Afghans strongly against Pakistan at Rabbani funeral

[TruthSeeker]

Strong anti-Pakistan sentiment at former Afghan president's funeral

Sally Sara reported this story on Saturday, September 24, 2011 08:06:00

The chairman of Afghanistan's High Peace Council was assassinated earlier this week by a suicide bomber with explosives hidden in his turban.

Police fired shots in the air as Professor Rabbani's supporters threw rocks at government vehicles during the funeral procession.

It's unclear whether the death of the high ranking leader will put an end to the peace process.

Our Afghanistan correspondent Sally Sara reports from Kabul.

SALLY SARA: They came in their thousands to farewell the former Afghan president.

But, there was anger mixed with grief.

Supporters of Burhanuddin Rabbani were in mourning.

(Sounds of chating)

Professor Rabbani was killed earlier this week, when a suicide bomber blew himself up at his home.

The attacker posed as messenger from the Taliban.

Opposition figure, Abdullah Abdullah says president Karzai needs to explain why Professor Rabbani was advised to meet the man.

ABDULLAH ABDULLAH: He has to explain, he has to answer to the people of Afghanistan.

SALLY SARA: President Karzai has condemned the suicide attacker as a murderer. He says Professor Rabbani was eager to listen to the supposed message from the Taliban.

But, he says the messenger betrayed the peace process, Islam and Afghanistan.

Thousands of police and soldiers were deployed for the funeral because of fears of an attack by insurgents.

Streets were blocked and mourners were searched as they made their way up Wazir Akbar Khan Hill to the burial site.

The atmosphere was tense. When the Afghan army sounded a ceremonial gun salute, some journalists and bystanders went running for cover.

(Sound of gun shots)

Critics of the former Afghan president accused him of human rights abuses. But to his followers, he was a respected religious and political leader.

Some of Burhanuddin Rabbani's supporters threw rocks at government vehicles during the procession. Police fired shots into the air to control the crowd.

Student Mohammad Assan, travelled from the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif to attend the ceremony.

MOHAMMAD ASSAN: The young generation are angry that why we can't have more security for the leaders, especially Mujahideen. And Taliban don't accept this action. But our message is for Pakistan: don't annoy Afghan people.

SALLY SARA: The anti-Pakistan sentiment was strong at the funeral. Many mourners believe the assassination of Professor Rabbani was ordered by Pakistan.

The Pakistani government has denied the latest direct US allegations, that it was responsible for previous attacks, including last week's strike on the US Embassy.

When the VIPs and politicians left the funeral in their armoured convoys, the personal body guards of the Professor Rabbani remained to finish the burial.

The bearded men in faded green uniforms tended the grave.

They said goodbye to the latest casualty of the escalating violence in Afghanistan.

This is Sally Sara in Kabul for AM.

AM - Strong anti-Pakistan sentiment at former Afghan president's funeral 24/09/2011

 

[TruthSeeker]

Pakistan and US trade accusations as peace envoy is buried in Kabul

Declan Walsh in Islamabad, Jon Boone in Kabul and Julian Borger
guardian.co.uk, Friday 23 September 2011 15.41 EDT


The bloodstained theatrics of Afghanistan's power game continued to play out as Hamid Karzai's government buried its main peace envoy while Pakistan's army chief hit back at American accusations that his country is secretly supporting the Taliban.

In Kabul, shots rang out over the coffin of Burhanuddin Rabbani, a former president who was assassinated by a suicide bomber on Tuesday, during an emotional and sometimes rowdy funeral on a city hillside.

Angry mourners shouted "death to Karzai" and "death to the ISI", highlighting the growing isolation of the president who appointed Rabbani, and public anger towards the Pakistani spy agency many Afghans blame for his death.

Amrullah Saleh, a former spy chief and rising political star, made a fiery speech to supporters outside the graveyard. "The government doesn't have the right to talk with enemies any more. Nothing will come of so much talking," he said. "Just wait for a call. Very soon we will come to the streets."

Hours later, Pakistan's army chief, General Ashfaq Kayani, denied allegations that he was waging a "proxy war" in Afghanistan through the Haqqani network, a ruthless militant outfit which the US military chief, Admiral Mike Mullen, described as a "veritable arm" of the ISI.

"Admiral Mullen knows fully well which countries are in contact with the Haqqanis. Singling out Pakistan is neither fair nor productive," Kayani said in a terse statement issued 24 hours after Mullen's stinging comments to the US Congress.

Kayani called on the US to stop the "blame game" and "give way to a constructive and meaningful engagement for a stable and peaceful Afghanistan".

Senior American officials have issued an extraordinary series of verbal assaults on the Pakistani military since Haqqani militants carried out an audacious attack on the US embassy in Kabul on 13 September.

Citing phone intercepts, US officials said they had linked fighters at the scene of the 20-hour battle to ISI officials in Pakistan, a senior Pakistani official said.

The US also accuses the ISI of orchestrating a truck bomb attack on a US base near Kabul on 10 September that wounded 77 US soldiers – one of the highest casualty tolls against western forces in the 10-year conflict.

