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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: maceng2 who wrote (11523)	11/25/2001 11:07:06 AM
From: maceng2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Northern alliance commander says Kunduz captured A Northern Alliance commander says the city of Kunduz has finally been captured. Mohammed Daoud says the capture came at midday. "All of Kunduz is in our control," he said by satellite telephone. He said Taliban forces were in retreat toward Chardara, west of Kunduz, and Northern Alliance troops were pursuing them ananova.com

To: maceng2 who wrote (11523)	11/25/2001 11:30:37 AM
From: maceng2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Mazar-i-Sharif Prison Riot A battle has been raging between Northern Alliance troops and captured foreign fighters in a prison in the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, leaving many dead and wounded on both sides. Hundreds of foreign fighters who had surrendered during the siege of the northern city of Kunduz reportedly grabbed guns from their captors and started an uprising. They had been taken to the fort at Mazar-i-Sharif on Saturday after giving themselves up to Northern Alliance commander General Abdul Rashid Dostum, whose headquarters are located there. It is as yet unclear whether his forces have been able to contain the riot. Foreign fighters, who include an unknown number of Arabs, Pakistanis and Chechens, have been beaten or killed when territory has fallen to the opposition in the course of the current war. But on Sunday, ousted Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbini promised that his forces would spare foreigners, and suggested they might be handed over to the United Nations for repatriation. news.bbc.co.uk

To: maceng2 who wrote (11523)	11/25/2001 11:52:18 AM
From: maceng2	Respond to of 281500

WFP: "52,000 tonnes of supplies needed each month" Dangers hamper Afghan aid effort [Note from pb: Nice map in link] news.bbc.co.uk Parts of Afghanistan are still too dangerous for the international aid effort to be fully effective, a senior United Nations official has warned. UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers made the comment as relief efforts were stepped up to assist the huge number of refugees scattered around the country. Mr Lubbers said that, although thousands of people in the north-west had begun to return home voluntarily, in some cities up to half the population had fled. He welcomed the fact that more aid was beginning to arrive, but warned it was not enough to meet the desperate need. "Much food and other things were brought in earlier, but it is still not at all a secure environment," he said. "Although our international staff went back to Kabul and hope to go back to the other places, one cannot say it is safe in the country and secure enough. "So there is quite a job to be done in creating a secure environment. " On Saturday, a convoy of supplies from the World Food Programme (WFP) arrived in Kabul - but only after the unarmed drivers had been robbed of their personal possessions along the route. The convoy of 47 lorries was ambushed by bandits during its journey from Peshawar in northern Pakistan. Protection plea The WFP says it needs to deliver about 52,000 tonnes of supplies each month if it is to reach the most needy. Calls for a UN-backed multi-national force to protect aid convoys have so far received a cool response. On Thursday, the UN agency's trucks were robbed near Sarobi. And UN premises in Jalalabad and Mazar-e-Shariff were also looted last week. Meanwhile, in northern Afghanistan, a convoy from the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) completed the four-day journey from neighbouring Turkmenistan to the city of Mazar-e-Sharif. The 59 trucks took 1,500 tonnes of aid for distribution to 65,000 people in and around the city. This included food and blankets plus medical supplies for hospital treating the war wounded. On Friday, the WFP carried out its first airlift of food aid to Afghanistan since 11 September. The agency said it would fly four times a day from neighbouring Tajikistan, carrying food aid to the mountainous north-east of Afghanistan to feed those stranded in isolated villages. The deputy UN coordinator for Afghanistan, Antonio Donini, said the UN was trying to expand the presence of its international staff, but was first checking security had been restored. The UN says it is carrying out security assessments in Kabul, Faizabad and Mazar-e-Sharif, with one due to take place in Herat shortly. Mr Donini said the overall situation in Mazar-e-Sharif was still fragile, but there was a sense that it was improving. He described the humanitarian situation in northern Afghanistan as a crisis of stunning proportions. It was a race against time and said all corridors for delivering aid would be used as they became available.

To: maceng2 who wrote (11523)	11/25/2001 11:59:21 AM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

re the argument ...That Tony Blair and George Bush have made a MASSIVE mistake. It would have been better not to attack the Taliban at all, and use their infrastructure to distribute food to the starving Afghans. What simply amazes me is that these people, having argued that it would take YEARS to dislodge the Taliban, seem unfazed by developments in Afghanistan. Turns out that the Taliban was deeply unpopular and it's going to take only WEEKS to dislodge them -- do the critics even acknowledge that they were wrong? No way. Furthermore, their humanitarian arguments were equally bogus; now that the NA holds the ground, aid agencies are going to be able to feed the hungry this winter, something that the Taliban never really permitted. You'd think the critics would be happy about this. But no. Now they just say, well the war wasn't a quagmire, but the nation-building will be, so there. Small reminder: Nation-building wasn't our aim (though we need to do it). Removing the Taliban and Al Quaeda from power was, and we've done it.

To: maceng2 who wrote (11523)	11/25/2001 12:42:17 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

It would have been better not to attack the Taliban at all, and use their infrastructure to distribute food to the starving Afghans. Y'know what's funny? George Patton made the same recommendations in the immediate post-war Germany. There was a complete de-nazification policy that he was unwilling to implement since the former Nazi administrators knew how to keep the government running and make the trains run on time. He was relieved of his command for that... (Well, comparing the Nazis to the Republicans and Democrats might have worked against him as well... :0) And now we have some segments of Britain claiming we should use those who have oppressed the rest of the people to distribute our food aid... The substance makes sense... but the political angle is pretty tough to swallow. What we're going to see here is the UN displaying its complete lack of credibility as an world political institution. Hawk