December 23, 2012

Giving Birth Is A Battle For Survival In Afghanistan

HERAT, Afghanistan (Reuters) - She was 15 years old, heavily pregnant and had travelled eight days on the back of a donkey to reach hospital.

Suffering from seizures and high blood pressure, she died soon after at the Herat Maternity Hospital in western Afghanistan, one of the thousands of women who die in the country each year from causes linked to pregnancy and birth.

“She came at a late stage and we couldn’t help her,” said Somayeh, a midwife at the hospital and herself just 21. “She was already in a coma.”

Politicians, economists and activists from around the world met in Bonn this month to thrash out their vision for battered and impoverished Afghanistan. In addition to the insurgency and violence, it remains the most dangerous place in the world for a woman to have a baby, the latest World Health Organization data shows.

The figures are distressing, but still a marked improvement on the situation 10 years ago. The latest available WHO data, from 2008, shows the number of women who died giving birth had dipped to 1,400 per 100,000 live births from 1,800 in 2000.

The Ministry of Public Health says it has made maternal health a priority, supporting training schemes that have lifted the number of qualified midwives in the country to 3,000 from just 400, and expanding emergency delivery services.

“We have demonstrated that these strategies can work in Afghanistan. They can bring a change in the lives of women and families,” acting public health minister Suraya Dalil says. “The challenge is to sustain those achievements.”

Charities such as World Vision — which trained Somayeh — and Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) also have in-depth programs to help new mothers across Afghanistan.

But they worry that the planned drawdown of Western troops and funds — all foreign combat soldiers will be gone by the end of 2014, and a large chunk of aid budgets is expected to go with them — could jeopardise the modest gains of the last decade.

Without foreign cash to bolster scarce government funds, midwife training will almost certainly drop off, while aid groups may leave if they cannot operate in safety. MSF closed its Afghan operations in 2004 after five team members were killed, although the group has since returned.

“The greatest risk at present is through aid levels dropping off precipitously,” says Sarah Pickworth, a public health specialist who has worked extensively in Afghanistan.

“Without sufficient funding, there is likely to be a significantly slower pace of change. This risks losing the momentum of the tremendous gains made.”

SECURITY DEADLINE

Faced with an appalling death toll among pregnant women and new mothers, communities in rural areas — which have some of the highest mortality rates — have mobilised to help women.

Herat’s Institute of Health Sciences (IHS) has trained 256 midwives in the past seven years through schemes largely supported by charities such as World Vision. Many of its students have been deliberately selected from remote villages.

But if Herat is hit by violence, the families are likely to take their daughters out of school and take them home to safety.

A deterioration in the security situation would likely hit pregnant women as well as midwife training.

Transporting women in labour from rural areas to clinics is already a tough proposition in a country where few can afford cars and roads are scarce and badly maintained. It will become still harder if gunmen have freer rein to target travellers.

The re-emergence in political life of groups like the Taliban, which banned education and the free movement of women, could also have a devastating effect on death rates.

Under their influence, a generation of potential female midwives and doctors has already been lost, midwife trainers say. This is particularly devastating in a country where male doctors treating women is still largely taboo.

PLUGGING THE GAP

But as big a problem for Afghanistan is money. The Afghan government is facing a $7 billion hole in its budget after 2014, which it will need to pay for security and other services. It is relying on foreign help to plug that gap.

The grinding poverty in which many women live means hygiene and nutrition are often poor. A recent survey showed only around half of Afghans have access to clean drinking water, and only a fifth use approved toilet and sanitation facilities.

The IHS’ deputy director, Dr Ehrary, says money is a major stumbling block to completing the five further rounds of midwife training he calculates are needed to provide a base number of healthcare professionals in the region.

“Training is not difficult, but finding funds is difficult,” he says. The institute is struggling to train this year’s government-recommended quota of midwives to the right standard.

“We told the ministry we could not run the class this year because we have only three teachers and we cannot meet their standards,” he added. “They have now been funded. We found another donor, (German humanitarian group) Cap Anamur.”

If meetings like the Bonn conference fail to deliver a plan for action on poverty and some kind of roadmap to stability, the fragile gains in maternal healthcare could easily slip away.

In rural Herat, villagers say they are determined to stop that happening. After decades of upheaval and war, they are tired of death and violence and want a safer future.

“Everybody hopes there will be no more war in Afghanistan,” says one senior shura, or village council, member from rural Herat. “The first thing we want is safety, the second is to improve people’s health. We need doctors — we need midwives.”

 

Source: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/giving-birth-battle-survival-afghanistan-101333359.html

Afghanistan: “There Will Be Civil War”

Delegations from 100 countries and organizations will meet on Monday in Bonn, Germany, for a conference on Afghanistan. Among the 1,000 participants: Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and 60 foreign ministers. “Laying the foundation for a better future of Afghanistan” the German Foreign Ministry proclaims. But just when official optimism showed signs of froth, classified documents surfaced in Germany that predicted a dire future for Afghanistan after the departure of NATO troops.

“It is time to focus on nation building here at home,” President Obama announced in June, because “we’re meeting our goals.” He’d pull out 30,000 troops by September 2012, but from a “position of strength” not weakness. By late 2014, all combat troops from the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) would be withdrawn. In the interim, the US and its allies would transfer security responsibilities to the Afghan military and police. That’s the public plan.

But U.S. and German military and intelligence officials apparently have a much more pessimistic view: Bild, the largest German newspaper—a broadsheet tabloid—has obtained a number of classified documents (Bild, article in German) and decided to make them public “because they prove what no one wants to know.”

