The Dominion - War in Afghanistan

Multi-Billion Dollar Mining Boom

Moira Peters — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 04:24:08 +0000

From the archives: the economics of war and empire in Afghanistan

Two years ago, in State of Mine—our 2008 special issue on the Canadian extractive industry—the Dominion published an article by Michael Skinner about the international bidding war for Afghan minerals. Skinner cites a 2002 US Geological Survey report detailing over 1,000 mineral deposits in Afghanistan, and Soviet geological studies from the 1970s that led to large-scale mining operations in the country.

We thought—given the New York Times just broke the "news" about a trillion dollars in minerals in Afghanistan—that we would, ahem, dig up this piece for our readers.

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BAMIYAN, AFGHANISTAN—On a brilliant sunny afternoon in July, 2007, my research partner Hamayon Rastgar and I climbed Shahr-e Gholghola, a tiny but strategically-located mountain that incongruously juts upward in the center of the Bamiyan Valley in Afghanistan’s central province, Bamiyan. Our guide was a geologist I’ll call Aziz.

Aziz led us through the minefields that guard the approach to Shahr-e Gholghola to reach the strategic lookout above. From the mountaintop we surveyed the incredibly verdant Bamiyan Valley bounded by the famous cliffs of Bamiyan to the north, the snow-capped mountains of the Koh-e Baba Mountains to the south, and looking downstream along the Bamiyan River to the east, the red cliffs of Shahr-e Zohak. A chain-smoking Afghan soldier, posted on sentinel duty to keep watch over the NATO airbase below and guard the BBC broadcasting equipment installed atop the mountain, kept us under his bored gaze. But we didn’t climb Shahr-e Gholghola just to admire the spectacular view. Aziz wanted to tell us his story of war, empire, and mining in Afghanistan with the Bamiyan Valley as his dramatic backdrop.

Some of the richest mineral deposits in the world, said Aziz, exist within a few kilometres of where we stood. Many more deposits are scattered throughout the rest of Afghanistan. A promotional brochure distributed by the Afghanistan Ministry of Mines claims the Hajigak iron deposit in Bamiyan contains 1.8 billion tonnes of ore with a concentration of 62 per cent iron. There is also abundant coal nearby that can be used for the coking process and to generate electricity, making this a world-class site for mine development.

Since antiquity, Afghanistan has been a source for gems and semi-precious stones, metals, and marble. Small-scale artisanal mining has always existed to supply jewelers and metal industries. A Soviet geological survey conducted in the 1970s led to some development of large-scale industrial mining, but most of these developments stalled after 1992 during the upheavals of the American-backed Mujaheddin regime, and then the Taliban regime after 1996. The Soviets also developed natural gas extraction, which helped to fuel the Soviet economy and provided the Afghan economy with a significant portion of its foreign trade.

In 2002, the US Geological Survey (USGS) published a list of more than 1000 deposits, mines, and occurrences in Afghanistan to confirm the country’s wealth of mineral and hydrocarbon resources. Among the minerals found in abundance are gold, copper, iron, mercury, lead, and rare metals such as cesium, lithium, niobium, and tantalum. Tantalum, which is also known as coltan, is a rare element essential in the manufacture of cell phones, computers, and digital cameras. Lithium is necessary for high-tech batteries, specialty glasses and ceramics, and for some high-performance metal alloys. Niobium is used in steel alloys. According to Afghan geology expert John Shroder, writing for online geography journal GeoJournal in 2007, oil and natural gas reserves identified by the USGS far surpass earlier Soviet estimates.

Aziz said he fears most Afghans could be condemned to even greater suffering if these resources are developed by giant transnational companies. Looking over the Bamiyan Valley, we can see that productive and sustainable agriculture fills every available niche in a delicate balance of nature. It is an extremely fragile environment, similar to the arid American southwest. Building a railway through the valley, spewing toxic waste into the atmosphere during the smelting process, and dumping tons of slag onto the watershed would have an incredibly destructive impact on the delicate ecological balance that has been maintained for millennia by local farmers. Aziz reminded us of the genocidal slaughter of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas as they were displaced to make way for economic development and the ecological destruction that resulted from resource extraction. Recognizing that, to this day, resource extraction practices continue to disrupt social and environmental systems, Aziz fears for the future of the Hazara people of Bamiyan and all Afghans throughout his country.

