Recently in Taliban Category

What they say echoes what other would-be child suicide bombers say they were told: "They told us the bombs would not kill us, only the Americans would die and you can come back to us."

What intrepid, manly mujahedin, lying to children to send them to their deaths. "Police arrest two Afghan boys for suicide bomb plan," from Agence France-Presse, February 12:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Police arrested two 10-year-old would-be suicide bombers in southern Afghanistan, officials said Sunday, months after President Hamid Karzai pardoned the pair over a similar incident.

"The two ten-year old would-be bombers were arrested along with three other militants last week, while planning an attack on Afghan and international forces in Kandahar", Zalmai Ayubi the provincial spokesman told AFP.

The children had two vests full of explosives when they were detained, he added.

They had previously been arrested by security forces, again wearing explosive vests but were reportedly released last August, along with 18 other children, after receiving a pardon from the Afghan President.

The two boys had gone to Pakistan after their release but were sent back to Afghanistan after being trained to conduct suicide attacks.

"They told me I would be safe after conducting a suicide attack," one the boys Azizullah was quoted in a statement sent by Kandahar media office.

The boy said he was persuaded to carry out the attack at a training camp by militants who told him when "Americans fire at you... they will not be able to hit you".

The second boy, named as Nasibullah in the statement, said he had been forced to join a militant team who handed him over to the Taliban.

"The Taliban forced me to fire a Kalashinkov [sic]... I was scared at first. They also taught me how to blow my vest, they showed me how to press the button in my hand," he said, according to the statement.

"They then brought me to the city, asked me to sit on the side of the road and wait for foreign forces to come... I was there when two police came and arrested me.

"I ask all my madrassa teachers not to teach kids to become suicide bombers."

Ten years after being overthrown by US forces in response to the airborne Al-Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington, Taliban insurgents have shown a ruthless resilience to the West's military might.

Taliban militants have reportedly used children and teenagers to conduct attacks on security forces.

Where's the outrage? Imagine if this effort and ingenuity had been put toward something constructive over the past 10 years. But you don't get 72 virgins for building roads and sewers. "Civilian deaths in Afghanistan at highest level in a decade," by Ben Farmer for the Telegraph, February 4:

The number of civilians killed in the conflict rose eight per cent last year to reach 3,021 – with more than three-quarters caused by attacks from the Taliban-led insurgency.

The findings that on average more than eight Afghans a day are being killed are at odds with Nato assessments that violence is falling.

Deaths from suicide attacks rose more than 80 per cent to 431 over the year.

The number of suicide attacks did not rise, but "the nature of these attacks changed, becoming more complex, sometimes involving multiple suicide bombers, and designed to yield greater numbers of dead and injured civilians" the report found.

The worst was an attack outside a Kabul shrine in December that killed at least 56 and wounded 195 when a bomber detonated in a crowd of Shia worshippers celebrating the Ashura holiday. That attack was claimed by Pakistan-based militants.

The biggest single killer of civilians was homemade landmines often dug into roads, tracks and paths to target Nato or Afghan troops, but detonating indiscriminately.

The United Nations said on average 23 such bombs were found or blew up each day, killing 967 civilians during the year.

Numbers of civilians killed by Nato troops or by Hamid Karzai's forces fell slightly to 410.

Taliban leaders last year repeatedly called on their fighters to do more to protect civilians and threatened punishment to those who failed.

Such pronouncements have had little effect on the bloodshed, however.

"The continued high rate of civilian casualties by anti-government elements suggests that statements and proclamations alone neither resulted in improved protection of civilians nor minimised civilian casualties," the UN report said.

Women and children were increasingly caught up in the violence, accounting for 30 per cent of deaths in the last half of the year....

It won't be the Afghan government that fills the security vacuum. As became the template for the decade to follow in other countries, the U.S. greatly underestimated the Afghan population's support for the Taliban, for Sharia, and for jihad for the sake of imposing it. That is in large part because the U.S. greatly underestimated the content of Sharia, accepting a sugar-coated, vapor-ware Sharia -- what is at best an academic, drawing-board conception of what Sharia, could, would, or should be according to agenda-driven apologists, and at worst an outright lie -- as what it really has been in practice all these centuries.

"Taliban "poised to retake Afghanistan" after NATO," by Hamid Shalizi and Mirwais Harooni for Reuters, February 1:

KABUL (Reuters) - The U.S. military said in a secret report that the Taliban, backed by Pakistan, are set to retake control of Afghanistan after NATO-led forces withdraw, raising the prospect of a major failure of Western policy after a costly war.

Lieutenant Colonel Jimmie Cummings, a spokesman for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, confirmed the existence of the document, reported on Wednesday by Britain's Times newspaper and the BBC.

But he said it was not a strategic study.

"The classified document in question is a compilation of Taliban detainee opinions," he said. "It's not an analysis, nor is it meant to be considered an analysis."

Nevertheless, it could be interpreted as a damning assessment of the war, dragging into its 11th year and aimed at blocking a Taliban return to power.

It could also be seen as an admission of defeat and could reinforce the view of Taliban hardliners that they should not negotiate with the United States and President Hamid Karzai's unpopular government while in a position of strength.

The U.S. military report could boost the Taliban's confidence and make its leaders less willing to make concessions on demands for a ceasefire, and for the insurgency to renounce violence and break ties to al Qaeda.

But Britain's Kabul Ambassador William Patey wrote on his Twitter feed that "if elements of the Taliban think that in 2015 they can take control of Afghanistan they will be in for a shock." He did not say if he was referring to the document.

Hours after the Times report, the Afghan Taliban said that no peace negotiation process had been agreed with the international community, "particularly the Americans."

More on this story.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement that prior to any negotiations, confidence building measures must be completed, putting pressure on Washington to meet demands for the release of five Taliban in U.S. custody.

The hardline Islamist movement also said it had no plans to hold preliminary peace talks with Afghanistan's government in Saudi Arabia, dismissing media reports of talks in the kingdom.

The U.S. military said in the document that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) security agency was assisting the Taliban in directing attacks against foreign forces.

Reasserting control over the country would be more difficult a second time for the
Taliban, however, with Afghan police and soldiers expected to number about 350,000 beyond 2014 and some foreign troops likely to remain, including elite forces.

Just days ago, it had sounded like this plan had faltered when the Taliban refused to agree to a cease-fire before starting talks. These are no small fish, either; some are prominent detainees considered "high-risk." It is less clear from this report whether their release would be part of a quid-pro-quo exchange of actions for actions, or closer to earlier reports that spoke of nebulous "confidence building" measures and appeared to offer U.S. actions in exchange for pledges from the Taliban.

"US confirms possible release of Taliban from Gitmo," by Ann Gearan and Kimberly Dozier for the Associated Press, January 31:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged Tuesday that the United States may release several Afghan Taliban prisoners from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as an incentive to bring the Taliban to peace talks.

Meanwhile, Afghan officials told The Associated Press that a plan to give Afghanistan a form of legal custody over the men if they are released satisfied their earlier objection to sending the prisoners to a third country.

Director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper told Congress Tuesday that no decision had been made on whether to trade the five Taliban prisoners, now held at Guantanamo Bay as part of nascent peace talks with the Taliban. He and CIA Director David Petraeus did not dispute that the Obama administration is considering

transferring the five to a third country.

U.S. officials and others had previously spoken only vaguely, and usually anonymously, about the proposal to send the prisoners to Qatar, a Persian Gulf country that has asserted a central role in framing talks that might end the 10-year war in Afghanistan. The lead U.S. negotiator trying to coax the Taliban into talks had also publicly acknowledged the possibility of a release, but said there was no final decision.

The prisoners proposed for transfer include some of the detainees brought to Guantanamo during the initial days and weeks of the U.S. invasion that toppled the Taliban government in Afghanistan in 2001. At least one has been accused in the massacre of thousands of Shiite Muslims in Afghanistan, according to U.S. and other assessments, but none are accused of directly killing Americans.

"I don't think anybody harbors any illusions about it, but I think the position is to at least explore the potential for negotiating with them as a part of this overall resolution of the situation in Afghanistan," Clapper said during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing.

The Obama administration has recently embraced the possibility of negotiation with the Taliban much more openly, saying that although they remain cautious they are also encouraged that the militants may be ready to bargain. Peace talks, if they come to pass, would include the elected Afghan government and, at least at the outset, representatives of the U.S. government. With nearly 100,000 troops in Afghanistan and a war and development budget in the billions of dollars, the U.S. remains the largest power broker in Afghanistan.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai supports a prisoner release as a means to build confidence among the Taliban militants that talks are worthwhile, but he had balked at the U.S.-backed plan to send them to Qatar instead of home to Afghanistan. That plan appeared to undercut his authority and offend Afghan sovereignty, Afghan officials said. Karzai yanked his ambassador from Qatar, saying Qatar had not kept him properly informed....

In FrontPage this morning, I discuss the Taliban's recent efforts to present a kinder, gentler face to the West:

Apparently the Taliban are softening, even allowing girls to get an education. Clearly this heralds an opening to the West, a heady indication that their most repressive days are past them, and that soon they will take their place among the free people of the earth. Soon they will be following the teachings of Naomi Wolf and Thomas Paine.

Yaroslav Trofimov, in a piece that ran Sunday in the Wall Street Journal, noted that Maulvi Qalamuddin, who headed the Committee to Protect Virtue and Prevent Vice back when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, has completely changed his tune regarding the education of girls. Where once he oversaw the shutting-down, sometimes violently, of girls’ schools, now he says: “Education for women is just as necessary as education for men. In Islam, men and women have the same duty to pray, to fast—and to seek learning.”

Anyone who believes this, or believes that Maulvi Qalamuddin believes it, should contact me, as I have a lovely bridge to sell you. “War is deceit,” said Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, according to a famous hadith, and the Taliban are listening. But the Taliban are to be forgiven for thinking that this sort of thing would play well in Washington, for it very likely will. After all, Joe Biden is still the Vice President – the amiable dunce who recently said: “Look, the Taliban per se is not our enemy. That’s critical. There is not a single statement that the president has ever made in any of our policy assertions that the Taliban is our enemy because it threatens U.S. interests. If, in fact, the Taliban is able to collapse the existing government, which is cooperating with us in keeping the bad guys from being able to do damage to us, then that becomes a problem for us.”

In other words, the Taliban might win, so we have to surrender and act as if we’re just fine with that. And the alternative? Hamid Karzai, who got so annoyed with his American patrons last year that he threatened to join the Taliban himself. The Karzai government, that has been so helpful in “cooperating with us in keeping the bad guys from being able to do damage to us” that an increasing number of American and allied soldiers have recently fallen victim to surprise attacks from Afghan army forces that are supposed to be on our side....

Read it all.

