Afghanistan Weekly Security ReportFebruary 19, 2015

Executive Summary• Pakistani-Afghan cooperation delivers prospects of revived Taliban diplomacy, despite ongoing security chal-

lenges in southern and east-central provinces.

• Kabul city is currently experiencing a heightened threat of IED attack, which primarily target official vehicles and other high profile targets in the central districts.

•Militant activity on the Nangarhar-Kunar border has shifted west over the past seven days, resulting in an increased threat of attack along sections of the Kabul-Jalalabad road south of Mehtar Lam city. .

National OverviewPakistani-Afghan cooperation delivers prospects of revived Taliban diplomacy, despite ongoing security challenges in southern and east-central provinces.

First reported by the Reuters news agency on Thursday, February 19, Pakistani officials are believed to have con-veyed to the Afghan Premier a renewed intention among Taliban leaders towards peace talks during meetings in the capital this week, with negotiations between the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA) and the militant group potentially occur-ring as early as March. Credence to the reports has also been provided by the recent announcement from the Taliban’s spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, who has confirmed to the Afghan press that a delegation of the group has arrived in Qatar, echoing the last significant attempt at public dialogue between the Taliban and the GIRoA in June 2013. While prospects for a single diplomatic solution to Afghanistan’s security crisis remain unlikely given the fractured and increasingly diverse nature of insurgent forces active in the country, a revival of the peace process would nonetheless offer a considerable boost to the Ghani administration which has long argued for a revival in direct negotiation with insurgent groups. Existential challenges, namely the increasing hostility of the Pakistani government to the group and defections to competing ISIS affiliates may also have played a role in the Tali-ban’s tentative step towards reconcilia-tion.

Security AnalysisFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

Reported violent incidents February 12 - 18, 2015

Over 20 Incidents

Over Ten Incidents

Over Five Incidents

At Least One Incident

No Incidents

NIMRUZ

LAGHMAN

LOGARNANGARHAR

PAKTIA

KHOWSTGHAZNI

DAYKUNDI

GHOWRHERAT

FARAHURUZGAN

PAKTIKAZABUL

KANDAHAR

HELMAND

PARWANBAMYAN

SAR-E POL

BADGHIS

FARYAB

JOWZJANBALKH

SAMANGAN

BAGHLAN

KUNDUZ

TAKHARBADAKHSHAN

NURISTAN

KUNAR

KAPISA

WARDAKKABUL

PANJSHII

Northern Region BADAKHSHAN, TAKHAR, BAGHLAN, KUNDUZ, SAMANGAN, BALKH, SAR-E POL, JOWZJAN, FARYAB

Following widespread disturbances the previous week, local agencies imposed order over much of the north, including the restive territories of central Faryab where attacks fell over 60 percent.

The major outlier of this trend remains Kunduz and its provincial capital, where armed criminality and ambushes against police checkpoints continue to occur on a weekly basis. In one attack in the early morning of February 13, an assailant shot dead two local nationals and injured another in a suspected robbery in the city’s outlying district. Local sources indicate the attacker was subsequently shot by Afghan Local Police (ALP) units

while he attempted to flee the scene. High levels of ban-ditry and kidnapping are also currently being reported in the Uzbek and Pashtun heartlands of north-western Takhar. Further west, it is recommended that all transits in and around Sar-e Pol city operate with particular cau-tion, following a considerable build-up of police assets and protracted clashes with militants at fortified check-points this week.

Central Region KABUL, LOGAR, WARDAK, BAMYAN, PARWAN, KAPISA, PANJSHIR

Kabul city is currently experiencing a heightened threat of IED attack, primarily targeting official vehicles and other high profile targets in the central districts.

In most cases, the devices are attached to the under-side of stationary vehicles before being detonated remotely by insurgents, although in at least one case a roadside explosive is also believed to have been used this week. Targets have included the private car of Afghan Member of Parliament Amanullah Guzar which was destroyed by a Magnetic IED (MAGIED) on Feb-ruary 17, killing the car’s driver, and destroying vehi-cles belonging to National Directorate of Security (NDS)

officers close to the airport road in Kabul’s 9th district. The bombings occurred on the same day as militants launched a deadly assault upon the Logar’s provincial police headquarters in Pul-e Alam city, and are likely to have been timed to coincide with the arrival of Paki-stan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Chief, General Rizwan Akhtar who visited the capital on Tuesday morning as part of a one day conference aimed at strengthening security cooperation with the Afghan government.

Security AnalysisFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

Security AnalysisFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

Eastern Region NURISTAN, KUNAR, LAGHMAN, NANGARHAR, PAKTIA, KHOWST, GHAZNI, PAKTIKA

Militant activity on the Nangarhar-Kunar border has shifted west over the past week, resulting in increased threats of attack along sections of the Kabul-Jalalabad road south of Mehtar Lam city.

