to a weeks-long wait, if it were processed at all. Full story ...
PAN: A father sold his minor daughter to a 35 years old man in return for some animals and food items, officials said Thursday. The sale of Ghancha Gul, 7, in northern Jawzjan province drew denunciation from human rights campaigners, attorneys and law-enforcement officials. Full story ...
PAN: Police on Monday arrested three men for allegedly gang-rapping a 15-year-old boy a day earlier in northeastern Kunduz province. Crime branch chief, Col. Waisuddin Talash, told Pajhwok Afghan News the detainees took the boy to a home at gun-point in Kunduz City and gang-raped him on Sunday. Full story ...
Los Angeles Times: Two thirds of Americans questioned in a recent poll said the 12-year war fought in Afghanistan to cleanse the country of terrorists hasn’t been worth the price paid in lives and dollars. Nevertheless, a majority still favors keeping some U.S. forces in the troubled country even after the military mission ends a year from now, the ABC News/Washington Post poll found. Full story ...
IWPR: Officials and elected councillors in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province have raised the alarm about illicit arms deliveries to the Taleban. Police, they say, are happily trading away their ammunition to the insurgents they are supposed to be shooting at. "On the basis of evidence in our possession, we can absolutely confirm this,” Mohammad Ali Ahmadi, the deputy governor of this southeastern province, told IWPR. Full story ...
Reuters: An Afghan policewoman and a pregnant teacher were hanged and their bodies dumped within a few kilometres of a foreign military base recently handed over to Afghan control, officials said on Thursday. The two women, policewoman and mother of two Feroza and teacher Malalai - like many in Afghanistan the pair use only one name - were kidnapped on Monday in the conservative southern province of Uruzgan... Full story ...
BBC News: Women’s rights may have moved up the agenda in Afghanistan over the last decade, but violence against women has increased sharply, rights groups say. Two recent cases of brutality have shocked the nation, as the BBC’s Mahfouz Zubaide and Yo Haniewicz in Kabul report. Readers may find some of the details in these accounts distressing. Full story ...
PAN: A woman was axed to death by her husband in an attack driven by domestic violence in the Aab Kamari district of northwestern Badghis province, officials said on Tuesday. The governor’s spokesman, Mirwais Mirzakwal, told Pajhwok Afghan News the assailant, Habibullah, escaped after killing his spouse. Police had not been able to arrest him because the area was insecure, he said. Full story ...
Counterpunch: On January 15, 1973 Richard Nixon announced a halt to offensive operations by US forces in Vietnam. Twelve days later a peace agreement was signed in Paris between the United States, northern Vietnam, the US client regime in Saigon, and the Provisional Revolutionary Government (PRG) of southern Vietnam. This agreement called for an immediate ceasefire and called for the Vietnamese to negotiate a political settlement regarding the fate of southern Vietnam. Full story ...
BBC Persian (Translated by RAWA): Officials in Afghanistan’s western Herat province have said that a man cut his wife’s nose and lips with a knife. Sami Wafa, the governor’s spokesman told BBC that the incident had occurred in Injil district near central Herat. Full story ...
PAN: A group of unidentified gunmen gang raped a teenage girl after kidnapping her from home in Doshi district of the northern Baghlan province, the victim’s father wishing not to be named said. Talking to Pajhwok Afghan News, her father said unidentified gunmen stormed his home in Kelgi area of the district last night and abducted her 15-year old daughter who said the kidnapper freed her daughter next morning. Full story ...
PAN: Hundreds of people, including women, on Wednesday held a protest demonstration in Kabul to mark the “National Victims Day,” criticising NATO and US forces for their involvement in Afghan civilian deaths and calling for war criminals to be brought to justice. Full story ...
The Killid Group: Ahead of World Human Rights Day, Dec 10, Killid reports the state of human rights continues to be sobering in Afghanistan despite some small gains made by activists this year. The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) has calculated a shocking 24 percent rise in human rights abuse compared to 2012. There is a rise in the graph of violence against women, murder of civilians by foreign troops, air attacks, and sexual aggression. Full story ...
The Washington Post: The Afghan “Pentagon” being built here is a sprawling symbol of U.S. generosity. The American government has already spent about 107 million USD — double the initial estimate — on the five-story Defense Ministry headquarters, which will include state-of-the-art bunkers and the second-largest auditorium in Kabul. Full story ...
Middle East Quarterly: Since the 9/11 attacks, numerous books have been written about the Taliban, documenting its history and resurgence. Many writers fault the United States for failing to turn Afghanistan into the Shangri La that it could be, claiming that beginning with the Bonn conference in December 2001, the Afghanistan war has been a disaster punctuated by one missed opportunity after another, guided by a hubristic new imperialism. Full story ...
PAN: Officials and locals on Friday alleged irregularities to the tune of 200,000 USD had been committed in a vocational training project for surrendering insurgents in Syed Karam district of southeastern Paktia province. The latest graft claims in the restive province surface days after Afghanistan was viewed among the world’s most corrupt countries in a survey released by graft watchdog Transparency International (TI). Full story ...
Future of Freedom Foundation: Last week a remarkable exchange about the future role of the U.S. military in Afghanistan took place on the MSNBC program Andrea Mitchell Reports. In a discussion of the U.S. government’s uncertain negotiations with Afghan President Hamid Karzai over the continued presence of U.S. troops beyond 2014, NBC’s chief foreign correspondent, Richard Engel, pointed out that... Full story ...
PAN: Gunmen loyal to Uzbek leader Abdul Rashid Dostum have allegedly attacked and beaten some residents of a village on the outskirts of Shiberghan, the capital of northern Jawzjan province. Nearly 100 people, protesting in front of the governor’s house, accused armed supporters of the Junbish-i-Milli Afghanistan leader of severely beating residents of Hassan Tabin village. Full story ...
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