The defence secretary, Leon Panetta, the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and the CIA chief, David Petraeus, have all called on Pakistan to cut its links to the Haqqanis. Pakistan denies the links exist. But it was Mullen's harsh comments on Thursday that sent ripples through political circles in Islamabad, where some worry the frayed relationship is edging towards violent confrontation.

"This is very serious and I'm extremely worried," said Talat Masood, a retired general and veteran commentator. "One side has to pull back or change course. If they continue like this, they are obviously headed for a clash." Some US officials have advocated sending special forces teams into the Haqqani safe haven of Waziristan – a move that could trigger a wider armed conflict between the two countries.

The Pakistani foreign minister, Hina Rabbani Khar, warned that the US could lose Pakistan as an ally. The Obama administration would alienate Pakistan "at their own cost", she warned in unusually strong language.

But some analysts said it could be just another ugly spat. "You're seeing a lot of political theatre matched by bad tempers," said Cyril Almeida of Dawn newspaper. "But I'm not sure that the fundamentals of the relationship, the things that keep them together, have changed."

Critics accuse Pakistan of using proxies to influence Afghanistan's "end game" – a political settlement to end the conflict by the time western combat troops leave in 2014. But the shadow wars are complicated by the presence of other armed groups in the region.

Western intelligence agencies are investigating whether Rabbani was assassinated by al-Qaida to show its continuing power 10 years after the similar assassination of the warlord Ahmad Shah Massoud.

Western analysts are also trying to decipher the Taliban's confused response to the killing, in which one "spokesman" claimed responsibility but others denied it. One working theory is that the Taliban has become so accustomed to claiming credit for attacks carried by other groups that its press apparatus did so reflexively.

The turmoil has left Karzai increasingly isolated. Few members of his government attended Rabbani's funeral while the president himself stayed away, having presided over a low-key state funeral at his heavily guarded palace earlier.

Karzai's powerful half-brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, and a close adviser have been killed in recent months. The death of Rabbani, one of the most important former jihad leaders who fought both the Soviets and the Taliban, has damaged prospects for substantive peace talks and re-opened dangerous divisions in Afghan society not seen since the vicious civil war of the 1990s.

Rabbani's fellow Tajiks, the country's second biggest ethnic group, were already becoming increasingly angry and fearful over Karzai's limited and largely failed efforts to open talks with the Taliban.

Karzai's political rival Abdullah Abdullah, the runner-up in the disputed 2009 presidential election, accused the authorities of trying to silence him when his microphone failed as he tried to make a speech at the funeral. "Be awake and know your enemy," he urged the crowd.

Hopes are fading fast that any political progress can be made at an international conference on Afghanistan in Bonn in December. If the Taliban distances itself from the Rabbani killing, a European diplomat said, it may be possible to salvage some political substance from the meeting.

Failing that, Bonn will revert to being more a donors' meeting and the western strategy in the runup to 2014 would revert to bolstering Afghan security forces, and trying to stimulate internal political reform in the hope it eventually draws in Taliban factions.

"What we've learned is that we can't rely on reconciliation going anywhere," the diplomat said. "There has to be a plan B."

Pakistan and US trade accusations as peace envoy is buried in Kabul | World news | The Guardian

 

[RKhan]

IN all honestly what do you expect. The funeral was of Northern Alliance leader who were at war with the Taliban for 10 years. We should have never supported the Taliban into power.

 

[Developereo]

Afghan people are like people everywhere. They are FED UP of the fighting, terrorism and devastation in their country. Their leaders are unwilling to accept responsibility for their failures of governance. The foreign liberators-turned-occupiers are so deeply immersed in their own arrogance, they can't even begin to understand why the insurgency continues to flourish.

In all this mess, everybody's looking for easy answers and convenient scapegoats. You can't blame the Afghan people for being brainwashed by the dominant media.

 

[Developereo]

A western expert on the Taliban, who did not want to be identified, said [...] ISI [...] Pakistan

 

[Ahmad]

Pakistani analyst has also given in his opinion there.

 

[Developereo]

Pakistani analyst has also given in his opinion there.

Yes, we have plenty of people in Pakistan who feel that parroting anti-Pakistani rhetoric is the chic thing to do. They feel it makes them sound progressive, liberal, intellectual -- basically western -- and sets them apart from the dumb masses.

 

[r3alist]

Yes, we have plenty of people in Pakistan who feel that parroting anti-Pakistani rhetoric is the chic thing to do. They feel it makes them sound progressive, liberal, intellectual -- basically western -- and sets them apart from the dumb masses.

These people are essentially selfish.

 

[SMC]

If the Afghans have one bit of concern for their nation they should unite against these murderous Taliban and their guardians/well-wishers in Rawalpindi instead of being divided on ethnic lines.

These bharatis have absolutely no shame.

Have some shame guys. Accusing others without evidence but attacking others for not providing evidence for their claims. Guys, have at least some shame. Surely you realize you're among the top grade hypocrites in the world.

 

[Drawn_Sword_of_God]

and yet they cross into our country

 

[Emmie]

I see, thats why 3 million Afghani came to Pakistan.