Occurring from roughly February 13 onwards, multiple attacks on Afghan National Police (ANP) positions and civilian communities began to be reported In the Qar-ghahi and Mehtar Lam districts, forcing Afghan National Army (ANA) authorities to respond with air strikes in the Zafran area which saw more than seven insurgent gunmen killed. Precise causes of this shift westward remain unclear at present. One possible explanation is that the entry of new militant recruits and hostility

between local residents and pro-ISIS factions along the eastern border is leading to an alteration in tactics for insurgent forces, resulting in the spread toward for-merly secure territories. Beyond a number of small arms fire incidents in Mehtar Lam itself however, the security environment in the major cities such as Jalalabad, Asa-dabad and Ghazni has not experienced any significant change.

Western RegionHERAT, FARAH, BADGHIS, GHOWR

No significant change in security conditions in the west occurred this week, as low level armed clashes remained the primary threat to transits in rural areas of Herat, Farah and Badghis.

Common targets of militant groups include the houses and vehicles of ANP personnel, with at least one Afghan Public Protective Force (APPF) officer known to have been killed and a female local national injured on Feb-ruary 16 in one of many armed attacks against residen-tial buildings in Muqur on the Badghis-Iran border. IED cells are also known to be active in the Bala Boluk, Injil and Mohmand Darah territories at present, with further

roadside bombings on routes north of Herat city and Farah expected in the coming week. As ever, security threats in the western region continue to derive from a complex mixture of insurgent activity, tribal rivalry and established criminal entities, made all the more chal-lenging by the extensive terrain which local police and government agencies are required to oversee.

Security AnalysisFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

Weekly Violence figures August through February

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

DEC JAN FEBAUG SEP OCT NOV

TOTALEASTNORTHWESTSOUTHCENTRAL

Southern RegionKANDAHAR, HELMAND, URUZGAN, ZABUL, DAYKUNDI, NIMRUZ

Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) operation to clear Sangin launched amid height-ened threat of insurgent expansion beyond north-eastern Helmand.

Named operation “Zulfiqar” (the sword of Prophet Muhammad’s son in law, Ali), as many as 53 armed fighters are already believed to have been killed since security forces entered the Siahi, Boostan and Shila areas of the territory on February 17, preceding a week of deadly raids at police checkpoints across the district. Other affected areas include Dehrawud district in neigh-boring Uruzgan, which from February 13 onwards wit-

nessed a surge in armed attacks as armed cells spread beyond their traditional strongholds in Kajaki east of the Helmand river. Expansion of armed fighters has also brought with it an increased use of IEDs along rural roads leading towards Tarin Kot and Helmand’s Lashkar Gah city, both of which remain at high risk of further attacks, despite an increased police presence in recent months.

NIMRUZ

LAGHMAN

LOGARNANGARHAR

PAKTIA

KHOWSTGHAZNI

DAYKUNDI

GHOWRHERAT

FARAHURUZGAN

PAKTIKAZABUL

KANDAHAR

HELMAND

PARWANBAMYAN

SAR-E POL

BADGHIS

FARYAB

JOWZJANBALKH

SAMANGAN

BAGHLAN

KUNDUZ

TAKHARBADAKHSHAN

NURISTAN

KUNARKAPISA

WARDAKKABUL

PANJSHII

Key Security EventsFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

SAR-E POL, FEBRUARY 14: Large numbers of police reserves were deployed to the outskirts of Sar-e Pol following attacks on checkpoints by armed militants. Nine insurgent fight-ers were later killed in operations over the following three days.

HELMAND, FEBRUARY 17: ANSF forces conducted a major oper-ation following a week of heavy insur-gent attacks in Sangin district. At least 53 militant fighters are estimated to have been killed in district-wide clashes.

KABUL, FEBRUARY 17: A magnetically attached IED which had been placed under the car of Member of Parliament Amanullah Guzar detonated, killing the vehicle’s driver.

URUZGAN, FEBRUARY 13 - 16: Insurgent fighters launched a campaign of attacks against police units in the Dehrawud area, conducting multiple IED strikes and leading to the death of a number of ANP and civilians.

LOGAR, FEBRUARY 17: Four suicide bombers conducted a complex attack targeting the Logar Police Headquarters in Pul-e Alam city. The first suicide bomber detonated at the gates of the facility, killing two guards while three others struck security checkpoints and ANP personnel in the police canteen, killing 20 people.

