PAN 47th MEDITATION FOCUS

3. MORE INFORMATION ON THIS MEDITATION FOCUS

This section is for those who wish to understand in more details the
situation outlined in this Meditation Focus. For those who wish to read on,
we would encourage you to view the following information from a positive
perspective, and not allow the details to tinge the positive vision you
wish to hold in meditation. Since what we focus on grows, the more positive
our mindset, the more successful we will be in manifesting a vision of
healing. We provide the details below because we recognize that the
knowledge of what needs healing can assist us to structure our awareness to
maximise our healing effect.

From:
http://us.news2.yimg.com/f/42/31/7m/dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010914/ts/terrorist_attacks_8.html

Senate Approves Military Force
(Friday September 14)

WASHINGTON (AP) - The nation on maximum alert, President Bush is activating
up to 50,000 (35,000 according to several U.S news broadcasts) members of
the National Guard and Reserve in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks.
The Senate voted by resounding 96-0 and 98-0 counts to provide $40 billion
and authorize military force to fight terrorism.

Bush met with his Cabinet at the White House Friday morning, the constant
hum of helicopters overhead. He planned to call up the Guard and Reserve
members to aid in recovery and security efforts, officials said.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld opened the meeting with a prayer
asking for ``patience to measure our lust for action, resolve to strengthen
our obligation to lead, wisdom to illuminate our pursuit of justice and
strength in defense of liberty.''

After voting 96-0 for the financial help, the Senate turned immediately to
a second measure endorsing the use of force in what Bush and many lawmakers
have called a war against terrorists. That vote was 98-0.

Bush was pledging a global campaign to whip terrorism and the likes of
Osama bin Laden at the same time Americans grieve over the attacks that
claimed thousands of lives in New York and Washington

CLIP

New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said 4,763 people were reported missing at
the World Trade Center site, where hijackers flew two jetliners fully
loaded with fuel into the twin towers Tuesday morning. There were 184
confirmed fatalities.

Authorities said they expected 190 deaths at the Pentagon, where a third
plane blew a hole in one side of the nation's five-sided defense nerve
center. A fourth hijacked plane crashed in a rural area of Pennsylvania,
with 65 aboard.

CLIP

In Washington, Congress was moving with uncommon speed to approve tens of
billions of dollars for anti-terrorism and rebuilding, and legislation
authorizing military action was likely, as well.

Administration officials said no military response was imminent - but that
didn't prevent officials from discussing it.

CLIP

---

See also

Formidable US weapons await target at:
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,3-2001320580,00.html

In-depth coverage about U.S. Military at
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/fc/US/US_Armed_Forces/

---

From: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010914/wl/attack_afghan_dc_7.html

Afghans Fearful of Possible US Strikes Flee Capital
(Friday September 14)

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghans fled their capital on Friday, fearful that the
United States might unleash its military might in retaliation for Tuesday's
devastating terror attacks on New York and Washington.

But the secretive, supreme leader of the ruling Taliban movement, Mullah
Mohamamd Omar, appeared to try to stem the exodus by issuing a message to
Afghans to face up to any U.S. assault.

Quoted by the Taliban's Voice of Shariat Radio, Omar's message asked
Afghans to be patient and steadfast and ``face any American attack with
courage and self-respect.''

With U.S. officials making it clear that they believe Saudi-born dissident
Osama bin Laden was in some way linked to the suicide attacks that
flattened the World Trade Center and blew a hole in the Pentagon (news -
web sites), and that the Taliban was protecting him, ordinary Afghans
feared the worst.

The Taliban vowed revenge ``by other means'' should Washington attack, and
their fundamentalist clerics used Friday prayers to call on the world's
Muslims to unite against the United States.

``Oh Muslims of the world, we should unite together if the United States
attacks us,'' one cleric told the faithful at a Kabul mosque.

``We won't die without His will, so don't be frightened,'' said another.

But ordinary Afghans were feeling less brave.

``In a situation like this, you feel that death is creeping up on you,''
said a baker. ``I am leaving Kabul with my family and can't wait any
longer.

Although figures were not available, one resident said any Afghans with
relatives in the countryside had left, or were making plans to do so.

Residents have been following the aftermath of Tuesday's attacks on New
York and Washington, mostly by listening to foreign radio stations.
Television has been banned by the Taliban, and the few international phone
lines have been cut for security reasons.

NO STRANGERS TO CONFLICT

Although no strangers to conflict after 23 years of war, even ordinary
Afghans have been shocked at the suicide hijackers flying airliners into
U.S. landmarks.

``We don't suggest that America should ignore what happened to their people
and country, but keep in mind our fragile condition too,'' said one man as
he got ready to leave.

Mullah Omar broke his silence on Friday by insisting neither bin Laden nor
Afghanistan was capable of planning such large and skilled operations as
Tuesday's terror attacks.

