IDNUMBER 200707310111
PUBLICATION: National Post
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: National
SECTION: World
PAGE: A9
ILLUSTRATION:Black & White Photo: Getty Images / Murdered South KoreanBae Hyung-kyu won't be buried until all his countrymen captured by the Taliban are released, his family said. ;
DATELINE: KABUL
BYLINE: Sayed Salahuddin
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 487

Taliban shoot Korean hostage; Second Victim; Threaten To Kill More Captives If Demands Not Met


KABUL - Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage yesterday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignores their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot yesterday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al-Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently Taliban.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent. Al-Jazeera said it had obtained the footage "from a source outside Afghanistan." The television said an off-camera speaker was reading a statement but it did not report what he said. The hostages were not speaking in the video.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the Governor of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital Kabul, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after they said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said that force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 women hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea yesterday.

The bullet-riddled body of Bae Hyung-kyu was found last Wednesday, the day he would have turned 42. His brother, Bae Shin-kyu, told reporters the family would not hold a funeral until the other hostages returned to South Korea.
KEYWORDS: WAR; HOSTAGES; TERRORISM; FOREIGN AID; BOMBINGS; AFGHANISTAN

====


IDNUMBER 200707310110
PUBLICATION: National Post
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: National
SECTION: World
PAGE: A9
ILLUSTRATION:Black & White Photo: Larry Downing, Reuters / British PrimeMinister Gordon Brown avoided making any personal remarks during his press conference with George W. Bush yesterday. ;
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
NOTE:A war the U.S. might win, Page A13.
WORD COUNT: 646

Brown Says Afghanistan Terror Focus; New British Leader Stands With U.S., But Maintains Distance, Analysts Say


UNITED NATIONS - Gordon Brown presented a united front yesterday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British Prime Minister said there were "duties to discharge" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line of the war in terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Mr. Brown became Prime Minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Mr. Bush than was his predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Mr. Brown said international terrorism is the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he departed from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged that the presence of al-Qaeda in Iraq shows the conflict there is more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan is more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Mr. Brown said.

"Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government, and to the security forces as progress is made."

Mr. Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops - deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand - from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies. There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Mr. Brown might seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Pundits also predicted he would distance himself from Mr. Bush, whose close personal relationship with Mr. Blair became a political liability for the former prime minister.

While Mr. Brown said British forces deployed in relatively less violent southern Iraq have been able to transfer primary security responsibility to Iraqis in three of four provinces in which they operate, he expressed no radical policy change.

"There's no doubt in my mind that Gordon Brown understands that failure in Iraq would … say to people sitting on the fence around the region that al-Qaeda is powerful enough to drive great countries like Great Britain and America out of Iraq before the mission is done," said Mr. Bush.

Nevertheless, Mr. Brown insisted on an independent course of action for Britain in Iraq, saying decisions would be made according to advice from commanders on the ground.

Mr. Brown at one point described terrorism as a "crime" --in contrast to the Bush administration's argument it is an act of war that for the most part cannot be dealt with by the courts.

But he later used words Mr. Bush himself may have used when he said "there should be no safe haven and no hiding place" for terrorists.

Mr. Bush brought up the speculation about their personal relationship, saying his British counterpart was not the "dour Scotsman" he has been made out to be, and declaring him "the humorous Scotsman."

He also paid tribute to Mr. Brown's personal strength in overcoming the death of the first of his three children, saying "instead of that weakening his soul, [it] strengthened his soul."

"In terms of the war on terror, Brown is saying there has been a seamless transition, and that the U.K. is there," said Patrick Basham, director of the Democracy Institute think-tank, based in Washington and London.
KEYWORDS: WAR; IRAQ; ARMED FORCES; UNITED STATES

====


IDNUMBER 200707310096
PUBLICATION: The Record (Kitchener, Cambridge And Waterloo)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Front
PAGE: A4
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: CANADIAN PRESS/FILE PHOTO / Prime Minister StephenHarper is in Charlottetown this week for his party's national caucus meeting. ;
DATELINE: OTTAWA
SOURCE: Canadian Press
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 321

Tory caucus gathers in P.E.I. to plan course for future


After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs tomorrow through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals -- both far shy of majority government support -- there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain- storming for future policy initiatives.

With the meetings being held over three days, Alberta backbencher James Rajotte says the sense among MPs that there won't be an election before next spring at the earliest, has also given the caucus licence to do a little longer-term thinking.

