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Afghanistan Turns Away Plane Carrying Its Vice President Wall Street Journal (subscription) KABULA plane carrying a top Afghan official under investigation for kidnapping and raping a political rival was prevented from landing in northern Afghanistan, authorities said Tuesday. The official, First Vice President Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, was ... Afghan Vice President's Return Thwarted as Plane Is Turned BackNew York Times Noor says no legal hindrance for Gen. Dostum's return to AfghanistanKhaama Press (press release) (blog) all 12 news articles »

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Afghanistan Turns Away Plane Carrying Its Vice President - Wall Street Journal (subscription)

Christina Gregg, AOL.com

Jul 18th 2017 1:37PM

President Trump's eldest daughter and senior adviser greeted participants at a global robotics competition in Washington on Tuesday, paying a special visit to one team that struggled to get visa clearance before the event.

The FIRST Global competition is an annual event put on by the non-profit with a mission of inspiring STEM around the world.

"With 160+ countries represented, @FIRSTweets goes beyond robotics," Ivanka Trump wrote with a Twitter post on Tuesday. "It is a game everyone can play & where everyone can turn pro!"

Click through to see photos from Ivanka's appearance at the robotics competition:

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Ivanka Trump greets participants at global robotics conference

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The six girls representing Afghanistan in the competition faced an uphill battle leading up to the July event when they were twice denied visas allowing them to participate. Eventually, President Trump and Washington officials involved themselves in the affair, and all participants -- even those from Yemen and Syria -- were allowed to come to Washington for the robotics event.

The U.S. team was paired with the Afghanistan team on Tuesday morning before the competition began, during which Ivanka Trump visited and shared some words with the girls.

"For many of you who have traveled great lengths to be here, we welcome you," Ivanka said, smiling at the Afghan girls. "It's a privilege and an honor to have you all with us."

The competition will conclude with an awards ceremony on Tuesday night, after which many team participants will spend the rest of the week touring the nation's capital.

"I am excited to meet these young men and women, whose work ethic, ingenuity and passion has driven them to achieve tremendous success and granted them the opportunity to represent their home countries at this challenging competition," Ivanka Trump echoed in an Instagram post. "Teaching robotics and engineering skills to the next generation of innovators is critical to the future of our economy and the world!"

RELATED: A look at the FIRST Global robotics conference:

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FIRST Global robotics conference

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Team Portugal talks business in the hallways during the robot cometition July 17, 2017 at the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

A member of the Lebanon Team looks up for a photo while working his booth with team computer during the robot cometition July 17, 2017 at the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

Members of the Morocco robotic team work on their robot July 17, 2017 outside the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

Computer aficiendos from Lebanon (rainbow hair) and Oceania(blue shirts) do a version of the Macarena in the hallways during the robot cometition July 17, 2017 at the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

A member of the Senegal team works on the team computer during the robot cometition July 17, 2017 at the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 17: Participants compete during the first of two days of the First Global International Robot Olympics, an international robotic challenge, July 17, 2017 at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. Teams from over 150 countries, including an all-girl team from Afghanistan whose visas had been initially denied to enter the U.S., took part in the competition. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

One of the members of the United Arab Emirates robotics team carries his robot to the comptetion floor July 17, 2017 outside the 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 17: A member of Team Libya works on his team's robot during the first of two days of the First Global International Robot Olympics, an international robotic challenge, July 17, 2017 at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. Teams from over 150 countries, including an all-girl team from Afghanistan whose visas had been initially denied to enter the U.S., took part in the competition. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 17: (2nd L-R) Rodaba Noori, Yasimin Yasinzadah, Somayeh Faruqi, Kawsar Roshan, and Lida Azizi of Team Afghanistan test their team's robot as coach Alireza Mehraban (L) looks on during the first of two days of the First Global International Robot Olympics, an international robotic challenge, July 17, 2017 at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, DC. Teams from over 150 countries, including an all-girl team from Afghanistan whose visas had been initially denied to enter the U.S., took part in the competition. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Members of the Afghan all-girls robotics team make adjustments to the team robot in the practice area July 17, 2017, between 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall, in Washington, DC. A team of Afghan girls prevailed in their first encounter at an international robotics competition in Washington Monday, but the result was perhaps less significant than the fact they made it at all. Twice denied visas into the United States until a late intervention by the Trump administration, the team of six from the war-torn country's western Herat are now determined to strike a blow for gender equality and national pride. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

