The Afghanistan page - 2004 - news archive

"During the last year I have seem a number of changes in Afghanistan or I should say Kabul which is not Afghanistan and as with most capitals is more progressive and liberal than elsewhere. A year ago I was surprised to see a woman driving a car. Now it is not exactly the norm but not so strange either. Fewer women where the burqa but still most do even in Kabul. More women are in good jobs. I contract to two NGOs with women directors. Girls can go to school and many do in Kabul. In some conservative areas none do. Still one can see women packed into the boots of cars and are still second class citizens."

"Greece has launched an emergency inquiry into allegations that police tortured a group of Afghan immigrants using "Abu Ghraib" tactics at an Athens police station last week. At least four Greek police officers are accused of inflicting brutal beatings, mock executions and taking naked photographs of up to 30 immigrant men during interrogations."

"Why can an 8 year old prisoner be moved into a secure facility whilst visitors are still advised not to bring children. And when the child contracts the virus, starts vomiting and shitting through the night, the prison tells his mother her son can’t see a doctor but might be able to the next day. And visiting doctors tell a mother of a two year old who has been sick for weeks and lost about 2 kilos, that if she weren’t a prisoner he’d insist she went to a hospital to see a paediatrician, but because she’s a prisoner she is not entitled to this care? How can the prison repeatedly get a mum with an 8 month old to pack her bags at 4 a.m. ready for immediate deportation, only to keep returning her to prison because her paperwork hasn’t been sorted or the prison transportation is late for the flight. Repeatedly putting the mother and child through the anxiety and uncertainty associated with being booted out of the country? Why does the Immigration Service’s Oakington prison only allow prisoners to use the few telephones provided with their own ‘prison issue’ phone cards that’ll give you 4 minutes to a mobile for a fiver (£5)? Why are the only refreshments available in the cramped visiting room a cold drinks vending machine and a chocolate machine, both of which go for days with the ‘sold out’ lights flashing? Why do they only allow the secure family unit to have one TV and one remote control (at least as a criminal prisoner you don’t have to fight over what channel you watch)? Why do prisoners ask visitors to bring in fresh vegetables and fruit because the chips & chicken nugget diet are not up to scratch? I could carry on with such questions endlessly, but as I mentioned,

I don’t want the answers. I don’t want to be told the government will ensure a healthier diet for these prisoners, I don’t want to be told the contractors will be held accountable and prisoners will be given more comfortable surroundings and treated with some respect, I don’t want to be told that administration will be hurried up so that prison terms are shortened. I want to be told that we won’t lock innocent people and children up in shabbily run prisons en masse. "

"The first frosts killed the roses a couple of weeks ago. Roses grow very well here and have been touted as an alternative to poppies but I think the poppy flower is nicer. Today 22nd December 04 was the first snow in Kabul. Grey skies and slushy mud roads. It is interesting that as we worry about bombs and kidnappings ordinary death carries on as usual. One man I know recently died from a gas heater in his bedroom. He got up and said hello to people in his house and then said he was not feeling so good so he was going back to bed. He then returned to bed in the gas filed room and died. Another friend suddenly found he had cancer and is in a Dubai hospital having large tumors being removed."

"As home secretary, Blunkett's abuses of human rights and civil liberties have been staggering. He has introduced internment without trial for suspected foreign terrorists is introducing military camps for children, and barely a day would go by without him dreaming up another crackpot neo-fascist scheme to attack civil liberties, criminalize working-class communities, and put more and more people behind bars. Labour's ID Cards Bill is not about spending resources wisely to safeguard the security of this country. It is all about the Labour party looking tough before election and outmanoeuvring the Tories. By taking this reckless course they risk a massive resistance from the 3 million or more people who have declared they would rather go to prison than submit to having ID Cards. The backlash could far exceed the impact of Stop the War. This month activists from Cambridge publicly spearheaded a new campaign against the proposed National I.D. Card. More on I.D cards: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]. The use of identity information (fingerprints and iris scans) to control the population is also being used in Iraq. The Law Lords ruled on 16 December 2004 that the detention of foreign "terrorist" suspects without trial breaks human rights laws. Nine men are currently imprisoned without trial in Belmarsh prison, also known as Britain's Guantanamo Bay. They have not been charged with any crime and are not able to see the "intelligence" evidence against them. Their solicitors say they have been "entombed in concrete". Charles Clarke has just taken up his new job as Home Secretary, following in the footsteps of David Blunkett, the most right-wing Home Secretary in living memory. Charles Clarke must now release the Belmarsh Nine. Write and ask him when they will be freed."

"At Oakington asylum seeker detention centre, near Cambridge, an Indian couple with a two year old child have been imprisoned for 54 days, and have been refused bail. The child has been ill, but because he is in detention has not been allowed to see a paediatrician. The family have been told that deportation is imminent. By the time they leave, they may have been imprisoned for 77 days. See [full report] [press release]. A recent Cambridge feature described how Lina Castanos, and her 8 year old son, Miguel were violently taken from their home at night, to be held first at Gatwick, and then at Oakington. While at Oakington, Miguel was refused a doctor for at least 24 hours when he became ill (Read more on Lina and Miguel's stay in prison). The Castanos family face fear and uncertainty, as to whether they will be deported to Columbia. While at Oakington, they thought deportation would occur soon, however they have now been told they can appeal. Despite the fact that several close family members have been killed by Columbian paramilitary authorities, they are left uncertain as to whether they can remain in the UK."

"Here is a very rough summary of the first three hours of the parliaments second hearing of the identity cards bill. It has been posted 'as taken', so excuse any discrepancies. Where the speaker is refered to as 'MP', i did not know the MP's name. Otherwise i have reffered to the speaker by his name. Of note is Charles Clarkes shift from the voluntary to the compulsory nature of the system. Also of note is Mark Oaten's (lib dem) talk against the card."

"Detaining foreign terrorist suspects without trial breaks human rights laws, the UK's highest court has ruled. In a blow to the government's anti-terror measures, the House of Lords ruled by an eight to one majority in favour of appeals by nine detainees. The Law Lords said the measures were incompatible with European human rights laws, but Home Secretary Charles Clarke said the men would remain in prison. He said the measures would "remain in force" until the law was reviewed. Most of the men are being held indefinitely in Belmarsh prison, south London."

"Brian Haw, the Parliament Square peace protestor, who has spent over three and a half years in a continuous anti-war protest vigil opposite the Houses of Parliament (1), had a charge of assault against him dismissed today at Bow Street Magistrates Court. The police claimed that Mr Haw had attempted to assault an officer yet they failed to produce any evidence and gave conflicting accounts; the judge was not satisfied that any attempt at assault had been made by Mr Haw. A further charge of 'failing to leave a cordoned area' was upheld against Mr Haw. Mr Haw was arrested and his extensive protest display removed in a sudden midnight police operation on 10 May 2004. The police claimed there was a security threat in the area and said that a security cordon had been imposed. When Mr Haw refused to move he was arrested."

"A Brighton anti-war activist awoke yesterday morning to a dawn raid from Special Branch. The anti-war activist was arrested for Harrassing company directors of Edo/Mbm. When taken to Hollingbury custody suite and placed before the desk sergeant PC AB394 Bialoszewski of special branch stated that the activist had been arrested and his address spun due to information being downloaded from companies house about Directors of Edo/Mbm Brighton and due to this he was responsable for Harassment of David Jones of Hastings ,company director of Bomb makers Edo/Mbm."

"The Court of Appeal ruled today that police violated the Human Rights Act when they illegally detained 120 protestors en route to a demonstration at RAF Fairford, Gloucestershire. Giving judgment, Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf stated that, 'the passengers were virtually prisoners on the coaches for the length of the journey…[W]e are not persuaded that there were no less intrusive possible alternative courses of action here.' "

"The ruling will be delivered at 10am this Wednesday. There will probably be a demo outside the royal courts of justice, but this is contingent on there being a hearing. apparently in some cases a ruling can be delivered without a hearing. keep an eye on the indywire and the coach case website for more details. The press release follows."

"The war on terror has made the world less safe and is not addressing the underlying causes of conflict, Pakistan's president has told the BBC. In an interview for the Newsnight programme, it was suggested to Gen Pervez Musharraf the world was less safe - in part because of the campaign. "Absolutely," he said, adding that the social grievances that helped recruit terrorists were not being addressed."

"Afghanistan is a success story with underground US prisons, US not spraying poppies, constant threat of car bombs, suicide bombers, rockets and kidnappings. A success story."

"Today I went to see Brian Haw who has been on a one-man vigil for Iraq in London’s Parliament Square since 1st June 2001. He sleeps in the square 24/7 and says he will be there for “as long as it takes.” Initially he was campaigning against the economic sanctions on Iraq and the bombing of the country by the US and UK. After 11 September 2001, he widened his focus, directing his messages of peace against the 'war on terror', the terror that the UK and US have inflicted on Afghanistan and Iraq. He protests on behalf of those innocent people who suffer and die in other countries, as our governments seek to further their own economic, military, political and strategic interests around the world. The authorities have been trying to remove him for most of the time he has been there but Brian can’t be got rid of! He is being taken to court again and the case is “proceeding”. "

"Tony Blair is today facing accusations that he is copying George Bush's 'terror politics' ahead of the General Election after Commons leader Peter Hain sparked fury by claiming a September 11-style attack was less likely under Labour. The Conservatives branded his comments "disgusting", "scandalous" and "extraordinary" by Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats."

"Peter Hain has been accused of playing politics with terrorism by suggesting the UK is safer under Labour. The Commons leader told BBC News: "If we are tough on crime and on terrorism, as Labour is, then I think Britain will be safer under Labour." Tory shadow foreign secretary Michael Ancram said the comments could be a challenge to terrorists. And the Liberal Democrats say it is a mistake to make the security services into a "political football". Between 11 September 2001 and 30 September 2004, 664 people were arrested under the Terrorism Act of 2000. Of those 315 were released without charge, 135 were charged under other legislation and 118 were charged under the Terrorism Act - with 17 of them so far convicted."

"An Afghan special force is being set up to deal with poppy eradication. Unofficially the private security firm, Dyna Corp will be fully involved. They are the ones that stepped on the toes of someone in Wardak office resulting in a large car bomb outside one of their houses in the middle of Kabul. At the moment most of the poppies being destroyed belong to poor farmers trying to survive and pay off loans acquired against the harvest."

"Sowab Khan claims he has planted no opium this year. Onions and wheat are all that will be sprouting in his fields after the Kabul government issued a ban, he insisted yesterday, although a teacher in a nearby school said every farmer in the district grows poppy because they would be fools to grow anything else. For dirt-poor farmers, opium brings 10 times the price of wheat. And they have never had it so good. Three years after the fall of the Taliban, the crop demonised by the West is flourishing in the new Afghanistan it has forged. This year, 1,300 square kilometres of poppies were growing, an all-time high."

"Ninety percent of the heroin on Britain's streets comes from Afghanistan ... Ironically it was only during the Taleban's five-year rule that production actually declined. "

"VIENNA, 18 November (UN Information Service) -- This year, opium cultivation in Afghanistan has increased by 64 per cent compared to 2003, according to the Afghanistan Opium Survey 2004, released today by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). "In Afghanistan, drugs are now a clear and present danger," stated Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of UNODC. Announcing the Survey findings during a press briefing in Brussels, Mr. Costa added, "With 131,000 hectares dedicated to opium farming, this year Afghanistan has established a double record -- the highest drug cultivation in the country's history, and the largest in the world." "

"SWINDON Peer David Stoddart has urged the government to trust public common sense when it comes to coping with terrorist attacks. He said British people could be relied upon to help each other, and to deal with whatever terrorists threw at them. Lord Stoddart, a former Swindon MP, said that he had faith in a Blitz spirit carrying the country through in the face of new aggression. He also insisted people did not need to be nannied or mollycoddled by the state. Speaking in the House of Lords, the 78-year-old cited World War Two and more recent emergencies, including this week's train crash near at Ufton Nervet, as proof of public resilience."

"A rift is growing in Afghanistan between the US-led coalition forces and the aid agencies working in the country. At its root lies the military strategy of using reconstruction work to win popular support while simultaneously conducting robust anti-Taleban operations. NGOs say the US military's aid is often just feel good projects. US forces in the south and east of the country believe their tactics have been extremely effective. But French charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, which pulled out of Afghanistan in June after an attack that killed five of its workers, has denounced the coalition for using humanitarian aid to "win hearts and minds". "By doing so, providing aid is no longer seen as an impartial and neutral act...[it endangers] the lives of humanitarian volunteers and jeopardises the aid to people in need," it said. Since then the US military has, if anything, increased its aid work. "

"AN X-RAY machine that sees through air passengers’ clothes has been deployed by security staff at London’s Heathrow airport for the first time. The device at Terminal 4 produces a 'naked' image of passengers by bouncing X-rays off their skin, enabling staff instantly to spot any hidden weapons or explosives. But the graphic nature of the black and white images it generates - including revealing outlines of men and women - has raised concerns about privacy both among travellers and aviation authorities."

"According to Bush Afghanistan is a success... My friend Shiqpe kidnapped a 10 days ago in Kabul along with two others probably does not think so. Infact I know she does not as I was having a drink with her a few days before and discusssing the elections. She as most is fully aware that elections (especially flawed ones) do not equal democracy. The problems have not been solved in Afghanistan. Drugs, warlords, Muslim fanatics, people angry at the way Americans have reated their women and stampled on their culture, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Uzbekistan and USA interferience are all still there."

