Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
Latest attack in Kabul shatters Taliban assumptions
Beginning at a little after 9.30 a.m., Kabul was rocked by a series of explosions. Small-arms fire could be heard across the capital as police responded to the co-ordinated assaults on the ministries of justice, finance, defence, and mines and industries.
For the next three hours, the city was in a panic. Plumes of black smoke could be seen over Pashtunistan Square. Reports swept the city that several buildings were on fire, that the presidential palace was under attack and the Central Bank had been overrun.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mojahed warned that 20 suicide bombers were roaming the city and the insurgents were prepared to fight to the death.
Banks and stores closed; embassies locked their doors. The city came to an almost complete standstill.
By 1 p.m. it was all over. Afghan police had re-established control, and the capital slowly began to pick up the pieces.
By the end of the day, there was still no accurate information on the number of dead or injured.
The attacks are the largest to date in Kabul, which has witnessed a number of insurgent operations over the past year.
In February 2009, a similar series of assaults left 20 dead in Kabul; in October, the storming of a UN guest house killed six and resulted in the United Nations sending most of its staff out of Afghanistan.
Suicide bombings, once a rarity in the capital, are now almost a weekly occurrence.
While interior ministry spokesman Zmarai Bashari sought to portray the attack as a sign of Taliban weakness, most observers agree that the co-ordinated assault clearly represents just the opposite. For years the insurgents had been denied access to the capital. Now they appear to be able to launch their attacks even in the most heavily protected sections of the city.
It appears that security forces may actually have been anticipating an attack, which occurred on the same day that President Hamid Karzai was swearing in new members of his cabinet. Kabul residents say that security had been unusually tight in recent days, with police at virtually every intersection stopping cars and searching suspicious vehicles.
The violence also comes as Karzai is trying to win the international community over to the idea of reconciliation with the Taliban.
He has called repeatedly for peace overtures to the insurgents, and has even broached the subject of removing Taliban leaders from the UN "black list," which restricts extremists' movements and freezes their assets.
He was due to unveil his proposals at the London Conference, scheduled for Jan. 28.
But with the Taliban so publicly and dramatically signaling their willingness to continue the conflict, peace talks may be off the table for some time to come.
Jean MacKenzie is a reporter in Afghanistan who writes for The Institute for War & Peace Reporting, a non-profit organization that trains journalists in areas of conflict.
-- McClatchy-Tribune Information Services
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition January 22, 2010 A13
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