"This is the biggest chance since the last election for the prime minister and cabinet to set some fresh plans and priorities," he said.

Most observers agree fresh ideas are needed by a government that was geared for a sprint to a spring 2007 election powered by a list of five priorities.

But Tory fortunes faltered and the election window closed. A blistering battle with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland over offshore resource revenues soured relations with Atlantic Canada.

The decision to hold the summer caucus on Prince Edward Island, a solidly Liberal province, looks gutsy or overly optimistic.

Sources say Atlantic MPs may lead MPs disgruntled by the Harper communications team in airing their concerns at the national caucus meeting.

Political scientist David Docherty says he doubts any Tory beefs will escape the meeting room and is skeptical about whether they'll be aired at all.

"Are they even willing to say it privately behind closed doors to Stephen Harper?'' said the Wilfrid Laurier University dean of arts.

"I don't get the sense there's that many brave souls within the caucus . . . But at some point they're going to have to sit back and say, 'What are we going to campaign on? What will we hang our hat on?'"

====


IDNUMBER 200707310091
PUBLICATION: The Record (Kitchener, Cambridge And Waterloo)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Front
PAGE: A5
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS / A student at the former college ofIm Hyun- joo, one of the South Korean hostages in Afghanistan, holds the captive's portrait yesterday during a rally demanding the safe return of kidnapped South Koreans held by Taliban militants. ;
DATELINE: KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN
SOURCE: Associated Press
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 371

Taliban claims another; A spokesperson for the militants claims second South Korean has been executed


A purported Taliban spokesperson claimed the hardline militia killed a second South Korean hostage yesterday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage that it said depicted seven female hostages in Afghanistan.

Militant spokesperson Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners,'' Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location. "The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim but hadn't recovered a body. He said police were looking but he couldn't say when they might find anything.

"Ghazni is a very vast area, so we really don't know where the body is,'' Pathan said.

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group.

It's not clear if the Afghan government would consider releasing any militant prisoners.

In March, President Hamid Karzai approved a deal that saw five captive Taliban fighters freed for the release of Italian reporter Daniele Mastrogiacomo. Karzai, who was criticized by the United States and European capitals over the exchange, called the trade a one-time deal.

On Sunday, Karzai and other Afghan officials tried to shame the Taliban into releasing the female captives by appealing to a tradition of cultural hospitality and chivalry. They called the kidnapping "un-Islamic.''

Yesterday, South Korean officials changed their estimate of the number of women captives to 16, down from earlier reports of 18.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310082
PUBLICATION: The Record (Kitchener, Cambridge And Waterloo)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Insight
PAGE: A7
COLUMN: THE NATION
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: CANADIAN PRESS / Prime Minister Stephen Harper speaksto reporters during a news conference in Santiago, Chile, on July 18. ;
BYLINE: JAMES TRAVERS
SOURCE: TORSTAR NEWS SERVICE
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 533

Despite his successes, Harper can't raise Tory support


Stephen Harper's summer is going well enough to warrant genuine bonhomie when the Conservative caucus meets tomorrow in Prince Edward Island.

In fact, the prime minister's cross-country and offshore travels are progressing so nicely that it will be hard for his party not to wonder how much better this season of soft ice and slow politics might have been.

If best-laid plans hadn't gone awry, Harper and the unstable alloy of old Reformers and remaindered Progressive Conservatives would now be enjoying the sweet aftermath of a second consecutive election victory. Sure, the majority that voters are reluctant to grant might have escaped them but not an autumn return to Parliament with a fresh mandate, more control and a long respite before the next campaign.

Instead, this prime minister and his party are looking for answers to a perplexing question: Exactly what will push them through the trust barrier blocking growth?

Heaven knows Harper is trying everything. He's appealed to patriotism in the Arctic as well as Afghanistan, applied the poultice of federal defence dollars to regional wounds and polished a statesman's image even as he deflects foreign policy attention from Asia and Africa to Latin America and the hemisphere.

List, too, the March election budget bonanza and the relentless hammering of the old government by the no longer new and what emerges is an ideologically different prime minister relying on familiar tactics. Except they're not working -- at least not yet.

Conservative strategists remain optimistic that voters would overwhelmingly choose Harper over Liberal Leader Stephane Dion. Polling that also defines the Conservative conundrum.