"US-backed Hamid Karzai has been officially declared the winner of Afghanistan's first presidential election. Wednesday's announcement came almost a month after eight million Afghans defied threats of violence to vote in the elections. "Karzai is the winner," the UN-Afghan joint electoral commission's spokesman, Sultan Baheen, said after the findings of a fraud probe concluded that "shortcomings" did not affect the poll's outcome."

"Step by step Afghan refugees in Iran are being denied basic services - they're not allowed to buy medical insurance any more, to rent a house without government permission or open a bank account. It's official Iranian policy that all the remaining one million Afghan refugees in Iran should go home within the next 18 months. The education policy has sparked small protests by Afghan women and children outside UN offices and the Afghan Embassy. "The sin of our children is only that they are refugees," read the banner in one such protest."

"It was no surprise when Saudi-owned MBC TV stopped broadcasting the Arabic series, “The Road to Kabul” after airing only 8 of the 30 episodes. What was surprising was the reaction of Arab audiences. The serial started at the beginning of Ramadan on three satellite channels and was preceded by a huge publicity campaign. For an Arabic TV drama, it was an innovation as it explored still-unfolding events. Arab historical drama usually shies away from portraying living issues and contemporary events; since the matter of the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan is still both hot and sensitive; the series quickly became a magnet for a wide range of viewers."

"An Arabic-language TV soap opera set in Taleban-era Afghanistan has been taken off the airwaves amid legal wrangling and threats from Islamist militants. Two Arab TV networks have stopped screening the show mid-series, accusing its makers of failing to supply them with the remaining episodes. An Islamist website had threatened violence against anyone involved in the multi-million dollar series. Viewers have been left wondering how the series, the Road to Kabul, ends."

"His home is a roll of green plastic sheeting, his possessions no more than necessary to make coffee, keep warm and roll the occasional cigarette. Approaching his fourth winter on Parliament Green, few passers-by even notice Brian Haw and his collection of anti-war posters. For ministers, however, the 55-year-old peace protester is about to become Britain's most wanted man, the first target of new legislation to crack down on organised crime."

"WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 - Many detainees at Guantánamo Bay were regularly subjected to harsh and coercive treatment, several people who worked in the prison said in recent interviews, despite longstanding assertions by military officials that such treatment had not occurred except in some isolated cases. The people, military guards, intelligence agents and others, described in interviews with The New York Times a range of procedures that included treatment they said was highly abusive occurring over a long period of time, as well as rewards for prisoners who cooperated with interrogators. One regular procedure that was described by people who worked at Camp Delta, the main prison facility at the naval base in Cuba, was making uncooperative prisoners strip to their underwear, having them sit in a chair while shackled hand and foot to a bolt in the floor, and forcing them to endure strobe lights and screamingly loud rock and rap music played through two close loudspeakers, while the air-conditioning was turned up to maximum levels, said one military official who witnessed the procedure."

"Since September 11 Britain has been warned of the 'inevitability' of catastrophic terrorist attack. But has the danger been exaggerated? A major new TV documentary claims that the perceived threat is a politically driven fantasy - and al-Qaida a dark illusion. Andy Beckett reports "

"both the ethnic politics of opposition candidates and Karzai's own initiatives clearly indicate that Afghanistan's "new politics" is helplessly caught in the maelstrom of volatile ethnic politics, with each of the dominant groups - Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras - jockeying for position and influence in the post-elections scene. "

"Counting of ballots in Afghanistan's landmark election has been delayed after allegations the vote was flawed. A poll official said organisers were waiting to hear what form an inquiry into alleged irregularities in Saturday's presidential vote will take. An announcement is expected later on Monday following demands by 15 of the 18 candidates for a new poll. International observers have endorsed the vote. Ballot boxes have been arriving at centres around Afghanistan."

"Very few anticipated the Afghan elections to be completely free and fair. Only 200 international observers confined to the eight regional centres and the lack of security meant that the elections were not going to be particularly democratic. Most also realized that the elections were coming too soon for Afghanistan and were to satisfy Bush’s election ambitions. However, few predicted that the UN would make such a mess. The answer to multiple registrations was people can register a number of times and obtain a few registration cards but they will only be able to vote once because their hands will be marked with indelible ink which will last two weeks. In reality a lot of the indelible ink lasts a few minutes."

PART 1: The school of death
PART 2: Idealism in a hostile territory
PART 3: Safe haven in Bamiyan
PART 4: Ominous signs

"The main theme of this election won't be reported: it's called voter intimidation. Both the European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe even said they could not monitor the election for fear they would be constrained to denounce it as not being free and fair. In the end, they sent some 125 monitors - but they are confined to Kabul - for fear of Taliban attacks. In the mountains and deserts of Afghanistan, "security" in the polls will be provided by local militias controlled by - who else - regional warlords, who themselves will be controlling voter intimidation. "

"You're registered, you've educated yourself about the issues, and you know where your polling place is located. You're set to make your voice heard on November 2, right? For too many voters, the answer will be "Yes, as long as the machine works." Thirty-five million of us will cast our ballots using electronic voting machines, but the machines are far from foolproof. It's more than a technical problem, says TomPaine.com assistant editor Laura Donnelly. It's an issue of trust."

"Threats on women by the Taleban and warlords are undermining their participation in Afghanistan's upcoming elections, a human rights group says. The US-based Human Rights Watch says in a report that very few women have registered to vote on Saturday in areas where the Taleban are active. The report says even campaign workers have received death threats for raising women's issues. More than 40% of Afghanistan's 10.5 million registered voters are women."

"Afghan President Hamid Karzai has attended his only campaign rally outside the capital, Kabul, just four days before landmark elections. Mr Karzai flew to Ghazni, 100km (63 miles) south of Kabul, to address a crowd of about 5,000. Two other leading presidential candidates held rallies - Yunus Qanuni in Kabul and General Abdul Rashid Dostum in Mazar-e-Sharif."

"Afghanistan's first presidential election will take place on 9 October, but for Hamid Karzai - the clear favourite - it has been business as usual. Just about everyone in Kabul knows when Hamid Karzai is on the move. Soldiers and intelligence officers stream onto the clogged streets and road blocks appear as whole areas are shut down. Road rage spreads as quickly as the news that it is the president who is once again holding up the traffic. In time a convoy of Humvees - the armoured jeeps mainly used by the American military - sweeps past. They are packed with Western security contractors brandishing machine guns. This American military paraphernalia has, in recent months, become an integral part of the public image of Hamid Karzai, the hero of the international community and the clear favourite to win next week's presidential poll."

"A British man held at Guantánamo Bay has alleged that he saw US soldiers kill two men in Afghanistan. Moazzam Begg, 36, who has been detained for 2 years without charge or trial, complains in the first letter from a serving inmate to describe severe mistreatment of having suffered "vindictive torture" and death threats, and implies that he has made a false confession. Mr Begg wrote: "During several interviews, particularly - though unexclusively - in Afghanistan, I was subjected to pernicious threats of torture, actual vindictive torture and death threats - amongst other coercively employed interrogation techniques." He described signing a statement in early February 2003 "under threats of long-term imprisonment, summary trials and execution", and added: "Interviews were conducted in an environment of generated fear, resonant with terrifying screams of fellow detainees facing similar methods ... "

"Visitors to the US who are not required to have a visa will be fingerprinted and photographed from Thursday. It applies to 27 nations which have so far escaped the new security controls - including several European nations, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. Immigration officials will take a digital photo of each visitor and inkless prints of both index fingers.

Human rights group Privacy International says the new measures damage people's privacy and civil rights. "The technology being used is demonstrably unsafe and can only result in security being compromised rather than being improved," said the group's director, Simon Davies. "This programme is a slap in the face for those countries that have regarded the United States as a friend and ally." Travellers would have no rights under US law "when falsely accused and deported", he added. "

"The power of Afghan armed factions means elections there will go ahead in an environment of fear and repression, US-based Human Rights Watch says. A 51-page report released on Tuesday says local warlords are involved in widespread intimidation aimed at affecting the 9 October poll results. Most are former mujahideen leaders and are resisting efforts to disarm them. The study says warlords are using threats of violence to ensure people vote for their preferred candidate. While the continuing Taleban insurgency often gets more headlines, it is the grip these commanders retain that worries more people here."

"Fearing a sharp decline in recruiting and troop retention, the Army is considering cutting the length of its 12-month combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, senior Army officials say. The prospect of lengthy combat tours already appears to be affecting recruitment. For example, the Guard had set a goal of 56,000 recruits for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, but is likely to end up with about 51,000, he said. It would be the first time since 1994 that the Guard had missed its sign- up goal."

"The Afghan President Hamid Karzai has made a rare visit to the Afghan provinces just two weeks before the country's first presidential elections. On Sunday Mr Karzai opened a road in Jawzjan province, a stronghold of another presidential candidate, General Abdul Rashid Dostum."

"The latest plan to make local authorities and police pick out the worst 50 local anti socials is a precise recipe for a witch-hunt. Police and authorities are obliged to deliver 50 anti socials for persecution and will have to make up the number by picking on anyone they can. This is facilitated by the law where ASBOs were enacted, whereby any unconventional behaviour can be classed as anti social, even if it affects no one at all. And then it will be the worst hundred and so on."

"A couple of days a go a truck carrying 1 tone of explosives was stopped as it entered Kabul. If they (Taliban or any other disgruntled group) is willing to risk carrying this much in one load they obviously have enough to risk and are likely to have transported other large amounts which will already in Kabul. This amount of explosives is a few times more than used in the bomb at the end of August which blew the windows of my office in a third of a kilometer away. The elections are on 9th October and internationals are leaving. The security services have recommended internationals to go on leave or hibernate over the electoral period. Many have taken their advice."

"A foreign national held under the government's emergency anti-terrorism powers since 2001 has been released. Home Secretary David Blunkett said the weight of evidence no longer justified detaining the Algerian, known as "D". The man had been in the high-security Woodhill jail near Milton Keynes since 17 December 2001. Mark Oaten, home affairs spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, said: "If this individual was so dangerous that he had to be locked up for nearly three years, how can it be safe to release him now? "This case makes the government's policy of detention without trial look even shakier than it did before." Kate Allen, UK director of Amnesty International, called for an end to internment. She said: "We've consistently opposed locking people up without charge or trial under this deeply unfair legislation." "

"After violent clashes in the Afghan city of Herat, its new governor will be in no doubt about the mammoth task ahead of him, as he seeks to restore order just weeks before the presidential elections. It was several hours before the plane left Kabul. With reports of spreading violence in Herat, many thought it would never take off. And when the governor arrived, it was a convoy almost fit for a US president that took him into the city, guarded by heavily armed soldiers from the new Afghan national army. But this was ultimately an American-run operation. The hundreds of Afghan troops now in the city had all arrived in US aircraft. The governor was driven straight to a ceremony at Ismael Khan's offices, which was supposed to mark his official takeover. The choice of venue was symbolic, the ornate hall in which Khan - the self-styled Amir of Herat - used to literally hold court."

"Three members of IOM (International Organization for Migration), who I work for, have just been evacuated to Kabul from Heart. They say the violence yesterday in Herat and the burning of the UN offices was definitely orchestrated by the war lord Ismail Khan. The demonstrators started with Kalashnikovs and systematically broke into UN and international NGO buildings, looted them and then burnt them down. They were also specifically looking for foreigners to kill."

"Every evening, minibuses pour into Kabul in their hundreds. But the Afghan refugees who have spent four days returning from Iran speak of leaving reluctantly and being "sharply encouraged" by Tehran. More than one million of these Afghan refugees have returned from Iran since April 2002, the UNHCR said last month. In recent weeks, there have been almost 4,000 a day. 48-year-old widow,Fatima, said: "Now we are here, we came here and we don't have any house. We have come back to Afghanistan and we have nothing." "

"In the three years since the attacks on America, domestic security has become a primary concern throughout the world. The most recent attack occurred this week. It is thought a suicide car bombing is responsible for the devastation at the Australian embassy in Jakarta. President Putin has described Beslan as Russia's 9/11. In response to the attacks a Russian General has said the country is prepared to launch pre-emptive strikes on terrorist training bases anywhere in the world. US President George W Bush pledged at the recent Republican Party convention in New York "to build a safer world". However some critics have said that US policies have made the global community more vulnerable. Has the world become less safe since the attacks on America? Is the threat of international terrorism growing? Is the so called war on terror being won? Do you feel threatened where you live?

including: The point of terrorism is to sow fear. We are attacked and so we are afraid. The government keep telling us there's a huge risk of us being attacked again, so we are more afraid. We allow legislation to be passed that restricts our freedom and denies human rights because we are afraid. Terrorism has always been a risk but it's only since the war on terror was declared that we have allowed the terrorists to change our way of life. Who looks like they're winning here?"

"About 50 UN staff and aid workers are preparing to leave the western Afghan city of Herat following clashes between troops and angry demonstrators. A BBC correspondent in Herat says the UN withdrawal comes at the worst possible time as staff were due to help organise elections there next month."

"The reign of one of Afghanistan's most powerful and most colourful warlords appeared to have ended in chaos yesterday after a mob of his supporters clashed with American troops and set fire to a UN compound in the Western city of Herat."

"Life is not easy at the best of times for the last two Jews in Afghanistan. But the situation is made more complicated by the fact that they hate each other."

