AFGHANISTAN/PAKISTAN – SWEEP

PAK

1 - Taliban should prove if Hakimullah alive: Rehman – GEO2 - Police, protesters clash in Lahore-Kasur road - GEO3 - Improved US-Pakistan coop. a big step forward-Holbrooke, says al-Qaeda under pressure - APP4 - SpaceX says Falcon 9 rocket test fire is a success – ARY5 - Pak economy pays heavy price of anti-terror war - GEO6 - Six buses set on fire in Lahore protest - GEO7 - Iran tried to buy nuclear bomb from Pakistan as early as 1987 – Haaretz8 - Dr A.Q Khan a closed chapter – APP9 - Taseer lashes out Shahbaz Sharif's statement - Dawn10 - Nirupama Rao to visit Pakistan for further talks: Krishna - Sindh Today11 - Airports under terror threat? – Daily Times

AF

1 - Afghan president, Pakistani prime minister discuss war on terror - Tolo TV, Via BBC Mon2 - Anti-US rally held in Afghanistan – Press TV3 - Diggers, Afghans catch Taliban commander – Sydney Morning Herald4 - Contractors Tied to Effort to Track and Kill Militants - NYT5 - Top UN official for Afghanistan arrives in Kabul - PTI

FULL ARTICLE

PAKISTAN

1 - Taliban should prove if Hakimullah alive: Rehman Updated at: 0444 PST, Monday, March 15, 2010 http://www.geo.tv/Pakistan.htmISLAMABAD: Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Sunday that Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud had died of wounds inflicted in a US drone aircraft attack in January and if this was not true Taliban must bring his video.

He was talking to Geo News.

Hakimullah was hit within 72 hours after the release of a confessional video of Jordanian doctor Human Khalil Abu-Mulal al Balawi, who killed seven CIA agents in Khost on Dec 30.

The video, which showed Hakimullah sitting with the Jordanian double agent Balawi, was released in the evening of January 9 and Hakimullah was hit in a drone attack in Shakoti on the night between Jan 13 and 14, which simply leads to the conclusion that Hakimullah was under US surveillance.

Malik while condemning TTP terrorist activities said they would not be spared from God's wrath.

Rehman Malik on Sunday telephoned Senator Abbas Kumaili and clarified that Imamia Students Organization (ISO) was not being banned and reports about it are baseless and an attempt to create misunderstanding between ISO and the government.

2 - Police, protesters clash in Lahore-Kasur road Updated at: 1100 PST, Monday, March 15, 2010 http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=100758 LAHORE: The transporters and students staged protest on Lahore-Kasur Road and blocked the road, which triggered massive traffic jams there, Geo News reported Sunday.

The protesters set on fire at least six buses and broke the glasses of various others vehicles in protest against the police behaviour.

Police entered clash with the protesters with shelling as they were pelted with stones by the protesters.

3 - Improved US-Pakistan coop. a big step forward-Holbrooke, says al-Qaeda under pressure: http://www.app.com.pk/en_/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98489&Itemid=2

WASHINGTON, March 14 (APP): The Obama Administration’s Special Representative Richard Holbrooke Sunday described improvement in US-Pakistan cooperative relations a “very big step forward” as he applauded Islamabad’s successes against local and Afghan Taliban and noted that al-Qaeda along the Pak-Afghan border region faced “fantastic” pressure.

“In the last 13 months, since this (Obama) Administration took over, there has been a significant improvement across the board in the relationship between our government and the government of Pakistan,” Holbrooke told CNN’s GPS program aired Sunday.The American diplomat saw erosion of distinction between Afghan and Pakistan Taliban, if such a distinction ever existed, and

