India and the Central Asian dawn, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

India and the Central Asian dawn

By M.K. Bhadrakumar

Dec 31, 2009

The point is, the geopolitics of Afghanistan always had two halves. Which, of course, posed a major challenge to U.S. President Barack Obama when he crafted the new Afghan strategy. Equally, for regional powers like India or Uzbekistan, the dichotomy came in the way of creating a common space that would open the vistas of a regional initiative. Viewed from Delhi and Tashkent, the “great game” in the Hindu Kush mountains assumed different shades. Some things do not easily change in life — even for an aspiring regional power. Even today, Indian discourses on Afghanistan run a predictable course. Has the U.S. administration finally woken up to the harsh reality of the Pakistani military’s doublespeak in the fight against terrorism? If so, will it turn the screw on its single most crucial partner in the fight? Period.

From this point, the angst deepens somewhat. Will the U.S. finally abandon the willing suspension of disbelief about the Pakistani military’s passion for its strategic asset, the Taliban, and realise instead that New Delhi is Washington’s sole “natural ally” in the region in the fight against terrorism? And, therefore, will the U.S. allow itself the privilege of India’s cooperation in “stabilising” Pakistan? This range of issues more or less hogs the quaint Indian approach toward the Afghan problem in the seminar circuits in Delhi where one hears the thesis being rolled out ad nauseam like a repeatedly-vulcanised rubber tyre not possessing its original tensile strength any more.

http://newageislam.com/india-and-the-central-asian-dawn/current-affairs/d/2325

Taliban militants attack Afghan capital, Islamic World News, NewAgeIslam.com

Islamic World News

Taliban militants attack Afghan capital

• At least 10 killed in series of Kabul attacks

• Up to two dozen militants target ministries

• Hamid Karzai says security restored to city centre

A series of co-ordinated attacks by presumed Taliban militants in the Afghan capital of Kabul has killed at least 10 people and injured 32. Seven of those responsible were among the dead.

Explosions and gunfire rocked several parts of the city during sustained attacks against ministries and other targets including shopping centres.

After more than three hours of fighting, the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, said security had been restored to the capital. He accused "enemies of Afghanistan" of "trying to spread fear among Kabul citizens". Searches were continuing for the attackers, officials said. Reports of casualties remained confused.

It is the most serious attack on the city for years and rated by some as the biggest since the Taliban were ousted. Militants initially struck around the presidential palace and several government ministries. At least three blasts shook the district.

Gunfire echoed through the streets as Afghan police and soldiers tried to track down what a Taliban spokesman said was a force of 20 armed militants. Some reports put at the number higher. Security forces evacuated a large part of the city centre, forcing back traffic and pedestrians and closing shops and schools.

The attack, the most significant in Kabul since militants stormed the justice ministry and other government buildings in February last year, took place on the day Karzai was to swear in several members of his new cabinet following his re-election in August in a vote heavily criticised for fraud. The country's parliament has twice rejected many of Karzai's cabinet nominations.

Zemerai Bashary, a spokesman for the interior ministry, said eight suicide bombers were involved in the attack. Four targeted the central Kabul shopping centre and two or three were found in another building nearby.

http://newageislam.com/taliban-militants-attack-afghan-capital/islamic-world-news/d/2394

Afghanistan: Man who went to vote loses nose to Taliban, Islamic World News, NewAgeIslam.com

Islamic World News

Afghanistan: Man who went to vote loses nose to Taliban

LAL MOHAMMAD, a 40- year old Afghan farmer, was one of the millions of people who defied Taliban threats against elections and set out to cast his ballot in the presidential election in August. But he soon regretted his defiance.

Fighters ambushed Mohammad as he was walking towards a polling station and cut off part of his nose and ears.

The Taliban vowed to disrupt the August 20 vote, threatening reprisals against voters and staging scores of rocket attacks and several bombings across the country on Election Day. The threats and violence failed to stop the elections from taking place, but they do seem to have hurt turnout in some areas, especially the Taliban heartland in the south.

Mohammad, speaking haltingly at a hospital in the Afghan capital, Kabul, described how militants stopped and searched him while he was on his way to a polling booth. They beat him with the butt of an assault rifle after they found his voting card.

Then they took out a knife.

“I saw one reaching my nose with a knife. I asked him to stop, but it was useless,” Mohammad said. “I regret very much getting the card and going to vote.” Election officials have reported scattered incidents in which militants cut off voters’ fingers stained with indelible ink. The ink was meant to prevent multiple voting but it also helped the militants pick out people who had cast their ballots.

A Taliban spokesman denied before the election that an order had been given to mutilate voters.

Mohammad described how he lay bleeding and unconscious for several hours, coming to his senses only after a man from his village spotted him and put him on the back of a donkey.

http://newageislam.com/afghanistan--man-who-went-to-vote-loses-nose-to-taliban/islamic-world-news/d/1710