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ashraf ghani
'An Insult to All Afghans': Kabul Outraged After Trump Floats Plan to Kill Millions, Wipe Afghanistan Off Face of the Earth
The U.S. president said he has not acted on the plan because he doesn't "want to kill 10 million people"
Jul 23, 2019
Kabul reacted with outrage and demanded clarification Tuesday after U.S. President Donald Trump said he has military plans that could wipe Afghanistan "off the face of the Earth," killing millions of people.
Following Trump's remarks, the office of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said in a statement that Afghanistan "will never allow any foreign power to determine its fate."
"While the Afghan government supports the U.S. efforts for ensuring peace in Afghanistan," the statement read, "the government underscores that foreign heads of state cannot determine Afghanistan's fate in absence of the Afghan leadership."
Trump's comments came during a meeting in the Oval Office Monday with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan.
"We're not fighting a war," Trump said of the U.S.-led conflict that has lasted nearly 18 years, the longest war in American history. "If we wanted to fight a war in Afghanistan and win it, I could win that war in a week. I just don't want to kill 10 million people."
"I have plans on Afghanistan that, if I wanted to win that war, Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth. It would be gone," the president added. "It would be over in, literally, in 10 days. And I don't want to do that--I don't want to go that route."
Watch:
\u201cWATCH: President Trump says that he could win the 18-year Afghan War in 10 days, because he has plans that could wipe Afghanistan off the face of the Earth and kill 10,000,000 people, but "I don't want to go that route."\u201d— MSNBC (@MSNBC) 1563817413
The Afghan public expressed revulsion at Trump's remarks, which came as U.S. envoy to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalizad arrived in the Middle East for talks with the Taliban.
Shakib Noori, an entrepreneur based in Kabul, toldReuters that Trump's comments were "embarrassing and an insult to all Afghans."
Afghan-American author Khaled Hosseini expressed a similar sentiment, calling Trump's statement "reckless" and "appalling."
Rahmatullah Nabil, former Afghan intelligence chief and presidential candidate, slammed Trump on Twitter.
"Your insulting message to [Afghanistan]," Nabil wrote, "is either accept the [Pakistan] proposal for peace or eventually you may have to use nukes."
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Peace Is a Word That the West Has Taken From the Afghans
With no end of war in sight, this past year has been the deadliest year for civilians since the United States first began to bomb Afghanistan in 2001
Jun 11, 2019
It's difficult to explain the nature of the Afghanistan peace talks. There is no single table with the combatants arrayed on either side. Talks are not even taking place in the same city, since there are at least two sets of discussions ongoing. One location for the peace talks is Doha, Qatar, where the Taliban is meeting with the U.S. government. The other location is Moscow, Russia, where the Taliban has been holding meetings with Afghan opposition leaders--including the former president Hamid Karzai. Absent from both meetings is the incumbent President Ashraf Ghani and his government. The Taliban sees them as illegitimate and irrelevant. Everyone--except President Ghani--says that the talks have made "progress." But seasoned diplomats say that this "progress" is far too slow for a war that has now lasted 18 years.
Qatar
Between February and March of this year, U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar met during the fifth round of peace talks. The Taliban says that there can be no peace unless all foreign forces withdraw from the country. On a practical level, the withdrawal of the 15,000 foreign--mostly U.S.--troops will deliver the country to the hands of the Taliban.
Last week, Taliban forces struck the Afghan government's troops across the country. Each spring, since 2002, the Taliban and its allies have left their mountain hideouts to conduct guerrilla and conventional attacks on U.S., NATO and Afghan government forces. The epicenter of these attacks has been in Afghanistan's southeast--Ghazni and Helmand provinces in particular--as well as in the western province of Ghor. Fierce fighting in these areas came alongside suicide attacks in Kabul.
Two changes in U.S. policy suggest that the U.S. government knows that the game is up in Afghanistan. In October 2017, the United States stopped counting casualties for Afghan security forces. This year, the U.S. government has stopped measuring how much territory and how much of the Afghan population is under government control. The last U.S. study showed that the Afghan government controlled territory in which about 63.5 percent of the population lived, while the rest was in Taliban hands or remained contested. All signs show that the balance is shifting, with the Taliban taking control of more territory. This is why the U.S. government has stopped its tally.
