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Taliban turn to Iraq-style tactics to take Kabul districts

 
Daily Telegraph
26 May 2008
Tom Coghlan in Taggab District, Kapisa Province
 
Taliban militants have begun infiltrating districts around Kabul, adopting Iraq-style insurgency tactics against Nato forces and the fragile Afghan government.
 
The strategy can be seen in microcosm in Taggab, which lies just 40 miles to the north of Kabul and where the Taliban is seen by many as a credible alternative to the weak US-backed government.
 
"Three months ago there were many Taliban preachers who moved through this area, calling the people to begin jihad," said Mohammad Nabi "Rahimullah" Safi, the deputy governor of Kapisa province.
 
"Then armed groups arrived. The people were consulting the government less. They went to the Taliban instead to sort out their issues."
 
Taliban tactics have shifted sharply away from frontal attacks on Nato forces in the first four months of the year. However, the overall level of violence has risen and roadside bombings are up by 34 per cent overall. At the same time, there have been reports of Taliban fighters moving into several rural districts north and east of Kabul, the capital.
 
The strategy seeks to exploit local grievances and disillusionment with the Afghan government in rural areas.
 
Around 60 per cent of the country is still controlled by local tribes or warlords, according to the most recent US intelligence survey. The Afghan government and its Western backers effectively control about 30 per cent and the Taliban 10 per cent.
 
One Western military source explained: "The shadow governments that they attempt to form are more worrying than insurgent violence."
 
Nine Taliban commanders now operate in and around Taggab and there are growing links to local supporters of Hizb-e-Islami, a powerful faction that is split on whether to join the Taliban insurgency.
 
The Taliban has been able to exploit long-standing tensions between local Pashtuns, the ethnic tribe from which the Taliban draws its support, and neighbouring Tajik areas associated with the Northern Alliance that helped US troops evict the Taliban in 2001.
 
"The police and the army round here are all Tajik thieves from the Northern Alliance," said one local Pashtun. He said that Tajik areas received preferential treatment.
 
Driving into the district – which was once a popular picnic destination for residents of Kabul – The Daily Telegraph passed the wreckage of a burning truck close to the new US base in Taggab. It had been ambushed by Taliban fighters armed with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades just an hour earlier. Six Afghan soldiers were killed and 13 injured last month.
 
That evening, Gul Rahman Safi, the local governor, and his police bodyguards waited for darkness before fleeing across nearby fields to the mud fortress home of a sympathetic businessman. Hours later their caution was justified by the whistle and thud of an incoming rocket and 10 minutes of gunfire from the hills above the town.
 
"This is a pivotal point," said Capt James Bithorn, 26, the commander of the small American base in the valley.
 
"The Taliban don't tend to mess with my guys, they pick off the soft targets. Really the fights don't matter too much. My focus has to be the population. We are in a tug of war for their support. " But according to the local MP, who stays mostly in Kabul these days, the population has lost faith in the government.
 
"President [Hamid] Karzai got 40,000 votes from Kapisa Province, but now he wouldn't get five," said Abdul Hadi Safi. "Since 2001, Taggab was left to fester. I went to the government. I begged for help.
 
"They ignored me. I guarantee that I will not be voted again the MP. The situation will get worse. If it gets worse it is not my problem. I tried."
 
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| Ander Nieuws week 24 / nieuwe oorlog 2008 |