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Friday,
November 9, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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Rid
Afghanistan of foreign terrorists: Karzai USA losing
propaganda war, says Putin Bush may
ask Musharraf for troops US vote
on ‘radio free Afghanistan’ |
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Afghan refugee Hossein Rezaei (right) and his grandchild, Asadollah Ebrahimi, cry at the Shahid Arbabi temporary refugee camp in Zahedan, Iran, on Wednesday. Stop
attacks: Pervez Indian
charged on anthrax hoax
Nepal
sets 185 prisoners free
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Rid Afghanistan of foreign terrorists:
Karzai Islamabad, November 8 Karzai vowed that he would stay for as long as necessary despite the Taliban’s threat to execute anyone found helping the US attacks aimed at flushing out Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda network and punishing his Taliban protectors. “I’m determined to stay on,” the ethnic Pashtun leader told the BBC in an interview from south-central Uruzgan province. “I want these foreign terrorist elements out of my country. I want this country to belong to Afghans,” he said. Karzai said while Afghan opposition forces could defeat the Taliban without outside military help, they needed international military and humanitarian assistance to expel foreign fighters— mostly from Pakistan and Arab nations — who are loyal to bin Laden. “I am asking now in very strong terms for international assistance to help the Afghan people get rid of the foreign terrorist enemies of Afghanistan,” he said. “I’m asking for help from the USA, Europe and Muslim countries to help the Afghan people to regain independence, regain peace and once again live among the nations of the world as a dignified, honourable nation,” he added. While some military help was needed, most Afghans opposed the USA bombing of their country. The 46-year-old Karzai has been in Afghanistan for more than three weeks to lobby support for former King Zahir Shah and for a Loya Jirga to find a broad-based government in the war-ravaged country. He is being hunted by Taliban forces and, if caught, faces the same fate as former Mujahideen commander Abdul Haq who had also sneaked into the country to rally opposition to the Taliban. Haq and some companions were summarily executed by the Taliban within hours of their capture after a gunbattle in Afghanistan late last month. His nephew Izzatullah was also executed. The Taliban said last week they almost captured Karzai, a Deputy Foreign Minister in a pre-Taliban government and head of the large Popalzai tribe. A Taliban minister in Kabul said the militia attacked Karzai’s camp on November, forcing him to flee to the hills after a battle in which two of Karzai’s men were killed. Karzai told BBC that he had managed to escape after several hours of fighting and was now in a safe location. “We were lucky that the villagers informed us...one hour before, they informed us of the attack and then we prepared and defended ourselves,” Karzai said. “We walked for three days from village to village. We reached a safe position after three days with the help of villagers and nomads.” The US Defence Secretary Mr Donald Rumsfeld told news persons in Washington earlier this week that the USA was supplying Karzai and had helped him and some of his senior supporters to get out of Afghanistan for a brief period for consultations in Pakistan. However, Karzai said he had not left Afghanistan. “I’m still in Afghanistan,” he said. Karzai is believed to have more than 100 fighters with him on his mission.
Reuters |
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USA losing propaganda war, says Putin Washington, November 8 “I would say the USA is losing not in the military, but in the information,” Putin said in an interview with the network’s news programme yesterday. “It seems to me that on the information field, terrorists are acting more aggressively and more offensively and they’re presenting opposition in terms of emotions,” the Russian leader told the network. The USA has stepped up its public diplomacy efforts since opening air and missile strikes on Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers for refusing to hand over Osama bin Laden, whom Washington blames for September 11 strikes on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon. PARIS: France’s broadcasting authority, the CSA has warned Qatari satellite station Al-Jazeera to abide by French laws against inciting hatred or violence in its coverage of the conflict in Afghanistan. The news station — the only one permitted to cover events in Afghanistan by the ruling Taliban — signed a contract in 1999 with the CSA (the Conseil Superieur de l’Audiovisuel) allowing it to be distributed on French satellite and cable as long as it abided by several rules. That contract, renewed in July this year for another five years, permits Al-Jazeera to be distributed in all 15 EU countries. “Programmes must not contain any incitement to hate or violence for reasons of sex, customs, religion or nationality,” CSA chief Dominique Baudis wrote to Al-Jazeera director Hamad Ben Thamer Al Thani yesterday. “Every item broadcast by your station is at your editorial responsibility, which supposes that either you have watched it before broadcast or clearly informed the viewers of the conditions of its reception and broadcast,” it said. The warning letter appeared in particular to address concerns over Al-Jazeera’s playing of videos of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda members that are supplied by Al-Qaeda itself. Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda are blamed by Washington for the September 11 attacks on the USA that killed around 5,000 persons. This reminder was necessary given the conditions under which the first Osama bin Laden speech was broadcast by Al-Jazeera (on October 7), without pre-viewing and without an explanation of how the pictures made it to the station,” Baudis said. US authorities have put pressure on US media not to reproduce Al-Qaeda video messages live and uncut, claiming they might contain secret codes to Al-Qaeda members. British broadcasters have rebuffed an attempt by their government to put similar restrictions on Al-Qaeda video messages by saying they were the best judges of what may be put to air, not state officials directly implicated in targeting Al-Qaeda. The Taliban increasingly rely on foreign forces loyal to Osama bin Laden, who come from Pakistan, the Wast Asia and elsewhere, The Wall Street journal said in a dispatch from Islamabad. “The foreign forces — mostly Arabs, Chechens and Uzbeks — are estimated at about 5,000 men. Though a fraction of the Taliban’s 40,000 fighters, foreign forces appear to form the backbone of Taliban strength,” it said. Their goals include partitioning and establishing Muslim majority states in any area of the world where there is a Muslim majority — whether it is Kashmir or Bosnia, Kosovo or part of Macedonia, Chechnya or Sinkiang.
