Neo

29 April 2006

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Taleban insurgents on Saturday threatened to kill a kidnapped Indian telecommunications worker unless Indians left Afghanistan. The Indian and his Afghan driver were kidnapped after gunmen stopped their car on a road in the volatile southern province of Zabul on Friday. The Taleban claimed to have kidnapped him.


“If India does not pull out all its nationals working in Afghanistan by 6 p.m. (1330 GMT) tomorrow, we’re going to kill him,” Taleban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

Violence and lawlessness across much of the Afghan south has crippled development, and the main task of thousands of NATO troops due soon to move into the region will be to ensure sufficient security for reconstruction.

Militants have kidnapped aid agency staff and foreign company workers, who the Taleban say are supporting the Western-backed government. Some have been released but several, including Turks and Indians, have been killed.

Yousuf said the Indian was a US spy.

Police reinforcements had been sent to Zabul to help with the hunt for the Indian and his driver, said Gulab Shah Alikhail, spokesman for the governor of Zabul.

“By the grace of God, we’ll find him soon safe and sound,” Alikhail.

He declined to comment on the Taleban demand and threat to kill the Indian, a contract worker for Afghan telecommunications company Roshan.

India has close relations with Afghanistan and is involved in numerous aid and reconstruction projects. India was collaborating with Afghanistan on the kidnap, an Indian government official said in New Delhi.

Security fears

Security is a major worry in Afghanistan with Taleban attacks mounting as NATO prepares to double its peacekeeping operations, and the United States hopes to cut its forces there by several thousand.

In a separate incident on Saturday, two Taleban were killed when government troops attacked a Taleban hideout in the volatile southern province of Helmand, a commander said.

About 3,500 British troops are going to be stationed in Helmand province, where the two Taleban were killed in an hour-long clash, said General Rahmatullah Raufi.

Taleban and other militants have attacked many schools in their campaign government efforts to promote education.

US and Afghan opposition forces drove the Taleban from power in late 2001 after the Islamists refused to hand over Osama bin Laden, architect of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Taleban and other militants have waged an insurgency against US-led foreign troops and government forces since then.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayA...continent&col=

__________________
Administrator @ Defence.pk

Neo

29 April 2006

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Taleban militants will kill an Indian engineer being held hostage in southern Afghanistan if all Indians don’t leave Afghanistan within 24 hours, a purported spokesman for the insurgent group said on Saturday.


Qari Yousaf Ahmadi, who releases regular statements on behalf of outlawed Taleban fighters, accused the Indian contractor, who was abducted on Friday in the southern Zabul province, of being an “American spy.”

“We warn all Indians working here to leave Afghanistan within 24 hours starting 6 p.m. (1330GMT) on Saturday otherwise we will kill him,” Ahmadi said after contacting The Associated Press by telephone.

India’s ambassador to Kabul, Rakesh Sood, said the threat was “not a very positive development.”

Sood identified the hostage as K. Surya Narayana, a father of three from Hyderabad aged in his early 40s, who had been employed here since January by a Bahrain-based company, al-Moayed. The firm has been contracted by an Afghan mobile phone company, Roshan, to expand its mobile phone network across volatile provinces in southern Afghanistan.

Sood said that he was in contact with officials from Roshan, the Afghan government and the U.S. military to secure the captive’s release.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayA...continent&col=

Neo

Press Trust of India

Paris, April 29, 2006

Al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri has lashed out at US President George W Bush accusing him of giving a "strong impetus" to India's nuclear programme while "doling out orders" to Pakistan.

In a video released on a Jihadist website, Zawahiri pointed to a visit by Bush in March to New Delhi during which he signed a nuclear cooperation agreement with India.

"He gives a strong impetus to the Indian nuclear programme, while doling out orders to Pakistan," the Al-Qaeda leader said on Friday.

He also lashed out at Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf for his support to the US-led war on terror.

"Musharraf is fighting Islam in Pakistan ... Threatens national security in Pakistan... Has placed Pakistan's nuclear programme under Americans, therefore Jewish and Indian control."

"I call on the people of Pakistan to work to remove this traitor from power...And I call on every officer and soldier in the Pakistani army to disobey their commanders' orders to kill Muslims in Pakistan and Afghanistan," Zawahiri said.

In the third message from the organisation in a week, Zawahiri said "Musharraf was prepared to flee abroad where he had bank accounts when the popular revolution breaks out."

