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News archives for the week ending 23rd October 2009

Miliband believes Afghan run-off will go well

Britain's Foreign Secretary David Miliband told British radio he believes Afghanistan's run-off election will go well.

"I think that it is possible to have a credible election that provides a legitimate expression of the will of the Afghan people," he said.

Voice of America, 21/10/09

Israel joins US for largest ever military exercise

Israel and the US are due to begin a two-week military defence exercise, thought to be the largest of its kind in Israel's history. The exercise will focus on providing a joint defence against a simulated co-ordinated missile attack on Israel.

The BBC's Middle East correspondent Tim Franks said many observers inside Israel believed the exercise carried a two-fold significance. This included sending a message of deterrence to any would-be attackers of Israel - whether they were in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria or Iran.

It was also possibly an attempt to reassure Israel's people that the US took the country's security seriously - especially at a time when the US has expressed increasing concern about Iran's nuclear programme, although Tehran insists it is purely peaceful.

BBC News, 21/10/09

New Afghan vote creates new tensions...

President Hamid Karzai’s concession of the need for a runoff election in Afghanistan appears to have prevented his country from slipping into paralysis, but has created a new landscape of risks and uncertainty.

Mr. Karzai’s concession was a critical first step toward creating a credible Afghan government, coming after heavy pressure from European and American officials, including veiled threats that his actions could affect pending decisions about troops levels, according to one American official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the matter.

But diplomats immediately questioned whether a new vote could be arranged before the announced date of Nov. 7, and whether a second round of balloting would have more security or less fraud than the first, in which nearly a quarter of ballots were thrown out by international auditors.

“There are huge constraints to delivering in the second round,” said one Western official. “Can you deliver a result that is any different from the one we’ve already got?”

New York Times, 20/10/09

...as West press for deal to avoid election

Last night diplomats had not ruled out a deal between Messrs Karzai and Abdullah that would avoid the need for a second round. Yesterday's announcement of the run-off date was delayed by several hours as power-sharing discussions dragged on, but the parties were unable to find enough common ground.

As a Pashtun, Afghanistan's largest ethnic group, Mr Karzai is almost certain to win the run-off, although voter apathy will probably reduce the turnout, and the shadow of the first-round fraud will linger.

A deal with Mr Abdullah would not only avoid the logistical headache of getting the vote organised before winter cuts off swaths of Afghanistan, but might also remove the incentive for the Taliban to launch a new wave of attacks, as well as allowing Barack Obama to proceed swiftly with a decision about whether to send extra US troops to stabilise the country.

"The message from the international community is, for the sake of your people, reach some kind of agreement," said one Western diplomat in Kabul.

Independent, 21/10/09

Iran blames US and Britain for suicide attack

Iranian officials claimed Monday that they had evidence of American and British involvement in the country’s worst suicide bombing attacks in years, raising tensions as Iran meets with Western nations for another round of delicate talks on its nuclear program.

At least five commanders of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps were killed and dozens of other people were left dead and wounded on Sunday in two bombings in the restive southeast along Iran’s frontier with Pakistan, according to Iranian state news agencies.

Mohammad Ali Jafari, the Guards’ commander in chief, told the semiofficial ISNA agency on Monday: “Behind this scene are the American and British intelligence apparatus, and there will have to be retaliatory measures to punish them,” adding that Iran had documents proving their and Pakistani involvement.

New York Times, 19/10/09

Oil companies prepare for Iraq bonanza

Iraq is poised in the coming weeks to sign a series of deals that promise to lure the tens of billions of dollars it needs to become one of the world's elite oil producers.

In addition to signing contracts already being negotiated, the world's largest energy companies will face off in December in a second fierce competition to develop some of the country's largest untapped oilfields.

The allure of the world's third-largest oil reserve holder outweighs concern that future Iraqi governments could tear up contracts in a country where there is no consensus on control of oil wealth.

The second bidding round since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 could see deals that would add millions of barrels more to Iraq's future oil output, building on the promise of huge gains through deals that Baghdad is close to finalising after the first bidding round in June.

Reuters, 19/10/09

US prepares for long war in Afghanistan

While the Obama administration weighs whether to send additional troops to Afghanistan, the U.S. military is spending billions of dollars on construction projects to ensure the country's infrastructure can support American and coalition personnel in 2010 and years beyond.

