Taliban's darkness descends on Swat Valley

Article from: The Australian
"GUL Makai" finished the Seventh Grade at her private school in Pakistan's Swat Valley last December. But the holidays brought little joy for the young Afghan, her friends or family.In a diary that she writes under a pen name for the BBC's Urdu service she documents the miseries of life in the former tourist mecca, whose mountains have become a stronghold of militant Islamists."Our parents are very scared," she writes in one entry. "They told us they would not send us to school until or unless the Taliban themselves announce on the FM channel that girls can go to school."Just 160km from Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, the picturesque valley - once famed for its cosmopolitan ski resort and liberal, artistic community - has become a symbol of the Pakistani Government's inability to crack down on a jihadist movement that is threatening to destabilise the country.Almost daily, residents in Mingora, the only major town in Swat, find four to five headless bodies on the streets, victims of the Taliban.Responsible for the reign of terror is radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah, a Talibani leader known as Radio Mullah for his fiery sermons broadcast nightly via a pirate FM radio frequency.Fazlullah stepped up his campaign in Swat after November's Mumbai attacks when Pakistan redeployed troops to the border with India. In just a few months he is said to have increased his area of control from less than a third to more than 80 per cent of the 9000sqkm area.In December, he announced all education for girls would cease by January 15 - when private schools were due to reopen - prompting Pakistani newspaper The News to editorialise: "The beautiful valley now enters a time of darkness."The number of schools blown up or torched stands at 181, and militants have blown up power grids, bridges, gas lines and hotels.Last week, Fazlullah demanded 40 provincial ministers and local government officials appear before a Taliban court to answer charges of causing unrest in the area, or face death.Kamran Bokhari, senior South Asia analyst with US-based global intelligence company Stratfor, says Swat now represents a "red line" for the Pakistani Government.Bokhari says the Taliban and al-Qa'ida have long had strongholds in the neighbouring Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a special autonomous zone along the Afghan border, but Swat is in the heart of the North Western Frontier Province and "very much part of Pakistan"."Swat is extremely important because if it does completely fall to the militants, or the army is unable to re-establish the writ of the state, then that would be the first district in Pakistan proper to fall," he told The Australian.The US views Swat as the most dangerous of the militant strongholds because its terror camps feed into the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan - the Western coalition's main front in the war on terror.Pakistani Interior Affairs Minister Rehman Malik told the Senate last week that the organisations behind the trouble in the valley included al-Qa'ida, Tehrik-i-Taliban, Tanzeem-i-Islami, Tora Bora and Qari Mushtaq.Swat is likely to be at the top of Richard Holbrooke's agenda this week when he meets Pakistani leaders in Islamabad on his first visit as the US's special envoy to South Asia.While the Government has been fighting Fazlullah's insurgency since 2007, many believe the strife in the region might have been averted far earlier had former president Pervez Musharraf shut down the cleric's broadcasts, which tapped into local frustration with corruption and the judicial system."Absolutely everyone listens to the daily radio broadcasts, because they don't know if a rival has made an accusation that puts them on the list," a Mingora resident widowed by the Taliban told local media."It gives them an opportunity to present their side of the case to the Taliban, and be acquitted in the following day's broadcast."The military has made little headway and has alienated many residents who suspect government troops of tipping off militants before attacks and accuse them of killing more civilians than militants.Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani vowed last week that his Government would swiftly crush the insurgency. But he added that military action was not the only solution, suggesting negotiations with Fazlullah might still be an option."You can't imagine how bad it is," Muzaffar ul-Mulk, a federal politician whose home in Swat was bombed in December, said of the security situation. "It's worse day by day."Haji Adeel, a senator and senior ANP leader, told Dawn television that security was so dire that "no governor, chief minister or the Prime Minister can venture to go there".Those with the means have already relocated to Islamabad or Peshawar. Up to a third of the Swat's 1.5 million population are said to have fled - and the region's poorest residents began flooding out last week after the Government opened two relief camps around Mingora.The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs projected last week that the situation in Swat and FATA tribal areas could significantly worsen over the next 12 months, displacing a further 625,000 people.

Taliban's darkness descends on Swat Valley

Article from: The Australian
"GUL Makai" finished the Seventh Grade at her private school in Pakistan's Swat Valley last December. But the holidays brought little joy for the young Afghan, her friends or family.In a diary that she writes under a pen name for the BBC's Urdu service she documents the miseries of life in the former tourist mecca, whose mountains have become a stronghold of militant Islamists."Our parents are very scared," she writes in one entry. "They told us they would not send us to school until or unless the Taliban themselves announce on the FM channel that girls can go to school."Just 160km from Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, the picturesque valley - once famed for its cosmopolitan ski resort and liberal, artistic community - has become a symbol of the Pakistani Government's inability to crack down on a jihadist movement that is threatening to destabilise the country.Almost daily, residents in Mingora, the only major town in Swat, find four to five headless bodies on the streets, victims of the Taliban.Responsible for the reign of terror is radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah, a Talibani leader known as Radio Mullah for his fiery sermons broadcast nightly via a pirate FM radio frequency.Fazlullah stepped up his campaign in Swat after November's Mumbai attacks when Pakistan redeployed troops to the border with India. In just a few months he is said to have increased his area of control from less than a third to more than 80 per cent of the 9000sqkm area.In December, he announced all education for girls would cease by January 15 - when private schools were due to reopen - prompting Pakistani newspaper The News to editorialise: "The beautiful valley now enters a time of darkness."The number of schools blown up or torched stands at 181, and militants have blown up power grids, bridges, gas lines and hotels.Last week, Fazlullah demanded 40 provincial ministers and local government officials appear before a Taliban court to answer charges of causing unrest in the area, or face death.Kamran Bokhari, senior South Asia analyst with US-based global intelligence company Stratfor, says Swat now represents a "red line" for the Pakistani Government.Bokhari says the Taliban and al-Qa'ida have long had strongholds in the neighbouring Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a special autonomous zone along the Afghan border, but Swat is in the heart of the North Western Frontier Province and "very much part of Pakistan"."Swat is extremely important because if it does completely fall to the militants, or the army is unable to re-establish the writ of the state, then that would be the first district in Pakistan proper to fall," he told The Australian.The US views Swat as the most dangerous of the militant strongholds because its terror camps feed into the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan - the Western coalition's main front in the war on terror.Pakistani Interior Affairs Minister Rehman Malik told the Senate last week that the organisations behind the trouble in the valley included al-Qa'ida, Tehrik-i-Taliban, Tanzeem-i-Islami, Tora Bora and Qari Mushtaq.Swat is likely to be at the top of Richard Holbrooke's agenda this week when he meets Pakistani leaders in Islamabad on his first visit as the US's special envoy to South Asia.While the Government has been fighting Fazlullah's insurgency since 2007, many believe the strife in the region might have been averted far earlier had former president Pervez Musharraf shut down the cleric's broadcasts, which tapped into local frustration with corruption and the judicial system."Absolutely everyone listens to the daily radio broadcasts, because they don't know if a rival has made an accusation that puts them on the list," a Mingora resident widowed by the Taliban told local media."It gives them an opportunity to present their side of the case to the Taliban, and be acquitted in the following day's broadcast."The military has made little headway and has alienated many residents who suspect government troops of tipping off militants before attacks and accuse them of killing more civilians than militants.Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani vowed last week that his Government would swiftly crush the insurgency. But he added that military action was not the only solution, suggesting negotiations with Fazlullah might still be an option."You can't imagine how bad it is," Muzaffar ul-Mulk, a federal politician whose home in Swat was bombed in December, said of the security situation. "It's worse day by day."Haji Adeel, a senator and senior ANP leader, told Dawn television that security was so dire that "no governor, chief minister or the Prime Minister can venture to go there".Those with the means have already relocated to Islamabad or Peshawar. Up to a third of the Swat's 1.5 million population are said to have fled - and the region's poorest residents began flooding out last week after the Government opened two relief camps around Mingora.The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs projected last week that the situation in Swat and FATA tribal areas could significantly worsen over the next 12 months, displacing a further 625,000 people.