According to the video the "message to the people of Pakistan" was recorded after the third anniversary of the fall of the regime of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein on April 9, 2003.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1686538,0005.htm

Neo

Looks like India is AQ's next target.
Heavy Indian military presence in southern Afghanistan seems to have annoyed Al-Zawahiri.
Dangerous development indeed!

Karthik

Heavy Indian military presence in Afghanistan?

I hope the Indian engineer is not killed by those cowards.

__________________
"There is no excellence in all this world that can be separated from right living." - David Star Jordan My Blog

Maximus

India is AQ's next target!! LOL!

Bring it on!

Yeah! Dangerous for Al-Qaeda! Now let them face the brunt of Indian Army's Jawans!

__________________
Self-control is the chief element in self-respect, and self-respect is the chief element in courage.

OrdinaryGuy

LOL, we could deal with Pakistani funding groups like the LeT, what is the Al-Qaida to us but a bunch of sexually frustrated extremists

Its about time we started hunting down this al-qaida leaders and hanging them by their balls for kidnapping innocent people

Neo

India is keeping 300-600 special forces in the Kandahar area to 'protect' indian civilians involved in recunstruction of Afghanistan.

Neo

Pretty arrogant to say so!
If AQ can strike in NYC it can strike anywhere!
Don't underestimate your enemy.
I actually fear AQ.

Ray

If ITBP is Special Force, then Musharraf is a Cadet from the Dufai Mujahids and I am an idle rich golf professional!

__________________


"Some have learnt many Tricks of sly Evasion, Instead of Truth they use Equivocation, And eke it out with mental Reservation, Which is to good Men an Abomination."

I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.

HAKUNA MATATA

Tronic

ITBP is in Afghanistan? lol, never knew that... and what are they doing there anywayz??? They are mountain troops no?

__________________
Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory

Tronic

just did some checking up and most of the sources say that a ITBP "commando" arm is present in Afghanistan...

platinum786

actaully Al Queda would be a new phenomena India couldn't handle.

leT attaacked your military, it fought gun battles with you, Al Queda will walk onto a bus and press a button.

With sucha big country and finite resources, the task would be next to impossible to eradicate them.

In the UK we have a £60 million population, a tiny country, yet extremists live in our midst, we find out only after they have done thier ditty deeds.

Ray

Neo

Taliban kill Indian hostage in Afghanistan

Nasrat Shoaib

Kandahar, April 30, 2006

Police in Afghanistan on Sunday found the body of an Indian engineer kidnapped two days ago by Taliban militants, a killing that earned swift condemnation from New Delhi.

Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said the killing of Suryanarayan was unintentional, but officials said the killing was not an accident.

The Indian was working as a contractor for Afghan mobile telephone network Roshan.

Suryanarayan's body was found in Shahjoy district of restive Zabul province in southern Afghanistan, district police chief Mohammed Mir said.


Suryanarayan's family in Hyderabad

"His body was found beheaded in an area called Hassan Karez, so it cannot be an accident as the Taliban claim," an interior ministry official said on condition of anonymity.
Suryanarayan was abducted on Friday in Zabul province, along the main highway linking the capital Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar, birthplace of the Taliban movement.

On Saturday, the militants threatened to kill Suryanarayan unless all Indian nationals and companies left Afghanistan within 24 hours.

"The Indian engineer was in a room with one guard, he attacked the guard and punched him, went out of the building running as other mujahideen shot him dead," Ahmadi said.

Ahmadi said the Taliban's council of leaders was "saddened" by the incident, as New Delhi had shown its willingness to negotiate for Suryanarayan's release.

"We are sorry — the leading council had decided to extend the deadline for another 24 hours since the Indian side had showed gestures that they were ready to negotiate," he said.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh condemned what he called the "inhuman" killing of Suryanarayan, who hailed from the southern Indian city of Hyderabad and was a father of three.

Afghan interior ministry spokesman Mohammed Yousuf Stanizai could not immediately confirm the police findings.

Indian TV channels footage of Suryanarayan's family in severe shock in Hyderabad after receiving news that he had been killed.

His wife Manjula and three children were crying inconsolably, surrounded by family members who were trying to comfort them.

Several foreign nationals working in security and reconstruction projects in war-ravaged Afghanistan have been kidnapped since the toppling of the Taliban regime in a US-led operation in late 2001.

Some kidnappings have been blamed on Taliban militants and some of those abducted have been killed, including a Briton and an Indian national last year.

The Taliban abducted and killed another Indian in November. Truck driver Maniappan Raman Kutty's almost decapitated body was dumped in another volatile southern province, Nimroz.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/7...0500020005.htm