For the second time in two weeks, President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan is sending newly trained Afghan National Army troops from the capital to quell fighting in outlying regions, this time in northern Afghanistan, government officials said.
Heavy fighting broke out on Wednesday as an Uzbek warlord's militia advanced on Maimana, the capital of the northern province of Fariab, forcing the local governor to appeal for support from the central government.
The government ordered a battalion of 750 men to prepare to fly yesterday to Maimana, said General Mir Jan, a spokesman for the Defense Ministry. A senior government delegation, led by the deputy chief of staff and a presidential adviser, left for the region on Wednesday, he said.
The militia forces loyal to the warlord, General Abdul Rashid Dostum, are fighting forces loyal to General Hashim Habibi, who recently refused orders from Dostum and declared his allegiance to the local governor and the central government in Kabul. Jan said that the militia forces attacked in four different areas, suggesting a coordinated operation.
Dostum's forces had seized control of several towns in the north of the province and were advancing on Maimana, the local intelligence chief, Homayoun Aini, said in a telephone interview. He said the militia forces had captured Juma Bazaar, a suburb just 18km from the center of the provincial capital, and two other districts to the north.
"Fighting is still going on in two areas," he said, "government soldiers and supporters have fled in disarray." There were no immediate reports of casualties, but government officials said there were bound to be some.
The fighting is a fresh blow for the government of Karzai, which is trying to make progress in reconstruction and prepare for elections amid continued instability in the country. Taliban and other anti-American militants are continuing an insurgency in southern and eastern Afghanistan, with intermittent factional fighting in the north and west.
KINGPIN: Marset allegedly laundered the proceeds of his drug enterprise by purchasing and sponsoring professional soccer teams and even put himself in the starting lineups Notorious Latin American narco trafficker Sebastian Marset, who eluded police for years, was handed over to US authorities after his arrest on Friday in Bolivia. Marset, a Uruguayan national who was on the US most-wanted list, was passed to agents of the US Drug Enforcement Administration at Santa Cruz airport in Bolivia, then put on a US airplane, Bolivian state television showed. “The arrest and deportation were carried out pursuant to a court order issued by the US justice system,” Bolivian Minister of Government Marco Antonio Oviedo told reporters. The alleged kingpin was arrested in an upscale neighborhood of Santa
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
SCANDAL: Other images discovered earlier show Andrew bent over a female and lying across the laps of a number of women, while Mandelson is pictured in his underpants A photograph of former British prince Andrew and veteran politician Peter Mandelson sitting in bathrobes alongside late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was unearthed on Friday in previously published documents. The image is believed to be the first known photograph of the two men with Epstein. They are currently engulfed in scandal in the UK over their ties to their mutual friend. The undated photograph, first reported by ITV News, shows King Charles III’s disgraced brother and former British ambassador to the US sitting barefoot outside on a wooden deck. They appear to have mugs with a US flag on them
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
RSS