One bit of good news in this is that the U.S. actually demanded substantive action from the Taliban and not just words, as prior reports implied. An update on this story. "US, Taliban talks on prisoner swap falter," by Mustaf Yusufzai for NBC News January 29:

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Talks between the Afghan Taliban and the United States in Qatar almost failed as the Taliban leadership reportedly refused to accept the U.S. demand of a ceasefire before swapping prisoners.

Sources in the Afghan Taliban said the Taliban had set up an office in Qatar hoping that it would help in a prisoners' swap, especially for their five top commanders held at the Guantanamo Bay base since 2002.

The Taliban sources said their talks with the U.S. had been going for the past few years in exchange for an American soldier, Bowe Bergdahl, captured by Taliban militants in Afghanistan's Paktika province in June 2009, bordering Pakistan's South Waziristan.

Maulvi Sangeen, a senior commander of the powerful Haqqani terror network, had initially claimed responsibility for kidnapping the U.S. soldier.

The Taliban sources said U.S. officials had earlier promised them they would exchange prisoners and later start peace talks.

However, according to the sources, the U.S. demanded that the Taliban announce a ceasefire in Afghanistan before any prisoner swap, which they said their central leadership had turned down.

"Our stance is the same. We will announce a ceasefire when the foreign forces start their withdrawal from Afghanistan," a Taliban source said.

The Afghan Taliban leadership is also worried about the reaction from their field commanders and fighters if a ceasefire were announced without getting anything to show in exchange.

Some members of the 140-strong Taliban delegation that went to Qatar had started leaving after no breakthrough was seen in talks with the U.S.

Time travel: You're doing it wrong. "Taliban militants torch TV sets, mobile phones," from the Press Trust of India, January 14 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Islamabad: The Pakistani Taliban confiscated computers, television sets and mobile phones from residents of the largest town of the restive South Waziristan tribal region and set them on fire at a market, according to a media report today.

The militants set on fire over a dozen computers, television sets and cellular phones and several cassettes at the bazar in Wana, the main town of South Waziristan Agency, yesterday. The Taliban militants, who belonged to a faction led by Maulvi Nazeer, said they had already banned the use of TV sets and computers for watching movies and playing music.

Part of this behavior is a continuation of Muhammad's antipathy toward music, and familiar patterns of "morality" policing. But a totalitarian government must restrict a population's access to information to maintain control.

They said they had also banned mobile phones with cameras. The militants, who claimed people were defying their ban, seized over a dozen TV sets, computers and mobile phones and several cassettes, reportedly with music, from local residents, The News daily reported.

Before burning the items they had confiscated, the militants closed the main road passing through Wana's Rustam Bazar. A large number of tribesmen gathered to watch the militants burning the TV sets and computers.

The intrepid mujahedin, showing how manly they are by outsourcing suicide bombings to children. "Afghan boy suicide bombers tell how they are brainwashed into believing they will survive," by Ben Farmer for the Telegraph, January 13:

The mission was as simple as touching two wires together, the little boy was promised. The resulting blast would obliterate the American infidels – but God would spare him from the flame and shrapnel. Abdul Samat would be unharmed and free to run back to the men who had fitted his bomb vest.

Blindfolded and rigged with his explosive payload, the boy, who was about 13, was driven to his target in the Afghan city of Kandahar, after being plucked from the streets of Quetta in neighbouring Pakistan. Minutes before he was due to execute the attack, however, Abdul realised the lies of his recruiters seeking to turn him into a human bomb.

"When I opened my eyes, I saw it was a very black thing they wanted me to do," he later recalled.

"I began to cry and shout. People came out of their houses and asked what was wrong. I showed them I had something in my vest. Then they were scared too and called the police who took the bombs off me."

Afghan security officials say that Abdul's story is not unusual. In the past year, insurgents have used a wave of child suicide bombers, some as young as 10, on the ruthless assumption that small boys can pass through checkpoints and security cordons more easily than men.

A senior Afghan intelligence official estimated that more than 100 had been intercepted in the past 12 months, including 20 from the Kandahar area in the south. The insurgents seek to exploit the innocence of their recruits and turn it into a weapon.

What they really want is to place NATO forces in a situation where they have to decide between dying in a bombing and using force to stop the bomber. The propaganda mill would then say that NATO forces fired on a child.

The largely illiterate boys are fed a diet of anti-Western and anti-Afghan government propaganda until they are prepared to kill, he said. But the boys are also assured that they will miraculously survive the devastation they cause.

"The worst part is that these children don't think that they are killing themselves," said the official. "They are often given an amulet containing Koranic verses. Mullahs tell them, 'When this explodes you will survive and God will help you survive the fire. Only the infidels will be killed, you will be saved and your parents will go to paradise'."

Throughout the war against the Soviet invaders in the 1980s, and the civil strife that followed, Afghan fighters of all factions rejected suicide attacks as cowardly and unIslamic.

The tactic was adopted only after 2001, learned from Arab jihadists who had used it to devastating effect in Iraq.

The first Afghan suicide bomber is believed to have been a man called Hafez Abdallah, who in 2004 threw himself on a military Jeep and detonated mortar bombs strapped to his body. Suicide bombs hidden in vehicles or sewn into vests have since been widely employed.

The Taliban denies using children as bombers, pointing out that its battlefield code forbids any military use of pre-pubescent boys. One Taliban facilitator from northern Afghanistan told The Daily Telegraph: "All our bombers are men and they are all volunteers. We never use boys."

But Nato and Afghan security officials said the tactic has been widely adopted. Child bombers had been used by the Haqqani network, an insurgent group aligned to the Taliban. [...]

And Pakistani intelligence.

Gul Khan, who looks no older than 10, said his father had insisted he go to a madrassa in Pakistan run by a man called Maulawi Sher Jan.

"Each day they were preaching that we would tie bombs on to our bodies and attack foreigners in Afghanistan," he said after escaping and being arrested on the border.

"They told us the bombs would not kill us, only the Americans would die and you can come back to us."

Many of the captured boys have been pardoned, but others remain in Afghanistan's child jails. Once in custody, they often retract their televised confessions, justice officials in Kandahar said.

Three convicted child suicide bombers, seen by The Daily Telegraph, all said their confessions had been false and they were wrongly convicted. Haji Abdul Haq, the juvenile prosecutor for Kandahar, denied pressure had been placed on them and said they were often caught wearing bomb vests. "They confess at first, but when their families reach them, they change their minds," he said.

The only ones who might be surprised by this are in Washington, and they won't listen anyway. "Afghan Taliban says peace talks 'don't signal end to Jihad,'" from ANI, January 12 (thanks to Twostellas):

Islamabad, Jan 12 : Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents have said that their support for peace talks does not mean a surrender from Jihad, and have vowed to continue their armed struggle.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the militants had been fighting for the past 15 years to establish an Islamic government in Afghanistan "in accordance with the request of its people".

"It is for this purpose and for bringing about peace and stability in Afghanistan that we have increased our political efforts to come to mutual understanding with the world in order to solve the current ongoing situation," Mujahid said in an emailed statement.

"But this understanding does not mean a surrender from Jihad and neither is it connected to an acceptance of the constitution of the stooge Kabul administration," he added....

The Taliban wants them sent to Qatar so they are not detained in Afghanistan. Of course, they'll all just take up shuffleboard wherever they're released. No security issues there.

The U.S. has "agreed in principle" to release high-ranking Taliban prisoners from Guantánamo Bay in what has appeared so far to be an exchange of concrete American actions for pledges from the Taliban. "Taliban 'want US prisoners sent to Qatar'," by Joris Fioriti for Agence France-Presse, January 6:

Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents have demanded in negotiations with the US that prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay be transferred to Qatar, an Afghan government spokesman said Friday.

But President Hamid Karzai's government objects strongly to the move and wants the prisoners sent directly to Afghanistan, presidential spokesman Aimal Faizi told AFP.

The Taliban announced this week that they planned to set up a political office in Qatar, a move seen as a precursor to peace talks with Washington.

At the same time, the hardline Islamists demanded the release of prisoners from the US military detention centre at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba -- but the statement did not specify where they should be sent.

Karzai was told by the US about the demand that they should go to Qatar shortly before the Bonn conference on Afghanistan in December, Faizi said.

"Several meetings had taken place between the Americans and the Taliban. It was something discussed between the two sides.

"But that day, when the Americans talked to Karzai, it was the first time that they talked about the transfer of the prisoners to Qatar."

Faizi said his government was in favour of a release of Guantanamo prisoners, "but we don't want them to go directly to Qatar -- our government is strongly against it".

Karzai's government is concerned about being sidelined in the negotiations towards possible peace between the Taliban and the US, and Faizi stressed that it wanted "an Afghan-led transition".

"You can't send them directly to Qatar because it would be a breach of our sovereignty, of the Afghan laws or of the constitution. Afghanistan is an independent nation, you know.

"You can't do anything you want with our citizens without informing the Afghan government. The prisoners should be sent to the Afghan government first.

"We agreed on the opening of an office for the Taliban in Qatar, but never on the transfer of the prisoners to that country." [...]

Afghan analyst and former Taliban official Waheed Mujhda said that if released Taliban prisoners were repatriated to Kabul they risked being detained by the government, which is why the movement was pressing for them to be sent to Qatar....

Earlier reports suggested they would be transferred to Afghan custody. This report also speculates about a possible prisoner exchange for the abducted U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl, but notes there is no clear indication that this arrangement is under discussion.

Instead, "the releases would be to reciprocate for Tuesday's announcement from the Taliban that they are prepared to open a political office in Qatar to conduct peace negotiations." So, once again, by all appearances, the U.S. is trading risky American actions for pledges from the Taliban.

"Taliban leaders held at Guantánamo Bay to be released in peace talks deal," by Julian Borger and Jon Boone for the Guardian, January 3:

The US has agreed in principle to release high-ranking Taliban officials from Guantánamo Bay in return for the Afghan insurgents' agreement to open a political office for peace negotiations in Qatar, the Guardian has learned.

The Taliban are set to be the beneficiaries of "negotiations" Homer Simpson described best: "You help me, and I, in turn, am helped by you."

According to sources familiar with the talks in the US and in Afghanistan, the handful of Taliban figures will include Mullah Khair Khowa, a former interior minister, and Noorullah Noori, a former governor in northern Afghanistan.

More controversially, the Taliban are demanding the release of the former army commander Mullah Fazl Akhund. Washington is reported to be considering formally handing him over to the custody of another country, possibly Qatar.

The releases would be to reciprocate for Tuesday's announcement from the Taliban that they are prepared to open a political office in Qatar to conduct peace negotiations "with the international community" – the most significant political breakthrough in ten years of the Afghan conflict.

