Posted on 10/24/2003 8:41:51 PM PDT by TexKat
KABUL, Afghanistan - Attackers fired rockets and machine guns at a pickup truck ferrying passengers to a northern Afghan town, killing 10 people including two children, a local commander said Friday.
The passengers were riding in the vehicle from Samangan city when they were ambushed in Shamar in Samangan province, said Ahmad Khan, a local commander under Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, the Uzbek warlord who is a major force in the north.
Khan said the pickup had likely been targeted because the attackers suspected an important commander was riding in the truck.
An estimated 12 attackers fired rockets, Kalashnikovs and heavy machine guns at the vehicle, killing the two children, three women and five men, Khan said. One other passenger was injured, he said.
Northern Afghanistan was the scene this month of heavy fighting between Dostum's forces and fighters from rival Tajik warlord Gen. Atta Mohammed, in some of the worst recent factional violence. A tenuous cease-fire was declared, but reports of tension persist in the region where the central Kabul government holds limited influence.
No burka for me baby!!!
Miss Afghanistan Vida Samadzai leads other Miss Earth candidates during a press preview in Manila October 23, 2003. Samadzai is among contestants from 60 countries vying for the Miss Earth title in the final next month. REUTERS/Erik de Castro
Oh the islamist fanatics are going to wipe us off the face of the earth now.
By JONATHAN EWING, Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS - Increasing terrorist attacks and infiltration from neighboring Pakistan by suspected Taliban and al-Qaida are significant obstacles to reconstruction in Afghanistan, a top U.N. official said Friday.
The worsening security situation, which also includes an increase in factional fighting in parts of the country, comes as Afghanistan prepares for its first democratic elections in decades, scheduled for June.
"In several border districts, Taliban have been able to establish de facto control over district administration," U.N. Undersecretary-General for Peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno told the Security Council.
In recent weeks, Taliban rebels near those areas have stepped up attacks against government troops, aid workers and U.S.-led coalition forces.
As a result, U.N. missions were temporarily suspended in Nimroz, Helmund, Uruzgan and Zabul provinces, he said. In Kandahar, armed escorts are required in the four districts of Ghorak, Maywand, Spin Boldak and Kharkez.
But Guehenno also warned against blaming all attacks on the Taliban.
Nearly two years have passed since the ouster of the Taliban regime, and the Afghan government in Kabul has little authority outside of the capital, much of which is ruled by warlords and their private militias.
"Caution must be exercised against attributing all significant incidents to Taliban forces, as there other non-Taliban forces that benefit from instability, including narcotics traffickers."
Earlier this week the commander of the 5,000-strong NATO -led International Security Assistance Force in Kabul said well-trained terrorists from Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the Russian republic of Chechnya, have made their way to Afghanistan.
They are "excellently trained and ... they also have improved technique at hand," Lt. Gen. Goetz Gliemeroth said Wednesday. He said it was unclear if the terrorists were working in tandem with a particular group.
The German general said their intention was to bring the international terrorist campaign to Afghanistan.
ISAF currently is confined to Kabul but the U.N. Security Council last week voted unanimously to allow the 31-country force to fan out to key cities in some of Afghanistan's most lawless provinces, where feuding warlords hold power.
Separately, an 11,500-member U.S.-led fighting coalition is in the country hunting down al-Qaida fugitives and remnants of Taliban insurgents.
The Afghan government has, however, made some progress toward addressing the causes of insecurity. First among them was the reform of the defense ministry.
In September, Afghan President Hamid Karzai approved a reshuffle in the ministry, viewed as a crucial step toward disarming powerful warlords and building a viable national army that is expected to eventually fill the gap left by the militia fighters.
"The appointment of these individuals, has gone some way toward a better representation of the full ethnic and geographic diversity of Afghanistan," Guehenno said. It "should bring a level of professionalism and accountability to a state institution largely seen as above the law."
Many of the warring factions were members of the northern alliance, which helped U.S.-led forces to topple the hardline Taliban regime in late 2001. But the loose coalition of warlords, while nominally loyal to Karzai, remain split along factional and ethnic lines.
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