Among them was a joint analysis by the German military and the US military that predicted that insurgents could regain power in Afghanistan when NATO troops are withdrawn. Bild quoted from the report:

“After the end of the occupation by the ISAF in 2014, the leaders of the insurgency, who have fled to Pakistan, will return to Afghanistan.” And the conclusion: “When ISAF troops leave the country, there will be civil war.”

A stark contrast to President Obama’s positive spin on Afghanistan’s future, though the likelihood of civil war has been bandied about for years. The model: when the Soviet Union pulled out of Afghanistan in early 1989, civil war spread across the country. There are also recent indications, for example, BBC’s story, “What happened when US forces left Afghan hotspot?” So, is NATO really “laying the foundation for a better future?”

Among the other documents that Bild got its hands on:

  • Reports by the German military stated that the Afghan secret service was involved in deadly attacks on German soldiers, something the German Ministry of Defense has been denying strenuously.
  • NATO documents outlined how Pakistan and Iran were colluding to support attacks on German soldiers. The Pakistani intelligence service, ISI, was also involved. They supplied weapons, training, and money.
  • A document from the US military indicated that Pakistan expected an invasion of US troops and established defensive positions in the border region, including radar systems to detect low-flying aircraft.

Afghanistan is the country where a young rape victim named Gulnaz was thrown in jail for adultery because she refused to marry her attacker. The case caught the attention of foreign reporters. To get them off his back before the Bonn conference, President Karzai pardoned her. If it weren’t so tragic, it would be funny. BBC reports:

President Karzai tasked the minister of justice to go and talk to Gulnaz to see what she wants. During her meeting with the minister, she said she will marry the attacker only if her brother marries the attacker’s sister,” Emal Faizay, a spokesman for President Karzai, told the BBC. “This is a decision by her. I can confirm that there is no precondition set by the Afghan government.

But Gulnaz’s lawyer, Kimberley Motley, told the BBC:

In my conversations with Gulnaz she told me that if she had the free choice she would not marry the man who raped her.

Ten years ago, the US military removed the Taliban from power, but Afghanistan still has these kinds of absurd issues. Okay, now they also have cell phones, TVs, and opium, but nearly 3,000 NATO soldiers—mostly Americans—died. It’s time to let Afghans sort out their future. Why wait till 2014 to pull all US combat troops out? There is one presidential candidate who promises to act promptly: Ron Paul.

Meanwhile in Europe, a flood of proposals, plans, and rumors to save the euro rely on the uneasy partnership between Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel. But he may be out of a job by May 2012—and his potential successors have very different ideas….French Presidential Election: Coup De Grâce For The Euro?

 

 

Source: https://www.testosteronepit.com/home/2011/12/4/afghanistan-there-will-be-civil-war.html

 

 

Afghan Daughters and their Mother Disfigured in Acid Attack

It really blows my mind when I think of the countless ways mankind has found to inflict violence against women around the world.

Acid attacks are one of such violent forms of assault that is most common in countries like Cambodia, Afghanistan, India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. A

The perpetrators were after the family’s oldest daughter because her father had denied one of the men’s requests for her hand in marriage. The girl’s father said he rejected the man’s offer of marriage at the time because his daughter was too young. Forced marriage of young Afghan girls is not uncommon today which makes the father’s protection notable.

Rejected, the man and his brothers, who are suspected of being members of a local militia, broke into the house to attack the girls and their mother in revenge. The men involved in the attack have since been brought to the capital by the Interior Ministry for investigation and potential prosecution.

“The attackers defamed Afghanistan in the eyes of the world,” said the ministry’s spokesman, Sediq Sediqui. “It was the harshest violence they could ever carry out.”

He said that the Afghan police were warning “those who commit such brutal acts that they will be brought to justice at any cost.

The Elimination of Violence Against Women law, which was passed last year, specifically prohibits chemical attacks against women. Such offenses carry a punishment of at least 10 years of imprisonment and at most life in prison.

Given the law and the ministry’s quick arrest, one would hope that the men will be adequately punished, but history has proved differently. Since Afghanistan enacted the law banning violence against women there have been 2,299 complaints of gender-motivated abuse registered with the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission from March 2010 to March 2011 only 7% of those crimes have been prosecuted.

This is very unsettling. Acid attacks are a violent and inhumane form of violence against women that should be prohibited and punished under the law strictly. We have such laws for a reason; let’s make sure they are enforced so less women have to suffer.

Source: https://www.care2.com/causes/afghan-daughters-and-their-mother-disfigured-in-acid-attack.html#ixzz1gJQ6uN2l

 

US Vacates Air Base In Pakistan To Meet Deadline

QUETTA, Pakistan (AFP) - The United States on Sunday vacated a Pakistani airbase following a deadline given by Islamabad in the wake of anger over NATO air strikes last month that killed 24 soldiers, officials said.

Pakistan’s military said in a statement that the last flight carrying US personnel and equipment had left Shamsi airbase, in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, completing a process that began last week.

Islamabad’s fragile alliance with the United States crashed to new lows in the wake of the November 26 NATO air strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers and which the Pakistan military called a deliberate attack.

The base was widely believed to have been used in covert CIA drone attacks against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda commanders in northwest Pakistan’s tribal areas, which border Afghanistan.

“The control of the base has been taken over by the Army,” the statement said.

A senior security official requesting anonymity earlier told AFP: “The Americans have vacated the Shamsi air base and it has been handed over to the Pakistani security forces.”

Another official in Baluchistan confirmed that the last batch of US officials left in two flights on Sunday.

Following the November air strikes, Pakistan closed two border crossings to Afghanistan to US and NATO supplies and gave American personnel until Sunday to leave Shamsi airbase.

US Ambassador to Islamabad Cameron Munter told a Pakistan television channel last week: “We are complying with the request.”

