War News for Thursday, May 10, 2012

Afghan Refugee Children Perish in Harsh Winter


Reported security incidents
#1: A wounded Huntsville solider is on his way home from Afghanistan and you can show your support for him this week. Sgt. Colin Erwin is with the 203rd MP Alabama Army National Guard. He was working as a contractor supporting the Army when the gym he was in took a direct hit from mortar fire. Sgt. Erwin's mother said her son suffered injuries to the torso and right leg.

#2: A double bomb attack has injured nine people in Pakistan's northwestern town of Akora Khattak. Officials said police and journalists were among the injured in the twin blasts on May 9 at the tomb of a Pashtun nationalist leader, Ajmal Khattak. Officials said that after a first bomb went off, a second explosion hit police and journalists who had gone to the scene. Officials said five policemen and four local journalists were among the wounded.
#3: Three policemen and four militants were killed Thursday morning when militants launched an attack on police checkpoints in YahyaKhil district of eastern Paktika province, a provincial police source said. "Four militants armed with suicide vests and weapons stormed police checkpoints around the Yahyakhil administrative district office building at about 8 a.m. local time Thursday and the attackers intended to target the compound," provincial police chief Daulat Khan told Xinhua. He said all attackers were killed as police repelled the attack and no government employees or civilians were injured during the fight near the compound.

#4: At least four policemen were injured when a blast hit their vehicle in Pakistan's southwest city of Quetta on Thursday morning, reported local Urdu TV channel Dunya.

At least one policeman was killed and three others were injured when a bomb hit their vehicle in Pakistan's southwest city of Quetta on Thursday morning, reported local Urdu TV channel Dunya. The attack took place at about 10:00 a.m. local time when a roadside bomb hit a police vehicle patrolling on the Qambrani Road of Quetta, capital city of Balochistan province in southwest Pakistan, injuring four policemen on the spot, local media reported.


DoD: Sgt. Jacob M. Schwallie

DoD:  Spc. Chase S. Marta

DoD: Pfc. Dustin D. Gross

War News for Wednesday, May 09, 2012

Separately, Afghan President Hamid Karzai spoke on the phone Tuesday to relatives of civilians killed in Nato airstrikes that he says run the risk of turning the recently signed US-Afghan partnership agreement into a “meaningless” document.

Pakistan army says US scapegoating

Military operation in North Waziristan imminent

IEDs targeting Pakistan

Bomber in Plot on U.S. Airliner Is Said to Be a Double Agent

Nuclear Inspector Dies in Iran Crash

Reported security incidents
#1: Five police officers were killed after their patrol vehicle hit a roadside bomb in the Khak-e Sefid district in the western province of Farah late Tuesday, Ghulam Gawas Malayar, the deputy provincial police chief told Press TV. Another policeman was wounded in the incident, he said.

#2: Separately, a roadside bomb followed by a gun attack injured a provincial education director and killed four Education Ministry employees as well as a bodyguard in the eastern Paktika province. Two other Afghan police officers also were killed in an ambush by Taliban militants in a bazaar near the city of Pul-e-Alam in the eastern Logar province on Tuesday.

#3: Din Mohammad Darwesh, a spokesman for the governor of Logar province in the east, says two policemen were killed Tuesday when Taliban militants ambushed them in a bazaar near the provincial capital of Pul-e-Alam.

#4:  In the meantime an Afghan intelligence official was killed by Taliban militants at Qalat city in eastern Zabul province. A spokesman for the Taliban group Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said Habibullah Afghan NDS official was killed by Taliban fighters.

#5: According to local security officials in eastern Paktika province, two Afghan national army soldiers were injured following roadside bomb explosion in this province. A spokesman for 203 Thunder Afghan army brigade said the incident took place between Orgun and central Sharana city.

DoD: Staff Sgt. Thomas K. Fogarty

DoD: 2nd Lt. David E. Rylander

DoD: Spc. Junot M. L. Cochilus

War News for Tuesday, May 08, 2012

NATO is reporting the deaths of three ISAF soldiers from an IED blast in an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, May 7th.


Reported security incidents
#1: Afghan soldiers and NATO - led coalition troops eliminated 22 Taliban militants in an operation in the country's eastern Paktika province Monday night, an Afghan army spokesman said Tuesday. "Afghan National Army (ANA) backed by coalition forces raided a Taliban hiding place in Nike district Monday night, killing 22 armed militants, "army spokesman Ajmal Zhwak said. He said no security force member was injured in the operation in the province, 155 km south of capital Kabul.


