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September 25, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Wall Street Journal: President Hamid Karzai's government is taking a series of steps to chip away at the country's media freedoms, one of Afghanistan's few success stories since the Taliban regime's downfall nine years ago. In the past week, the government ordered the shutdown of Benawa.com, a popular Pashtu-language news website, following requests by the first vice president, Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim. It is also moving to outlaw another widely followed muckraking journalism site, Tolafghan.com. Full news...
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September 25, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Protestors in eastern Laghman province said on Saturday civilians were also among 30 people killed in an ongoing coalition operation in the Alishang district. More than 250 Afghan army, police and coalition personnel conducted the air assault in the Alishang district on Friday after they came under small arms fire, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said. Full news...
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September 25, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
McClatchy Newspapers: Last year, Kabul-based artist Aman Mojadidi transformed himself into an Afghan policeman and set up a fake checkpoint where he searched cars and then offered drivers $2, along with an apology for any bribes they had been forced to pay to policemen in the past. This fall, Mojadidi’s latest incarnation, the Jihadi Gangster took his bling, his gold-plated guns, and his bravado on the campaign trail to run for parliament. Full news...
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September 24, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Foreign Policy: On Thursday nights, when Afghan Star, a popular American Idol-like talent show, is on TV, the streets of Kabul are noticeably quieter. Even in a land torn apart by fighting and where people consume less energy per person than in any other country, somehow 65 local television stations still manage to beam programming to captivated viewers in Afghanistan's larger cities. Full news...
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September 23, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Xinhua: Two bomb blasts in a span of few minutes in Jalalabad city, the capital of Afghanistan's eastern Nangarhar province, Wednesday night left 19 people injured, provincial administration spokesman said Thursday. Full news...
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September 23, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: A senior police official said on Thursday 64 people were killed and dozens others injured during Saturday's parliamentary election in the north. Commander of 303rd Pamir Police Headquarters, Gen. Daud Daud, told a press conference the casualties happened in a string of incidents in the north, a relatively peaceful part of the war-torn country. Full news...
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September 23, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: The voter turnout in Saturday's parliamentary elections was 50 percent lower than the 2004 ballot when 8.5 million people exercised their franchise right, an official said on Thursday. About 4.5 million people took part in parliamentary polls, showing exactly a 50 percent decrease in the turnout, said Muhammad Fahim Hakim, who served as a member of the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) in last year's presidential poll. Full news...
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September 23, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
McClatchy Newspapers: Internal reports from Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission on Tuesday provide new evidence of serious fraud in Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections, including turnouts that exceeded 100 percent in many southeastern districts under the control of the Taliban or other militants. One district in Paktika province recorded 626 percent voter turnout, according to reports obtained by McClatchy Newspapers. Full news...
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September 22, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Nation: A significant number of unregistered Afghan voters, mostly the refugees, who had moved to Afghanistan from Pakistan were used by Afghan government to cast votes in favour of government-backed electoral candidates, TheNation has learnt. Full news...
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September 21, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
AFP: Afghanistan’s electoral watchdog said on Tuesday it has received over 3,000 complaints about irregularities in the run-up to Saturday’s parliamentary election and on polling day itself. The Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) said 1,388 complaints had been received specifically about election day irregularities -- which could impact the results -- ahead of a 4 pm (1130 GMT deadline) deadline for submissions. Full news...
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September 21, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Associated Press: Several warlords supported candidates in Afghanistan's parliamentary elections last weekend, and observers allege they engaged in widespread intimidation and vote-buying. While analysts say it's important to give such groups a way into the mainstream, they suspect warlords will use Parliament seats to consolidate control over certain regions – setting the stage for more violence and possibly even civil war when international forces eventually depart. Full news...
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September 20, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Australian: AFGHANISTAN'S weekend parliamentary election was a seller's market for voters who hawked their support around candidates' offices looking for the highest bidder, according to observers. Details of a thriving voter blackmarket emerged yesterday, along with more allegations of ballot-box stuffing and vote fraud. About 2500 candidates stood for 249 lower house seats. In Kabul, 664 candidates vied for just 33 seats. Full news...
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September 20, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Coalition troops arrested a journalist working for an international news agency during a raid on his residence in southern Ghazni province, Afghan officials and NATO said on Monday. Rahmatullah Nekzad, working for the Al-Jazeera Television channel and Associated Press (AP), was arrested by the joint assault force in Ghazni City, the provincial capital, late Sunday night. Full news...
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September 20, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: In what was billed as a tactical realignment of foreign troops, British forces officially transferred the security responsibility to US marines in the Sangin district of southern Helmand province, NATO said on Monday. The district chief, Muhammad Sharif, was quoted as saying: "The attitude, service and sacrifice paid by the Royal Marines has been exemplary and has set a very good example for the people of Sangin." Full news...
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September 19, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: Eight Afghan children were killed today while playing with an unexploded rocket in a village in northern Kunduz Province. Ali Abad district chief Habibullah Mohtashim said seven died on the spot and the eighth while he was being taken for treatment. Full news...
