An ominous sign for NATO: Afghan security forces in Kabul
flee for their lives during an attempt on the life of President
Hamid Karzai. Is the Northern Alliance behind the attack? …
Novosti, Russia
Who Tried to Kill
Hamid Karzai?
"Now comes the search for the perpetrators
... Conducted by the perpetrators themselves ... "
By Commentator Pyotr Goncharov
Translated By Igor Medvedev
April 29, 2008
Russia
- Novosti - Original Article (Russian)
MOSCOW: Who was behind the April
27 attempt on the life of the President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan,
Hamid Karzai, and what did they have to gain?
There are many possible
answers to this question, as always happens in such cases. But it's clear that
the Taliban could not have mounted such an attempt without the help of
"third parties." It would be naïve to believe otherwise.
The operation in Kabul was
literally copied from the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in
October 1981 
. The script was followed
exactly: the timing - during a military parade; the executors - militants sent
by the regime's irreconcilable opponents. There operation had, however, its own
purely Afghan features.
Just as a military band
started playing the national anthem and soldiers began a 21-gun artillery
salute, those gathered for the ceremony were attacked not only with light
weapons, but with mortars. This from any point of view is quite a shock.
Experts sat that no matter what caliber these mortars were, their appearance in
such a carefully-guarded zone raises doubts about the competence of the
regime's security forces (assuming of course, that they weren't directly
involved). What kind of security is it, when the nation's president is attacked
in broad daylight by mortars and from all sides by small arms - and on
Mujahedin Day, Victory Day for the jihad?!
For clues as to who is
responsible for the assassination attempt, let's recall a little history. In
Kabul on April 27, there is an annual military parade to mark the Mujahedin
victory in 1992 . The current year, the 16th
anniversary of the victorious jihad and fall of Najibullah government coincided
with the 30th anniversary of another major all-Afghan event - the 1978 Saur
Revolution .
The Saur Revolution diverted
Afghanistan onto an unexpected course. It's obscure even now, thirty years
later. Experts still argue about whether it was an absolute detriment or some
good came of it. There are many experts and many opinions. The most common
diagnosis is that Afghan society wasn't ready for the radical reforms that were
proposed by the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan [communist]. These
radical reforms failed to take account, first and foremost, of the traditions
of Islam, which engendered sufficient resistance that ultimately yielded a
civil war.
Five years after the
revolution, the emphasis had shifted from reform to a policy of "national
reconciliation." In 1987, this was the officially declared PDPA line and
after the withdrawal of Soviet troops, Najibullah invited the seven leading
Islamic groups for talks, but "reconciliation" failed.
Najibullah lost power to the
Mujahedin in 1992. It was then that a major civil war broke out. Members of the
seven leading Islamic groups, whose members couldn't settle relations amongst
themselves, razed Kabul to the ground. Then in 1994 a new force emerged on the
politician scene - the Taliban. Far from being without support among a
population tired of war, the Taliban seized Kabul in 1996, and then took hold
of 90 percent of the country. At stake was the future of Afghanistan's as a
sovereign state.
But today, what prevents
Kabul, which appears to represent a consensus among the Afghan political elite,
from ensuring real stability and security in the country?
The Parliamentary opposition
in the person of the United National Front, which for the most part represents
the Northern Alliance, has accused Karzai's government of incompetence in its
conduct of domestic policy. They blame the President and his team with allowing
the very anti-government elements that helped to organize the terrorist attempt
on his life to infiltrate high into his government and security services. In
turn, Karzai strongly condemned several people including [former president]
Burhanuddin Rabbani and [former Karzai defense minister] Marshal
Mohammad Fahim for conducting unauthorized talks with the
Taliban and [former prime minister] Gulbuddin Hekmatyar .
President
Karzai criticized former
president
Rabbani [left] and former
defense
minister Fahim [middle] for
talking
to ex-premier Hekmatyar, who
is
wanted by the U.S. for attempting
to topple the Karzai government.
This is a standard situation
of mutual distrust such as that which existed during the Saur Revolution when
two factions of the ruling [communist] People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan
- Parcham and Khalq - were unable to share power. This is an
ancient disease, and it even seems as though it was it was the unlearned
lessons of history that attacked Karzai at the parade.
Posted by WORLDMEETS.US
While the confrontation
between Karzai and the former Northern Alliance is now fully exposed, Kabul is
trying not to broach the painful issue. Karzai must have many questions for his
national security apparatus in Kabul, staffed largely by ex-members of the
Northern Alliance. How could mortars appear in the capital, which is literally
packed with various offices for domestic and security affairs and where the
appearance of anyone unusual rarely goes unnoticed?
Responsibility
for the attack on the April 27 parade has been claimed by the Islamic Party of
Afghanistan of Gulbuddin Hekmatiyar, although initially the Taliban was blamed.
Since the "discovery" of an additional domestic enemy isn’t within
the scope of the primary scenario of "gradual stabilization," it's
extremely convenient to blame the Taliban for every nasty event. Notably, neither
the Islamic Party of Afghanistan nor the Taliban have renounced responsibility
for the attack. This is due to the usual and immodest desire to claim full
ownership over anything that demonstrates the fact of the government's weakness
and the strength of its opponents. For them, this is the height of prestige.
Now comes the search for the
perpetrators ... Conducted by the perpetrators themselves ...
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[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US May 3, 11:47pm]