#2: Hamid Shakil says two men on a motorcycle opened fire on Shah Nawaz Khan on Tuesday outside his house in Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province. Khan was deputy head of Baluchistan's Crimes Investigation Department, which works exclusively on cases dealing with terrorism and sectarian violence.

#3: Meanwhile, NATO is still investigating reports of an airstrike in Bala Murghab district of northwestern Badghis province that allegedly killed 14 civilians last Sunday.

#4: According to Afghan defense ministry officials at least 2 Afghan national army soldiers were killed following two separate incidents during the past 24 hours. The officials further added one of the Afghan national army soldier was killed following a roadside bomb explosion at Mohammad Agha district in eastern Logar province and the second soldier was killed at Syedabad district in central-eastern Maidan Wardak province.

#5: In the meantime Afghan interior ministry officials announced Afghan national police forces killed 8 Taliban militants and detained 5 others during joint military operations. Afghan interior ministry officials also added the militants were killed and detained in 4 separate military operations conducted by Afghan police, Afghan army, Afghan intelligence and coalition security forces. The operations were conducted at Kabul, Zabul and Paktia provinces of Afghanistan. Anti-government armed militant groups yet to comment regarding the operations.


DoD: Master Sgt. Gregory L. Childs

DoD: Sgt. John P. Huling

War News for Monday, May 07, 2012

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from an IED blast in an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, May 6th. This is an update to the release of three ISAF soldiers killed.

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from small arms fire/gunshot wounds from an ANA soldier in an undisclosed location in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, May 6th. News reports that another soldier was wounded in the attack.

Afghan flood kills 27 people at wedding, hundreds missing

Yemeni officials: Al-Qaida fighters kill 20 troops

US secretly released prisoners in Afghanistan: Report

Afghan consulate deemed unsafe   


Reported security incidents
#1: The Pakistani army says militants have ambushed a security checkpoint in a region close to the border with Afghanistan, killing nine soldiers. The army says the attack took place Sunday in Miran Shah town in North Waziristan, a militant sanctuary frequently targeted by American drones.

The Taliban beheaded two security personnel and hung their heads on wooden poles on Monday in North Waziristan tribal region of Pakistan, where nine soldiers were killed in a clash with the militants. A Pakistani Taliban commander claimed the militants captured the two security personnel last night while troops were conducting a raid in Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan Agency. The raid was conducted after nine soldiers and at least three militants were killed in a clash near Miranshah. The clash erupted after militants ambushed a security forces convoy in the area.

#2: Four Taliban militants have been killed after hours of gunfight with Afghan police forces in Afghanistan's eastern province of Paktia, Press TV reports. The incident occurred when a group of Taliban militants armed with weapons targeted a number of governmental buildings in the city of Sharan, the provincial capital of Paktika on Sunday night, Paktia governor Mohebollah Samim said. The militants seized a building at 7:00 p.m, and from there targeted Pakita governor office, police center and the intelligence office. The fighting ended early Monday after all Taliban fighters were killed in the gun battle. A civilian was also injured in the violence.

#3: In a separate incident, a least one driver was killed and three other people injured when Taliban attacked a line of trucks carrying goods for NATO-led force in northern Baghlan province at early Sunday morning, a provincial security official who declined to be named said. Three vehicles were also damaged after Taliban fired rocket propelled grenade on the convoy along a highway in Dushi District in the province 160 km north of Kabul, he said.

#4: Six civilians were killed as aircrafts of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) targeted a suspected hideout of Taliban militants in Sangin district of Helmand province, 555 km south of Afghan capital Kabul on Friday, a statement of Helmand provincial administration released on Monday said. "Taliban militants opened fire on the checkpoints of Civil Order Police and ISAF on Friday and in retaliation the NATO-led ISAF aircrafts carried out air raids against the suspected hideout of the insurgents but unfortunately six innocent civilians were martyred," the statement added. The victims, according to the statement, include two boys, three girls and a woman, all from same family. ISAF has also confirmed the incident and apologized for the mistake, promising to help with the remaining members of the ill- fated family.

