Will US-NATO Start World War III by Attacking Iran?
Mar 11, 2010 News & Events, Videos
A UN nuclear watchdog report suggests Iran could be developing a nuclear bomb, apparently confirming long-held suspicions in the West. But Tehran denies the claims, again insisting that its atomic intentions are peaceful. Michel Chossudovsky, who’s from an independent Canadian policy research group, believes that what Iran says hardly matters, because the U.S. is planning for war…
Movement of U.S., NATO Troops Concerns Waziristan Tribes
Jul 28, 2009 News & Events, Pakistan, pakistan politics
The International News
July 27, 2009
The movement of Afghanistan-based US and Nato troops over the past few days close to North and South Waziristan Agencies has frightened tribesmen, who are already under stress due to the increasing number of drone attacks and a possible military operation by the Pakistan Army.
Official and tribal sources informed The News from the border villages of North Waziristan about the unusual movement of what they termed huge number of the US and Nato forces along the Pak-Afghan border.
They said the Nato troops were armed with helicopter gunships, tanks and armoured personnel carriers (APCs) and had started establishing camps and checkpoints along the border.
The residents of border villages, including Dwatoi, Kazha Madakhel and Gorweek, said warplanes and helicopter gunships were seen flying over the border areas between the two neighbouring countries throughout the day. In some of the areas, the tribesmen claimed the planes violated PakistanÃs airspace and flew over their villages.
Villagers claimed that the US and Nato forces were brought to the border area in 80 vehicles amid tight security.
A military official based in Miramshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan, said they had also received reports about the troop movement but could not confirm it. Wishing not to be named, he said PakistanÃs armed forces were fully alert on their posts along the border with Afghanistan. ìThey often come to the border villages inside Afghanistan and return to their bases after some time. There is no need to be worried,î the official said.
Tribal sources close to the Taliban in Afghanistan said there had been an unprecedented rise in attacks on the US and Nato forces in Afghanistan and their movement in the border areas could be an act of desperation.
They said the foreign forces had particularly suffered losses in Helmand, Paktia, Paktika and Khost provinces, which were close to PakistanÃs restive South and North Waziristan tribal regions.
Besides suffering casualties, the sources said, the Taliban militants had made some US and British soldiers hostage in Afghanistan.
The movement of foreign forces close to PakistanÃs border and establishment of the checkpoints, along the porous Durand Line, could be part of their strategy to stop the Taliban militants from shifting the kidnapped US and British soldiers to the adjoining tribal areas, said the sources.
On September 3, 2008, the US-led foreign forces carried out their first-ever ground operation in the Pakistani territory, killing 15 Pakistanis, including women and children, in South WaziristanÃs Musa Nika village near Angoor Adda, close to AfghanistanÃs Paktika province. The tribesmen fear recurrence of such an attack.
Tags: Afghan border, afghanistan, NATO Troops, Pakistan, Swat, US-nato, war on terror, wazieristan
Angry Protest Against Civilian Casualties in Deadly US-led Strike
May 10, 2009 News & Events
“We ask the Afghan government to force the American forces to leave Afghanistan. They kill more civilians than Taliban,”
Over 120 innocent Afghan civilians were massacred by US bombardment
Afghanistan — Afghans chanted “Death to America” and demanded US troops leave Afghanistan as mobs threw stones at government offices Thursday in a violent protest against civilian deaths, witnesses said.
Four people were wounded when hundreds of furious demonstrators protested in the western town of Farah against the reported killings of up to 70 civilians during US-led air strikes and fighting against insurgents, officials said.
“Police tried to disperse them but they started throwing stones at police, who fired into the air,” deputy provincial governor Mohammad Younus Rasouli told AFP, describing the protest as “violent”.
He said no one was hurt in the shooting. However, the provincial health director, Abdul Jabar Sahieq, said one demonstrator was admitted to hospital with gunshot wounds and three others with injuries from being trampled.
“People are really angry and they shout ‘death to America, death to the invaders,’” a demonstrator who gave his name only as Abdullah told AFP before the protest was broken up.
“They are hurling stones at government buildings and there is some gunfire in the air,” he said, adding that he didn’t know who was firing.
US military and Afghan teams pressed on Thursday with an investigation into how many civilians and insurgents were killed in fighting and air strikes this week in what appeared to be one of the deadliest incidents for Afghan civilians in eight years.
Afghan police said more than 100 people were dead, most of them civilians. One Afghan official said he had seen the bodies of 20 children.
Haji Nangyalai, 42, said he was demonstrating to “show our anger at the crimes committed by the American forces.”
“We ask the Afghan government to force the American forces to leave Afghanistan. They kill more civilians than Taliban,” he said angrily.
The United States has around 38,000 troops in Afghanistan, the bulk of a foreign deployment of roughly 70,000 tasked with hunting down armed Islamist extremists and stabilising the country.
The killing of civilians in foreign military operations is a sore point between Washington and Kabul which warns it is squandering local support for the gruelling fight against a vicious Taliban-led insurgency.
A delegation of foreign troops and Afghan government officials left for Bala Buluk district, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) north of the provincial capital, earlier in the day to continue investigations, police said.
The police spokesman for western Afghanistan, Abdul Rauf Ahmadi, told AFP Wednesday that according to information passed to him more than 100 people died in the air strikes and ground operations.
Up to 30 were Taliban and the remainder were civilians, including children, women and elderly people, he said. Another official said he had seen the bodies of 20 children.
Farah town resident Haji Samir, 56, said he joined the protest after seeing two truckloads of bodies brought to the provincial capital on Tuesday.
Locals said the bodies, apparently a few dozen, belonged to civilians but the US military said they appeared to include dead insurgents.
“We want the Americans to stop killing civilians otherwise they will face a strong reaction from the people,” Samir said.
In the nearly eight years since the US military invaded Afghanistan to oust the Taliban and remained to fight the insurgency, civilians have been reported killed in multiple strikes against militants.
If investigators confirm 70 non-combatants were killed in Bala Buluk, it would make it the deadliest such incident affecting civilians in Afghanistan.
US military spokesman Colonel Greg Julian told AFP, however, that investigators were looking into claims that some of the civilians may have been killed by the Taliban and not in the air strikes.
Last year was the most dangerous for civilians caught up in the conflict, according to UN figures that estimate nearly 2,200 were killed, about 55 percent in insurgent attacks and nearly 40 percent by pro-government force action.
An injured Afghan woman from the Bala Baluk is seen on a bed at the hospital in Farah province. (Photo: AP)
A wounded Afghan villager stands amid the rubble of destroyed houses after the coalition airstrikes in Bala Baluk district of Farah province. (Photo: AP)
Tags: afghanistan, US-nato, war on terror