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As part of its economic liberalization and privatization strategy, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is directing the sale of every Afghan state enterprise in transportation, communications, manufacturing, and resource extraction. Any potentially profitable sector of the Afghan economy is overseen by the agency.

In October 2006, the British Agencies Afghanistan Group announced that privatization of the Jawzjan gas field was beginning and that deals had already been signed to privatize the Karkar-e Dodkash coal mine in Baghlan, a fluoride mine in Uruzagan, a gold mine in Herat, a precious stones mine in Nuristan and cement factories in Ghori and Parwan.

In November 2007, the huge Aynak copper deposit, which is approximately 35 kilometres southeast of Kabul, was auctioned under the USAID plan. According to an article in GeoJournal, the Aynak deposit is estimated to contain more than 11 million metric tons of recoverable copper.

For centuries, if not millennia, artisanal copper mining was practiced at Aynak. In the 1980s, Soviet geologists and engineers began exploration and preliminary mine development of the 28-square-kilometre Aynak copper field, but the Soviet miners were forced to leave when the Soviet military withdrew in 1989. In August and September 2008, the Afghanistan Ministry of Mines tendered four more mine sites for auction: the Feranjal barite deposits in Parwan, the Da Eman coal deposits in Bamiyan, the Namakab coal deposits in Takhar and the Ghorian iron deposits in Herat.

While the privatization program is overseen by an office of USAID, the ultimate decision to accept a winning auction bid rests with the Afghan government. However, there are questions about whether the Karzai government has the power to make autonomous decisions. Some Afghan critics complain that American, British and Canadian diplomatic and military advisers act as Karzai’s shadow cabinet.

For example, a team of Canadian Forces advisers called SAT-A (Strategic Advisory Team Argus) is embedded within Karzai’s presidential offices. During Karzai’s September 2007 visit to Canada, documents acquired under the Access to Information act suggested that Karzai’s speech to the Canadian Parliament was written by the SAT-A.

Ironically, Aynak was technically not privatized in accordance with liberalization doctrine—it was sold to a Chinese state enterprise, China Metallurgical Group, for an astounding US$3.5 billion. The principals of Vancouver-based Hunter-Dickinson, who thought they would win the bidding process with an offer in the neighbourhood of $2 billion, were not pleased by the outcome, according to a Canadian government source. Other bidders on the Aynak deposit were Phoenix-based Phelps Dodge, London-based Kazakhmys Consortium, and a subsidiary of Russia’s Basic Element Group.

Awarding the Aynak mine deal to the China Metallurgical Group may be a shrewd strategic move from the perspective of Canadian advisers. A considerable portion of the extraordinary Chinese bid is earmarked for constructing a 400-megawatt power plant to feed the mine and its smelters, the development of a nearby coal mine to feed the power plant, and construction of Afghanistan’s first railway, which will stretch from Western China through Tajikistan to the Aynak mine and on to Pakistan. The political and commercial risk of investing in Afghanistan makes it unlikely a private company would undertake an infrastructure project of the scale needed to develop the Aynak deposit. The American, Canadian, and British governments operate state-financed insurance schemes to protect investors from political risk in foreign investments, but they will not insure investments of this massive scale. Considering the high degree of influence American, Canadian, and British diplomats and military advisers have inside the Afghan government, it is conceivable that working out the deal with China Metallurgical Group could have been a deliberate strategy designed to shift the burden of infrastructure development to the Chinese state. Private companies from the NATO states can potentially benefit from the surplus capacity of the Chinese coal mine, power plant, and railway to service the many other mines and development sites yet to be sold.