#5: At least four Taliban militants were killed Sunday in a clash in the western Afghan province of Farah, authorities said. "A group of armed militants launched an attack in the wee hour of Sunday morning on Afghan National Police (ANP) check posts along a main roadway in Bakwa district and the ANP repelled the attack killing four armed Taliban militants," deputy provincial police chief Mohammad Ghaus Malyar told Xinhua. He said several rebels fled the area following the retaliation attack and that no members of ANP were injured in the incident.


MoD: Corporal Andrew Steven Roberts

MoD: Private Ratu Manasa Silibaravi

News of the Day for Sunday, May 6, 2012

Update: Three NATO troops killed by bomb in eastern Afghanistan. No further information at this time.

Taliban attack an Afghan army checkpoint in Farah Province, four insurgents are killed in return fire.

Three boys are injured in a small arms attack on a school in Ghazni province. More than 100 schools in the province have closed after receiving threats. President Karzai denounced the attacks on schools on Saturday.

The in-laws of Sahar Gul, a 15 year old girl who they tortured for refusing to work as a prostitute, are sentenced to 10 years in prison. Women's rights groups assail the sentence as too lenient.

No big surprise, Iranian Foreign Minister Ramin Mehmanparast is unhappy about the strategic agreement that will keep U.S. troops in Afghanistan through 2024. Rather mysterious, is it not, that this is portrayed in the U.S. as a timeline for withdrawal? -- C

Afghanistan's members of parliament Saturday criticised a provision within the US-Afghan long-term agreement which does not allow Afghanistan to change its system of government. Seriously -- the pact apparently forbids Afghanistan from amending its constitution for a decade.

Separate roadside bomb explosions in Zabul kill 2 civilians, injure 2 others.

Thirteen Afghan government employees are arrested on corruption charges by the Attorney General's office. It remains to be seen, however, whether any of them will be successfully prosecuted:

A spokesman for the Afghan finance ministry Wahid Tawhidi said the detained individuals are charged with fraudulent acts and their cases had been forwarded to Attorney General a year back. Officials at the Afghan Attorney General said the legal cases of the detained individuals will be forwarded to judiciary institutions within the next 2 weeks. In the meantime Afghan finance ministry officials said the detained individuals can resume to their duties if the charges against them were not proven.

Chief of Policy in the president's office, Sebghatullah Sanjar, is killed in an apparent traffic accident after colliding with a military vehicle. The incident is under investigation. 

Broken record department: Pakistan has condemned in the strongest terms the U.S. drone attacks in North Waziristan Saturday morning, which killed at least 10 people, the Foreign Ministry said. 

Eugene Robinson is also confused by the U.S. policy in Afghanistan:

The Taliban government was deposed and routed. Al-Qaeda was first dislodged and then decimated, with “over 20 of their top 30 leaders” killed, according to the president. Osama bin Laden was tracked to his lair in Pakistan, shot dead and buried at sea. To the extent that al-Qaeda still poses a threat, it comes from affiliate organizations in places such as Yemen and from the spread of poisonous jihadist ideology. Al-­Qaeda’s once-­extensive training camps in Afghanistan have long been obliterated and the group’s presence in the country is minimal.

That smells like victory to me. Yet 94 American troops have lost their lives in Afghanistan so far in 2012, U.S. forces still will be engaged in combat until the end of 2014, and we are committed to an extraordinary — and expensive — level of involvement there until 2024. Why?

War News for Saturday, May 05, 2012

MoD: Two RLC soldiers killed in Afghanistan


Reported security incidents
#1: An American drone fired a volley of missiles into a house close to the Afghan border on Saturday, killing eight suspected militants and indicating U.S. resolve to continue with the attacks despite renewed Pakistani opposition, officials said. The strike in North Waziristan was the second American drone operation in Pakistan this week. Up to eight missiles were fired at a house in the Dra Nishtar area of North Waziristan early Saturday, Pakistani intelligence officials said. They didn't give their names because they were not authorized to be named in the media.

#2: At least five border police forces have been killed in a roadside bomb attack in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Nangarhar, Press TV reports. The incident occurred when an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) hit an Afghan police patrol near the border in Dur Baba district in Nangarhar province on Friday, killing five police officers, Nangarhar governor spokesman Ahmad Zia told Press TV correspondent on Saturday. The police patrol was also destroyed in the violent blast.
#3: Three special forces soldiers (Australian) have been wounded, two seriously, by a bomb in Afghanistan. The Defence Force says the soldiers were wounded when an improvised explosive device (IED) detonated near them during a mission in the northern Helmand province two days ago.