AFP, PTI |
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Bush may ask Musharraf
for troops Washington, November 8 The News has reported in Thursday’s edition that the USA was a bit concerned over the composition of the coalition forces as it was dominated by White and Christian soldiers. The report believed that the idea was to add troops from some Islamic countries, even if it was symbolic, to avoid any misgivings about clash of ideologies. The Bush administration was more keen on Pakistani troops joining the coalition even though Turkey had already pledged its troops. The report claims the U S government believed that the representation of Islamabad had more symbolic and political value. Fearing the backlash by the Islamist parties, Pakistan had initially agreed only for moral and some logistic support from some of its bases for emergency and relief measures. However, it is significant to note that Islamabad has shown flexibility about the usage of its territory by US troops.
ANI |
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US vote on ‘radio free Afghanistan’ Washington, November 8 The U.S. House of Representatives has passed legislation to create a radio free Afghanistan to broadcast news and information to Afghans in their local languages. The idea is to inform Afghans about their Taliban rulers and explain the goals of the U.S.-led anti terrorism campaign. The legislation, which the Senate is yet to take up, authorizes $27 million during the next two years for radio transmissions into Afghanistan. It would fund 12 hours of broadcasting a day, six hours each in Pashtu and Dari.
IANS |
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Subduing Taliban ‘no easy task’ Washington, November 8 The experts spoke yesterday to Reuters as the Taliban’s battle-hardened military and Al-Qaeda guerillas of fugitive Osama bin Laden remained entrenched and defiant, raising key questions about the war against terrorism in that rugged country. How and when will the Taliban go, and at what cost? Despite statements from Pentagon officials that anti-Taliban Northern Alliance forces were making some progress with support from US bombs and special forces troops, the private analysts said Washington’s dependence on the opposition force was misplaced. “To expect the Northern Alliance to sweep through Afghanistan is daft. They have never been a credible military force,” said Charles Heyman, Editor of Jane’s World Armies in London. With weapons ranging from $ 1 million ship-fired cruise missiles to Napalm-like 6,800 kg “daisy cutter” bombs, US and British forces have since October 7 raked Taliban military targets and hide-out tunnels and caves of Al-Qaeda leaders. More than 2,000 bombing missions have been flown, some accidentally killing civilians. But with the icy winter settling in, Bin Laden remains at large and the fundamentalist Muslin Taliban — who once defeated the Soviet Union — are jeering at the US military to come and get them. Ivo Daalder of the Brookings Institution in Washington agreed with Pentagon officials that an air campaign alone would not win the war. But defence officials have repeatedly refused to speculate about any major use of US troops. “The Northern Alliance is a very fragile reed to pin your hopes on,” said Larry Korb, a former Assistant Defence Secretary, now with the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. “It is clear that we have over-estimated the Northern Alliance and under-estimated the Taliban,” he said.
Reuters |
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Stop attacks: Pervez Paris, November 8 He said he would ask US President George W. Bush to suspend the bombing during the Muslim holy month of Ramzan, which starts in mid-November. Continuing the campaign during Ramzan would cause trouble throughout the Muslim world, he said. “It is being perceived in the whole world...as if this were a war against the poor, miserable and innocent people of Afghanistan,” General Musharraf told a news conference after talks with French leaders in Paris. General Musharraf was due to travel to London for talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair later today and from there to the USA to meet Mr Bush on the fringes of the UN General Assembly. President Jacques Chirac told him at a dinner at the Elysee Palace on Wednesday that France would support “a generous treatment for Pakistan’s debt” in the Paris Club group of Western creditors. General Musharraf also met French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin today.
Reuters |
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Indian charged on anthrax hoax New York, November 8 Nixon B. Saldanha approached a member of the National Guard outside New York’s Grand Central Station on Saturday, showing him two suspicious letters he claimed he had found atop a telephone booth, the US attorney’s office said in a statement yesterday. However, Saldanha later told the police that he had decided to get himself arrested so he could be deported back to India.
AFP |
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Nepal sets 185 prisoners free Kathmandu, November 8 The constitution was adopted on November 8, 1990, after a popular movement against absolute monarchy led to the restoration of democracy. The king became a constitutional head. King Gyanendra, in his message on the occasion, underscored the political uncertainty facing Nepal.
AP |
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US
President George W. Bush announced that the USA had closed the
offices of two "terror-supporting financial networks"
with links to Osama bin Laden in four US states.
(
Qatar-based
Al Jazeera Television has broadcast pictures of what it claims
are sons of Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden inside Afghanistan.
