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December 31, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
ZNet: Barack Obama is the leader of a contemporary Oceania. In two speeches at the close of the decade, the Nobel Peace Prize winner affirmed that peace was no longer peace, but rather a permanent war that "extends well beyond Afghanistan and Pakistan" to "disorderly regions and diffuse enemies". He called this "global security" and invited our gratitude. To the people of Afghanistan, which America has invaded and occupied, he said wittily: "We have no interest in occupying your country." Full news...
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December 30, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Digital Journal: A recent telephone survey suggests that 66 per cent of Canadians believe the military build-up in Afghanistan will not defeat the Taliban, while only 34 per cent think the war in Afghanistan can be won. As the war in Afghanistan enters its ninth year and still continues, violence going up and military presence increases, majority of Canadians believe that it’s pointless because it’s unwinnable. Full news...
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December 29, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Four civilians have reportedly been killed and eight others wounded in a fresh air strike by foreign forces in northern Baghlan province, residents alleged on Tuesday. The overnight attack took place in Kohna Qala area of Baghlan-i-Markazi district, residents told Pajhwok Afghan News. The fresh air raid came about three days after 10 civilians were killed during military operations in eastern Kunar province. Full news...
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December 28, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
BBC News: At least 10 Afghan civilians, including eight schoolchildren, have been killed in fighting involving Western troops, President Hamid Karzai has said. Kunar governor Sayed Fazlullah Wahedi told the Reuters news agency officials could not visit the area "because of the presence of the Taliban". Full news...
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December 28, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Xinhua: With the death of a U.S. soldier on Saturday, U.S. military fatalities in Afghanistan this year have increased to exactly twice of those in the previous year, according to statistics released by an independent website on Monday. The killed soldier raised the U.S. death toll in Afghanistan this year to 310, while 155 U.S. soldiers were killed in the same country last year. Full news...
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December 28, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN (Translated by RAWA): Workers in the Human Rights Commission of Daikundi Province say that a woman was ousted from her home due to the violence by her husband and died outside on the way. Hassan Ali Faiz, director of the Human Rights Commission of Daikundi Province told PAN that the incident had occurred on the night of 10th Muharram (Dec. 28) in the Ishtarli District. Full news...
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December 27, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
New York Times: Capt. Margaret H. White began a relationship with a warrant officer while both were training to be deployed to Iraq. By the time they arrived this year at Camp Taji, north of here, she felt what she called “creepy vibes” and tried to break it off. In the claustrophobic confines of a combat post, it was not easy to do. He left notes on the door to her quarters, alternately pleading and menacing. He forced her to have sex, she said. Full news...
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December 27, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
DPA: Aid organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) released Monday its list of the ten worst global humanitarian crises for 2009, with places like Somalia, Yemen and Afghanistan making the grouping, along with failing efforts to fight malnutrition and HIV/AIDS. Full news...
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December 26, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Al-Jazeera: The call for over 30,000 more troops to be sent to Afghanistan is a travesty for the people of that country who have already suffered eight brutal years of occupation. Many from within the ranks are openly declaring that they have had enough, allying with anti-war veterans and activists in calling for an end to the US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with some active duty soldiers publicly refusing to deploy. Full news...
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December 24, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Residents in the southeastern Khost province claimed that some people arrested from a village by foreign and local troops during an operation have been killed. However, the security officials rejected the claim as baseless. Locals said the troops raided some houses in Molai village of Sabri district and arrested some people who were later killed in custody. They said bodies of two of the arrested people were found in Salarno area on Thursday morning. Full news...
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December 24, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
AP: The State Department's internal watchdog on Wednesday criticized the agency's nearly $2 billion anti-drug effort in Afghanistan for poor oversight and lack of a long-term strategy. The department's inspector general said the Afghanistan counter-narcotics program is hampered by too few personnel and rampant corruption among Afghan officials. Full news...
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December 23, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Xinhua: "I have little hope to return home safe and sound in the evening," the nine-year-old Rahmat Khan said. Selling shopping bags in a dusty bazaar along Kabul river to support his five-member family, Khan said that he and his elder brother both earn between 150 Afghanis (3 U.S. dollars) to 250 Afghanis (5 U.S. dollars) daily. His elder brother washes cars in the afternoon and attends school in the morning. Full news...
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December 23, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Times: When Afghan killers burst into a 12-year-old girl’s bedroom and shot her brother at close range it barely warranted an investigation. Police said that no one reported the crime. Were it not that the pair were President Karzai’s cousins — and that the murder had all the hallmarks of a revenge killing connected to a Karzai dynasty feud — the shooting would in all likelihood have languished as little more than a footnote in Kandahar’s long catalogue of violence. Full news...
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December 22, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
BBC News: A senior US diplomat who resigned over the war in Afghanistan has told the BBC that the troop surge there "will not make a difference". Matthew Hoh stepped down from his position in the US state department in October 2009. He told BBC Radio 4 that a political solution was needed to what he called a "35-year-old civil war". Matthew Hoh's resignation was described by one leading American newspaper as having sent "ripples all the way to the White House". Full news...
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December 22, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
WSWS: Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai announced his second-term cabinet last Saturday, retaining roughly half of his incumbent ministers, including those with the closest ties to Washington. Also included in the lineup are figures tied to Afghan warlords who helped him rig the presidential election last August. Full news...
