Eye On Afghanistan

[Rasputin]

Amid tensions, US, Iran both give lift to Afghanistan city

When the US government wanted to show its friendship here after the Taliban fell, it brought fuel to run the generators at the local hospital. When neighboring Iran wanted to show its friendship, it brought electricity to the entire city.
Today, Herat -- just 75 miles from the Iranian border -- is the only place in Afghanistan with power 24 hours a day, impeccably paved highways, and plans for a railroad. Even US officials acknowledge that this stunning progress occurred mostly thanks to Iran.

As tension mounts over Iran's nuclear ambitions and alleged support for militants in Iraq, Afghanistan offers the greatest chance for cooperation between Washington and Tehran. But it also stands the greatest risk of becoming the next battlefield.

Recent events underscore both the risks and opportunities: Iran recently offered to take over the training of Afghanistan's counternarcotics ministry, and US officials have told the Afghan government that they do not object. Last month, Iran signed an agreement with Afghanistan's education ministry to train hundreds of Afghan teachers and develop the curriculum, a task that has put Iranian officials in face-to-face meetings with USAID contractors.

But increasingly, Afghan officials have also begun to accuse Iran of supporting groups that undermine the Afghan government and oppose the presence of US troops.

Two weeks ago, President Hamid Karzai accused embassies of "some of the neighboring countries" of funding a new opposition bloc in Parliament, mostly composed of former warlords who oppose his rule. Political analysts in Kabul said the uncharacteristically blunt statement was a reference to interference from both Pakistan and Iran.

While Pakistan has been the neighbor most frequently accused of supporting militants, Iran has become an increasing target of Afghan suspicion.

A former general from the Northern Alliance, an armed group that fought against the Taliban, said Iran has been training disgruntled, unemployed former Northern Alliance fighters in the Iranian city of Mashad and sending them back to Afghanistan "to make propaganda against the Americans and the government."

The general, who asked that his name not be used because he fears for his security, said Iran is also rebuilding a group of Afghan fighters known as Sepah-e-Mohammad -- "Soldiers of Mohammad" in Farsi. He said the group was established to fight the Taliban, but that it could one day turn against US troops.

Iran's ambassador to Kabul, Mohammad Reza Brahimi , said he felt sorry to hear such allegations, calling them false.

"We have strongly supported Karzai's government," he said. "We have not supported any other specific group or individual other than the Afghan government and we will never do that. . . . There is nothing to show the involvement of the Iranian government in supporting the anti-Afghan government militants."
Five years ago, Afghanistan appeared to be a rare opportunity for Washington and Tehran to mend relations, cut off in 1979 after Islamic fundamentalists ousted the pro-American shah and took American diplomats hostage.

The United States and Iran shared a common enemy: Afghanistan's Taliban regime. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the subsequent US-led invasion that toppled the Taliban in December of that year, US and Iranian diplomats worked closely -- for the first time in decades -- to set up the framework for the new Afghan government at a conference in Bonn, Germany.

"They were, in many ways, our principal collaborators at that meeting," said James Dobbins , President Bush's envoy to the gathering. Dobbins said the Iranian envoy, Javad Zarif , persuaded the Northern Alliance to share power with other factions, a crucial step in establishing Karzai's government.

At the time, cooperation was so good that Al Qaeda suspects who were arrested in Iran ended up in the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay.

Dobbins said the Iranians even offered to help train Afghan troops under US leadership but that Washington did not respond to the offer. Eventually, the cooperation faded.

Now US diplomats are under orders not to engage their Iranian counterparts at the numerous, multination meetings convened in Kabul and abroad to coordinate aid and other issues.

Some said the enmity has taken a toll on reconstruction efforts. Most humanitarian aid and equipment for Herat, Afghanistan's third-largest city, has to be shipped through Pakistan and trucked across the country, because US aid can't be shipped through Iran.

Counternarcotics appears to be another missed opportunity to cooperate. Iran, which suffers from high rates of opium abuse, has offered to take over the mentoring of Afghanistan's counternarcotics ministry. But coordination remains weak between Iranian and Afghan border police, who are aided by American advisers.

"We are not working together," said Zia Rahman , head of logistics for the border police at the check point at Islam Qala. "We are doing [it] ourselves on our side, and they are doing [it] themselves on their side."

Tense relations have also complicated a new US effort to modernize the Islam Qala border post in order to capture hundreds of millions of dollars in customs revenue currently lost to corruption.

Iran has expressed anger at the daily visits to the border by American advisers implementing the effort, Rahman said.

Iran has also protested a $70 million US project to rehabilitate a Soviet-era military air base near Herat. US planes have used the base.

Izzatullah Wasifi , the former governor of Farah, an Afghan province just south of Herat, said Iranians are nervous about American troops on their doorstep. He said he traveled frequently to Iran during his 15-month stint as governor, which ended last year, to try to persuade Iranian officials to pave a road in Farah, put up electricity lines, and open a new border crossing.

[Rasputin]

Iran deports thousands of Afghans

More than 36,000 Afghans have been deported from Iran in the past 10 days, the UN refugee agency says.

The move has virtually cleared the south-eastern Iranian border town of Zabol of its Afghan population.

Iran says it has collected 50,000 Afghans for deportation, and argues it is the right of every country to send home illegal workers.

Iran is estimated to have more than a million illegal Afghan workers, and slightly fewer registered refugees.

Although the numbers seem to have slowed down a bit in the past few days, the sheer scale and speed of the deportations has caused problems.

Iranian Interior Minister Mostafa Pour-Mohammadi told the state-run news agency that 50,000 illegal Afghans have been collected for deportation in the past 10 days.

But he does not say how many have actually been sent across the border.

But the UN says they know of about 36,000 deportations in the same period, and their figures come from monitoring the border crossing points.

Mr Pour-Mohammadi said Iran had warned the illegal workers in February that they would be sent back, but unfortunately they failed to prepare for leaving.

He denied that families had been divided in the deportation process and said Iran had allowed 4,000 of the Afghans they had rounded up to remain because of problems they faced.

Dirty jobs

The UN says 20,000 of those deported come from the south-eastern border town of Zabol.

They say that on the Afghan side of the border initially there was not enough food or water or health facilities to cope with the influx, but that has now been provided.

Iran is estimated to have up to one and a half million illegal Afghan workers who do the most dangerous and dirty jobs with little legal protection.

There are also just under a million registered refugees.

Tehran says some 300,000 of those refugees will be eligible to apply for work visas to return to Iran, if they first go back to Afghanistan.

