IRIN: Human rights groups are calling on the Afghan government to adopt a new law which would more clearly differentiate rape, a criminal offence, from consensual adultery, considered a serious crime in the country. "Rape and adultery are two different issues and should be separate in law. Rape is an act of violence and coercion and the inflicting of suffering on a victim, and is not consensual, whereas adultery is consensual, freely chosen," Sonya Merkova, a researcher at London-based Amnesty International, told IRIN. Full story ...
IRIN: Flash floods killed at least 11 and damaged dozens of houses in Alingar District, Laghman Province, eastern Afghanistan on 2 September, according to provincial officials. "So far five bodies have been found and search and rescue activities are ongoing in the affected areas," Sayed Ahmad Sapai, a spokesman for the Laghman governor's office, told IRIN, adding that most victims were children Full story ...
...tch pierces pitch-black darkness, casting an eerie glow on dirty, feral faces. Sucking sounds. Lungs expand with the inhalation of heroin fumes. A gulp and an aahhh. There's more furtive movement nearby, scratching, the rustle of newspapers crunching underfoot, foul-smelling bodies pressing in. These are the human moles of Kabul, drug addicts who live in the stark ruins of the Russian Cultural Ce... Full story ...
Washington Post: One week after Afghanistan's presidential election, with the winner still undeclared, increasing accusations of fraud and voter coercion threaten to undermine the validity of the results, deepen dangerous regional divisions and hamper the Obama administration's goals in this volatile country.... "I was a witness to fraud, and I couldn't do anything to stop it," said a female election monitor at a voting site... Full story ...
Time: The frantic run-up to Afghanistan's presidential election has given way to a bitter anti-climax. Even as results trickle in, they are in danger of being overwhelmed by mounting claims of fraud from the leading candidates, who appear to be increasingly unlikely to back down should the final verdict not go their way. In the second installment of results, announced on Wednesday, President Hamid Karzai extended his lead over his top challenger, former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah. Full story ...
BBC News: A blast has been reported in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, a day after the country's deadliest bombing for a year killed some 43 people there. The explosion was reported close to the site of Tuesday's car bomb attack. There are reports of casualties. A local official told the BBC the injured were being taken to hospital. "This is a terrorist attack but we are trying to find out more details," a senior government official in the city told the BBC. Full story ...
AFP: Rescue workers Wednesday sifted through the rubble of the deadliest bombing in Afghanistan for a year as signs of poor election turnout pointed to the success of Taliban intimidation. With the Taliban-led insurgency at record levels, the Islamist rebels were blamed for setting off a truck bomb in the heart of southern city Kandahar, killing up to 43 people and injuring 65, almost all civilians. The bomb blew up near a Japanese construction company, a guest house used by foreigners and government offices. Full story ...
Aljazeera.net: An Afghan journalist has been killed by gunmen in northwest Pakistan's lawless tribal belt, officals and colleagues have said. Janullah Hashimzada, 40, was returning from Afghanistan on a bus when fighters ambushed the vehicle on Monday near Jamrud in the Khyber tribal district. Taliban fighters are known to operate in the area where he was killed. Rehan Gul Khatok, an assistant administrative agent in Jamrud, told the AFP news agency: "Unidentified gunmen stopped his coach, pulled him out and shot him dead." Full story ...
RAWA News: Buried in the public relations blather of U.S. Marine legions “liberating” Helmand and Afghan (sham) “elections” as democracy-restored is an unspoken trade-off over who disproportionately dies in America’s modern wars in the Third World. Under George W. Bush, U.S politico-military elites chose to fight the Afghan war with minimal regard for so-called colla Full story ...
Foreign Policy: So it finally happened. The election that we've been waiting for and looking forward to at least since last winter took place yesterday all over the country. I'll refrain from writing anything about the rest of the country. I'll just be talking about the things in Kandahar that I saw and was able to confirm from here on the ground. There weren't so many foreign journalists down here and most are unlikely to publish detailed accounts of what happened and the things that they saw; NPR decided not to run a piece on the election down here, judging that "one piece from Kabul was enough." Full story ...
The Independent: Call it the mystery of the invisible voters. At one polling station in Nad-e-Ali, just over 400 people had voted by 1pm. Three hours later, the figure had apparently surged to some 1,200. This despite the fact the streets were empty, all shops and businesses were shut and an Afghan army officer saying his men standing guard had hardly seen any civilians heading to these particular voting booths. Full story ...
PAN: At least 11 people including six girls were killed in separate attacks on Election Day in restive southern Afghanistan. The first incident occurred in Kandahar City, where a rocket hit a home, leaving six girls of a family dead. The attack took place at around 1pm in the Hindu intersection area. Full story ...
The Independent: Like millions of Afghans, I have no hope in the results of today's election. In a country ruled by warlords, occupation forces, Taliban terrorists, drug money and guns, no one can expect a legitimate or fair vote. Even international observers have been speaking about widespread fraud and intimidation and, among the people on the street, there is a common refrain: the real winner has already been picked by the White House. Full story ...
Spiegel Online: Afghans go to the polls Thursday to vote for a new president. But if the incumbent Hamid Karzai declares victory after the first round of elections, his opponents, who fear vote-rigging, are threatening to take to the streets. Observers warn that things could get bloody. Full story ...
BBC News: Voting cards are being sold openly and candidates have been offering thousands of dollars in bribes for votes. The findings came as campaigning closed before Thursday's election, in which incumbent President Hamid Karzai faces 41 challengers. A senior Afghan Independent Election Commission official denied to the BBC that voting cards were being sold. Full story ...