Barack Obama envoy Richard Holbrooke warns of 'a new Iraq' as he heads to Pakistan

President Obama’s special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan hit out at previous US policy in the region yesterday as he embarked on his first tour of South Asia in his new job.“I have never seen anything like the mess we have inherited,” Richard Holbrooke said at a security conference in Munich that was also attended by top Afghan, Pakistani and Indian officials. “It is like no other problem we have confronted, and in my view it’s going to be much tougher than Iraq,” he added.
The 67-year-old former ambassador to the UN arrives in Pakistan this morning, and will head for Afghanistan on Thursday and India next Monday on a mission to overhaul US policy in the region. Mr Holbrooke has a reputation as a hard-nosed negotiator, best known for brokering the Dayton peace accords that ended the war in Bosnia in 1995.However, he has little experience of South Asia’s political minefields, few personal contacts in the region and no guarantee that his interlocutors will even be in power for much longer. President Zardari of Pakistan is chronically weak, with only nominal control of the army. President Karzai of Afghanistan looks increasingly unpopular at home and abroad ahead of presidential elections in August. India also faces national elections by May and Manmohan Singh, its 76-year-old Prime Minister, is recuperating at home after a heart bypass.Relations between all three countries are especially fraught because India blames Pakistani spies for the attacks on Mumbai in November as well as the bombing of its embassy in Kabul in July. Mr Holbrooke’s visit to Afghanistan will be overshadowed by recent criticism of President Karzai in Washington and rumours that President Obama is looking for a replacement. Mr Karzai will try to deflect US criticism by accusing Pakistan of allowing al-Qaeda and the Taleban to shelter in its northern tribal areas.“We know today what we seemed to neglect for several years – that terrorism did not emanate from Afghanistan’s villages and people; that there were sanctuaries outside our borders where terrorism might be defeated,” Mr Karzai told the conference.

EU condemns execution of Polish engineer in Pakistan

BRUSSELS-- The European Union (EU) on Monday condemned the execution of a Polish engineer, who was kidnapped in Pakistan by Taliban militants in September 2008. Both EU foreign and security policy chief Javier Solana and EU external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said they were shocked by the death of Piotr Stanczak, who worked as an engineer geologist. "Solana condemns this heinous crime, which highlights the extremely dangerous and unstable situation in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and wishes to express his solidarity with Mr. Stanczak's relatives and the Polish government," Solana's spokeswoman, Cristina Gallach said. Ferrero-Waldner said: "The perpetrators of this appalling terrorist crime must be pursued and brought to justice. I condemn in the strongest possible terms this despicable act of violence which cannot be justified under any circumstances." She said the EU remains steadfast in its support for strengthening the institutions of the Pakistani state, and is ready to support all efforts to reinforce stability in the country.A video distributed to news organizations showed Stanczak was apparently beheaded by his kidnappers.

Pakistan identified as biggest foreign policy test

Pakistani soldiers target militant positions in the tribal region, an increasing threat to the country's new and fragile democracy. Washington's newly appointed special envoy is due to arrive in Islamabad today, as Barack Obama's administration tackles what may turn out to be its greatest foreign policy challenge: a nuclear-armed country hurtling towards chaos.According to Obama's aides, Pakistan is the nation that really "scares" him. The country is threatened by a growing Islamist insurgency, economic collapse and a crisis of governance as it struggles to establish democratic rule. The Obama administration believes Pakistan is key to its objectives of pacifying Afghanistan and going after al-Qaida and has appointed a pugnacious diplomatic troubleshooter, Richard Holbrooke, as a special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan."We often call this situation Afpak," said Holbrooke at a conference in Munich yesterday, before flying to Islamabad. "There will be more focus on Pakistan," he said. "A new and fragile democracy has emerged ... but the situation in Pakistan requires attention and sympathy."Leaks of a US military review, conducted under David Petraeus, the American general in charge of the region, say he has concluded that Pakistan, not Iraq, Afghanistan or Iran, is the most urgent foreign policy issue facing Obama.Pakistan is al-Qaida's headquarters, while its tribal territory, which runs along the Afghan border, is used by the Taliban to launch attacks against coalition forces in Afghanistan. Some Pakistani extremists who previously focused on Afghanistan, have now turned inwards, spawning a vicious Pakistani Taliban movement which challenges the writ of the state. Obama warned in a television interview this month that the spillover of the war in Afghanistan risks "destabilising neighbouring Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons".The security situation in Pakistan seems to deteriorate daily. Last week's headlines, for instance, included: a bombing of a religious procession in the central town of Dera Ghazi Khan, which claimed at least 27 lives; government helicopter gunship attacks that killed 52 militants in the Khyber area of the tribal region; the kidnapping of a senior UN official by gunmen; and the beheading of a Polish engineer who was abducted five months ago. A videotape of the execution was released last night by his captors.
A year ago democracy was restored after eight years of military rule but many believe the government is in a state of paralysis, as an unwieldy coalition and a cabinet of about 70 ministers jockey for position - ever wary of the army, which has ruled Pakistan for most of its existence. Government decision-making is concentrated in the hands of President Asif Zardari, creating a log-jam, critics say."Yes, we have a million problems. We had lots of inherited issues and perhaps a slowness to get the government off the ground," said Farahnaz Ispahani, a member of parliament for the Pakistan People's party, which leads the coalition. "But I do feel that we're slowly and gradually moving towards better governance."However, the government has been unable to forge a political consensus on the fight against terrorism, with opinion divided between political parties, who favour military action against the extremists and those who want to negotiate, even within the ruling coalition.As a result, no clear direction has been given to the army. In tandem with the security crisis, the economy, which was saved from bankruptcy late last year by an IMF loan, is plagued by inflation and a collapse in economic activity."The civilian leadership is weak and fearful of the inevitable in Pakistan, that it oversteps the mark and runs the risk of being removed [by the army]," said Rashed Rahman, a political analyst based in Lahore. "It's a non-functional government."The army has repeatedly shown that it will not bow to civilians on national security, refusing a government order last year, for instance, to place the top spy agency, the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence, under government control.Armed extremists appear to be able to spread unchecked, with a Taliban-style mini-state now existing 100 miles from Islamabad, in Swat valley. Many Pakistanis are asking whether the country's armed forces are unable or unwilling to take on the jihadists, who are rapidly pushing their influence out from their base in the tribal area."We always say that we have one of the most powerful armies, yet how come we cannot even cut off the supply routes [for the militants] in Swat?" said Bushra Gohar, a member of parliament for the Awami National party, part of the ruling coalition. "We are patronising terror. The training camps and safe havens are still there. This has to stop."The top priority for Washington will be getting Pakistan to take more concerted military action in the tribal territory. The Obama administration is promising more non-military aid, with a plan to triple social and economic assistance to $1.5bn a year.Western diplomats believe the military's top brass, including army chief General Ashfaq Kayani and head of the ISI, Lieutenant General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, are committed to fighting the extremists, but that there are problems further down the ranks.The deep confusion in Pakistan also envelops the role of the US and other western powers, who many believe are secretly supporting the extremists, in order to destabilise Pakistan. And while most Pakistanis do not agree with the Taliban's methods, their message of enforcing Islam resonates.Mosharraf Zaidi, a columnist for The News, a Pakistani daily, said: "Nobody knows what to believe. There is no clarity in Pakistan about who's behind the extremists. For one group of people it's Raw [the Indian intelligence agency], for another group of people it's the CIA, for another group of people it's the ISI. In that scenario, the idea that there's political will in Pakistan to solve this is absurd. You can't have political will when you don't even know who the enemy is."