Members of the Afghan all-girls robotics team make adjustments to the team robot in the practice area on July 17, 2017, between 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall, in Washington, DC. A team of Afghan girls prevailed in their first encounter at an international robotics competition in Washington Monday, but the result was perhaps less significant than the fact they made it at all. Twice denied visas into the United States until a late intervention by the Trump administration, the team of six from the war-torn country's western Herat are now determined to strike a blow for gender equality and national pride. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC- JULY 15: L-R, Katie Johnson, Sanjna Ravichandar, and Colleen Johnson, sit with their robot while watching the FIRST Global competition held at the DAR building (Photo by April Greer For The Washington Post via Getty Images)

A member of the Afghan all-girls robotics team makes a few adjustments to her team's robot on July 17, 2017, between 2017 FIRST Global Challenge competitions at DAR Constitution Hall, in Washington, DC. A team of Afghan girls prevailed in their first encounter at an international robotics competition in Washington Monday, but the result was perhaps less significant than the fact they made it at all. Twice denied visas into the United States until a late intervention by the Trump administration, the team of six from the war-torn country's western Herat are now determined to strike a blow for gender equality and national pride. / AFP PHOTO / PAUL J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC- JULY 15: L-R, Katie and Colleen Johnson, and Sanjna Ravichandar hold their group's robot at the FIRST Global competition held at the DAR building. (Photo by April Greer For The Washington Post via Getty Images)

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PHOTOS: Ivanka Trump attends global robotics conference, meets Afghanistan team - AOL

With the stark injustices women and girls continue to face in the country, Afghanistans Sesame Streethas unveiled a new boy muppet whose mission it is to promote gender equality.

Last month,Sesame Workshop introduced Zeerak, a 4-year-old male orange muppet who will be joining his big sister on Baghch-e-Simsim, Afghanistans local version of Sesame Street, an educational series for preschoolers.

According to the Sesame Workshops press release,Zeerak will fight for gender equality and girls education, among other issues, important topics for a country where girls have often been excluded from educational and other critical opportunities.

Kids in Afghanistan will meet Zeerak a little over a year after his sister, Zari, made her debut on the show. The 6-year-old girl has been an advocate for female empowerment.

In a male-dominant country like Afghanistan, I think you have to do some lessons for the males to respect the females. So by bringing a male character to the show who respects a female character, you teach the Afghan men that you have to respect your sister the same way as you do your brother, Massood Sanjer, head of TOLO TV, which broadcasts the show in Afghanistan, told The Associated Press.

WAKIL KOHSAR via Getty Images

During the Talibans rule in the 1990s, harsh laws were implemented in the country to drastically restrict social opportunity for women and girls, including outlawing school for girls and largely banning women from working outside the home.

While Afghanistan has made progress in terms of educational opportunities for girls, the country still lags globally in many categories measuring human development and gender equality.

At 14 percent, the literacy rate for Afghan women is among the lowest in the world, according to the United Nations Girls Education Initiative.

Meanwhile, between 2008 and 2012, about 21 percent of girls attended secondary school, compared to about 42 percent of boys, according to the United Nations Childrens Fund.

Despite recent gains, girls are still often forced to drop out of school because of realities including persistent conflict,the existence of early marriage and the fact that girls schools are still targetedby anti-government insurgentsopposed to educating women, according to UN Women, the United Nations body tasked with empowering women and fighting for gender equality.

WAKIL KOHSAR via Getty Images

To demonstrate the importance of education, Zeerak and Zari will be featured discussingthe benefits of school, and Zeerak is intent on listening to his sisters daily stories.