Given Dion's vague persona, it's not surprising so many Canadians think Harper is the better prime minister. What's startling is that the differential isn't pulling Conservatives close to a majority.

Arguably Harper's strength is his party's weakness. Strong leadership loses its appeal if voters resist following where Conservatives want to go.

That wasn't a problem when a prime minister growing fast into a complex job was busy with five modest priorities. It is now.

Sometime after the budget and a Quebec election that didn't deliver the overwhelming federalist victory Harper spent lavishly to secure, Conservatives ran out of momentum and ideas while stumbling over the Kandahar mission.

All were predictable. An obsessively controlling administration designed to self-destruct around the 18-month life expectancy of federal minorities is poorly suited to longevity. And mounting casualties were certain to erode support for an increasingly ill-defined mission Harper first explained with words too obviously borrowed from Uncle Sam.

Past performance and future prospects intersect this week in the doll's house capital that Anne of Green Gables made an international destination. Halfway through a successful summer, the prime minister needs to reassure his party that he has a plan to free them from opinion poll stasis.

Its constituent parts are a refreshed agenda and a revised Afghanistan position that creates enough political space for new priorities to thrive. One demands the room to manoeuvre an expected late fall return of Parliament would provide, the other a cabinet shuffle to ease out an embarrassing defence minister increasingly at public odds with his top general.

Having missed the election off-ramp, the prime minister must calm Canadians about the ultimate destination and convince Conservatives they are still en route.

James Travers covers national affairs.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310147
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 395

Bush, Brown meeting shows differences


UNITED NATIONS -- Gordon Brown presented a united front Monday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British Prime Minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of al-Qaida in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said. "Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops -- deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand -- from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Brown may seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Pundits also predicted he would distance himself from Bush, whose close personal relationship with Blair became a political liability for the former prime minister.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310146
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Reuters / The mother (left) and another family memberof Sim Sung-min, 29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry after hearing the news about him in Seongnam, south of Seoul on Monday. Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners. The identity of the dead hostage has yet to be officially announced. ;
DATELINE: KABUL
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 605

Taliban kill South Korean hostage


KABUL (Reuters) -- Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6.30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot on Monday had been dumped on a roadside. The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al Jazeera said it had obtained the footage "from a source outside Afghanistan."

The television said an off-camera speaker was reading a statement but it did not report what he said. The hostages were not speaking in the video.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the governor of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital Kabul, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

The Taliban had earlier insisted the release of Taliban prisoners was the only way to settle the crisis.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after they said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said that force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 women hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea on Monday.

The bullet-riddled body of Bae Hyung-kyu was found last Wednesday, the day he would have turned 42. His brother, Bae Shin-kyu, told reporters the family would not hold a funeral until the other hostages returned to South Korea.

In Seoul, family members of the hostages gathered at Saemmul Church on hearing news that a second male hostage had been shot, said a pastor at the church, which sent the volunteers to Afghanistan.

Broadcaster KBS said the foreign ministry and the presidential Blue House were trying to verify the report.

A South Korean shipment of emergency medical supplies and daily necessities has been delivered to the Taliban, but Seoul does not know if the goods have reached the Koreans, Yonhap news agency quoted a presidential spokesman as saying earlier.

The Koreans were abducted a day after two German aid workers and their five Afghan colleagues were seized by Taliban in neighbouring Wardak province. The body of one of the Germans has been found with gunshot wounds.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310145
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
DATELINE: OTTAWA
BYLINE: Glen McGregor
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 377

Company will prepare remains


OTTAWA -- The Harper government has signed a $1.5-million agreement with a Toronto company to help prepare the bodies of dead Canadian soldiers for return to Canada.

The standing offer awarded by Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) gives funeral home MacKinnon and Bowes Ltd. the right to provide "care of remains and funeral services" to the Department of National Defence (DND).

The offer is valid until April 2010 -- more than a year after the current Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end -- with two optional one-year extensions.

MacKinnon and Bowes has received individual contracts in the past for similar work, but the offer allows the government to call up the company's services when required, at a fixed price, to a maximum of $1.5 million.

When a Canadian soldier is killed in Afghanistan, the body is normally sent to the U.S. Army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. DND usually dispatches one or more civilian morticians to Landstuhl to prepare the body for the flight back to Canada. The mortician can do some non-invasive preservation work, but does not embalm the body.