Politics and Security•In Afghanistan’s Deadliest Year, Battles, Not Bombs, Top Killer of Civilians – Reuters. Battles between the Taliban and government forces were responsible for the most Afghan civilian casualties in 2014, the war’s deadliest year, surpassing roadside bombs as the leading killer for the first time, the United Nations said on Wednesday. A total of 3,699 Afghan civilians were killed and 6,849 wounded in the war last year, as fighting intensified in tandem with the sharp decrease of US and allied foreign troops who formally ended their combat role in December after 13 years. The 22 percent rise in civilian deaths and injuries – the highest total since the UN began keeping records in 2009 - came despite US generals’ assessment that the newly trained Afghan army and police are winning the war. Full Article

•Electoral Reform Commission Expected Within One Week – Tolo News. After months of delay, national unity government officials indicated on Wednes-day that a commission devoted to reforming the coun-try’s electoral system would likely be formed within the coming week. Although it was one of the central tenets of the agreement that marked the formation of the national unity government itself in September of 2014, initiating electoral reform via a specialized commissioned has been a task sidelined in the face of other matters the government has deemed more pressing over the past five months. Now, however, with just a few months before parliamentary elections are expected to be held, calls for reform have grown from certain circles of the govern-ment as well as civil society groups. Full Article

•US Applauds Improving Kabul-Islamabad Ties – Pahjwok News. Washington has lauded Islamabad’s deepening security cooperation with Kabul, vowing support to the positive trajectory in relations between the neighbors. “We’ve long said that we welcome the prospect that we bring deepening cooperation between Afghanistan and Pakistan,” US State Department spokes-person Jen Psaki told a daily press briefing on Wednes-day. Full Article

Pakistan Officials Say Afghan Taliban Signal Readiness for Peace Talks Senior Pakistani army and diplomatic officials said on Thursday the Afghan Taliban has signaled through the Pakistani military that they are willing to open peace talks, which could be held later in the day. Sources within the Afghan Taliban said their negotiators would hold the first round of peace talks with US officials in Qatar later on Thursday, although no comment was immediately available from US or Qatari officials.

Previous efforts to negotiate an end to a war that began in late 2001 have proved fruitless, but the latest signals raised hopes of a much-needed boost for new Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. “The first session will take place today in Qatar and then there would be another session on Friday. Let us see what happens as talks before did not yield any results,” a senior member of the Afghan Taliban said by telephone from Qatar. Bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table would be a major break-through in Afghan efforts to find a diplomatic solution to more than a decade of war following the withdrawal of most US-led troops last year.

Source: Reuters Full Article

News SummaryFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

Economics and Business •India Refuses to Invest Further in Iran-Afghan-istan Highway – Wadsam. India has declined to invest more in an infrastructure project with Iran designed for the transportation of Afghan mineral goods by the Iranian port Chabahar. This comes as Iran had demanded India to increase investment on the highway from Chabahar, a port city of Iran, up to Afghanistan. The pullout of US-led NATO troops from Afghanistan has dissuaded New Delhi from investing any further in the concerned infrastructure, taking into account a sharp rise in fighting across Afghan-istan. Afghanistan, India and Iran signed a trilateral agreement in 2003 to build a highway from Chaba-har up to the Afghanistan border. Full Article

•German and Dutch Governments Continue Justice Sector Program in Kunduz until 2017 – Wadsam. The German and Dutch governments signed an agreement to continue their joint program to promote rule of law in Kunduz province until the end of 2017. On behalf of Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), parliamentary state secretary Thomas Silberhorn and, representing the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Trade and International Cooperation (DGIS), Dutch Ambassa-dor to Afghanistan Hank Jan Bakker met in Kabul to announce the continued joint effort. The Dutch government pledged a further €4.5 million (AFN 294 million) to fund justice sector activities together with German government in Kunduz province until the end of 2017. Full Article

Key Upcoming DatesMarch 21 Nawruz (Afghanistan

New Year)

Awash in Opium, Afghan ‘Wild West’ Slips from Kabul’s GraspIn fields less than a 10-minute drive from the intelligence headquarters of Afghanistan’s remote western province of Farah, farmers are planting their first illegal opium crop of the year. Taliban insurgents control half of the region bordering Iran, government officials estimate. In one district, Khaki Safed, the sacked local government chief refuses to step down.

Worried villagers there say a former Taliban com-mander is leading an armed band several dozen strong who have pledged allegiance to Islamic State. Farah offers a prime example of Afghanistan’s nexus between Islamist militancy, crime, opium and Kabul’s feeble grip on power. Residents say prob-lems escalated after foreign troops withdrew in early 2013 and locals in Farah’s most lawless areas say the breakdown in order is complete. There are four administrations in Khaki Safed,” said Benyamin Akhunzada, a bearded farmer in his 50s, keeping warm with a traditional wool shawl over his shoul-ders. “One is the governor. Another is Afghan local police.

Source: Reuters Full Article

News SummaryFebruary 12 - 18, 2015

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