Afghanistan — Security

• Military Strategy: Gen. Petraeus has completed broad guidelines for the transfer of security to Afghan forces and the repositioning of ISAF troops within the country, the NYT reports, although it gives little sense as to what the conditions for transfer may be. A senior Pentagon official tells the paper that about two-thirds of Afghanistan’s more than 300 districts could be transferred over to local security forces without significant risk. Pres. Karzai issued another statement criticizing the international military strategy, saying "the counter-insurgency strategy should be re-assessed because the experience from the last eight years shows that fighting in Afghan villages is not effective as it only causes civilian casualties, nothing else". Wired’s Danger Room notes that despite a decline in the number of bombs dropped in Afghanistan, the number of reconnaissance sorties by drones and spy planes has nearly tripled since last year. [NYT] [BBC] [Danger Room]
• Attacks: Seven U.S. military soldiers were killed Monday in two separate bomb attacks in southern Afghanistan, following weekend losses in which seven other troops were also killed. A bomb planted in the car of a Nangahar district governor exploded as it was entering provincial governor Gul Agha Sherzai’s compound, killing the district governor; the Taliban claimed responsibility. The governor of Wardak province said Taliban fighters attacked a NATO supply convoy and destroyed two fuel tankers. [AP] [BBC] [BBC] [TOLO] [Reuters] [TOLO]

Afghanistan — Remainders

• Taliban Source Claims Recruiting Boom Thanks to NYC Mosque Controversy [Newsweek]
• Extraction to Begin at Ainak Copper Mine in Three Years [TOLO]
• Interview: Ramazan Bashardost Warns Against Karzai, Corruption, and Parliamentary Election Fraud [Reuters]
• Interview: Quetta Shura Taliban IED Unit Commander on IEDs in Afghanistan [Views from the Occident]
• Commentary: The Young Candidates’ Challenges – “Most young candidates do not strongly define themselves as proponents of any political group or trend, but emphasise that a change from the failed elites to fresh personalities is required in the longer term.” [Gran Hewad, AAN]

Afghanistan — Security

• Attacks on Khost Bases: The reported attack Saturday on Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost province was matched by a parallel assault on Forward Operating Base Salerno in the same area, military officials say; at least twenty-one attackers were killed in the two engagements, and five captured. Some of the attackers were wearing U.S. army uniforms, the AP reports, and were spotted cutting wire fencing at Salerno. Four U.S. soldiers were wounded and two Afghan soldiers killed. In separate attacks elsewhere, seven U.S. troops were killed in southern and eastern Afghanistan over the weekend. [NYT] [AP] [AP] [AP] [Reuters] [AJE] [TOLO]
• Election Violence: Two gunmen in a car shot and killed Abdul Manan Hashimi Noorzayee, a tribal elder and parliamentary candidate in Herat province, on Saturday evening. There was no claim of responsibility. Five of the ten kidnapped campaign workers for candidate Fauzia Gilani were released and the other five found dead; the Taliban had claimed to carry out the initial abductions but did not issue a claim of responsibility for the killings. [TOLO] [Reuters] [BBC] [TOLO] [Guardian]

Afghanistan — Politics and Diplomacy

• Corruption and Relations with Karzai: Afghanistan’s deputy attorney general, Fazel Ahmed Faqiryar, and another top prosecutor who had worked closely with him, Amrodin Wafa, were fired by Afghanistan’s attorney general last week, they say, after pushing to continue with investigations of high-level Karzai administration officials on corruption cases. The attorney general’s office said Faqiryar, who is 74, had been dismissed because had reached mandatory retirement age and his allegations were untrue. Among other investigations, the NYT reports Faqiryar had evidence ready to prosecute Kapisa governor Khoja Gulam Ghaws for collusion with insurgents and receiving kickbacks from US and Afghan prosecutors; Karzai and the attorney general are said to have blocked his prosecution. Karzai’s chief of staff, Umer Daudzai, said that “unfortunately we see some of these cases as politicized” and that “we need to review our strategy, our code of conduct, so that Afghans believe that this is a sovereign state and President Karzai is the ultimate decision maker in this country.” "What he was doing was very important," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said of Mr. Faqiryar. "Those charged with pursuing corruption need to continue their work without political interference. It’s something we are watching to make sure the Afghan government lives up to the pledges it has made in battling corruption." Separately, Karzai’s office issued a statement Friday condemning media reports that many officials within his administration were on the CIA payroll; “Afghanistan believes that making such allegations will not strengthen the alliance against terrorism and will not strengthen an Afghanistan based on the law and rules, but will have negative effects in those areas”, the statement said. [NYT] [WSJ] [WSJ] [WAPO] [LAT] [AJE] [AP] [AP]

