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Army Maj. Gen. Robin Fontes on Saturday assumed the highest position of any female servicemember in Afghanistan since the war began, taking over command of Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan.

I promise to give you my full support, my best effort, my respect and my loyalty every day, Fontes told a crowd at a change-of-command ceremony. Fontestook over fromoutgoing Commander Army Maj. Gen. Richard Kaiser.

Fontes, a U.S. Military Academy graduate, has spent 12 years in the region, serving in Afghanistan multiple times, as well as in India, Pakistan and Tajikistan. She speaks three regional languages.

Army Gen. John Nicholson, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, described Fontes as the most proficient and competent officer in the field of security assistance within the military. He said he had to fight to get her the position because she was heavily sought after in Washington.

There is no officer of any service in the United States military that has more experience in this region than Maj. Gen. Robin Fontes, Nicholson said. She is the best possible commander for this command. She will take this command to the next level.

In addition to taking control of CSTC-A, Fontes will assume the role of deputy chief of staff, security assistance for Resolute Support headquarters.CSTC-A is part of NATOs Resolute Support mission aimed at developing Afghan security forces. It provides resources and training in areas such as management and sustainability.

Before relinquishing command, Kaiser, who Nicholson described as universally respected, told Stars and Stripes that he believed his tenure as CSTC-A commander was productive.

I always hesitate to use the word success, he said. Weve had many successes, but there are many challenges that remain.

Kaisersaid establishing Afghanistans Anti-corruptionJustice Center and implementing measures to identify and prevent so-called ghost soldiers were among his biggest successes.

He saidissues regarding genderremain one of the biggestchallenges, but he believes progress will be made underFontes.

Im confident shell do a wonderful job, Kaiser said.

2017 the Stars and Stripes. Distributed byTribune Content Agency, LLC.

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New Commander Is Highest Ranking Female Officer In Afghanistan ... - Task & Purpose

This year at FIRST Global Challenge, a robotics competition in Washington, D.C., an international committee of judges will assess the creativity and collaboration of 163 teams from 157 nations focused on tackling the global water crisis. From Sunday through Tuesday, the teams will present robots designed to clean contaminated water, as represented in a simulation by colored balls.

One of the groups attending consists of six teenage girls from Herat, a city in western Afghanistan near the border with Iran. (They will present a device that can recognize and sort balls of different colors.) These young women, who range in age from 14 to 16, know the ravages of water crises firsthand. Indeed, Afghanistan and Iran, which share a border, are just now trading barbs about water usage.

That the girls are able to attend at all is a political miracle. Despite winning a spot in the event, they were turned down twice by the U.S. consulate when they sought visas to come to America, once in May and again in June. Even after traveling to Kabul to try to obtain them, the girls joined their Gambian counterparts as the only teams turned down by local U.S. consulates. This, even though nearly 10,000 U.S. soldiers remain in Afghanistanwith more likely heading there before the year is outin what has become Americas longest-ever war. As part of Americas presence in Afghanistan, it has invested heavily in girls education, maternal health, and the broader issue of womens rights. These investments are frequently cited by U.S. leaders as measures of the country's progress. Yet it took sustained pressure on and from Washington leaders to bring these six girls, who embody their nations forward movement over the past 16 years, to the United States.

On Tuesday, a congressional letter signed by more than 50 members of Congress urged Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to reconsider the decision to bar the girls. Then, on Wednesday, word broke that the Trump White House itself would intervene to get the visas approved. The State Department worked incredibly well with the Department of Homeland Security to ensure that this case was reviewed and handled appropriately, Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategy Dina Powell said in a statement issued on Wednesday. We could not be prouder of this delegation of young women who are also scientiststhey represent the best of the Afghan people and embody the promise that their aspirations can be fulfilled. (The Gambian team has also been cleared to attend.)

For the Afghans working to build this team, the high-profile attention and approval meant a great deal after several weeks of disappointment and dashed hopes. The team had worked for months, and come up against the challenges of the old and real world: the conservative society from which they came, and the security risks people representing the U.S. government viewed them as posing. And then, suddenly, the same government that denied them the chance to compete reversed itself.