[Rasputin]

Now my friends, I am opposed to the system of society in which we live today, not because I lack the natural equipment to do for myself but because I am not satisfied to make myself comfortable knowing that there are thousands of my fellow men who suffer for the barest necessities of life. We were taught under the old ethic that man's business on this earth was to look out for himself. That was the ethic of the jungle; the ethic of the wild beast. Take care of yourself, no matter what may become of your fellow man. Thousands of years ago the question was asked; ''Am I my brother's keeper?'' That question has never yet been answered in a way that is satisfactory to civilized society.

Yes, I am my brother's keeper. I am under a moral obligation to him that is inspired, not by any maudlin sentimentality but by the higher duty I owe myself. What would you think me if I were capable of seating myself at a table and gorging myself with food and saw about me the children of my fellow beings starving to death. -- Eugene V. Debs: 1908 speech

For close to half a century, Afghanistan has been a battleground for foreign armies and local warlords. The country survives on international aids and opium cultivation. The central government controls only Kabul. There is heavy fighting in the south and east of the country. The northern and some western parts of Afghanistan are relatively quite but are ruled by warlords. On the western side, only Herat seems to have any stability and economic growth.

Afghanistan with a population of 35 million people consumes only 782.9 million kWh of electricity. Compare this to Iraq’s 33.3 billion kWh (Population: 27 million, 2007). Afghanistan has only 280000 (land-lines, 2005) telephones, and only 8229 km of paved roads. Close to 50% of the workforce is unemployed, and the rest, if not serving in national army or warlords’ private armies, are working in the fields (agriculture). The life expectancy of an Afghan is only 43.6 years, one of the lowest in the world. Similarly Afghanistan has one of the world’s highest (10th place) infant mortality rates (19.6/1000). In other words, Afghanistan is a failed state, poor and chaotic. The government can not provide the most basic services to its people, let alone accommodate a few million returning refugees.

The arrival
In 1973, a military coup headed by Daoud Khan and PDPA (Afghan Communist Party) ousted the Afghan king Zahir Shah. Daoud Khan abolished the monarchy and declared himself the President of the Republic of Afghanistan. In 1978, the communist party of Afghanistan staged a coup and took over the government. It also signed a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union. Shortly after, with the help of United States, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Mujahedin (guerrilla) movement was born. The internal fighting and subsequent arrival of Soviet forces started a mass exodus of people to neighbouring countries such as Iran and Pakistan.

At that time Iran was in the middle of a war with Iraq and under sanctions. Nevertheless, it accepted the arriving refugees, first housing them in camps and later giving them work permits, allowing them to move to towns and cities. Later fighting between Taliban and the Northern alliance simply increased the number of refugees seeking safety or a better life in the neighbouring countries such as Iran and Pakistan. By the end of 1980s Iran and Pakistan hosted 3 million refugees each [1]. In addition to refugees, there were a large number of people entering Iran illegally seeking work. Iran’s GDP is over 11 times that of Afghanistan and hence a magnet for those seeking a better standard of living.

As the numbers kept rising, Iran requested help from UN. However, the UN help when it arrived was not only insufficient, but also nearly always late. As time passed, the refugee numbers kept increasing. The government began to restrict its liberal refugee policies; work-permits became harder to obtain. But lack of documentation did not restrict the movement of the unregistered immigrants/refugees within the country. Many simply moved to large cities and became illegal aliens. There was some hope that the American invasion and subsequent occupation would lead to some improvements in Afghanistan, thereby facilitating the return of some of the refugees. However, things did not improve and the continuing fighting between NATO forces and Taliban has worsened the situation even further. War, draught and lack of investment have only increased the number of people seeking a better life abroad.

Image problem
Afghanistan has an unemployment rate of close to 50%. Add war, draught, lack of basic services such as healthcare and education and one can see the pressure on the population to emigrate. Iran has a GDP that is 11 times higher than Afghanistan’s and is close by. To complete the picture, many Afghans understand and speak Farsi (Dari is close to Farsi). Iran is a natural magnet for Afghans. It is not therefore surprising to see that millions of Afghans have immigrated to Iran. In addition, some families that stayed in Afghanistan have established a security net by sending out one family member to work in Iran, and numerous families are completely dependent on remittances from family members working in the neighbouring countries.

As is the case with many illegal aliens or refugees elsewhere in the world, Afghan immigrants / refugees were and are willing to work for much lower wages than the natives. This has greatly benefited industries such as farming and construction. Service industry has also been a beneficiary of cheap Afghan labour as well. They build roads, buildings, work as janitors etc. Yet again as is the case with the immigrant population elsewhere, few seem to speak of the benefits that these people bring to the country.

Iran is suffering from double digit inflation and unemployment. Iranians see the Afghans as competitors for jobs and more importantly as a barrier to higher wages for themselves. But the fact is that few Iranians are willing to work as hard as Afghans. And it is highly improbable that they will work for similar wages. So they see these immigrants as a threat to their living standard.

Afghanistan is one of the world’s biggest opium producers. Much of its products are smuggled to Europe and elsewhere through neighbouring countries, where it is also distributed. This has created a huge drug problem in Iran. Security forces regularly clash with well-armed Afghan smugglers, resulting in deaths of thousands of Iranian security personnel. Another problem is the general insecurity along the borders. For a while some Afghan criminal elements were raiding Iranian villages in the border area, kidnapping people for ransom. Iranian government had to station troops around these areas to protect the population.

All these problems have changed the general sentiment towards the refugees and immigrants. Iranians in general see the Afghans as a burden and think it is about time for them to return to Afghanistan.

[Rasputin]

My brother’s keeper
“In Iran today, there is both subtle and overt discrimination, and at times harassment. Opportunities for higher education were closed in 2003. Little or no compensation is paid when workers in the construction sector are killed or disabled in accidents. Informed reports have suggested increased use of drugs to sustain long and hard working days. Iranian women who marry Afghan men lose their Iranian citizenship. If involuntary returns are instituted, such families risk being sent to Afghanistan. Estimates of the number of persons who may be affected vary markedly, but a reasonable figure suggests 30,000.

... By mid-2003, all Afghans residing in Iran were asked to re-register with the authorities. Those with refugee documents were obliged to hand in their refugee cards and received in return only temporary residence permits, with no time for staying or leaving specified. The number of registered Afghans at that time totalled 2.3 million. Of these, UNHCR considers 1.1 million to be refugees or otherwise ‘of concern’ to its mandate” [2]. This left over 1 million “registered” Afghans without any protection from deportation. Add the unregistered Afghan immigrants and one gets close to two million or more people who have no legal status in the country (illegal aliens).

When confronted with the allegation of maltreatment of Afghan refugees in Iran, Iranian government claims that it has born a very large burden for a long-time without much international assistance. It claims that it has done more than its share for the country and it can no longer curry this burden alone.