"For Pakistan's powerful military and the rugged Pashtun tribesmen, the South Waziristan region, near the border with Afghanistan, is a virtual war zone.
...
The military offensive had been part of the overall war against al-Qaeda. The US-led forces have largely been operating across the border in Afghanistan, and Islamabad admits, have also been assisting the Pakistani troops in surveillance and communication."
...
Some analysts say it is a no-win situation for the Pakistani troops. They cannot abandon the operation half-way, but are now having to use bombers and gunship helicopters against what was earlier described as a "handful of foreign militants and some local miscreants". "

"Campaigning has begun in earnest for Afghanistan's first presidential election, with a series of rallies across the country. Masooda Jalal, the only female candidate, was one of the first to kick off her campaign with a rally in Kabul attended almost exclusively by women. The country's first nationwide vote is being seen as a landmark in efforts to bring democracy after years of war. President Hamid Karzai is among 18 candidates are standing in the poll."

"Even though the war on terrorism is indeed, as the president said, a "crusade," it has nothing real to do with Islam either, although Islam is surely its target. Not Islam as it actually exists in dozens of different settings and cultures across the globe, but an imagined Islam that exists only in the troubled minds of a people who project "evil" outward and then attack it. Alas, it is an old Christian habit. The war, meanwhile, answers the Bush administration's need to justify an unprecedented repressiveness in the "homeland," and simultaneously prompts widespread docile submission to the new martial law. But more deeply still, by understanding ourselves as a people at war, we Americans find exemption from the duty to face the grotesque shame of what we are doing in the world."

"I was happily sitting in a hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan when I saw on BBC World Service that a large vehicle bomb had exploded in an area of Kabul where there are a lot of International aid offices and guest houses. This is where my office is. The target was offices of DynaCorp, a US security contractor. This company reports to the state department and besides giving protection to President Kharzai is also dealing with poppy eradication although this would probably be officially denied."

"The USA PATRIOT Act stands for "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism"—a remarkable acronym in its own right. The Patriot Act was proposed as a necessary and immediate response to the horrific events of September 11th. My remarks today are in no way intended to minimize that tragedy or to suggest that appropriate actions should not be taken to bring those criminals to justice. The Patriot Act was signed into law just 45 days after those attacks. It passed the Senate without discussion, debate or hearings. Despite attempts in the House to construct a compromise bill, the House leadership rejected that approach and instead insisted that the bill be considered without discussion or amendment. Our representatives in Washington were faced with a simple yes or no vote—one that by extension was characterized as:Are you a patriot—or not? Two simple questions remained unasked at that time: Would the provisions contained in this bill have prevented those attacks? Or were these provisions merely a longstanding law enforcement "wish list" that had been previously and repeatedly rejected by Congress? For today's gathering, I'd like to review the Patriot Act as it relates to the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution."

"A State Supreme Court judge today ordered the city to release hundreds of people who had spent as many as 48 hours or more in jail and found the city in contempt of court after it failed to comply. Most of the people had been swept up in mass arrests on Tuesday, August 31, the day of nonviolent direct action to confront the Republican National Convention. Many claimed they were bystanders not connected to any protest."

"A US bombing raid killed at least six civilians and wounded nine in eastern Afghanistan, after assailants attacked US-appointed government positions, an Afghan official said."

"You see, out of 30,000 raids carried out under the Prevention of Terrorism Act last year, only 100 people were charged with terror related offences. That's a success rate of 0.3%. Just imagine if only 0.3% of the parliamentary labour party had voted for the Terrorism Act, or the British army had only managed to invade 0.3% of Iraq. Let's hope you manage to stop more than 0.3% or terrorist attacks planned by al-Qaeda against the UK. Or is that the labour government's (secret) official target? I recall Ken Livingstone saying something about, 'Not if, but when.' Now I understand!"

"Was it not sufficient that the Anti-Terrorist officers burst into his home and brutally beat Mr. Ahmad, inflicting more than 50- potentially life-threatening- injuries in December 2003? Was it not sufficient to imprison him in solitary confinement and interrogate him for 10 days, subjecting him to psychological abuse, only to release him as a free man without a single charge levelled against him. Surely if there had been a shred of incriminating evidence it would have been found in the forensic searches of his property, in the intricate scans of his computers or in the raid of his workplace. And if that were not enough, then exhaustively sending samples of his DNA and fingerprints around the globe should have been more than adequate in securing some charge, but unsurprisingly - yet again - they were able to find nothing. So from where arises the need to extradite this British citizen to a country infamous for its human rights abuses? "

"US Army Gen Tommy Franks, who led the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq until his retirement in July last year , said both the Afghan and Iraqi governments would need three to five years to build an administrative structure. Gen Franks says that the CIA's regional station in Islamabad had identified Mr Karzai as future leader of Afghanistan long before the Sept 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. "

"A former US soldier being tried in Afghanistan for hostage-taking and torture has said his trial is unfair. Jonathan Idema told a court in Kabul on Monday that he had not been given a copy of the charges against him. He and two other American men, Edward Caraballo and Brent Bennett, are accused of illegally entering Afghanistan and running a private jail. Mr Idema says his mission was approved by the Pentagon, a charge the US authorities deny."

"The UK could "sleepwalk into a surveillance society" as a result of ID cards and other plans, the information commissioner Richard Thomas has warned. He told The Times he had concerns about how much information would be collected and shared under the ID card plans."

"Government proposals could see police in England and Wales being given powers to arrest people for dropping litter. Under the new plans due to be published by the Home Office on Thursday, offences such as such as graffiti and dropping litter could in theory lead to arrest, but there would be strict guidelines to determine when such a move was appropriate. At the moment, police can only arrest individuals for crimes attracting jail terms of five years or more, although there are dozens of exceptions to that rule. Officials have described the proposals as a "tidying-up exercise" but civil liberty campaigners have expressed concerns that the increased powers could be used in an arbitrary manner. Will the proposals help the fight against crime? Should the police be able to arrest people for minor offences? Do you agree that this is a "tidying-up exercise"."

"When a government floats changes to the criminal justice system, look for the context as much as the content. The political parties are using the summer to test-run ideas ahead of a frenetic election year. There can be no other reason why David Blunkett has, two days after a speech from Michael Howard, decided to unveil another pot-pourri of ideas in the never-ending "battle" against crime. The consultation document, Modernising Police Powers to Meet Community Needs, is extraordinary in its scope. It ranges from allowing police to arrest people for all offences, extending the use of DNA, giving community support officers (CSOs) more powers, potentially banning all protest near parliament, making search warrants apply to every home of a suspect, and making it harder for animal rights protesters to harass scientists - all this in one bill coming our way in the Queen's speech in November"

"Sweeping changes to police powers were proposed by the government today, with officers in England and Wales to be permitted to arrest suspects for any offence, rather than only those which attract prison sentences. But civil rights campaigners have already branded the idea of arresting people for offences such as graffiti and dropping litter "disproportionate".

Other proposals include:
· Testing people arrested for property crimes for class A drugs.
· New powers to fingerprint suspects at the roadside and to take DNA samples and footwear impressions.
· Allowing police to take DNA and fingerprint samples covertly - for example, by undercover officers - to determine identification of suspects and their possible involvement in an offence, although such material would be for intelligence use only and not as evidence in court.
· Allowing revenue from motoring fixed penalties to fund automatic number plate recognition systems, which are already in use in 23 forces in England and Wales.
· Removing the requirement for civilian investigators to wear a uniform, so that they can go "plainclothes" if required.
· Allowing the courts to remand in police custody anyone suspected of swallowing parcels of drugs - possibly for as long as 12 days - to allow the drugs to be passed and seized as evidence.
· Create a new offence of "keeping an incorrectly registered vehicle" to tackle the problem of an estimated 1.2 million untaxed, unsafe or uninsured vehicles on Britain's roads.
· Giving police a new power to stop, search, seize and confiscate fireworks where they suspect the items are held illegally under the Fireworks Act 2003 - which made possession by under-18s illegal.
· Possible new legislation to deal with demonstrations outside parliament.
· Allowing officers to photograph suspects outside the police station, and use moving images such as video."

"The ramifications of yesterday's ruling in the appeal court that evidence obtained by torture should be admissible in the UK are awesome. We have warned before of the way in which Britain's "Guantánamo Bay" law erodes the most fundamental principles of the nation's criminal justice system. Under the 2001 Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act, rushed through parliament following the al-Qaida attack on the US, foreign suspects can be detained indefinitely without charge or trial. Yesterday's verdict goes much further, by eroding fundamental principles of international law."

"The Court of Appeal has ruled the government acted legally by detaining 10 terror suspects without charge. They have been held in Belmarsh prison, south-east London, and in a psychiatric hospital. They have been backed by civil liberties groups who have described Belmarsh as "Britain's Guantanamo". They are detained under the 2001 Anti-Terrorism and Security Act, which came into force after the 11 September attacks on the US."

"US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has arrived in Afghanistan for talks ahead of the country's 9 October presidential elections. He has travelled to the eastern city of Jalalabad and will later meet President Hamid Karzai and the defence minister. Jalalabad is also in a key poppy-growing region and there are signs of an increasing focus on the narcotics trade in Afghanistan. Mr Rumsfeld has identified it as a serious problem and a threat to the democratic system in the country. He says a new plan is being worked on to deal with the problem but will not go into details. It is estimated that Afghanistan produces 75% of the world's illegal opium."

"President Hamid Karzai will face 17 challengers including his former education minister Yunus Qanuni in Afghanistan's upcoming presidential elections, the electoral commission announced on Tuesday. The final list of 18 candidates for the 9 October polls also includes northern Uzbek regional commander General Abd Al- Rashid Dostum, one woman and a poet."

"Two months before Afghanistan holds its first election for president, preparations have an air of democratic ... Nearly nine million eligible Afghans have registered to vote so far, several million more than expected, despite efforts by the Taliban to disrupt the process. NATO has agreed to provide extra forces to...

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"A British man, wanted for extradition by the United States to face terrorism charges, has been arrested in London under anti-terror laws. Detectives are also continuing to question 12 men arrested in a series of anti-terrorism raids across England on Tuesday. The US and its allies has begun a campaign to disrupt terrorist operations according to the Bush administration. British intelligence is thought to be checking the information, which is understood to have come from the arrest of a computer expert in Pakistan. Since 11 September, 2001 Britain has arrested more than 600 people under new terrorism laws but fewer than 100 have been charged with any crime and only 15 have been convicted. Is the US and its allies winning the war on terror? Do you believe the intelligence reports? Is the threat of terrorism dominating your life? Do you feel safer knowing what the threats are?"

We must put the threat of terrorism in perspective. The threat of terrorism is rather insignificant in the US and UK. People are being killed by terrorism on a daily basis in Iraq, but not in the US or UK. 30,000 people die every day from malnutrition and treatable disease. Our resources would be far better spent saving some of these lives than waging 'the war on terror'..... "

"Kabul at the moment is a mixture of unfounded optimism by many Afghans, pesimism by internationals, rocket attacks, international parties and cold beer by the pool. There is lots of speculaation about what will happen with the run up to the elections but Afghanistan will be as unpredictable as ever.Have a glance at some of the articles I have attached to get a better feel of what is going on here."

"The FAS [Federation of American Scientists] set a challenge for the scientific community - design a house that is affordable, energy efficient, and earthquake-resistant. That meant finding a cheap, lightweight material that could easily be adapted to the Afghan building style. They found the answer in Florence, Alabama, in the shape of H H "Hoot" Haddock. He has spent the last 20 years, and millions of his own dollars, developing a building system that uses polystyrene. "The polystyrene foam that we use is just like the stuff you drink out of," said Mr Haddock."

"Rhuhel Ahmed, one of the "Tipton Three", claims in the 115-page dossier that shortly after his capture in November 2001 he was interviewed in Afghanistan by a British interrogator who said he was from the SAS. Mr Ahmed alleges he was taken by US guards to be interrogated by the British officer in a tent. "One of the US soldiers had a gun to his head and he was told if he moved they would shoot him," the report says. The SAS officer pressed him to admit he had gone to Afghanistan to fight a holy war. In an echo of the abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib jail in Baghdad which shamed Washington, the three Britons, held as illegal enemy combatants by the US, say they were photographed naked and subjected to anal searches unnecessarily, after being shackled for hours."

"The Home Office is trying to calm fears of an imminent terrorist attack in the UK, while simultaneously saying there's a "real and serious risk" from al-Qaeda. Pressure is growing on the government to give more details of the threats, with the Conservatives saying they are concerned British citizens are being kept in the dark about possible risks. American authorities have put New York and Washington on high alert with the Bush administration saying it believes al-Qaeda has targeted five leading US financial institutions. The Home Office has declined to follow the US in intensifying security, but American banks in London are reportedly being asked to tighten up procedures. Are you worried by the threats? Why do Britain and the US appear to be acting differently over the threats? Do you work for the institutions that might be targeted?"

"New Labour has solved the problem. The presumption that a badger is innocent until proved guilty beyond reasonable doubt of a criminal offence, which dates back to Magna Carta, if not 1066, has been dismissed as an impediment to an acceptably behaved Britain. The council is considering applying for anti-social behaviour orders to be enforced on the badgers, and if it wants them it will get them with ease."

"In November 2001, near the northern Afghan city of Kunduz, a major battle was raging between the Northern Alliance forces of Rashid Dostum and the suddenly vulnerable Taliban. Following the battle, thousands of the latter surrendered, "under assurances that they would not be harmed." However, due to a complex series of events, this was not to be. Now, up to 3,000 murdered Taliban prisoners lie in an unmarked mass grave in a lonely stretch of Afghan desert, according to Afghan Massacre: The Convoy of Death, a compelling new documentary from veteran BBC journalist and filmmaker Jamie Doran."