The girls are very talented and we are very happy the U.S. didnt ignore us and they are giving us the option to come here, Roya Mahboob, an Afghan tech entrepreneur who serves as one of the teams sponsors told me. It will be an inspiration for other girls to follow these girls [into studying] mathematics and robotics.

Immigration, visas, and foreign visitors, have consumed a great deal of attention since Trumps election and subsequent anti-Muslim travel ban. But Afghans difficulty in securing visitor visas to America began well before the Trump administration, out of concerns stemming from people who came to the country and then either sought asylum in Canada or simply skipped out on their visas.

In late 2015, for example, the Thunderbird School of Global Managements Thunderbird for Good program, which has offered business training to Afghan women entrepreneurs since 2004, put forward 14 names for visas to attend its two-week program at the schools Phoenix campus. A few months later, they got their answer: zero yess, 11 nos, and three maybes. We were totally shocked, Kellie Kreiser, executive director of Thunderbird for Good, told me.

Eventually, she learned that visas had become more difficult to come byeven Fulbrighters were being turned down. Government officials didnt know who was going and who was staying, and they had so many people who were seeking asylum or skipping out that they had to ratchet [the administering of visas] down, she said. It was a legitimate response to something they couldnt get a handle on anymore. I cannot fault them for that. Kreiser and her team moved the session to India so that the women they selected would still have access to Thunderbirds training.

The entrepreneurs didnt lose out, as they still got the training they sought. But even fewer Americansincluding policy makersgot to meet them, to hear their stories, and to speak in person with these entrepreneurs working towards their countrys future.

Some see at least one bright spot in the Trump administrations reversal on the visas for the Afghan robotics team: Americans, long accustomed to a narrative that has bled into caricaturethat Afghanistan is a basket case which remains in the stone agecan now see for themselves a new generation of Afghans fighting for a different future. Young people who want to be connected to the world, who see something other than war as a possibility for their nation.

At 16 I [only] had the option [of knowing] what a computer is. But for these girls that are 16, they are building robots and they are coming to the States to compete with other countries, Mahboob said. It is huge compared to 12 years ago.

The abrupt policy change on the visa issue came about after sustained media attention. While Afghanistan was never part of Trumps travel ban, the questions about who can come and for what reason send a message as America prepares to send more troops back to Afghanistan.

For Americans who have worked to raise money for development programs in Afghanistan, there is some vindication in all this high visibility. It has shown that there are Afghan women who are advanced enough in technology to be able to compete that is a big reveal for a lot of people, that there has been progress, especially in education, in Afghanistan, Toni Maloney, CEO of Business Council for Peace, which since 2004 has supported and mentored small business owners in Afghanistan, told me. We do have to credit the past work of a lot of non-profits, the State Department and their own exchange programs, and USAID. There has been a lot of money invested and a lot of time. And so it is hard won by anybodys standards.

Mahboob echoed the idea that Afghanistan is changing, and said technology is a part of that shift. Technology gives us access to new realities, she said. It allows us to dream further.

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The Young Robot-Builders of Afghanistan - The Atlantic

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis speaks during his meeting with Italy's Defense Minister Roberta Pinotti on July 11, 2017, at the Pentagon. Manuel Balce Ceneta / AP

The past two ISIS-K emirs were killed in July 2016 and

Nicholson helped launch an Afghan and U.S. counteroffensive aimed at driving ISIS-K out of the country by the end of the year. Nicholson said in a video statement that operations over the last year have killed dozens of the groups senior leaders.

Mattis is currently conducting a review of Afghanistan strategy and troop levels and is expected to release those plans soon, though he said he did not want to put a timetable on it.

Mattis and Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford previously said that the Pentagons review includes the broader South Asia region and that it would be delivered in mid-July.

Senate Armed Committee Chairman John McCain, R-Arizona, last month said the United States has no strategy to end what he called a stalemate in Afghanistan after 16 years of war.

"Six months into the new administration, it still has not delivered a strategy," McCain said in a June 19 statement. We cannot keep going like this. If the administration fails to develop a strategy for success, Congress will need to play a greater role."

McCain said Congress could put a committee-created Afghanistan strategy into the National Defense Authorization Act. The House passed its version of that act, which raises defense spending to $696 billion in fiscal year 2018, 344-81.

