If we can get past the numbers and just go forward with assisting the Aghan people to securing their nation. The troop deployment ends July 2011. No time to waste.
Map: Foreign forces in Afghanistan (click here)
Of the 71,030 NATO troops, 34,800 are from the USA (click here - bottom of page)
NATO needs to commit their troops to end the war in Afghanistan, the USA will not fight a forever war. All nations are accountable for their participation. The USA is carrying the heaviest burden to secure NATO, while building a strong Homeland Security, by sending American troops into the most dangerous regions of Afghanistan. Regions the Afghan military have to come to defend by themselves.
I am proud of my President. I wish General McCrystal success and above all valor for his commitment and dedication to his country. I thank them both.
It is my estimate there should be no weakening of the Pakistani forces in regard to their efforts, regardless, of the strategy of General McCrystal. There are methods the General can use that do not have to be disclosed to anyone. Quite frankly, it would be better if the American effort in the toughest regions of Afghanistan were left in secret while carrying out a successful campaign.
...He said (click here) that US National Security Adviser James Jones had contacted Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in Frankfurt and informed him about the US decision.
Mr Qureshi said that Pakistan had no objection to the increase in the number of US troops in Afghanistan, but wanted details about their deployment.
‘We want to know how they will be deployed and in which areas,’ the foreign minister said.
President Obama called President Asif Ali Zardari a few hours before the announcement of his new Afghan strategy.
According to presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar, President Obama mentioned broad outlines of the new policy.
President Zardari was among the five world leaders contacted by the US president, the others being the leaders of France, Canada, Australia and Afghanistan....
The issue with al Qaeda does not exist in Afghanistan alone.
Aid workers feared kidnapped by al-Qaeda's north Africa wing (click here)
Three Spanish aid workers kidnapped in Mauritania on Monday are believed to be being held by the group linked to al-Qaeda which beheaded a British hostage in June.
By Mike Pflanz, West Africa Correspondent
Published: 6:00AM GMT 01 Dec 2009
Gunmen fired shots to stop the vehicle carrying the two men and one woman, which was at the back of a 13-car convoy heading north from the capital Nouakchott to deliver aid.
"I heard my colleagues in one of the cars who said 'soldiers, soldiers, machine guns, machine guns'," Joseph Carbonell, head of the aid group Barcelona-Accio Solidaria, told Reuters....
As the noose tightens on Afghanistan Opium, the 'enterprise' of kidnapping gains momentum for the terrorist network. I looks as though Africa is choice real estate for the funding operations of al Qaeda and the Somali pirates. Something tells me 'times are getting tough' for al Qaeda.
Sahel: Al-Qaeda and the "business" of Western hostages (click here)
ennahar 01 December, 2009 03:50:00
DAKAR - For Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), always menacing but in financial difficulty, the kidnapping of Westerners in the Sahel countries constitutes increasingly a "business" to bail out, according to experts.
In less than a week, a French has been kidnapped in north-eastern Mali and three Spaniards captured in northern Mauritania: two actions usually attributed to the jihadist movement, even if they have not yet been claimed. The abductions have "multiplied in recent months, the degradation is continuous for over five years," said Alain Antil, a researcher at the French Institute for International Relations (IFRI) in Paris....
Brown’s Bin Laden remark irks Pakistan (click here)
Azhar Masood
Arab News
ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office of Pakistan expressed its surprise on Monday over the latest British demand that Pakistan should hunt Al-Qaeda leaders, including Osama Bin Laden’s second in command, Ayman Al-Zawahiri.
“We have eliminated about 7,000 pro-Al-Qaeda militants and Pakistan’s forces are still making extraordinary efforts to track down and eliminate militants,” said Foreign Office Spokesman Abdul Basit. “We ask the British government or other NATO powers to provide us intelligence reports that suggest a presence of Al-Qaeda elements. We totally deny these inaccurate reports that Al-Qaeda’s leaders are present in Pakistan.”
Interior Minister Rehman Malik also urged the British government to pass on any information about whereabouts of Bin Laden. “If anyone has information about the presence of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan, then it must be shared with our government. We would take action,” he told reporters....
Somali pirates hijack Greek-flagged supertanker (click here)
Agencies
NAIROBI, Kenya: Somali pirates seized a supertanker carrying crude oil from Saudi Arabia to the United States in the increasingly dangerous waters off East Africa, an official said on Monday, an attack that could pose a huge environmental or security threat to the region.
The Greece-flagged Maran Centaurus was hijacked on Sunday northeast of the Seychelles about 1,300 km off the coast of Somalia, said Cmdr. John Harbor, a spokesman for the EU Naval Force....
