An upsurge in violence in Afghanistan over the past week was the result of pressure on the Taliban from al-Qaeda and other supporters, a provincial governor said, citing Afghan intelligence.
This included al-Qaeda and other militants based in neighbouring Pakistan, said Asadullah Khalid, governor of Kandahar province, which has seen the bulk of the unrest.
”Al-Qaeda and certain countries were pressuring the Taliban to capture some ground, particularly in Kandahar, to claim their active presence,” the governor said, citing Afghan intelligence presented to him.
”The latest violence was more than the insurgency,” Khalid told Agence France-Presse on Thursday.
Afghan officials regularly say the Taliban-linked insurgency is plotted by leaders of the movement who fled across the border into Pakistan with their al-Qaeda allies when the Taliban government was toppled in 2001.
Pakistan and Afghanistan, both key allies in the United States-led ”war on terror”, have recently been locked in a war of words over Taliban and other Islamic rebels operating along their common border.
Khalid said intelligence reports showed that ”senior Taliban leaders” were living and training recruits in Pakistan, notably in the city of Quetta — about 100km from the border and opposite Kandahar.
Madrassas in Pakistan were recruiting men into the Taliban war, Khalid said, repeating an assertion often made in Afghanistan, including by President Hamid Karzai this week.
The ultra-Islamic Taliban movement was born in Kandahar province in the early 1990s, eventually taking control of most of conflict-ravaged Afghanistan in 1996.
The governor said recent operations against Taliban militants by Afghan and coalition forces had crippled the rebel leadership in Kandahar. The security forces have claimed that more than 350 rebels have been killed in the south in the past week.
”I can tell you that their leadership body has been destroyed, at least in Kandahar,” he said.
Operations would continue against Taliban militants holding out in villages around Kandahar city, the Afghan military commander for the southern region said.
”We don’t say there are not Taliban. They’re still in some villages, but we’ll clear them one after another,” General Rahmatullah Raufi said.
Khalid admitted he did not have sufficient government forces to crack down on rebels.
”About police being weak, yeah. You’re talking about good police, I’m telling you even we don’t have enough bad police,” he said.
Kabul had allowed him 40 police officers for each district, some with a population of more than 2 000, he said.
Abdul Qaudar Noorzai, regional director for Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, said rife corruption had distanced people from the authorities, which may explain some support for the Taliban.
And in some regions provincial officials turned a blind eye to the militants in exchange for peace, he said.
”In some cases the district chiefs have had agreements with the Taliban that they will not attack,” he said. ”In return they could keep their positions.”
President Hamid Karzai visited Kandahar on Thursday and called for calm amid the spiral in violence.
”I swear to God, I’ll bring security to you,” he said at a meeting of elders in the city. — AFP