As far as the international assistance is concerned the government is right. It has not received the assistance that it needs. It is also fair to say that it has kept its doors open to refugees from both Iraq and Afghanistan. With regards to helping Afghanistan, Iran has done more than any other country in the region. Since 2001, Afghanistan has received over $4.5 billion in aid from Iran, which it has spent constructing more than 1000 schools, government buildings and clinics and paved some 1,200 kilometres (more than 730 miles) of roads [3].

The biggest problem with the Iranian government refugee/immigration policy has been that of not having one. It is quite clear that Iran is and will continue to be a magnet for Afghans. The government knows that refugees or immigrants will not voluntarily return to a country where there is no infrastructure, housing, education, healthcare or jobs for them.

The successive Iranian governments have done very little in planning for integration of these refugees into the Iranian society. The government can not deny that the country has benefited greatly from this cheap labour pool. It also can not deny that the majority of Afghans in Iran are law abiding, hardworking people. The government has done very little in changing the negative image of these people. At times it has even contributed to it.

A large number of these immigrants have been in Iran for a long time, and their children have been borne in Iran. These children know nothing about Afghanistan. They rightfully consider themselves as Iranians. It is inhumane to just deport these people. And where and what are they going to?

To solve some of the existing problems, the government should declare an amnesty for the illegal aliens that have been in the country for the past seven years. In this way, the possibility of these people engaging in illegal activities will be greatly reduced. It should also offer citizenship to those who have been legally in the country for the past seven years. How long should a person live in the country before it can become a citizen? Under the current arrangement the Afghans will never become eligible for citizenship. It is reprehensible to keep such a large number of people in legal limbo for such a long time.

It should force the labour unions to enforce the minimum wage laws for all workers, especially the Afghans. In this way, the native Iranians will not see the Afghans as undercutting their wages. It should also vigorously persecute those that are (so openly) abusing these people. Iranian government should not forget that there are a few million Iranians living in Europe and America. I am sure that it would not appreciate similar treatments for its own emigrants.

The recent reports of large scale deportation, heavy handed and at times brutal treatment of deportees is highly troubling. Iranian government should know that deporting one million people without proper planning is going to cause great hardship for these people. Afghan government can not handle such large number of returnees. It even can not care for its internally displaced population, let alone one million more returning from Iran.

Iran has done a lot for Afghanistan and should do more. If it deports such a large number of people without providing adequate provisions for them in Afghanistan, it will create a humanitarian catastrophe that will (rightly) bring shame to Iran. It is not that long ago that Afghanistan was part of Iran. Afghans are Iranians’ brothers and as such should be respected and treated with respect and compassion. I urge the Iranian government to immediately stop the deportations and reconsider its immigration policies. I also hope that this message is taken-up by Iranians abroad. I hope that they also write to Iranian government and urge them to reconsider their actions. In conclusion I would like to cite sura 002.177 from the Holy Quran:

“It is not righteousness that you turn your faces towards the East and the West, but righteousness is this that one should believe in God and the last day and the angels and the Book and the prophets, and give away wealth out of love for Him to the near of kin and the orphans and the needy and the wayfarer and the beggars and for (the emancipation of) the captives, and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate; and the performers of their promise when they make a promise, and the patient in distress and affliction and in time of conflicts-- these are they who are true (to themselves) and these are they who guard (against evil).”

Dr. Abbas Bakhtiar lives in Norway. He is a management consultant and a contributing writer for many online journals. He's a former associate professor of Nordland University, Norway.

Copyright Abbas Bakhtiar, all rights reserved.

[1] UNHCR, “Afghan Refugee Statistics: February 2005”

[2] International Peace Research Institute, Oslo, “Afghan Refugees in Iran: From Refugee Emergency to Migration Management”, Chr. Michelsen Institute, Development Studies and Human Rights, 16 June 2004.

[3] UPI, “Iran 'buying Afghan influence' with aid”, December 28, 2006

[Rasputin]

Officials: Taliban commander killed

The Taliban's most prominent military commander was killed in fighting in southern Afghanistan with Afghan and Western troops, officials said Sunday.
Mullah Dadullah, a top lieutenant of Taliban leader Mullah Omar, was killed Saturday in the southern province of Helmand, said Said Ansari, the spokesman for Afghanistan's intelligence service. A NATO spokesman hinted that the report was true but said he couldn't confirm it.

Dadullah would be one of the highest-ranking Taliban leaders to be killed since the fall of the hard-line regime following the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. His death would represent a major victory for the Afghan government and the international coalition that has struggled to contain a Taliban-led insurgency wracking the south and east of the country.

Kandahar Gov. Asadullah Khalid said Dadullah, who had only one leg, died during an operation by U.S.-led coalition, NATO and Afghan troops.

"Mullah Dadullah was the backbone of the Taliban," said Khalid. "He was a brutal and cruel commander who killed and beheaded Afghan civilians."

Khalid showed Dadullah's body to reporters at a news conference in the governor's compound. An Associated Press reporter said the body, which was lying on a bed and dressed in a traditional Afghan robe, had no left leg and three bullet wounds: one to the back of the head and two to the stomach.

The AP reporter said the body appeared to be Dadullah's based on his appearance in TV interviews and Taliban propaganda videos.

But Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a purported Taliban spokesman, denied that the Taliban commander had been killed.

"Mullah Dadullah is alive," Ahmadi told AP by satellite phone. He did not give further details.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force did not confirm the death but appeared to give it validity.

"You might want to keep pursuing it. It certainly is an issue that we're tracking," said spokesman Maj. John Thomas. "But it's not our issue, it's an Afghan issue."

A second intelligence service official said Dadullah was killed near the Sangin and Nahri Sarraj districts of Helmand province, an area that has seen heavy fighting the last several weeks involving British and Afghan troops and U.S. Special Forces. The official was not authorized to give his name.

In December, a U.S. airstrike near the Pakistan border killed another top Taliban commander in southern Afghanistan, Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani. Dadullah, Osmani and policymaker Mullah Obaidullah had been considered to be Omar's top three leaders.

Dadullah, who comes from the southern province of Uruzgan, lost a leg fighting against the Soviet army that occupied Afghanistan in the 1980s. He emerged as a Taliban commander during its fight against the Northern Alliance in northern Afghanistan during the 1990s, helping the hard-line militia to capture the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif.

Dadullah — an ethnic Pashtun, the group that makes up the core of the Taliban and is prominent in eastern and southern Afghanistan — led a Taliban massacre of ethnic Hazaras in 1999 in the province of Bamiyan, where the Taliban in 2000 destroyed two large, ancient Buddha statues carved into a hillside cliff.

Since the Taliban's ouster in late 2001, Dadullah emerged as probably the militant group's most prominent and feared commander. He often appeared in videos and media interviews, and earlier this year predicted a massive militant spring offensive that has failed to materialize.

