Radio Sahar: Disarmament in Herat’s Obe District

Weapons handed in voluntarily in district in western Afghanistan

Text of report by Afghan female-orientated community Radio Sahar on 2 October

[Presenter] Obe District [of Herat Province] has been announced part of the peace region. According to disarmament officials, the district has been included to other peace areas after a number of district residents pledged to hand over their weapons and ammunition. Hami Azad is reporting:

[Correspondent] In an exclusive interview with Radio Sahar, Gen Sayedi, the DIAG [Disbandment of Illegal Armed Groups] operations manager, has criticized government departments for not collaborating with the disarmament commission. The official says certain government departments have failed to cooperate with the commission.

[Gen Sayedi] I strongly criticize government departments because they collect weapons but do not hand them over to DIAG on time. They keep the weapons for some time and then they either submit them or continue keeping the confiscated weapons.

[Correspondent] The official is criticizing government departments at a time when security incidents have been on the rise in Herat Province and security officials blame the presence of weapons among illegal armed groups for causing this predicament.

At the same time, Mr Sayedi says that Obe District has joined the peace region after 84 machineguns of various types were collected. An amount of 200,000 US dollars has been allocated for construction projects in this district.

Obe is the third district joining the peace regions in Herat Province so far. According to the disarmament operations manager, the commission is planning to include Robat Sangi, Zendajan and Adraskan districts to the peace regions.

In addition, it is reported that security officials have handed over 50 machineguns of different types and 2 tonnes of ammunition to DIAG in Ghowr Province. The provincial security officials say they have collected the weapons and arms from the illegal armed groups in the past few months.

[Description of Source: Herat Radio Sahar in Dari -- local independent radio station in Herat run mainly by women.  OSC IAP20071002950057 Herat Radio Sahar in Dari 1230 GMT 02 Oct 07]