The military has already spent roughly $2.7 billion on construction over the past three fiscal years. Now, if its request is approved as part of the fiscal 2010 defense appropriations bill, it would spend another $1.3 billion on more than 100 projects at 40 sites across the country, according to a Senate report on the legislation.

At the main U.S. base in Afghanistan, Bagram, the military is planning to build a $30 million passenger terminal and adjacent cargo facility to handle the flow of troops, many of whom arrive at the base north of Kabul before moving onto other sites. Under the proposed schedule, those facilities will not be completed until late 2010 and go into operation early in 2011, according to military sources.

Washington Post, 18/10/09

West presses Karzai on election result

Western officials have been pressing Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, to accept the results of a United Nations-led audit in a last-minute effort to smooth what has become an increasingly contentious election process.

A ruling on the extent of fraud in this country’s Aug. 20 presidential election is expected Sunday, and if Mr. Karzai’s vote slips below 50 percent, as expected, a second round would be required.

Western officials say privately that Mr. Karzai seems to be balking at accepting the results, and a flurry of visits and phone calls from officials on Saturday was aimed at averting a crisis.

A runoff could bolster the legitimacy of the election process and of the government it eventually produces. It could, however, take weeks or months, paralyzing the political process and leaving unanswered the question of who will be running the government, something the United States hopes strongly to avoid.

American officials say the latest an election could be held before winter made it impossible would be mid-November, and waiting until spring, one official said, “would be disastrous.”

Legally, there are few alternatives. The second round is mandated by the Constitution, but the Supreme Court managed to work around that document last spring when it ruled that Mr. Karzai was still president though his term had expired.

New York Times, 17/10/09

White House seeks to explain its hesitations on Afghanistan

President Obama will not decide whether to sanction a troop surge for Afghanistan until the issue of whether the country has a credible government has been settled, the White House Chief of Staff said today.

Rahm Emanuel said that the question of whether to send 40,000 extra troops was important but that the biggest issue was whether Afghanistan had a legitimate and credible government that could work with the US and other countries seeking to stabilise it.

Widespread allegations of voting fraud by President Hamid Karzai in this summer’s presidential ballot has left the Afghan electoral process bogged down. Several months on the electoral watchdog has yet to announce whether Mr Karzai’s first-round victory will be allowed to stand or whether, as expected, a second round of voting will be held. An announcement, due yesterday, has been delayed yet again.

Mr Obama is under strong pressure to reach a decision on the way forward in Afghanistan after weeks of deliberations and rumours of splits among his top advisers.

Vice-President Joe Biden is pushing for a more narrow, counter-terrorism approach focused on targeting al-Qaeda militants in Afghanistan and using unmanned drone aircraft and special operations forces in Pakistan.

The country’s Electoral Complaints Commission had been expected to announce yesterday that Mr Karzai’s share of the ballots was being cut from 54.6 per cent to about 47 per cent as a result of the inquiry, triggering a second round of voting. But the announcement was delayed amid diplomatic efforts to convince Mr Karzai to abide by the decision.

Times, 18/10/09

Deported Iraqis put straight back on plane to Britain

More than 30 Iraqi asylum-seekers deported to Baghdad by the Home Office have been refused entry to their own country and flown back to Britain.

In a hugely embarrassing blow to the Government's immigration and asylum policy, Iraqi ministers are understood to have ordered the men back to Britain after Baghdad immigration officers raised questions about the legality of the deportations.

Ten other Iraqi asylum-seekers were allowed entry to the Iraqi capital. Witnesses on the flight said the 10 men were given $100 (£60) each by the British embassy then left to fend for themselves in the Iraqi capital.

In the past few weeks dozens of civilians have been killed by bomb blasts and violence on the streets of Baghdad.

Independent, 17/10/09

Iraq cabinet approves BP-CNPC oil deal

Iraq's cabinet have ratified a contract with BP and China's CNPC to develop the super-giant Rumaila field, the first major new oilfield deal signed since the 2003 U.S. invasion.

Separately, Iraqi oil officials are in talks again with Royal Dutch Shell on revising its offer to operate the Kirkuk oilfield, after Europe's biggest oil company failed to win the license in Iraq's first bidding round in June.

The oilfield contracts tendered this year are a central plank of Iraq's aspirations to more than triple current oil production of 2.5 million barrels per day and catapult itself to third place from 11th in the league of oil producing nations.

The Iraqi Oil Ministry says that cabinet has the final say on the contracts, but some lawmakers insist that deals must also be sent to parliament for approval.