The Taliban are holding just one American soldier, Bowe Bergdahl, a 25-year-old sergeant captured in June 2009, but it is not clear whether he would be freed as part of the deal.

"To take this step, the [Obama] administration have to have sufficient confidence that the Taliban are going to reciprocate," said Vali Nasr, who was an Obama administration adviser on the Afghan peace process until last year. "It is going to be really risky. Guantánamo is a very sensitive issue politically."

Nasr, now a professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, said the Taliban announcement on the opening of an office in Qatar was a dramatic breakthrough.

"If it had not happened then the idea of reconciliation would have been completely finished. The Qatar office is akin to the Taliban forming a Sinn Féin, a political wing to conduct negotiations," Nasr said, but added: "The next phase will need concessions on both sides. This doesn't mean we are now on autopilot to peace."....

No kidding!

Awwww. More on this story. It is unfortunate that it does not look as if anyone (least of all Pakistan) is pressing for a military advantage while the group is floundering; the CIA has suspended drone strikes as of last month. It would appear that this is an opportunity that is being allowed to pass. "Exclusive: Pakistan Taliban commanders 'at each other's throats'," by Chris Allbritton for Reuters, January 3:

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Al Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani militants have held a series of meetings aimed at containing what could soon be open warfare between the two most powerful Pakistani Taliban leaders, militant sources have said.

Hakimullah Mehsud, the head of the Pakistani Taliban, also known as the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and his deputy, Wali-ur-Rehman, were at each other's throats, the sources said.

"You will soon hear that one of them has eliminated the other, though hectic efforts are going on by other commanders and common friends to resolve differences between the two," one TTP commander said.

Any division within the TTP could hinder the Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda's struggle in Afghanistan against the United States and its allies, making it more difficult to recruit young fighters and disrupting safe havens in Pakistan used by the Afghan militants.

Despite multiple reports of the Rehman-Mehsud split, Rehman told Reuters on Tuesday there was no problem between the two.

"There are no differences between us," Rehman said.

The TTP, formed in 2007, is an umbrella group of various Pakistani militant factions operating in Pakistan's unruly northwestern tribal areas along the porous border with Afghanistan.

It has long struggled with its choice of targets. Some factions are at war with the Pakistani state while others concentrate on the fight against the United States and its allies in Afghanistan.

There has been a noticeable decrease in militant attacks in Pakistan, but there continue to be random acts of violence across the country.

Al Qaeda and Afghan Taliban commanders are asking the TTP to provide more men for the fight in Afghanistan and are looking to smooth over the dispute between Mehsud and Rehman.

Taliban sources said Rehman had ordered his fighters to kill Mehsud because of his increasing closeness with al Qaeda and its Arab contingent.

Mehsud's former deputy has also alleged the TTP chief received money from Pakistan's arch-rival, India, to kill a former Pakistan spy agency official acting as a mediator between the Pakistani Taliban, Afghan insurgents and the Pakistani government.

The reported enmity between Mehsud and Rehman is not the only conflict within the TTP ranks.

Mehsud has a long-standing feud with militant commanders Maulvi Nazeer in South Waziristan and Hafiz Gul Bahadur in North Waziristan, both of whom have non-aggression agreements with the Pakistani military.

Mehsud's men have also fought with the militia under the control of Fazal Saeed Haqqani, the former TTP head in the Kurram tribal region. He has accused Mehsud of killing his commanders and innocent people and kidnapping for ransom.

Haqqani, who is close to the militant Afghan Haqqani network, broke away from the TTP last year.

A pamphlet distributed by militants in North Waziristan this week announced the formation of a council to try to resolve the conflicts.

"All jihadi forces have jointly, on the recommendation of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, formed a five-member commission which will be known as the Shura Muraqba," the pamphlet said, using the term by which the Afghan Taliban describe themselves.

"The Shura Muraqba will be working to resolve differences and problems between mujahideen."

It said that any mujahideen -- or holy warriors -- found to have committed an "unlawful" killing or kidnapping would be punished under Islamic law. It is likely any attack on a fellow mujahideen commander would be considered "unlawful."

"All mujahideen should respect the decisions of the council that has been set up," a senior commander of the Haqqani faction in Kurram said....

The U.S. agreed to the idea earlier last year. The third-country presence carries the risk of giving the Taliban an undeserved veneer of legitimacy, giving it the opportunity to buy time on the battlefield by going through the motions, and engage in blackmail over quitting negotiations. It also threatens the evolution of a Hizballah-like Taliban that joins the political process, but will not disarm.

Note also the continued talk of "trust-building" that involves "assurances" from the Taliban in exchange for concrete, risky concessions from the U.S. This is the first mention of a possible prisoner exchange for the abducted soldier Bowe Bergdahl, though it is not clear how seriously that is under discussion.

"Taliban strike deal with Qatar on office there," by Patrick Quinn and Rahim Faiez for the Associated Press, January 3:

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Afghan Taliban said Tuesday that they have reached a preliminary deal with the Gulf state of Qatar to open a liaison office there, in what could be a step toward formal, substantive peace talks to end more than a decade of war.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid indicated the liaison office will conduct negotiations with the international community but not with the Afghan government — a condition that President Hamid Karzai has indicated he would reject. Mujahid did not say when it would open.

The reported progress came as three bomb blasts hit Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, killing 13.

For the United States and its allies, the idea of a Taliban political office in the Qatari capital of Doha has become the central element in efforts to draw the insurgents into peace talks.

"Right now, having a strong presence in Afghanistan, we still want to have a political office for negotiations," said Mujahid. "In this regard, we have started preliminary talks and we have reached a preliminary understanding with relevant sides, including the government of Qatar, to have a political office for negotiations with the international community."

Mujahid's emailed statement also said the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan — the name of Afghanistan under Taliban rule — has "requested for the exchange of prisoners from Guantanamo."

He was referring to a Taliban demand that the U.S. military release about five Afghan prisoners believed to be affiliated with the Taliban from the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The Taliban are holding Bowe Bergdahl, a 25-year-old U.S. Army sergeant from Hailey, Idaho, who is the only U.S. soldier held by the insurgents. He was taken prisoner June 30, 2009, in Afghanistan.

From the American perspective, other trust-building measures would involve assurances that the insurgents cut ties with al-Qaida, accept the elected civilian government of Afghanistan and bargain in good faith...

Of course they'll promise to bargain in good faith.

The earlier report we posted on "confidence building measures" noted that the U.S. "has asked representatives of the Taliban to match that confidence-building measure with some of their own. Those could include a denunciation of international terrorism and a public willingness to enter formal political talks with the government headed by Afghan President Hamid Karzai."

According to that account, we could be pledging American actions -- big, risky ones -- in exchange for words from the Taliban. What could possibly go wrong? After all, the Taliban don't want Fazl and the other detainees back in Afghan custody just to visit: in Afghan custody, they stand to benefit from any number of "sudden" security lapses and inside help, as has occurred in the massive Kandahar prison break last year.

"U.S. mulls transfer of Taliban prisoner in perilous peace bid," by Mark Hosenball, Missy Ryan and Warren Strobel for Reuters, December 29:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration is considering transferring to Afghan custody a senior Taliban official suspected of major human rights abuses as part of a long-shot bid to improve the prospects of a peace deal in Afghanistan, Reuters has learned.

The potential hand-over of Mohammed Fazl, a 'high-risk detainee' held at the Guantanamo Bay military prison since early 2002, has set off alarms on Capitol Hill and among some U.S. intelligence officials.

As a senior commander of the Taliban army, Fazl is alleged to be responsible for the killing of thousands of Afghanistan's minority Shi'ite Muslims between 1998 and 2001.

According to U.S. military documents made public by WikiLeaks, he was also on the scene of a November 2001 prison riot that killed CIA operative Johnny Micheal Spann, the first American who died in combat in the Afghan war. There is no evidence, however, that Fazl played any direct role in Spann's death.

Senior U.S. officials have said their 10-month-long effort to set up substantive negotiations between the weak government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Taliban has reached a make-or-break moment. Reuters reported earlier this month that they are proposing an exchange of "confidence-building measures," including the transfer of five detainees from Guantanamo and the establishment of a Taliban office outside of Afghanistan.

Now Reuters has learned from U.S. government sources the identity of one of the five detainees in question.

The detainees, the officials emphasized, would not be set free, but remain in some sort of further custody. It is unclear precisely what conditions they would be held under.

In response to inquiries by Reuters, a senior administration official said that the release of Fazl and four other Taliban members had been requested by the Afghan government and Taliban representatives as far back as 2005.

The debate surrounding the White House's consideration of high-profile prisoners such as Fazl illustrates the delicate course it must tread both at home and abroad as it seeks to move the nascent peace process ahead.

One U.S. intelligence official said there had been intense bipartisan opposition in Congress to the proposed transfer.

"I can tell you that the hair on the back of my neck went up when they walked in with this a month ago, and there's been very, very strong letters fired off to the administration," the official said on condition of anonymity....

Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi has been praised by Saudi-funded dhimmi pseudo-academic John Esposito as a champion of a “reformist interpretation of Islam and its relationship to democracy, pluralism and human rights.” But numerous statements of Qaradawi demonstrate that he anything but a “reformist” or a genuine champion of “democracy, pluralism and human rights” – and is, in fact, positively Hitlerian in his Jew-hatred and bloodlust.

During the uprising against the Mubarak regime, a Muslim website published a chapter from Qaradawi’s book Laws of Jihad, including this passage: “One of the forms of jihad in Islam is jihad against evil and corruption within [the Islamic lands]. This jihad is crucial in order to protect society from collapse, disintegration, and perdition — for Muslim society has unique characteristics, and if these are lost, forgotten or destroyed, there will be no Muslim society.”

Qaradawi also enjoys a reputation as a moderate beyond just Esposito: the former Ground Zero mosque imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who is himself widely assumed to be a “moderate” despite evidence to the contrary, has hailed Qaradawi as a “very very well known Islamic jurist, highly regarded all over the Muslim world.” And another Muslim leader whose moderate bona fides have been questioned, the vaunted “Muslim Martin Luther” Tariq Ramadan, wrote a foreword to one of his books in 1998, and former London Mayor Ken Livingstone welcomed him to the city in 2004 and praised him repeatedly, despite the fact that during that visit Qaradawi explained to the BBC that suicide attacks against Israelis were not actually suicide at all, but “martyrdom in the name of God.” (Qaradawi has since been banned from Britain, as well as from the U.S.)

And the things that Qaradawi tells the millions of Muslims that he reaches are anything but moderate. In January 2009, during a Friday sermon broadcast on Al-Jazeera, he prayed that Allah would kill all the Jews: “Oh Allah, take this oppressive, Jewish, Zionist band of people. Oh Allah, do not spare a single one of them. Oh Allah, count their numbers, and kill them, down to the very last one.” He also declared: “Throughout history, Allah has imposed upon the [Jews] people who would punish them for their corruption. The last punishment was carried out by [Adolf] Hitler.”

