"You" Are Corrupt, "We" Just Misplace Things (Like Top-Secret Laptops)0

Update: U.S. officials looking into irregularities in the early portion of the $125 billion U.S.-led effort to rebuild Iraq have expanded the inquiry to include senior U.S. military officers who oversaw the program....Officials told the [New York] Times several criminal cases in recent years pointed to widespread corruption within the operation run by the men being investigated."


Amidst the growing Washington campaign against Afghan President Hamid Karzai over corruption, you can classify this story from Thursday under I for Irony:

The Pentagon has lost track of some 87,000 weapons handed out without proper accounting to Afghan army and police units, federal investigators reported today. The weapons included rifles, pistols, machine guns, grenade launchers, shotguns, mortars and other weapons, the Government Accountability Office said.

OK, maybe you can pin that one of the Afghans as well: just can't trust the locals, can you? (N.B. Surprisingly, nowhere in the story do the words "black market" occur.) It's harder, however, to pass the blame in this incident in Peshawar, Pakistan, reported by Shahan Mufti of GlobalPost:

I was recently able to purchase a U.S. military laptop for $650 from a small kiosk, which is known as the “Sitara Market,” on the western edge of the sprawling open-air markets on the edge of Peshawar. The laptop, which has clear U.S. military markings and serial numbers, contained restricted U.S. military information, as well as software for military platforms, the identities of numerous military personnel and information about weaknesses and flaws in American military vehicles being employed in the war in Afghanistan.

Longtime observers of the region and military experts say the open market on U.S. military hardware and technology is increasingly compromising the American military supply route that runs from the Pakistani seaport in Karachi through the Khyber Pass and into neighboring Afghanistan.

"This kind of trade has been happening in the past, but not so openly," said Rahimullah Yusufzai, a Peshawar-based journalist who has reported from Afghanistan and Pakistan for several decades. "In the past few months this has started in a big way," he added.

(Hat-tip to reader Beth)

One to Watch: Secret Talks in Afghanistan with the Taliban

Amidst the attention to the possible US military "surge" in Afghanistan, we've been keeping a close eye on an alternative strategy, namely, talks with "moderate Taliban". High-ranking officials in Pakistan have long favoured such a strategy, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has been vocal recently in advocating such discussions.

The twist in the excellent article below by Kim Sengupta of The Independent is the detail of Saudi Arabia, notably the head of Saudi intelligence Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (pictured), in setting up these secret negotiations. Conversely, there is little sign of Pakistani involvement, probably of the great pressure from Washington for Islamabad to show a tough line against the Taliban as well as its own insurgents.

Secret talks with Taliban gather pace as surge looms: Saudis warn Washington that offensive may hinder talks with militant group
By Kim Sengupta

Secret talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban, brokered by a Saudi royal who heads the country's intelligence service, are gathering pace before the US-led military surge in Afghanistan.

Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz Al Saud is said to have been greatly encouraged by meetings he had held with both sides on recent visits to Afghanistan and Pakistan, paving the way for a fresh round of negotiations, The Independent has learnt.

The militant groups have appointed a former member of the Taliban regime as their envoy because of his good relations in the past with the Saudi government. He is Aghajan Mutasim, a minister under the ousted Taliban leader Mullah Omar, who is believed to have held detailed discussions with Saudi officials and also to have visited the kingdom during Ramadan.

The Afghan President Hamid Karzai, uncertain of US support in the forthcoming national elections, is said to be prepared for direct dialogue with the insurgent leadership. Officials close to him claim there is also growing concern that the US military offensive, with its prospect of a rising toll of civilian casualties, would hinder prospect of a peace deal.

Abdul Hakim Mujahid, a former Taliban envoy in New York at the time of 9/11, was invited by Mr Karzai to return to Afghanistan and help organise the reconciliation process. In 2001 he conveyed the Bush administration's demands to Mullah Omar, that Osama bin Laden should be handed over. He was among those, including Mr Karzai's older brother Qayum, who took part in a meeting with representatives of the insurgents organised in Mecca last September by the Saudi King Abdullah.