The morticians and other staff must be ready to travel on short notice. The repatriation process is done as quickly as possible, but with long flights back to Canada, decay can occur.

The Canadian Forces own refrigerated caskets that weigh about 360 kilograms with a body inside. Because they're so unwieldy, they must be moved by forklift and conveyer belts.

They are therefore rarely used. Instead, bodies are returned in "transfer cases" -- the aluminum coffins that are draped with Canadian flags at so-called ramp ceremonies.

The standing offer with MacKinnon and Bowes does not specify a fixed price for repatriation of each body, but sets the value of travel costs, per diems for company staff and other expenses.

The offer includes "mortuary services for timely and comprehensive response to international casualty situations," said Lucie Brosseau, a spokeswoman for PWGSC.

It also covers advice from a mortuary expert, including forensic and pathological advice, and training, when requested.

The offer does not pertain specifically to Afghanistan.

Brosseau said it makes no reference to the number of repatriations that are expected will be needed.

"We can't anticipate that," she said.

Allan Cole, president of MacKinnon & Bowes, described the contract at a "more formalized process" than the company's previous arrangement with DND.

The company specializes in bringing home the bodies of Canadians who die overseas, but Cole said his employees find the experience of working with dead soldiers particularly sad.

"You're dealing with young people. It always a very heart-wrenching tragic event," Cole said.

Canada has lost 66 soldiers and one diplomat in Afghanistan since 2002.

Ottawa Citizen

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IDNUMBER 200707310103
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: C8
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Getty Images / A Pakistani pro-Talibanmilitant carries a rocket propelled grenade launcher (RPG) as he stands inside the shrine in Lakaro village in the lawless Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan, some 60 kilometres northwest of Peshawar on Monday. ;
DATELINE: ISLAMABAD
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 454

Seven killed in militant violence


ISLAMABAD (Reuters) -- Seven people died in Islamic militant attacks on Monday and a mosque and shrine have been occupied in northwestern Pakistan, officials said, as the country struggles to cope with increasing violence.

Pakistan has been hit by a string of attacks and suicide bombings, especially in its tribal areas near the Afghan border, following a military assault on the Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, complex in the capital Islamabad early this month.

More than 100 people were killed in that assault and an anti-government backlash has followed.

Three paramilitary soldiers and four civilians died in militant attacks on Monday in the North Waziristan tribal region, military spokesman Maj.-Gen. Waheed Arshad told Reuters.

The soldiers were killed "when militants attacked a check-post near Miranshah," he said, referring to the main town of North Waziristan.

The four civilians died when militants fired on a military convoy at a time when normal traffic was also plying the road, Arshad said.

Elsewhere in northwest Pakistan, Islamist militants have occupied a shrine and adjacent mosque and named the complex after Lal Masjid, government official Muhammad Nasir told Reuters.

Calling themselves Taliban, about 50 masked gunmen took control of the area in Lakarai town near the Afghan border on Sunday.

"They are saying they will construct Jamia Hafsa and Jamia Faridia madrasas (religious schools) for male and female students there," Nasir said, referring to two institutions affiliated to Lal Masjid.

"We have intensified security around the shrine and mosque," he said, but he declined to comment on whether any action was immediately planned to clear the buildings.

Lakarai is in Mohmand district, next door to Bajaur tribal agency, a hotbed of support for al-Qaida and Taliban militants.

Militants also wounded one paramilitary soldier on Monday in an attack in Miranshah, using an improvised explosive device. Arshad said seven suspects had been arrested.

Authorities were meanwhile searching for an intelligence official kidnapped at the weekend in Mir Ali town of North Waziristan.

The Waziristan region has long been regarded as a safe haven for al-Qaida and Taliban militants sheltered by allies among the local Pashtun tribes.

Pakistani authorities struck a deal with the local militants last September in a bid to isolate foreign groups and curb cross-border incursions into Afghanistan.

But the militants denounced the agreement early this month and have since launched several attacks on security forces.

The army said it killed at least 54 militants in clashes with militants in several days of fighting that erupted on July 21.

Those followed the deaths of at least 13 soldiers in two separate militant attacks between July 18 and 20 in North Waziristan.

Adding to the tension, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has been under increasing pressure from the United States, an important ally and aid source, to step up action against Taliban and al-Qaida elements in the border areas.

