Kabul gives soldiers with ties to Pakistan an ultimatum

daily times

In an effort to rid their army of Taliban infiltrators, Afghan officials have begun ordering soldiers with families in Pakistan to either move their relatives to Afghanistan or leave the military, the Washington Post reports.

Afghan defence officials told the newspaper that the policy was crafted in response to a recent spate of incidents in which soldiers who were secretly working for the Taliban carried out attacks against NATO or Afghan troops. According to the army’s counterintelligence findings, those men often have ties to insurgent havens in Pakistan. But the ultimatum could force painful choices for thousands of Afghan troops, and it is likely to stoke ethnic tensions just as the country’s leadership is seeking a negotiated end to the war, the Post said, adding that purging members of the military with family in Pakistan also has the potential to aggravate long-troubled relations between Afghanistan and its eastern neighbour.

The policy has not yet received final approval from the Defence Ministry, and Afghan officials are still weighing whether to apply it nationwide, even as implementation begins in some areas. Mere consideration of the policy reflects the depth of anxiety in Afghanistan – both among Afghan officials and Western powers – over sleeper agents within the military, according to the newspaper.

US officials have expressed concern about the Taliban’s ability to penetrate Afghan security forces but have not publicly proposed concrete remedies. Afghan commanders say that the connection between sleeper agents and time spent in Pakistan has been well documented and that there is consensus on the need to act.

“When they’re in Pakistan, they can be influenced and intimidated by the enemy,” said Lt Gen Sher Muhammad Karimi, the army chief of staff. “It’s a big concern, and it’s something we’re trying to change,” he told the Post.

According to the newspaper, Afghan counterintelligence officials have already compiled lists of soldiers with ties to Pakistan. In some parts of the country, such as the battle-scarred south, soldiers on the list have been told to move or leave the army. “We’ve told them, ‘If you can’t move your families, you’ll be kicked out’,” said Col Abdul Shokor, the top Afghan counterintelligence official in the Afghan army’s Kandahar-based 205th Corps. No deadline has yet been set for the families to move, he said. If the new rule is implemented nationally, it could affect several thousand soldiers, the Post said.

After an infiltrator’s attack last month on French troops north of Kabul, France announced its troops would depart a year earlier than expected. The assailant probably had a contact with the Taliban in Pakistan, French Defence Minister Gerard Longuet said.

Shortly after the incident, the Afghan Defence Ministry sent top Afghan military officials a memo titled “Keeping the Enemy Out of the Army”, the newspaper reported, adding that the memo highlighted the urgency of the infiltration problem and the need to make changes.

A report commissioned by the US military said at least 58 Western military personnel were killed in 26 attacks by Afghan soldiers or police between May 2007 and May 2011, when the report was finished.

In Kandahar alone, four rogue Afghan soldiers have killed three American and two Australian soldiers in the past year. Shokor said that in each of those cases, “upon investigation, we found a relationship with Pakistan”.

A senior Pentagon official played down the threat from Afghans with Pakistani relatives. “Our strong sense is that the insider threat isn’t an organised effort. Insurgents are probably to blame in some cases, but sometimes it’s simply disaffected members of the ANSF [Afghan National Security Forces]. And it’s worth noting that instances of Afghan-on-Afghan violence inside the ANSF are more frequent than ANSF-on-NATO attacks,” the official told the Post on condition of anonymity.