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September 19, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Press TV: US-led forces have killed at least six civilians and wounded several others in two separate incidents in Afghanistan's troubled east. Five people were killed during a US-led military assault in Nangarhar Province. In Laghman Province, an elderly woman died during an operation by American forces and her offspring was wounded in the attack. Full news...
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September 19, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Press TV: A U.S. airstrike has reportedly left 70 people dead in southeastern Afghanistan as the war-ravaged country votes to elect a new parliament. According to Afghan officials, the incident took place in province of Paktia on Saturday when a Taliban convoy came under attack. Provincial officials say the victims were all militants, however, locals and eyewitnesses say the attack claimed civilian casualties. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
BBC News: It was not the most auspicious start. Twenty minutes past the 0700 (0230 GMT) opening time, and the polling station in eastern Kabul still had not opened. But then the small line of voters were allowed in, each was searched and their voting card inspected; Afghanistan's parliamentary elections were under way. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: Taliban militants have blocked highways in several districts of southern Ghazni province ahead of Saturday's parliamentary election, residents said on Friday. However, officials rejected the claim. "Armed insurgents are patrolling major highways, stopping cars and motorcycles, telling people not to go to polling stations," said Ghulam Farid, a resident of the Qarabagh district. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Washington Post: Insurgents have kidnapped a parliamentary candidate and at least 18 election workers, Afghan officials said Friday, raising fears on the eve of an election that has emerged as a test of wills between the Afghan government and the Taliban. Insurgent leaders have urged voters to refrain from voting in Saturday's election, the third major vote in Afghanistan’s short and troubled history as a democracy. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Reuters: Some Afghan voters scrubbed their fingers clean of supposedly indelible ink on Saturday in a bid to return to cast extra votes in a parliamentary election the government has acknowledged will be flawed. An ink-stained fingertip is meant to mark out those who have already cast ballots in the second parliamentary election since the fall of the Taliban government in 2001. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
PAN: About 15 people were killed and nearly 40 wounded in various violence-related incidents in different provinces of the country on Saturday, officials said. Eight people were wounded in separate attacks and a clash between supporters of two candidates in eastern Nangarhar province Saturday morning. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
wsws.org: Today’s elections in Afghanistan for the 249-seat Wolesi Jirga, or lower house of parliament, are a travesty of democracy. The poll further discredits the puppet regime of President Hamid Karzai, who was re-elected last year on the basis of widespread fraud. The election takes place under the shadow of the Obama administration’s military “surge,” which has increased the number of foreign troops in the country to more than 140,000. Full news...
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September 18, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Washington Post: The U.S. soldiers hatched a plan as simple as it was savage: to randomly target and kill an Afghan civilian, and to get away with it. For weeks, according to Army charging documents, rogue members of a platoon from the 5th Stryker Combat Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, floated the idea. Then, one day last winter, a solitary Afghan man approached them in the village of La Mohammed Kalay. Full news...
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September 17, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Huffington Post: President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan is getting on everyone's nerves in the US and Afghanistan over the endemic corruption in his government. Despite promising a tougher anticorruption fight, Mr Karzai continues to protect officials from his inner circle and his family members by helping them hold on to ill-gotten wealth and transfer hundreds of millions of dollars every month outside the country. Full news...
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September 17, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Independent: Often characterised as valiant crusaders defying Afghanistan's chauvinistic culture, many female candidates standing in tomorrow's parliamentary elections may in fact be just the opposite: proxies doing a warlord's bidding. Women's rights campaigners in Kabul claim that the majority of a record number of female candidates in the vote – a contest widely expected to be marred by bloodshed and fraud – have little interest in advancing their own political agendas or promoting women's and human rights. Full news...
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September 17, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
The Sydney Morning Herald: THE United Nations has ordered 300 of its international staff out of Afghanistan and the British commander of foreign troops in the south of the country predicts mayhem as violence and corruption collide as 13 million Afghan voters attempt to elect a new national parliament today. Full news...
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September 16, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
RFE/RL: On the streets of Kabul, it is never difficult to find people angry about the notorious level of corruption in the country. Like Haroon Yakobi, who owns a small photo shop. Asked if he will vote only for a candidate who will fight corruption, he says: "Yes, of course, all the people of Afghanistan should pay attention to the fact that our last five years have been in misery. Full news...
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September 16, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
McClatchy Newspapers: The man who directed the onslaught, according to residents and human rights groups, was Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf, an Islamist member of parliament’s lower house who’s close to U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai. He’s running for re-election from Kabul, and analysts say he could be the next speaker of the lower house. Sayyaf is among a raft of former guerrilla chieftains and commanders implicated in war crimes who are likely to win re-election Saturday to the 249-seat Wolesi Jirga in polls that are expected to be marred by coercion, fraud and violence. Full news...
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September 15, 2010 :: RSS :: Print :: Email
Monsters and Critics: Baraki Barak, Afghanistan - About 3,000 people including government officials and police were about to begin a prayer when a man shouted that he had an important message to deliver. The crowd had gathered Friday on Eid al-Fitr, a day of festivities that follows the fasting month of Ramadan, but instead they heard a message from the Taliban as the young man moved to the microphone. Full news...
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