And now he is a mediator for the U.S. Government.

"Report: Radical Sheikh a Key Mediator in U.S.-Taliban Talks," from IPT News, December 28 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

Radical Islamist cleric and longtime Muslim Brotherhood spiritual guide Yusuf al-Qaradawi serves as a "key mediator in secret talks between the U.S. and the Taliban," according to unnamed government sources referenced in a report published late Wednesday in The Hindu.

In early December, the report said, "Qaradawi helped draw a road map for a deal between the Taliban and the United States, aimed at giving the superpower a face-saving political settlement ahead of its planned withdrawal from Afghanistan." The United States is expected to begin pulling out of Afghanistan in 2014.

The Qaradawi-brokered deal calls for significant American commitments, including "the release of prisoners still held by the United States at Guantanamo Bay, the lifting of United Nations sanctions on its leadership and its recognition as a legitimate political group." In return, the Hindu's sources say, the Taliban would be "expected to sever its links to transnational organisations like al-Qaeda, end violence and eventually share power with the Afghan government."

If true, the report raises significant questions about American strategy in the talks and the enhancement of a radical cleric's stature.

Qaradawi repeatedly has lashed out against Jews, glorifying violence against them and calling for Allah to "count their numbers, and kill them, down to the very last one." In 2009, he prayed for the chance to kill a Jew before dying. He has readily encouraged suicide bombing as "the greatest of all sorts of Jihad in the Cause of Allah." And, perhaps most troubling when considering the nature of the talks, Qaradawi actively supported the killing of U.S. servicemen and women, writing in 2003:

"Those killed fighting the American forces are martyrs given their good intentions since they consider these invading troops an enemy within their territories but without their will…Although they are seen by some as being wrong, those defending against attempts to control Islamic countries have the intention of Jihad and bear a spirit of the defense of their homeland."

Biden continues here the Obama Administration's narrow focus on al-Qaeda as the enemy. Not even the Taliban are included anymore, despite their obvious involvement in 9/11 plotting and more. And the ideology that al-Qaeda and the Taliban, as well as many other jihad groups around the globe? Off the table. Cannot and must not be examined.

"Joe Biden On Iraq, Iran, China and the Taliban," by Leslie H. Gelb for Newsweek via The Daily Beast, December 19 (thanks to Wimpy):

On Thursday, Dec. 15, Vice President Joe Biden sat down in his sunlit White House office adjoining the Rose Garden to do what he loves best—talk about foreign policy—with Leslie H. Gelb of Newsweek/The Daily Beast. What follows are excerpts of their exclusive review of the year’s hotspots....

NEWSWEEK: What are our vital interests in continuing to fight a major war in Afghanistan?

BIDEN: We were in Afghanistan for two reasons. One is to deal with, curtail, begin to dismantle, and eventually eliminate al Qaeda. Not only from being able to come back into Afghanistan and control Afghanistan but from the region—to decimate al Qaeda.

NEWSWEEK: Almost an impossible goal to achieve.

BIDEN: No—to fundamentally alter their capacity to do damage to American allies and vital U.S. interests, to fundamentally alter that. We have done that. It doesn’t mean they’re not capable.

NEWSWEEK: It means we’ve done it for the time being, but depending upon who comes to power in Afghanistan in the future, they can come back. I know you don’t favor staying there ad infinitum to prevent that.

BIDEN: I would argue they are not able to come back. I would argue that there has been serious damage done to their infrastructure in a way that the coherence of this thing called al Qaeda and their ability to metastasize has been severely damaged.

NEWSWEEK: So we no longer have to stay in Afghanistan to fight for it?

BIDEN: No, let me finish. That is not fully achieved, it is close. The second reason for us to be in Afghanistan was to make sure that a country with tens of millions of people and nuclear weapons called Pakistan did not somehow begin to disintegrate or fall apart. That is a hell of a lot tougher job....

Great job on that score, Joe. Pakistan is a paragon of anti-jihad Islamic moderation, now, ain't it?

NEWSWEEK: I know you don’t believe we can reshape Afghanistan and make it into a caramelized democracy.

BIDEN: Look, look, Les, let’s posit that your statement is that it’s clear that Pakistan could live with an Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban.

NEWSWEEK: They did.

BIDEN: We could not. We could not because they harbored, sheltered, and supported an outfit that created a real threat to the United States.

NEWSWEEK: And we told them if you stop harboring al Qaeda, we’ll live with you too.

BIDEN: Yes, but they didn’t.

NEWSWEEK: And we can make that deal now.

BIDEN: We didn’t. That is part of what the reconciliation process is about right now. We are not just deciding that all we are doing is supporting a government and building up their military capability. We’re engaged in a reconciliation process. Whether it will work or not is another question. But we are in a position where if Afghanistan ceased and desisted from being a haven for people who do damage and have as a target the United States of America and their allies, that’s good enough. That’s good enough. We’re not there yet.

Look, the Taliban per se is not our enemy. That’s critical. There is not a single statement that the president has ever made in any of our policy assertions that the Taliban is our enemy because it threatens U.S. interests. If, in fact, the Taliban is able to collapse the existing government, which is cooperating with us in keeping the bad guys from being able to do damage to us, then that becomes a problem for us. So there’s a dual track here:

One, continue to keep the pressure on al Qaeda and continue to diminish them. Two, put the government in a position where they can be strong enough that they can negotiate with and not be overthrown by the Taliban. And at the same time try to get the Taliban to move in the direction to see to it that they, through reconciliation, commit not to be engaged with al Qaeda or any other organization that they would harbor to do damage to us and our allies....

The Taliban don't want this so they can visit. They know that in Afghan custody, they stand a good chance of seeing the detainees escaping or being released outright. Failing that, they can attempt to organize a prison break of their own, which they did in Kandahar "with inside help."

"Exclusive: Secret U.S., Taliban talks reach turning point," by Missy Ryan, Warren Strobel and Mark Hosenball for Reuters, December 19:

(Reuters) - After 10 months of secret dialogue with Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents, senior U.S. officials say the talks have reached a critical juncture and they will soon know whether a breakthrough is possible, leading to peace talks whose ultimate goal is to end the Afghan war.

As part of the accelerating, high-stakes diplomacy, Reuters has learned, the United States is considering the transfer of an unspecified number of Taliban prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay military prison into Afghan government custody.

It has asked representatives of the Taliban to match that confidence-building measure with some of their own. Those could include a denunciation of international terrorism and a public willingness to enter formal political talks with the government headed by Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Words from the Taliban must not be accepted as a "confidence-building measure," especially not in exchange for substantive action taken by the U.S. or NATO.

The officials acknowledged that the Afghanistan diplomacy, which has reached a delicate stage in recent weeks, remains a long shot. Among the complications: U.S. troops are drawing down and will be mostly gone by the end of 2014, potentially reducing the incentive for the Taliban to negotiate.

Still, the senior officials, all of whom insisted on anonymity to share new details of the mostly secret effort, suggested it has been a much larger piece of President Barack Obama's Afghanistan policy than is publicly known.

U.S. officials have held about half a dozen meetings with their insurgent contacts, mostly in Germany and Doha with representatives of Mullah Omar, leader of the Taliban's Quetta Shura, the officials said.

The stakes in the diplomatic effort could not be higher.

Failure would likely condemn Afghanistan to continued conflict, perhaps even civil war, after NATO troops finish turning security over to Karzai's weak government by the end of 2014.

Success would mean a political end to the war and the possibility that parts of the Taliban - some hardliners seem likely to reject the talks - could be reconciled.

The effort is now at a pivot point.

"We imagine that we're on the edge of passing into the next phase. Which is actually deciding that we've got a viable channel and being in a position to deliver" on mutual confidence-building measures, said a senior U.S. official....

Savagery. And yet the world community is much more upset about the chimera of "Islamophobia" than it will ever be about this. "Taliban cut nursing woman’s breast, asked others to eat pieces: UN-backed report," from the Press Trust of India, December 16 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

Islamabad : Pakistani Taliban fighters cut the breasts of a woman who was breastfeeding her child and asked other women to eat the pieces, in a gory incident highlighted in a report on the abuse of women in the militancy-hit tribal belt bordering Afghanistan.

The incident occurred when five militants walked into a house and saw the woman breastfeeding her child, The Express Tribune quoted the report titled ‘Impact of crisis on women and girls in FATA’ as saying.

The report, released by the human rights organisation “Khwendo Kor” (Sisters’ Home in Pashto) with financial support from the UN, is based on case studies of women from the tribal belt living in camps set up in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa for people displaced by militancy.

Women in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas are more susceptible to abuse in a post-conflict scenario, whether or not they are part of the conflict, the report says.

Another revelation is that women in camps were forced to have sex in exchange for food and non-food items. Girls and widows were at greater risk of such abuse.

“A security officer forced me to have sex in exchange for cooking oil and pulses when I was collecting food at the main entrance of the camp,” a 22-year-old woman in Jalozai camp is quoted as saying.

The surveys conducted at relief camps at Nahqai and Jalozai showed that women were uncomfortable going to toilets because men constantly lurked around.

The report said there was also an increase in “honour killings” in which women who were raped were murdered because rape was considered a disgrace to the family....

Similar proposals have been floating around for some time, and have included not only Turkey, but Qatar, as discussed below. Such measures carry a major risk of granting the Taliban a veneer of false legitimacy, an undeserved upgrade in international standing, and a tool to buy time by going through the motions of overtures toward peace talks, while continuing to fight and plot attacks. "Afghans propose Saudi, Turkey for Taliban liaison office," from Middle East Online, December 15:

KABUL - Afghan authorities on Thursday named Saudi Arabia or Turkey as the best places to set up a Taliban liaison office abroad to enable peace talks to end a devastating 10-year insurgency.

President Hamid Karzai convened a top level meeting, the outcome of which is not binding, to discuss how to move forward with a peace process derailed by the assassination of his peace envoy, Burhanuddin Rabbani, in September.

The meeting came one day after Afghanistan announced it had recalled its ambassador to Qatar in protest at being left out of talks in which the United States discussed plans for the Taliban to open an address in Qatar.

"The participants of the meeting insisted that the address created for the opposition should be inside Afghanistan," Karzai's office said.

"But if the situation does not allow this, the office should be established in an Islamic country, preferably in Saudi Arabia or Turkey.

"The participants also asserted that the fighting and violence against the people of Afghanistan should stop before the peace talks start.

"It was also decided in the meeting that no other countries should interfere in this process without the agreement of Islamic republic of Afghanistan."

The meeting at the presidential palace involved high-ranking government officials, including the first vice president and foreign minister, former Mujahedeen commanders, members of the peace council, and Rabbani's son, Salahuddin.