``Training of pilots is the work of a running government,'' he said in a
statement read by his ambassador to neighboring Pakistan in Islamabad.
``Osama has no pilots, and where did he train them? In Afghanistan there is
no such possibility for the training.''

Significantly, the statement by the Taliban's leader -- who rarely gives
interviews, has never been filmed or photographed and has met just two
non-Muslims in his entire life -- failed to condemn Tuesday's terror
attacks or even sympathize with relatives of the victims.

The Taliban's official spokesman was even more defiant.

``We will take revenge if America attacks through different means,'' Abdul
Hai Mutamaen told reporters in the capital.

FOREIGNERS PULL OUT

Most foreign aid workers pulled out on Thursday, although the International
Committee of the Red Cross retains a presence. Diplomats in Kabul to visit
eight foreign aid workers detained for promoting Christianity have also
left.

The United Nations has closed its offices and suspended flights --
drought-ridden and impoverished Afghanistan's only international air links
as a result of sanctions imposed over the presence of bin Laden.

While making clear bin Laden was a suspect, Secretary of State Colin Powell
stressed the U.S. would also root out those guilty of assaults against U.S.
personnel and allies in the past, wherever they may now be.

U.S. officials are seeking cooperation from Pakistan because it is the main
backer of the Taliban, a movement otherwise only recognized by Saudi Arabia
and the United Arab Emirates.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage handed over a list of steps
Washington wanted Pakistan to take. U.S. officials said these included
permission to overfly Pakistan with military aircraft and ``military
access,'' the closure of its border with Afghanistan and halting fuel
supplies to the Taliban.

Pakistan military ruler General Pervez Musharraf has pledged cooperation,
but it remains to be seen what form this will take.

``If Pakistan co-operates...then it should wait for the enmity of Afghans
which is more dangerous than any other thing,'' the Taliban spokesman said.

The Taliban emerged from religious schools in Pakistan's northwest in 1994,
sweeping to power in Kabul two years later.

They have imposed a strictly fundamentalist interpretation of Islam on
Afghanistan since taking control of most of the country and have been
criticized even by other Muslim nations for their treatment of women and
the recent destruction of Afghanistan's ancient non-Islamic cultural
heritage.

---

See also:

AFGHANISTAN - CRISIS OF IMPUNITY
The Role of Pakistan, Russia, and Iran in Fueling the Civil War at:
http://www.hrw.org/reports/2001/afghan2/

From: http://www.hrw.org/reports/2001/afghan2/Afghan0701.htm

I. SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The civil war in Afghanistan, a geopolitical battleground during the cold
war, is once again being sponsored by outside parties: Pakistan, Iran,
Russia, and other neighboring countries, with the United States and India
working in other ways to influence the war's outcome. A country whose main
economic activity is as a global arms market and smuggling hub is
threatening to become, again, a theater of geopolitical competition.
Meanwhile, the humanitarian toll of twenty years of fighting-some 1.5
million deaths and the massive displacement of populations, famine, and the
ruin of the country's economic base-has not figured prominently in
international policy on Afghanistan. Instead, several members of the Six
Plus Two contact group, the six countries bordering Afghanistan, plus
Russia and the U.S. that are nominally committed to negotiating an end to
the war, are providing military and material support to Afghan parties that
have committed gross violations of the laws of war.1

The general outlines of the delivery of military support to both sides-the
Taliban in Kabul and the loose coalition of forces known as the United
Front2-in Afghanistan are well known to experts monitoring the situation
but not to a wider public. In light of the possibility of broadening
military sponsorship of the warring factions, Human Rights Watch has
investigated the delivery of arms and other forms of military aid to both
sides and the impact of this aid on human rights. This report details the
nature of military support provided to the warring parties, the major
transit routes used to move arms and other equipment, the suppliers, the
role of state and nonstate actors, and the response of the international
community. The implications of foreign military assistance go beyond
Afghanistan, as the war also poses a threat to regional security: armed
groups in neighboring Uzbekistan and Tajikistan are obtaining military
support from the well-supplied Afghan factions.3

Both the Taliban and the United Front have failed to ensure that the
fundamental human rights of the Afghan population under their control are
protected. Some five million are refugees, with the remainder displaced
throughout the country because of fighting between Taliban and United Front
forces and the devastating effects of a three-year drought. Millions inside
the country are facing starvation and drought, some of the world's highest
infant and maternal mortality rates, and a health care system in ruins.4

While the international community has provided some assistance to address
the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, some members simultaneously are
fueling the war. Moreover, U.N. sanctions imposed on arms and fuel to the
Taliban in December 2000 are one-sided and strongly influenced by
short-term U.S. and Russian interests, not humanitarian goals: the U.S.
seeks to induce the Taliban to hand over Osama bin Laden, the exiled Saudi
billionaire suspected of orchestrating the 1998 attacks on U.S. embassies
in Kenya and Tanzania; Russia seeks to curb Taliban support for insurgents
in Chechnya and states of the former Soviet Union, like Uzbekistan.