Such a meshing of economic and geopolitical strategies fits with the strategic agenda outlined in the 2008 US National Defense Strategy (USNDS). It outlines America’s strategy to economically engage China and Russia, while still relying on the old Cold War era strategy of containment by NATO forces as a military backup. This latest strategic statement outlines how the US “will develop strategies across agencies, and internationally, to provide incentives for constructive behaviour while also dissuading them [China and Russia] from destabilizing actions.” Strategists in the NATO states are concerned with controlling the growth of Russia and China in Central Asia as these two emerging powers increase their level of mutual co-operation through the Shanghai Co-operation Organization and the Russia China Security Partnership. Allowing China to make a huge and extremely risky investment, for which success is entirely dependent on a continued NATO military occupation of Afghanistan on China’s border, may be a cunning tactic as part of the engagement-containment strategy outlined in the USNDS 2008.

Many Afghans—from cab drivers, shopkeepers and day labourers to intellectuals—told us they believe the privatization of Afghanistan’s resource wealth is one among many factors in the strategic geopolitical and economic calculus the leaders of the NATO states use to rationalize their war in Afghanistan. Afghanistan’s undeveloped resource wealth is no secret to Afghans, even if most Canadians outside the mining industry remain ignorant of the fact.

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Like many Afghans, Aziz is sceptical of an Afghan government controlled by warlords that was first established by military force and backed by American aid in 1992, and re-established by American and NATO forces in 2001. This government cannot survive without the support of foreign military forces. He doubts such an arrangement will protect Afghans from the destructive practices of foreign mining companies, whether these companies are based in the powerful NATO states or elsewhere. Among the many warlords prominent in Afghan politics and business are Rashid Dostum and Ismail Khan.

Since 2001, Dostum has held numerous influential positions in government and business including the office of Minister of Defence. Dostum is alleged by Human Rights Watch to have committed numerous war crimes since the 1980s, including while he led the Northern Alliance as the ground forces for the American-NATO invasion in 2001. Khan was a captain in the Afghanistan National Army when he led the Islamic revolution in Herat in March 1979. Khan’s Islamic revolutionary forces received covert support from the US during that year. Human Rights Watch alleges that Khan committed war crimes and crimes against humanity since first seizing power in 1979 and throughout his participation in the Northern Alliance. Khan was appointed Minister of Energy by Hamid Karzai in 2004.

Before the NATO states chose to support the Northern Alliance in 2001, Human Rights Watch, among other agencies, repeatedly warned that the Northern Alliance, as well as the Taliban, committed widespread and systematic crimes against humanity that included targeted civilian killings, indiscriminate bombardment of civilian areas, summary executions, torture, rape and sexual abuse, and the use of child soldiers.

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As we soaked in the breathtaking view of the Bamiyan Valley, a man I’ll call Zahir joined our conversation. Alexander the Great’s army, he said, is believed to have occupied the valley for four years after sweeping through the Persian Empire. From here, Alexander moved south to invade India. The Greek legacy can be found in remnants of art and architecture still scattered about the valley. We could also see Shahr-e Zohak to the east.

In the 13th century, the grandson of Genghis Khan was killed there. The Khan set his army on a genocidal rampage through the valley in retaliation. We could see, carved into the cliffs north of Bamiyan, the two empty colossal niches that, until March 2001, had housed the largest Buddha statues in the world. The destruction of the Buddha statues is portrayed in the West as an act of religious fanaticism by the Taliban. According to Zahir, however, the destruction was a calculated act of cultural cleansing and ethnic subjugation of the Indigenous Hazara people. This deliberate process of ethnic subjugation began at least as early as the late 17th century when the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb’s army first defaced the East Asian facial features of the Buddha statues. Zahir suggests the Buddha statues were defaced because they resembled the features of local Hazaras, although this is a contentious theory.

At the base of the Bamiyan cliffs, we could see the ruins of the famous bazaar of Bamiyan destroyed during battles in the early 1990s between the Hazara Islamic Unity Party and the National Islamic United Front. The United Front became better known as the Northern Alliance when these forces were used as NATO’s ground troops to take Kabul, in 2001.