Afghanistan — Remainders

• More Schoolgirl Poisonings Reported in Kabul [TOLO]
• Commentary: On the Loya Paktia Campaign Trail – “With a long history of low degree of state control and an equally long border shared with Pakistan’s FATA, the region does not look like the perfect ground for a democratic election in these hard times. Why are people running as candidates, then?” [Fabrizio Foschini, AAN Part 1,Part 2]

CNN and others have confirmed that the bodies of five kidnapped parliamentary campaign workers have been found in a remote district of Herat province in western Afghanistan, quoting Naqibullah Arwin, spokesman for the provincial governor.

Arwin said a group of insurgents kidnapped the workers when they drove to the area, and later shot them dead.

The fate of the other five, campaign workers for Fawzia Gelani, a female candidate in the Wolesi Jirga election, is not clear.

Clarifying earlier uncertainty about the identity of a man killed in Herat, TOLOnews has confirmed he was 55-year-old Abdul Manan Hashimi Noorzayee, “an influential tribal elder and a candidate for the upcoming Afghan parliamentary election in Shindand”, a district in Herat province, and was was shot dead by unknown gunmen on Saturday night.

Local/offline news

Local radio news reported this morning (Sunday) that a candidate was shot dead in western Herat province on Saturday night. However, TOLO TV news reported that the person shot dead was actually a military officer. We’ll add more details as we receive them.

Obstacles in the way of elections. (editorial)
Payam e Mujahid, Dari weekly. August 29, 2010.

Payam e Mujahid in its editorials delves into the difficulties in the way of the parliamentary elections. The paper identifies security problems and undemocratic government policies as the main problems facing the elections.

An interview with Hafiz Mansur, a prominent candidate in the upcoming elections
Payam e Mujahid, Dari weekly. August 29, 2010.

Mansur: The fact that my proposals and ideas have turned into the dominant discourse in our country’s politics has encouraged me to run in elections.

Women Candidates campaign is getting momentum in northern Qunduz province
8 am, Dari daily. August 29, 2010.

Despite security and many other problems in the way of women candidates’ campaign in the country, in Qunduz women candidates’ campaign is getting unprecedented momentum.  

Afghanistan — Elections

• Campaign Report: The GlobalPost reports on candidate campaigns in Ashraf Khel village outside Kabul, where the main rivals are Janan Mosazai, a first-time candidate, and a former mujahadeen commander named Anwar Khan. [GlobalPost]

Afghanistan — Security

• Taliban Attack Khost Base: A group of at least 30 fighters attacked Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost province on Saturday morning; the base was the site of a December 2009 suicide attack on a CIA station there that killed eight. Taliban spokesmen claimed responsibility for the attack and said suicide bombers were among the fighters. As of press time Saturday, ISAF spokesmen said the attack was ongoing and could not give details on casualties. [Reuters] [BBC]
• Other Attacks: Three U.S. soldiers were killed in separate bombing attacks in southern and eastern Afghanistan Friday. Police in Kunar province say six Afghan children collecting scrap metal were killed in an ISAF airstrike yesterday; ISAF said it was investigating the claim. [Dawn] [AFP]

Afghanistan — Remainders

• Marines in Helmand Prepare for “A Long Haul” [LAT]
• Concerns Over Security for UK PM Cameron During Recent Visit [BBC] [Guardian]
• Commentary: Quit Whining About Corruption - “Corruption can in fact help us in our battle to achieve a stable Afghanistan.” [Barry Gewen, TNR]
• Commentary: The CIA Paymaster in Kabul – “The policy of making systematic payments for small favors creates the widespread impression that the United States is prepared to pay generously for anything it wants.” [Scott Horton, Harpers]
• Commentary: Kabul’s Wedding Cake Architecture – “The emphasis evident in these buildings, like much of what goes on in Afghanistan today, is on the show and not the substance … as most Afghans are unsure of just how long the current period of peace will last, spending money fast and ‘cheap’ may appear to many the best option.” [Anne Feenstra, AAN]