They agreed the Taliban address should be established "for the sole purpose of peace talks", the statement added.

The US has discussed plans for the Taliban to open an address in Qatar by the end of the year to allow the West to begin formal peace talks.

So, does anyone still say "friend and ally?" "Pakistan says U.S. drones in its air space will be shot down," from MSNBC, December 11:

ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan will shoot down any U.S. drone that intrudes its air space per new directives, a senior Pakistani official told NBC News on Saturday.

According to the new Pakistani defense policy, "Any object entering into our air space, including U.S. drones, will be treated as hostile and be shot down," a senior Pakistani military official told NBC News.

The policy change comes just weeks after a deadly NATO attack on Pakistani military checkpoints accidentally killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, prompting Pakistani officials to order all U.S. personnel out of a remote airfield in Pakistan.

Pakistan told the U.S. to vacate Shamsi Air Base by December 11.

A senior military official from Quetta, Pakistan, confirmed to NBC News on Saturday that the evacuation of the base, used for staging classified drone flights directed against militants, “will be completed tomorrow,” according to NBC’s Fakhar ur Rehman.

Pakistan's Frontier Corps security forces took control of the base Saturday evening after most U.S. military personnel left, Xinhua news agency reported. Civil aviation officials also moved in Saturday, Xinhua said.

Pakistani Military Chief Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani had issued multiple directives since the Nov. 26 NATO attack, which included orders to shoot down U.S. drones, senior military officials confirmed to NBC News on Saturday.

It was unclear Saturday whether orders to fire upon incoming U.S. drones was part of the initial orders.

Cutting off their noses to spite their faces:

The Pakistani airbase had been used by U.S. forces, including the CIA, to stage elements of a clandestine U.S. counter-terrorism operation to attack militants linked to al-Qaida, the Taliban and Pakistan's home-grown Haqqani network, using unmanned drone aircraft armed with missiles.

President Barack Obama stepped up the drone campaign after he took office. U.S. officials say it has produced major successes in decimating the central leadership of al-Qaida and putting associated militant groups on the defensive.

Since 2004, U.S. drones have carried out more than 300 attacks inside Pakistan.

Pakistani authorities started threatening U.S. personnel with eviction from the Shamsi base in the wake of the raid last May in which U.S. commandos killed Osama bin Laden at his hide-out near Islamabad without notifying Pakistani officials in advance.

Nothing shows the bravery, nobility, and magnanimity of the glorious mujahedin quite like... beating up on 70-year-olds. An update on this story. "Concern grows for American kidnapped in Pakistan," from MSNBC, December 5:

ISLAMABAD — Concern was growing Friday for the safety of American development expert Warren Weinstein, who was kidnapped from home in Pakistan in August.

Al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri said in an audio recording issued on Islamist websites late Thursday that his organization had captured "this man who has had an active part in American aid to Pakistan since the seventies."

And that's just the sort of thing you really want to punish. Jihad causes poverty.

However, sources told NBC News on Friday that there were strong indications that Weinstein, 70, had been passed to a dreaded faction of the Pakistani Taliban.

They said he was presently in the custody of militants led by Commander Tariq Afridi, operating in the gun-manufacturing, semi-autonomous tribal region of Darra Adamkhel.

It is the same militant group that kidnapped a Polish engineer, Piotr Stancza, from Attock area of Punjab province on Sept. 28, 2009. Stancza was later executed after their demands for money and a release of prisoners were not met by the government.

Some sources said that Weinstein was kidnapped by another group and later sold to Afridi, NBC News reported.

Ruthless

He is considered the most ruthless among his militant colleagues and is known for his harsh policies.

The list of demands is staggering:

In the al-Qaida Internet statement, Zawahri said the group's demands for Weinstein's release included the release of all those held by the United States at the Guantanamo detention center and all others imprisoned for ties to al-Qaida or the Taliban. The statement was translated by the SITE group, which says it monitors the "jihadist threat."

Sneer quotes noted.

He also demanded an end to air strikes by the United States and its allies against militants in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia and Gaza.

Zawahri specifically demanded the release of high-profile militants including Ramzi Yousef, imprisoned in the United States for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, and Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, serving a life sentence for plotting to attack the U.N. headquarters and other New York City landmarks.....

To land a gig like that, are they sure he has been miraculously cured of his "misunderstanding" of Islam? He does not sound terribly remorseful below in spite of hitting a few talking points. In fact, it sounds like he is bragging. More on this story. "Insurgent commander who planned bomb attacks that 'blew soliders to bits' is granted amnesty," by Ben Farmer for the Telegraph, November 27 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Maulawi Noor ul Aziz estimates he ordered or took part in hundreds of attacks on Afghan and Nato forces during his decade as an insurgent commander. As a senior rebel leader in the Nad-e Ali district of Helmand during some of that time, many of his targets were likely to have been British troops.

Yet the commander has been welcomed and granted amnesty by the Afghan government under a British-funded scheme to undermine the Taliban by coaxing fighters away from the battlefield and reintegrating them into society.

Maulawi Noor ul Aziz became the scheme's greatest success yet when he and 80 of his men defected to the government in April 2011, when he was then "shadow" governor of the northern province of Kunduz - in charge of the Taliban's own clandestine administration.

Rather than face trial for his role in the insurgency, he has been given a government job as acting head of Kandahar's department for Hajj and Islamic Affairs.

He told The Sunday Telegraph he had decided to leave the war against Hamid Karzai's government and its foreign backers because his country had seen enough fighting.

He said: "Fighting does not lead to peace or prosperity anywhere in the world. We have to use this chance for peace." The Afghan Taliban had also come too heavily under the influence of Pakistan he believed.

"There are people in the Taliban who do not want to kill their own people on the orders of strangers. They wish to join this government, to join their own people, to live together, but those Taliban are under the control of strangers. If they have the opportunity, I am sure they will switch sides like me."

Maulawi Noor ul Aziz, who is originally from the Panjwayi district of Kandahar, said he had joined the Taliban movement as soon as it formed in 1994. "I have been in many battles in the past 10 years since our government was overthrown by the foreigners."

As he rose through the ranks he directed ambushes and improvised bomb attacks against the Afghan and Nato forces in Kandahar, Zabul and Helmand provinces.

"I was a commander of fighting and I cannot tell you how many were killed, or injured. The fighting was often at a distance. Maybe in our struggle our mines and bullets killed some government forces and foreigners.

"Also, I was very busy with battle planning and making mines and ambushes. I did not myself participate a lot in the face-to-face fighting as much as I would have liked to."

He said his most successful attack came when he and his men had sown a field in Nad-e Ali with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) rigged up to a command wire, to target regular foreign patrols which passed through.

As they waited, they were surprised to see a Nato Chinook helicopter land in the field instead. He and his band detonated their bombs from 400 yards away as foreign soldiers disembarked from the aircraft.

"All the bombs went off. Some of the foreigners were blown to bits and some were wounded. We were very happy with the result. I have done hundreds of these missions," he said. [...]

Critics of the scheme have warned that too few of those defecting are actual insurgents, and that it is failing to undermine the rebels in their southern heartlands.

"Of around 30,000 insurgents, only eight per cent have reconciled so far - and 99 per cent of them are not from the south," said Hanif Atmar, former interior minister.

"Frankly speaking, it does not work. The eight per cent that are reconciled, most of them are not genuine insurgents, particularly not from the regions that matter."

The intrepid mujahedin, keeping the world safe from literate girls and women. "Bomb attack on Pakistan school kills policeman," from Agence France-Presse, November 22:

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A bomb attack on a girls' school in northwest Pakistan on Tuesday killed a policeman, wounded eight others and destroyed a wall, police said.

The remote-controlled bomb was planted at the outer wall of the government-run middle school in the outskirts of Mardan town in troubled Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan.

The bomb exploded after police arrived to investigate complaints about a suspicious plastic bag outside the school, which was closed at the time.

"One policeman was killed and eight other people including five civilians were wounded," Zeshan Haider, Mardan police chief, told AFP by telephone.

Three policemen were also wounded but no pupils were hurt.

Haider said the target was the school.

"The outer wall of the school was also destroyed," he added.

Islamist militants oppose co-education and have destroyed hundreds of schools, mostly for girls, in northwest Pakistan in recent years.

Early Tuesday, Taliban militants killed two anti-Taliban militia men on the outskirts of Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, police said.

Dilawar Khan, head of the anti-Taliban militia, said that Taliban killed his men and dumped their bodies in Matni, one of the northwestern areas where villagers have raised militias to fight the Islamist militants.

After all, the truce with the Taliban in North Waziristan in October of 2006 was such a smashing success -- for the Taliban.

The risks are clear: Pakistan would have an excuse not to take action against the Taliban as long as "talks" are pending, or may enter into another disastrous agreement. The Taliban would have a means of buying time while playing both sides of the issue, continuing to fight, plot, and acquire more firepower while attempting to blackmail Islamabad with the threat of abandoning negotiations and unleashing a wave of attacks.

"Exclusive: Taliban, Pakistan said to have started peace talks," from Reuters, November 21:

(Reuters) - Pakistan's Taliban movement, a major security threat to the country, is holding exploratory peace talks with the government, a senior Taliban commander and mediators told Reuters on Monday.

The United States, the source of billions of dollars of aid vital for Pakistan's military and feeble economy, is unlikely to look kindly on peace talks with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which it has labeled a terrorist group.

Past peace pacts with the TTP have failed to bring stability, and merely gave the umbrella group time and space to consolidate, launch fresh attacks and impose their austere version of Islam on segments of the population.

The discussions are focused on the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border and could be expanded to try to reach a comprehensive deal if progress is made.

The Taliban, who are close to al Qaeda, made several demands, including the release of prisoners and the withdrawal of Pakistani forces from South Waziristan, said the commander.

In other words, an end to Pakistani sovereignty in Pakistani territory. That should be a non-starter.

An ethnic Pashtun tribal mediator described the talks as "very difficult." Pakistani military and government officials were not immediately available for comment.

"Yes, we have been holding talks, but this is just an initial phase. We will see if there is a breakthrough," said the senior Taliban commander, who asked not to be identified.

"Right now, this is at the South Waziristan level. If successful, we can talk about a deal for all the tribal areas," he said, referring to Pashtun lands along the Afghan border.

The Taliban will break the deal, and accuse Pakistan of doing so if challenged. It will keep the concessions it has won, and resume fighting for more.

The TTP, allied with the Afghan Taliban movement fighting U.S.-led NATO forces in Afghanistan, is entrenched in the unruly areas along the porous frontier....

"The U.N. attributed 80 percent of the civilian deaths to insurgents and others fighting against the Afghan government."