A security official said the US aircraft left the Pakistani airfield around 3:00 pm (1000 GMT) with the remaining group of 32 US officials and material.

US President Barack Obama last Sunday expressed condolences to Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari for the soldier deaths and said the NATO air strikes that killed them were not a “deliberate attack.”

But the incident has rocked Washington’s alliance with its counterterrorism ally Islamabad, though officials say neither country can afford a complete break in relations.

US officials and intelligence analysts have said the covert drone war would not be affected by the closure of the base as Washington could fly Predator and Reaper drones out of air fields in neighboring Afghanistan.

But the Shamsi air base was supposed to be particularly useful for flights hampered by poor weather conditions.

Islamabad has tacitly consented to the covert US drone campaign, which many Pakistanis see as a violation of their country’s sovereignty.

Nearly half of all cargo bound for NATO-led forces runs through Pakistan. Roughly 140,000 foreign troops, including about 97,000 Americans, rely on supplies from outside Afghanistan for the decade-long war effort.

Pakistan has shut off the border over previous incidents, partly to allay popular outrage, but the latest closure had entered a third week.

Islamabad has so far refused to take part in a US investigation into the deadly November air strikes, and decided to boycott the Bonn Conference on the future of Afghanistan earlier this month.

Source: https://www.activistpost.com/2011/12/us-vacates-air-base-in-pakistan-to-meet.html

Ten Ways the War on Drugs is a Wild Success

For all the evidence of how the War on Drugs has failed society, there’s equally as much evidence of how it is a great success to those who continue to support it. The drug war has many advantages if you wish to control society and expand your empire. It also enriches several industries that would otherwise have a very difficult time staying solvent without it.

Here are ten ways the War on Drugs is a wild success:

Military-Industrial Profits: As the Vietnam War came to an end, it struck fear into the military-industrial machine that enjoyed great profits from that conflict. In a world where contrived enemies were needed to keep a constant funding of weapons, Richard Nixon declared drugs “Public Enemy Number 1″. Thus, domestic armies were erected to combat the illegal drug trade, delivering consistent cash flow to weapons manufacturers. These companies make money, not just from the needs of the DEA, border patrol, and local police forces, but also from drug traffickers. Win-win and profits all around.

Huge Boon to Private Prisons: The private prison industry thrives off long sentences for drug offenders. At least 25% of their profits come from these nonviolent criminals. A great number more are held on “drug related” charges that may have resulted in drug violence. However, the current trend shows that three-quarters of new inmates admitted to state prisons are nonviolent offenders. Private prisons clearly depend on arresting pot smokers and addicts of more severe drugs.

Prevents Higher Unemployment Rates: Imagine if the millions of American currently jailed on drug charges were released into a job market already suffering from real unemployment numbers over 20%. Additionally, if it wasn’t for drugs being illegal, countless people like DEA agents, court staff, prison guards, parole officers, drug dealers, etc would otherwise be unemployed. Thank goodness for the war on drugs, or the U.S. economy would look even worse.

Suppresses Minority Populations: It’s often said that the drug war is a war on minorities: “According to the ACLU, African Americans make up an estimated 15% of drug users, but they account for 37% of those arrested on drug charges, 59% of those convicted and 74% of all drug offenders sentenced to prison. Or consider this: The U.S. has 260,000 people in state prisons on nonviolent drug charges; 183,200 (more than 70%) of them are black or Latino.” So it is a huge success for those who wish to suppress minority populations.

Drives Up Prices: Making any substance illegal will result in much higher prices than a free market would dictate. Especially when there’s a high demand for that substance. In the case of the cannabis plant, which grows like a weed and requires very little value added, the dried flower would virtually be free if it wasn’t for the harsh restrictions and dangers involved in producing and distributing it. These high prices are terrific for drug dealers and even medical marijuana growers opposed legalization in California because it threatened their profits.

Drug Violence Justifies Tough Gun Laws: The violence generated from the prohibition of drugs is reminiscent of the extreme mob violence during the prohibition of alcohol. Prohibition of anything will always create black markets which require firearms to protect banned products. Recently, the U.S. government itself was caught red-handed supplying guns to Mexican drug cartels in their “Fast and Furious” scandal. It’s now proven that the ATF plotted to use Fast and Furious to push for new gun control regulations. Indeed, most street violence is due to turf wars over the drug trade, and tougher gun laws are proposed as the war escalates. It’s wonderful for those who blame violence on guns and wish to restrict them from law-abiding citizens.

Protects Big Pharma Monopolies: No one is happier about the war on drugs than Big Pharma. Their control over the FDA and monopoly of “controlled substances” would be threatened if all drugs were legalized. They want you addicted to their FDA-approved versions of heroin and cocaine, not something you can get on the black market. In turn, they also benefit greatly when the prices of street drugs increase, as they can then inflate the cost of their products. They love the drug war so much they’ve lobbied to extend it to vitamins and supplements.

Allows Proxy Armies: If you want to create an empire by force, but it’s politically disadvantageous to base your army in certain countries, then the global war on drugs is your ticket to supplying troops or creating proxy armies. One of the most recent examples is Costa Rica, a peaceful country in Central America without an army, where the U.S. bribed the government to allow the Navy and Marines to be stationed off the Caribbean coast to fight the war on drugs. In other nations where even this won’t be allowed, the CIA funds and arms one of the drug cartels who then act as their hired enforcers, or they’re used as an excuse for governments to accept U.S. help to combat the enemy they created. In either case, the U.S. sells more arms and trains soldiers to be used upon command.