Mr Mujahid said: "Prince Muqrin is an influential man and so his involvement in the negotiation process is very important. The talks he held here in Kabul were at the top level and the armed opposition groups on the other side also respect him. The appointment of Aghajan Mutasim by the resistance is also important because he had very good relations with the Saudis and also because it shows that some of the armed resistance is taking this seriously.

"The Saudi government is doing its best to get peace talks going but there may be big problems if the Americans carry out this big offensive in the wrong way. That kind of action will lead to anger and help those in the Taliban who do not believe in any kind of negotiations. So it is important that we start doing things before this offensive starts and the international community should try to persuade the US that there should be less military action and not more."

Mr Karzai has repeatedly complained that Afghan civilians have been wounded and killed in Nato air strikes. He recently sent a document to Nato outlining new "rules of engagement" which Nato officials say are "totally impractical" as they would directly interfere with the mandate for foreign forces in the country.

Diplomatic sources say Mr Karzai's recent pronouncements on welcoming back insurgents into the fold show his need to show he is a nationalist standing up to the West. He told the Afghan parliament last week: "Once again I call on all oppositions to return home without any fear, save the life of children and help rebuild their country."

Facing each other: The negotiators

Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz Al Saud

Given the post of the head of Saudi intelligence service with the task of combating jihadist groups which had declared war on the kingdom. He played a part in establishing a reconciliation process under which a number of Saudis arrested on terrorism charges were rehabilitated. He also knew Osama bin Laden well and encouraged him to join the jihad against the Russians in
Afghanistan where the Yemeni-born Saudi set up al-Qa'ida. Although the Saudi government fell out with Bin Laden it has maintained contacts with militants and Prince Muqrin is said to have used these links to try to broker peace with the Afghan government.

Aghajan Mutasim

Became finance minister under the Taliban and, in that capacity, had extensive dealings with the Saudis who were bankrolling the Islamist regime. After the fall of the Taliban in 2001 and the battle of Tora Bora which saw Osama bin Laden and leading Taliban leaders escape to Pakistan, Mr Mutasim issued a statement saying: "We want to tell the people that the Taliban system is no more. They should not give donations in the name of the Taliban." Since then he had been living in Pakistan keeping a low profile before emerging recently as a key negotiator in the recent talks organised by the Saudis with whom he had maintained contacts through the years.

Mr Obama's World: The Latest in US Foreign Policy (14 February)

Related Post: “You” Are Corrupt, “We” Just Misplace Things (Like Top-Secret Laptops)
Related Post: Tarnished by the Black Water of Violence, Abuse, Murder? Change Your Brand Name….
Related Post: The “New Iraq”, Up Close and Ugly: A Report from Fallujah

Current Obamameter Reading: Settled with Distant Turbulence



7:15 p.m. What happened in today's meeting between US envoy Richard Holbrooke and Afghan President Hamid Karzai?

No, really, what happened?

2:15 p.m. How to Miss a Story. Reuters declares, "Lavrov welcomes U.S. signals on missile shield". Which is true, as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, "It's not too late [to discuss the American deployment in Eastern Europe. We could sit down at the negotiating table and evaluate the situation."

The wider story, however, is Washington's attempt to link discussions on missile defence to a changed Russian position on support for Iran's nuclear programme. And Lavrov made no indication that Moscow would make such a connection.

11 a.m. Thousands of people have gathered in Martyrs' Square in Beirut to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri.

8 a.m. GMT: Just in case you missed it late night, we've passed on the helpful warning in Human Events that "Iran is Taking Over America".

