Mission & Justice

3/10/08

A senior Taliban commander today rejected reconciliation with what he called the “puppet” Afghan Government, the latest in a series of pronouncements from both sides on potential peace talks. While violence has increased to its worst level since 2001, neither side has managed to break the strategic stalemate and gained a clear advantage, leading many to call for talks to end the conflict and bring the Taliban into peaceful politics. Afghan President Hamid Karzai said this week he had asked the king of Saudi Arabia to mediate in talks with the insurgents and called on Taliban leader Mullah Omar to return to his homeland and to make peace. But Mr Karzai’s plea appeared to have fallen on deaf ears and was rejected by a senior Taliban leader.
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Daniel Flitton; 30/9/08

Public opinion has soured against the war in Afghanistan, with a new poll showing most Australians now oppose the troop deployment. And in worrying signs for the Federal Government — which argued that Australia needed to pull out of the unpopular Iraq war and focus on Afghanistan — only half the country is confident Australia has clear aims in the conflict. The survey, released yesterday by the Lowy Institute for International Policy, suggests mixed views on the reasons driving Australia’s almost seven-year military commitment.

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Bruce Loudon; 27/9/08

The first major shoot-out on the tense border with Afghanistan between anti-terrorism allies Pakistan and the US plunged their relations to a new low last night as President Asif Ali Zardari told Washington: “Friends can’t be intruders.” In a dramatic escalation of the stand-off between the two nations over cross-border raids, conflicting accounts emerged of what military analysts regard as a serious encounter involving ground-fire by Pakistani troops aimed at bringing down US helicopter gunships. The US forces - part of the NATO coalition force fighting in Afghanistan - fired back at Pakistani positions from their helicopter gunships as well as from the ground in what is the biggest exchange of its kind.

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Claire Mackay; 26/9/08

Pakistan’s military says it exchanged fire with NATO forces when two NATO helicopters crossed the border from Afghanistan. But Pakistan’s new President has since contradicted the account. Pakistani military spokesman Major-General Athar Abbas says two NATO helicopters crossed the border from Afghanistan into Pakistan yesterday in the Ghulam Khan area. General Abbas says the OH-58 Kiowa helicopters passed over a checkpoint and Pakistani troops fired warning shots.

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Aunohita Mojumdar; 23/9/08

On September 21, Afghanistan marked Peace Day, a UN-sponsored event whereby all fighting parties (Nato, Taliban, and the Afghan military) agreed to cease hostilities for one day. Al Jazeera asked ordinary Afghans what they believe will bring peace to their war-torn country.For Kandigul Diljan Durrani, Peace Day in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, was almost like any other day. Almost. She said she was irritated by all the road closures due to the city-wide events held to commemorate the day.

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23/9/08

The US department of defence has denied that its helicopters flew into Pakistani airspace above its troubled border region with Afghanistan. Pakistani intelligence officials say US helicopters flew into North Waziristan, an area considered to be home to tribal fighters and groups who back the Taliban, but returned to Afghanistan after troops and tribesmen opened fire. “There was no such incursion, there was no such event, Colonel Gary Keck, a Pentagon spokesman, said on Monday. Two helicopters flew over North Waziristan on the border with Afghanistan near Lwara Mundi village late on Sunday, two local intelligence officials said on condition of anonymity.

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Jonathan Power; 22/9/08

How far is downhill? Well, that’s like asking how long is a piece of string. But whatever the answer, the American/NATO military effort in Afghanistan, triggered by 9/11, seems to have all the marks of a quick descent. In Barack Obama’s phrase, American public opinion doesn’t get it. How could they when Obama himself, supposedly a fresh eye on the international scene, bangs the drum for more troops and yet more force? Does European and Canadian opinion get it? Apart from the Canadians, who have had the good sense and the foresight to give a date for the withdrawal of their troops, public opinion appears to be asleep at the switch. Their young men are dying for a method of attack that the older men have devised without ever being challenged to think it through. The policy, made within hours of the atrocity of 9/11, seemed to be to try to bomb the country to cinders, irrespective of the number of civilian casualties, not learning the lesson of Dresden, that wild bombing rather than leading to capitulation merely reinforces local opinion against the aggressor.

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Bruce Loudon; 19/9/08

A US missile strike inside Pakistan only hours after Washington’s top soldier publicly vowed to respect the country’s sovereignty plunged relations between the allies against terror even deeper into uncertainty last night. As President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani held meetings with advisers in Islamabad on how to deal with the fallout from the attack, senior officials were quoted as saying the missile strike made a mockery of a promise made by Admiral Mike Mullen, the Bush administration’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. At a meeting with Mr Gilani and other officials, Admiral Mullen had issued a statement in which he “reiterated the US commitment to respect Pakistan’s sovereignty and to develop further US-Pakistan co-operation and co-ordination on these critical issues that challenge the security and wellbeing of the people of both countries”.

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Patrick Seale; 19/9/08

One of the most explosive spots on Earth today is the so-called Durand Line, the 2,640 kilometre border, much of it in harsh mountain country, between Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is where the United States and its Nato allies are battling the Taliban - and are facing the possibility of military defeat. Of all the challenges which will face the new American administration next January, the ongoing war across the Afghan-Pakistan border could be the most difficult and dangerous. It is likely to overshadow the contest with Russia in the Caucasus, the rise of Iran as a major regional power, the search for an honourable exit strategy from Iraq, the impact of the collapsing Arab-Israeli peace process, and even the horrors of global warming. The Durand Line was a British creation.

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Mark Dodd; 19/9/08

An Afghan government official has been confirmed killed in a friendly fire incident involving Australian special forces. The Australian Defence Force confirmed this afternoon, Chora District Governor, Rozi Khan, was among several Afghans killed in the exchange near the main base at Tarin Kowt. The number of casualties remains unclear. The NATO-backed International Security Assistance Force said yesterday, it was investigating claims Mr Khan was among three Afghan nationals identified as police who were killed in the exchange which left two others wounded.

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