SWAT VALLEY....Headmaster flees a ‘living hell’

PESHAWAR: Sitting on a cold floor in a mud house on the outskirts of provincial capital, Akbar Ali fights back tears about getting his five children and pregnant wife out of "hell" in turbulent Swat valley.When extremists came to his village, his life as a respected local headmaster fell apart. Today he hears that Aligrama has become a ghost village, overrun by rebels and damaged by army shelling.The displaced say civilisation as they knew it has collapsed in the picturesque and historic valley.A lucrative tourist industry for Western and Pakistani holidaymakers after skiing and mountain hikes - decimated."The lives of ordinary people in violence-hit Swat get worse and worse. It's like living in hell. There's no trade. Nobody's safe. Militants rule most of the area and anybody who opposes them is killed," he said.
"Everything in Swat is destroyed, they are bombing schools, killing notables and targeting government employees."All women's institutions are closed. There is no entertainment, no CD or music shops, and most hairdressers are closed," he added.
Ali's nightmare began about 14 months ago when Taliban warned him to close the girls' section of his village school, the 41-year-old said."Masked militants armed with rocket launchers, small and heavy weapons started patrolling our village.
"First they told us to sack the female staff at school and then ordered us to close the female section or face the consequences," he told this news agency.
"So we were forced to shut the classes where some 135 female students were getting an education. This created panic among the boys and the number of students dropped from 435 to 125," he said.Six months ago, he fled Aligrama for nearby Mingora, the main town in the region. The militants closed in again, killing teachers and bombing schools, so he left restive Swat in January and followed five of his brothers to the city.Local residents say 41 families from troubled Swat are living in the village of Mosa Zai, on the outskirts of the provincial metropolis where Ali has found refuge.
Ordinary families renting houses or staying with relatives in the city - which has a population of 2.5 million people in addition to 1.7 million Afghan refugees, according to local authorities - say they were caught between the security forces and Taliban.Local officials said last week that 20,000 people had fled Swat recently. Witnesses talk about men, women and children walking down from the mountains in the freezing cold often with just the clothes on their backs.
"Ten people were killed in our village and dozens more wounded in fighting in recent months," Ali said."The Taliban killed an elected women councillor and her husband, and beheaded two others 'spying' for the government. Six people died in government shelling in various incidents."Every time there was fighting, there was a curfew but the victims were innocent civilians"."Almost the entire village has evacuated. Only those with nowhere to go have stayed," he said.People newly displaced here told Ali, the village had fallen to the militants and Taliban fighters were in control of five kilometres (three miles) of road heading to the towns of Kabal to Kanju.
He said anyone who opposes the militants is liquidated."Not even the police can protect us, police can't leave the police station, they're living like prisoners in police stations," he added.Local residents say the government has lost control of most if not the entire valley. Ali further said militants were demanding land tax and rents previously collected by local administration officials."We cannot trust either party as both - Taliban and the security forces - treat civilians as sub-human," Ahmad Gul, another resident from Aligrama said.As a man, Ali said he would have been happy to face death, but that he had to keep his wife and children from danger.Here, his wife gave birth to her sixth baby, a healthy girl, and he was just happy that mother and children were safe and well."We have suffered enough. Every family in Swat has buried loved ones and the death toll is still rising

UN begins relief work for people from Swat

The United Nations (UN) relief organisations have begun their relief activities for the people affected by the ongoing military operation in Swat, a private TV channel reported on Sunday. The details released by the UN said its relief subsidiaries, the WHO, the UNHCR, the WFP and UNICEF were sending relief goods to Swat. Twelve trucks carrying food, medicine, tents and other essential items have arrived in Mingora from Peshawar, the channel added. The UN coordinator in Pakistan said half of the population in Swat had been affected by the military operation and people had deserted their homes and were living in camps. daily times monitor

Two Taliban Are Killed in Revenge by Afghans

THATS GREAT STORY,KILL THOSE IGNORANT TALIBAN WHO ARE INVOLE IN KILLING INNOCENT PEOPLE,ALL PEACE LOVING PEOPLE IN AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN SHOULD UNITE AND CRUSH THOSE IGNORANT RELIGIOUS FANATICS...Mwaqar
KABUL, Afghanistan — On Saturday, something typical happened in eastern Afghanistan: Two Taliban guerrillas assassinated a top local politician.But on Sunday, something very unusual occurred, according to witnesses and Afghan intelligence officials.
Hundreds of people from around the district of Dara-e-Noor joined with the local police to corner the Taliban assassins. A firefight broke out. Eventually the wounded Taliban were captured. But instead of turning them over to the authorities, the villagers trussed the men to a tree and punched and kicked them to death.
Revenge killings are not unusual in Afghanistan; when the Taliban executed accused murderers in Kabul before the American invasion they would shout, “In revenge, there is life!”But such killings against the feared Taliban are relatively rare. The episode in Dara-e-Noor represented an uncommon response from local villagers, one motivated at least in part by an angry fear that Afghanistan’s deeply corrupt judicial system would turn the killers loose.The mob dragged the wounded assassins away from their hideout and made quick work of them, Hassan Khan, a local tribal elder, said in a telephone interview. “The people punched them with their fists and kicked them with their legs and whatever they had in their hand” until they were dead, he said.“The people were very angry and upset because of the atrocious actions” of the killers, Mr. Khan said. “So when people get angry, no one can stop them.”
Conditions may have been ripe for such an unusual reprisal, some in the community said. The politician who was assassinated, Qazi Khan Mohammed, the secretary of the Nangarhar Provincial Council, was a highly respected local leader. And the region around Dara-e-Noor has always been home to people loyal to a powerful anti-Taliban commander named Hazrat Ali.Moreover, it was not only villagers who appeared to rejoice in the killing of the assassins. The Afghan intelligence service issued a statement on Sunday that almost seemed to endorse the revenge killing, which, however popular in Dara-e-Noor, was contrary to the rule of Afghan law.“Such action, and the rapid decision by people against the criminals, shows the hatred and anger against the Taliban and terrorists,” the statement said. ( Its account also varied slightly from that of the villagers and the police, saying that one attacker was killed by the provincial secretary’s bodyguards on Saturday and that the other assassin was arrested but then killed on the orders of tribal elders.)It may not have been such a surprise that the Afghan intelligence service would highlight an illegal, extrajudicial killing. Three months ago the head of the service, Amrullah Saleh, appeared on national television and criticized the judicial system as freeing kidnappers and other criminals.While local vigilantes had the upper hand in Dara-e-Noor, the Taliban took credit for a deadly attack at the other end of Afghanistan, in restive, opium-dominated Helmand Province.There, two American servicemen were killed Sunday by a two-stage roadside bomb, according to the provincial governor’s spokesman. He said the Taliban had structured the bomb in such a way as to make whoever defused the smaller charge on top of the device think the danger had passed.
In reality, said the governor’s spokesman, Dawood Ahmadi, a much larger explosive was hidden beneath. As the men tinkered with what they believed was an already defused bomb, the much larger bomb on the bottom exploded, killing the two Americans, both advisers to the Afghan police, Mr. Ahmadi said. An Afghan policeman was also killed, while an interpreter and two other police officers — one of them the acting district chief — were wounded, he said.Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, said the Taliban were behind the blast, which he described as a trick device. “We will carry out more attacks against NATO and Afghan forces all over Afghanistan in the future,” he said.An American military statement said only that “two coalition service members” were killed in the blast, along with an Afghan national policeman and an Afghan civilian.