"Since the collapse of the Taleban regime, large, expensive hotel weddings are growing increasingly popular. In the capital alone, there are 34 wedding hotels. The owner of one of the biggest said that "in the last two years, the number of people who prefer to have their weddings at a hotel has increased every day". For ordinary Afghans, the thousands it costs for a sumptuous hotel can leave them starting married life deeply in debt."

"Afghanistan's interim government and the United Nations are pressing forward to register voters to participate in the first democratic elections since the Taliban regime fell in late 2001. With the presidential election coming up in October, the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) has now registered nearly eight million out of 10 million eligible Afghan voters, 40 per cent being women. The JEMB has also been successful in reaching out and working in unstable areas, registering voters in all of the 34 provinces. But security concerns, which prompted the delay of elections three times this year, remain. "

"Afghanistan's Buddhas may rise again. Some experts believe the gaping Buddha-shaped holes should be left, a tribute to the barbarity of the Taliban. Others argue that two wonders of the ancient world can be recreated from the rubble. Meanwhile, hare-brained schemes abound. A former warlord threatens to reconstruct them in concrete. A shadowy Japanese billionaire is said to have a rebuilding plan. An Italian sculptor wants to carve them anew further along in the cliff. Another artist wants to recreate them in polystyrene."

"The Nobel prize-winning relief agency Medecins Sans Frontieres announced today thatr it was withdrawing from Afghanistan because of the murder of five of its staff in June, fear of further attacks and its frustration with the US military. The group complained that American-led forces were using humanitarian aid "for political and military motives," though it didn't elaborate. It also said it was unhappy with the Afghan government's investigation into the June 2 shootings - claimed by Taliban militants."

"Aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres says it will pull out from Afghanistan because of the killing of five of its staff and the risk of further attacks. The group said in a statement it was also unhappy with a government inquiry into the 2 June deaths. The statement accused US-led forces in Afghanistan of using humanitarian aid for "military and political motives". "

"The opium harvest in Afghanistan this year will be one of the biggest on record, the Foreign Office said yesterday, and it has triggered a flood of heroin on Britain's streets. The revelation will prove highly embarrassing for Tony Blair, who cited cutting the supply of heroin as one of the main reasons for the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, in addition to removing the Taliban regime and rooting out al-Qa'ida from the training camps run by Osama bin Laden."

Report of a heavy police presence including stop-and-search at Camden tube station. Cue debate about civil liberties, fare-dodging and its links to terrorism, anti-social behaviour orders, and free public transport.

"President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan postponed a state visit to Pakistan at the last minute on Sunday amid political tension at home with his defense minister and potential vice-presidential running mate, Marshal Muhammad Qasim Fahim. Generals from the Northern Alliance faction loyal to Marshal Fahim said they were called to Kabul and put on alert, and some international agencies closed their offices and ordered staff members to take precautions before going out. Rumors circulated that American troops were going to take control of the Bala Hissar, the ancient fortress that commands the heights of Kabul, where Marshal Fahim retains the few remaining heavy weapons and tanks in the city."

"A NATIONAL database containing confidential details about every child in Britain is to be set up by the government. An identifying number will be assigned to each child so that the authorities can access their records. Details of the proposals — affecting all 13.5m children in Britain under the age of 18 — are contained in cabinet papers leaked to The Sunday Times. Barry Hugill, a spokesman for Liberty, the civil liberties group, said: “They are creating a national database through the back door. You start with information about all children but in 20 years’ time you’ve got almost half the population." "

"It is shocking that the Government is now willing to sacrifice people's health for their own authoritarian tendencies. The BMA has echoed the Green Party's long-held fears, that ID cards will roll back some of our most hard-won rights by placing obstructions in the way of people accessing basic medical healthcare."

"A US citizen arrested in Kabul over an alleged freelance counter-terrorism operation says he was working with the knowledge of the US defence secretary. Jonathan K Idema said the US government had abandoned him. Washington says he was a mercenary. Mr Idema was speaking shortly before he went on trial with two other Americans, Edward Caraballo and Brent Bennett. The trial, on charges of torture, kidnapping and running a private jail, was adjourned on Wednesday for 15 days."

"President Hamid Karzai said that Afghanistan's private militias had become the country's greatest danger - greater than the Taliban insurgency - and that new action was required to disarm them. Asked to rate his government on how well it had achieved its goals, Mr. Karzai offered the barely passing grade of D. He said that corruption remained rampant and that the failure of the disarmament program was a source of keen anxiety among the people. Out of the 60,000 armed militiamen, only 10,000 have been disarmed and demobilized, and the program has stalled rather than accelerated in recent months."

"One hears a lot about the insurgency, Taliban, opium and increasing violence in Afghanistan (see articles) but not the desperate need for water. Eight years of drought has meant that the main projects people are asking for involve water. One large provincial centre one and half hours drive from Kabul has 12 parts. Only two of these get water twice a week. The rest of the population gets water from a dirty canal. In other areas with wells the stop gap measure is digging wells deeper as the water table decreases. If villages realized that the next village digging a deeper well was actually reducing their water there would be fighting. Fortunately they do not. There is no coordinated plan for water management in Afghanistan."

"The US State Department says three US citizens arrested in Afghanistan are counter-terrorism mercenaries operating outside Washington's command. Correspondents say the US bounty for al-Qaeda fugitives has drawn many foreign vigilantes to Afghanistan. The US government has promised $25m for anyone who facilitates the arrest of al-Qaeda kingpin Osama Bin Laden. An Afghan security official told the Associated Press news agency the men had mistreated captives imprisoned in their house in Kabul. The official said a police raid on the house led to the discovery of several prisoners "hanging upside down". They was also evidence that the captives had been beaten, he said."

"The American military is investigating the death in November of an Afghan man held in detention at an American military outpost here in southern Afghanistan. There are now five deaths of Afghans in American detention that the military is investigating. The family of the dead man, Abdul Wahed, 28, charge that the Afghan commander of security at the base was responsible for his torture and death, and various local authorities back that account."

"Afghanistan's government could amend legislation in order to hold presidential elections as planned in September. Under current Afghan law, the government must announce election day 90 days in advance, which means even if announced immediately the earliest elections could be held would be the first week of October. But the US-backed administration of President Hamid Karzai, who intends to contest the presidential poll, could amend the law,"

"Elections due for September in Afghanistan face further delays because of differences over the timing of the poll, the government says. A foreign ministry spokesman insisted the landmark vote - already delayed from June - would be held as promised. But he acknowledged that Friday's legal deadline of 90 days' notice for a September date was unlikely to be met. The election has already been postponed from June because of worsening security and slow voter registration. It is Afghanistan's first free electoral exercise for more than two decades, and a key component of attempts to build democracy in the country after years of war."

"Afghan President Hamid Karzai has addressed Nato leaders at a summit in Istanbul, urging them to send promised extra peace-keepers immediately."

"We know torture when we see it - the problem is those meting out the violence often don't. That's the revelatory conclusion of one expert who is attempting to understand the insidious way in which torture becomes "acceptable". "

"Taliban fighters have kidnapped and killed 16 people in an Afghan province after finding them with voter registration cards for the country's September elections, officials said on Sunday."

"Karzai is still talking about September elections. He does not seem to have read the election law he has signed which make the absolute earliest 5th October 2004. Due to logistics, deteriating security and lack of funding it is unlikely they will happen this year in time to support Bush’s re-election. If it does it will be a sham. They have reduced the estimated voting population from 10.5 m to 9.5m but still only 30% have registered to vote and they are from the easier regions. Many Pashtuns, 43% of the population, see Karzai as a token Pashtun in a government run by Tajiks (the second largest ethnic group) and controlled by America."

"The male registration team sat on the terrace, waiting for the last stragglers, its job almost done. In three days in early June, the men had registered the entire male voting population of this village of 300 households in preparation for elections in September. But the going was proving to...

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"As the Supreme Court prepares to rule on the legal status of the 595 men imprisoned at Guantánamo, an examination by The New York Times has found that government and military officials have repeatedly exaggerated both the danger the detainees posed and the intelligence they have provided"

"As America gears up for the presidential elections more and more attention is being focussed on the so-called USA Patriot Act, which in the wake of 9/11, gave the intelligence agencies new powers to keep watch on American citizens. "An FBI agent would not be welcome here," she says, standing in the lobby of the cavernous library in Berkeley, California. She is its director. The Berkeley City Council, in time-honoured fashion for this counter-culture community, has decided not to obey George W Bush's Patriot Act should the FBI try to impose it here. They can now check most things about your life without you knowing - including, for example, your laundry bills or pizza orders. They could for example subpoena Jacky Griffin to release details of all the books you had checked out in recent months and from your reading habits deduce whether or not you are a threat to security. For Jacky that would be breaking her librarian's code of practice."

"Afghan President Hamid Karzai has called for Nato to increase its forces in the country before national elections in September."

"The murder of 11 Chinese construction workers and the killing of five Medecins sans Frontieres employees have stunned Afghanistan's aid community."

"At least 11 Chinese construction workers have been killed in Afghanistan in an attack described by Beijing as a "brutal terrorist act". An Afghan national was also killed and several Chinese wounded. The attack took place in north-eastern Afghanistan, an area considered one of the safest in the country. No one has claimed responsibility for the incident. It is the second fatal attack on foreign workers in Afghanistan in a week."

"Forget drug-free and nuclear-free zones. A growing grassroots movement seeks to make the United States a Patriot Act-free zone, one city at a time. Or, at the very least, the people behind the movement hope to make their cities constitutional safe zones. In the past two years, more than 300 cities and four states have passed resolutions calling on Congress to repeal or change parts of the USA Patriot Act that, activists say, violate constitutional rights such as free speech and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure."

"The international relief agency Medecins Sans Frontieres has suspended operations in Afghanistan after five of its workers were killed in an ambush. The country's former Taleban rulers say they carried out Wednesday's attack in the north-west of the country. Correspondents say it was one of the deadliest since the radical Islamic militia was ousted in late 2001. MSF employs 80 expatriates and 1,400 local people in its Afghanistan operations."

"The head of the UN drugs control agency is due to meet Afghan president Hamid Karzai amid rising concern about the growth in the country's drugs trade. Corruption is widespread. Police chiefs have said their forces are too weak and the traffickers too strong. Farmers are confused about government policy. That confusion is often wilful, but hardly surprising when some religious leaders admit giving conflicting messages about opium poppy - telling worshippers it is okay to grow it, as long as they do not use it themselves."

"But civil liberties campaigner Andy Newman thinks that the campaign is misguided and that the police should concentrate on infiltrating terrorist organisations. "I think it's a terrible idea," he said. "They did a similar scheme in America and it just resulted in a lot of people phoning up about neighbours who were just different from them. A lot of people have the pre-conception that Muslims are terrorists and may start making calls about their Muslim neighbours." He thinks the design of the poster, showing just a pair of women's eyes, may invoke an association with Muslim traditional dress and reinforce the idea that the majority of terrorists are Muslim. "Any publicity about terrorism needs to be very sensitive not to inflame misconceived prejudices," he added. "

"The Bush administration sent a calculated message to grassroots political activists this week: The War on Terrorism has come home. Since September 11, the T-word has been tossed around by law enforcement and politicians with more and more ease. Grassroots environmental and animal activists, and even national organizations like Greenpeace, have been called "eco-terrorists" by the corporations and politicians they oppose. The arrests on Wednesday, though, mark the official opening of a new domestic front in the War on Terrorism. Bush's War on Terrorism is no longer limited to Al Qaeda or Osama Bin Laden. It's not limited to Afghanistan or Iraq (or Syria, or Iran, or whichever country is next). And it's not limited to the animal rights movement, or even the campaign against Huntington Life Sciences. The rounding up of activists on Wednesday should set off alarms heard by every social movement in the United States: This "war" is about protecting corporate and political interests under the guise of fighting terrorism."

"The world could soon catch a glimpse of Afghanistan's fabled Bactrian gold, as preparations get under way to exhibit some of the 20,000 pieces that make up the country's most important ancient treasure trove. While other important archaeological sites are plundered or have been ruined by war, the Bactrian gold, discovered by a Soviet team near the northern town of Shiberghan just before the Red Army invasion of 1979, has had a number of narrow escapes, adding to its allure and mystery. "When the process of inventory is done, we will decide," said Culture and Information Minister Said Makhdum Rahin. "We will sit down with the Americans, the Germans, French and Japanese and make a joint decision on arranging a tour," he said."

"National, state and local activists planning demonstrations for the G-8 Summit are appalled by the “preemptive” State of Emergency called by Georgia Governor Perdue. Under the Georgia Code section 38-3-51 that states the Powers of Emergency granted to the Governor, and the GEMA Act of 1981 that spells out the conditions and powers of a State of Emergency, the Governor would have the power to seize any property, public or private, close down events whether public or private regardless of permit status, detain citizens without charging them with crimes, impose curfews, override local ordinances and law enforcement, and to use military personnel for civilian law enforcement."

"About 20 Taleban militants have been killed in an attack by the US-led coalition near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan, Afghan officials say. Local commander Khan Mohammed said US aircraft bombed Taleban positions in support of 150 Afghans who had attacked camps near Spin Boldak on Tuesday. "

"Steve Kurtz was already suffering from one tragedy when he called 911 early in the morning to tell them his wife had suffered a cardiac arrest and died in her sleep. The police arrived and, cranked up on the rhetoric of the "War on Terror," decided Kurtz's art supplies were actually bioterrorism weapons. Kurtz, a member of the Critical Art Ensemble, makes art which addresses the politics of biotechnology. "Free Range Grains," CAE's latest project, included a mobile DNA extraction laboratory for testing food products for possible transgenic contamination. It was this equipment which triggered the Kafkaesque chain of events."