In an interview shown on Al-Jazeera on April 25, Dadullah claimed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was behind the February attack outside a U.S. military base in Afghanistan during a visit by U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney — although the U.S. military this month claimed a Libyan al-Qaeda operative, Abu Laith al-Libi, not bin Laden, was behind it.

Dadullah insisted bin Laden was alive and well. "Thank God he is alive. We get updated information about him. Thank God he planned operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan," he told Al-Jazeera in excerpts that were translated into Arabic.

The interview was not the first time in recent months that Dadullah has said bin Laden is alive. On March 1, London television Channel 4 aired an interview in which he said the al-Qaeda leader was in contact with Taliban officers. The station did not say when the tape was made.

[Rasputin]

مقامات افغان می گویند ملادادالله، فرمانده ارشد نظامی طالبان در جنوب افغانستان کشته شده است.
اداره امنیت ملی افغانستان در کابل با انتشار این خبر می گوید جسد ملادادالله در ولایت قندهار در اختیار نیروهای امنیتی افغان قرار دارد.

اسدالله خالد، والی قندهار نیز به خبرنگاران گفته که ملادادالله در نتیجه یک عملیات مشترک ناتو و ارتش ملی افغانستان در ولایت آشوب زده هلمند کشته شده و جسد او به ولایت همجوار قندهار انتقال داده شده است.

آقای خالد در یک کنفرانس خبری در قندهار گفت که این یورش براساس اطلاعات دقیق استخباراتی انجام شده و شکی وجود ندارد که فرد کشته شده ملا دادالله است.

والی قندهار افزود: "او (ملا دادالله) فرمانده مشهوری برای طالبان بود و می توانم بگویم که مهره اصلی برای طالبان و القاعده در افغانستان بود."

در مورد جزییات این عملیاتی که منجر به کشته شدن ملا دادالله شده، جزییاتی افشا نشده و این هم گفته نشده است که آیا به دیگر افراد طالبان نیز در این عملیات آسیب رسیده یا خیر.

منابع طالبان نیز خبر کشته شدن ملا دادالله را تایید کرده اند.

اگرچه ساعاتی پیش قاری یوسف، یک سخنگوی طالبان گفت که ملا دادالله هنوز زنده و سالم است ولی بعدتر منابع این گروه تایید کردند که ملا دادالله در ولایت هلمند کشته شده است.

مقامات افغان در قندهار پیش از این به منظور اثبات ادعای خود، جسد منسوب به ملا دادالله را به خبرنگاران نشان داده و خبرنگار بی بی سی نیز می گوید این جسد را دیده است.

ملادادالله، از فرماندهان ارشد نظامی طالبان بوده و ظرف سالهای اخیر عملیات نظامی این گروه را عمدتا در حوزه جنوبی افغانستان به عهده داشته است.

در گذشته نیز یکبار مقامات افغان خبر بازداشت این فرمانده طالبان را اعلام کرده بودند اما بعدتر این خبر از سوی طالبان و نیز از سوی دولت افغانستان رد شد.

ضربه بزرگ به طالبان

ملا دادالله، در کنار موقف مهم نظامی در گروه طالبان، نزديک ترين فرد به ملا محمد عمر، رهبر طالبان بود.


جای خالی دادالله

کشته شدن ملا دادالله، ضربه بزرگی را به تحریک طالبان در افغانستان وارد کرده و انتظار نمی رود طالبان بزودی بتوانند جای او را پر کنند


اين فرمانده طالبان، در گذشته از يورشهای زيادی جان سالم بدر برده ولی يک پای خود را در جريان جنگها از دست داد.

او قبل از تهاجم نیروهای جهانی به افغانستان در 2001 میلادی، عضو شورای ده نفری رهبری طالبان در افغانستان بود.

ملا دادالله برخلاف دیگر رهبران گروه طالبان، چندین بار در رسانه های تصویری ظاهر شد و به خبرنگاران اجازه داد از او عکس بگیرند.

این فرمانده نظامی، همچنین از نخستین افراد طالبان بود که پس از ورود نیروهای خارجی به افغانستان، جنگ علیه دولت مرکزی افغانستان و سربازان خارجی را آغاز کرد.

ملا دادالله اخیرا به تلویزیون الجزیره گفته بود که صدها نفر را در افغانستان آماده اجرای حملات انتحاری کرده است.

به باور بسیاری از آگاهان، کشته شدن ملا دادالله، ضربه بزرگی را به تحریک طالبان در افغانستان وارد کرده و انتظار نمی رود طالبان بزودی بتوانند جای او را پر کنند.

'بی رحم ترین' فرمانده

افراد تحت فرمان دادالله همچنین متهم به آدم ربایی و قتل چندین گروگان در افغانستان هستند.

براساس گزارشها، اجمل نقشبندی، روزنامه نگار افغان نیز که در اسارت گروه طالبان قرار داشت، به دستور مستقیم ملا دادالله سر زده شد.

همچنین، این فرمانده طالبان در گذشته بارها به روزنامه نگاران در افغانستان هشدار داده بود که اگر گزارشهایشان را در مخالفت با فعالیت گروه طالبان تهیه کنند، کشته خواهند شد.

اجتماعات خبرنگاران در افغانستان به ویژه پس از قتل اجمل نقشبندی، از ملادادالله به عنوان "بی رحم ترین" فرمانده طالبان و کسی که "مسئول کشتارهای دسته جمعی" است یاد کردند.

[Rasputin]

Taliban replaces slain top commander with brother

SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Mullah Dadullah, the feared Taliban commander killed at the weekend in battle with U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan, has been replaced by his younger brother, a Taliban spokesman said.

Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar appointed Mullah Bakht Mohammad to take the place of the insurgents' top operational commander in the south, Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters.

The death of Dadullah, the main architect of suicide bombings, kidnappings of foreigners and Afghans, beheadings and a rise of violence in southern Afghanistan, was seen as the biggest blow to the Taliban since the start of the insurgency.

An ethnic Pashtun from the southern province of Uruzgan, Dadullah was a member of the Taliban's 10-member leadership council and took charge of battlefield operations in the south of Afghanistan in 2004.

"The Taliban will continue jihad under the command of the New Taliban commander, Mullah Bakht Mohammad," Qari said. "Our chief, Mullah Omar, asked the Afghan government to hand over Mullah Dadullah's dead body to his family soon."

Afghan authorities said on Monday they had buried Dadullah in an undisclosed location in the southern province of Kandahar but his relatives could rebury it if they wished.

Dadullah, who was called Afghanistan's Al Zarqawi after the slain leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, lost a leg in a landmine blast during fighting in the 1990s. During the Taliban's rule from 1996 to 2001 he gained a reputation as a ruthless commander who ordered revenge massacres.