Keeps Big Banks Flush with Cash: It has long been known that big banks happily launder money for the big drug cartels. According to The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), “Up to 1.5 trillion dollars in drug money are laundered through legal enterprises, accounting for 5% of global GDP.” Take just this year and one bank, Wachovia; who had to pay a slap-on-the-wrist fine for laundering more than $420 billion for Mexican drug cartels. Imagine where the big banks would be without this money, given that they also needed a bailout of over $23 trillion for lack of sufficient deposits to pay for their gambling habits.

Funds CIA Black Ops: Do you ever wonder where the U.S. government gets all that money for their secret “Black Ops” like underground bases, secret wars, corporate takeovers and seed money, etc? It’s been proven over and over that the CIA (and Pentagon) controls a large majority of the illicit drug trade either directly or indirectly through proxies mentioned above. They’ve been caught in the act of shipping in massive amounts of cocaine, while the CIA now openly admits to protecting and facilitating the opium trade in Afghanistan. If it wasn’t for this tremendous profit, the CIA would not be able to build their secret shadow government.

So, as you can see, there are great benefits to the War on Drugs depending what side of the coin you’re on. If you’re a poor pot smoker, well, you’re out of luck. But if you’re the biggest heroin and cocaine dealer in the world and desire a monopoly . . . well, you’ve got the world right where you want it.

 

Source: https://www.activistpost.com/2011/12/10-ways-war-on-drugs-is-wild-success.html

Oh What A Lovely War In Afghanistan: We’re Staying Till ‘The Job Is Done’

The picture painted by the British army commander in Afghanistan of an enemy ever closer to defeat and a war with some kind of victory in sight is plainly an Alice in Wonderland concoction.

Here we go again: a top UK General telling us the war in Afghanistan is going well and we have to stay as long as it takes to “finish the job“.

Lieutenant General James Bucknall, the outgoing commander of the British forces in Afghanistan, says the war has to continue because otherwise we will be betraying the “investment in blood” spilt by British soldiers who have been killed, soon to reach 400. Applying this logic, the Americans would still be in Vietnam, where over 50,000 of their troops died.

Bucknall is like a compulsive gambler who thinks if he just keeps betting he will eventually recoup all past losses. But unlike the gambler at the casino tables, Bucknall is gambling with peoples lives in a war which has seen ten years of carnage, with no return on the “investment”, whether in blood or treasure.

Bucknall of course makes no mention of the six British soldiers who died in the two weeks prior to him insisting that “we owe it to those who have gone before” to continue the war. Nor does he say how many more will have to be “gone” until we “see the job through”.

But it’s not just the lives of British soldiers that have been lost. Tens of thousands of Afghan civilians have been killed, their deaths unrecorded by their killers and unreported by the western media — and never mentioned by those like Bucknall who commanded the slaughter.

It’s all been a price worth paying according to Bucknall, who is adamant — like all his predecessors — that western forces are progressively stabilising the country and re-establishing security.

“We are taking out 130-140 mid-level Taliban leaders every month”, he proclaims triumphantly. A somewhat pathetic sign of progress, after six years of British troop deployment in the region, is the ability of a provincial governor to travel between Lashkar Gah and Nad Ali by road instead of helicopter.

But it is when Bucknall says the clearest indication that NATO is winning is found in Kabul — “a flourishing capital city that is much safer than Karachi” — that you have to ask what world he is living in. On 5 December, the day after Bucknall’s confident assertion about Kabul safety, 55 worshippers at a mosque were killed by a suicide bombing. This was following a series of high profile attacks launched by the Taliban this year in the city, which included:

  • June 28: 21 killed, including 10 civilians, when suicide bombers storm Kabul’s luxury Intercontinental Hotel.
  • August 19: Nine people, including a New Zealand special forces soldier, die when suicide bombers attack the British Council cultural centre in Kabul.
  • September 13/14: Taliban attacks targeting locations including the US embassy and headquarters of foreign troops kill at least 14 during a 19-hour siege.
  • September 20: Burhanuddin Rabbani, Afghanistan’s former president leading efforts to find a peace deal with the Taliban, is assassinated in a suicide attack at his home in Kabul’s supposedly secure diplomatic zone.
  • October 29: 13 US troops operating under Nato are among 17 people killed in a car-bomb attack on a foreign military convoy in Kabul.

Bucknall is not alone in his delusion. The latest catch phrase of the western occupiers is “Fight, Talk, Build”.

Whatever politicians and generals say, the “fight” part is not going well. The last two years have seen the highest casualty rate since the start of the war for US forces — who are doing the bulk of the fighting. And there are currently only four areas in the whole of Afghanistan where there is no Taliban or insurgent activity.

The US is desperate to implement the “talk” part of the strategy, which is why they are holding secret meetings with Taliban representatives and are trying to arrange for a Taliban office to be established in Qatar — to help, it is said, peace negotiations to take place.

How the US and NATO — or Bucknall come to that — can square this recognition that negotiations are an essential pre-condition to ending the war, while at the same time assassinating the very people they want to talk peace with, is beyond satire. The Taliban have clearly come to the same conclusion, hence in September their assassination of Burhanuddin Rabbani, who was leading the Afghan government’s attempts at negotiation.

But where the “talk” strategy is most obviously running into the sand is in the collapse of the US-Pakistan relationship, which has been a cornerstone alliance in America’s “war on terror”.

Pakistan is seething with anti-American ferment due to the almost daily US drone attacks, which violate both international law and Pakistani sovereignty, and kill far more civilians than the targetted “insurgents”. Then came the US airstrike a week ago that “accidently” killed at least 24 Pakistani soldiers, which has taken the alliance close to breaking point..

As for “build”, there is very little to show for the $70 billion which have been spent on reconstruction over the past ten years. Afghanistan is the world’s most corrupt country, so it’s hardly surprising that on some reconstruction projects an estimated 30% of the cost has been attributed to corruption - whether payments to relatives and cronies of the US puppet President Karzai and the warlords he cultivates to bolster his regime, or in kickbacks for the Afghan security services.