" 'We've got to make sure this time that we do it properly'
Tony Blair, 5 April, 2002

'It's a basket case. It's a forgotten country'
Eric Illsley, Labour member of Foreign Affairs Select Committee, yesterday "

"Three years ago, with the defeated Taliban and their al-Qa'ida allies driven from power, Hamid Karzai could do no wrong. Today President Karzai remains in power. But his writ is effective just in Kabul, and only with the protection of the international force."

"George Bush and Tony Blair made grand promises when they took on the Taliban. They sound hollow now. What does it all mean for Iraq?"

"A military intelligence unit that oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq was also in charge of questioning at a detention center in Afghanistan where two prisoners died in December 2002 in incidents that are being investigated as homicides."

"A private company has been appointed to be the Home Office's "development partner" for the proposed national identity card scheme. PA Consulting Group has a two-year contract to work on the design and implementation of the cards."

"David Blunkett has lost three appeals over rulings he was acting unlawfully when he refused accommodation to house homeless asylum seekers. Mr Adam, from the Sudan, reportedly slept in a carpark for a month after his application for refugee status was refused. He had entered Britain secretly before travelling by coach to London where he claimed asylum. That was deemed by officials to be too late under the terms of S55. In the case of Mr Limbuela, the Angolan claimed asylum the day after arriving in the UK but was refused and spent two nights outside a police station without food before "interim relief" was granted."

"George W. Bush is scaring Americans into silent complicity. Creating “no protest zones” patrolled by American police riot squads, aiming high-powered weaponry on unarmed American people TRYING to exercise free speech...this is not freedom. So let us see how free speech works in America. You are a citizen like me. You think this war is sick, so you go out to the public square when the war is declared and decide to USE FREE SPEECH to hold a big NO WAR sign. And you are met with a thousand riot police dressed like Darth Vader with baseball bat-sized clubs in their hands, thumping their palms anxiously in a row, drooling, so to speak. These riot police have hidden all identifiers and refuse to speak or follow the law, as per Seattle Muni Code 3.28, and identify themselves when asked. People are scared and leave with their children. Chaos and fear is present due to these riot police. A climate of fear, anxiety and terror surround the permitted protest zone. A group of protesters decide to march. They leave on the sidewalks, following all traffic lights, crossing with the lights. All of a sudden, riot police start blocking them off and forcing them to block sidewalks and into the streets. Unarmed people, 300-500 people, are then falsely imprisoned for breaking no laws, and contained and abused by this mob of non-talking, violent Robocop Darth Vaders."

"Pakistani authorities have arrested four men believed to be al-Qaeda suspects in an area close to the Afghan border, reports say. The men are said to have been picked up during an overnight raid in the North West Frontier Province. Information minister Sheikh Rashid told the AFP news agency that "explosives, timer devices and computers" were seized from suspects."

"US troops in Afghanistan have written permission to use threats, dogs and the firing of mortars near prisoners to help extract information during interrogations, a German news weekly said on Tuesday. The magazine said one of its reporters had found and taken photographs of the documents at a US military base in south-eastern Afghanistan. The directives also allowed "sensory overload", the use of loud noise or music, "use of warm or cold temperatures, long interrogation sessions, threats of transfer to the US detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, and sleep deprivation to weaken prisoner resistance". "

"The Afghan government has launched a nationwide campaign to disarm the country's militia forces, seen as crucial to the holding of elections. The Disarmament Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) initiative has been running as a pilot programme in five Afghan regions since October. The campaign was launched at a Kabul military base where a former anti-aircraft defence unit ceremonially handed over its missiles. But most of the missiles did not look especially threatening. Many had holes in, and several were missing their nose cones."

Photos of some high-quality graffiti, including an 'asylum seeker contact point': "Insert entitlement card and follow instructions on screen. You can update your claim at any contact point in your assigned liberty zone. Failure to make contact for a period of more than 24 hours will incur immediate arrest and possible deportation"

"I have been living and working in Afghanistan since September 2003. This is a personal analysis of what is happening on the ground plus a few articles that may not have got into your press."

"In recent years, U.S. prison inmates have been beaten with fists and batons, stomped on, kicked, shot, stunned with electronic devices, doused with chemical sprays, choked, and slammed face first onto concrete floors by the officers whose job it is to guard them. Inmates have ended up with broken jaws, smashed ribs, perforated eardrums, missing teeth, burn scars-not to mention psychological scars and emotional pain. Some have died. Both men and women prisoners-but especially women-face staff rape and sexual abuse. Correctional officers will bribe, coerce, or violently force inmates into granting sexual favors, including oral sex or intercourse. Prison staff have laughed at and ignored the pleas of male prisoners seeking protection from rape by other inmates. "

"Mistreatment of prisoners by U.S. military and intelligence personnel in Afghanistan is a systemic problem and not limited to a few isolated cases, according to Human Rights Watch . Afghans have been telling us for well over a year about mistreatment in U.S. custody. We warned U.S. officials repeatedly about these problems in 2003 and 2004. It's time now for the United States to publicize the results of its investigations of abuse, fully prosecute those responsible, and provide access to independent monitors"

"A former Afghan police colonel gave a graphic account in an interview this week of being subjected to beating, kicking, sleep deprivation, taunts and sexual abuse during about 40 days he spent in American custody in Afghanistan last summer. He also said he had been repeatedly photographed, often while naked."

"Ministers will have to comply with new freedom of information laws or explain their reasons to MPs, Parliament's data protection watchdog has said. From January 2005, the public will be able to demand to see swathes of information currently kept secret by public bodies like the NHS and police. But in certain cases, ministers will have a veto on what the information commissioner says should be released."

"The US military is checking complaints by an Afghan police officer that he was stripped naked, beaten and photographed at a US base in Afghanistan. The alleged incidents occurred at a US base in Gardez, east of the capital Kabul, in August 2003. The New York Times quoted the officer as saying he was subjected to sexual abuse, taunting and sleep deprivation. The US only allows the International Committee of the Red Cross access to bases such as Bagram and the Red Cross reports are confidential. Ahmad Zia Langari, of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, says this lack of access leads people to think Iraq-style abuses are happening in Afghanistan."

"Some of the world's poorest people are suffering as a result of the war on terror, a leading UK charity has said. Christian Aid says the UK Government must reverse a "dangerous drift" towards linking aid to the fight against terror. The report's lead author, John Davison, told BBC News Online: "Some of the world's poorest people already paying for the war on terror as the giving of aid by the world's richest countries is ruled by the rhetoric of 'with us or against us'. In its report, the charity cites two particular case studies - Afghanistan and Uganda. Afghanistan's $2.2bn in aid for 2004 is being diverted to military projects and emergency relief rather than long-term redevelopment, it said."

"Details of how to contribute to the public consultation on ID cards & some good links on the issues"

"Torture's back in the news, courtesy of those lurid pictures of exultant Americans laughing as they torture their Iraqi captives in Abu Ghraib prison run by the US military outside Baghdad. Apparently it takes electrodes and naked bodies piled in a simulated orgy to tickle America's moral nerve ends. Kids maimed by cluster bombs just don't do it any more. But torture's nothing new. One of the darkest threads in postwar US imperial history has been the CIA's involvement with torture, as instructor, practitioner or contractor."

"The total cost of the UK's ID card scheme is likely to be considerably in excess of the Home Office's £3.1bn, it became clear from evidence given by Home Secretary David Blunkett to the Home Affairs Committee earlier this week. Considerable expenditure outside of the core of the scheme will be effectively "laundered" via other government departments and private sector rganisations, which is somewhat ironic considering that one of the things the scheme is supposed to do is tackle, er, money laundering."

"When the world turned to e-mail, the security agencies had a collective wet dream, no more intercepting and steaming open envelopes, listening in on boring phone calls in the hope of hearing something interesting, now it was possible to do key word searches and automate the whole process. When the world turned to e-mail, the security agencies had a collective wet dream, no more intercepting and steaming open envelopes, listening in on boring phone calls in the hope of hearing something interesting, now it was possible to do key word searches and automate the whole process. This quite naturally caused paranoia in the intelligent services, faced with nirvana, the ability to read everyone's private communications at will, very easily, they were facing their worse nightmare, they could not read anything, the door had been slammed shut in their face."

"Welcome to George W. Bush's version of America—Bush Democracy. Apparently, he's had his fanatical neocon programmers working overtime to iron out all those bothersome bugs and kinks that have been holding the United States back for the last 228 years—exasperating glitches like openness, integrity, accountability, responsibility and the value of an informed public. I have to admit, this new edition has been a little hard for me to get used to; it's a lot different than the America that I grew up studying—and revering. You might be having a similar problem. So, as a public service, I've decided to provide this helpful primer. Think of it as Bush Democracy for Dummies."

" If you're not with us, you're against us, warned the Bush White House. To most Muslims almost anywhere on Earth, that meant "You had better give up your religion and your culture, because if we can identify you as being kindred in any way to those bastards who bombed our buildings in New York, even if it's just the syllables you utter when you pray or the clothes you wear or the folktales you grew up on, we're coming after you."
...
Imagine the impact on the Muslim world if today, had the news from Afghanistan told of a country cleared of landmines—in which schools and clinics and hospitals had gone up in even the smallest villages, in which good highways made it possible for people to move among the cities and villages freely, in which fields and orchards had been replanted and grains and fruit were being harvested."

"After boarding a Lithuania Airlines aircraft to photograph celebrations marking the country's entry into the EU, I was absolutely appalled to find 3 Lithuanian women being deported in shackles, along with 3 terrified unaccompanied children. UK Immigration officials had one child in a neck lock, and one woman in an arm lock - all were screaming in fear and pain."

"The severe oppression of women in Afghanistan suddenly became a issue when Washington decided to invade the country in 2001. But how much has improved? According to human rights activist Dr Nazir Gul, a former UN officer in Kabul, Afghan women are still fighting for basic rights. "

"The bodies of five Afghan government soldiers abducted on Monday have been found in the south of the country. Officials blame members of the ousted Taleban regime for the killing of the five who were seized in the Shah Joy district of Zabul province. "They were all shot in the stomach and chest," Zabul governor Khial Mohammed told the Associated Press news agency."

"The Bush administration has still not answered charges leveled in The Washington Post which, citing numerous unnamed U.S. officials, described the rendition of captured Al Qaeda suspects from U.S. custody to other countries, such as Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Morocco, where they were tortured or mistreated. These countries, like Syria, are ones where the United States itself has criticized the practice of torture. "

"NEW YORK – The American Civil Liberties Union and New York Civil Liberties Union today disclosed documents in an extraordinary sealed case in federal court involving the Patriot Act’s expanded “National Security Letter” power. The ACLU lawsuit challenges the constitutionality of a provision that allows the Federal Bureau of Investigation to demand sensitive customer records from businesses without judicial oversight. “The National Security Letter provision allows the FBI to demand the sensitive records of innocent people in complete secrecy, without ever appearing before a federal judge,” said Jameel Jaffer, an ACLU staff attorney. “Before the Patriot Act, the FBI could use this invasive authority only against suspected terrorists and spies,” Jaffer said. “Now it can issue National Security Letters to obtain information about anyone at all. This should be disturbing to all of us.” "

"At least seven Afghan soldiers have been killed in two attacks in the south of the country blamed on guerrillas loyal to the former Taleban government. Officials in Kandahar province say at least five soldiers died on Thursday in an ambush in Panjwai district. In a second attack late on Thursday, suspected Taleban fighters set fire to a checkpoint in Choto, in Helmand province, killing two soldiers. Meanwhile, in Uruzgan province in central Afghanistan, at least two people were killed in an attack by suspected Taleban fighters on Thursday. More than 650 people have died since August - Afghanistan's bloodiest spell since the fall of the Taleban. "

"Amnesty said yesterday it feared Shah's execution "may have been an attempt by powerful political players to eliminate a key witness to human rights abuses". The organisation says Afghanistan's judicial system is "currently incapable of fulfilling even the most basic standards for fair trials". "

"Two aid workers and a soldier have been killed by suspected Islamic militants in Afghanistan's unruly southern province of Kandahar, an official said. The murdered aid workers were employees of a Western-funded relief agency, the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance (CHA), which operates in the fields of health and education. There has been no confirmation from Taleban sympathisers or spokesmen that they were behind the latest violence."

Report from a UN worker in Afghanistan: "In December, 2002, a year after the Taliban had been driven from power in Afghanistan, Donald Rumsfeld gave an upbeat assessment of the country's future to CNN's Larry King. A year and a half later, the Taliban are still a force in many parts of Afghanistan, and the country continues to provide safe haven for members of Al Qaeda." Hamid Karzai and his lack of influence outside Kabul. Warlords and their shifting loyalties. Increases in opium production since the fall of the Taleban. Strategic errors in the US invasion. And more.

"The Home Office has acted to prevent suspects held under anti-terrorism laws from being released on bail in the future. On Thursday, an Algerian Al-Qaeda suspect known only as "G" was allowed out of prison on bail because of concerns about his mental health after being detained without charge. Mr Blunkett described the release as "extraordinary" and said he would be looking to take such cases to the Court of Appeal. "G", had been held at Belmarsh prison without trial for more than two years and will now be kept under house arrest. Do you agree with David Blunkett? Should terror suspects be prevented from being released on bail? Send us your views."

"Draft legislation outlining plans for a national ID card scheme will be unveiled by the government on Monday. Home secretary David Blunkett will set out details of the proposals, which he says could be effective in the fight against terrorism. But civil rights groups and other critics say they do not believe the ID cards will deter terrorist attacks. Civil rights campaign group Liberty said the government was effectively introducing an identity tax."