In show segments, Zari urges Zeerak to think about his future, what he wants to be when he grows up and how he can excel at future educational opportunities.

We know children learn best when they can identify with characters, and research shows that Zari has been a powerful role model for boys and girls alike, Sherrie Westin, an executive vice president at Sesame Workshop, said in the statement last month announcing the new characters. The debut of Zeerak builds on the incredible impact weve seen Zari achieve over the past year.

Sesame Street Musical Guests 35

Johnny Cash, "Five Feet High" (1973)

The best part of this is how mildly nonplussed Johnny Cash looks, as if he's not quite sure where he is.

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New Boy Muppet On Afghanistan's 'Sesame Street' Is A Feminist - HuffPost

A huge truck bomb detonated at a crowded traffic circle in Kabul in May was one of the deadliest strikes in the long Afghan war, and a reminder of how the battlefield has extended to the capital. That attack killed around 80 people, and though many of the people killed and injured were commuters on the streets, many other casualties were in office buildings close to the blast site. (Three women were killed in the bombing and another 52 injured.)

They made up more than a quarter of the total casualties, and child deaths were up 9 percent compared with the same period last year.

These civilian attacks need to stop, said David Skinner, the country director for the nongovernmental organization Save the Children. Not only do they injure and kill innocent people in the most horrific way, but they cause untold distress and trauma, especially for children, often leading to serious psychosocial issues and impacting their longer-term development.

The report blamed antigovernment forces for 67 percent of the civilian casualties, holding the Taliban responsible for 43 percent, the Islamic State for 5 percent and unidentified groups for 19 percent. But Afghans also suffer at the hands of government and allied forces, sometimes as they come across their unexploded ordnance.

The report commended government forces for reducing civilian casualties from ground engagements, including indiscriminate firing of mortars and other heavy weapons in civilian areas. In the meantime, it said, casualties caused by the insurgents use of homemade bombs had only increased. Roughly 40 percent of all civilian casualties 596 deaths and 1,483 injuries resulted from the insurgents use of such explosives, including suicide bombs, the report said.

The Taliban rejected the report in a statement, calling it one-sided and politically motivated.

Homemade bombs continue to be one of the Talibans main weapons, one that was on display again this week as Afghan forces tried to recapture the district of Nawa in the southern province of Helmand.

As Afghan forces pushed toward the district center this week, they had to defuse as many as 100 Taliban bombs, said Omar Zwak, a spokesman for the governor of Helmand.

Even as violence has increased in 15 of the countrys 34 provinces, mass-casualty attacks in the capital have killed the most civilians, the U.N. report said.

Ninety-four percent of the roughly 1,000 casualties in Kabul resulted from suicide bombings, the largest of which killed more than 90 people and wounded close to 500 when a truck full of explosives went off near the citys diplomatic enclave. (President Ashraf Ghani put the death toll from that bombing at 150.)

A drastically different case of civilian casualties occurred over the weekend in Kabul, an increasingly militarized city where checkpoints and security barriers have been proliferating. Guards for a senior government official opened fire on a wedding convoy passing in front of his heavily fortified street, killing the bride and another woman.

The Kabul police said that members of the wedding convoy had fired celebratory shots into the air as they were passing the home of Hajji Mohammad Mohaqiq, deputy chief executive of the Afghan government, and that his guards had thought they were under attack. Two of the guards have been arrested, said a police spokesman, Abdul Basir Mujahid.

A United States military raid last Thursday on the outskirts of Tarinkot city, the capital of Uruzgan Province in the south, resulted in civilian casualties, residents and officials said. Dust Muhammad Nayab, a spokesman for the governor of Uruzgan, said Taliban from all over had come to the rescue of the militants shadow governor, the target of the raid, so the fighting had become intense.

Six civilians have been killed and 12 others injured, including women and children in the cross-fighting, Mr. Nayab said.

Faiz Muhammad, 60, who lives on the outskirts of Tarinkot, said life had become difficult for his village even before the raid, with the Taliban warning people to leave before each offensive. He would take his family to the forested area of Sajawal, sometimes five times a month, and they would return after the fighting quieted down.