remarked that a combintion of Pakistanis’ developing a strong awareness in reaction to the Taliban brutality and high-level US-Pakistan engagment have contributed to an evolution.“All of this, plus the recognition that the distinction between Afghan Taliban and the Pakistan Taliban, if it ever existed, has eroded, and it has led the Pakistan to take a much more forward-leaning position.“There was above all a backlash from the excesses of the Taliban in Swat, South Waziristan and their attacks in places like Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Karachi, have all contributed to an evolution.”Citing the top American officials’ meetings with Pakistani leadership civilian leadership including President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and Army Chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, he said: “We feel clearly that we are working more closely together with them. And I think that is a very big step forward.”Questioned if Pakistan would launch operation against Afghan Taliban suspected to be hiding in North Waziristan, Holbrooke said it is up to the Pakistanis to decide on the basis of their assessment of the situation.“They captured the number two person of the (Afghan) Taliban, Mullah Baradar. That is a big deal.”“They have moved one hundred thousand troops from their eastern border against a giant neighbor to the western border to fight. They have two divisions in Swat right now. There are several other divisions in South Waziristan,” he stressed.“Of course, it will be extremely valuable for them to go in North Waziristan. Everyone understands that. But that is for the Pakistani army to decide based on their resources and their assessment of the situation. We all know that if you spread yourself too thin, there can be a backlash. And I leave that to General Kayani,” he added.On the current state of al-Qaeda militant organizations, he said, they are “under fantastic pressure” and “recently their external operations chief was eliminated.”“They have lost about 10 to 12 of their top 20 people in the last year or so. It looks, and I want to be very careful about this, it looks like they are less an organization that plans operations now than an organization that summons people to inspirational jehad.”Responding to a question about the political stability in the country, Holbrooke said “it is an internal process” but noted a constructive democratic improvement in the situation compared with what it was a year ago. He said now the political competition has returned to the same kind that people are familiar with in the United States.“It involves an opposition party, led by Nawaz Sharif, the government of President Zardari, it involves the discussions they are having, and the military has said very clearly that they don’t want to get involved.”

4 - SpaceX says Falcon 9 rocket test fire is a success

Updated : Monday March 15 , 2010 9:45:42 AM http://www.thearynews.com/english/newsdetail.asp?nid=44717CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla: Space Exploration Technologies successfully test fired its Falcon 9 rocket this weekend, clearing a milestone toward the inaugural flight of a privately developed spaceship to fly cargo, and possibly astronauts, into orbit, the company said.

Saturday's 3.5-second 'static' firing of the Falcon's nine kerosene and liquid oxygen-burning motors took place on a refurbished oceanside launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. It followed an earlier firing test aborted last week due to an improperly configured valve.

The successful test by California-based SpaceX clears the way for Falcon 9's debut mission -- a demonstration flight which could take place as early as April 12 from the same launch site, just south of the space shuttle launch pads at the Kennedy Space Center.

President Barack Obama has proposed adding $6 billion to space agency NASA's budget over the next five years to help private firms like SpaceX develop spaceships that can ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station, which he wants to continue until at least 2020.

With the NASA shuttle fleet retiring due to safety and cost concerns, the U.S. agency has turned over space station crew transport to the Russian government at a cost of about $51 million per seat.

Obama plans to hold a summit in Florida next month to discuss the U.S. space plans and industry.

SpaceX, owned and operated by Internet entrepreneur Elon Musk, already holds NASA contracts worth nearly $1.9 billion to develop and fly Falcon 9 rockets and Dragon capsules for space station cargo resupply missions.

Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corp has NASA contracts of similar value for its Taurus II-Cygnus system, which is scheduled to debut next year.

SpaceX says it needs about three years to develop a launch escape system for Dragon and other upgrades to have Falcon 9 ready for passenger service.

"What we are going through right now is the equivalent of 'beta testing'," Musk, SpaceX's founder and chief executive, wrote in an email after last week's aborted test. "The beta phase only ends when a rocket has done at least one, but arguably two or three consecutive flights to orbit," he said.

With its FAA license to launch granted last week, SpaceX is just awaiting clearance from the Air Force for Falcon 9's emergency abort system, which would be used to terminate the launch if the rocket strayed from its projected fight path and threatened populated areas.

