Resurgent Taliban strangles southern heartland

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Nov 16: Thousands of cars, gleaming in the desert sun, fill sales yards along the road to the airport in Afghanistan's second city.

The shops and bazaars of Kandahar are full to bursting.

But the prosperity is deceptive in the city where the Taliban was born, now a centre of violence amid a resurgence by the hardline Islamist group five years after it was toppled from power by US-led forces.

''It's getting worse. I am afraid -- these suicide attacks happen all the time,'' said Ahmad Shah, a 60-year-old tyre mechanic outside his shop -- an old shipping container on the airport road by the city gates.

''The foreigners fight only for themselves. The Taliban fight only for themselves.'' The road from the city to the airport, a major military base, has been the scene of many bombings targeting foreign troops.

In August, a suicide bomber rammed his car into a NATO convoy near Shah's shop, killing a civilian and wounding several more.

This has been the bloodiest year in Afghanistan since the Taliban's hardline government was ousted in November, 2001.

A resurgent Taliban is fighting back, fuelled by drug money, safe havens in Pakistan and growing frustration and anger among Afghans at the lack of reconstruction or a real economy.

''It is getting worse because they (the Taliban) have got stronger,'' Shah said. ''It's getting worse because people don't have jobs. They have nothing.'' Until recently, the Taliban had virtually surrounded Kandahar, where one-eyed Mullah Mohammad Omar began his movement in 1994.

TALIBAN OFFENSIVE

In September, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) launched a two-week offensive against the insurgents, killing at least 500. Attacks in the south have dropped since, but the Taliban remains strong and active.

''If it keeps going on like this, nothing will get better,'' said Faizal Huk, who runs one of about 70 car sales yards along the airport road. ''Fighting for the Taliban is like work. That's all they have.'' He estimates his business has almost halved in the past few months due to worsening violence. The middle-aged father of six never fled his homeland during years of Soviet occupation, civil war and Taliban rule.

''Now, I will go anywhere,'' he said. ''I spent all my life in Afghanistan. Now we will be refugees. I don't think things will improve. It is getting worse day-by-day. ''We don't have any hope for our children. Tomorrow or the day after we will die, we are old. What will happen to our children?'' Increasingly in Kandahar, people are talking of leaving the country or of friends or relatives who already have, although there is no real evidence yet of a mass exodus by residents.

The head of the 31,000-strong ISAF, British General David Richards, has warned failure to reinforce military victories with reconstruction, jobs and a better life is undermining the mission in Afghanistan. He says the next six months will be pivotal.

''The desire for a quick cheap war followed by a quick cheap peace is what has brought Afghanistan to the present, increasingly dangerous, situation,'' the International Crisis Group (ICG) think tank said in its latest report this month.

DANGEROUS CITY

In Kandahar, there is a long way to go. Provincial women's affairs department head Rona Trena says most aid groups have shut shop or dramatically pared back their work because of the danger.

''Everything comes back to security. It is getting worse every day,'' she said in her modest office, with almost no security despite the assassination of her predecessor.

''Reconstruction and development has slowed about 80 percent. We are also seeing a drop in the number of girls going to school.

''Many women have no jobs now. They are coming here looking for work because but they can't find anything because the (aid) projects have stopped.'' Many here and in Kabul blame Pakistan, home to a large number of ethnic Pashtuns who support the mainly Pashtun Taliban.

Senior intelligence officers say all training camps for the Taliban and other militant groups lie in Pakistan and say they have firm evidence Islamabad still supports its one-time protege.

The Pakistani government denies the charges.

''Pakistan has been at best a most grudging ally,'' the ICG said. ''The Taliban and al Qaeda found refuge there and regrouped.'' Security is tight around Kandahar, but it can be deceptive.

Gunfire occasionally crackles at night and the police at key posts are under-equipped, poorly paid. And scared.

At the main checkpoint where the highway from the opium capital of Helmand province enters Kandahar six constables have five AK-47s. Only one works. The magazines of the rest are empty.

They haven't been paid for five months, some don't have proper boots. They feed their families by taking home leftover bread from the lunch the police force gives them.

''We are just left here. No one comes to ask about us,'' complained 28-year-old Mohammad Arif.

If fighting erupted? ''We would run away,'' said Abdul Ahmad, 43, without hesitation. ''We don't want to die.''

Reuters