More here:
ISIS Leader in Afghanistan Killed in Airstrike, Pentagon Says - NBCNews.com

Afghanistan has suffered through a harrowing summer, even by the nightmarish standards of a country convulsed by conflict for decades.

On May 31, a truck bomb exploded in Kabuls heavily fortified diplomatic enclave, killing more than 150 people. On June 2, Afghans, furious about their governments failure to provide security, took to the streets of Kabul. Security forces cracked down, killing at least five people. One of them was the son of the deputy leader of Afghanistans Senate. His funeral the next day, attended by top Afghan political leaders, was rocked by three explosions that killed at least twenty people.

This merciless cycle of violence continued unabated. Two bomb blasts at Shia Muslim mosques, one in Herat on June 6 and the other in Kabul on June 15, killed seven and four people, respectively. On June 18, an assault on a police station in eastern Afghanistan killed five officers. On June 20, eight Afghan guards employed at Bagram, the largest U.S. military base in Afghanistan, were gunned down in an ambush as they headed to the base to work a night shift. And on June 22, a car bomb outside a bank in Helmand Province claimed at least thirty lives.

Thats at least 229 dead in just twenty-three days.

Against this bloody backdrop, the Trump administration plans to send several thousand more soldiers to Afghanistaneven as it continues to flesh out a broader strategy.

The decision to put more boots on the ground has made headlines, but the still-evolving strategy is far more consequential. Indeed, if the United States is to help arrest Afghanistans spiraling destabilization, itll need much more than troops to do so. And yet, whats known about the emerging strategy so far inspires little confidence that the Trump administration will have any more success than its predecessor.

Make no mistake: A mini-surge will do little to rein in Afghanistans recent orgy of violence, much less tame the Taliban insurgency. More than one hundred thousand American troops couldnt do the trick during the height of the surge in 2010 and 2011, so you can bet your bottom dollar that dispatching a few thousand troops to reinforce the current 8,500 wont eithereven with the improvements in Afghan warfighting capacities in recent years.

Read more here:
Trump's Afghanistan Strategy Is Simply Old Wine in a New Bottle - The National Interest Online

What does the return of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar mean for Afghanistan?

Signing of Peace Accord with HIA

Afghanistan signed a landmark peace deal with the Islamic Party known as Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan, allowing for the groups leader, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, to return to his country. Hekmatyar returned to the capital of Afghanistan in early May of this year after two decades in hiding.[1] He called for peace and reconciliation as he was welcomed by the Afghan government and many other parties in the country.

The United Nations lifted sanctions against Hekmatyar, subsequent to a decision made by the UN Security Council to remove Hekmatyar from the UN terrorist blacklist. This decision was made following a peace deal which was signed between the Afghan government and Hekmatyars party. A formal request by the Afghan government was made to remove Hekmatyars name from the sanctions list.[2] The UN Security Council stated in a Press Release that it had lifted a freeze which was placed on Hekmatyars assets, a travel ban and an arms embargo, all of which no longer apply to him.[3]

The 25-point pact provides Hekmatyar and his members with amnesty and grants them full political rights. It also recognises the Hezb-i-Islami organisation as a political party, and allows for the release of some of its prisoners. As part of the deal, he and his party agreed to accept the constitution, abandon fighting and to encourage others to do the same.[4]

Hekmatyar also signed the pact last year via a video link which was played at a ceremony in the presidential palace. Hekmatyar made a speech from an undisclosed location and made some remarks on the accord and the future of Afghanistan. The ceremony was broadcasted live on television and attended by many politicians from different political parties.[5]

Hekmatyar opened his speech by reciting a verse from the Qurn to validate and endorse the peace agreement, [6]

And if they incline to peace, then incline to it [also] and rely upon Allh. Indeed, it is He who is the Hearing, the Knowing. [8:61]

He further stated,

I call on all sides to support this peace deal and I call on the opposition parties of the government to join the peace process and pursue their goals through peaceful means,

We hope that the day comes when foreign interference has ended, foreign troops have departed fully from Afghanistan, and peace has been achieved.[6]

As soon as sanctions against Hekmatyar were lifted, he returned to his country after more than 20 years in exile. He appeared in public for the first time in the eastern province of Afghanistan, Laghman and later travelled to Jalalabad. He then travelled to the capital with tight security, in a large armed convoy that was guarded by an army helicopter.