"As soon as the tests are complete and (Air Force) has signed off, we will launch," said Musk.

5 - Pak economy pays heavy price of anti-terror war Updated at: 1210 PST, Monday, March 15, 2010 http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=100764 KARACHI: The 9/11 attacks did not affect the US economy as much as the war started in the name of elimination of terrorism, harmed Pakistani economy, Geo News reported Monday.

Following the 9/11 attacks, Pakistan entailed several economic and financial benefits; but, with the passage of time, all these benefits proved detrimental to Pakistan economy.

Pak economy which was making headway with 7.7 percent in FY 2005, was pushed to 2.5 percent as a result of terrorism and bomb blasts.

There was time when Pakistan received record $8.42 billion in foreign investment in FY 2007; but, lawlessness, terrorism and bomb blasts have repelled the foreign investors away, pummeling down the foreign investment to $888.7 million in the initial seven months of the present fiscal year.

Being a part to anti-terror war, Pakistani economy incurred a total of Rs20.82 trillion from FY2005 to 2009.

It is yet to be seen whether the present government will be able to resurrect the national economy again or …

6 - Six buses set on fire in Lahore protesthttp://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=100765 Updated at: 1225 PST, Monday, March 15, 2010 LAHORE: Transporters and students set a blaze six buses in Lahore during a protest against increase in fares and closure of wagons routes. The protestors also closed Ferozpur Road.

According to reports, transporters and students have gathered outside General Hospital at Ferozpur Road on Monday morning to protest increase in fares and closure of wagons. Police carried out shelling and baton charge to dispersed the protestors. Some of the protestors tortured DSP and ASI. Heavy police contingents have

reached the scene and fired tear gas and carried out baton charge to disperse the demonstrators. The protestors also set on fire six buses during the rumpus. Later, fire brigade has

7 - Iran tried to buy nuclear bomb from Pakistan as early as 1987http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1156533.html New documents reveal how a close ally of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei bid $10bn for ready-made weapons.

Iran attempted to buy a nuclear bomb from Pakistan as early as 1987, a leading Middle East analyst has told Haaretz.

Documents obtained by Simon Henderson, a research fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former journalist, offer crucial evidence that Iran's nuclear program is not wholly for civilian purposes as it claims ? but aimed at developing an atomic bomb.

Henderson told Haaretz he has acquired material written by the scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan - popularly known as the father of Pakistan's bomb program - while under house arrest between 2005 and 2009.

Khan was arrested by Pakistani authorities after it emerged he had for years been operating an 'atomic supermarket', touring the Middle East to peddle nuclear know-how to the highest bidder.

During his detention, Khan provided Pakistani security services with a wealth of detail on his sale of nuclear secrets to Iran and Libya in the late 1980s and 1990s, much of which is now in the hands of British and American intelligence.

But according to Henderson, Pakistan omitted to pass to its Western allies a sensitive report detailing visits to Pakistan in the late 80s by two Iranian officials, who Khan said offered $10 billion in exchange ready-made atomic bombs.

While Libya in 2003 publicly declared its nuclear program at and end, Western powers still suspect Iran of seeking a bomb, a charge it denies.

The report, obtained by Henderson, reveals that in 1987 or 1988 Admiral Ali Shamkhani, a former senior commander in Iran's Revolutionary Guard and minister of defense from 1997 until 2005, arrived in Pakistan with an entourage of officials.

Shamkhani offered to buy the nuclear devices on the spot and came prepared to take them home with him, Khan said.

The newly revealed material appears to confirm speculation that Khan, who despite his arrest remains a popular hero in his home country, did not act alone in selling Pakistani nuclear expertise to Iran and Libya, as Pakistan has claimed. Shamkhani's meetings suggest that Pakistani intelligence was aware of Khan's activities, as may have been the prime minister at the time, Benazir Bhutto.

Pakistan apparently refused Iran's offer - but Khan later traveled to the Middle East, where he auctioned his services as a private adviser. It was Khan who first provided Iran with designs for the centrifuges with which it continues to enrich uranium at its plant in Natanz.