Morning Update (7:15 a.m. GMT; 2:15 a.m. Washington): Two days after US envoy Richard Holbrooke left Pakistan and amidst public confirmation that the US is using bases within the country for its missile strikes (more on that later), news is coming in of an aerial attack which has killed 25 people in South Waziristan. The US military is claiming the dead were "Al Qa'eda-linked" militants.

Diplomatic headlines are still taken up by the outline of US policy on North Korea by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Speaking on Friday before her departure to East Asia, she laid out the "unclenched fist" formula which is already being applied to Iran:

If North Korea is genuinely prepared to completely and verifiably eliminate their nuclear weapons program, the Obama administration will be willing to normalize bilateral relations, replace the peninsula's long-standing armistice agreements with a permanent peace treaty and assist in meeting the energy and other economic needs of the North Korean people.

Clinton then added the warning to Pyongyang "to avoid any provocative action or unhelpful rhetoric toward South Korea".

Clinton also restated the Obama Administration's line on China: no need for tension over economic matters but the US would continue to raise the issues of the environment and human rights.

What Israel Lost in Gaza: Talks with Syria, A Relationship with Turkey?

To my knowledge, this story from Ha'aretz on Friday has received little notice outside Israel:

Israel and Syria were about to announce that they would speak directly a week before the fighting in Gaza broke out, a Turkish official said. Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan had spoken with Syrian President Bashar Assad (pictured) during Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's visit to Ankara, and had mediated in crafting a joint statement.

But a few days later, while still awaiting Olmert's approval for the statement, Israel launched Operation Cast Lead in Gaza and Erdogan felt betrayed.

Now it could well be that Turkey is playing up the story to cover Erdogan's very public denunciation of Israeli actions. And it may be the case that, after making political calculations, Damascus will decide that the benefits of coming back to the negotiating table with Israel outweigh or even balance its backing of Hamas. As my colleague Ali Yenidunya has argued, there may be no long-term cost to the Israeli-Turkish alliance.

For the moment, however, let's note that the Israeli Government was so driven to take action in Gaza that it was willing to risk a peace process to ease tensions on its northern border and a strategic relationship with Ankara. It will be some time before we know what motives lay behind this gamble --- regime change? a strike at Hamas as a strike against Tehran? a grand scheme in collusion with the Palestinian Authority, Egypt, and, possibly, Saudi Arabia? Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's attempt to wipe away the stain of Lebanon 2006?

It is almost definite, however, that given the stakes involved, Operation Cast Lead was never just a response to rocket fire.B

Tarnished by the Black Water of Violence, Abuse, Murder? Change Your Brand Name....

Update: A reader directs us to a longer version of the article in The Salt Lake Tribune, in which Blackwater President Gary Jackson tells employees that the name change reflects the company's move from private security to training and logistics: "The volume of changes over the past half-year have taken the company to an exciting place and we are now ready for two of the final, and most obvious changes."

We offer no further comment on a story that speaks for itself. From The New York Times:

Blackwater Changes Its Name to Xe
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

RALEIGH, N.C. — Blackwater Worldwide is abandoning the brand name that has been tarnished by its work in Iraq, settling on Xe (pronounced zee) as the new name for its family of two dozen businesses.

Blackwater Lodge and Training Center, the subsidiary that conducts much of the company’s overseas operations and domestic training, has been renamed U.S. Training Center Inc., the company said Friday.

The company’s rebranding effort grew more urgent after Blackwater guards in Baghdad were involved in a shooting episode in September 2007 that left 17 Iraqi civilians dead.

Blackwater’s president, Gary Jackson, said in a memo to employees that the new name reflected the company’s shift away from providing private security. He has said the company is going to focus on training.

Last month, Iraqi leaders said they would not renew Blackwater’s license to operate in Iraq; the State Department said later that it would not renew Blackwater’s contract to protect diplomats when it expired in May.

A Blackwater spokeswoman, Anne Tyrrell, acknowledged the need to shake the company’s past in Iraq. “Certainly that is an aspect of our work that we feel we were defined by,” she said.