Afghanistan: Secret files reveal Taliban will retake control when NATO troops withdraw
- Report compiled by U.S. forces claims Pakistan security agency is assisting Taliban attacks against NATO forces
- Afghans bracing for return of Taliban when foreign troops withdraw in 2014
- Taliban detainees claim Pakistan employs network of spies to give strategic advice to militants
- Pakistan Foreign Ministry dismisses claims as ‘frivolous’ and insists it is committed to non-interference in Afghanistan
- 10-year conflict has seen nearly 3,000 service personnel killed
By Wil Longbottom
Last updated at 6:53 PM on 1st February 2012
A secret U.S. military report claims the Taliban, backed by Pakistan, are set to retake control over Afghanistan when NATO-led forces withdraw from the country.
The State of the Taliban report, compiled by U.S. forces, said Pakistan’s powerful security agency – the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) – was assisting the Taliban in directing attacks against foreign forces.
It is a damning assessment of the war, now dragging into its eleventh year and which has already seen nearly 3,000 service personnel killed – 1,846 U.S. and 390 British.
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Poised: A Taliban militant holds a grenade launcher in Herat. A secret U.S. report claims the insurgent movement is poised to regain control of Afghanistan when NATO troops withdraw
Unbowed: The document claims Taliban fighters are being supported by Pakistan intelligence services across the border
The report could heap further pressure on British Prime Minister David Cameron, and U.S. President Barack Obama, as they face strengthened calls to withdraw troops earlier.
It could also reinforce the view of Taliban hardliners that the group should not negotiate peace with the U.S. and President Hamid Karzai’s unpopular government while in a position of strength.
The report, seen by The Times newspaper, said: ‘Though the Taliban suffered severely in 2011, its strength, motivation, funding and tactical proficiency remains intact.
‘Many Afghans are already bracing themselves for an eventual return of the Taliban.’
It was compiled from the interrogation of more than 4,000 Taliban and al Qaeda detainees at Bagram air base in Afghanistan.
Attacks: An explosion after an airstrike in Nanagarhar, Afghanistan. The report, based on interrogation of insurgents, claims Taliban fighters are being given weapons and training by Pakistan-backed militants
Cost: The remains of Private First Class Cody R. Norris arrive at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware. More than ten years after the U.S.-led conflict in Afghanistan, the Taliban are poised to regain control
The detainees have revealed that Pakistan employs a network of spies and go-betweens to give strategic advice to the Taliban, The Times reported.
‘The Government of Pakistan remains intimately involved with the Taliban,’ the report says.
‘ISI is thoroughly aware of Taliban activities and the whereabouts of all senior Taliban personnel.
‘Senior Taliban leaders meet regularly with ISI personnel, who advise on strategy and relay any pertinent concerns of the Government of Pakistan.’
Militant groups on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan provide electronics, explosives and suicide vests to the Taliban, with one detainee claiming: ‘The Taliban are not Islam. The Taliban are Islamabad.’
No confidence: An Afghan border police officer receives his graduation certificate. There are concerns that the police, security forces and Afghan army will not be able to maintain order in the country when NATO forces leave
Unpopular: The Taliban is playing on public opinion of President Hamid Karzai’s government
The allegations have drawn a strong response from the Pakistani Foreign Ministry.
Spokesman Abdul Basit said: ‘This is frivolous, to put it mildly. We are committed to non-interference in Afghanistan.’
Large swathes of Afghanistan have already been handed back to Afghan security forces, with the last foreign combat troops due to leave by the end of 2014.
But many Afghans doubt their army, security forces or police will be able to take firm control of one of the world’s most volatile countries once foreign combat troops leave.
The accusations will likely further strain ties between the West and Islamabad, which has long denied backing militant groups seeking to topple the U.s.-backed government in Kabul.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar is visiting Kabul today on a mission to repair strained diplomatic ties with Afghanistan’s government and to meet Karzai to discuss possible peace talks with the Taliban.
Ties between Pakistan and the U.S. are at a low after a series of setbacks since the raid that Osama bin Laden in May last year and humiliated Pakistan’s powerful generals.
PAKISTAN JETS BOMB HIDEOUTS
Pakistani fighter jets bombed the hideouts of two militant commanders along the Afghan border today, killing up to 31 insurgents.
One of those killed was reported to be a Pakistani Taliban leader in the Orakzai region, Moin ud Din.
The strikes followed clashes between soldiers and militants over a strategic mountain in Kurram last week, in which more than 60 people were killed.
In recent years, the Pakistani military has launched a series of offensives against militants in the border regions – which are only nominally controlled by the central government.
Large areas remain under the effective control of extremists, who use the region to plan attacks in Pakistani cities and Afghanistan.
Gunmen also attacked a Pakistan paramilitary checkpoint in the Marwah area of Baluchistan province last night, killing six troops.
And the bodies of seven unarmed men were discovered near the checkpoint.
A cross-border NATO air strike in November which killed 24 Pakistani soldiers deepened the crisis, prompting Islamabad to suspend supply routes into Afghanistan.