Afghan leader cites cross-border terror as major threat, praises better ties with Pakistan

MUNICH - Afghan President Hamid Karzai called cross-border terrorism one of the greatest threats confronting his country and said improved ties with Pakistan were helping to combat the problem.

Speaking Sunday to a gathering of world leaders and top security officials, Karzai praised new U.S. administration's more regional approach to fighting terror and welcomed President Barack Obama's appointment of Richard Holbrooke as a special representative to Pakistan and Afghanistan.

"Security can ... not come to Afghanistan, or to the region, or to the international community without better coordination with our neighbors," Karzai said.

He also repeated his call to integrate moderate Taliban back into Afghan society, inviting them to participate in fall elections.

"We will invite all of those Taliban who are not part of al-Qaida, who are not part of terrorist networks, who want to return to their country, who want to live by the constitution of Afghanistan, who want to have a normal life, to come back to their country," Karzai said.

For his part, Holbrooke described the Afghan campaign as "one theater of war straddling an ill-defined border."

"We have to think of it that way and not distinguish between the two," he said.

Violence in both Pakistan and Afghanistan has risen steadily since U.S.-led forces drove the Taliban from power in Afghanistan in 2001. Many militants fled to Pakistan's border regions, where they have established bases and continue to attack U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Pakistan's new government, elected last year, appears keener to crack down on Taliban bases on its side of the border used by extremists — a commitment welcomed by both Afghanistan and the United States.

The extremists are also blamed for a surge in suicide attacks on Western, government and military targets within Pakistan, including last year's devastating blast at the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad.

"Our neighbors are suffering with us," Karzai said, citing the November terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, as well as the violence in Pakistan.

But, he said Afghanistan's diplomatic ties with its neighbors are getting stronger.

"There is greater understanding with Afghanistan and its neighbors in the region," Karzai said, a message reinforced by Pakistani Foreign Minister Makhdoom Quershi, who spoke of a "new era of understanding and cooperation between Afghanistan and Pakistan."

Marine Corps Gen. James Jones, Obama's national security adviser, said that was news he was "very happy" to hear.

"Working relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan ... have to be effective if we're going to solve this problem," Jones said. "We've learned over time that problems in Afghanistan are not just uniquely confined to one country — it's a regional problem set."

The U.S. has been pushing for allies to send more troops to the region — a theme struck forcefully at Sunday's closing session by British Defense Minister John Hutton.

"(NATO cannot) consistently ... look to the Americans for all the heavy lifting," he said, adding other alliance members "should be looking to do more."

"Combat roles right now are ... the most precious contribution to the campaign," he said. "We kid ourselves if we imagine that other contributions right now are of the same value."

But German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung stuck to Berlin's contention that there should be added focus on civil reconstruction.

"There will be no development without security, but without development we won't have security either," Jung said. "We won't win with military alone."

To this end, he said Germany was increasing its commitment to train Afghan police forces and was stepping up reconstruction aid.

Jung said Germany thought the number of troops in Afghanistan was sufficient, given NATO's roughly 55,000 forces there and the fact that Washington was preparing to double American troops to about 60,000.

NATO's top official chastised European nations on Saturday for refusing to commit more troops to Afghanistan, in comments that appeared directed at Germany and France.

Taliban courts in Swat and Dir

Situation in Swat and Dir is dismal, as writ of the state is being challenged by the Taliban, who according to a press report, have set up their high court in Kabal, upper Swat. Harassed by the militants, people are taking their cases to the Taliban High Court (THC), and they are beheading people who defy the Taliban or try to leave the village and hanging the corpses from the lampposts to terrorize the people. This means that they are using people as human shield because if they leave the area, the security forces can pound and eliminate them. People of Swat being sick and tired of the situation staged a rally in Chakdara against the Taliban's expanding role in Dir. Like in other parts of the province, legal fraternity on Friday completely boycotted the court proceedings in Peshawar against the use of derogatory statements by Swat Taliban against lawyers in which Taliban had stated that lawyers should be killed and the courts in Swat closed down. Meanwhile, a meeting of the lawyers chaired by Peshawar High Court Bar Association President Abdul Latif Afridi was also held. He told the meeting that the lawyers were the most dignified community of the society and yet they receive threats. The Taliban have been emboldened by the support from some political parties and a section of the people. Qazi Hussain Ahmed of Jamaat-i-Islami and Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam have never condemned the actions of the militants who have been challenging the writ of the state, destroying girls' schools and barbers' shops. These leaders and leaders of Tehrik-e-Insaf and Pakistan Muslim League-N have opposed every action against the militants and always ask the government to negotiate with the militants. But they never spell out the methodology and name the militants with whom the government should hold negotiations. Or if negotiations fail, what next should be done? In the past, central as well as provincial governments had signed agreement with the local Taliban but they are not willing to wean from enforcing their perception of sharea. They also insist they will cross the international Pak-Afghan border to help their Afghan brothers. But such acts have created problems for Pakistan, as international community suspects that Pakistan state has a hand in encouraging the militants. Leaders of the above political parties do not realise that army action is imperative when civil administration and police fail to control the situation, which is provided in the Constitution. They should understand that the 1973 Constitution was unanimously adopted by all hues and shades. There was consensus that no law can be made contrary to Islamic injunctions. If the above leaders and militants wish to change the Constitution they have to have two-third majority in the assemblies. Since Jamaat-i-Islami and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam do not see any possibility of having that majority they want to use the pressure of the militants to enforce their perception, which is at variance with the broad majority of the people of Pakistan. They should declare in no unequal terms if they want to bring about a change through peaceful or through violent means. The latter course is, however, fraught with dangers, and these politico-religious parties would get nothing out of it, as the militants would not accept their leadership. Anyhow, there is awareness among the people. Awami National Party (ANP) women Parliamentarians constituted a jirga to look after the affectees of Swat military operation in Swat and would visit the valley to meet with political leaders and displaced persons. Provincial leaders, President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gillani should establish their camps in Swat to boost morale of the security forces and also convey the message to the militants that the nation is united against them.

U.S. soldiers killed while disabling bomb in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan-- Two U.S. soldiers were killed while trying to disable a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan Sunday.The U.S. military said it is trying to gather more details about the incident.The soldiers were part of a convoy of coalition soldiers accompanying Gulab Mangal, the governor of Helmand province, to a village where he intended to talk to residents about alternatives to opium farming.The convoy came upon two bombs stacked on top of each other, said journalist Abdul Tawab Qureshi.When the soldiers tried to disable the bombs, the second one went off, he said. The blast also killed a translator and an Afghan police officer.Mohammed Nader, the police chief of the province's Nad Ali district, was critically wounded.Over the years, opium and heroin, both derivatives of the poppy, have served as a major source of revenue for the insurgency, most notably the Taliban movement that once ruled Afghanistan.Though southern Afghanistan still provides about two-thirds of the world's opium and heroin, poppy cultivation has dropped by 20 percent to its lowest level since 2006.

APSA presses government to protect schools in Swat

PESHAWAR: The All Private Schools Association (APSA) NWFP has warned of province-wide protest if the provincial and federal governments failed to ensure protection of educational institutions, both for girls and boys, in the restive district of Swat.

“The government should provide full compensation to those owners whose schools’ buildings were destroyed or damaged by militants in Swat besides ensuring their protection in future,” said Aqeel Razzaq, president of the private schools’ association NWFP, here on Saturday. Speaking at a news conference along with president of Swat-based private schools’ association Ziauddin Yousafzai, Aqeel Razzaq demanded of the provincial government to ensure the holding of matriculation and intermediate annual examinations as per schedule. Any delay on part of the government would result in waste of time of the students, he warned.