International Sponsors Lined up with the Taliban is Pakistan, which has
supported various factions within Afghanistan since at least the 1970s.
Official denials notwithstanding, Pakistan has provided the Taliban with
military advisers and logistical support during key battles, has bankrolled
the Taliban, has facilitated transshipment of arms, ammunition, and fuel
through its territory, and has openly encouraged the recruitment of
Pakistanis to fight for the Taliban. In flagrant violation of the U.N.
sanctions imposed in December 2000, Pakistan has continued to permit arms
to cross its borders into Taliban-controlled territory. According to
sources in Afghanistan and Pakistan, in April and May 2001 up to thirty
trucks were crossing the border at Torkham daily en route to Jalalabad; at
least some of these were carrying tank rounds, artillery shells, and
rocket-propelled grenades.5 Pakistani antipersonnel and antivehicle mines
have been found in Afghanistan. Observers interviewed by Human Rights Watch
in Afghanistan and Pakistan have also reported that Pakistani aircraft
assisted with troop rotations of Taliban forces during combat operations in
late 2000 and that senior members of Pakistan's intelligence agency and
army were involved in planning military operations.6

A range of private and semi-private agencies in Pakistan has provided
enormous support to the Taliban with the full knowledge of government
officials, even when their actions violated Pakistani law. In addition,
Saudi Arabia has provided funds and heavily subsidized fuel to the Taliban,
through Pakistan, while private actors and some officials benefit from the
smuggling that links these countries. The extent of outside support,
particularly during the Taliban's northern offensive in late 2000, was
noted by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in a November 2000 report to the
General Assembly.7

Supporting the United Front are Iran and Russia, with secondary roles
played by Tajikistan and, at least until 1998, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan,
and Kyrgyzstan. Iran has provided weapons, large-scale funding, and
training. Russia has played a crucial enabling role in the resupply of
United Front forces by arranging for the transport of Iranian aid, as well
as providing direct military assistance itself, including transport
helicopters in late 2000. Military assistance to United Front forces has
crossed the Tajikistan-Afghanistan border with the active collusion of the
Russian government.

Almost none of the arms transfers that have gone through has been publicly
documented via submissions to the U.N. register on conventional arms. In
fact, several of the implicated governments also participate in the
so-called Six Plus Two contact group whose mandate is to negotiate a
settlement to the war and whose members have publicly pledged not to
provide military support to Afghan combatants.

CLIP

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From: http://english.pravda.ru/main/2001/09/14/15203.html

U.S.A. PLANS TO ATTACK AFGHANISTAN FROM RUSSIAN MILITARY BASES

This possibility is being discussed by the US administration and the
Russian authorities. In particular, under discussion is using Russian
military bases in the Central Asian republic of Tajikistan and also the
former Soviet base in Bagram, on Afghanistan's territory, controlled by the
North Alliance, according to New York Post. But to what extent can one
trust this information? Nobody knows. Such rumour have been circulating for
several days. By the way, as PRAVDA.Ru has already reported, the Taliban
leadership warned today Tajikistan that it this country is used as a base
for US troops' invasion into Afghanistan, all the responsibility will laid
upon Tajikistan itself and only then upon the USA. That is to say, Taliban
is ready to declare war on Tajikistan. The experience is that such warnings
should be taken seriously. In the meantime, Russia's Defence Minister
Sergei Ivanov told journalists today that the territory of Central Asian
countries should not be use for a possible US operation against
Afganistan's Taliban leadership. "I do not see any reasons for even a
hypothetical possibility of NATO's military operation on the territory of
Central Asian countries incorporated in the Commonwealth of Independent
States," the minister is quoted as saying.

---

From: http://www.nyt.com/2001/09/13/international/asia/13AFGH.html

Taliban Plead for Mercy to the Miserable in a Land of Nothing

ABUL, Afghanistan, Sept. 12 - If there are Americans clamoring to bomb
Afghanistan back to the Stone Age, they ought to know that this nation does
not have so far to go. This is a post-apocalyptic place of felled cities,
parched land and downtrodden people.

The fragility of this country was part of the message the Taliban
government conveyed in a plea for restraint issued late tonight. It said in
part, "We appeal to the United States not to put Afghanistan into more
misery because our people have suffered so much."

Whatever Afghanistan's current cataclysm, its next one seems to require
little time to overtake it. Wars fought by sundry protagonists have gone on
now for 22 consecutive years, a remorseless drought for 4. Since 1996, most
of the nation has been ruled by Taliban mullahs whose vision of the world's
purest Islamic state has at least as much to do with controlling social
behavior as vouchsafing social welfare.

The accused terrorist Osama bin Laden has found a home here, angering much
of the world. In 1998, America fired a volley of more than 70 cruise
missiles at guerrilla training camps reportedly operated by the Saudi
multimillionaire. Now, there seems to be the prospect of another barrage,
with Afghan hospitality to the same man as the cause.

CLIP

Full coverage on Afghanistan at
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/fc/World/Afghanistan/ 


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