Billions more has been wasted in lucrative contracts for western companies, paid huge sums for reconstruction projects, many of which have been left unfinished or not even started.

But the biggest joke in the “build” part of the strategy is the central pillar of the US-NATO “exit strategy”: to remove all foreign combat troops from the line of fire by the end of 2014 and replace them with the Afghan army and police. Supposedly, by then these forces will be ready to take over all security in the country, and effectively act as a surrogate army continuing the war, while the US and its allies keep tens of thousands of troops in the country to act as ‘trainers and advisors’, with their only military involvement being air strikes and drone attacks that carry no risk of US casualities.

The US and NATO are embarked on a frantic recruitment campaign aimed at mobilising a 352,000-strong Afghan army. The 10% desertion rate of recruits after finishing training and the drug addiction of 15% of troops are perhaps one way to guage the prospects of achieving this.

But even if the army and police numbers can be expanded on this scale, the costs of maintaining such a huge security force are clearly beyond what could be afforded by the Afghan economy. It’s estimated these plans would cost $8 billion a year, eating up 50% of Afghanistan’s GDP, which is $900 per head of the population in a country where the average yearly income is $450.

No wonder the Karzai government has said Afghanistan will need at least $10 billion in foreign aid annually to survive economically when the occupying armies have left. This would be far in excess of the $3 billion a year that the US gives to Israel, recipient of one fifth of America’s total foreign aid budget.

The picture painted by Lieutenant General James Bucknall of an enemy ever closer to defeat and a war with some kind of victory in sight is plainly an Alice in Wonderland concoction.

The war in Afghanistan has lasted longer than the two 20th century world wars combined and is the longest in US history. Once you are resolved to delay indefinitely an admission that it has been an utter catastrophe for both the warmongers and their victims, refusing to look reality in the face becomes an imperative.

 

Source: https://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/afghanistan-and-pakistan/976-oh-what-a-lovely-war-in-afghanistan

Pakistani General gives OK to Fire on NATO

Pakistani army top general gives troops ok to fire on NATO. Since Pakistan govt and army are notoriously corrupt it remains to be seen if this is more hot air looking for additional US loans to cool down.

According to the latest news feeds pouring in from Rawalpindi, the Pakistani Army Chief has suspended the regular chain-of-command system and all forward operating units have been ordered to retaliate in case of aggression from the eastern border with Afghanistan. The implementation of this order allows Pakistan Army units based at checkpoints along the Afghan border to retaliate in case of any NATO/US incursions without seeking permission from the military high command.

Pakistan had recently blocked the NATO supply routes into Afghanistan due to the unprovoked NATO/US attack on a Pakistani checkpost which left 25 soldiers dead. Relations between the two forces have been tense since the attack and NATO’s belligerent behaviour has left it in a dangerous Afghanistan with an evenly irked nuclear powered neighbour.

The Afghan End-Game certainly seems to be approaching at a blistering rate and international powers have already started siding with the fast emerging winner. With more non-cooperation measures, such as the evacuation of Shahbaz air base (Jacobabad) & the withdrawal of fly over rights, looming on the horizon relations between the US led NATO and Pakistan are destined to take a new low.

Source:

https://www.islamist.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1267

The Coming War With Pakistan (Video)

BBC rewrites 10 years of history and declares Pakistan the new enemy.

BBC are propagandists whose lies have killed people. Their documentaries are made upon request by special interest groups whose narratives are sewn verbatim into what would otherwise look like a “documentary.” With BBC’s name attached, it is hoped, these tissues of lies are then able to gain traction and begin rewriting reality.

Their recent hit on Pakistan is not the first time they have been caught peddling wholesale lies dressed up as “documentaries.” Earlier this year, they also cobbled together “This World: Thailand - Justice Under Fire,” where evidence drawn from paid lobbyists of Western-backed opposition leaders and US State Department cables and used to promote Wall Street and London’s corporate-financier interests in Thailand.

BBC’s two-part Secret Pakistan documentary attempts to frame the 10-year foreign occupation of Afghanistan and the lack of progress as the result of “Pakistani duplicity.” In reality, even upon watching BBC’s “documentary,” one can clearly see that the US, UK, and NATO have simply traded places with invading Soviets and now face the same fierce indigenous force fighting against occupation. Indeed, just as Pakistan’s intelligence agency ISI supported Afghans during the Soviet invasion, they are very likely to be supporting Afghans now in their current bid for freedom.

However, BBC is entirely unable to establish this and instead, crutches its argument along on false pretenses, such as the Taliban “are” Al Qaeda, that the US, UK, and NATO have a right to be in Afghanistan in the first place, and that Pakistan has some sort of obligation to unconditionally cooperate with these foreign occupiers.

While it may be instructive for many to watch the lengthy, two-hour “documentary,” there are two quotes from prominent interviewees that give BBC’s game away while perfectly summing up the reality of the Afghanistan war.

BBC’s Secret Pakistan Summed Up in Two Quotes.

Sherard Cowper-Coles was a British diplomat who served as the Foreign Secretary’s Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan from 2009-2010, before that as ambassador to Israel and Saudi Arabia, and is now the international business development director of British defense contractor BAE Systems. He claims during the BBC documentary that (44:00), “the real military threat is the Taliban - a serious insurgency that’s got nothing to do with Bin Laden. Bin Laden, in operational terms, is utterly spectacularly irrelevant.” Quite clearly this contradicts the “war on terror” narrative and instead suggests that current US, British and NATO operation in Afghanistan has more to do with Western interests in the region than fighting the alleged perpetrators of 9/11.