Khan's other customer, Libya, eventually agreed to wind up its nuclear program and passed the CIA details of its transactions with the scientist. American intelligence was able to trace an elaborate smuggling operation in which the Pakistani had transferred bomb technology using front companies in Dubai.

In the Gulf emirate, Khan opened bank accounts under a variety of false names, including 'Khaidar Zaman', through which Iran paid him $5 million for his assistance.

As well as providing technical aid, Khan also gave the Iranians a list of Western suppliers of high-tech components vital to the enrichment process, who had helped Pakistan with its own bomb program.

As well as casting doubt on Iran's claims about the purpose of its nuclear research, Henderson's material could shed light on the thinking of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Khamenei is believed initially to have opposed plans to acquire a bomb ? only to become convinced of its necessity in the early 1980s during a bloody war with Iraq, in which Saddam Hussein unleashed chemical weapons on Iranian troops.

Shamkhani, who now heads the Center for Strategic Research in Tehran and has been touted as a candidate for the presidency, is thought to be a close confidant of the Supreme Leader. His role at the center of Iran's attempts to gain a bomb may point to Khamenei's personal role in an Iranian bomb program.

8 - Dr A.Q Khan a closed chapter: http://www.app.com.pk/en_/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98491&Itemid=2ISLAMABAD, Mar 15 (APP): Pakistan on Monday rejected a news story published in the Washington Post, terming it as “fiction” and

said nuclear scientist Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan is a closed chapter.The Foreign Office spokesman said the story is yet another repackaging of fiction, which surfaces occasionally for purposes that are self-evident.

“Pakistan’s non-proliferation credentials are second to none and its export controls are foolproof,” the spokesman said in a statement issued here.

9 - Taseer lashes out Shahbaz Sharif's statementhttp://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/provinces/03-taseer-lashes-out-shahbaz-sharifs-statement-ss-06Monday, 15 Mar, 2010LAHORE: Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer lashed out at Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif for what he making a ‘highly irresponsible statement that has disturbed the entire country.’

He said that he feared the Punjab Government wanted to Talibanise Punjab.

Reacting strongly to Sharif's statement in Jamia Naeemia on Sunday, Taseer said that Punjab has been embarrassed, and that such statements will only embolden Sipah-e-Sahaba and the Taliban.

Taseer alleged that the federal government is in the dark about safe houses and alleged that they were being run by Punjab Law Minister, Rana Sanaullah.

He said that with the entire country facing the threat of terror, Sharif has indirectly pledged support for Taliban by saying they should not target Punjab, thereby creating a negative distinction with the rest of the country.

10 - Nirupama Rao to visit Pakistan for further talks: KrishnaMarch 15th, 2010 SindhTodayhttp://www.sindhtoday.net/news/2/116336.htm

New Delhi, Mar 15 (ANI): External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on Monday said that Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao would soon visit Pakistan for further talks.

On the sidelines of a function here, Krishna said, ‘We have already taken the initiative. Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh is in good

faith. Provided the backdrop of having talks at the level of foreign secretary.’

‘The foreign secretary of Pakistan came here, and then, perhaps it is time for the foreign secretary of India to go to Pakistan,’ he added.

Despite talks between the two neighbours during Pakistani Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir’s visit to India, nothing fruitful came out and the two sides ended the interaction with a pledge to ‘keep in touch’, signalling that relations between the nuclear-armed rivals remain frosty.

This was the first talk between the two countries after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.

India had broken off talks after the Mumbai attacks, saying dialogue could resume only if Pakistan acted against militants operating from its soil.

New Delhi had put the blame on Islamabad for the attacks, which killed at least 166 people and derailed a four-year-long peace process. (ANI)[NF]

11 - Airports under terror threat?Monday, March 15, 2010 E-Mail this article to a friend Printer Friendly Versionhttp://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\03\15\story_15-3-2010_pg7_1

LAHORE: The terrorists’ next possible target site can be the airport, which can lead to an attempt to highjack aircrafts, sources told Daily Times on Sunday.