Where's the outrage about that? But Omar also manages to blame the victim, saying "civilians also need to keep themselves safe from attacks, such as staying away from U.S. troops on patrol."

"Taliban chief asks militants not to harm civilians," from the Associated Press, November 4:

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar says his fighters need to protect Afghan civilians from harm so that the insurgency can maintain good relations with the population.

The death of civilians is on the rise in the 10-year-old war between the Taliban and Afghan and U.S.-led coalition forces.

The U.N. says the number of Afghan civilians killed rose 15 percent in the first half of this year.

The U.N. attributed 80 percent of the civilian deaths to insurgents and others fighting against the Afghan government.

Omar posted his message Friday on the Taliban's website ahead of Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice.

Omar says civilians also need to keep themselves safe from attacks, such as staying away from U.S. troops on patrol.

"They said that Taliban commander deceived them in the name of jihad and Islam."

Qur'an 3:28 warns believers not to take unbelievers as "friends or helpers" (َأَوْلِيَا -- a word that means more than casual friendship, but something like alliance), "unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them." This is a foundation of the idea that believers may legitimately deceive unbelievers when under pressure. The word used for "guard" in the Arabic is tuqātan (تُقَاةً), the verbal noun from taqiyyatan -- hence the increasingly familiar term taqiyya.

Ibn Kathir says that the phrase Pickthall renders as "unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them" means that "believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers" may "show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly. For instance, Al-Bukhari recorded that Abu Ad-Darda' said, 'We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them.' Al-Bukhari said that Al-Hasan said, 'The Tuqyah [taqiyya] is allowed until the Day of Resurrection." While many Muslim spokesmen today maintain that taqiyya is solely a Shi'ite doctrine, shunned by Sunnis, the great Islamic scholar Ignaz Goldziher points out that while it was formulated by Shi'ites, "it is accepted as legitimate by other Muslims as well, on the authority of Qur'an 3:28." The Sunnis of Al-Qaeda practice it today.

Also, there is Muhammad's statement, "war is deceit" (Bukhari 4.52.267). He also allowed for lying in battle and between a husband and wife (Muslim 6303). And when he gave permission to one of his followers, Muhammad bin Maslama, to murder one of his critics, Ka'b bin al-Ashraf, he also gave Muhammad bin Maslama permission to lie to Ka'b in order to lure him close enough to be killed (Bukhari 5.59.369).

And Muhammad is the "excellent example of conduct" for Muslims (Qur'an 33:21).

"Beheaded bodies of abducted tribesmen found in Mohmand," from Dawn, September 21 (thanks to Wimpy):

GHALANAI, Sept 21: The beheaded bodies of three tribesmen, kidnapped by militants a month ago, were found in Khawezai tehsil of Mohmand Agency on Wednesday.

Sources said that Mian Hazrat, Nazeem, and Habib had been kidnapped by militants about a month ago from Palosai area of Khawezai tehsil. Their beheaded bodies were found in Sam Ghakay area of the tribal region. Sources said that volunteers of local peace committee and officials of political administration brought the bodies of Mian Hazrat and Nazeem to agency headquarters hospital in Ghalanai and later handed them over to their relatives. The body of Habib was still lying there, they added....

In Bajaur Agency, 25 militants laid down arms and surrendered to security forces on Wednesday.

Sources said that the surrendered militants belonged to different areas of Salarzai tehsil. They said that the militants, including three commanders, laid down weapons and surrendered to security forces during a tribal jirga.

They told the jirga on oath that they would not keep contacts with militants nor would they provide any kind of support to them in future. They said that Taliban commander deceived them in the name of jihad and Islam....

The Taliban have not staged their usual touchdown dance through their propaganda operations, as usually follows a high-profile attack. And so "diplomats are bracing themselves for the possibility that blame will be pinned on the Haqqani network, a militant group that nominally follows Omar but is believed to be heavily influenced by the [Pakistani] ISI."

More on this story. "Taliban stay quiet on killing of former Afghanistan president Rabbani," by Jon Boone for the Guardian, September 21:

The Taliban have refused to accept or deny responsibility for the assassination in Kabul of former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, which has plunged the country into a deep political crisis.

Rabbani was assassinated by a turban bomber who claimed to be carrying an offer of peace from the Taliban.

On the first of three days of national mourning following the killing on Tuesday of Hamid Karzai's chief peace negotiator, the Taliban's spokesmen published a statement on their website refusing to discuss the incident and contesting an earlier report by the Reuters news agency that said the Taliban accepted responsibility.

"Our position on this issue is that we can't talk about it and all the media reports that claim responsibility are groundless," it said. "Right now we don't want to talk."

Their reticence to comment on the killing – by a man posing as a senior Taliban envoy with explosives hidden in his turban – is in stark contrast to the aftermath of other spectacular attacks in the capital: the Taliban's PR department often feeds details to the media while their operations are still ongoing.

Diplomats say it raises the possibility that Mullah Omar and other high-ranking Taliban leaders may not have approved, or even have been aware of, an operation conducted by a splinter or affiliated group linked to Pakistan's powerful military intelligence agency, the ISI, which has long-standing ties to militant groups.

A western expert on the Taliban, who did not want to be identified, said senior figures within the movement had tried to bypass the ISI and hold direct talks with Karzai's government and the US, and Pakistan had responded with ruthless efforts to reassert control of any negotiations.

He said spectacular attacks in Kabul in recent months were probably designed to derail any independent Taliban contacts with the government, while the killing of Rabbani could have been aimed at putting all talks on hold for several months.

"It is not that they want to close the door on one set of negotiations [with Rabbani] but on all kinds of negotiations," he said. "They would rather have no talks than some talks that they can't control."

Diplomats are bracing themselves for the possibility that blame will be pinned on the Haqqani network, a militant group that nominally follows Omar but is believed to be heavily influenced by the ISI. If the recent rhetoric of US ambassadors in the region is anything to go by, it is already in a state of apoplectic anger over Pakistan's role in supporting Haqqani, which has been blamed for several major attacks, including last week's 20-hour assault on the US embassy in Kabul.

That fury would grow if Haqqani was implicated in the hugely destabilising killing of Rabbani.

"There is no doubt that there is a very serious conspiracy by those opposed to peace talks," said Ahmed Rashid, an influential Pakistani commentator who strongly supports a political settlement in Afghanistan. "They are trying to sabotage them before they take off."

There was no love lost between Rabbani and the Taliban, a movement he fought against. And the Taliban have a stated policy of trying to kill members of the high peace council, the body that Rabbani chaired.

But some analysts think killing him would be a step too far, even for the Taliban. Wahid Mujda a political analyst who held a mid-level position within the old Taliban regime, said its Quetta Shura would be reluctant to claim credit for killing a figure who commanded respect among a large group of Afghans, not least among his fellow Tajiks....

The jihadis in Pakistan are relentless in their determination to make everyone too terrified to oppose them. After all, Muhammad said, "I have been made victorious through terror" (Bukhari 4.52.220)

"Pakistani Taliban vow to attack weddings and funerals of their enemies," by Nasir Habib for CNN, September 16 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- The Pakistani Taliban declared Friday they will target the weddings and funerals of anyone involved in pro-government activity against them.

The threat came as the Taliban claimed responsibility for Thursday's suicide blast targeting a funeral procession for a member of an anti-Taliban militia.

"Anyone who supports the U.S. and Pakistani military will face the same fate," Taliban spokesman Siraj-ud Din said. "We will target funeral processions and wedding ceremonies of those who support the U.S."...

But having them open a "political office" in Qatar will just fix this right up. An update on this story. "Kabul attack ends after 20 hours, 6 attackers dead," by Mirwais Harooni and Sanjeev Miglani for Reuters, September 14:

KABUL (Reuters) - An assault by Taliban insurgents on the heart of Kabul's diplomatic and military enclave has ended after 20 hours, when security forces killed the last of six attackers, a spokesman for the Ministry of the Interior said on Wednesday.

"The operation just ended and 6 terrorists were killed by police. Details on casualties will be announced later," spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said on Twitter.

The insurgents had holed up in a multi-storey building still under construction and launched their attack early on Tuesday afternoon, firing rockets towards the U.S. and other embassies and the headquarters of NATO-led foreign forces.

Afghan security forces backed by NATO and Afghan attack helicopters fought Taliban insurgents floor-by-floor in the building in the longest sustained attack on the capital since the U.S.-led invasion a decade ago.

One or two fighters held out overnight in the high-rise building, site of the most spectacular of four coordinated attacks across the city. Suicide bombers had targeted police buildings in other parts of the city.

At least nine people were killed and 23 wounded in four attacks, and the ability of the Taliban to penetrate Kabul's vaunted was a clear show of strength ahead of a handover of security to Afghan forces slated for 2014.

A squad of insurgents were armed with rocket-propelled grenade launchers, AK-47 assault rifles and suicide bomb vests, a Taliban spokesman said, but the amount of time they held off foreign and Afghan troops prompted speculation they had weapons and ammunition hidden in the building before the attack.

Gunfire continued throughout the night, with residents of nearby buildings staying indoors with their lights off, as children panicked and helicopters flew low overhead

"It would go silent for 30 to 35 minutes and then there were explosions and the sound of heavy machine guns," he said.

Explosions were interspersed with gunfire all afternoon on Tuesday and several rockets landed in the upmarket Wazir Akbar Khan district, near the British and other embassies. One hit a school bus but it appeared to have been empty at the time.

"There was almost certainly either a break-down in security among the Afghans with responsibility for Kabul or an intelligence failure," said Andrew Exum, fellow at the Centre for a New American Security....

The Taliban are firing rockets at our embassy in Kabul. "Militants Launch Attack on U.S. Embassy in Kabul," by Alissa J. Rubin and Jack Healy in the New York Times, September 13:

KABUL, Afghanistan — Insurgents launched a complex assault against the United States Embassy and the nearby NATO headquarters on Tuesday, pelting the heavily guarded compounds with rockets in an assault that raised new questions about the security of Afghanistan’s capital and the Westerners working there.

At least 10 explosions — apparently from rockets launched by militants — and waves of automatic weapons fire were reported amid the drone of sirens and English-language warnings telling Americans inside the embassy to take cover.

It was unclear whether anyone — Western or Afghan — had been hurt or killed, but it appeared that one rocket had struck a minibus belonging to the Tak Beer private school, and witnesses said that young adults had been carried away bleeding and apparently unconscious.

Kerri Hannan, a spokeswoman for the American embassy, said that no embassy personnel were injured in the attack.

Afghan officials said several attackers were behind the assault, but it was unclear precisely how many assailants there were or whether they were attacking from a single or multiple locations. The attackers were holed up on several floors of a tall, partially built concrete building that offered a bird’s-eye view of the secured diplomatic and military compounds about a half mile away. Flashes from gun barrels could be seen as the militants fired from their perch. Afghan security forces returned fire from the ground, sending puffs of concrete dust into the air as bullets slapped the building.

