36,000 Afghans Flee US-led Offensive in South
10 February 2011
, AFP, 9 February 2011
EXCERPT: "There is no-one drinking tea or tending animals outside their homes in Khakai, one of the ghost villages of southern Afghanistan - just lots of collapsed mud walls and an eerie quiet. 'It's totally empty,' said Bryan Baker, a medic accompanying a US-Afghan military patrol searching for landmines among collapsed mud houses. 'Weird place.'...
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10 February 2011
US Troop Cut Could Set Back Afghan Gains: Thinktank, Reuters, 10 February 2011
EXCERPT: "The International Council on Security and Development (ICOS), which regularly conducts research in Afghanistan, recommended current force levels be maintained until July 2012. 'The directive to begin drawing down U.S. forces in July 2011 ... is based on domestic politics and pressure for a withdrawal rather than a realistic assessment of on-the-ground...
Afghan Rights Groups Shift Focus to Taliban over Civilian Casualties
10 February 2011
, The New York Times, 10 February 2011
EXCERPT: "International and local human rights groups working in Afghanistan have shifted their focus toward condemning abuses committed by the Taliban insurgents, rather than those attributed to the American military and its allies. Outraged by growing civilian casualties, many activists are now calling for the insurgents to be investigated for war crimes...
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Taliban Directed Kabul Supermarket Attack from Prison
10 February 2011
, The New York Times, 10 February 2011
EXCERPT: "A cell of suicide bombers active in Kabul was run for three years by a Taliban commander operating from inside the city's main prison, Afghan officials said Thursday. Another suicide bomber cell recruited young men from religious schools, and got them high on a drug that made them enraptured by the handlers who were trying to persuade...
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