"The decision by judges to release an Algerian man suspected of having terrorist links has been branded "extraordinary" by David Blunkett. The home secretary said he was now planning to seek a change in the law. Speaking on a trip to Birmingham, he said he wanted to prevent a repeat of the legal challenge that allowed "G" to be released and placed under house arrest. The director of civil rights group Liberty, Shami Chakrabarti said detaining people without trial showed the government had a "terrifying contempt for the rule of law" and was showing a "complete failure to observe the presumption of innocence". "

"A new survey suggests people in the UK overwhelmingly support identification cards and would be happy to carry one. "

"As privacy organizations and civil liberties organizations voice concern, and opportunists like New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer file legal briefs decrying a lack of enforcement by the FCC, your commissioner and his team are busy watching soap operas to see whether they’re too steamy for afternoons. Even after September 11th, and despite early assurances by Mr. Ashcroft himself, in the days following the attacks, that the unprecedented power the Patriot Act provided would not be abused by the government, the Attorney General demonstrated his high priority focus on terrorism in the form of a sweeping invasion of medical privacy which followed a crackdown on physician assisted suicide and medical marijuana. While Al Qaeda plotted to blow up trains in Madrid, the Justice Department of America, Spain’s biggest and strongest ally, was fastidiously tracking down, one by one, records of women who had abortions to see if the procedures used were "medically necessary."

The head of the UN refugee agency, Ruud Lubbers, has said all new refugee camps inside Pakistan's border with Afghanistan will close by September. Mr Lubbers said the camps were too close to areas where al-Qaeda and Taleban militants were active. "

Andy Newman's report of the public meeting on civil liberties held by Swindon Stop the War Coalition, with guest speaker solicitor Matt Foot.

"More than two years after a United States-led coalition brought down the Taliban government, and as Afghanistan prepares for the elections in September, security remains a serious problem in much of the country, and the authority of the transitional government in Kabul is in question. "

"Human rights campaigners have urged caution over plans to make it a crime to "associate" with terror suspects. The proposal being considered by the Home Office could see people jailed if they ignore warnings not to contact certain groups or individuals. An Amnesty International spokeswoman told BBC News Online it was almost impossible to define "association". She said it could mean people were jailed for being friends with someone suspected of terrorism. "

"Fighting has broken out in north-west Afghanistan between a regional commander and a provincial governor allied to the central government. The defence ministry says it will fly 750 troops into Faryab province after forces loyal to General Abdul Rashid Dostum overran three districts. Faryab's intelligence chief, Omayoun Haini, told the Associated Press news agency that between 2,000 and 3,000 Dostum soldiers had crossed into Faryab from neighbouring provinces on Tuesday on 200 vehicles and 400 horses. General Dostum is an adviser to President Hamid Karzai but his forces have been involved in several territorial clashes since the fall of the Taleban in 2001. "

"Proposals for ID cards should be published within a month, David Blunkett told BBC Radio 5 Live. Last week Tony Blair said at his monthly news conference that identity cards would be introduced "more quickly than even we anticipated". He added that the government had won over those who opposed the controversial measure for civil liberties reasons. Practical issues and logistics were the only things stopping the introduction of ID cards, he said. "

"Pakistan has angrily denounced comments made by the US ambassador to Afghanistan that America may move against "terrorists" based in Pakistan. Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Ahmed Rashid said the army was fully capable of dealing with the problem. He said Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad was not aware of realities on the ground, and that his comments were "harmful". Pakistani officials have repeatedly insisted that they will never allow foreign troops on their soil. "

"You have to be pretty committed to go to Belmarsh prison in a remote part of south-east London on a windy Sunday afternoon. So it was no surprise to find a defiant mood among 150 protesters calling for the release of 13 men inside, held as terror suspects without trial. Some of those attending claimed to have first-hand experience of persecution as a Muslim. A group called the People's Freedom Front, highlighting the plight of political prisoners in Turkey, led the chants.They were joined by people from many backgrounds, representing groups such as the Green Party, Stop the War and Campaign Against Criminalising Communities. Others came unaffiliated to an organisation but eager to support the cause. Asad Raja, known as MC Incyte, rapped a poem about always being picked out by customs officials when coming back from mainland Europe.

"Over 200 people gathered from noon, Sunday 4 April, outside Belmarsh Prison in south east London to protest against the indefinite internment of 14 people and to demand the repeal of the UK's anti-terrorism laws."

"A rally calling for an immediate end to the detention without trial of 13 terror suspects is taking place at London's Belmarsh prison. Around 150 people, including civil rights campaigners, gathered outside the prison gates from midday on Sunday. Campaigners have described the prison as "Britain's own Guantanamo Bay". The men are being held under emergency powers in the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act, which was introduced in the wake of the 11 September attacks. "

"So now the elections are September this year, which comes as no surprise to anyone involved with them. Logistically they were impossible in June. In fact the only reason they are in September is to assist Bush in his re election. There is less and less optimism about the elections. Some top UN people are leaving and moral in the UN is low. Great areas of the country in south and east are no go areas where people will not have the opportunity to register or vote. These are Pashto areas. Pashtuns make up 43% of the population. If most of them are not involved in the election the results will not be very representative of the will of the people and trouble is likely. The elections could easily be a focus of trouble generally. Warlords will expect to have a position in the new government. If they do not then expect trouble. These are not a few troublesome tribal leaders but extremely rich powerful men who individually have more men and arms than the Afghan national army. How can someone be given a high position when are guilty of war crimes. However, Kissinger does come to mind."

"The weapons inspectors had not finished their work in Iraq, they wanted a few more weeks, but war determined the agenda. The Taliban offered to hand over Osama bin laden, if the US provided evidence of his involvement in 9/11, the US refused, war determined the agenda. And ultimately oil determined the agenda. Blair shaking the hand of Gaddafi had nothing to do with forgiveness or reconciliation. Oil determined the agenda. Whilst the Blair visit was taking place, Western oil companies were negotiating future oil concessions in Libya. "

"Around 20 people went today to Manchester Town Hall to find out if people can stand in the streets of manc, talk to other people, give them bits of paper and smile without being pushed around by massive corporations that effectively own the street we stand on..."

"A world conference on development aid for Afghanistan has opened in Berlin with a call to end the impoverished state's "spiral of violence". Afghanistan is seeking $27.5bn over seven years during the two-day meeting of officials from more than 50 nations. The World Bank's country director for Afghanistan, Alastair McKechnie, has defended the size of the aid being sought, putting the total cost of two decades of war at about $240bn. "

"The Metropolitan Police are attempting to remove Brian Haw from Parliament Square. Brian has been protesting against US/UK policy on Iraq (sanctions, war, occupation) and the war on terror since June 2001. The Police have not decided on what legal basis to remove Brian. Recent newspaper reports suggest that the move may be politically motivated ( http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2696993 ). A report in the Mail on Sunday on 7 March said that Downing Street are considering introducing a special law against protest in Parliament Square based on the embarrassment being caused by the protest to Tony Blair. The consequences of future protest outside Parliament could be serious."

"Swindon Stop the War Coalition has organised a public meeting to discuss the impact on civil liberties of the war on terror. The meeting will be at 7:30 on Tuesday 6th April at Friends Meeting House, Eastcott Hill. Matt Foot, a civil liberties lawyer from Fishers solicitors in London will address the meeting. Matt successfully acted for British protesters arrested at the anti-globalisation protests in Genoa, Italy in 2002. "

"Civil rights campaigners have voiced concerns over plans to implement a global biometric identity system for air travellers. The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) is set to agree an international standard for facial recognition on all new passports. Millions of air passengers could end up on a computer system that could be accessed by governments across the world, said Dr Gus Hosein from Privacy International. "

"Two comrades from the Manchester M&S picket recently attended court to face charges regarding the way in which we conduct our protest. The case was brought against the picket after constant harassment from the labour council. One of the two comrades was charged with affixing placards to council property and both comrades were charged with depositing a paste table on the highway 'without lawful authority or excuse.' "

"It's time to listen for a moment not to defense analysts briefing officers, pols or pundits, but to people like Jooma Khan, a grandfather who lives in a village in Laghman Province, in northeastern Afghanistan, who is quoted above. Surely he deserves 30 seconds of our undivided attention. "When I saw my deformed grandson," he told an interviewer in March of 2003, "I realized that my hopes of the future have vanished for good. (This is) different from the hopelessness of the Russian barbarism, even though at that time I lost my older son Shafiqullah. This time, however, I know we are part of the invisible genocide brought on us by America, a silent death from which I know we will not escape." "

"This is not the article I started out to write. What I wanted to write about was the Patriot Act and the way this Federal statute was giving license to federal, state and local law enforcement to curtail our due process protections, by blurring the line, which is more fluid than ever, between what law enforcement can do in the name of foreign intelligence and what it can do in the name of a domestic criminal investigation. However, reality intruded. The last month was a very bad one for civil liberties and the First Amendment. So my rather abstract cautionary narrative about what might happen if we do not pressure Congress to repeal the Patriot Act morphed into a chronicle of actual events that should send chills up the spine of all of us who believe in the U.S. Constitution. It is no longer what might happen, but what is happening."

"The United States is sending up to 2,000 more marines to Afghanistan to step up the hunt for Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaeda and Taleban leaders. The marines began deployment to the US Central Command region, which includes Iraq and Afghanistan, last month and are based on ships in the Persian Gulf. The troops will join about 12,000 US troops already in the country. Pakistan is also reinforcing the military operation against al-Qaeda on its side of the border. "

"I was arrested at the anti-war demo on Saturday after videoing the cops & walking on the wrong side of some white tape. I've been charged under Section 5 of the Public Order Act."

"On 8 March, Finnish total objector Aleksi Uski started to serve 192 days in prison for refusing to serve military or substitute service. Aleksi Uski's refusal is based on his anarchist-pacifist world view. He considers the conscription system as foolish and therefore does not accept any substitute civilian service as part of it. Although Finland has a law on conscientious objection, this law requires from any conscientious objector to perform a substitute service which is more than twice as long as military service, and therefore has to be considered as punitive. In addition, the substitute service is poorly organised."

"Afghan warlord Ismail Khan has buried his son, whose killing on Sunday sparked fierce factional fighting. Thousands lined the streets of the western city of Herat, as the cortege carrying the body of Mirwais Sadiq was taken for burial. In an emotional address to mourners, Mr Khan said his son was a martyr and told the government to find his killers. "

"Moral in the UN is low and the biggest outbreak of fighting since the defeat of the Taliban. Things are not looking too good in Afghanistan. This is a personal diary from a UN worker in the north of Afghanistan."

"There are number of private jails belong to the commanders and warlords in provinces. Some of the authorities are using the prisons as their private jails in provinces as well. The main concern of the The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) is the torture, arbitrary detentions, and extrajudicial killing cases in prisons by local authorities and putting people in detention for property disputes out of law. "

"David Blunkett has just rintroduced yet more 'anti-terrorist' legislation to back up the powers of the police and the state, each time the fascist opens his mouth one shudders at what new Draconian restrictions he's going to spout out. This was represented again on the picket of Marks and Spencers last night when the police came out in force with a very hard line. Backing up the normal bewildered footsoldiers of the Metropolitan Police were the local inspector and superintendent forcing fictional laws down upon us. They came out with the old stories that no megaphones were allowed and that we weren't allowed to attach banners to the railings or lamposts as 'police officers may harm themselves if they had to remove such decorations in an emergency.' "

"The Pakistani army is meeting heavy resistance as it continues its attacks on positions held by Islamic militants close to the Afghan border. Thousands of soldiers have been involved in fierce clashes with hundreds of fighters - both sides are using heavy artillery and mortars. Some reports suggest al-Qaeda's number two, Ayman al-Zawahri, is surrounded. BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner says the area being surrounded is 25 square kilometres (10 square miles) and there is a chance the militants could slip away. If Mr Zawahri was captured, he adds, it would be a major blow to the militant network founded by Bin Laden. "

"Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Dr Bertrand Ramcharan was the guest in our global phone-in programme Talking Point. Commenting on the Madrid train bombs Dr Ramcharan said terrorists all over the world had in common an utter disregard for life and human rights. He was speaking on the eve on the UN Commission on Human Rights meeting next week in Geneva. Does security take precedence over human rights in the post 9/11, post Madrid, world? "

"WHAT do you give someone who’s been proved innocent after spending the best part of their life behind bars, wrongfully convicted of a crime they didn’t commit? An apology, maybe? Counselling? Champagne? Compensation? Well, if you’re David Blunkett, the Labour Home Secretary, the choice is simple: you give them a big, fat bill for the cost of board and lodgings for the time they spent freeloading at Her Majesty’s Pleasure in British prisons."

"Asking who's behind these murderous crime it doesn't make sense for ETA to strengthen Aznar and his party by random bombing civilians `cause he is a deadly enemy and uncompromising against any dialogue. There is no sense for ETA bombing civilans 'cause the political backing goes to zero. There is no sense `cause ETA at most attacks politicans, officials and executive authority. There is no sense for Al Quaida to bomb civilians 'cause 90 percent of spain civilians have denunciate the raid on Iraq. The question is who can capitalize on fear, rage and panic. Who can protect us by total control, by lashing civil law to establish a Orwell Europe, a Orwell America."