Recently movement of military and paramilitary convoys in and around areas near the Afghan border has become more frequent and check-posts have been reinforced, although the government has not linked the moves to Washington's demands.

While violence has been heaviest in the northwest, Islamabad itself has experienced two suicide bomb attacks since the Lal Masjid assault, the latest on Friday when 14 people, eight of them policemen, were killed.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310081
PUBLICATION: Times & Transcript (Moncton)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: News
PAGE: C8
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Times & Transcript (Moncton)
WORD COUNT: 291

Taliban claim to have killed second hostage; Insurgents say Afghan gov't has failed to meet Taliban demands to trade South Korean civilians for insurgent prisoners


A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hardline militia killed a second South Korean hostage yesterday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven female hostages in Afghanistan.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their twelfth day of captivity.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location.

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim but hadn't recovered a body.

He said police were looking but he couldn't say when they might find anything.

"Ghazni is a very vast area, so we really don't know where the body is," Pathan said.

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages.

It did not say how it obtained the video.

The authenticity of the video could not immediately be verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group.

The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea yesterday, where the families of the remaining hostages pleaded for their loved ones' release.

Relatives have gathered at Saemmul Community Church in Bundang, just outside Seoul.

They waited anxiously for developments, sharing prayers, meals and sleepless nights as they followed 24-hour television news coverage.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310076
PUBLICATION: Times & Transcript (Moncton)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: News
PAGE: C1
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Times & Transcript (Moncton)
WORD COUNT: 528

Conservative caucus plots future in P.E.I.; Strategy session marks unofficial launch of second stage of Harper mandate


After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs tomorrow through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals -- both far shy of majority government support -- there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

Tomorrow, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others. The party's various regional caucuses will hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain- storming for future policy initiatives.

With the meetings being held over three days, Alberta backbencher James Rajotte calls it "a real opportunity for every MP to stand and say what they're hearing from constituents, what they feel the issues are heading into the fall."

The sense among MPs that there won't be an election before next spring at the earliest, has also given the caucus licence to do a little longer-term thinking, he said.

"This is the biggest chance since the last election for the prime minister and cabinet to set some fresh plans and priorities."

Most observers agree some fresh ideas are needed by a government that appeared geared for a short sprint to a spring 2007 election powered by a tight list of five manageable priorities.

But Tory fortunes faltered and the election window closed. A blistering battle with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland over off-shore resource revenues soured relations with Atlantic Canada.

The decision to hold the summer caucus on Prince Edward Island, a solidly Liberal province, looks gutsy or overly optimistic.

Expect to see a number of feel-good government announcements this week dealing with Atlantic Canada in an effort to smooth the waters.

But sources suggest that won't stop Atlantic MPs from leading a larger group of MPs disgruntled by the Harper communications team from airing their concerns at the national caucus meeting.

Political scientist David Docherty says he doubts any Tory beefs will escape the meeting room and is skeptical about whether they'll be aired at all.

"Are they even willing to say it privately behind closed doors to Stephen Harper?" said the Wilfrid Laurier University dean of arts.

"I don't get the sense there's that many brave souls within the caucus . . . But at some point they're going to have to sit back and say, 'What are we going to campaign on? What will we hang our hat on?' "

Government communications almost certainly will be discussed, insisted one insider, precisely because many MPs are concerned that the Conservatives should be more proactively selling their policies and ideas, rather than simply attacking the Liberals and waiting for the opposition to implode.

The caucus meeting itself is a case in point.

As recently as seven days ago, the party was refusing to divulge even the barest details -- including the venue, a Charlottetown hotel -- to reporters seeking to make travel arrangements.

Apparently, someone has since realized that holding a national governing party strategy session under a lead blanket of secrecy might be a bit discordant with the Harper government's mantra of transparency and accountability.

Two officially sanctioned events where news media and MPs can rub elbows have now tentatively been scheduled over the three days of meetings.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310045
PUBLICATION: The Daily Gleaner (Fredericton)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
BYLINE: The Associated Press
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 The Daily Gleaner (Fredericton)
WORD COUNT: 327

Leaders try to find common ground


President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown forged a unified stand on Iraq onMonday, aiming to head off talk of a splintering partnership in the face of an unpopular war.

"There's no doubt in my mind he understands the stakes of the struggle," Bush said of Brown after two days of talks at the tranquil presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains.