[Rasputin]

آمادگی ناتو در برابر واکنش طالبان به مرگ دادالله


فرمانده ناتو در افغانستان می گوید مرگ دادالله پایان خشونتها نیست
نیروهای ناتو در افغانستان، برای مقابله با واکنش طالبان به کشته شدن فرمانده ارشد شان، آمادگی می گیرند.
ژنرال دان مک نیل، فرمانده آمریکایی نیروهای تحت فرمان پیمان آتلانتیک شمالی (ناتو) در افغانستان گفت کشته شدن ملا دادالله، فرمانده ارشد شورشیان طالبان، به نا امنی در افغانستان پایان نخواهد داد.

او گفت که انتظار دارد طالبان ظرف چند هفته آینده، با تجدید قوا، به ادامه حملات انتحاری و بمبگذاری در افغانستان بپردازند.

ناتو می گوید ملا دادالله، روز یکشنبه در درگیری با نیروهای مشترک غربی و افغان، در ولایت آشوب زده هلمند افغانستان کشته شد.

از او به عنوان بی رحم ترین رهبر طالبان نام برده می شود.

خبرنگار بی بی سی می گوید دادالله در دوازده ماه گذشته، شاید مهمترین فرمانده طالبان، به ويژه در جنوب افغانستان بوده باشد، اما برآورد تاثیر مرگ وی بر حملات طالبان مشکل است.


ملا دادالله فرمانده ارشد طالبان که اخیرا کشته شد
به گفته خبرنگار بی بی سی، عملیات شورشیان طالبان، تابع سلسله مراتب مشخص و فرماندهی متمرکز نیست و جنگجویان این گروه، اغلب در گروههای کوچک مجزا از هم عمل می کنند.

ژنرال آمریکایی، دان مک نیل به روزنامه فایننشال تایمز بریتانیا گفته است که انتظار دارد حملات طالبان، ظرف چند هفته ازسر گرفته شود.

او گفت: "موج جدید حملات، شامل حملات انتحاری، و بمبگذاری با استفاده از مواد منفجره دست ساز خواهد بود".

خشونتها در افغانستان، اکنون به سطحی رسیده که از زمان سقوط طالبان در سال 2001 میلادی سابقه نداشته است.

بیش از چهار هزار تن که اکثر آنها غیر نظامی بودند، در جریان خشونتهای یک سال اخیر افغانستان کشته شدند.

[Rasputin]

جسد دادالله 'مخفیانه دفن شده است'


جسد ملا دادالله از بیم حمله مخالفانش مخفیانه دفن شده است
ریاست امنیت ملی افغانستان اعلام کرده که جسد ملا دادالله فرمانده ارشد طالبان، به طور مخفیانه دفن شده است.
در اطلاعیه ای که از سوی ریاست امنیت ملی افغانستان منتشر شده، تاکیده شده است از آنجایی که ملا دادالله در قتل افراد زیادی دست داشت، در صورتی که محل دفن وی مشخص می شد، ممکن بود عده ای قبر او را آتش بزنند.

ملا دادالله فرمانده ارشد و رهبر عملیات نظامی طالبان، یکشنبه گذشته 23 ثور / اردیبهشت، در حمله نیروهای مشترک افغان و ناتو در ولایت هلمند افغانستان کشته شد.

برخی منابع خبری اعلام کردند که سخنگویان طالبان، از دولت افغانستان خواسته اند که جسد دادالله را به آنها تحویل دهد تا آن را بر اساس آداب و سنتهای خود دفن کنند، اما این درخواست، از سوی دولت افغانستان پذیرفته نشده بود.

ریاست امنیت ملی در اطلاعیه که باختر خبرگزاری دولتی افغانستان آن را منتشر کرده، همچین گفته است که سه تن از افراد بلندپایه طالبان که در ازای رهایی خبرنگار ربوده شده ایتالیایی آزاده شده بودند نیز، به همراه ملا دادالله در این حمله کشته شده اند.

نام این افراد، ملا حمدالله، فرمانده غفار و شاه منصور برادر ملا دادالله اعلام شده است.


دولت افغانستان خوشبین است که مرگ دادالله، بر اوضاع این کشور اثر مثبتی داشته باشد
در اطلاعیه همچنین آمده است از زمانی که این افراد و ملا دادالله، از پاکستان حرکت کردند، "منابع اطلاعاتی" وابسته به امنیت ملی افغانستان زمان و مسیر حرکت آنها را به این اداره گزارش دادند.

امنیت ملی افغانستان، محل قتل ملا دادالله همراهانش را، "ساروان قلعه" در ولسوالی سنگین ولایت هلمند اعلام کرده است.

پیشتر وزارت دفاع افغانستان نیز ابزاز خوشبینی کرده بود که قتل ملا دادالله، "اثرات عمیقی بر فعالیتهای طالبان" داشته باشد.

روز گذشته و در حالی که فقط چهار روز از کشته شدن دادالله می گذشت، ژنرال ظاهر عظیمی سخنگوی وزارت دفاع افغانستان ابراز امیدواری کرد که این رویداد سبب تسریع برنامه های وزارت دفاع در زمینه تامین امنیت در جنوب کشور شود.

اما ناتو گفته است که کشته شدن دادالله، به نا امنی در افغانستان پایان نخواهد داد.

ژنرال دان مک نیل فرمانده آمریکایی ناتو در افغانستان گفته که ناتو انتظار دارد طالبان ظرف چند هفته آینده، با تجدید قوا، به ادامه حملات انتحاری و بمبگذاری در افغانستان بپردازند.

[Rasputin]

Coalition: Taliban have Iran arms

Weapons crossing the border from Iran to Afghanistan may be winding up in the hands of the Taliban, the hard-line Islamic militia that is battling U.S.- and NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, U.S. and British officials said.

Coalition officials in Afghanistan said they have intercepted Iranian-made AK-47s, C-4 plastic explosives and mortars. One explosively-formed penetrator bomb (EFP) that was found can pierce American armor, a NATO official said.

The EFP is similar to the weaponry the United States says Iran has provided to militants in Iraq, but the NATO official said the weapon has not been traced directly to the Iranian regime.

Some analysts question whether the top echelons of the Iranian government are behind any transfer of arms from the Islamic Republic to the Taliban, Iran's long-time foe. Rogue elements -- perhaps the Quds force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard -- may be operating on their own, the analysts suggest.
But a U.S. official who requested anonymity told CNN the United States believes Iran's supreme leaders know about these operations and could stop them if they wanted to.

Another U.S. official said Iran still sees the Taliban as an enemy but has a history of dealing with people it considers "nasty" as long as it is "congruent with Iran's overall objectives." In this case, Iran is "working the Taliban angle" to "bleed the U.S." in Afghanistan, the official said.

