Fars News Agency: Iran Hopeful About Boosting Economic Exchanges With Afghanistan

October 19, 2007

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki expressed hope that trade and economic exchanges between Iran and Afghanistan would increase in future.

Mottaki made the remarks in a meeting with Afghanistan’s Energy, Water and Power Minister Ismail Khan in Herat on Friday, where the two sides reviewed latest developments in the two countries’ ties as well as projects underway in the city of Herat.

Also in the meeting, Mottaki noted the two nation’s interests, and viewed Tehran-Kabul ties as developing.

He hoped that longer strides would be taken for the boosting of the two sides’ trade exchanges, implementation of joint ventures, facilitation of the visits of traders and industry owners and materialization of economic prosperity in light of the existing potentials.

The minister also stressed Iran’s deep eagerness to implement joint ventures and assist Afghanistan with technical and engineering services.

For his part, the Afghan minister underlined Iran’s positive role in his country, particularly in promoting trade activities and reconstruction of Herat, and expressed the hope that the two countries’ exchanges would increase.

Mottaki is in Afghanistan to attend the 17th ministerial meeting of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO).

The foreign ministers of ECO’s member states are scheduled to convene in Herat to attend a meeting on October 20.

Meantime, Iranian, Afghan and Tajik foreign ministers are scheduled to attend a trilateral meeting to study regional issues and discuss economic cooperation.

The Economic Cooperation Organization which was established in 1985 in pursuit of the promotion of economic, technical and cultural cooperation among the member states has now turned into a powerful body.

The organization was founded by Iran, Turkey and Pakistan but Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan jointed the block afterwards.

[Description of Source: Tehran Fars News Agency (Internet Version-WWW) in English -- Privately-owned news agency. It began operating in mid November 2002. Its managing editor is Mehdi Faza'eli, the editor in chief of the Javan daily and a member of the managerial board of the Association of Muslim Journalists. The other members of the board of directors of the news agency, are Alizera Shemirani, of Farda newspaper, Abdollah Moqaddam and Akbar Nabavi of Resalat newspaper, the former director of Farabi Foundation Hasan Eslami-Mehr, and university professor Abolhoseyn Ruholamin. OSC IAP20071019950066 1425 GMT 19 Oct 07.]

AFP: US general implicates Iran military in Afghan weapons find

October 18, 2007

KABUL (AFP) — The top US general in Afghanistan said Thursday it was hard to believe a convoy of high-technology explosives intercepted here last month could have arrived without the knowledge of the Iranian military.

The convoy from Iran, which was stopped on September 5 in western Afghanistan, reportedly contained armour-piercing bombs likely intended for insurgents fighting Afghan and international security forces here.

General Dan McNeill, head of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), confirmed to journalists in Kabul that the convoy had contained “a number of advanced technology improvised explosive devices.”

“It is difficult for me to conceive that this convoy could have originated in Iran and come to Afghanistan without at least the knowledge of the Iran military,” he said.

McNeill has said before that the shipment clearly came from across the border with Iran but that he could not say whether the Iranian government was involved.

US and British officials have alleged for months that weapons from Iran are going to the Taliban rebels fighting the Afghan government and its international allies. Tehran has denied the allegations.

AFP: No evidence Iran arming Taliban: Afghan foreign minister

October 19, 2007

HERAT, Afghanistan (AFP) — Afghan Foreign Minister Rangeen Dadfar Spanta said Friday there was no evidence that Iran was supplying weapons to Taliban militants waging a violent insurgency.

Spanta’s comments came after the top US commander in Afghanistan, General Dan McNeill, said Thursday a convoy of explosives intercepted last month had arrived from Iran and probably with the knowledge of the Iranian military.

“Our government has no evidence to show Iran is giving weapons to the Taliban and we have never stated this,” Spanta told reporters after meeting with his Iranian counterpart Manouchehr Mottaki in the western city of Herat.