“We don’t know how many suicide bombers are in the building,” said Col. Abdul Zahir, of the criminal investigative division of the Kabul police. “They’re shooting at the embassy. We’re still in fighting position. We can’t say anything.”

Two explosions were also reported near the Afghan Parliament, but it was unclear whether militants were specifically trying to attack the government building, or other targets....

Another victory for the courageous and glorious mujahediun. "Gunmen 'kill five children' in attack on Pakistan bus," from the BBC, September 13 (thanks to B.D.):

Gunmen have ambushed a school bus near the north-western Pakistani city of Peshawar, killing at least five children, police say.

The driver was also killed and 19 other children were wounded in the attack in Matani town about 20km (12 miles) south of Peshawar, police said.

The area is close to Pakistan's volatile tribal areas where Taliban militants are active.

But so far no group has said it carried out the attack....

The bus is thought to belong to a private school in Matani and was taking children back to a village after lessons. One report said that those who were killed were aged between nine and 14.

"First a rocket was fired but it didn't hit. Then gunmen opened fire," said Sahibzada Sajjad, police deputy superintendent in Peshawar.

It is little short of miraculous that the casualties were not far worse; 77 soldiers were wounded, but all are expected to return to duty. One wonders if the Afghan civilian casualties and major destruction of Afghan property will elicit any local outrage, as early reports said the bomb damaged "more than 100 shops in Sayed Abad's main bazaar, the hospital and the small town's administration building."

Once again, jihad causes poverty. "Authorities investigate Afghan blast that injured 77 U.S. troops," by Barbara Starr for CNN, September 12:

(CNN) -- Authorities believe a truck carrying more than 1,500 pounds of explosives caused a massive blast outside a combat outpost that injured 77 U.S. troops and killed at least two Afghan civilians over the weekend, a U.S. military official said.

The attack -- which occurred on the eve of the 10th anniversary of al Qaeda's 9/11 attack on the United States -- left a large crater at the site that could be 20 feet deep, according to the official, who asked not to be identified due to the sensitive nature of the ongoing investigation.

Most of the U.S. troops have concussions, the military official said. More than half of them were evacuated to U.S. military medical installations for evaluation, but all are expected to return to duty, the official said.

Two Afghan civilians were killed and 25 others were wounded in attack, U.S. Army Sgt. Lindsey Kibler said.

The truck bombing took place in the central-east province of Wardak, and those killed were Afghan laborers, said Shahidullah Shahid, the Wardak governor's spokesman.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the assault. NATO's International Security Assistance Force confirmed the attack was carried out by a Taliban suicide bomber.

Authorities are still investigating, the U.S. military official said. Investigators are looking at the possibility that insurgents originally planned to use the bomb against a high-profile target in Kabul around the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, but found security too tight in the capital, the official said.

Investigators also believe the bomb included a chemical accelerant to increase the impact of the blast, the official said, but the majority of the blast was absorbed by protective barriers.

"This attack was a high-profile attack. It was a pretty significant suicide vehicle bomb," Gen. John R. Allen, commander of coalition and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, told CNN's Suzanne Malveaux on Sunday....

This concept is not new; earlier, there were discussions about allowing the Taliban to open a "political" office in Turkey.

Only the Taliban would benefit from the opportunity to gain legitimacy, and to transform itself into Hizballah-like "political party" that also happens to function as a state-within-a-state with its own armed forces. Indeed, the office to open in Qatar is reportedly to bear the name of the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan," signaling that it does not recognize the current government in Kabul.

They will benefit the most from the ability to buy time through going through the motions of dialogue, while business as usual continues on the battlefield.

"U.S. backs move to let Taliban open headquarters in Qatar in the hope of ending war in Afghanistan," from the Daily Mail, September 12:

Talks to end the 10-year war in Afghanistan could be on the horizon after the U.S. backed a plan to let the Taliban open political headquarters in the Middle East.

The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is likely to open a base in Qatar before Christmas, The Times said.

We'll get it for Christmas? Coal in the stocking sounds pretty good right about now.

It is hoped this will help facilitate peace talks which could lead to a truce with the Taliban.

The hudna is never intended to last.

A senior member of the Taliban - Tayyab Agha - has been talking on and off with western diplomats for the past year but it is hoped this move will accelerate the process.

Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammed Omar is understood to be backing the negotiations.

They must be sure they have the right guy this time.

When the HQ is opened in the Qatari capital Doha, it will be the first time the Islamist group has been treated like a political party since it fell from power in 2001.

The Times said the Taliban wants to make sure its members are free from harassment and arrest whilst based in the city.

This, from the group that was filmed beating women in the street when it was in power.

The Gulf state is believed to have agreed to let the group have a base after Washington decided that it should be located away from the influence of Pakistan.

One diplomat told the Times: 'It will be an address where they have a political office.'

He said it would not be an embassy or consulate but 'like a residence where they can be treated like a political party'....

All they killed were five Afghan civilians, including a 3-year-old girl. Not the anniversary massacre they were hoping for, but 10 years later, the enemy is consistent in his disregard for civilians, and his desire for spectacular acts of slaughter in the cause of jihad. "77 Americans wounded in Afghan truck bombing," by Rahim Faiez for the Associated Press, September 11 (thanks to Ima Freeman):

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Nearly 80 American soldiers were wounded and five Afghans civilians were killed in a Taliban truck bombing targeting an American base in eastern Afghanistan, NATO said Sunday, a stark reminder that the war in Afghanistan still rages 10 years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks against the United States.

No U.S. soldiers were killed in Saturday night's bombing, which took place hours after the Taliban vowed to keep fighting U.S. forces in Afghanistan until all American troops leave the country. The insurgent movement also stressed that it had no role in the Sept. 11 attacks.

The blast shaved the facades from shops outside Combat Outpost Sayed Abad in Wardak province and broke windows in government offices nearby, said Roshana Wardak, a former parliamentarian who runs a clinic in the nearby town of the same name. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

Eight wounded civilians were brought to Wardak's clinic, two of them with wounds serious enough that they were sent to Kabul. She said one 3-year-old girl died of her wounds on the way to the clinic.

The Wardak governor's office confirmed the death toll and said a total of 17 Afghans were wounded — 14 civilians and three security officers.

The attack was carried out by a Taliban suicide bomber who detonated a large bomb inside a truck carrying firewood, NATO said. It was unclear how many foreign and Afghan soldiers were serving on the base.

"Most of the force of the explosion was absorbed by the protective barrier at the outpost entrance," NATO said, adding that the damage was repairable and that operations were continuing.

NATO said none of the 77 injuries sustained by the Americans was life-threatening. Spokesman Maj. Russell Fox said Sunday that all the international troops at the combat outpost are American.

Jihad causes poverty:

The governor's office said the blast was so powerful it damaged more than 100 shops in Sayed Abad's main bazaar, the hospital and the small town's administration building.

They do like their abductions. The children they abducted have not been released yet. "Taliban plan abductions to free bin Laden family," by Sheree Sardar for the Associated Press, September 9:

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistani Taliban militants plan to kidnap senior Pakistani officials to pressure authorities to release relatives of Osama bin Laden detained after the al Qaeda leader was killed, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Friday.

Bin Laden's wives and several of his children are being held by authorities in the South Asian nation, where the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Taliban Movement of Pakistan, and al Qaeda have been building an alliance for years.

"Intelligence agencies have issued an alert that the TTP have plans to kidnap top people in Pakistan," Malik told Reuters.

It was not possible to immediately verify the report.

"They are planning to use (hostages) as bargaining chips to demand the release of members of Osama's family in exchange."

Bin Laden's relatives were detained after U.S. special forces killed him in a raid in the garrison town of Abbottabad on May 2.

Pakistan's Foreign Ministry had said bin Laden's wives, one from Yemen and two from Saudi Arabia, would be repatriated, but a government-appointed commission investigating bin Laden's killing prevented repatriation.

The Pakistani Taliban, who pose the biggest security threat to the U.S.-backed Islamabad government, have staged several suicide bombings in Pakistan to avenge bin Laden's death.

They have demonstrated ability to carry out high-profile attacks, including a raid on army headquarters in Rawalpindi in 2009 in which the Taliban took more than 40 people hostage.

Sunday marks the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attacks on the United States, which killed nearly 3,000 people. Pakistan joined the U.S. "war on terror" after 9/11 and has lost about 5,000 soldiers and security forces fighting militant groups based along the unruly border with Afghanistan.

An estimated 30,000 civilians were killed in the violence.

Bin Laden's youngest wife, Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, told Pakistani investigators in May that she and her family lived for five years in a compound in Abbottabad.

Suspicions grew in Washington that some members of Pakistan's powerful security establishment knew bin Laden was living there.

Pakistan, which denied any knowledge of his whereabouts, was enraged because it was not informed of the U.S. Navy SEALs raid that killed bin Laden.

Malik said security had been beefed up after the Taliban kidnap threat.

The TTP is holding more than 20 young tribesmen hostage in an area straddling the border with Afghanistan and have demanded the release of scores of prisoners and an end to tribal elders' support of offensives against them.

This is a curious twist, as early reports indicated the boys were abducted after accidentally crossing into Afghanistan. Some details remain unclear: did they boys actually cross the border? Or were they abducted within Pakistan? Either way, Pakistan's initial story looks suspicious in light of its recent attempts to portray the U.S., NATO, and Kabul as irresponsible for border security, trying to evade pressure over behavior Pakistan itself has demonstrated for years.

Just this past week, for example, Islamabad chided Afghanistan over its poor border security that led to a cross-border raid into Pakistan, with one inconvenient detail: even Pakistan believes the raid was planned by Pakistani Taliban.

Were initial reports here affected by the "fog of war," or political opportunism? Time will tell. "Pakistani Taliban claim kidnapping up to 25 boys," by Sahibzada Bahauddin for Reuters, September 3:

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters)- Pakistani Taliban on Saturday claimed responsibility for holding up to 25 boys hostage as punishment for tribesmen who supported the military in the country's troubled northwest.

Pakistani officials said Friday militants in Afghanistan kidnapped the boys after they mistakenly crossed the border while on an outing in the border tribal region of Bajaur on Wednesday.

A Pakistani Taliban spokesman said they held the boys, and their fate would be decided by the militants from Bajaur.

"We have kidnapped them as their parents and tribal elders are helping the government and are fighting against us," spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told Reuters from an undisclosed location.

He said they held between 20 to 25 boys, but did not say where they have been kept. Bajaur's top government administrator, Islam Zeb, said 25 boys were missing. A group of around 60 boys took part in the outing but about 20 below ten years old were allowed to return to Pakistan, while up to 40 others between 12 to 14 years old were held, officials said earlier.