The British government called any provision of arms by Iran to the Taliban "unacceptable."

"We know about illegal movements of munitions across the border from Iran to Afghanistan, destined for the Taliban," the British Ministry of Defense said in a statement. "We are concerned that some of these munitions are of Iranian origin."

A former U.S. intelligence official said Iranian activities in Afghanistan would be a disturbing development.

"That suggests the Iranians are now turning up the pressure on the NATO forces in Afghanistan," said former national security official Bruce Riedel. "Since Iran has one of the most extensive intelligence networks in the entire country, they would have an enormous capability to cause mischief."

Denial by Iran
An Iranian official at the United Nations denied his country is giving weapons to the Taliban, noting that the Iranian government has long supported Afghan President Hamid Karzai and has always seen the Taliban as an enemy.

Both U.S. officials and outside analysts said any malicious intentions on Iran's part would only be directed at the United States. The majority-Shiite Iran would not want the Taliban to gain too much strength, they said.

"Iran and the Taliban nearly went to war in 1998 over the killing of 11 Iranian diplomats in Afghanistan," said Afshin Molavi of the New American Foundation, a non-profit, public policy institute based in Washington. "And the Taliban are also virulently anti-Shiite. So if these allegations are true, Iran is playing a very dangerous and delicate game."

One analyst called it a game of "managed chaos," just enough to bloody America's nose in Afghanistan.

[Rasputin]

Afghan woman radio head shot dead

Daughters and relatives of Ms Zaki weep by her coffin
A female owner of a radio station in Afghanistan has been shot dead.
Zakia Zaki was shot seven times, including in the chest and head, as she slept with her 20-month-old son at her home north of Kabul, officials say.

The governor of Parvan province, where the attack took place, told the BBC he did not know who killed her. No one has admitted carrying out the attack.

Her murder came just days after a woman newsreader was killed for reasons which were described as "family-related".

'Act of terror'

The Parvan governor, Abdul Jabbar Taqwa, visited the scene of the killing in the town of Jabal as Siraj, about 70km (40 miles) north of the capital.


Ms Zaki (centre) was a rare female voice in Afghanistan

He said the attackers were three men armed with pistols and rifles, who broke into Ms Zaki's house and got into the bedroom.

An older son, aged three, was with her at the time of the attack, but none of her six children was injured.

The Interior Ministry condemned what it called "this act of terror" and said it was trying to track down the perpetrators.

Zakia Zaki, was 35 years old and worked as a reporter and a schoolteacher.

She was one of the few female journalists in the country to speak out during the Taleban's rule.

She had also headed the US-funded station, Radio Peace, since it opened after the fall of the Taleban in 2001.

The BBC's Charles Haviland in Kabul says that at times Ms Zaki criticised the former mujahideen, some of who have been implicated in war crimes.

Observers say that the motive behind the murder is far from clear, and a massive police operation is now underway to identify and arrest the killers.

'Freedom of expression'

Zakia Zaki started her radio career eight years ago. At the time Parvan province was one of the few areas in the country to be controlled by anti-Taleban forces.




New hopes of Afghan media

The Independent Association of Afghan Journalists has condemned the murder, describing it as an example of how difficult the working environment has become for journalists and especially for women.

"She believed in freedom of expression, that's why she was killed," the association's head Rahimullah Samander told Reuters.

The group said she had received threats in the past but had no personal enemies.

The killing comes six days after the shooting dead of another Afghan woman working in journalism, a 22-year-old newsreader from a private television station, Shakiba Sanga Amaj.

According to senior police sources in Kabul, her father has blamed two male relatives and one person has been arrested.

[Rasputin]

The queues of refugees start to pour over the border from first thing in the morning - as they have been doing for the last month.

Ninety thousand people have so far been forcibly returned to Afghanistan from Iran since 21 April, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Every hour or so another bus arrives on the Iranian side, the people are unloaded, carrying the few possessions they had when they were arrested.

A policeman meets them on the Afghanistan side, and they join a long line of people waiting to pick up the few pieces of charity an aid agency has gathered for them.

They get water, biscuits and a bundle of clothes. They can also make a free phone call to relatives to let them know where they are.

Then they get a free 120km (75mile) bus trip from the border post to the city of Herat where they are left to start all over again in a country where they used to live.

'Cruelty'

In the gathered crowd waiting to tell their stories I see a young man, a tear rolling down his cheek.


Iran has never deported so many people in such a short space of time

"My wife and children are left there, even though I asked the authorities to let us go together," he said, a reference number scrawled on his hand in thick black ink.

"I didn't even have time to get my wages from my employer. Now that they deported me who will look after my children? If someone throws them on the street who will give them shelter? This is cruelty."

Among the lines of men was a 12-year-old boy who said he had been deported on his own.

And passions are high. An older man, emphasising his point by striking his fist into his hand, says he has lived in Iran for 28 years and now he is back in Afghanistan, he cannot even afford the bus fare to Kabul, and doubts there is any work there anyway.

"We are Muslims and they are Muslims as well, so why have they done this to us? We don't have any one to look after us."

Human rights

Iran received millions of refugees during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the later civil war. It has been deporting refugees for some time, but never on this scale - never so many in such a short space of time.

Josep Zapater is from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which under its remit can do little to help most of the returnees - only the vulnerable such as the old, the young and families.

While many of the single men were living in Iran illegally, almost 22,000 of those deported have been families.

"This wasn't happening last year," Mr Zapater explained. "Also there are the human rights concerns that we have seen at the border like separated families, some cases of maltreatment.

"The process definitely needs to be sorted out in a more humane manner."

An Afghan delegation visited Iran earlier this month and they returned saying the Iranian government had promised to suspend forced expulsions, but as they delivered their report hundreds more refugees continued to be deported.

Development

And the Iranian director general of the Bureau for Aliens and Foreign Immigrant Affairs, Ahmad Hosseini, defended their decision.


Iran is doing a great deal to help development in Herat

"We are determined once and for all to resolve the problem of illegal immigrants in Iran and this doesn't mean only Afghans but any other nationalities who have illegal immigrants here," he said.

"The money we were supposed to spend on reconstruction for our own country has been spent on refugees. Today when we count the cost, it is $7bn a year, or $6 per Afghan every day."

In Herat the arrival of tens of thousands of unemployed men is starting to have a real impact on the city and the whole region.

Each morning they queue up for daily work, but there is little around.

"I had my passport but they just tore it up" one man said. "What kind of law is that?"

Iran is doing a great deal to help development in Afghanistan, particularly in Herat, but there are complaints so many desperate people arriving in a short time maybe undoing efforts to stabilise and assist the people.

