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Fighting erupts before Rice visit

Afghan farmers harvest opium in a field in the remote Jurum district of Afghanistan's northern Badakhshan Province in June. Afghanistan urgently needs to legalize its massive opium crop, which supplies most of the world's heroin, to avoid becoming a narco-state and to fund reconstruction, a think tank said in Kabul last month. PHOTO: AFP

Fighting has erupted across Afghanistan ahead of a visit by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, with 10 suspected rebels, six police and five medical workers killed and rockets slamming into the capital.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai warned the militants were receiving support from drug traffickers and that his nation could fall back into the hands of terrorists if its booming heroin trade, which supplies nearly 90 percent of the world's supply, isn't stamped out.

It was the first time Karzai has directly linked the drug trade with the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan. Washington earlier this year criticized Karzai for not being tough enough on narcotics and US officials have said they suspect the insurgency is being partially funded by drug money.

Karzai's comments on Wednesday at a news conference with Rice came as his US-backed government is struggling to strengthen a fragile democracy while dealing with a rebellion that has killed about 1,400 in the past half-year.

"We will have terrorism attacking [us] ... for quite some time," Karzai warned, before adding that there was "cooperation between the drug trade and terrorism."

"The question of drugs ... is one that will determine Afghanistan's future ... If we fail [to fight drugs], we will fail as a state eventually and we will fall back in the hands of terrorism."

The US and other countries have pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into counter-narcotics programs, but it's had little impact, sparking warnings Afghanistan is becoming a "narco-state" four years after a US-led invasion ended its role as a haven for al-Qaeda.

Latest violence

In the latest violence, five medical workers were killed on Wednesday as they were returning to Kandahar after treating refugees in a nearby camp, said Abdul Qadir, director of UN and US-sponsored Afghan Help Development Services, which employed the five.

Gunmen opened fire on their vehicle as they drove through the desert. Two of the five dead were doctors. Three other medical workers in the vehicle were wounded.

US warplanes also killed 10 suspected Taliban rebels on Monday in an attack on their mountain hideout in Uruzgan Province.

Six police officers were killed by suspected Taliban who ambushed their convoy in the same area a day later. One officer was still missing and feared dead. Reinforcements were rushed to the area.

Four rockets exploded in Kabul just hours before Rice arrived on Wednesday. One hit a large compound housing the government's intelligence service, but there were no casualties. The other detonated outside the Canadian Ambassador's residence, wounding two guards, one seriously, police said. The other two hit the outskirts of the city.

Fighting also erupted in northern Afghanistan between two rival militia factions, wounding 10 people.

"We are doing everything we can to defeat the terrorists. We cannot simply defend ourselves, we have to be on the offensive," Rice said.

There were hopes that the US military would be able to reduce its troops here next year as a separate NATO-led peacekeeping force takes responsibility.

But Rice said US forces will remain "for as long as they are needed in whatever numbers they are needed to make certain that they defeat the terrorists and Afghanistan becomes a place of stability and progress."
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