He said the secondary school certificate (SSC) and intermediate examinations were getting close and the government should ensure the examinations be held in time. There were around 500 private and as many government schools in Swat.

The total number of students was around 0.4 million, said Aqeel. He added that the Taliban’s threat to schools had put the future of all those students at stake. He said the threats and closure of both private and government schools were jeopardising the future of students belonging to poor and middle class as those coming from rich families had already shifted to educational institutions in other cities.

The people of Swat do not know the logic behind destruction of schools or forcing girls to stay away from educational institutions because Islam terms education compulsory for both men and women, he said. Coming hard on political leaders, Aqeel said they had raised much hue and cry on “extra-marks” allotted to a student (Farah Hameed), but ignored the over one hundred thousand girls from Swat whose future was at stake because of threats from Taliban.

Speaking on the occasion, president of the private schools’ association in Swat Ziauddin Yousafzai said the government had lost writ in Swat and threat to girls’ education and boys’ schools was a proof of that. He said they were going to open boys’ schools in the district from February 9 while girls’ schools would not be opened because of threats involved to girls and the educational institutions. According to unofficial figures, 188 schools have been destroyed in Swat so far.

They included both government and private educational institutions. Some of those were partially damaged in bomb blasts or arson attacks while others were completely destroyed.

Pakistan Tribesmen back army operations

ISLAMABAD: Expressing their support for military operations in the Tribal Areas, tribal elders on Saturday said they will always remain “the first line of defence for Pakistan”. The tribal elders met Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Ashfaq Kayani who visited the troops in FATA’s Mohmand Agency. An Inter-Services Public Relations press release said the COAS was briefed on the operational preparedness and prevailing security environment in the area by the commandant of Mohmand Rifles. The COAS interacted with the troops and prised their high morale. He also met tribal elders and appreciated their efforts to evict foreign elements from their areas.

CIA warns Barack Obama that British terrorists are the biggest threat to the US

Barack Obama has been warned by the CIA that British Islamist extremists are the greatest threat to US homeland security.The CIA has told President Barack Obama that British terrorists are the biggest threat to the US.American spy chiefs have told the President that the CIA has launched a vast spying operation in the UK to prevent a repeat of the 9/11 attacks being launched from Britain.They believe that a British-born Pakistani extremist entering the US under the visa waiver programme is the most likely source of another terrorist spectacular on American soil.Intelligence briefings for Mr Obama have detailed a dramatic escalation in American espionage in Britain, where the CIA has recruited record numbers of informants in the Pakistani community to monitor the 2,000 terrorist suspects identified by MI5, the British security service.A British intelligence source revealed that a staggering four out of 10 CIA operations designed to thwart direct attacks on the US are now conducted against targets in Britain.And a former CIA officer who has advised Mr Obama told The Sunday Telegraph that the CIA has stepped up its efforts in the last month after the Mumbai massacre laid bare the threat from Lashkar-e-Taiba, the militant group behind the attacks, which has an extensive web of supporters in the UK.The CIA has already spent 18 months developing a network of agents in Britain to combat al-Qaeda, unprecedented in size within the borders of such a close ally, according to intelligence sources in both London and Washington.Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer who has advised Mr Obama, told The Sunday Telegraph: "The British Pakistani community is recognised as probably al-Qaeda's best mechanism for launching an attack against North America."The American security establishment believes that danger continues and there's very intimate cooperation between our security services to monitor that." Mr Riedel, who served three presidents as a Middle East expert on the White House National Security Council, added: "President Obama's national security team are well aware that this is a serious threat."The British official said: "The Americans run their own assets in the Pakistani community; they get their own intelligence. There's close cooperation with MI5 but they don't tell us the names of all their sources.
"Around 40 per cent of CIA activity on homeland threats is now in the UK. This is quite unprecedented."Explaining the increase in CIA activity over the past month, Mr Riedel added: "In the aftermath of the Mumbai attack the US and the UK intelligence services now have to regard Lashkar-e-Taiba as just as serious a threat to both of our countries as al-Qaeda. They have a much more extensive base among Pakistani Diaspora communities in the UK than al–Qaeda."Information gleaned by CIA spies in Britain has already helped thwart several terrorist attacks in the UK and was instrumental in locating Rashid Rauf, a British-born al-Qaeda operative implicated in a plot to explode airliners over the Atlantic, who was tracked down and killed in a US missile strike in November.But some US intelligence officers are irritated that valuable manpower and resources have been diverted to the UK. One former intelligence officer who does contract work for the CIA dismissed Britain as a "swamp" of jihadis.
Jonathan Evans, the director general of MI5, admitted in January that the Security Service alone does not have the resources to maintain surveillance on all its targets. "We don't have anything approaching comprehensive coverage," he said.
The dramatic escalation in CIA activity in the UK followed the exposure in August 2006 of Operation Overt, the alleged airline bomb plot.The British intelligence official revealed that CIA chiefs sent more resources to the UK because they were not prepared to see American citizens die as a result of MI5's inability to keep tabs on all suspects, even though the Security Service successfully uncovered the plot.
MI5 manpower will have doubled to 4,100 by 2011 but many in the US intelligence community do not think that is enough.For their part, some British officials are queasy that information obtained by the CIA from British Pakistanis was used to help target Mr Rauf, a British citizen, whom they would have preferred to capture and bring to trial.Sensitivities over the intelligence arrangement formed a key part of briefings given to Mr Obama, since they are central to what is often called "the most special part of the special relationship" and could complicate his dealings with Gordon Brown.Tensions in transatlantic intelligence relations which were laid bare last week during the High Court battle over Binyam Mohamed, the British resident held in Guanatanamo Bay. British judges wanted to publish details of the torture administered to Mr Mohamed, an Ethiopian national, in US custody. But key paragraphs were blacked out after American officials threatened it could damage intelligence sharing between the two countries.Intelligence experts said that a trusting intelligence relationship, in which one country does not publish intelligence data obtained by the other, is vital to both countries' national security.Patrick Mercer, chairman of the House of Commons counter-terrorism sub-committee, said: "The special relationship is a huge benefit to us. It clearly works to our advantage and helps keep the people of the UK and the US safe."There is no doubt that a great deal of valuable intelligence vital to British national security is procured by American agents from British sources."Mr Riedel added: "The partnership between the two intelligence communities is dynamic; it is one of great intimacy. We overuse the term special relationship, but this is an extraordinarily special relationship.
"Since September 11 the philosophy on both sides has been to err on the side of telling each other more rather than less. It is in everyone's interests that that continues

British army rations to swap corned beef for curry

BRITISH troops in Iraq and Afghanistan will soon be swapping their chocolate bars and corned beef hash for oreos and chicken kormas, in a radical overhaul of army rations.

The new menus - including halal, vegetarian and Sikh and Hindu diets - are designed for troops serving in extreme weather conditions, and will be trialled on the front lines from May until October.
Among the new additions are chicken tikka masala, the British version of south Asian curries that was once referred to as a "national dish" by former foreign secretary Robin Cook, and Thai green vegetable curry.

Troops will also be given energy bars rather than chocolate, and fruit biscuits and pate have been removed, with fruits and muesli among the added rations.

In all, there are 20 updated menus, along with a further six menus each for Sikhs and Hindus, vegetarians, and those on Halal diets, specially made so that soldiers reach their recommended daily intake of 4000 calories.

"All the products that have been inserted are products more suitable for troops on operations in Iraq and, particularly, Afghanistan," a ministry spokeswoman said.

Britain has 4100 troops in Iraq, most of whom will pull out by the middle of the year, and some 8300 soldiers in Afghanistan, most of whom are fighting a fierce insurgency against Taliban militia in the south of the country.