The next important point is garnered nearly toward the very end of the documentary where former CIA officer Bruce Riedel (57:35) claims, “there is probably no worst nightmare for America, for Europe, for the world in the 21st century than a Pakistan that is out of control, under the influence of extremist Islamist forces armed with nuclear weapons.” This comment, however, is not as straightforward or as truthful as Cowper-Coles’. However, if one realizes that this destabilization Riedel is hinting at is actually the work of the US and NATO done as a pretext to invade Pakistan, then it becomes truly telling — and we see the BBC documentary as yet another corporate-media conjured casus belli.

Riedel’s “Pakistan out of control” is a long planned plot to invade Pakistan.

In a 2007 article from the London Guardian titled, “Bush handed blueprint to seize Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal,” it is stated that fears of destabilization inside Pakistan might prompt the United States to occupy Islamabad and the provinces of Punjab, Sindh, and Baluchistan in an attempt to secure Pakistan’s nuclear warheads.

The report was written by Fredrick Kagan who sits within the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). AEI’s board of trustees represents a wide variety of corporate-financier interests including those of the notorious Carlyle Group, State Farm, American Express, and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co (also of the CFR). War criminal Dick Cheney also acts as a trustee. Joining Kagan as members of AEI’s “research staff” are warmongers Newt Gingrich, John Bolton, Richard Perle, John Yoo, and Paul Wolfowitz.

Kagan’s report regarding Pakistan’s partial occupation and the seizure of its nuclear arsenal is founded on what may first appear to be a reasonable concern, one shared by Bruce Riedel; the fear of Pakistan collapsing and its nuclear arsenal falling into the wrong hands. According to Kagan’s narrative, Islamic extremists seizing Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal pose as much a threat today as “Soviet tanks” once did, a sentiment that echos Riedel’s words in the BBC’s “Secret Pakistan.

Bruce Riedel is a former CIA officer and was a senior adviser to three US presidents, including President Obama. His area of focus is the Middle East and South Asia and he is currently a “Senior Fellow” at the corporate-financier-funded (page 19 .pdf) Brookings Institution. It was at Brookings that Ridel would help co-author the 2009 “Which Path to Persia?” a documented conspiracy to overthrow the government of Iran with foreign-backed color revolutions, covert military operations, sanctions, invasion, and even funding terrorists groups including the US State Department listed, French/Iraqi-based Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK) and Baluchistani terrorists who straddle the Iranian-Pakistani border.

For those that believe Riedel is nothing more than a paunchy, pencil-pushing “expert” used to pad out BBC documentaries, and that think-tanks like the Brookings Institution are merely dispensing advice and not corporate-approved policy, it should be noted that Riedel’s “Which Path to Persia?” has already long since gone operational. It is also noted within the BBC documentary itself, that Riedel was advising the US president regarding Pakistan.

Riedel is indeed right about the threat of a nuclear-armed Pakistan being destabilized and falling into the hands of extremists, but by now it should be clear by looking at Riedel’s background that these are extremists like those armed by US British and NATO forces in Libya, who were then provided air cover to commit sweeping genocide before handing the nation over to the West’s proxy rulers. And in Pakistan, the forces of destabilization are likewise being armed and backed by the West.

US backing terrorists to destabilize Pakistan.

One group amongst this “force,” are the Baluchi terrorists that straddle the Iranian-Pakistani border. In a 2006 report by the corporate-financier funded think tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace titled, “Pakistan: The Resurgence of Baluch Nationalism,” violence starting as early as 2004-2005 is described. According to the report, 20% of Pakistan’s mineral and energy resources reside in the sparsely populated province. On page 4 of the report, the prospect of using the Baluchi rebels against both Islamabad and Tehran is proposed. In Seymour Hersh’s 2008 article, “Preparing the Battlefield,” US support of Baluchi groups operating against Tehran is reported as already a reality. As already mentioned, in Brookings Institution’s “Which Path to Persia?” the subject of arming and sending Baluchi insurgents against Tehran is also discussed at great depth.

The 2006 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace report makes special note of the fact that above all, the Baluchistan province serves as a transit zone for a potential Iranian-India-Turkmenistan natural gas pipeline as well as a port, Gwadar, that serves as a logistical hub for Afghanistan, Central Asia’s landlocked nations as well as a port for the Chinese. The report notes that the port was primarily constructed with Chinese capital and labor with the intention of it serving as a Chinese naval station “to protect Beijing’s oil supply from the Middle East and to counter the US presence in Central Asia.”

This point in particular, regarding China, was described in exacting detail in the 2006 Strategic Studies Institute’s report “String of Pearls: Meeting the Challenge of China’s Rising Power across the Asian Littoral.” Throughout the report means to co-opt and contain China’s influence throughout the region are discussed.

The Carnegie Endowment report goes on to describe how the Baluchi rebels have fortuitously begun attacking the development of their province over concerns of “marginalization” and “dispossession.” In particular attacks were launched against the Pakistani military and Chinese facilities. The question of foreign intervention is brought up in this 2006 report, based on accusations by the Pakistani government that the rebels are armed with overly sophisticated weaponry. India, Iran, and the United States are accused as potential culprits.

The report concludes that virtually none of Pakistan’s neighbors would benefit from the insurgency and that the insurgency itself has no possibility of succeeding without “foreign support.” The conflict is described as a potential weapon that could be used against Pakistan and that it is “ultimately Islamabad that must decide whether Baluchistan will become its Achilles’ heel.” This somewhat cryptic conclusion, in the light of recent reports and developments can be deciphered as a veiled threat now being openly played.