The security forces have already foiled several bids to smuggle weapons onto aircrafts. In two recent attempts, the forces arrested passengers from the Karachi and Lahore airports trying to bring weapons onboard the aircraft.

On March 10, authorities arrested a passenger who tried to bring a pistol and explosive material on board a Dubai-bound flight of a private airline at the Quaid-e-Azam International Airport in Karachi. The arrested man was a resident of Rajanpur.

Authorities are still conducting an investigation to determine if the arrested man had any other accomplice travelling on the same flight, sources said.

Similarly on Saturday (March 13), the security forces foiled another attempt to bring a weapon onboard a Karachi-bound flight at the

Allama Iqbal International Airport in Lahore. The security personnel recovered a disassembled pistol from the hand-carry luggage of a passenger. Sources said the criminal had tried to bring the disassembled parts of the weapon in two separate luggage bags.

The Punjab Home Department has alerted the police and other law enforcement agencies against threats of terrorist activities at sensitive locations in Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Lahore, and directed them to take effective preventive measures.

A circular issued by the Punjab Home Department stated that a group of suicide bombers have been trained to target Peshawar, Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Lahore. The group has been provided with suicide jackets and Remote Controlled Improvised Explosive Devices (RCIDs), it said.

The circular stated that a terrorist code-named ‘Asadullah’ has been given an anti-aircraft machine gun and a ZGO gun. These guns have been mounted on hill-tops for hitting targets in Rawalpindi and Islamabad, the circular stated.

AFGHANISTAN

1 - Afghan president, Pakistani prime minister discuss war on terrorSource: Tolo TV, Kabul, in Dari 0600 gmt 15 Mar 10 – BBC Mon

Text of report by Afghan independent Tolo TV on 15 March

Kabul and Islamabad will work together against terrorism. Afghan President Hamed Karzai in a telephone contact with the prime minister of Pakistan have discussed the fight against terrorism.

Afghan presidential office has said in a statement that President Karzai and Pakistani prime minister on a telephone conversation last night termed Kandahar and Lahore bomb attacks as similar and strongly condemned these attacks.

Consecutive suicide attacks on Saturday [13 March] evening killed 35 and injured 57 others. It is taking place at a time when about 200 people were killed or injured in a series of bomb attacks in Lahore, Pakistan.

2 - Anti-US rally held in AfghanistanMon, 15 Mar 2010 08:48:54 GMThttp://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=120854&sectionid=351020403Afghan people condemn the civilians' casualties.People in Afghanistan have protested against the killing of civilians by the US-led forces.

Protesters took to the streets in the eastern province of Kunar on Monday to condemn the killing of ten Afghan civilians by American troops.

They also demanded that the perpetrators of the attack be brought to trial. The US army earlier claimed six Taliban militants were killed in the raid.

On Monday, three more civilians were killed and three others wounded by a roadside mine in Ghazni province.

Afghanistan has been under attack both by militants and foreign troops since the 2001 US-led invasion. Large numbers of civilians have lost their lives across the country.

Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai and tribal elders have repeatedly criticized the foreign troops for killing and injuring civilians.

3 - Diggers, Afghans catch Taliban commanderMarch 14, 2010http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/diggers-afghans-catch-taliban-commander-20100314-q5ph.htmlAAP

A key Taliban insurgent commander has been captured by coalition forces in Afghanistan, the Defence department says.

The commander was captured recently in a planned operation led by the Afghan National Security Forces and Australia's Special Operations Task Group.

During the operation, leader and improvised explosive device coordinator Mullah Janan Andewahl was captured in the Mirabad Valley, located in the Oruzgan Province.

He had been responsible for directing attacks and roadside bombings against Afghan civilians, military and ISAF assistance forces.

Defence said Andewahl had been a "person of interest" for some time.