Captain Paul Cunningham of the military's food services said soldiers were typically given freshly-prepared meals while in the main camps but that it was not always possible in remote parts of Iraq and Afghanistan.

"The new multi-climate ration trial will double the amount of available menus and remove the need for supplements," he said.

"We have lots of new items in the rations and I am convinced these will be very popular with our troops."

The new ration packs were developed after panels were conducted in May 2008 involving soldiers who had recently returned from operations. Troops trialling the new rations will fill out a survey giving their views on the menus.

Nosedive in Afghan-US relations

Relations between President Karzai's Afghan government and Washington are at an all-time low. As Richard Holbrooke - President Obama's envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan - prepares to make his first visit to the region since being appointed, the BBC's Ian Pannell in Kabul looks at why the relationship has soured.Hamid Karzai has become increasingly vociferous in his criticism of American military tactics and has been making half-hearted threats to shift his allegiance to Moscow if he does not get his way.Washington has yet to publicly declare its hand but a series of well-placed leaks, briefs and snubs have raised the prospect that it could move its support elsewhere in this year's presidential election.
One Afghan newspaper spoke of "a new cold war".
A senior Afghan government official says the new Obama administration has insulted President Karzai and one prominent MP accuses America of "running a shadow-government".
'Narco-state'
The decline in relations began with a visit last year by Joe Biden, now the vice-president, to Kabul.At the time, as the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, he attended a private meeting with Mr Karzai.A well-placed source describes Mr Biden, exasperated at not getting "straight answers" on drugs and corruption, launching into a verbal tirade and storming out of the meeting.In a country where honour and decorum are second only to God and country, this was less than tactful.On the campaign trail and more recently in confirmation hearings, senior members of President Barack Obama's team have questioned the effectiveness and honesty of Hamid Karzai's government.Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's written statement to Congress during her confirmation hearing called Afghanistan a "narco-state" that was "plagued by limited capacity and widespread corruption".She may have been wise enough not to use the phrase in her public testimony but by the time it was reported on the front page of the newspapers in Kabul, it did not really make much difference.
'Potential impediment'
Earlier in January the Nato secretary-general wrote an opinion piece about the lack of leadership in the country, laying the blame not at the feet of the Taleban but the lack of governance.Then there was a recent article in the New York Times. Quoting anonymous "senior administration officials", it said Washington planned to take a tougher-line with Kabul and that Hamid Karzai was now regarded as "a potential impediment to American goals" in the country.Hamid Karzai is an avid reader of the Western press and is known to be highly sensitive to criticisms they may have of him. Publicly he has not responded but he is now under considerable pressure.His government's writ is limited to Kabul, the north and a few urban spots elsewhere in the country.His own popularity has fallen and some whisper privately and mischievously about his "state of mind".When asked whether the country was heading towards a crisis, one senior political figure responded that the country was already in one.
Old Afghan hand
President Karzai has been holding a series of meetings with former Mujahedeen commanders in the past few weeks amid suggestions that he is trying to align the country with Russia.That has certainly been his public stance. As well as a deliberately leaked "letter of understanding" with Moscow, President Karzai publicly warned America that unless it supplied the military hardware he wanted, he would look to other countries for support.No-one was in a moment's doubt who this meant. The Russian ambassador, Zamir Kabulov, an old Afghan hand, was seen strutting around parliament last week.He has warned that the US and Nato are repeating the same mistakes of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. As he was posted to the Soviet Embassy at the time, his opinion is worth considering.Now President Karzai has sent a document to Nato outlining new "rules of engagement". If implemented they would substantially alter the mandate for foreign forces in the country.It seems inconceivable that there could be a real and lasting schism between Kabul and Washington. It will be the job of Richard Holbrooke, the US Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, to ensure that does not happen.But the date has been set for Afghanistan's presidential election and the West's disappointment with Hamid Karzai can no longer be disguised.A number of challengers are jostling for American support and in the current climate, their chances are starting to improve.

Reining in the militants

On his first visit to Peshawar since moving into the presidency, Asif Ali Zardari attended a series of detailed briefings at the Governor's House and met with key provincial officials. At the end of these sessions, which naturally enough focused primarily on militancy, President Zardari declared that it was essential to defeat the militants and to continue an all-out operation against them. He also, quite correctly, noted that the militants comprise a number of groups rather than one homogenous unit – and include extremists, criminals and smugglers. The issue of internally displaced people was also reviewed during the meeting and policies to address their plight discussed.What we do not know is whether other, more sensitive issues, which are crucial to the battle against the militants, were brought up at all during the meetings with the chief minister and other ANP leaders. The perception in many quarters in NWFP is that the military is not eager to defeat the Taliban, because it sees them as natural allies. The belief that these forces may regain control of Afghanistan strengthens this school of thinking. It is in this matter that we need intervention from Mr Zardari. The lack of will against militants is a very real problem. On the other hand, if the will and commitment is in place, then we need to see why there has been only limited success in combating them. Indeed, in Swat there has been no success at all while in Bajaur, Waziristan and the Khyber Agency the battle continues.Mr Zardari, and indeed all others who hold prime spots of decision-making, must realize that the militant issue has to be made a key priority. There must be more frequent visits to Peshawar and other areas closer to the crisis by key figures from Islamabad. Recently, the NWFP government has expressed displeasure with the handling of the operation in Swat by the federal government. There is immense apprehension in NWFP about the Talibanization in the province and the fact that this seems now to be fanning out from tribal areas to the rest of the province. Many people have left homes across the province, unable to live under the harsh order imposed by the militants. There is a feeling now that the extremists are eager to capture all the territory they can and that they will not stop at just the tribal territories.Our leaders must realize that this constitutes an immense threat. All those who can play a part must work closely together. This includes the military, the federal government and the provincial set-up. The series of detailed meetings held in Peshawar constitutes a good first step towards creating such cooperation. It must continue.

Taliban Say They Killed Polish Contractor in Pakistan

Another crime against humanity committed by cruel ignorant Taliban,U.N. should act against them.Mwaqar
KOHAT, Pakistan- Taliban fighters beheaded a Polish hostage in Pakistan Saturday, according to a spokesman for the militants who said the body wouldn't be handed over until some captured Taliban were released.Speaking in Germany, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said his government had received "unofficial confirmation" Piotr Stancza, an engineer and a father of one, had been killed."We do not have a solid proof but we have received unofficial confirmation that this tragedy indeed took place," Tusk told reporters in Munich in comments broadcast live on Polish TV.The Taliban spokesman, identified only as Mohammed, told Reuters Stancza, 42, was killed because Pakistani authorities failed to free the militants before a deadline expired at midnight Friday."We have killed the man after authorities refused to release our colleagues," the Taliban spokesman told Reuters. "We will now only hand over his body after our demands are met."He said Stanza was executed in the south Waziristan tribal region, a known haven for Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters.An intelligence official in the region, who requested anonymity, said the Taliban had demanded 200,000 rupees ($2,540) in exchange for the body.Officials were unable to verify the Taliban claim, and the two principal hostage negotiators handling Stancza's case could not be reached for comment.Speaking on the sidelines of a security conference in Munich, Prime Minister Donald Tusk told reporters:
"We have used every opportunity to avert this."
Stancza was kidnapped on September 28 while visiting one of his company's sites near Attock city, about 65 km (40 miles) west of the capital, Islamabad.Gunmen shot dead his Pakistani driver, bodyguard and translator before taking him hostage.Militants had demanded 60 of their comrades should be freed, but later cut their demand to four of their top men and negotiations have intensified over the past 10 days.Attacks on foreign aid workers, company employees and diplomats have increased in Pakistan over the past year, especially in areas near the border with Afghanistan, where Taliban and al Qaeda militants are battling government forces.An American heading the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) office in southwestern province of Baluchistan, was abducted last week and his driver was shot dead.Two Chinese telecommunication engineers, two Afghan diplomats and an Iranian diplomat were kidnapped in northwest Pakistan, though one of the Chinese later escaped.