Islamabad has resisted U.S. pressure to after insurgent groups like the Taliban and the Haqqani network, arguing the West overlooks complex realities on the ground.
The Pentagon has long been concerned over perceived ties between elements of the ISI and extremist networks.
Despite the presence of 100,000 foreign troops, violence in Afghanistan is at its worst since the Taliban were ousted by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in 2001, according to the UN.
Earlier this month, the Taliban announced it would open a political office in the Qatari capital Doha to hold peace talks with the U.S.
But there have also efforts to set up talks in Saudi Arabia because Mr Karzai believes his government could be sidelined.
The report also suggests the Taliban has begun moderating its hardline Islamist stance in a bid to win over the Afghan people.
Video: Pakistan’s Foreign Minister in Kabul responds to U.S. military report
Categories: News Tags: 'Nato, Afghanistan, Control, files, retake, Reveal, Secret, Taliban, troops', withdraw
Men who ‘control’ their partners targeted in domestic violence crackdown
By Jack Doyle
Last updated at 9:04 PM on 11th December 2011
Men accused of ‘bullying or abusing’ their wives could face criminal charges under new domestic violence laws.
It could mean prosecution for husbands who treat their wives in a controlling way but do not assault them physically.
The change is being proposed by Liberal Democrat ministers as part of a review of domestic violence to be published this week.
Domestic abuse could be defined in law under Lib Dem plans to be launched this week
Ministers are also likely to confirm plans to criminalise parents who force their children into arranged marriages.
Critics of domestic violence laws point to the lack of an agreed legal definition or specific criminal offence for attacks in the home.
The guidelines could cover anyone exercising ‘coercive control’ over their partner.
This would include demonstrating a pattern of threatening behaviour or emotional abuse.
It could also cover ‘economic control’ and the manipulation of children.
For the first time, the law could make clear that under-18s can be victims of domestic abuse.
A government television campaign has targeted abusive boyfriends amid fears girls are becoming victims in their teenage years and are unable to break the pattern throughout their lives.
The new definition would also cover women who bully their male partners.
Around 5 per cent of men report having been the victims of domestic abuse.
Around one in four women is thought to be a victim of domestic violence. But figures suggest that only one in 15 cases that reach the criminal justice system leads to a conviction.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg is hoping to tighten up the law covering domestic violence to include a new definition with psychological abuse
A government-agreed definition of domestic violence already exists. This describes it as ‘any incident of threatening behaviour, violence or abuse (psychological, physical, sexual financial or emotional) between adults who are or have been intimate partners or family members, regardless of gender or sexuality’.
But ministers fear the police, councils and government agencies are not applying this rigorously enough and will consult on whether there should be a new legal definition and how it should be phrased.
The proposals could, however, raise concerns that the law is being widened to criminalise non-violent behaviour unfairly.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone will launch the proposals on Wednesday.
Earlier this year three police forces began trialling Domestic Violence Prevention Orders, which allow the courts to prevent suspected abusers returning home to their wives or girlfriends for 28 days.
Domestic violence is thought to account for one in five of all crimes of violence committed every year.
A Home Office action plan published in March made 88 recommendations for changes to cut violence against women and girls.
Earlier this year, David Cameron described forced marriage as ‘little more than slavery’. Up to 3,000 British Asians, many of them young and vulnerable, are forced into arranged marriages every year.
Currently the courts can impose Forced Marriage Prevention Orders, which instructs parents and relatives not to take children abroad and make them marry against their will.
Breach of such an order will become a crime.
Separately, ministers are considering a new law allowing women to find out if their boyfriend has a history of violence.
It would allow the police to tell women who ask whether their prospective partner is a danger to them or their children.
The planned legislation is known as Clare’s Law after Clare Wood, 36, who was killed in 2009 by a man she met through Facebook.
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Child of five taken from parents for being obese: Social workers say they didn’t do enough to control weight
- NHS figures show that one in ten children starting primary school is obese
- Experts predict obesity will cost the Health Service up to £6.3billion a year by 2015
By Liz Hull
Last updated at 12:46 AM on 5th December 2011
Warning: Sir Liam Donaldson, the former Chief Medical Office said in 2006 that healthcare chiefs would look at removing children from their families if they became so obese their health was at risk
A five-year-old has become one of the youngest children to be taken into care for being obese, it emerged last night.
Social workers decided the parents were doing too little to bring the youngster’s weight under control.
The child, whose identity is protected by law, had a body mass index of 22.6 – clinically obese for a five-year-old. He or she is thought to have weighed around 4st 4lb – a stone and a half more than average.
The decision was taken by officials at Tameside Council in Greater Manchester.
The local authority has also taken a 14-year-old into care, according to figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
The teenager had a BMI of 30.3, giving a weight of 13 stone – five stone more than average.
Another child was removed by Sunderland council, but officials refused to provide details of their age or weight, claiming it would breach data protection laws.
The Freedom of Information request sent to all local authorities asked how many children, in the past financial year, have been taken into care where obesity was cited as a contributing factor.
The vast majority responded and where care proceedings were instigated, gave general neglect as the reason.