[Rasputin]

The pylons get smaller and smaller as they disappear in a long, straight line, across the wide-open, windswept desert, through the heat haze and over the horizon to Iran.
In the electricity sub-station just outside of Herat, western Afghanistan, there's the loud hum of power - Iranian power.

More electricity reaches Herat than the city can use, but the industrial park just across the road from the Nato military base is putting it to good use.

Small plastic bottles of fizzy orange juice shuffle along the conveyor belt to be labelled and packed - the building is noticeably Iranian in design and the markings on the machinery show exactly which country helped these Afghan businessmen.

The camels grazing outside cautiously cross the fast, straight, asphalt road - one of the best roads in Afghanistan stretching the 120km to the border.

Soon a railway line will link Afghanistan to Europe, or so boasts the Iranian government.

'Same destiny'

"We are one of the major donors in Afghanistan," said Mohammad Bahrami, Iranian ambassador to Kabul.


Afghan border guards now watch their Iranian counterparts

"We believe all of the international communities are in the same boat. We have the same destiny in Afghanistan."

Iran has always had close ties with western Afghanistan, and millions of dollars have been spent providing arguably the best infrastructure of any city in the country.


But in the murky world of global politics is the shared destiny he speaks of more about control and influence than charity?

The border policemen cover their faces and cling on to their weapons as the shiny, new, bright-green pickup trucks bump their way along the border patrol route, throwing up choking dust into the back.

The frontier runs for hundreds of kilometres and here, near the border post, both sides eye each other suspiciously from old mud forts and new wooden observation posts.

The intelligence reports that we get from our agents in Iran say some weapons come into Afghanistan

Rahmatullah Safi, border commander

The Afghans' vehicles were bought by the Americans, and US bases are springing up along the border.

Given the fragile international relations between the US and Iran, there is a much bigger political reason to fight for influence in Afghanistan.

Afghan opium is smuggled between the gaps between observation towers to fuel Iran's four million addicts, and there's increasing concern about what is now travelling in the opposite direction.

"The intelligence reports that we get from our agents in Iran say some weapons come into Afghanistan," said Rahmatullah Safi, the border commander for western Afghanistan.

"The weapons which the enemies use these days such as Kalashnikov, rocket-propelled grenades, heavy machine guns, hand grenades, explosives - they are not coming from the sky, these definitely are coming from across the border.

"Pakistan is kind of doing it openly but Iran is doing it behind the curtain in a secret way, helping the Taleban or the other opposition of the Afghan government."


The Iranian ambassador says his country is a major donor

Every week there is more evidence that the high-powered, hi-tech bombs being used to deadly effect in Iraq are now arriving in Afghanistan.

The commander of Nato's International Security Assistance Force for western Afghanistan (Isaf), Brigadier General Antonio Satta, discovered one cache: "We examined the charges, and unfortunately it is one of the first that is found in Afghanistan. So there are some concerns about it, but hopefully it's an isolated case".

"In Iraq the insurgency developed and they got more and more sophisticated. I believe we are seeing the same thing in Afghanistan, but fortunately they are still quite a long way behind Iraq."

Intelligence sources say Iranian agencies, but not necessarily the government, are talking to the Taleban and that weapons are on the move.

Right now, nowhere in Afghanistan appears to be safe from the insurgency.

'Iranian origin'

Roadside and suicide bombs have been killing soldiers and policemen from the Afghan and international security services, as well as civilians in every corner of the country from Kandahar to Kunduz, Badakhshan to Herat.

The British ambassador for the last year, Stephen Evans, has just left Afghanistan, but he had to deal with at least one case in Helmand.

"I think it was 11 April that a Taleban convoy was intercepted in southern Afghanistan and there was ammunition and explosives of Iranian origin," he said.


Is Iran's investment the latest move in a long-played game?

"Who supplied them, and why, and under what circumstances not yet clear."

Britain already blames Iran for: "backing, financing, arming and supporting terrorism in Iraq," and it suspects the same thing could happen in Afghanistan.

But the Iranian ambassador dismisses the allegations of supplying weapons: "Strongly denied. Strongly denied and we are ready to make that clear," he says.

Beautiful, ancient Herat with its huge citadel towering over the old city and its famous mud brick minarets has a multi-layered history of foreign powers using Afghanistan to expand their empires - to achieve their own global ambitions.

Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan came here. The British fought Persia here in the 1850s when the Great Game with Russia was at its height.

'Long, strategic game'

Rory Stewart, a former diplomat now living in Afghanistan, believes little has changed: "Both here, and in Iraq, the Iranian government's objectives are probably simply to destabilise the situation and deter the US-led coalition from attempting anything against Iran," he said.

"They play very, very long strategic games, and do a lot of very traditional interference in neighbouring countries in order to try to defend their own national interests."

Everyone, of course, is at it - even British, European and American forces are here to protect themselves from terrorism at home - it's another bigger battle being fought in Afghanistan.

And when diplomatic games are played in other lands, it's the people who suffer - it's their lives which are caught up in someone else's war.

[Rasputin]

نگرانی آمریکا از 'حجم سلاح های ایرانی در افغانستان'


وزیر دفاع آمریکا گفت مشکل بتوان باور کرد که این سلاح ها بدون اطلاع دولت ایران ارسال می شود
با گذشت دو ماه از زمانی که ارتش آمریکا برای نخستین بار از کشف سلاح های ساخت ایران در افغانستان که "برای طالبان ارسال شده بود" سخن گفت، مقام های بلندپایه آمریکایی اکنون نسبت به حجم "بزرگ" این سلاح ها ابراز نگرانی کرده و آن را نشانه نقش دولت ایران در ماجرا دانسته اند.
رابرت گیتس، وزیر دفاع آمریکا، روز چهارشنبه در جریان بازدیدی از آلمان گفت که مقادیر "قابل توجهی" سلاح ایرانی به افغانستان راه می یابد و افزود با توجه به ابعاد این جریان مشکل بتوان باور کرد که دولت ایران از این مساله بی خبر باشد.

پیشتر در همین روز نیکلاس برنز، معاون وزارت خارجه آمریکا، در مصاحبه با شبکه خبری سی ان ان گفته بود که "شواهد انکارناپذیری" از ارسال اسلحه از ایران برای طالبان با آگاهی دولت ایران در دست است.

واشنگتن در ماه های اخیر نسبت به آنچه "دخالت فزاینده منفی" ایران در افغانستان می داند ابراز نگرانی کرده است.


ایران هنوز به اتهامات تازه مقام های آمریکایی واکنش نشان نداده است اما دو مقام وزارت خارجه جمهوری اسلامی قبلا ارسال سلاح برای طالبان را تکذیب کرده بودند.

