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.
PHOTO: AFP
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."
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not