Daily Security Brief: December 22, 2011

HELMAND: Unidentified gunmen shot dead a member of municipality council in the southern province of Helmand, an official said on Thursday.

The incident took place on Wednesday evening in Lashkari Bazaar area of the capital city, the governor’s spokesman, Daud Ahmadi, told Pajhwok Afghan News.

Abudl Samad Khan, a member of the provincial municipality council who was also an active member of the Ishaqzai tribe in the province, was shot dead while he was on his way home, he said.

He blamed the anti-government militants for the killing. However, no one has so far asserted responsibility for the attack.

The municipality council member did not have any personal enmity. Last year he was also kidnapped by the Taliban fighters, but was released with mediation of tribal elders, Noor Ahmadi, a resident of Lashkari Bazaar area, said.

Abdul Samad Khan had also received death threats from the anti-government insurgents, telling him to stop the job, otherwise he would be assassinated.

—Zainullah Stanikzai

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KABUL: Three people were arrested on charges of using forged verification stamps and signatures of various government high officials and departments in Kabul, the spy service said on Thursday.

The detainees were involved in using fake monograms and stamps of the first vice president office, ministers including foreign, interior, defence , higher education said in a statement.

Up to 48 monograms and stamps, a laptop computer, 189,000 US dollars, hundreds of fake Nikah Namas (Islamic prenuptial contracts), fake national identity cards and other stamps were seized from their possession, it said.

The three were identified as Raees Mohammad, a resident of the 11th police district, Abdul Qadir, a resident of the 8th police district and Ataulhaq, alias Saber, a worker at the Gulbahar trade center and resident of the 10th police district of Kabul city.

The spy service said the detainees had confessed to their crimes during preliminary investigations. They had provided fake documents to thousands of people against payments, it said.

—Khwaja Baser Ahmad

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KANDAHAR: The military council in southern Kandahar province on Thursday said farmers growing poppy crops in deserts would face comparatively harsh punishment compared to those cultivating it on their farm fields.

The council in a meeting at the governor’s house decided to intensify efforts at eradicating poppy crops in deserts and destroying drugs caches, the governor’s spokesman, Zalmay Ayubi, said.

Chaired by Governor Toryalai Wesa, the meeting was also attended by police chief, intelligence department head, the 404 police zone deputy commander, the 205 Attal Military Corps deputy commander, border police chief and Kandahar central jail head.

The meeting also decided that explosives being discovered during security operations would be destroyed in presence of a high level official commission instead of destroying them at the scene.

It decided to invite Afghanistan Land Authority officials to the province to identify and retake government land from its illegal occupants in the capital city and districts, Ayubi said.

The intelligent department head Col Essa Mohammad Aminyati told the gathering their operatives arrested nine insurgents and 23 jerry cans full of explosives last week.

The border zone police commander, Maj. Gen. Tafsir Khan Khugyani said they had arrested six Taliban fighters and a large number of roadside bombs in border areas.

—Bashir Ahmad Naadem

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URUZGAN: One militant was killed and another wounded in a NATO airstrike in central Uruzgan province, where three illegal arms dealers were detained, officials said on Thursday.

The airstrike in the Safedkhar area on the outskirts of Tirinkot city, came after militants were spotted headed toward the Provincial Reconstruction) compound with missiles on Wednesday night, crime branch police chief, Col. Gulab Khan told Pajhwok Afghan News.

He said one the militants were killed, a second injured and a third managed to escape. The international troops took the wounded and body of the dead militant into custody, he said.

Meanwhile, a joint Afghan-international security force detained three alleged illegal arm dealers in the Khas Uruzgan district, according to the crime branch chief.

Elsewhere, three insurgents were detained with their weapons in the eastern province of Nangarhar, police spokesman, Staff Captain Hazrat Mohammad Zamarai, said.

Three Pakistan-made pistols were recovered from the three, who were arrested in the Batikot district on Wednesday evening.

Zamarai also said two kilograms of explosives and a bundle of electric wire were recovered from a house in the same district.

A remote-controlled bomb and two mortar shells were also recovered from a ruin house in Rokhan locality of Jalalabad city, he said.

—Ajmal Wisal & Abdul Mueed Hashmi

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