#4: Afghan police backed by NATO-led troops have killed 36 armed militants and captured 28 others over the past 24 hours, Interior Ministry said Saturday. "Afghan National Police, Afghan National Army and Coalition Forces launched eight joint operations in Kunduz, Helmand, Ghazni, Khost and Farah provinces over the past 24 hours during which 36 armed insurgents have been killed, three wounded and 28 others arrested," the statement added. However, it did not say if there were any casualties on security forces.

#5: At least 1 Afghan national army soldier was killed and 2 others were injured following roadside bomb explosion, Afghan defense officials said. According to a press release issued by the Afghan Defense Ministry an Afghan army soldier was killed following improvised explosive device explosion at Greshk district of southern Helmand province. The source further added two other soldiers were injured in Uruzgan and Logar provinces of Afghanistan.


DoD: Staff Sgt. Zachary H. Hargrove

War News for Friday, May 04, 2012

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from non-combat related injuries in an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday, May 3rd.

NATO is reporting the deaths of two ISAF soldiers from an insurgent attack in an undisclosed location in southern Afghanistan on Friday, May 4th.


Countries agree on $1.9bn Afghan refugee strategy

Clashes in Turkey kill 3 soldiers, 2 PKK militants

Double Blast in Volatile Russian Region Kills 13

US soldier dies of rabies after dog bite in Afghanistan - A 24-year-old American soldier died of rabies after being bitten by a dog last year in Afghanistan, US health officials said Thursday following an investigation into the rare case.


Reported security incidents
#1: An official of the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) was killed during a militant attack in the western province of Ghor in Afghanistan on Thursday. Mohiuddin was killed when the Taliban stormed the BRAC office in Chaghcharan, the provincial capital, just before dawn, acting police chief, Col. Murtaza Musleh, told Pajhwok Afghan News. Another Bangladeshi managed to flee the scene, he said, adding a wounded attacker was arrested after the incident. The detainee told police five insurgents, involved in the attack, wanted to kidnap the Bangladeshis. The militants sought to swap the foreigners for their detained associates, according to escapee, Samiul Haq, who said: "The office head was killed on the spot, but I succeeded in fleeing soon after the assailants entered the building." He added an Afghan worker of the organisation, who was sharing the room with the office head, escaped unhurt in the assault.

#2: A suicide bomber has killed at least 19 people and injured more than 50 others in an attack on a security checkpoint in northwest Pakistan. Officials say the bomber struck on May 4 near a crowded market in Khar, regional capital of the Bajaur tribal district, on the border with Afghanistan. The dead are reported to include two senior officers of the Bajaur Levies, a tribal police force in the remote region. At least five other policemen were also killed. Schoolchildren and other civilians were among the dead and injured.
#3: A total of 11 Taliban militants were killed over night when the NATO-led forces launched an air attack in Gereshk district of southern Helmand province, a police source said on Friday. "Eleven Taliban rebels were killed after they were spotted with weapons in Hous-e-Khoshk area of Gereshk district Thursday night," a police official and head of the coordination center of joint forces in the province, Muhammad Ismail Hotak, told Xinhua. He said the armed militants intended to launch attacks on security check posts in the area and the police forces called in an air support killing the entire attackers on the spot.

#4: Meantime, Hotak also confirmed that Taliban militants launched armed attacks in Naw Zad, Musa Qala and Sangin districts Thursday night but Afghan police and army soldiers repelled the attacks and causing no casualties on side of security forces. However, a Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi told local media that the insurgent fighters launched massive coordinated attacks across the Helmand province killing several Afghan and foreign troops.

#5: Separately, nine Taliban insurgents were killed in eastern Afghan provinces when Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) launched cleanup operations in the region within 24 hours ended on May 3, the ISAF's Regional Command East said in a statement on Friday morning. Operations in Regional Command East are still ongoing, the statement added.

#6: Afghan Intelligence, National Directorate for Security officials on Thursday said Afghan security forces foiled a deadly suicide bomb blast in capital Kabul. The officials further added the militants were looking to carry out suicide bomb blast using a truck laden with explosives. An Afghan NDS officials speaking on the condition of anonymity said a Pakistani militant wanted to detonate a truck packed with explosives in Kabul-Jalalabad road.