Politics.co.uk: The legitimacy of this week's crucial Afghanistan elections has been called into question, after the full price Britain's soldiers are paying to provide security for the poll was revealed yesterday. It emerged this morning that bribes have been offered to buy votes and that voting cards have been put up for sale. An undercover Afghan journalist working for the BBC discovered he could purchase voting cards at £6 per card. Full story ...
Associated Press: Voting observers expect fraud during next week's Afghan presidential election and warn that cheating will most likely take place at polling stations in remote or dangerous areas where independent monitors won't be able to be present. A suspiciously high number of women _ far more than men _ have been registered to vote in culturally conservative provinces where President Hamid Karzai expects to do well, a leading election monitor said this week. Full story ...
IWPR: “Everybody knows the United States will choose the next president of Afghanistan,” said Shah Rahman Afzali. “We should not participate in sham elections.” Afzali is not an illiterate farmer, indoctrinated by the Taliban about “puppet presidents” and “infidel elections”, but a student at Herat University. And he is by no means alone in his views. Among Herat’s intellectual elite, it is widely believed that NATO countries will determine the outcome of Afghanistan’s presidential and provincial council elections, scheduled for August 20. Full story ...
RAWA News: 20th August 2009 Elections is coursing in Afghanistan in a time that the call for improved governance, particularly at sub national level in Afghanistan has become increasingly urgent, as expressions and concerns over dissatisfaction, an increasingly virulent insurgency and the corrosive effects of corruption which has become part of a complex triad (corruption, opium economy and terrorism) where warlords, insurgents, factional leaders, corrupt officials and drug dealers are contributing to its sustenance has increasingly grown. Full story ...
Amnesty International: Days before the Afghan presidential elections, journalists from thirteen provinces in Afghanistan have told Amnesty International that they had recently been threatened by Afghan government officials because of their critical reporting. At the same time, the Taliban and other anti-government groups have also stepped up attacks against journalists and blocked nearly all reporting from areas under their control. Full story ...
Human Rights Watch: “Karzai has made an unthinkable deal to sell Afghan women out in return for the support of fundamentalists in the August 20 election,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “So much for any credentials he claimed as a moderate on women’s issues.” A copy of the final law seen by Human Rights Watch shows that many regressive articles remain, which strip away women’s rights that are enshrined in Afghanistan’s constitution. The law gives a husband the right to withdraw basic maintenance from his wife, including food, if she refuses to obey his sexual demands. Full story ...
The Guardian: Afghanistan has quietly passed a law permitting Shia men to deny their wives food and sustenance if they refuse to obey their husbands' sexual demands, despite international outrage over an earlier version of the legislation which President Hamid Karzai had promised to review. The new final draft of the legislation also grants guardianship of children exclusively to their fathers and grandfathers, and requires women to get permission from their husbands to work. Full story ...
Los Angeles Times: Mirza Mohammed Dost stood at the foot of his son's grave, near a headstone that read, "Raheb Dost, martyred by Americans." His son was no insurgent, Dost said. He was walking home from prayers on the night of May 5 when he was shot and killed on a busy Kabul street by U.S. security contractors. "The Americans must answer for my son's death," Dost said as a large crowd of y Full story ...
Inter-Parliamentary Union: In early July 2009, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) published a report on the situation of women in Afghanistan entitled Silence Is Violence: End the Abuse of Women in Afghanistan. The report describes and denounces the pervasive violence against women in Afghanistan, which unfortunately has been allowed to continue almost unabated since the demise of the Taliban regime and has crushed hopes for a better life for women in the country. The report focuses on sexual violence and on violence that inhibits the participation of women in public life. Full story ...
PAN: Three civilians were killed and fourth injured in an air strike by NATO-led troops in Chora district of southern Uruzgan province, officials said on Monday. Deputy police chief Col. Mohammad Nabi Khan told Pajhwok Afghan News the people came under attack in Sanger village soon after they climbed a mound to make a call from their mobile. Full story ...
The Telegraph.co.uk: The president's brothers, Mahmoud and Ahmed Wali, are accused of having amassed millions of pounds since Mr Karzai took office even as most of Afghanistan remains poverty stricken. The development has fuelled a popular disillusionment and anger with the leadership that the Taliban has exploited. Ahmed Wali Karzai has been dogged by allegations, which he denies, of involvement in the country's $3 billion opium trade, while Mahmoud Karzai has been accused of using his brother's influence to build a business empire that has made him one of the country's wealthiest men. Full story ...
CBC: Five farmers were killed by an air strike from Western forces, Afghan police said Thursday. The farmers were loading cucumbers into a taxi in the rural Zhari district near Kandahar city when a military helicopter fired on them, said district police Chief Niaz Mohammad Sarhadi. Sarhadi alleged the strike was conducted by U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Lt.-Cmdr. Christine Sidenstricker said the U.S. military believes the air strike hit a group of militants loading munitions into a van. Full story ...
Toronto Star: In dozens of mountain hamlets in this remote corner of Afghanistan, opium addiction has become so entrenched that whole families – from toddlers to old men – are addicts. Cut off from the rest of the world by glacial streams, the addiction moves from house to house, infecting entire communities. From just one family years ago, at least half the people of Sarab, population 1,850, are now addicts. Full story ...
Los Angeles Times: Separate roadside bombings in volatile Helmand province today killed at least 26 people, including 21 members of a wedding party and five police officers, Afghan officials said.Also today, the U.S. military reported the death a day earlier of an American soldier in western Afghanistan. That brought the number of U.S. troops killed so far this month to seven, out of a total of 11 Full story ...
PAN: Four civilians three of them children - were killed during an attack of foreign troops Tuesday night in Arghandab district of southern Kandahar province, civilians said. Dozens of protesting villagers brought the bodies this morning from their village to the governor's house in Kandahar City, about 12 kilometers away. Full story ...
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