"Forces belonging to the governor of Afghanistan's western city of Herat have regained control after heavy factional fighting left up to 100 people dead. The clashes between the governor's forces and those belonging to a local military commander broke out following the death of the country's civil aviation minister Mirwais Sadiq. One report said Mr Sadiq died after a rocket-propelled grenade hit his car in Herat. "

"It is now almost a year after the war, which was supposed to bring "liberation" to Iraqis. Rather than an improvement in the quality of women's lives, what we have seen is widespread violence, and an escalation of violence against women. ... After the US attack and installation of the interim government, raising women's banner steadily continued: the Women's Ministry and various other commissions were created and a few women became so-called "authorities". And now that two years have passed since these events, who is to deny the fact that the condition of 99 % of women in Afghanistan has not seen fundamental changes? There are no longer Taliban who lash women because their hair or feet came out of the Burqa. But how can women go out unveiled and have normal life without the fear of warlords who annoy, insult and rape them like hunting dogs? "

"It has been a while. Things have been a bit hectic. There has been yet another new plan for voter registration in Afghanistan. Now voter registration will stop in the 8 regional capitals on 7^th April and start in the rest of the country on the 1^st may and finish on 21^st May. Then elections will be 20^th June. That is only three weeks to register about 8 million people in mostly remote areas. It will take 4,200 registration sites and the hiring of about 30,000 new local staff. Can the UN manage to achieve this mammoth logistical task? Of course not. Any that believe it will happen as planned are ill-informed or stupid, which covers quite a few UN international staff.. "

"U.S. forces operating in Afghanistan have arbitrarily detained civilians, used excessive force during arrests of non-combatants, and mistreated detainees, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. Human Rights Watch concludes that the U.S.-administered system of arrest and detention in Afghanistan exists outside of the rule of law. The United States is maintaining separate detention facilities at Bagram, Kandahar, Jalalabad and Asadabad military bases. "The United States is setting a terrible example in Afghanistan on detention practices," said Brad Adams, executive director of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch. "Civilians are being held in a legal black hole – with no tribunals, no legal counsel, no family visits and no basic legal protections." "

"US troops in Afghanistan are operating outside the rule of law, using excessive force to make arrests, mistreating detainees and holding them indefinitely in a "legal black hole" without any legal safeguards, a report published today says. Having gone to war to combat terrorism and remove the oppressive Taliban regime, the United States is now undermining efforts to restore the rule of law and endangering the lives of civilians, Human Rights Watch says. "

Report from a British Muslim of their treatment at the hands of police in an Atlanta airport whilst en route back home to the UK.

"American forces are still conducting daily raids, bursting into homes and sweeping up families. More than 10,000 men and boys are in custody. According to a detainee database maintained by the military, the oldest prisoner is 75, the youngest 11. Many people have said that when they asked soldiers where their family members were being taken, they were told to shut up. A few hundred women have also been detained. "It took the Americans five minutes to take my son," said Fadil Abdulhamid. "It has taken me more than three weeks to find him." Adil Allami, a lawyer with the Human Rights Organization of Iraq, said security detainees had essentially no rights. None have lawyers, and most are denied visits. "Iraq has turned into one big Guantánamo," Mr. Allami said, referring to the United States military prison in Cuba where hundreds of terrorism suspects are being held, mostly without charges."

"The country is facing an unprecedented level of threat from global terrorism, says Prime Minister Tony Blair. "The threat we face is not conventional. It is a challenge of a different nature from anything the world has faced before," said Mr Blair. In his speech, delivered in his Sedgefield constituency, Mr Blair said no other decision he had taken "had been so divisive". But he asserted that it remained his "fervent view" that the danger posed by the Iraqi regime had been "real and existential". "

"So tonight we were served with a s14 notice banning the use of megaphones altogether, and when we challenged this were told that the 1986 Act was updated by further legislation. Given the tenure of the present government this seemed highly likely, but we wanted to know what it was and we were still not convinced it gave the police the right to stop us using a megaphone. "

"JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Rock music at full blast and the smothering darkness of a hood are sometimes enough to break a will already frayed by lack of sleep. If not, the subject can be slapped and shaken senseless, just short of permanent injury. Honed against Arab suspects in Israel and decried widely as "torture lite," such interrogation methods are now a prevalent part of the U.S.-led war on terror, human rights groups say. The most recurrent complaints include deprivation of sleep or food, and being forced to sit for hours shackled and hooded in a contorted position. Many suspects also say their captors beat and shook them, enough to jar and bruise but not to maim. These methods -- which U.S. officials describe as "stress and duress" rather than torture -- recall the "moderate physical pressure" Israel's Shin Bet security service uses on detainees believed to be withholding information about impending attacks. For even greater discretion, he said, U.S. forces transfer some detainees to Third World client states where "torture heavy" is the norm. Amnesty has also reported such "outsourcing" of interrogations."

"Children could end up on the streets if government plans to stop welfare payments to failed asylum seekers go through, social workers warn. The Asylum Bill was described as "dangerous and immoral" by the Refugee Children's Consortium and the British Association of Social Workers. "

"As both Houses of Parliament in the UK prepare to debate and renew Part 4 of the Anti-terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001 (ATCSA) this week, Amnesty International's worldwide membership of 1.5 million has stepped up its lobbying of the UK government, urging them to repeal these controversial and abusive provisions. Amnesty International is urging members of both Houses of Parliament to vote to abolish internment and uphold the rule of law and human rights. "

"Home Secretary David Blunkett has outlined measures being considered to stop a terror attack on the UK. Options include allowing the use of secretly-taped phone calls as evidence in trials of terrorist suspects. The home secretary says it is inevitable the UK will face a terror attack - and he wants a public debate about what should be done to thwart it. "

"Home Secretary, David Blunkett is set to announce new anti-terror measures on Wednesday including the use of secretly-taped phone calls as evidence. Other changes could include the hearing of parts of some trials in secret, without a jury. Mr Blunkett will also give details about a proposed expansion of MI5 with 1,000 new staff, many of them Arabic and Urdu speakers. The home secretary has defended the proposals by claiming that the security services needed more powers to apprehend terrorists before they strike. Are changes to anti-terrorism laws necessary? Do they violate civil liberties? Send us your views. "

"Brig. Gen. Thomas L. Hemingway, a chief legal adviser in the office of US military commissions wrote last week to Amnesty International, Human Rights First and Human Rights Watch, saying they would not be allowed to attend any military tribunals at Guantánamo." NB you need to register to read articles on this site

"A civilian helicopter has crashed in Afghanistan, killing the pilot, after being hit by small-arms fire. The Foreign Office in London told the BBC that a British man on board had been seriously injured. The chopper, owned by the Louis Berger Group, apparently came down in Panjwayi, about 50km (30 miles) south-west of the southern city of Kandahar. "

"Tony Blair has called a group of senior ministers to No 10 to hammer out how the UK will deal with people from the ten new EU member states. Britain is one of only two existing EU countries to allow people from states like Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Poland the right to work from 1 May. Ireland is the only only EU country to have decided not to place restrictions on the citizens of new member states working. The government has already indicated it is looking at ways to stop "benefit shoppers" - people turning up and trying to tap into the UK's health and benefits systems. "

"The Dutch parliament is set to vote on a plan that could lead to the expulsion of thousands of failed asylum seekers. Around 26,000 people will be deported if the bill is passed as expected, including some who have lived in the Netherlands for years. The New York-based group Human Rights Watch has condemned the bill, saying it would violate international standards by sending rejected asylum seekers - including children - back to unsafe areas, such as Afghanistan, Somalia and Chechnya. "

"The Bush administration has begun suggesting that Afghanistan's elections scheduled for June may have to be postponed because of security problems and the failure to register enough voters. security conditions are hampering registration so badly that only 8 percent of eligible Afghan voters have been enrolled. Among women, only 2 percent have registered." You need to register and provide demographic information to access the NYT new archive, and remember, the Data Protection Act doesn't apply overseas!

"Naw Zad, Afghanistan -- Ismail Agha was a slight, illiterate village boy of 13 when his family last saw him 14 months ago. When he reappeared last week, he was 3 inches taller, his voice had deepened, his chin had sprouted a black beard, and he had learned to read, write and do basic math. Agha's transformation occurred mostly in a place called Camp Iguana, a seaside compound within the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he and two other Afghan teenagers suspected of belonging to the extremist Taliban militia were confined together for more than 12 months until their release Jan. 29. "

"Although there are some 19,000 foreign troops in the country, none are engaged in seizing drug traffickers. Just 40 per cent of the overall 5.2 billion dollars pledged two years ago had been released and nearly a quarter of that had been diverted from long-term reconstruction to short-term emergency needs"

"General Boris Gromov, who led the withdrawal of the Soviet troops, and was the last Soviet soldier to leave Afghanistan on February 15, 1989, slammed the Afghan war, saying, "It was a big mistake and opened the hornet's nest that is terrorism, not only in Afghanistan but in the region as a whole. He said in an interview with the Russian army newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda published on Friday Feb 13th."

"We arrive at the first checkpoint on the way to the American embassy. This unmarked frontier is patrolled by heavily armed Afghan soldiers and police. The sandbagged checkpoint sits behind razor wire and chicanes at the desolate edge of what appears to have once been a good-sized city park, now brown and dusty. Still several hundred yards from the embassy, we are now in the Dead Zone, silent and colorless, negotiating one guard post after another, driving slowly past blast-deflecting gravel piles as we approach. There is no big bronze plaque outside announcing "The Embassy of The United States of America," but in the last 50 yards along the concrete wall leading to the main gate, there are signs in English and Dari every few yards reading "No Stopping." Last May in a chaotic five-minute firefight, American soldiers dug in behind this wall shot to death three soldiers of the new Afghan army who had mistakenly stopped their vehicle across the street and stepped out carrying weapons. "

"British Airways has cancelled flights to the US and Saudi Arabia amid fears they could be targeted by terrorists. The airline has cancelled flights BA223 to Washington DC on Sunday and BA263 to Riyadh on Monday. BA said the cancellations were for security reasons and followed government advice. The exact nature of the threat has not been revealed. "

"The United Nations has launched a reintegration and rehabilitation programme for thousands of former child soldiers in Afghanistan. The UN Children's Fund, Unicef, will begin by targeting 2,000 children in the north-east province of Badakhshan. They will be offered education, vocational training and lessons in civic responsibilities. Similar programmes are planned in other areas. Unicef estimates that there are around 8,000 child soldiers in Afghanistan. "

"Opium output hit a record high in Afghanistan in 2003 with another increase expected this year, a conference was told on Sunday. The official's remarks come after the recent publication of a Human Rights Watch report on Afghanistan, which documented how opium production had exploded in the country. The rights organisation said in the absence of the Taliban, which in some years managed to stop nearly all poppy production, the industry is generating billions of dollars for forces outside the control of any legitimate authority.

"The United Nations warned last year that opium production was spreading like a cancer in Afghanistan, with the country producing three quarters of the world's illicit opium, from which heroin is made. The UN estimates that two thirds of all opiate users take drugs of Afghan origin. Afghanistan has re-established itself as the world's biggest opium producer after the fall of the Taliban regime, which banned poppy cultivation."

"AN AFGHAN boy held for nearly a year at Guantánamo Bay on suspicion of being a Taleban sympathiser yesterday accused the United States military of stealing 14 months of his childhood. Mohammed Ismail Agha, 15, was one of the youngest prisoners at the US detention centre in Cuba until he was freed with two other teenagers at the end of January. Military officials said the boys had provided viable intelligence but had no further value in that respect and were no longer a threat."

"Plans to make it easier to convict British terror suspects have been condemned by a group of leading barristers. David Blunkett wants non-jury trials which would take place in secret. But five of the barristers due to play a central role in the plans have described the idea as "untenable". They have written to the Times, saying the special advocate system does not contain the "fundamentals of a fair trial". Shadow home secretary David Davis has already said the plans risked "throwing away the very freedoms we are fighting for" - and called the proposals "yet another of David Blunkett's kite-flying operations". "

"A renegade Afghan warlord captured in Pakistan last year has been handed over to the authorities in Afghanistan. Badshah Khan Zadran, who fought alongside US troops before turning against Afghan President Hamid Karzai, was taken to a border crossing."

"A poster for distributing to all your fellow citizens concerned about the Threat of Terrorism. (Be alert! Terrorists use a variety of disguises. Trust no-one. Shoot first, ask questions later)"

"Air passengers face further disruption on Monday because of a "credible" threat to air travel by al-Qaeda. British Airways and Air France have grounded specific flights to and from Washington on advice from the US. Both firms, together with Continental Airlines, also grounded transatlantic flights on Sunday. "

"Home Secretary David Blunkett wants new anti-terrorism laws to make it easier to convict British terror suspects.
* a new anti-terrorism act merging two existing pieces of legislation from 2000 and 2001
* the act could mean suicide bombers being tried and convicted before they strike
* possibly lowering the burden of proof in terrorism cases from "beyond all reasonable doubt" to "on the balance of probabilities"
* allowing British terror suspects to be tried at least partly in secret
* creating a pool of security-vetted judges to hear sensitive evidence
* appointing security-vetted lawyers to defend terror suspects, who would be prevented from hearing sensitive evidence against them"

"The protester who was charged with 'Causing a Public Nuisance' after hanging a banner at Cambridge railway station in the run-up to the George Bush visit in November of last year has been re-arrested and charged under section 5(1)(a) of the Public Order Act 1986."