Quite clearly when Islamabad accused foreign governments of fueling and arming the unrest in Baluchistan, they were absolutely correct. Seymour Hersh’s report lays to rest any illusions over whether or not America is arming Baluchi rebels. Brookings’ “Which Path to Persia?” report also openly calls for arming and sending Baluchi rebels out against Tehran. More recently, longtime proponent of a Baluchi insurgency, Selig Harrison of the Soros-funded Center for International Policy, has published two pieces regarding the “liberation” of Baluchistan itself.

Harrison’s February 2011 piece, “Free Baluchistan,” calls to “aid the 6 million Baluch insurgents fighting for independence from Pakistan in the face of growing ISI repression.” He continues by explaining the various merits of such meddling by stating, “Pakistan has given China a base at Gwadar in the heart of Baluch territory. So an independent Baluchistan would serve U.S. strategic interests in addition to the immediate goal of countering Islamist forces.”

Harrison would follow up his frank call to carve up Pakistan by addressing the issue of Chinese-Pakistani relations in a March 2011 piece titled, “The Chinese Cozy Up to the Pakistanis.” He begins by stating, “China’s expanding reach is a natural and acceptable accompaniment of its growing power—but only up to a point. ” He then reiterates his call for extraterritorial meddling in Pakistan by saying, “to counter what China is doing in Pakistan, the United States should play hardball by supporting the movement for an independent Baluchistan along the Arabian Sea and working with Baluch insurgents to oust the Chinese from their budding naval base at Gwadar. Beijing wants its inroads into Gilgit and Baltistan to be the first step on its way to an Arabian Sea outlet at Gwadar.”

Selig Harrison is also a regular attendee at the “Balochistan International Conference” and frequently reiterates his calls for a “free Baluchistan.” With him is Washington lobbyist Andrew Eiva, a former special forces operator who took part in supporting the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan. He proposes a vision of a bright future where Baluchis will enjoy their gas and oil wealth one day in their own autonomous, free nation. Such encouragement from Harrison, whose Center for International Policy is funded by the Ford Foundation, George Soros’ Open Society Institute, and Rockefeller Family and Associates, or Eiva’s flights of petroleum-fueled fancy at a Carnegie Endowment function – funded by Exxon, Chevron, BP Corporations of North America, the GE Foundation, Shell International, as well as the globalist mainstays of Soros, Rockefeller, and the Smith Richardson Foundation – would be almost laughable if real people weren’t dying and Pakistan’s entire future being put at risk.

With the inclusion of fake human rights NGOs like Soros’ Open Society-funded Human Rights Watch, attempting to tie the hands of the Pakistani government in dealing with these admittedly foreign-armed and backed militants, we can see the trifecta of NGOs, covert military support, and political propaganda destabilizing yet another nation. We also see a clear, over-arching strategy not aimed at Afghanistan, not even aimed at Pakistan, but ultimately aimed at disrupting and ending Chinese interests on their own border. This “trifecta” could also be seen successfully at work in the Southeast Asian country of Myanmar where covert military operations, coupled with foreign-funded NGOs, and political propaganda supplied by fake “democracy icon” Aung San Suu Kyi, were successfully used to stop the construction of a joint Chinese-Myanmar mega-dam in the northern state of Kachin.

Conclusion

Quite clearly, then, Riedel’s fears regarding Pakistan are somewhat disingenuous. In reality, he knows that the US is willfully destabilizing the country and setting the pretense for wider US and NATO military aggression throughout the region, including the invasion of Pakistan and the seizure of its nuclear arsenal. He also knows that the grand strategy is aimed not at neutralizing themanufactured threat of terrorism, but at containing China; a policy that was openly declared by current US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton within her article titled, “America’s Pacific Century.”

That BBC produced a two-hour long “documentary” to shoehorn every aspect of the “War on Terror” into the new narrative of Secret Pakistan and elude that the war “has a life of its own,” is a horrific piece of propaganda aimed at perpetuating, even expanding an already catastrophic conflict. BBC willfully misleads its audience into believing that Pakistan has “betrayed” its Western allies and is partially responsible for the now thousands of US, British, and NATO troops that have died in the war.

In reality, Pakistan is doing what it must against a nation that invaded its neighbor under false pretenses and has conspired within the halls of its corporate-funded think-tanks to subvert, overthrow, and then invade Pakistan. BBC and the corporate media have by far helped send more US, British and NATO troops to their needless death with their lies than any Pakistani intelligence agency.

The words of Kagan, Reidel, and Harrison, who are documented to have conspired against the sovereignty and security of foreign nations, must be spread far and wide. If soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines want to continue fighting with full knowledge that they do so for a corporate-financier agenda to eliminate Wall Street and London’s global competitors, so be it. At least they have the right to know what they are really fighting for and for what they may potentially die for. Pakistan can likewise defend itself from this army of mercenaries without disingenuous liars like the BBC twisting reality around and portraying Pakistanis as “duplicitous.”

 

Source: https://www.activistpost.com/2011/12/coming-war-with-pakistan-video.html

 

Pakistan Snubs US Probe Into Lethal Strikes

ISLAMABAD (AFP) Islamabad has so far refused to take part in a US probe into air strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, exacerbating fears Saturday of a prolonged US-Pakistani crisis as a result of the attack.

Pakistan was invited to cooperate in the probe into the November 26 strikes on the Afghan border, which enraged Islamabad and propelled US-Pakistani ties to their rockiest in years, but officials have declined to do so.

“They have elected to date not to participate, but we would welcome their participation,” said Pentagon press secretary George Little.

Washington had expected a refusal given the fury in Pakistan, which has already seen Islamabad shut down NATO’s vital supply into Afghanistan and boycott an international conference on the war in Bonn set for Monday.

Pakistan also ordered American personnel to leave the Shamsi air base, widely understood to have been a hub for a covert CIA drone war on Taliban and Al-Qaeda commanders in Pakistan’s troubled border areas with Afghanistan.