Ehsan said they had a plan of mass-scale kidnappings and expected people in large number to visit the border region on Eid al-Fitr, a Muslim holy festival that was celebrated this week, marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.

Security officials said they learned of the kidnappings when the parents of the children, members of a tribe that inhabits the frontier area, informed them of the abductions on Friday.

A Pakistani cabinet minister said the interior ministry was in contact with the Afghan officials on the issue.

"The incident happened on their side and, as per law, it is responsibility of the Afghan government to ensure their safe return to Pakistan," Shaukat Ullah, federal minister for States and Frontier Regions, told Reuters.

The boys belonged to tribesmen from Mamoun who are opposed to al Qaeda and the Taliban and have raised militias to fight them, angering militants who often hit back with bombings and shooting attacks.

Bajaur is opposite the eastern Afghan province of Kunar and has long been an infiltration route for militants entering Afghanistan to fight U.S.-led forces there.

Hundreds of Pakistani militants fled to Kunar in the face of Pakistani military offensives in Bajaur, officials say.

Nation-building hasn't exactly worked out, unless Western powers were actually trying to build a kleptocracy.

Neither opium nor the American taxpayer should be a source of income for the Taliban. In the case of the opium trade, which was instrumental in funding the Taliban's resurgence, Western governments looked the other way from opium production for fear of "radicalizing" the locals. Once again, whichever way one's foreign policy tries to buy love, the chase after "hearts and minds" costs lives.

More heartwarming news in the long-term debt crisis, and more on this story. "U.S. money is Taliban's No. 2 revenue source," by David Martin for CBS News, August 31:

(CBS News) It's no secret that war is expensive, but a report out Wednesday says the U.S. has wasted billions in Iraq and Afghanistan. More tax dollars will go down the drain unless the government makes big changes.

CBS News correspondent David Martin reports that in ten years of war, the U.S. has paid contractors $206 billion to do everything from building schools to guarding diplomats.

Today, a blue ribbon commission put a number on how much has been lost not to violence but to mismanagement and corruption.

Commission on Wartime Contracting Chairman Christopher Shays says: "We are wasting between $30 and $60 billion during the course of our engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Shays says $30 billion in waste can be documented; Everything from leasing four-wheel vehicles at "grossly exorbitant rates" of about $40,000 a year, to a $124 million prison renovation that was never finished. The larger $60 billion figure includes an estimate of how much money lined the pockets of corrupt officials and even the enemy.

The commission was told that except for the opium harvest, U.S. contracts were the Taliban's biggest source of funds. A separate investigation estimated $360 million has ended up in the hands of the taliban.. [sic]

The sheer volume of spending -- as many as 260,000 contractors on the payroll at any one time -- amid the chaos of war was simply too much for the U.S. to manage.

A $60 million project to distribute seeds and fertilizer to Afghan farmers became a $360 million cash for work program "paying villages for what they used to do voluntarily." The commission also warned of massive new waste. For instance, there is a planned $82 million Afghan defense university that the government of Afghanistan cannot afford to keep up.

For that matter, what did they wind up growing?

"What is the point of spending hundreds of millions on projects that will then fall into disuse?" asks commission member Dov Zakheim.

The commission warned that, without a major overhaul of wartime contracting, we can expect more of the same as the wars drag on.

When the shoe is on the other foot and jihadists are coming over the border into Pakistan, it's an outrage. We have wondered before how many involved in past raids of this nature were Pakistani Taliban.

This time, Pakistan itself believes the organizers of the raid did originate on the Pakistani side, but the Pakistani military is nonetheless seizing the opportunity to accuse the NATO and Afghanistan of culpable negligence.

It's a little like letting your dog go on the neighbor's lawn and complaining to him when the odor blows back over the fence. "Pakistan chides Afghanistan over border raid," from Agence France-Presse, August 27:

Pakistan lodged a protest with Afghanistan over a brazen cross-border attack on Saturday by hundreds of Taliban fighters that killed 25 Pakistani troops, the foreign ministry said.

The Pakistani military blamed what it claimed was inaction by Afghanistan and NATO in the latest flaring of tensions between the neighbours.

"The Afghan charge d'affairs was called in today at the foreign ministry to lodge a protest on attacks from Kunar and Nuristan," foreign office spokeswoman Tehmina Janjua said in a statement.

"The Afghan charge d'affairs was conveyed the imperative of establishing peace and tranquility in the border region and effectively dealing with terrorists.

"The activities of the terrorists are a matter of great concern to both the governments and peoples of Pakistan and Afghanistan. They cannot be allowed to continue such blatant attacks from across the border."

Between 200 and 300 "terrorists" based in Afghanistan attacked seven paramilitary Frontier Corps checkposts in the northwestern Pakistani district of Chitral early Saturday morning, Pakistan's military said in a statement.

The term "terrorists" is frequently used by the military for Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants. The military said both Pakistani and Afghan fighters were involved.

"At least 25 security forces personnel embraced shahadat (martyrdom) in the attack," the statement said.

About 20 of the militants were believed to have been killed. The border posts were overrun by militants, but reinforcements were later sent, it said.

The Pakistani military said that those believed to have co-ordinated the raid -- including a radical cleric from the Swat valley, Maulanah Fazlullah -- had previously fled into Afghanistan in the face of Pakistani military offensives.

"Since their expulsion from their native areas, the terrorists have organised themselves in Kunar and Nuristan provinces with the support of local Afghan authorities," the military's statement said.

It said the "scanty presence of NATO and ANA (Afghan National Army) forces" along the border had led to "safe havens" for militants on the Afghan side, allowing them to launch attacks in Pakistan.

Intelligence about the presence of Pakistani militants and their Afghan supporters had been passed to NATO and Afghan authorities, the statement said....

Not surprisingly, the Taliban have ignored Karzai's protests. "3rd 'Turban bomb' attack rocks southern Helmand province," by Matt Dupee for the Long War Journal, August 20:

For the third time this summer, a Taliban suicide bomber with an explosive device hidden within his traditional Afghan headdress detonated at an Afghan government center. The Friday attack occurred during a ceremony marking Afghanistan's Independence Day held at the Helmand Military Corps Center. Three Afghan National Policemen were wounded in the attack.

The Taliban-led insurgency is increasingly relying upon formerly-taboo tactics such as female suicide bombers and bombs rigged to traditional Afghan headdresses, called lungee, referred to by the West as "turbans." These tactics have raised the ire of many Afghan communities, particularly among those in Kandahar and Helmand. Afghan lungee are not searched at security checkpoints because of the acute level of cultural sensitivity regarding headdresses. The Taliban have exploited this dynamic and conducted at least three such "turban-bombings" since July 14.

On July 14, a Taliban suicide bomber detonated his headdress during a funeral ceremony for the slain half-brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, killing four people, including the ulema council leader, Maulvi Hikmatullah Hikmat, and another senior religious cleric. The National Directorate of Security chief for Kandahar, General Mohammed Naim Momin, immediately condemned the attack and said it violated the Pashtun legal code known as Pashtunwali. "We respect those people who wear turbans and did not check the turban as a sign of respect, but he betrayed this respect and hid explosives in his turban," he told the New York Times.

On July 27, a suicide bomber killed the mayor of Kandahar City, Ghulam Haidar Hamidi, after he exited a meeting and was speaking on his cellphone in a courtyard. The bomber rigged a small amount of explosives in his lungee and approached Hamidi, locking him in a bear hug before detonating the device that killed both of them.

By Aug. 9, President Karzai had met with ulema councils from around Afghanistan and urged a collective strategy to help end the use of "turban bombs" before the phenomenon became more widespread. Karzai asked the clerics to launch a public information campaign to "convince militants not to use turbans and other religious attire to carry out suicide bombings, not to target mosques and to make them aware that suicide was un-Islamic," according to a spokesman for Karzai.

Allah promises paradise to those who "slay and are slain" in his cause (Qur'an 9:111). These six probably thought this act of slaughter was the pinnacle of their worldly and spiritual achievement, and the best was yet to come. "Suicide bombers attack Afghan governor; 22 dead," by Amir Shah and Rahim Faiez and for the Associated Press, August 14:

CHARIKAR, Afghanistan (AP) — A team of six suicide bombers — some wearing explosive vests — stormed a provincial governor's compound in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, killing 22 people in the latest high-profile attack to target prominent Afghan government officials, authorities said.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in the Parwan provincial capital of Charikar, some 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of Kabul. The province is home to Bagram Air Field, a sprawling base for U.S. and NATO troops.

The coordinated assault is the most recent in a string of spectacular Taliban attacks within an hour's drive of Kabul — a worrying sign of the insurgency's strength near the heart of the country and its determination to target Afghanistan's nascent leadership.

Early this month, the Taliban shot down a helicopter in a province on the western border of the capital, killing 38 American and Afghan troops. In late June, gunmen killed at least 21 people in an attack on the Inter-Continental hotel in Kabul itself.

The violence is a sign of NATO's broader struggles in the east, where persistent insurgent attacks forced the alliance to pull forces back from outlying patrol bases and outposts. The coalition, which plans to send 10,000 troops home by the end of the year, is considering whether to move forces from Taliban heartlands in the south to reinforce troops fighting insurgents in the east.

Southern provinces like Kandahar and Helmand are the Taliban's traditional stronghold, while the east is a base of operations for many Pakistani based Taliban and international terrorist affiliates like al-Qaida and the Haqqani network.

Afghanistan's eastern border with Pakistan is also a common thoroughfare for insurgents attempting to strike Kabul, although Parwan is considered to be relatively secure.

Sunday's assault began with a car bomb outside the front gate, police said. The blast blew open a hole in the wall, allowing five insurgents wearing suicide vests and carrying automatic weapons and rocket propelled grenades to rush into the compound.

Afghan police said they killed three of the attackers as they approached the governor's house.

The attack took place during a high-level provincial security meeting attended by Parwan Gov. Abdul Basir Salangi, his police chief, intelligence director, a local army commander and at least two NATO advisers.

Salangi told The Associated Press that he and his aides fired from their meeting room with AK-47s. He claimed to have killed at least one of the insurgents himself.

"I had an AK-47. I shot him and from the window of my waiting room," said Salangi, who was formerly the police chief of Kabul and a rebel fighter during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. He said it was the second time in the past month he was targeted by an assassination attempt.

Provincial Police Chief Gen. Sher Ahmad Maladani also took part in the gun battle, which he said lasted for approximately one hour.

"The last attacker was killed by police when he was only about 15 meters away from me," said Maladani. The bomber was killed before he could detonate his explosives.

The attack left much of the compound in ruins. Part of the governor's offices were burned. Broken glass and body parts littered the courtyard. Several cars were wrecked by explosions and bullets....