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December 21, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
CNSNews.com: A majority of Americans believe an increased government role in health care would lead to more government corruption, while a plurality of Americans think that scientific data supporting man-made global warming is “mostly falsified.” That is what a new poll by Survey USA reveals. The poll also shows that 58 percent of Americans believe that decisions by the Obama administration have been “bad for America,” as opposed to 37 percent who think Obama’s decisions have been “good for America.” Full news...
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December 21, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Xinhua: Corruption and insecurity remained the big challenges for UN aid agencies to reach vulnerable and needy Afghans in the war-torn country, a UN official said Monday. "Insecurity and corruption are increasing the cost of our ability to deliver and transport goods and service to the needy people," Wael Haj-Ibrahim, head of United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told a press conference here. Full news...
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December 21, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Associated Press: While international forces in Afghanistan battle militants hiding in the mountains, aid agencies are fighting an even more elusive enemy: malnutrition. The World Food Program and UNICEF have launched a project to feed thousands of mothers and children — some too weak to cry. Aid workers hope a high-protein diet distributed through a network of village clinics can help them through the winter. Full news...
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December 18, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
CNN: In the Afghan capital's department of motor vehicles, the simple act of registering a car can turn into days, even weeks, of waiting and frustration. Unless you pay off the right people. Mohammad Zarif Formolly had been waiting for a month to obtain documentation for his vehicle. Another man, who identified himself only as Jamaludin, traveled 50 miles from Logar province and had been waiting for three days. Full news...
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December 18, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
AFP: A NATO air strike against suspected militants in troubled southern Afghanistan killed three civilians and wounded one other, local government and hospital officials said Friday. "Three male civilians have been killed and a woman has been wounded as a result of this attack," a statement read. Full news...
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December 18, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Washington Post: Federal auditors have identified more than $950 million in "questioned and unsupported" costs submitted by Defense Department contractors. The figure excludes potential waste from contracts with other departments or agencies, such as USAID. The following are some of the cases of waste, fraud and abuse: Full news...
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December 17, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
IWPR: Baz Mohammad, a shopkeeper in the Charbolak district of Balkh province, is a worried man. Security in this formerly stable province is becoming increasingly fragile, and he is concerned that fighting could break out.... Balkh has become more and more unstable since the results of the elections were announced in October. Karzai was declared the winner, and Atta’s position has come under question. Full news...
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December 17, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Associated Press: A U.S. government watchdog says the organization created to spearhead Afghanistan's battle against corruption has too little authority, independence and personnel to be effective. In an audit released Wednesday, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction says the leaders of the country's High Office of Oversight have conflicts of interest because they also serve as advisers to President Hamid Karzai. Full news...
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December 17, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: The President spoke at length about the bribes ordinary Afghans are forced to pay and rebuked officials who "after one or two years work for the government, get rich and buy houses in Dubai." However, he also cast doubt on the biggest anti-corruption conviction his prosecutors have achieved in years. Full news...
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December 17, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Telegraph: Karl Eikenberry, a former commanding general in Afghanistan, said parts of the regime had transcended sectarian divisions within Islam to provide support for fundamentalist groups fighting Western forces in Afghanistan. "Iran or elements within Iran have provided training assistance and some weapons to the Taliban," said Mr Eikenberry. Full news...
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December 15, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
AFP: A suicide bomber struck an upmarket district of the Afghan capital Kabul on Tuesday near a hotel and guest house frequented by foreigners, killing eight people and wounding another 40, officials said. The attacker blew himself up outside the gate of the Heetal hotel in the Wazir Akbar Khan district, near a guest house and the home of Afghanistan's former first vice president Ahmad Zia Massoud. Full news...
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December 14, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
RFE/RL: When Kabul's mayor was sentenced to four years in prison on corruption charges this week, officials were quick to paint the sentencing as evidence of the "serious steps" being taken to eliminate graft and bribery in Afghanistan. Deputy Attorney General Fazal Ahmad Faqiryar, speaking to RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan after the December 7 verdict, said that the case of Mayor Abdul Ahad Sahebi showed the "positive effects on society" that would result from the government's efforts to fight corruption. Full news...
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December 14, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Toronto Star: A former governor of Kandahar who is accused of personally torturing Afghans might have been removed from office as far back as 2006 if Canadian officials hadn't defended him, according to diplomatic memos that have never been made public by the Canadian government. The revelation about Asadullah Khalid opens up another embarrassing avenue of inquiry over Afghan prisoner abuse. Full news...
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December 13, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
CounterPunch: So Mr. Obama is getting ready to surge-again-in Afghanistan partly to fight opium trafficking. But an important report just released by the World Health Organization entitled The Global Tobacco Epidemic shows that Obama cannot possibly be waging a “war on drugs”-or else he would direct his attention towards tobacco executives and away from the Taliban. Full news...
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December 12, 2009 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: NATO forces have allegedly killed two civilians after arresting them in Alisher district of restive southeastern Khost province, relatives and officials said on Saturday. A relative of the victims named Ismail told PAN Nadeem and Noor Wazir were riding a motorcycle when NATO forces intercepted them near capital city late Friday afternoon. Full news...