نیروهای آمریکایی و ناتو در افغانستان در یک سال اخیر با چالش فزاینده طالبان که در سال 2001 از قدرت ساقط شد روبرو بوده اند.

تهران 'باید بداند'

آقای گیتس گفت او مواد اطلاعاتی تازه ای را مشاهده کرده است که "کاملا روشن می کند جریان کاملا قابل توجهی سلاح" از ایران به افغانستان جاری می شود.

وی گفت: "با توجه به حجمی که ما مشاهده می کنیم، مشکل بتوان باور کرد که کار قاچاقچیان عادی یا مواد مخدر باشد یا اینکه بدون دانش دولت ایران صورت گیرد."

آقای گیتس گفت این موضوع تناقض آمیز است زیرا ایران روابط خوبی با رهبران افغانستان دارد و افزود اینکه انگیزه ایران غیر از دردسر آفرینی برای آمریکا چه چیزی است را کسی نمی داند.

وی گفت به اعتقاد او این سلاح ها برای طالبان ارسال شده است.

پیشتر آقای برنز با لحن قاطعانه تری در این باره سخن گفت: "مسلما (این سلاح ها) از سوی دولت ایران می آید. ارسال آنها کار فرماندهی سپاه پاسداران انقلاب اسلامی ایران است که واحدی اساسی از دولت ایران است."

پیتر پیس، رئیس ستاد مشترک ارتش آمریکا، ابتدا در ماه آوریل گفت که نیروهای ارتش آمریکا سلاح های ساخت ایران را که برای طالبان ارسال شده بود ضبط کرده اند.

با این حال او گفته بود معلوم نیست که دولت ایران مستقیما در این قضیه دست داشته باشد.

ایران و طالبان هر دو قبلا این نوع اتهام را رد کرده بودند. محمدرضا بهرامی سفیر ایران در کابل همان زمان، با رد این ادعا، گفت برای اثبات این موضوع "هیچگونه سند و مدرکی وجود ندارد" و آن را بی اساس خواند.

وی اخیرا در مصاحبه با بی بی سی نیز به شدت این اتهام ها را تکذیب کرد و گفت هدف ایران کمک به دولت افغانستان است.

ایران همچنین اتهام مشابه تونی بلر، نخست وزیر بریتانیا، در زمینه کمک به طالبان را رد کرده و آن را "بی ارزش" خوانده بود.

تونی بلر گفته بود که ایران به قصد افزایش هرج و مرج در افغانستان و تحمیل تلفات بیشتر به نیروهای غربی، به طالبان کمک تسلیحاتی می کند.

[Rasputin]

وزیر دفاع افغانستان کشف سلاح ایرانی را تایید کرد


آقای وردک گفت نمی داند منبع تامین این سلاح ها چه گروهی است
عبدالرحیم وردک، وزیر دفاع افغانستان، تصدیق کرده است که نیروهای طالبان سلاح هایی دریافت می کنند که از ایران آمده است، با این حال او اضافه کرد نمی داند چه کسی این سلاح ها را تامین می کند.
وزیر دفاع افغانستان یک روز پس از آن اظهار نظر می کند که دو مقام بلندپایه آمریکایی دولت ایران را متهم به نقش داشتن در ارسال سلاح برای طالبان کردند.

اما آقای وردک در واکنش به اتهامات آمریکا گفت که او نمی داند آیا منبع تامین این سلاح ها گروه های قاچاق مواد مخدر، شبکه القاعده و یا دولت ایران است.

او گفت که افغانستان با ایران روابط خوبی دارد و به عقیده او ایران علاقه مند به برقراری و حفظ امنیت و ثبات در افغانستان است.

پیش از او شمار دیگری از مقام های دیگر مرزی افغانستان از کشف سلاح های ایرانی از جمله مین های ساخت ایران خبر داده بودند.

ارتش آمریکا ابتدا حدود دو ماه قبل از کشف سلاح های ایرانی در افغانستان که برای "طالبان ارسال شده بود" سخن گفت.

اما مقام های ارشد آمریکایی روز چهارشنبه برای نخستین بار نسبت به "ابعاد" وجود سلاح های ایرانی در افغانستان ابراز نگرانی کردند.

رابرت گیتس، وزیر دفاع آمریکا، گفت که اکنون مقادیر "قابل توجهی" سلاح ایرانی به افغانستان راه می یابد و نتیجه گیری کرد با توجه به ابعاد این جریان مشکل بتوان باور کرد که دولت ایران از این مساله بی خبر باشد.

نیکلاس برنز، معاون وزارت خارجه آمریکا، نیز در مصاحبه ای با شبکه خبری سی ان ان گفته بود که "شواهد انکارناپذیری" از ارسال اسلحه از ایران با آگاهی دولت آن کشور برای طالبان در دست است.

'جریان قابل توجه'

واشنگتن در ماه های اخیر نسبت به آنچه "دخالت فزاینده منفی" ایران در افغانستان می داند ابراز نگرانی کرده است.

ایران هنوز به اتهامات تازه مقام های آمریکایی واکنش نشان نداده اما دو مقام وزارت خارجه جمهوری اسلامی قبلا ارسال سلاح برای طالبان را تکذیب کرده بودند.

نیروهای آمریکایی و ناتو در افغانستان در یک سال اخیر با چالش فزاینده طالبان که در سال 2001 از قدرت ساقط شد روبرو بوده اند.

آقای گیتس گفت او مواد اطلاعاتی تازه ای را مشاهده کرده است که "کاملا روشن می کند جریان کاملا قابل توجهی سلاح" از ایران به افغانستان جاری می شود.

وی گفت: "با توجه به حجمی که ما مشاهده می کنیم، مشکل بتوان باور کرد که کار قاچاقچیان عادی یا مواد مخدر باشد یا اینکه بدون دانش دولت ایران صورت گیرد."

آقای گیتس گفت این موضوع تناقض آمیز است زیرا ایران روابط خوبی با رهبران افغانستان دارد و افزود اینکه انگیزه ایران غیر از دردسر آفرینی برای آمریکا چه چیزی است را کسی نمی داند.

وی گفت به اعتقاد او این سلاح ها برای طالبان ارسال شده است.

پیشتر آقای برنز با لحن قاطعانه تری در این باره سخن گفته بود: "مسلما (این سلاح ها) از سوی دولت ایران می آید. ارسال آنها کار فرماندهی سپاه پاسداران انقلاب اسلامی ایران است که واحدی اساسی از دولت ایران است."

ایران و طالبان هر دو قبلا این اتهامات را رد کرده بودند. محمدرضا بهرامی سفیر ایران در کابل همان زمان، با رد این ادعا، گفت برای اثبات این موضوع "هیچگونه سند و مدرکی وجود ندارد" و آن را بی اساس خواند.