Obama team works to define U.S. strategy in Afghanistan

WASHINGTON-- When U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks, then-President Bush said the goal in Afghanistan was "to build a flourishing democracy as an alternative to a hateful ideology."Seven years, billions of dollars and hundreds of U.S. casualties later, the goals are more pragmatic and modest.
The Obama administration's new special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, offered an understatement at the ceremony naming him to the post, telling the audience, "Nobody can say the war in Afghanistan has gone well."
Violence in Afghanistan is up. The Taliban continues to make a comeback and President Hamid Karzai is struggling to control the country, which with a rampant drug trade, threatens to turn into a narco-state.President Obama has called Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan the "central front in our enduring struggle against terrorism and extremism.But even as he promises to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, a robust debate in Washington has begun about what the U.S. should try to achieve in a country that due to 2,000 years of conflict has been called the "graveyard of empires."Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry lamented that the U.S. has forgotten that its goal in Afghanistan was to fight al Qaeda and get Osama bin Laden."It was not to adopt the 51st state of the United States. It was not to try to impose a form of government, no matter how much we believe in it and support it, but that is the mission, at least, as it is being defined today," Kerry said during Hillary Clinton's confirmation hearing for her post as secretary of state.Kerry warned that the U.S. risks getting bogged down in Afghanistan as it did in Vietnam -- parallels also drawn in the U.S. media.The administration is conducting reviews of its policy in Afghanistan, including one by Gen. David Petraeus, the American commander in the region. The objective is simple: Define what the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan should be.Defense Secretary Robert Gates cautions that goals have been too broad and need to be need to be more "realistic and limited," or the U.S. risks failure."If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of central Asian Valhalla over there, we will lose, because nobody in the world has that kind of time, patience and money, to be honest," Gates told senators, calling for more concrete objectives that can be achieved in the next three to five years.Obama seemed to signal a more modest approach, defining the mission as limited solely to stabilizing Afghanistan."What we can do is make sure that Afghanistan is not a safe haven for al Qaeda. What we can do is make sure that it is not destabilizing neighboring Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons," Obama told NBC News. "We are not going to be able to rebuild Afghanistan into a Jeffersonian democracy."At a minimum, the U.S. must help the Afghan government curb corruption and extend its authority to establish rule of law. That means a hefty component of civilian assistance.The U.S. will increase development efforts and aid to strengthen the Afghan government, including additional nonmilitary aid for education, infrastructure, human services and alternative livelihoods for farmers to turn away from narcotics.Part of the U.S. strategy will repeat the tactics used to help Iraq's "Sunni Awakening," in which Sunni tribal leaders united to fight insurgents and maintain security.In Afghanistan, the U.S. will look for opportunities to engage with tribal and regional leaders, including those who might have been affiliated with or joined forces with the Taliban, insurgents Petraeus refers to as the "reconcilable Taliban."For nuclear power Pakistan, extremists along its turbulent border with Afghanistan present an even greater threat to U.S. national security.As he heads out next week for his first trip to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, Holbrooke will seek to develop a regional approach to curbing extremism in Afghanistan and Pakistan as he did in the 1990s in the Balkans, which had a similar mix of different histories, cultures and traditions.
Holbrooke is expected to put more pressure on Karzai, amid a growing impatience with his inability to extend his authority, clamp down on corruption and deliver services to his people. Officials say there is a willingness to withhold U.S. aid if he doesn't deliver.In Pakistan, Holbrooke will seek stronger cooperation from the government of Asif Ali Zardari to crack down on extremists along the Afghan border and in the tribal areas seen as sympathetic to the Taliban and al Qaeda.Another part of Holbrooke's job will be to streamline the U.S. programs and assistance for Afghanistan and Pakistan and direct them toward the immediate goal of stabilizing the region."If our resources are mobilized and coordinated and pulled together, we can quadruple, quintuple, multiply by tenfold the effectiveness of our efforts there," Holbrooke said at his appointment.Coordinating a strategy will require a toughness and sense of purpose that has been lacking in U.S. policy toward the region.No one can question Holbrooke's toughness. The architect of the Dayton peace accord in the Balkans is, after all, famous for strong-arming the strongest willed of leaders -- such as former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.

Criticized, Putin Says Europe Has Rights Abuses of Its Own

MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin responded Friday to a European official’s criticism of what appeared to be several contract killings here by saying rights abuses occurred in Western Europe, too, citing the ill treatment of migrant workers.

With that, Mr. Putin told the official, the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, that the “hockey puck” was back in Europe’s zone on the issue of human rights abuses.

Even as Russia and Europe work toward better understandings on trade and energy, European Union officials say lapses in the rule of law and democratic norms remain major stumbling blocks to improving relations.

At a joint news conference with Mr. Putin late on Friday, Mr. Barroso said he had raised the issue of contract murders during a meeting that day with the Russian president, Dmitri A. Medvedev. At that point, Mr. Putin interjected his comments about Europe’s human rights problems.

Two recent deaths have drawn wide attention. Stanislav Y. Markelov, 34, a human rights lawyer, and Anastasia Baburova, 25, a reporter, were shot dead by a man with a silencer-equipped pistol on a busy Moscow street last month. The gunman escaped.

Ms. Baburova, a freelance journalist for the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, was its fourth reporter to be killed in a contract-style attack or under mysterious circumstances in recent years.

In November, Mikhail Beketov, a journalist for a suburban Moscow newspaper who was campaigning against what he called local corruption, was beaten into a coma and has yet to recover. In recent months, two former Chechen officials have been killed in Moscow, and last month in Vienna, a former bodyguard of the Chechen president was killed after filing a complaint against him with the European Court of Human Rights.

Mr. Putin’s response to Mr. Barroso stood in sharp contrast to a gesture last week by Mr. Medvedev, who met with the editor of Novaya Gazeta and expressed his “deepest sorrow” over the reporter’s death.

At the news conference on Friday, Mr. Barroso said: “In public opinion there is some concern regarding some recent events that happened in Russia. Namely, the murder of some journalists and some rights activists.”

Mr. Putin said Russia was willing to discuss human rights abuses, but wanted Europe to admit its own shortcomings. He said Russia was “not satisfied” with the treatment of Russian-speaking minorities in new member states of the European Union. He added: “We know about the rights of migrants in Europe, and how they are violated. So please, Mr. Barroso, here is the answering hockey puck from the government of the Russian Federation.”

How Long to Fix a New York Streetlight? A Year, if You’re Persistent

At first, Martin Daniels let it go. Hey, streetlights die all the time. But after a few days, with the light on East 96th Street still out, he could no longer help himself. On Jan. 22, 2007, he called 311.

So it began, smoothly enough, as one of the 50,000 or so daily complaints to New York’s call center for nonemergencies. After all, how many months does it take to change a light bulb?

As it turned out, a year and a day.

There are 330,000 street lights in the naked city; this is the story of only one of them. Pieced together through work orders provided by the Transportation Department and Mr. Daniels’s own meticulous notes, it shows how miscommunication, unresponsive officials, corroded equipment and a change in contractors combined to turn what is normally a two- or three-day job into a 52-week adventure.

But the story also illustrates the hair-pulling frustrations ordinary citizens often experience in getting potholes filled or obnoxious noises silenced and even, to a degree, what the mayor faces in trying to improve New York’s quality of life, or light.

It almost certainly made a difference in the outcome that Mr. Daniels is one of those quintessential New York characters: a confessed nudnik. Dozens of times a year, he telephones city officials about local irritants, from the lack of sidewalk curb cuts to accommodate wheelchairs to a mound of asphalt left on a sidewalk after a repaving job.