The visit was closely watched for any sign of daylight between the president and prime minister after four years of unwavering support by Tony Blair, Brown's predecessor.

Blair was saddled with the nickname "poodle" by critics at home he felt he was too compliant with Bush's policies, particularly in Iraq.

Brown told Bush that he shares the U.S. view of gradually turning over security of Iraq to its own people, based on signs of clear progress and advice from military leaders.

"We have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said of Britain's commitment to Iraq.

Still, as the United States has built up troops, Britain has been pulling them out.

Britain has around 5,500 troops based mainly on the outskirts of Basra.

That's a significant drawdown since the war began, and Brown hinted more reductions were coming.

There were also subtle but notable differences between the leaders, mainly in how they described the terrorist threat, that could end up having broader significance.

Brown maintained that "Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," in contrast to Bush's common refrain the Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.

The president said the fight against terrorism is a battle of good against evil; he referred to it as struggle over ideology many times. Brown steered away from that.

"Terrorism is not a cause; it is a crime," he said.

"It is a crime against humanity."

Bush said he listened carefully to Brown's thinking and was reassured. "He gets it," Bush said.

"What's interesting about this struggle ... is that he understand it's an ideological struggle, and he does," Bush said.

The United Kingdom's commitment to the war is essential to the Bush administration.

Bush didn't directly answer whether he planned to pass on the war to the next president, who will take office in January 2009. But he suggested that was likely.

"This is going to take a long time in Iraq, just like the ideological struggle is going to take a long time," Bush said.

In turn, Brown would not answer directly when asked to identify mistakes in how the war has been managed.

Brown said there have been problems but also successes.

He noted his country's ability to hand control back to Iraqis in three of four provinces the British oversee.

====


PUBLICATION: Kingston Whig-Standard (ON)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Editorial page
PAGE: 4
COLUMN: Opinion digest
SOURCE: The Sault Star
WORD COUNT: 130

Nothing wrong with decals


We see nothing wrong with the fire department, the police department or any other public service vehicle displaying a modest public sign of support for our troops in Afghanistan.

This issue has raised some criticism. The concern centres around the idea that the public service - especially emergency response workers - should never show overt displays of political sentiments while on the job.

Wishing the best for our men and women in harm's way is a universal sentiment. Or at least it should be.

If you believe we should pull out of Afghanistan now, or if you believe we should double our efforts there, you can still support our troops.

Our firefighters and soldiers are kindred spirits. Both jobs involve workers heading into a dangerous situation. They recognize there are risks involved and they accept these risks. It's natural they would support each other.

====


PUBLICATION: Kingston Whig-Standard (ON)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Local news
PAGE: 2
BYLINE: Brock Harrison
ILLUSTRATION:macleod
WORD COUNT: 496

New boss set to take command; 'Reserved' MacLeod to head CFB Kingston


The community spotlight Col. Spike Hazleton so enthusiastically occupied during his stint as CFB Kingston's base commander will today be cast on another, perhaps more reserved soldier.

Lt.-Col. Dave MacLeod, will assume Hazleton's base commander job at a change-of-command ceremony this morning.

He admits he's not quite as naturally sociable as the outgoing Hazleton, who delighted in his public role alongside local politicians, dignitaries and other community leaders, but says he's willing to stretch himself to do his important new job.

"You can never duplicate Spike," MacLeod, 59, said yesterday of his soon-to-be former boss, who is stepping aside in order to accept a leadership role with a contingent of about 80 CFB Kingston troops heading to Afghanistan in January.

Hazleton, as well as his two predecessors, Col. Larry Aitken and Maj.-Gen. Guy Thibault, set the bar for community involvement high, chairing United Way campaigns and making the military more prominent in public events.

"I'm a little bit quieter than Spike, a little more reserved, but I'm going to relish the role of being out there in the community and getting to know the city better than I already do."

But most of a base commander's day-to-day duties are done out of the public's view.

CFB Kingston is home to 34 units and the base commander is charged with administering services to each of them.

Having watched Hazleton, Aitken and Thibault over the years, four of them as deputy base commander, MacLeod says he's stepping into the job with a considerable amount of first-hand know-how.

"I think I have a good handle on what's worked and what hasn't and the kinds of approaches that work well with the city," he said.

Given the nomadic existence of the average military family, the MacLeods have been able to lay down considerable roots in Kingston, a luxury not afforded to most soldiers.