Both Aziz and Zahir told us they are fearful the historical subjugation of the Indigenous Hazara will continue and could intensify when mining companies move into Bamiyan. When empires compete over resources, ethnic groups are often enlisted as proxy forces in the fight for wealth.

The Hazara people, Zahir told us, like all the people of the almost two dozen distinct Indigenous ethnic groups scattered throughout Afghanistan, have a deep psychological attachment to their land. They know only too well the brutal history of invading armies that threatened their lives, their livelihoods, and their traditional claims to their land. During our travels, many Afghans, from all walks of life and different ethnic groups, told us they regard the current NATO occupation no differently than previous occupations by the Soviet military, the British military, or any of the other imperial armies that have invaded Afghanistan.

Leaders of the NATO states claim the current occupation of Afghanistan is different from previous imperial occupations. But the question remains as to how the current occupying forces will deal with Afghanistan’s natural resources: who will get access, who will benefit, and whose livelihoods and land will be sacrificed to mining? Recognizing the long global history of extractive industries—including the domestic and global practices of Canadian extractive industries—our two Afghan friends told us they are not hopeful that the Indigenous peoples who will be affected by mining development will be fairly compensated or that the environment will be adequately protected.

Michael Skinner is a researcher at the York Centre for International and Security Studies with the Afghanistan Canada Research Group (ACRG). In 2007, Skinner and his research partner Hamayon Rastgar travelled throughout Afghanistan, where they listened to Afghans from all walks of life who do not have a voice in the Western media.

Recent critiques of the NYT article have been written by Marc Ambinder in The Atlantic and by Paul Jay on The Real News Network.

Malalai Joya: Canada must withdraw troops from Afghanistan immediately

Tim McSorley — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 15:20:17 +0000

I have just completed a two-week speaking tour across Canada, bringing a message to the great people of this country: The people of Afghanistan are fed up with the occupation of their country and with the corrupt, Mafia-state of Hamid Karzai and the warlords and drug lords backed by NATO.

On behalf of the suffering people of Afghanistan, I offer my condolences to the families here who have lost their loved ones. I believe these fallen soldiers, themselves, are the victims of the wrong policy of your government. The families of Afghan civilians killed in this war share your feelings of loss.

If we turn these sorrows into strength, we can end this war. Bringing the troops home at the end of 2011 is too late; the troops should be withdrawn as soon as possible, before more Afghan and Canadian lives are needlessly lost.

Today, it has become an open secret that the Canadian government of Stephen Harper has been complicit in the torture of countless innocent Afghans. This is just one reason people in Kandahar and across my country are tired of this war.

It is clear now that the real motive of the US and its allies, hidden behind the so-called "war on terror", was to convert Afghanistan into a military base in Central Asia and the capital of the world’s opium drug trade. Ordinary Afghan people are being used in this chess game, and western taxpayers’ money and the blood of soldiers is being wasted on this agenda that will only further destabilize the region.

The recent so-called election in Afghanistan tells you all you need to know about what kind of "democracy" has been imposed by the occupation. It is ridiculous to Afghans that the Harper government and Defence Minister Peter MacKay have called this process a "successful election".

Even the cats of Afghanistan laugh at this kind of statement, because everyone knows that this was the most fraudulent election possible. Before the vote, people on the streets predicted the outcome with a proverb, "It will be the same donkey with a new saddle." In the end, in fact, we have seen that even the saddle—Karzai—is not new.

Now that Karzai has been inaugurated again, the nature of his government is more obvious than ever. Both of his new vice-presidents, Fahim and Khalili, are warlords with the blood of innocents on their hands. In Kandahar, where Canadian troops have been stationed for years, Karzai’s brother is reported to be involved in drug trafficking, and the New York Times recently reported that he’s been receiving regular payments from the American CIA.

So do not be deceived by talk of Karzai cleaning up corruption. His appointment of a new anticorruption team is a case of the rabbit being put in charge of the carrots.

Torture, drug trafficking, the continued rule of warlords and fundamentalists—these are the only things that this war has brought Afghans. Today, our people are being vicitimized by two enemies: the occupation forces bombing us from the sky, and the warlords and their Taliban brothers-in-creed.