Last week, his family fled, but Mr. Muhammad stayed home to take care of the cattle. One night he heard planes, and the next morning he learned that a raid had taken place in Sajawal. Eight members of his family were killed, he said: his wife, Shapirai, 45; his son Abdul Khaliq, 28; a daughter-in-law; three other sons; and two young grandsons. Five other family members were wounded.

My heart is just bleeding, Mr. Muhammad said at the bedside of his 25-year-old son, Mujahid, in a hospital in nearby Kandahar. The doctors say my sons leg might need amputation. I am worried about his health if they do amputate, he will be half a man.

Capt. Bill Salvin of the United States Navy, a spokesman for the American military in Afghanistan, said the military had looked at the tapes and did not see evidence that civilians had been targeted. But he said a preliminary inquiry had been started, a routine response to any claim of civilian casualties.

Mujib Mashal reported from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan. Fahim Abed contributed reporting from Kabul.

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Afghanistan More Deadly for Women and Children, UN Says - New York Times

Heres a crazy idea floating around Washington these days, outlandish even by todays outlandish standards: The United States should hire a mercenary army to fix Afghanistan, a country where weve been at war since 2001, spending billions along the way. The big idea here is that they could extricate U.S. soldiers from this quagmire, and somehow solve it.

Not surprisingly, the private-military industry is behind this proposal. Erik D. Prince, a founder of the private military company Blackwater Worldwide, and Stephen A. Feinberg, a billionaire financier who owns the giant military contractor DynCorp International, each see a role for themselves in this future. Their proposal was offered at the request of Steve Bannon, President Donald Trumps chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, his senior adviser and son-in-law, according to people briefed on the conversations.

It could get worse. In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Prince laid out a plan whereby the fighting force would be led by an American viceroy who would report directly to Trump. Modeled after General Douglas MacArthur, who ruled Japan after World War II, the viceroy would consolidate all American power in a single person. His mission: Do whatever it takes to pacify Afghanistan. No more backseat driving of the war from pesky bureaucrats in Washington, or restrictive rules of engagement imposed on soldiers. An American viceroy with a privatized fighting force would make trains run on time in Afghanistanif they had trains.

Who would this viceroy be? Probably Prince had himself in mind, and that should worry everyone. Under his watch, Blackwater military contractors opened fire in a city square in Baghdad, killing 17 civilians in one of the worst episodes of the Iraq war. When asked by Congress how he addressed potential wrongdoing among his employees in 2007, he said: If there is any sort of problem, whether it's bad attitude, a dirty weapon, riding someone's bike that's not his, we fire him. If they don't hold to the standard, they have one decision to make: window or aisle.

Prince has been developing these ideas for a while. In his Journal op-ed, he wrote that the British East India Company should be the model for U.S. operations in Afghanistan. This private company was the instrument of British colonization of India for centuries, led by a viceroy with monarchical powers and a private army to rule the natives. Princes solution for Afghanistan amounts to neo-colonialism.

There are other problems with Princes proposal. MacArthur was fired by President Harry Truman for abuse of powerhardly a venerable model for a viceroy. Also, the armies of the British East India Company did much harm in India, and bankrupted the company. British taxpayers had to bail it out in 1770, and then the government had to seize control in 1874.

For Prince, a large mercenary force inspired by the British East India Company would be Blackwater 2.0, a phenomenal business opportunity for someone with White House connections. (His sister is Betsy DeVos, the secretary of education.) But hes also got inroads of his own. In January, he held secret meetings in the Seychelles, allegedly to establish a back channel between Trump and Vladimir Putin (a spokesman for Prince denied to the Post that the meeting had anything to with Trump). Or perhaps he just wants to come home. After the Iraq fiasco, he went into self-exile, helping Abu Dhabi raise a secret army in the desert and working for China in Africa.