It is likely that whether the U.S. troops remain or go, the Taliban will soon have control of key districts--including access roads out of landlocked Afghanistan. If a deal is reached in Qatar to have the U.S. forces withdraw, the Taliban will eventually take Kabul.
Moscow
Having made his call for the withdrawal of foreign forces in Qatar, Baradar went to Moscow for the Russia-backed peace talks. Here the Taliban co-founder found a willing ear in Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Both affirmed the need for the departure of U.S. troops from the country as a precondition for further talks.
Karzai, who has emerged as the leader of a section of Afghanistan's opposition, agreed with this position. Karzai's former interior minister--Mohammad Hanif Atmar--has now said he would run against Ashraf Ghani in September's presidential election. Although Atmar fell out with Karzai about eight years ago, the two men are now said to be close. Atmar favors a full deal with the Taliban, whom he sees as a necessary ally in the Afghan government's fight against ISIS. Ghani, whose term ended on May 22, will face Atmar, who many believe was responsible for Ghani's victory in 2014.
Russia is eager to see an end to the 18-year war in Afghanistan. Threats of insurgency from Afghanistan have long troubled the Central Asian states, which continue to have close ties to Moscow. Chinese ambitions of the Belt and Road Initiative have suffered from the trouble in Afghanistan, which would be key territory not only for rail and road lines but also for the mining of minerals. Pressure from China on Pakistan--a key Chinese ally--will certainly mount. The Taliban is close to Pakistan, which would like to see the Taliban share power in Kabul in order to protect its interests and to sideline India. In June 2017, China and Russia brought both India and Pakistan into the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and one of the group's main mandates is to settle the instability in Afghanistan. Both China and Russia are pushing for a peace deal--even if this means that the Taliban will emerge as a political force in Kabul.
War
The war on Afghanistan has been ugly. Untold numbers of Afghans have died in this conflict, whose aims are not easy to formulate. United Nations figures show that in 2018 the civilian death count was 3,804--with 900 of them being children. This is the deadliest year for civilians since the United States first began to bomb Afghanistan in 2001.
Death is one consequence of war. Starvation is another. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Afghanistan said that half of the population would need food assistance over the course of this year. These 3.3 million people will starve as a result of crop failures and dry irrigation channels. Drought in western Afghanistan sent an additional 275,000 people in search of food, walking across the country, bewildered. Hunger will intensify malnutrition and illness. There is little sign of any help for these people.
All signs point to the desire in the Trump administration to withdraw U.S. troops. The International Criminal Court had tried to open a war crimes investigation on the basis of a preliminary finding that U.S. troops had violated international law in Afghanistan. The Trump administration blocked the investigation. On June 7, however, the ICC's chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda filed a request to continue her work. It appears that Bensouda is unwilling to allow the case to be politically closed down. On the table in Qatar is a side deal from the United States to accept some of the Taliban's demands if the Afghan government that will emerge asks the ICC to withdraw the case.
Many European states have begun to deport Afghan asylum seekers on the grounds that they are not "refugees" but are merely "economic migrants." A Norwegian Refugee Council report from 2018 shows, however, that those deported are forced to flee again. None of this matters to the European states. The rejuvenation of European racism and xenophobia drives the policy. Pressure from Europe to end this war is growing daily. It is likely that this pressure will mount at NATO headquarters, which will have an impact on the timetable for a U.S. withdrawal.
The peace talks in Qatar and Russia will not immediately result in any direct outcome. Afghanistan is damaged beyond belief, its own future less important to the external parties than their own petty gains.
This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.
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'Unprecedented': UN Finds US-Backed Forces Killed More Afghan Civilians Than Taliban and ISIS Did So Far in 2019
"A shocking number of civilians continue to be killed and maimed each day."
Apr 24, 2019
In an "unprecedented" revelation that highlights the consequences of the seemingly endless war in Afghanistan, the United Nations announced Wednesday that U.S.-backed forces killed more Afghan civilians than the Taliban and other armed anti-government groups did in the first three months of this year.
A new quarterly report (pdf) from the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) shows that "pro-government forces," including both Afghan and international troops, killed 305 civilians from January to the end of March.
That compared with 227 civilians killed by "anti-government elements" such as the Taliban and ISIS. There were 49 unattributable deaths, which includes those caught in crossfire.