Who is Hekmatyar/HIA?

Hekmatyar is well-known as one of the most prominent and influential leaders against the Soviet forces in the 80s. He is an Afghan war veteran and politician who also shortly served as the Prime Minister of the country in the 90s. His rebel group is considered as one of the most successful in defeating the soviet army and the second largest rebel group in the country.[7]

He is the founder and current leader of the political party Hezb-i-Islami, whom are ideologically influenced by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and Syed Abul Ala Maududis Jamaat-e-Islami.[8] His party, Hezb-i-Islami, which literally translates to Islamic Party, is an Islamic organisation that was set up by him and his associates in the year 1975. It was a group which stood firmly against the Communist Government of Afghanistan and then a few years later against the Governments close ally, the Soviet Union.

Hekmatyar has also authored as many as 118 books ranging from linguistics to Pashto grammar and comparative religion. He has written several books on Islm and has translated the Holy Qurn and Hadith books.[9] At a book launch, Qutbuddin Helal said that Hekmatyar wrote his books whilst continuously travelling and moving from one area to another.[10]

Returning Comments

Hekmatyar is seeking peace and considering a political solution to the turmoil in the country. Ever since his return he has spoken about establishing and working on a think-tank to help bring about a solution to the chaos in the country. Afghanistan is a mountainous and landlocked country located within South Asia and Central Asia. Although situated in Asia, in the present world it can also be considered in the Middle East according to theories of regionalisation. This is because Afghanistan is associated with the Middle East region as a result of religious and political similarities although being different in culture and language. Currently, the countrys infrastructure and economy is in ruins due to on-going severe instability and war, which has consequently resulted in the deaths of uncountable people with countless being forced to become refugees.

In his first public speeches Hekmatyar called on other groups such as the Taliban to lay down their weapons and to also come to the negotiation table. He said,

Come for Gods sake, come and give up fighting which the victims of this war are Afghans,

I invite you to join the peace caravan and stop the pointless, meaningless and unholy warSet your goals, and I will be with you on your good goals.[11]

He made further remarks such as,

I have come for brotherhood and unity, and I extend my hand to everyone. You can count on us. We are ready.

I want a free, proud, independent and Islamic Afghanistan,[12]

Ashraf Ghani, the President of Afghanistan, who signed the peace agreement and welcomed Hekmatyar at the ceremony in the presidential palace thanked him for,heeding the peace call. [13]

What does this mean for the future of Afghanistan?

Hekmatyar made another appearance at Kabuls main football stadium, Ghazi stadium. Thousands of supporters were present on this occasion which clearly demonstrated his continued support and influence throughout the country. He addressed the thousands of supporters who queued for hours and waited eagerly for Hekmatyar to address them on the peace agreement.

Referring to the current structure of the government which he has repeatedly criticised, he stated

This division of power is not Gods will, nor is it based on the constitution,

This is John Kerrys division. Do not look upon this division as sacred. [14]

Hekmatyar has also stated that,

Turkeys constitutional changes were inspired by the constitution I wrote. We also want that to replace the current Afghan constitution.

The peace deal now opens a new chapter for Hekmatyar as well as the future of Afghanistan. Hekmatyar aims to unite the different factions and movements in the country and to encourage them to come to the negotiating table.

Hekmatyar said at a Press Conference this month that all the political parties in the country should stand together to help find a solution to the ongoing problems. He also added that it was time for neighbouring countries, namely Iran and Pakistan, to also play their part in ensuring peace in Afghanistan.

In reference to some recent remarks made by the Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Hekmatyar stated that,

No one has got the right to instruct us from outside or interfere in our affairs.[15]

With the rapidly changing political climate in Afghanistan, for many Afghans the return of Hekmatyar is a sign of hope. Whether his return will bring about change only time will tell.

Source: http://www.islam21c.com

Notes:

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Will there be peace for Afghanistan? - Islam21c