In the previous year, 2009/10, four children were taken into care for obesity reasons: three from the London borough of Lewisham aged three, ten and 15, and an 11-year-old from Northumberland.
Responsibility: Parents should be supported to address their child’s obesity
In September this year, social workers in Dundee provoked outrage by removing four obese children from their parents.
Three girls aged 11, seven and one and a boy of five were placed into care to be ‘fostered without contact’ or adopted.
The most recent NHS figures show that one in ten children starting primary school is obese.
Overweight children are at far higher risk of heart disease, strokes, diabetes, asthma and cancer in later life.
Experts predict that obesity will cost the Health Service up to £6.3billion a year by 2015.
Sir Liam Donaldson, the former Chief Medical Officer, warned in 2006 that healthcare chiefs would look at removing children from their families if they became so obese their health was at risk.
‘Social workers use their professional judgment about how best to keep children from harm’
The first reported case came in 2007 when an eight-year-old girl from West Cumbria was taken into care weighing ten stone.
In 2008, seven children were removed from homes in England. These included a six-year-old boy from Derby, an eight-year-old girl from Cumbria who had to wear size 16 clothes, and children from Lincolnshire, Wolverhampton and Tower Hamlets in London.
A spokesman for the National Obesity Forum said it supported placing obese children into care, but only after everything possible had been done to try to reduce their weight.
‘We sincerely hope that such occasions would be rare…but make the point that this would be the automatic response to a child at the other extreme – severe malnutrition,’ the spokesman said.
A spokesman for Tameside Council said: ‘The point at which obesity turns into a child-protection issue is a complex and difficult area, and in these two cases there were other determining factors that led to the children being placed in local authority care.
‘Parents should be supported to address their child’s obesity, and social workers should only act if parents fail to engage with the proposed plan to improve their child’s safety and wellbeing.’
David Simmonds, of the Local Government Association’s children and young people board, said: ‘Social workers use their professional judgment about how best to keep children from harm.’
Categories: News Tags: being, child, Control, didn't, enough, five, from, obese, parents, social, Taken, they, Weight, workers
Riots would not have spread across the UK if London had been brought under control sooner, says police chief
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 10:26 AM on 14th November 2011
Peter Fahy: The Manchester chief constable boss says that lax policing in London allowed the riots to spread
August’s riots would not have spread beyond London if they had been swiftly dealt with by authorities in the capital, according to Manchester’s police chief.
Peter Fahy, chief constable of Greater Manchester Police, claimed trouble would not have spread north if rioters in London hadn’t been ‘getting away with it’.
He believes trouble in his area was caused by ‘copycat’ opportunists who had seen coverage of rioters running amok in the capital.
Mr Fahy told BBC’s Panorama: ‘A certain group of people saw what was happening in London and decided they seemed to be getting away with it, and the authorities weren’t in control, and they decided that they wanted their opportunity.
‘We knew what was absolutely critical, there needed to be control of London because that was creating more and more copycat violence up here.’
Mr Fahy added: ‘With hindsight, if London had been under control sooner, we probably would not have faced the problems in Manchester’.
The Metropolitan Police were criticised for their response to disorder in London in August, which later led to a row over an order allegedly given by Home Secretary Theresa May to cancel all police leave to deal with the riots.
Top policeman Sir Hugh Orde issued a statement saying it was the police service, and not MPs, who devised the ‘more robust’ approach that restored calm.
London: It was widely perceived that police were standing by rather than intervening during August’s riots
A preliminary report by the force into its own response to the rioting found that too few officers were deployed on the streets during the first three nights of rioting.
Mr Fahy’s remarks sparked an immediate defence of the actions of the Met by Paul McKeever, chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales.
‘I think any police force in the world would have found it extremely difficult to cope with the rapidly escalating violence that we experienced in London,’ he said.
‘The officers in London did a magnificent job, putting their lives on the line to protect their communities.
‘I don’t think anybody expected to see the disorder escalate so rapidly and become so widespread.’
Manchester: The city suffered ‘copycat’ looting after unrest in the capital
Manchester Police have arrested more than 350 people in connection with the riots.
Mr Fahy told the programme the force is still tracking down hundreds of suspects from at least 300 crime scenes.
Scotland Yard refused to comment on Mr Fahy’s remarks but drew attention to early findings published last month from the Metropolitan Police’s ongoing review into its policing of the riots.
These concluded that there were not enough officers available on the first night of the riots, and reinforcements took too long to arrive.
When the riots hit London, Manchester sent 100 public order officers to help.
Mr Fahy said that while this had left his own force short he had no regrets about the decision.
Policing minister Nick Herbert said that there was a public perception that police appeared to be standing back, but that they were in fact ensuring that it was safe to intervene rather than risk further injury or damage.
‘I think it is common ground that we want the police, and they themselves want, to be able to deal with these situations very swiftly and to ensure that there is a rapid response if anything like this happens again,’ he said.
Mr Fahy’s comments were made in a Panorama programme to be broadcast on BBC One tonight examining the day the riots reached the streets of Manchester. The programme marks 100 days this week since the disturbances began.