\u201cUnprecedented: Pro-Afghan govt & int. military forces responsible for more civilian deaths in Q1/2019 in #Afghanistan than Taliban & IS, finds UN Report. Immediate measures needed to halt rising civilian harm from air & search ops. \u2013Read report: https://t.co/WwRueueJqF\u201d— UNAMA News (@UNAMA News) 1556080530
"A shocking number of civilians continue to be killed and maimed each day," Tadamichi Yamamoto, the U.N. secretary-general's special representative for Afghanistan, said in a statement Wednesday.
While encouraging all parties to "do more to safeguard civilians," Yamamoto specifically urged anti-government elements--which injured more civilians in early 2019 than pro-government forces did--to stop targeting civilians, particularly with improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
Yamamoto also called on pro-government forces "to take immediate measures to mitigate the rising death toll and suffering caused by airstrikes and search operations." Such tactics drove an overall increase in civilian casualties (deaths and injuries) from those forces, according to the report.
"In Afghanistan, massive airstrikes, drone operations, and brutal night raids are killing more civilians in these days than any insurgent group does," Emran Feroz, a Austro-Afghan independent journalist and founder of Drone Memorial, tweeted Wednesday, citing the report. "This is not a surprise for those who are researching for years."
\u201cIt's official now: In Afghanistan, massive airstrikes, drone operations and brutal night raids are killing more civilians in these days than any insurgent group does. This is not a surprise for those who are researching for years. https://t.co/hJlLAmXztf\u201d— Emran Feroz (@Emran Feroz) 1556099521
The UNAMA report details the "increased harm to civilians from aerial and search operations" this year.
Pro-government forces carried out 43 aerial operations in the first quarter of 2019 that resulted in 228 civilian casualties (145 deaths, 83 injured), with international military forces responsible for 39 of these operations resulting in 219 civilian casualties (140 deaths, 79 injured). Women and children comprised half of the civilian casualties from all aerial operations...
Pro-government forces caused 102 civilian casualties (72 deaths and 30 injured) across 32 search operations, which is an 85 percent increase in civilian casualties as compared to the first quarter of 2018. The majority--80 percent--of the search operations resulting in civilian casualties were attributed to either the National Directorate of Security Special Forces or the Khost Protection Force, both of which are supported by international military forces. UNAMA reiterates its concern that these forces appear to act with impunity, outside of the governmental chain of command.
The report reiterates UNAMA's demands for greater transparency and accountability for search operations and for the Afghan government "to either disband the Khost Protection Force or formally incorporate members into its armed forces."
In response to the report, U.S. forces spokesman in Afghanistan Colonel Dave Butler toldAl Jazeera: "We reserve the right of self defense of our forces as well as the Afghan Security Forces. The best way to end the suffering of non-combatants is to end the fighting through an agreed-upon reduction in violence on all sides."
"It's not just my family, there are dozens of families just like mine who have been lost in bombings. The people have no power... We are the ones who are dying."
--Masih Rahman, Afghan civilian
Both Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and the Taliban, which controls nearly half the country, recently have urged their respective fighters to take care to avoid civilian casualties, The Associated Pressreported Wednesday.
After reaching a record high last year, Afghan civilian casualties declined overall in the first quarter of 2019, which the report notes was possibly influenced by harsh winter conditions in the country. The report says "it is unclear whether the decrease in civilian casualties was influenced by any measures taken by parties to the conflict to better protect civilians, or by the ongoing talks between parties to the conflict."
In recent months, the Taliban has engaged in talks with United States but refused to negotiate directly with Ghani's government. But as long the war continues, civilians remain at risk.
Per AP:
In September, Masih Rahman's family of 12--his wife, four daughters, three sons and four nephews--were killed when a bomb flattened their home in the Taliban-controlled Mullah Hafiz village in central Maidan Wardak province.
"It's not just my family, there are dozens of families just like mine who have been lost in bombings," Rahman told The Associated Press this week. "The people have no power... We are the ones who are dying."
Rahman, who was working in Iran at the time of the airstrike, blamed both pro-government forces and the Taliban, saying a Taliban-run prison was located just 400 meters (yards) from his home.
He has since sought redress from the U.N. and has also taken his case to Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission, which put out its own report on civilian casualties on Tuesday.
The commission found that from March 2018 to March 2019, more than 11,000 Afghan civilians were killed or injured, and over the past decade, the conflict has killed at least 75,316 civilians.
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