MacLeod's wife, Connie, has a full-time job at a local hazardous waste disposal company and his two sons, Daniel and Matthew, have mostly grown up here.

Even MacLeod himself is upgrading to a master's degree in defence management and policy at the Royal Military College.

"It's awesome, but unusual [for the military]," MacLeod says. "My wife has been able to make lifelong friends, my kids have been given the chance to grow up in one place. That's been very important to us."

MacLeod, who grew up in Sydney River, N.S., started with the Canadian Forces as a part-time reservist in 1982, while working as a geologist with Chevron Canada.

Four years later, he transferred to the regular force and was assigned to Calgary with the Lord Strathcona's Horse regiment.

He has done two tours of Bosnia, first in 1994 with the NATO protection force and then in 1997 with the stabilization force, and one tour of Cyprus in 1989. Like Hazleton, he hopes to go to Afghanistan sometime next year.

As the new base boss, MacLeod will preside over CFB Kingston's largest ever contribution to the Afghanistan mission.

The challenge will not be just availing base services to all the family members of deployed soldiers, but also co-ordinating a massive training exercise for troops from all over the country.

The 70 or 80 personnel from CFB Kingston heading to Afghanistan will be joined by an equal number from other bases across Canada for training before shipping out.

"There is a large requirement on the base to provide resources on the training side," MacLeod said. "Transportation, meals, lodging, it's not a small issue.

"It's one of the bigger missions we've had to launch out of Kingston in the last couple years."

The change of command ceremony gets underway at 9 a.m. at the CFB Kingston Vimy Officers' Mess.

bharrison@thewhig.com

====


PUBLICATION: The Chronicle-Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: World
PAGE: A5
BYLINE: Ben Feller
ILLUSTRATION:U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime MinisterGordon Brown are meeting for two days of talks at Camp David, Md. (CHARLES DHARAPAK / AP)
WORD COUNT: 417

'He gets it,' Bush says of British PM's view of war


CAMP DAVID, Md. - President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown forged a unified stand on Iraq Monday, aiming to head off talk of a splintering partnership in the face of an unpopular war.

"There's no doubt in my mind he understands the stakes of the struggle," Bush said of Brown after two days of talks at the tranquil presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains.

The visit was closely watched for any sign of daylight between the president and prime minister after four years of unwavering support by Tony Blair, Brown's predecessor. Blair was saddled with the nickname "poodle" by critics at home he felt he was too compliant with Bush's policies, particularly in Iraq.

Brown told Bush that he shares the U.S. view of gradually turning over security of Iraq to its own people, based on signs of clear progress and advice from military leaders.

"We have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said of Britain's commitment to Iraq.

Still, as the United States has built up troops, Britain has been pulling them out.

Britain has around 5,500 troops based mainly on the outskirts of Basra. That's a significant drawdown since the war began, and Brown hinted more reductions were coming.

There were also subtle but notable differences between the leaders, mainly in how they described the terrorist threat, that could end up having broader significance.

Brown maintained that "Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," in contrast to Bush's common refrain that Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.

The president said the fight against terrorism is a battle of good against evil; he referred to it as struggle over ideology many times. Brown steered away from that.

"Terrorism is not a cause; it is a crime," he said. "It is a crime against humanity."

Bush said he listened carefully to Brown's thinking and was reassured. "He gets it," Bush said.

"What's interesting about this struggle . . . is that he understand it's an ideological struggle, and he does," Bush said.

The United Kingdom's commitment to the war is essential to the Bush administration.

Bush didn't directly answer whether he planned to pass on the war to the next president, who will take office in January 2009. But he suggested that was likely.

"This is going to take a long time in Iraq, just like the ideological struggle is going to take a long time," Bush said.

In turn, Brown would not answer directly when asked to identify mistakes in how the war has been managed. Brown said there have been problems but also successes. He noted his country's ability to hand control back to Iraqis in three of four provinces the British oversee.

If Bush had any dissatisfaction about what he heard from Brown on Iraq, he didn't reveal it. Notably, though, Brown covered his bases. After leaving Bush, he met with U.S. congressional leaders on Capitol Hill, where support for Bush on the war is fading.

====


PUBLICATION: The Chronicle-Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Canada
PAGE: A4
BYLINE: Bruce Cheadle
WORD COUNT: 222

Tories gather in P.E.I. to plot future


OTTAWA - After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs Wednesday through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals - both far shy of majority government support - there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

On Wednesday, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others. The party's various regional caucuses will hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain-storming for future policy initiatives.