If the troops withdraw, it will be easier for Afghans to fight one enemy and to determine our own future. It is the duty of the Afghan people to work for freedom and democracy; these values can never be donated to us by the very foreign powers who—after nearly three decades of funding various fundamentalists are arming warlords and other criminals—are responsible for many of the problems Afghanistan faces today.

While I am opposed to the policy of the Canadian government in Afghanistan, I have been very moved by the support of ordinary people across this country, from Victoria to Halifax. Having spoken to big public meetings in cities right across this country, it is clear that the Canadian people are fed up with their government's policy in Afghanistan. Let's raise our voices together to end this unjust and devastating war.

Malalai Joya was the youngest woman elected to the Afghan Parliament in 2005. She has recently completed a cross-Canada book tour in support of her new political memoir, written with Vancouver writer and activist Derrick O'Keefe, A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice. This article originally ran on straight.com. Re-printed with permission.

Malalai Joya

Obama's Afghan plan

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:30:06 +0000

Roy Gutman, Foreign Editor of McClatchy Newspapers says Obama's announcement last week of his strategy in Afghanistan is unprecedented and is a "very good start." He says the problem has been that, "the United States has not had an integrated strategy for stabilizing Afghanistan and Pakistan."

The rights of women in Afghanistan

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:28:31 +0000

Mavis Leno of Feminist Majority on the need for Obama to focus on the rights of Afghan women. Mavis has been the chair of the Feminist Majority Foundation's Campaign to Stop Gender Apartheid in Afghanistan since 1997.

The secrets of Obama's surge

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:27:17 +0000

President Obama's highly anticipated new strategy for what the Pentagon now calls AfPak - Afghanistan and Pakistan - is full of grey areas. Most extra troops will be deployed to poppy-growing areas, not to fight al-Qaeda, the President's stated number one objective. The President talks about building trust - but as the US cannot trust the Pakistani ISI, the Pakistani people don't trust the US or even their own government.

Why are we in Afghanistan?

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:26:32 +0000

The Real News Cafe: Recorded live at the Gladstone in Toronto, a Real News panel takes on the Afghan war This is the first segment of a multi-part series on the Afghan war. Other segments will follow throughout the week.

Dangerous decisions in Afghanistan Pt. 1

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:22:13 +0000

Sharmini Peries speaks with Senior Analyst Aijaz Ahmad about the dangers of the long-term US involvement in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Ahmad says the only way for Obama to proceed in the region is to withdraw US military presence there and strengthen regional powers for a stable Afghanistan.

Canadian Drones Patrol Afghan Airspace

dawn — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 10:19:45 +0000

Unmanned warplanes stretch the definition of "nation building"

MONTREAL–War is rising to new heights over Afghanistan. Flying thousands of feet over the frontlines of Kandahar are several new unmanned military planes recently activated by the Canadian Army.

Beyond reach of the human eye, the advanced spy aircraft, the Heron, will monitor territory throughout southern Afghanistan from dizzying altitudes, delivering information for military strikes.

In early December two Afghans were killed in a targeted attack by Canadian forces on the basis of information gathered by the spy drones. According to military officials the Afghans killed were members of the Taliban. However, this has not been independently verified.

Far beyond the visual capacities of local Afghan authorities, the Heron will provide hyper details on human movements and activities allowing "ground forces to see...in real time [the] images acquired by the aircraft's sensors on a laptop on the ground," according to the Canadian Army.

Highly advanced spy aircrafts hovering over Afghanistan, collecting information on local movements, serve as a poignant reminder of Canada's role as a foreign military force in the country, operating beyond the domain of 'nation building' or reconstruction efforts.

Canada’s multi-million dollar unmanned spy airplanes are a direct result of recommendations stemming from the Conservative-government-initiated commission on Canada’s role in Afghanistan, headed by former Liberal cabinet minister John Manley. The commission's report paved the way for the controversial extension of combat operations until 2011.