It's believed he was also behind a number of organised attacks on and executions of civilians in the Mirabad district.

He is now in the custody of Afghan local authorities.

Army chief of joint operations Lieutenant General Mark Evans said ensuring Andewahl and others like him entered the Afghan justice system reinforced the message that the war-torn nation's government was intent on restoring security.

4 - The New York Times - Contractors Tied to Effort to Track and Kill Militantshttp://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/15/world/asia/15contractors.html?pagewanted=1Published: March 14, 2010

KABUL, Afghanistan — Under the cover of a benign government information-gathering program, a Defense Department official set up a network of private contractors in Afghanistan and Pakistan to help track and kill suspected militants, according to military officials and businessmen in Afghanistan and the United States.

The official, Michael D. Furlong, hired contractors from private security companies that employed former C.I.A. and Special Forces operatives. The contractors, in turn, gathered intelligence on the whereabouts of suspected militants and the location of insurgent camps, and the information was then sent to military units and intelligence officials for possible lethal action in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the officials said.

While it has been widely reported that the C.I.A. and the military are attacking operatives of Al Qaeda and others through unmanned, remote-controlled drone strikes, some American officials say they became troubled that Mr. Furlong seemed to be running an off-the-books spy operation. The officials say they are not sure who condoned and supervised his work.

It is generally considered illegal for the military to hire contractors to act as covert spies. Officials said Mr. Furlong’s secret network might have been improperly financed by diverting money from a program designed to merely gather information about the region.

Moreover, in Pakistan, where Qaeda and Taliban leaders are believed to be hiding, the secret use of private contractors may be seen as an attempt to get around the Pakistani government’s prohibition of American military personnel’s operating in the country.

Officials say Mr. Furlong’s operation seems to have been shut down, and he is now is the subject of a criminal investigation by the Defense Department for a number of possible offenses, including contract fraud.

Even in a region of the world known for intrigue, Mr. Furlong’s story stands out. At times, his operation featured a mysterious American company run by retired Special Operations officers and an iconic C.I.A. figure who had a role in some of the agency’s most famous episodes, including the Iran-Contra affair.

The allegations that he ran this network come as the American intelligence community confronts other instances in which private contractors may have been improperly used on delicate and questionable operations, including secret raids in Iraq and an assassinations program that was halted before it got off the ground.

“While no legitimate intelligence operations got screwed up, it’s generally a bad idea to have freelancers running around a war zone pretending to be James Bond,” one American government official said. But it is still murky whether Mr. Furlong had approval from top commanders or whether he might have been running a rogue operation.

This account of his activities is based on interviews with American military and intelligence officials and businessmen in the region. They insisted on anonymity in discussing a delicate case that is under investigation.

Col. Kathleen Cook, a spokeswoman for United States Strategic Command, which oversees Mr. Furlong’s work, declined to make him available for an interview. Military officials said Mr. Furlong, a retired Air Force officer, is now a senior civilian employee in the military, a full-time Defense Department employee based at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio.

Network of Informants

Mr. Furlong has extensive experience in “psychological operations” — the military term for the use of information in warfare — and he plied his trade in a number of places, including Iraq and the Balkans. It is unclear exactly when Mr. Furlong’s operations began. But officials said they seemed to accelerate in the summer of 2009, and by the time they ended, he and his colleagues had established a network of informants in Afghanistan and Pakistan whose job it was to help locate people believed to be insurgents.

Government officials said they believed that Mr. Furlong might have channeled money away from a program intended to provide American commanders with information about Afghanistan’s social and tribal landscape, and toward secret efforts to hunt militants on both sides of the country’s porous border with Pakistan.

Some officials said it was unclear whether these operations actually resulted in the deaths of militants, though others involved in the operation said that they did.

Military officials said that Mr. Furlong would often boast about his network of informants in Afghanistan and Pakistan to senior military officers, and in one instance said a group of suspected militants carrying rockets by mule over the border had been singled out and killed as a result of his efforts.