US and British officials have alleged for months that weapons from Iran are going to the Taliban rebels fighting Kabul and its international allies, the main one being Washington with which Tehran has a strained relationship.

Iran has denied the allegations and Afghanistan has also said it has no proof.

Asked about McNeill’s statement, Mottaki said: “These are claims that they make. For us the motives behind these claims are clear.”

He did not elaborate but suggested there were contacts, which he did not make clear, between “terrorist groups in Afghanistan” and “political circles and European capitals.”

Iran was fully behind the reconstruction of post-Taliban Afghanistan, both ministers said.

McNeill, the head of the 40,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, was referring Thursday to a convoy from Iran which was stopped on September 5 in western Afghanistan.

It contained “a number of advanced technology improvised explosive devices,” he said.

“It is difficult for me to conceive that this convoy could have originated in Iran and come to Afghanistan without at least the knowledge of the Iran military,” he said.

The Afghan and Iranian ministers met with their Pakistani counterpart Khurshid Kasuri in Herat ahead of a conference Saturday of foreign ministers from 10 regional countries in the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO).

ECO incorporates Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

AFP: Ancient heritage of Herat disappearing bit by bit beneath concrete

October 19, 2007

HERAT, Afghanistan (AFP) — In the ancient Afghan city of Herat, the fight is on between restoring historical monuments, palaces and houses or demolishing them to make way for bleak structures of smoked glass and concrete.

The battle in this once-essential stop along the Silk Road seems to be going the way of demolition — even if much of it is illegal.

Reconstruction needs a lot of time and work, as well as money and craftsmen skilled in ancient techniques necessary for recreating the vision of ancient architectural plans.

Herat is one of the few cities in Central Asia to have kept its medieval structure despite the march of time and the ravages of war.

In the 1980s the city near the Iranian border was home to around 200,000 inhabitants; today about three million people live here and the buildings stretch for miles.

Those who have swapped their traditional mudbrick homes for the new concrete blocks say they left to escape “the absence of comfort: running water, hot water, electricity and sanitation,” says Bismillah Fateh from the Agha Khan Trust for Culture.

The trust is working to restore a number of sites and lodgings in the western city which is more than 2,000 years old.

“It is a fight every day,” says Daud Sidiq, an architect with the foundation who has restored the Malik Cisterne and Mosque at the foot of the imposing Ikhtyaruddin citadel, the present structure of which was built in the 15th century.

Work is also underway on the palace of Attarbashi, the home of a wealthy physician that was constructed at the turn of the century and which is being restored with the agreement of the owner.

Winter and summer apartments face into a rectangular courtyard. Workers have put a large waterproof plastic sheet into the roof, a contemporary addition to a traditional technique.

Columns of stucco, reinforced with steel and asphalt, are whitewashed with a material made of limestone, ashes and flax, says Sidiq. For added protection from aging, nothing is better than mixing in “egg white, cooking oil and flour,” he says.

“We have been working for three months to bring back the old house,” says the architect, who is passionate about this undertaking.

Down narrow lanes, the historic homes of Kebabi and Akhawan have been entirely renovated and returned to their owners or their descendants.

To enter through their huge wooden gates, one has to choose between two large knockers — one for men and one for women: their different tones alert those inside to whether a man or a woman should answer.

In this maze, traditional structures are being given new life.

There is new paving in the old Jewish quarters, deserted in the 1970s. Two synagogues have been reconverted into a mosque and a school; one remains in ruins and another, its inside painted shiny blue, is being repaired.

The hamman, or bath, is again functioning for a male clientele.

“It is not a very expensive programme,” says Agha Khan urban planner Anna Soave, and there is support from a number of European nongovernment organisations.

The Commission for the Development of the Old City of Herat was created in 2005 but is handicapped by poor coordination between its members who include government and local groups.

The result: an acceleration of the demolition of the old and construction of illegal villas.

“All the illegal construction must be destroyed,” provincial governor Hossein Anwari said.