Despite the ridiculousness of all this, the idea appears to be gaining traction in Washington. Bannon recently went to the Pentagon to push for it, and others in the private military industry are lobbying in support. Their interests are more likely profit than concern for Afghans. The fact that the idea has champions in the West Wing sends a message to the whole galaxy of private military contractors: Business may be booming once again! If America entertains the possibility of outsourcing one of its most intractable foreign policy boondoggles, it may well push the market to spit out huge numbers of these fighters. It is supply and demand, generating tens of thousands of soldiers of fortune.

One might think these are different timesthat the abuses of the British East India Company are irrelevant to the current age. That would be wrong.

Like Prince, I was a private military contractor for years. I worked mostly in Africa, where I helped stop a genocide before it started, demobilized warlords, helped UN peacekeeping missions, transacted arms deals in Eastern Europe, and raised small armies for U.S. interest. Based on my experience, I would submit that not everything Prince suggests is crazy. We are seeing a new breed of conflict-entrepreneur roam the battlefield, selling war to anyone who can afford it. They are not just lone soldiers of fortune toting AK-47s, but small armies with armed aircraft and special-forces units. Despite the claims of those who have never seen an actual battle, these privately contracted fighters can be quite effective, and this is why the industry is flourishing.

The truth is, countries are increasingly turning to private military solutions to solve their problems, all in the shadows. Two years ago, Nigeria secretly hired mercenaries after a six-year struggle against Boko Haram, a jihadi terrorist group. They showed up with attack helicopters and special forces teams, and accomplished in weeks what the Nigerian military alone could not: Push Boko Haram out of much of the territory it held in Nigeria. Some quietly wonder if the same thing could be done against the Islamic State or al Shabaab.

Nigeria is not unique. Russia, the Emirates, Uganda and even terrorist groups, hire private fighters to wage secret wars everywhere. Ships enlist them as embarked security to fight pirates. There are even private cyber warriors, called "hack back companies, who hunt hackers that attack their clients. In some ways, the Trump administration is just making this furtive trend fully apparent, a final stroke and affirmation of what has been building for nearly two decades now.

However, as an ex-military contractor, I cannot think of a worse solution for Afghanistan. There are many concerns about the safety, accountability, and morality of going into business with these types of outfits. When I was in the industry, I had multiple opportunities to go off contract and form a Praetorian Guard. In ancient Rome, this infamous imperial bodyguard assassinated 14 emperors, appointed five, and even sold the office to the highest bidder on one occasion. Praetorianism is a real thing, and something Prince or a viceroy could not easily control.

Alternatively, what would happen if Russia, China, or Pakistan offered this private army a better deal? There would be a bidding war for the loyalty of the force, something I saw warlords do in Africa. Unlike soldiers, these fighters would be akin to products on an eBay of war.

Mercenaries also breed war and suffering. For-profit warriors proliferate armed conflictas long as there is someone to pay, there will always be a war to start, expand or prolong. History shows us that they often maraud between contracts, preying on the innocent. In the Middle Ages, they would sometimes extort whole cities in racketeering schemes, as happened to Siena, Italy 37 times between 1342 and 1399. Others set up de facto kingdoms of their own, or just took one over, as the happened to Milan in the 1400s. Sometimes they were hired to commit atrocities, sparing their clients from this nasty work. In 1377, the Popes private army was ordered to annihilate the town of Cesena, massacring all its inhabitants.

But contractors are not intrinsically evil; in fact, they can be a force for good. They are a tool, like firethey can burn down a building or power a steam engine. What good could they do? They can prevent mass atrocities, police warlords, hunt terrorist groups, augment peacekeeping missions, raise legitimate armies or enforce the rule of lawI know because I did these things. This is doable, but requires a small force under certain conditions and proper oversight. It is wholly different than the massive mercenary army Prince seems to envision to rule Afghanistan.

The privatization of war is already underway. Denial is not a strategy to manage this growing problem. Prince sees how it can be harnessed for U.S. interests and is pushing his proposal, as are others in the industry. But America is not ready for such a radical idea, and may never be.

Link:
The 'Blackwater 2.0' Plan for Afghanistan - The Atlantic