"There simply are not enough troops to ensure that the job can be properly done in Kandahar province...We hope that this [report] is not a poison pill," said Manley at a media conference after the release of the report. The report specifically outlined Canada’s acquisition of “high-performance unmanned aerial vehicles for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance” before February 2009 as a condition to extend the mission.

According to multiple opinion polls, the majority of people in Canada oppose the war in Afghanistan. It was the technicalities of war, however, and not the essential nature or context of the Canadian military presence in the country that were the subject of critique in the government-sponsored report.

“Operations on the ground in Afghanistan are easier for the Canadian government to present in their narrative of humanitarian war,” said Sophie Schoen, a Montreal-based anti-war activist with Block the Empire.

However, according to Schoen, “Canada’s military role in the sky makes it clear that the mission is not humanitarian. [The recent] expansions of military capabilities in the air is indicative of the real nature of Canada’s mission in Afghanistan and our role as an occupying force.”

Operating from the skies allows Canada a huge technological advantage over local guerrillas in southern Afghanistan. The advantage of aerial combat is especially important in light of recent events that suggest the US-backed government in Kabul is losing political control over major regions in the country, including Kandahar, where Canadian forces are stationed.

Last June, militias staged a spectacular jailbreak at the main prison in Kandahar, freeing up to 1,000 prisoners by blowing through the prison walls with explosives. This action set a new benchmark for the growing capacities of rebels in southern Afghanistan.

Hundreds have been killed in southern Afghanistan this past year, while US and Canadian military officials – as in Iraq – continue to ignore demands from human rights organizations that they keep records on civilian deaths.

“The number of civilians killed by the international forces in Afghanistan remains significantly underreported,” stated Amnesty International in a 2008 report.

“Taliban is a label applied to any male over 18 that the Canadian Army kills in Afghanistan, a term that is so broadly applied it is absurd,” said Schoen. "Generally this term, Taliban, is used without any verification and is used to cover up killings carried out by Canadian forces."

The spy drones that fly over Kandahar providing details for Canadian military strikes are adding another military layer to the thousands of foreign troops already occupying the country.

After decades of conflict in Afghanistan and thousands of civilian deaths since the 2001 US-led invasion, one key point has been clearly repeated by progressive voices inside Afghanistan: military-driven solutions delivered by foreign forces will not provide safety or stability for the country.

“We need liberation, not occupation,” said Malalai Joya, celebrated member of the Afghan Parliament, in a recent interview. “Afghans have a long history of fighting foreign occupation and if the[...]occupation lasts longer we may witness many mass resistance movements against it.”

A version of this article was originally published by the community newspaper, Sada al-Mashrek, based in Montreal.

Stefan Christoff is a community organizer and journalist based in Montreal and a member of Tadamon!, a collective of social justice activists in Montreal working for justice in the Middle East.

HighwayOfHeroes

Explosive Lamenting

Lia Tarachansky — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:13:51 +0000

Walking among the smiling, excited crowds, it’s almost possible to forget that we’re at war. It's eerie and bewildering to be so far from it. During the first Gulf War we were sitting in bunkers in gas masks, and even though Haifa was only lightly bombed, it wasn't this removed. Then there's of course suicide bombings, but I refuse to think about that considering the constant carpet bombing Palestinians endure. But in this country, I find so easy to forget that I'm at war. That we're at war in my name. It's easy to forget, that is, until that first firework goes off. Nightfall amazement among half-open mouths, staring into an illuminated sky.

I force myself to keep my eyes open so my brain overrides my mind and reminds me that it is, indeed, just fireworks. Each one, large one, awe-inducing one, sends shivers through me. Each one, large one, forcing me into the foetal position, covering my head with my arms, trying as hard as I can to not twitch every time, fear someone sees. Fear someone sees I’m not enjoying this. Fear someone sees that some of us remember we are at war.

I look at the exploding sky and note the difference. The ground doesn’t shake. There are no fires. The screaming all around is that of joy and not of agony. No ambulances and black smoke in the distance. No anxious speeding of your heart as you hear that screech through the sky with one propelling flame- whisking, zipping up, louder, louder, louder- EXPLOSION.