“I may be a pain, but I want these things done,” Mr. Daniels said, noting that his wife, a nurse, had to navigate the darkened street when she left work at Mount Sinai Hospital. “If you walk on the street, you want to be safe.”

The street light in front of 65 East 96th Street, on the north side of the street, east of Madison Avenue, became a particular passion for Mr. Daniels, a 66-year-old semiretired computer programming analyst who lived around the corner. So much so that he kept a diary documenting every call, explanation and excuse. It grew to four pages; excerpts read like a study in despair.

He called Con Ed. “Phone message said 20-minute wait — I hung up,” one entry reads. He called the office of City Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito and was referred to Community Board 11. “Already did — matter unresolved,” he noted with apparent dismay. “Also, told her how 311 does not work. Always say fixed when not fixed and treat it as a new complaint.”

He called the councilwoman’s office back and asked for an aide: “Put on hold for 20 minutes. Then was told to call back. I gave my name and number and said ‘call me back.’ She did not.”

Mr. Daniels even enlisted his wife, Christina. On Jan. 9, 2008, he wrote, “Con Ed truck working at base of light. Christina spoke with repairman. He said some lights out since 2001. Depends upon how active community complains.”

The complaints began almost a year earlier, at 10:01 p.m. on Jan. 22, 2007, when Mr. Daniels called 311 to report two defective streetlights — one of the nearly 100,000 such calls 311 receives each year.

Ordinarily, officials said, once the city is notified by a call to 311, the routine time for the city’s contractor to repair a defective street light is two days — down from 19 days three years ago. Even if the repair is more complicated and requires Con Ed’s intervention, the average repair time last year was under 13 days, compared with nearly 84 days as recently as 2005.

This repair job started routinely enough. The Department of Transportation was notified immediately. But then things began to go awry, Mr. Daniels’s diary and the department’s work logs show.

According to Mr. Daniels’s account, he called again on Feb. 2 and was told to resubmit his two complaints. By Feb. 12, three weeks after the first call to 311, the light at 96th Street and Lexington Avenue had been repaired. But not the one in front of 65 East 96th.

On Feb. 13, after a complaint from another resident had been logged at 311, Mr. Daniels was told that the streetlight had been fixed. It hadn’t been. When he called again on March 1, he was told no complaint was pending, so he submitted one again.

On March 12, the pole was removed.. A new pole (cost: $1,320) was installed a month later, by April 14, but the light still wasn’t working. Mr. Daniels informed 311 on April 17 and then began calling Con Ed directly.

He also turned to the community board and his councilwoman, to no avail. Finally, on Aug. 23, he phoned in another complaint to the city. He was told later that one was already pending; it turned out to be his call from April.

On Sept. 18, he reached a human being at Con Ed, who promised the light would be fixed within a week. It wasn’t. He said he called Con Ed again on Oct. 16 and someone said the light would be inspected within 48 hours and fixed within a week.

Finally, on Oct. 25, he called the office of the public advocate, Betsy Gotbaum, which contacted the Department of Transportation’s chief of street lighting.

The version of city officials, while not poles apart from Mr. Daniels’s, describes complications that undoubtedly slowed the repair work.

They said the pole lost power and blamed the problem on a “deteriorating conduit” from the Con Ed feeder cable, which meant that the foundation of the light had to be rebuilt and the pole replaced.

In the meantime, the city changed streetlight-repair contractors, so the inspection and repair process had to start over, delaying things for months. Con Ed had to get permits to dig a trench from its manhole to the lamppost.

“Our electrical engineers went to the location, inspected the street light and found a condition that required Con Ed to remove the electrical cable so that we could remove the light pole and work on the foundation,” said Ted Timbers, a city spokesman.

“We notified Con Ed. Once Con Ed had completed their work, we went back to the location, removed the light pole, reworked the foundation, removed an obstruction and replaced the light pole. We then notified Con Ed that they could reinstall the electrical cable,” Mr. Timbers said.

The city says the repairs were completed on Sept. 26. But sometime after that (Mr. Daniels’s calls resumed on Oct. 16), the light went out. Con Ed was summoned again by the city on Jan. 7, 2008. Everyone agrees it was finally fixed on Jan. 23, 2008 — a year and a day after the first complaint.

“You get frustrated, but I’m a persistent kind of person,” Mr. Daniels said. “I just don’t give up.” When would the light have been fixed without his noodging? “Maybe never,” he replied. A spokesman for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who initiated the 311 system, which now handles an average of 68,000 calls a day, deferred to the Transportation Department for comment.

“Most streetlights are repaired within three days of being reported to 311,” said Seth Solomonow, a spokesman for the department. “And while we work hard to keep each of the city’s 333,000 streetlights lit, a lifetime on the street can take its toll, requiring more than just a replacement bulb to fix.”

Mr. Daniels doesn’t take the delay personally. He said the neighborhood, on what has been considered the customary border between the Upper East Side and East Harlem, gets short shrift: “To tell you the truth, it’s north of 96th Street. That’s the end of the story. We’re at the very beginning of East Harlem and with rats running around; they don’t care if there’s a light out.”

After his wife retired late in 2007, the couple moved south — a dozen blocks — from Park Avenue north of 96th Street to a neighborhood where, he is convinced, public officials are more responsive to citizen complaints.

“I’m not going to give up calling,” he said, “but the number of phone calls will be down.”

7 policemen killed in Mianwali checkpoint ambush

MIANWALI: As many as seven policemen were killed in an ambush attack by unknown militants on a Qudratabad police checkpoint located on Mianwali road in Mianwali on early Saturday, police sources said.

Armed militants opened fire on the policemen standing on checkpoint following an explosion occurred there, which all of a sudden collapsed checkpoint with a loud blast, sources maintained confirming, “All police personnel, deployed on the checkpoint, have been feared dead in the incident.”

DSP Qudratabad police station Jamat Ali Bukhari told Geo News, “This was an important checkpoint while the attack took place at 3:30am on Saturday. Rescue efforts are underway.” He feared all deployed police officials have died.

Sources further stated, the checkpoint was completely shattered in the offensive.

ANP women MPs to visit Swat valley

PESHAWAR: The women parliamentarians of Awami National Party (ANP) have decided to send a delegation to restive Swat district to provide financial and moral help to the affected women in the wake of the closure and destruction of educational institutions.

Addressing a news conference here Friday, member of the NWFP Assembly, Shagufta Malik said that they have formed two committees for resolution of the problems of women hailing from the district.

Shagufta said that a three-member committee was constituted under the headship of Zara Khattak that would contact women leaders associated with different political parties and other segments of the society. The committee would assess the condition of the affected women and present recommendations to the government for resolution of their problems. She said another committee has been formed to raise funds for the affected women. The committee, to be headed by MNA Jameela Gilani, would collect funds at national and international level, which would be utilised for rehabilitation of the affectees, particularly women.

The female MNA also announced that the women parliamentarians of ANP would donate their one-month salary for the affected women. She also urged the well-off people to extend maximum financial aid for rehabilitation of the affectees of the militancy-hit areas. She also announced that a grand jirga of women would be held by the end of the current month.

Flanked by MNAs Bushra Gohar, Jameela Gilani, former member NWFP Assembly Farah Aaqil Shah, Zara Khattak and others, Shagufta strongly condemned the demolishing of educational institutions in the district. She said that keeping women away from education was against the teachings of Islam.

“Islam is the religion of peace and there is no restriction on women education,” Shagufta said, adding: “Our Pakhtun culture, too, does not discourage female education.” She said the provincial government was taking every step for restoration of peace in the province and for the purpose it was in touch with the federal government.