An oil law to establish a framework for foreign investment has been delayed for years. Analysts have said there are no guarantees contracts will be considered legal by future Iraqi governments, pointing to deep rifts among politicians over control of oil wealth. The next election is due to take place on January 16, 2010.

Iraq has reduced taxes and improved terms to make deals more profitable after the lacklustre response in June's auction.

Reuters, 18/9/09

Judges slam Miliband on torture cover up

David Miliband, the foreign secretary, acted in a way that was harmful to the rule of law by suppressing evidence about what the government knew of the illegal treatment of Binyam Mohamed, a British resident who was held in a secret prison in Pakistan, the high court has ruled.

In a devastating judgment, two senior judges roundly dismissed the foreign secretary's claims that disclosing the evidence would harm national security and threaten the UK's vital intelligence-sharing arrangements with the US.

"The suppression of reports of wrongdoing by officials in circumstances which cannot in any way affect national security is inimical to the rule of law," Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones ruled. "Championing the rule of law, not subordinating it, is the cornerstone of democracy."

Guardian, 17/10/09

UN endorses Gaza report but US likely to veto action

The United Nations Human Rights Council on Friday endorsed a report that details evidence of war crimes committed by the Israeli Army and Hamas militants during the Gaza war last winter.

The council’s vote in Geneva was, in part, an attempt to press both the Israelis and the Palestinians to conduct their own credible investigations into the war-crimes accusations.

But the Human Rights Council’s resolution, by endorsing several dozen recommendations within the report, also threatened action by the United Nations Security Council and possibly the International Criminal Court should there be no serious internal investigations.

That is considered very unlikely, however, because the United States has a veto over the Security Council agenda.

New York Times, 16/10/9

Pakistan forces plan offensive

The Pakistani political and military leadership have decided in principle to launch an operation against Taliban fighters in their South Waziristan stronghold, local media reports said.

The reports on Saturday came after four-hour crisis talks after continued bomb attacks in the country, and the offensive could begin within the next 24-hours.

Hundreds of residents in the South Waziristan have been moving out of the area in anticipation of the military offensive. The UN has said that they expect the number of refugees to rise significantly once the operation starts.

Al-Jazeera, 17/10/09

Anti-American party pushes for more democracy in Iraq

In an unexpected twist for Iraq's nascent democracy, an anti-American party is speeding ahead with electoral reform while the Iraqi parliament is gridlocked over how to run national elections slated for January.

On Friday, supporters of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr voted directly for candidates in a primary poll ahead of national elections, calling it a milestone in the democratic process. The vote is believed by Iraqi officials to be the first time that choosing candidates for any party outside Iraqi Kurdistan has been placed in the hands of ordinary Iraqis.

But in the national elections slated for January, it's not certain that citizens across Iraq will be able to follow suit. The Iraqi parliament is still wrangling over an election law that would determine whether voters will be able to vote for individual candidates on an "open list" or retain the closed-list system of 2005 elections, in which voters are told only the parties' names and not the candidates.

A closed list would likely favor incumbent politicians expected to lose support at the polls for failing to deliver essential services and cut down on corruption.

Christian Science Monitor, 16/10/09

Italians bribed Taliban for peace

A Taleban commander and two senior Afghan officials confirmed yesterday that Italian forces paid protection money to prevent attacks on their troops.

After furious denials in Rome of a Times report that the Italian authorities had paid the bribes, the Afghans gave further details of the practice. Mohammed Ishmayel, a Taleban commander, said that a deal was struck last year so that Italian forces in the Salobi area, east of Kabul, were not attacked by local insurgents.

The payment of protection money was revealed after the death of ten French soldiers in August 2008 at the hands of large Taleban force in Sarobi. French forces had taken over the district from Italian troops, but were unaware of secret Italian payments to local commanders to stop attacks on their forces and consequently misjudged local threat levels.

The Times, 16/10/09

Israel threatens Britain on Gaza vote

A furious Israel threatened to pull out of peace talks if the UN Human Rights Council endorses today a controversial report condemning the Jewish state for war crimes during the Gaza offensive in January.

Britain is planning to abstain, prompting a heated telephone call between Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, and Gordon Brown on Wednesday night. Mr Netanyahu urged the Prime Minister to oppose the resolution, saying that it could derail the peace process.

During what officials described as a “robust exchange”, Mr Brown said Israel could avoid censure if it held its own inquiry into the Gaza offensive.

The Times, 16/10/09