In Pakistan, a security official told AFP on condition of anonymity Saturday that a formal reply would be conveyed to the Americans, but confirmed there was no interest in taking part in the inquiry.

“Officially our response has yet to come, but we will not participate in the investigation because there was no outcome from the two previous inquiries and we feel that third inquiry will be the same, so there’s no purpose,” he said.

Pakistan claims NATO attacks in 2010 and 2008 were poorly investigated.

On Friday, the Wall Street Journal quoted US officials as saying Pakistani officers at a coordination centre gave a green light for the strikes believing they had no troops in the area.

But a Pakistani official told AFP that the Americans relayed the wrong coordinates, instead for a site 15 kilometres (nine miles) to the north.

“This is totally ridiculous,” he said on condition of anonymity, because he was not authorised to speak to the media.

“They thought there is some activity in that particular area… We confirmed there was no activity in that area. After some time, the same border coordination centre said we’re sorry it’s the wrong coordinates,” he added.

Pakistan says there was then a second air strike.

“The first strike could have been a mistake. They pulled out. What was the purpose of coming again? That is the most disgusting thing,” the official said.

US officials told the Wall Street Journal that Afghan forces and US commandos were pursuing Taliban fighters near the border when they came under fire from what they thought was a militant encampment.

But it also quoted officials as saying there were mistakes on both sides: “There were lots of mistakes made,” one official said. “There was not good situational awareness to who was where and who was doing what.”

The United States has voiced regret over the strikes but has stopped short of issuing an apology while the American military conducts the investigation.

“It’s safe to say that the incident has had a chilling effect on our relationship with the Pakistani military, no question about that,” Pentagon spokesman Captain John Kirby told reporters in Washington.

“Both sides deem it to be as serious as it was.”

Pakistan called the strikes a “deliberate act of aggression” and army chief General Ashfaq Kayani is understood to be facing fury from the ranks and junior officers livid with the Americans.

Kayani told troops to respond to any future attack without waiting for approval from commanders in what local media interpreted as a change in the rules of engagement.

Kirby suggested the US military would also review its operations and tactics for forces stationed in eastern Afghanistan.

“Clearly, an incident like this causes you — and should cause you — to take a step back and look at how you’re doing things and whether there need to be improvements made or any kind of tactical decisions …(to) do things a little differently,” Kirby said.

In an angry response to the strikes, Pakistan is boycotting an international conference on Afghanistan starting Monday in Bonn.

In an interview with a German weekly, Afghan President Hamid Karzai accused Pakistan, seen as vital to any prospect of stability in his war-ravaged country, of sabotaging all negotiations with the Taliban.

“Up until now, they (Pakistan) have sadly refused to back efforts for negotiations with the Taliban,” Karzai told Der Spiegel weekly in comments reported in German and due to be published on Monday.

Source: https://www.activistpost.com/2011/12/pakistan-snubs-us-probe-into-lethal.html

Afghan Woman’s Choice: Marry Rapist Or Stay In Jail

This story is both outrageous and terribly sad.

Three weeks ago I wrote here about Gulnaz, a 19-year-old Afghan woman who was raped by her cousin’s husband, then charged with adultery and finally sentenced to 12 years in prison. Her baby girl, born following the rape, is serving her sentence with her.

The European Union commissioned Development Pictures to produce a documentary highlighting women’s rights issues in Afghanistan, but subsequently suppressed it for political reasons. The documentary tells Gulnaz’s story.

Gulnaz To Be Freed, But Must Marry Her Rapist

Now comes the news that Gulnaz is set to be freed, but only after agreeing to marry the man who raped her.

You read that right: President Hamid Karzai ordered Gulnaz to be released on condition that she agreed to become the second wife of her rapist – a prospect that supporters say she had dreaded.

The Afghan President got involved in the case of Gulnaz when the decision not to broadcast the film led to a storm of publicity, including a Care2 petition with over 90,000 signatures.

So first the 19-year-old is raped and becomes pregnant. This makes her guilty of adultery under Afghan law, and she is sentenced to 12 years in jail. As a final indignity, she can leave jail only by marrying her rapist. But it gets worse.

“He Had Filthy Clothes On…He Shut Me Up By Putting His Hands On My Mouth”

From CNN:

Even two years later, Gulnaz remembers the smell and state of her rapist’s clothes when he came into the house when her mother left for a brief visit to the hospital.

“He had filthy clothes on as he does metal and construction work. When my mother went out, he came into my house and he closed doors and windows. I started screaming, but he shut me up by putting his hands on my mouth,” she said.

After the attack, she hid what happened as long as she could. But soon she began vomiting in the mornings and showing signs of pregnancy. It was her attacker’s child.

In Afghanistan, this brought her not sympathy, but prosecution. Aged just 19, she was found guilty by the courts of sex outside of marriage — adultery — and sentenced to twelve years in jail.

The only way around the dishonor of rape, or adultery in the eyes of Afghans, is to marry her attacker. This will, in the eyes of some, give her child a family and restore her honor. In order that she may stay with her child, Gulnaz is willing to do this.

Gulnaz Faced A Stark Choice

Gulnaz had a stark choice to make. Women in her situation are often killed for the shame their ordeal has brought the community. She is at risk, some say, from her attacker’s family. And her case is common to many women in Afghanistan.

Under Afghan law, Gulnaz has been judged an adulterer. Despite the ongoing dispute over her story, her predicament has not changed. She faced the hideous choice of 12 years in jail or marriage to her rapist and the risk of death.

Source: https://www.care2.com/causes/afghan-womans-choice-marry-rapist-or-stay-in-jail.html