In addition, at least one government contractor who worked with Mr. Furlong in Afghanistan last year maintains that he saw evidence that the information was used for attacking militants.

The contractor, Robert Young Pelton, an author who writes extensively about war zones, said that the government hired him to gather information about Afghanistan and that Mr. Furlong improperly used his work. “We were providing information so they could better understand the situation in Afghanistan, and it was being used to kill people,” Mr. Pelton said.

He said that he and Eason Jordan, a former television news executive, had been hired by the military to run a public Web site to help the government gain a better understanding of a region that bedeviled them. Recently, the top military intelligence official in Afghanistan publicly said that intelligence collection was skewed too heavily toward hunting terrorists, at the expense of gaining a deeper understanding of the country.

Instead, Mr. Pelton said, millions of dollars that were supposed to go to the Web site were redirected by Mr. Furlong toward intelligence gathering for the purpose of attacking militants.

In one example, Mr. Pelton said he had been told by Afghan colleagues that video images that he posted on the Web site had been used for an American strike in the South Waziristan region of Pakistan.

Among the contractors Mr. Furlong appears to have used to conduct intelligence gathering was International Media Ventures, a private “strategic communication” firm run by several former Special Operations officers. Another was American International Security Corporation, a Boston-based company run by Mike Taylor, a former Green Beret. In a phone interview, Mr. Taylor said that at one point he had employed Duane Clarridge, known as Dewey, a former top C.I.A. official who has been linked to a generation of C.I.A. adventures, including the Iran-Contra scandal.

In an interview, Mr. Clarridge denied that he had worked with Mr. Furlong in any operation in Afghanistan or Pakistan. “I don’t know anything about that,” he said.

Mr. Taylor, who is chief executive of A.I.S.C., said his company gathered information on both sides of the border to give military officials information about possible threats to American forces. He said his company was not specifically hired to provide information to kill insurgents.

Some American officials contend that Mr. Furlong’s efforts amounted to little. Nevertheless, they provoked the ire of the C.I.A.

Last fall, the spy agency’s station chief in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital, wrote a memorandum to the Defense Department’s top intelligence official detailing what officials said were serious offenses by Mr. Furlong. The officials would not specify the offenses, but the officer’s cable helped set off the Pentagon investigation.

Afghan Intelligence

In mid-2008, the military put Mr. Furlong in charge of a program to use private companies to gather information about the political and tribal culture of Afghanistan. Some of the approximately $22 million in government money allotted to this effort went to International Media Ventures, with offices in St. Petersburg, Fla., San Antonio and elsewhere. On its Web site, the company describes itself as a public relations company, “an industry leader in creating potent messaging content and interactive communications.”

The Web site also shows that several of its senior executives are former members of the military’s Special Operations forces, including former commandos from Delta Force, which has been used extensively since the Sept. 11 attacks to track and kill suspected terrorists.

Until recently, one of the members of International Media’s board of directors was Gen. Dell L. Dailey, former head of Joint Special Operations Command, which oversees the military’s covert units.

In an e-mail message, General Dailey said that he had resigned his post on the company’s board, but he did not say when. He did not give details about the company’s work with the American military, and other company executives declined to comment.

In an interview, Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, the top military spokesman in Afghanistan, said that the United States military was currently employing nine International Media Ventures civilian employees on routine jobs in guard work and information processing

and analysis. Whatever else other International Media employees might be doing in Afghanistan, he said, he did not know and had no responsibility for their actions.

By Mr. Pelton’s account, Mr. Furlong, in conversations with him and his colleagues, referred to his stable of contractors as “my Jason Bournes,” a reference to the fictional American assassin created by the novelist Robert Ludlum and played in movies by Matt Damon.

Military officials said that Mr. Furlong would occasionally brag to his superiors about having Mr. Clarridge’s services at his disposal. Last summer, Mr. Furlong told colleagues that he was working with Mr. Clarridge to secure the release of Pfc. Bowe Bergdahl, a kidnapped soldier who American officials believe is being held by militants in Pakistan.