"A couple of hundred protestors made a lot of noise at Lindhome Detention Centre, near Doncaster, today to protest at the treatment of asylum seekers. Lots of noise was made by the Sheffield Samba Band ( http://www.sheffieldsamba.org.uk) and others, paper darts were thrown across the fence with 'no borders' and welcome in multiple languages on them, banners were tied to the fence and ballons floated over it, and it didn't rain too much :-)"

"A blast near an arms dump in southern Afghanistan killed seven US soldiers yesterday in one of the deadliest blows in months to American forces hunting Taliban and al-Qaida guerrillas. US Central Command said in a statement that the soldiers were killed when working near an ammunition dump in the southern province of Ghazni yesterday afternoon. Another American soldier was missing and an interpreter was also injured, the statement said. "

"In Britain, constitutional lawyers are fond of prattling on about the “independence of the judiciary” from the government and other parts of the state. Judges do not take orders from government, even though they are appointed by a cabinet minister in the first place. They function free from direct interference by the executive. This is what first-year law students are taught about the democratic virtues of the unwritten British constitution.
In practice, the position is somewhat different, as the Hutton report has shown. The judiciary is without doubt part of the same state machine that includes the police, the army, the civil service, parliament and the government. Whether it gets direct instructions about what to do is not the point. In Britain, the judiciary is an integral part of the ruling elite and knowing how to act is a matter of reflex behaviour learned over hundreds of years of capitalist rule."

"Report on the Civil Contingencies Bill Meeting. The aim of the meeting was to create action, to let people know what is going on, to talk about it and to make it real. 1. Local experiences of civil liberties issues/police and council harrassment. 2. ID Cards/The Civil Contingencies Bill. "

"A British soldier has been killed in an explosion in the Afghan capital, Kabul, the British army says. Three UK soldiers and an Afghan interpreter were injured by the blast. Unconfirmed reports from the area say a suicide bomber crashed a car into a group of British soldiers that were on patrol in the east of the city. "

"Is it irresponsible to take kids to political protests? Are some protests safe and others not? How do you tell the difference? I interviewed 12 activists, 10 of whom are parents, 7 of whom are street medics on this topic. "

"If we leave it until it has become law, the common freedoms and basic civil liberties upos which we all depend will be in grave danger. The proposed legislation is opposed in private to the very highest level. There is every reason to suppose that organised opposition from letter writing lobbying MPs to oppose it outright and/or demand ammendments, as well as direct action protests and theatrical events will work! If we assume that we cannot stop it- and therefore do nothing- it will be too late. The legislation is outlined below: .... "

"The American nation-state led by the Bush Administration, and the transnational rebel group led by Bin Laden, has brought to life the artificially fabricated insanity that Hannah Arendt so dreaded. But the situation is far worse than she could have imagined. The insanity that permeates the psyche of the United States of America and the mysterious Al Qaeda is being carefully nurtured by Bush and Bin Laden, the products of wealthy families intertwined in business dealings for decades. Rather than trying to find a mid-point where some commonality and reduction of violence might be found, these two zealots and their minions have eliminated the possibility of any peaceful outcome and, instead, daily sow the seeds of destruction for the causes they claim to promote. In short, perpetual ideological conflict played out on the battlefields of the world. "

"IT'S the kind of thing that only happens in films... The hero, desperately searching for a terrorist or kidnap victim, taps their name into a computer. A map comes up on the screen, pinpointing the precise location of their target. The good guys move in, the hunt is over. Great for movie spooks, but only a scriptwriter's dream? In fact, the technology has arrived that allows anyone to track someone down without them having a clue they are under surveillance. It has crept in almost unnoticed - and at the centre of this new Big Brother technology-for-all is nothing more sophisticated than our own mobile phones. "

"A few photos and report from the North of Afghanistan, where a citizen of Oxford is now a UN volunteer."

"Afghan state television has gone back on a decision to show female singers, saying the country is not yet ready for such broadcasts. A song by the popular artist, Salma, was shown on Monday, the first time such images were broadcast since 1992. But the programming chief of state-run TV, Azizullah Aryanfar, told the AFP news agency: "Current circumstances are not suitable to air women singing." The decision came after the supreme court complained to the government. "

"1920 was a significant year. It witnessed the formation of the Communist Party of Great Britain and it also saw the insidious Emergency Powers Act become law.Drawn up in the aftermath of the World War I, the act was ostensibly intended to allow parliament to respond quickly and efficiently in response to a threat to Britain’s ‘security’. Its real purpose was soon revealed. It was first used the very next year, in response to the miners’ strike, and then again in 1926. It was used nine times subsequently - five times by the Heath government alone - and on every single occasion it was the organised working class that was the target. Eighty-four years on there is good news and bad news. Good news: the law will soon “cease to have effect”. Bad news: it will be replaced by the government’s new Civil Contingencies Bill."

"The campaign to save Swindon teenager Inna Haville has ended with complete victory as Immigration Minister Beverley Hughes has given Inna indefinite leave to stay in the UK. Reversing an earlier Home Office decision that Inna should be deported to the Ukraine."

Tony Blair said at the Labour party conference in September 2001 that "To the Afghan people, we make this commitment. We will not walk away... If the Taliban regime changes, we will work with you to make sure its successor is one that is broadbased, that unites all ethnic groups and offers some way out of the poverty that is your miserable existence." This detailed feature from Cambridge Indymedia shows this was just another lie.

"Qantas Airways, the Australian national flag carrier, said today that US authorities have banned passengers from gathering near toilets and other places on flights to America. The Australian Government believes the order might be completely impractical, given that commercial flights from Australia to the west coast of America are among the world's longest. A spokeswoman for Qantas said: "The US Transport Security Administration are now requiring that passengers on flights to the US are not to congregate in groups in any areas of the aircraft, especially around the lavatories." John Anderson, the Australian Transport Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, described the ban as "a little bit hard to handle". "

"I am from Oxford and working for the UN in nothern Afghanistan. I here British polititians are talking about how democracy is being supported and security is maintained in Afghanistan. There is no democracy and the security situation is deteriorating. A bomb was found outside my office a few days ago."

"Three days after a bomb was found next to my office and I had to go down the bunker an NGO guard box was blown up with a hand grenade near my guesthouse and i ended up in a bunker again. These are the first incidents of targeting internationals in the north of Afghanistan for about two years."

"Five soldiers were among nine killed and three others were injured in two separate incidents of violence in southern Afghanistan, officials said on Sunday. Afghan troops clashed with drug smugglers near a government post in a remote area of Kandahar province on Saturday, said Mohammad Anas, deputy governor of the province. The fighting left five soldiers dead and three wounded, Anas added. The soldiers were killed after they tried to stop the smugglers from trafficking drugs into Pakistan, a key export source for Afghan narcotics. In another incident on Saturday, four Taliban members were killed in a clash with troops in Helmand province while they were planting land mines on a road often used by soldiers, a spokesman for the provincial governor said."

"UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's stark warning that the peace process has reached a critical stage reflects the view of many that unless security improves it would be unwise, indeed impossible, to prepare and hold planned parliamentary and presidential elections later this year. There has been a growing number of attacks in recent months, principally in southern and eastern provinces. Afghan officials are quick to blame them on Taleban forces going back and forth across the border with Pakistan, although it is not always clear who is behind the violence."

"At least eight people are reported to have died in a powerful explosion in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar. All the victims of the blast are thought to have been Afghans, Kandahar's deputy police chief Salim Khan told the Associated Press. He said at least 15 other people had been injured in the blast, which also damaged nearby cars and buildings. "

"Afghanistan's grand assembly or Loya Jirga has reached full agreement on the country's new constitution, its chairman has announced. Under the provisions of the landmark document, the presidential system favoured by President Hamid Karzai has been approved, but with two vice-presidents instead of the original one. Minorities such as Uzbeks feared they would be sidelined by the new constitution, whereas Pashto-speaking Pashtuns (who represent about 40% of Afghans) argued their language was spoken by a majority and should be the sole national tongue. There has been a long standing rivalry between the Pashtuns, who have traditionally dominated Afghan political life, and smaller groups such as the Dari-speaking Tajiks and Uzbeks."

"Delegates from Afghanistan's constitutional assembly have met behind closed doors to try to salvage a process that has exposed ethnic fault lines and undermined the US vision of a strong presidential system. The Loya Jirga, or Grand Assembly, descended into chaos on Thursday after an estimated 200 of the 502 delegates refused to vote on amendments to the draft charter, and counting of the assembly's first ballot was suspended."

"TARIQ ALI, born in Lahore, Pakistan, is an internationally renowned writer based in London where he is the editor of New Left Review. He is a prolific writer, the author of more than a dozen books on politics and world history, including, most recently, The Clash of Fundamentalisms and Bush in Babylon, both published by Verso. In his spare time he's a filmmaker, a playwright and a novelist. He's a charismatic speaker and lectures all over the world. He spoke to David Barsamian on November 19 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. David Barsamian is the director and producer of Alternative Radio in Boulder, Colorado. He recently published Culture and Resistance, a book of interviews with Edward Said."

"Refugee groups began lobbying Senator Vanstone and the [Australian] Liberal Government after they were made aware of a flight leaving Nauru on 1 December to return 23 Afghan asylum seekers ‘voluntarily’ home to Afghanistan. In late November Rural Australians for Refugees warned of the dangers of returning individuals to Afghanistan, The United Nations Association of Australia (UNAA) reported these warning. Rural Australians for Refugees says much of Afghanistan is under the control of the Taliban, Al Queda, and War Lord forces. As a result of the continuing danger inside Afghanistan the United Nations and other aid agencies have withdrawn from areas such as Ghazni. The very place we are returning these people to, said the UNAA."

"The island of Diego Garcia, some 17 square miles, is a permanent floating aircraft carrier, where despite government denials, terrorist suspects may be being "rendered" at a place called Camp Justice, a camp where no journalist has been permitted entrance. There could be no objections if terrorist suspects were brought to Diego Garcia and immediately handed over to the judge and magistrate who, along with the "BritRep" and 50 or so Marines, have responsibility for what is known as the British Indian Ocean Territory, and of which Diego Garcia is part. There they could be charged under British law on what remains British territory. But The Washington Post, Time magazine and all of us who have been campaigning over Diego Garcia for as long as we can remember doubt that is what is happening and simply do not believe what we have been told by Baroness Amos. And if it is the case that prisoners are being held on Diego Garcia in contravention of British law, it might go some way to explaining the lacklustre attempts by Tony Blair to persuade George Bush to budge on British-born prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay."

"WITH the exception of university top-up fees, the measures in this year's Queen's Speech were trailed as something of a boring, lacklustre package. In television terms, it would be the point at which you could safely nip out and make a pot of tea. The draft Civil Contingencies Bill, which has been in circulation for some time, is astonishing only in that so little critical attention has been given to it. The Bill would replace the Emergency Powers Act 1920. When it was first published, the new Bill was described by the Guardian as "the greatest threat to civil liberty that any parliament is ever likely to consider." "

" Compulsory ID cards are nothing new in the UK. They were issued to all British civilians during World War II. That is until one ordinary man said no. Clarence Willcock, a 54-year-old dry cleaner from suburban north London, must rank as one of the unlikeliest Davids ever to take on a Goliath. Mr Willcock was stopped on December 7 1950 while driving his car along Ballard's Lane by uniformed police constable Harold Muckle, who demanded to see the motorist's identity card. Mr Willcock refused. Pc Muckle told him to produce the compulsory card at the local station with 48 hours. "I will not produce it at any police station," Mr Willcock replied. With this act of defiance, Mr Willcock brought crashing down a giant bureaucracy which had, since the outbreak of World War II in 1939, forced an identity card on every civilian in the UK - man, woman and child."

"UK and European legislation would be significantly breached if the Anti-Social Behaviour Bill becomes law, a leading barrister reveals. Thirteen charities, including The Children's Society, National Children's Bureau, NCH, Barnardo's and Children's Rights Alliance for England, have issued a joint statement calling for urgent changes to government plans. This comes as an independent legal report they commissioned reveals that parts of the bill could contravene the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Children Act 1989. The House of Lords is set to debate the bill later today at the second reading stage."

"Campaigners say the police force misused new powers afforded them under the Terrorism Act 2000 in the way they dealt with their presence at the Gloucestershire air base during the war in Iraq. Protesters claim officers were "over zealous" in how they carried out stop and search and they would like to see a court clarify just what these new powers meant for police and protester alike.

"First of all, we want to know whether it was correct and legitimate that stop and search powers had been authorised and why they were used to deter what was a reasonable and legitimate protest." "

"DAVID Drew MP has asked for an explanation of policing policy at RAF Fairford following reports of numerous protesters being stopped and searched outside the airbase under the new anti-terrorism laws. The Stroud MP has asked home secretary David Blunkett what provision under the Terrorism Act 2000 is being used to prevent people from protesting at the site. Mr Blunkett replied that: "The Terrorism Act is not being applied in the prevention of protests at RAF Fairford. The stop and search tactics employed by police were lampooned by political comic Mark Thomas at a recent Fairford Rally. "Saddam Hussein might be cunning but you're not going to find him hiding in people's sandwich boxes between the Marmite and the cucumber," he said."

"Military aggression abroad has always meant political repression at home. This should not come as a surprise: The American capitalist class and its government are not one class and one state at home, and another, different state/class abroad. Because we live in a bourgeois democracy, it is easy to develop illusions about the American ruling class, the American government, and freedom and democracy. Unlike activists throughout Central America, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, we are not used to living with the searing, daily reality of secret and indefinite detentions, military "justice," disappearances, and widespread torture by America's allies and client regimes.

But illusions are rapidly shattered when the "freedom-loving" state goes to war. Suddenly, the previous balance of civil liberties and milder repression no longer best serves its needs. The government wastes no time in "adjusting" that balance to suit its new, wartime requirements--which include, among other things, a quashing of dissent and the targeting of an immigrant population as "the enemy." "