KABUL, Jan 2: An advance party of senior officials from 17 countries contributing to a peacekeeping force in Afghanistan arrived in Kabul early on Wednesday, a British official said.
The advance party, including between 20 and 30 officials from 17 countries, arrived at Kabul International Airport before dawn.
The advance party will prepare for the arrival of the 4,500-strong International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), which will operate under the command of Britain’s Major General John McColl.
British military sources said the foreign troops would eventually be housed in five bases located to the north and east of central Kabul, including the old Afghan army officers’ club near the US embassy complex.
British embassy spokesman Paul Sykes said on Tuesday that the reconnaissance party would be transported to the new headquarters at the old officers’ club before being briefed on local conditions.
They will also be taken on an orientation tour of Kabul before they begin assessing what contribution their respective countries can make to the ISAF.
French military sources also said that 260 French troops currently in Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan, would arrive in Kabul soon.
Sections of the ISAF force — whose activities will be confined to Kabul for the foreseeable future — will be based on two strategic roads.
One leads to the former Soviet airbase at Bagram, 50 kilometres north of Kabul, and the other contingent will be based along the road leading to Jalalabad.
Peacekeeping troops will also occupy two sites at Kabul International Airport — the former civilian terminal and a strategic position near the aircraft taxi-way adjacent to the main tarmac.
The peacekeeping force is expected to patrol Kabul alongside Afghan counterparts, but will retain a separate chain of command under Major General McColl.
KARZAI BACKS US ACTION: Afghan interim leader Hamid Karzai was quoted on Wednesday as saying he wanted US military activity in Afghanistan to continue until terrorism was stamped out, but that he was worried about the growing number of civilian casualties.
“We want to finish terrorists in Afghanistan — we want to finish them completely ... But we must also make sure our civilians do not suffer,” the New York Times quoted Karzai as saying.
The new Afghan leader said he planned to discuss the issue of civilian deaths due to U.S. military bombing with American officials this week, it added.
Karzai said he backed the U.S. military campaign, as well as the British-led peacekeeping force that is to patrol Kabul, the newspaper reported. Karzai said that he and many Afghans wanted peacekeepers to work throughout the country, the newspaper said.
Karzai’s interview with the paper came on the heels of reports that US warplanes killed more than 100 people in a weekend raid in eastern Afghanistan.
The Afghan defence ministry, headed by Mohammad Fahim, has said the bombings should end as soon as possible. Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said on Sunday the campaign will go on “for as long as it takes to finish the terrorists”.
Karzai said he is planning to discuss the weekend U.S. bombing with elders from the affected part of the country, and has sent a helicopter to bring them to Kabul.
The newspaper quoted Karzai as saying that, while he supported actions against Taliban leadership, low-level Taliban, or “common people” recruited by force, would be released from prisons. “The bad guys” and foreigners who fought with the Taliban would stay in jail, he added.
Karzai said that lawlessness on the country’s highways made it hard to import goods and deliver aid, the newspaper said. He has raised concerns about Northern Alliance behaviour toward Pakhtoon leaders on their way to Kabul, including the theft of cars, with Yunus Qanooni, the interior minister, it added.
Economic issues are paramount, and healing Afghanistan’s shattered economy is “as important as security”, the newspaper quoted Karzai as saying. The new government is working to establish a customs system and a currency policy, and choose a central bank head, he said. “That is a priority area,” the paper quoted him as saying.—AFP / Reuters
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