From December 2008 to mid-June 2009, both Mr. Taylor and Mr. Clarridge were hired to assist The New York Times in the case of David Rohde, the Times reporter who was kidnapped by militants in Afghanistan and held for seven months in Pakistan’s tribal areas. The reporter ultimately escaped on his own.

The idea for the government information program was thought up sometime in 2008 by Mr. Jordan, a former CNN news chief, and his partner Mr. Pelton, whose books include “The World’s Most Dangerous Places” and “Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror.”

Top General Approached

They approached Gen. David D. McKiernan, soon to become the top American commander in Afghanistan. Their proposal was to set up a reporting and research network in Afghanistan and Pakistan for the American military and private clients who were trying to understand a complex region that had become vital to Western interests. They already had a similar operation in Iraq — called “Iraq Slogger,” which employed local Iraqis to report and write news stories for their Web site. Mr. Jordan proposed setting up a similar Web site in Afghanistan and Pakistan — except that the operation would be largely financed by the American military. The name of the Web site was Afpax.

Mr. Jordan said that he had gone to the United States military because the business in Iraq was not profitable relying solely on private clients. He described his proposal as essentially a news gathering operation, involving only unclassified materials gathered openly by his employees. “It was all open-source,” he said.

When Mr. Jordan made the pitch to General McKiernan, Mr. Furlong was also present, according to Mr. Jordan. General McKiernan endorsed the proposal, and Mr. Furlong said that he could find financing for Afpax, both Mr. Jordan and Mr. Pelton said. “On that day, they told us to get to work,” Mr. Pelton said.

But Mr. Jordan said that the help from Mr. Furlong ended up being extremely limited. He said he was paid twice — once to help the company with start-up costs and another time for a report his group had written. Mr. Jordan declined to talk about exact figures, but said the amount of money was a “small fraction” of what he had proposed — and what it took to run his news gathering operation.

Whenever he asked for financing, Mr. Jordan said, Mr. Furlong told him that the money was being used for other things, and that the appetite for Mr. Jordan’s services was diminishing.

“He told us that there was less and less money for what we were doing, and less of an appreciation for what we were doing,” he said.

Admiral Smith, the military’s director for strategic communications in Afghanistan, said that when he arrived in Kabul a year later, in June 2009, he opposed financing Afpax. He said that he did not need what Mr. Pelton and Mr. Jordan were offering and that the service seemed uncomfortably close to crossing into intelligence gathering — which could have meant making targets of individuals.

“I took the air out of the balloon,” he said.

Admiral Smith said that the C.I.A. was against the proposal for the same reasons. Mr. Furlong persisted in pushing the project, he said.

“I finally had to tell him, ‘Read my lips,’ we’re not interested,’ ” Admiral Smith said.

What happened next is unclear.

Admiral Smith said that when he turned down the Afpax proposal, Mr. Furlong wanted to spend the leftover money elsewhere. That is when Mr. Furlong agreed to provide some of International Media Ventures’ employees to Admiral Smith’s strategic communications office.

But that still left roughly $15 million unaccounted for, he said.

“I have no idea where the rest of the money is going,” Admiral Smith said.

5 - Top UN official for Afghanistan arrives in Kabul

12:46 HRS ISThttp://www.ptinews.com/news/564825_Top-UN-official-for-Afghanistan-arrives-in-KabulUnited Nations, Mar 15 (PTI) The new UN mission chief for Afghanistan arrived in Kabul to take over the reins of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

Promising to help improve the lives of the Afghan people, Italian-Swedish diplomat Staffan de Mistura said, "The UN has been associated with Afghanistan's history and its people for many years".

"We're involved not only with assisting the political stability of Afghanistan, but also with many other activities in the social and economic sphere", de Mistura, the Special Representative of the Secretary General (SRSG) said.

"The Afghan people have suffered a lot and endured many difficult times. They deserve international support, but they deserve above all a better future. The UN will do its part," he added.