Continuing occupation fuels public resentment

Sayed Karim, Foreign Correspondent

• Last Updated: July 06. 2009 12:06AM UAE / July 5. 2009 8:06PM GMT

US soldiers check a vehicle during a patrol in Logar province, where there is growing resentment at the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan. Ahmad Masood / Reuters

BARAKI BARAK DISTRICT, LOGAR PROVINCE // The audience listened quietly as a young man stood and sang in a beautiful, pitch-perfect voice without any musical accompaniment.

“O wind, go to Mohammed and take him this news,” he recited. “The criminals have destroyed the pure white law of Sharia. They have taken away the love. O my friends, look at the English people with anger.”

Here in Logar, on Kabul’s southern border, there is little support for the occupation. Even at public gatherings like this recent one to commemorate Teacher’s Day in the provincial capital, Pul-e-Alam, songs sympathetic to the Taliban are well received.

Elsewhere, there is increasing frustration with the foreign troops. Few residents in Baraki Barak district believe extra US troops will bring them long-term stability and many worry instead that the situation is about to deteriorate further.

“They are infidels. They don’t care about Muslims; they only care about themselves,” said a taxi driver too afraid to give his name.

Logar lies just a short journey to the south of Kabul and in the past year or so the Taliban’s presence here has become a major concern for the Afghan government and the international community.

The deep-rooted insurgency in this province and in neighbouring Maidan Wardak has contributed to a lasting feeling that the country’s capital is under siege.

Residents in Logar complain they are caught in the middle of a violent and indiscriminate struggle between militants and foreign troops. The only chance for peace, they conclude, is if the occupation ends.

“During the Taliban regime there was good security. At that time, if someone wanted to go from here to Khost, there were no problems. Nobody would ask them any questions. Even if you wanted to leave your money lying in the street then, nobody had the courage to take it,” the taxi driver said.

“Now the Americans sometimes block the roads with their ­vehicles for four or five hours and no one is allowed to pass them. Even if someone is sick, they have to wait.”

This month the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force detained someone it described as a “senior insurgent”. Mohammed Tahir was, it claimed in a press statement, “responsible for kidnappings and several bombings”. The operation showed “that Afghans are determined to expose insurgents posing a danger to local communities”.

But although many people here are indeed scared of the rebels, they appear to be more terrified of the foreign troops.

Farid, a 30-year-old labourer, fears for his life every time he leaves home, he says. And, like the majority of others prepared to speak out, he wants the occupation to end.

“We are afraid of both the ­Americans and the Taliban. The Taliban say we shouldn’t work with the Americans or the Afghan government,” he said.

“God willing, we believe that if the Americans leave this country the fighting will stop because if there are no Americans then there will be no one for [the insurgents] to fight.

“The Americans came here to kill all Muslims and they want to commit lots of crimes. They have not built this country and they are not working for Afghanistan.”

Nationwide violence has reached record levels this year, with civilians and soldiers paying a heavy price. Not a day goes by without news of another deadly attack somewhere; how the next six months pan out could be ­crucial to the future of this war.

In areas with large Pashtun populations like Logar, there is often sympathy for the Taliban and hostility towards the occupation. But even in parts of the country that remain fairly peaceful and opposed to the militants, residents are becoming restless.

Lt Gen Stanley McChrystal, the new commander of foreign forces in Afghanistan, has warned that troop casualties will probably increase. He has also acknowledged that support among Afghans is waning.

Sayed Dawood Hashimi, a father of three in Logar, said the international troops must be made to change their tactics or they would face growing resistance.

“All the time they are searching people’s houses and doing operations at night that cause problems for the women and children,” he said.

“The people are upset and the government must control them. We are civilians and we cannot do anything, so the government must.”

skarim@thenational.ae