The decision to hold the summer caucus on Prince Edward Island, a solidly Liberal province, looks gutsy or overly optimistic. Expect to see a number of feel-good government announcements this week dealing with Atlantic Canada in an effort to smooth the waters.

But sources suggest that won't stop Atlantic MPs from leading a larger group of MPs disgruntled by the Harper communications team from airing their concerns at the national caucus meeting.

====


PUBLICATION: The Chronicle-Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: World
PAGE: A3
SOURCE: The Associated Press
BYLINE: Noor Khan
ILLUSTRATION:Under a huge portrait of Im Hyun-joo, one of the SouthKorean hostages, students pray in front of lit candles during a rally in Daegu, south of Seoul on Monday, demanding the safe return of the South Koreans kidnapped in Afghanistan. The candles form Korean letters spelling 'safe return.' (Ahn Young-joon / AP)
WORD COUNT: 497

Taliban claim they killed second hostage; Male Korean was slain because demands not met, militants claim


KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hardline militia killed a second South Korean hostage Monday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents. Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven female hostages in Afghanistan.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location. "The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim but hadn't recovered a body. He said police were looking but he couldn't say when they might find anything.

"Ghazni is a very vast area, so we really don't know where the body is," Pathan said.

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group.

The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea on Monday, where the families of the remaining hostages pleaded for their loved ones' release.

Relatives have gathered at Saemmul Community Church in Bundang, just outside Seoul. They waited anxiously for developments, sharing prayers, meals and sleepless nights as they followed 24-hour television newscasts.

Seo Jung-bae, 59, whose daughter and son were among the hostages, appealed to the Taliban.

"Please, please send my children back so I can hold them in my arms," he told The Associated Press, fighting back tears in a plea to the captors. "Our families are the same. Your family is precious, so is mine."

Speaking from an emergency centre set up by the church, he said his children had travelled to the country to assist Afghans in need. "They went there to help, thinking they (Afghans) are their friends."

It's not clear if the Afghan government would consider releasing any militant prisoners.

In March, President Hamid Karzai approved a deal that saw five captive Taliban fighters freed for the release of Italian reporter Daniele Mastrogiacomo. Karzai, who was criticized by the United States and European capitals over the exchange, called the trade a one-time deal.

On Sunday, Karzai and other Afghan officials tried to shame the Taliban into releasing the female captives by appealing to a tradition of cultural hospitality and chivalry. They called the kidnapping of women "unIslamic."

====


PUBLICATION: The Guardian (Charlottetown)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Deaths/World
PAGE: B5
COLUMN: Around the globe
SOURCE: AP
DATELINE: KANDAHAR, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 97

Taliban claim to kill second South Korean hostage


A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hardline militia killed a second South Korean hostage Monday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents. Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven female hostages in Afghanistan.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity.

====


PUBLICATION: The Guardian (Charlottetown)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE: A7
COLUMN: National Affairs
BYLINE: James Travers
DATELINE: OTTAWA
WORD COUNT: 525

Conservatives ask too much of defence spending


Not much about Stephen Harper's government is as simple or complex as its support for the military. Since promising in the last election to boost defence budgets by more than $5 billion, Conservatives have been even more generous, ordering planes, ships and even tanks while talking about restoring pride and more muscular offshore missions. What isn't clear is how that spending fits the forces into a coherent foreign policy.

Critics insist the reason is obvious: This prime minister's international priorities are pleasing Washington and playing diaspora politics at home. Neither requires a sophisticated, overarching strategy.

Mostly true, that analysis shortchanges Harper's multi-tasking. He's maximizing the bang in every buck by simultaneously raising force capability and his party's prospects of winning elections.

That's hardly unique. Along with paving roads, spreading defence dollars is a time-tested way to prime the partisan pump.

Still, Conservatives are spreading them awfully thick. Harper is spending what passes for a summer vacation making serial announcements in political hot spots while Gordon O'Connor is taking special care of Quebec.

With byelections coming there, the Defence minister is using $200 million to reopen a Quebec Royal Military College campus that Liberals closed and is injecting an estimated $85 million annually into the local economy of the separatist Saguenay region by creating an air force unit for rapid foreign deployment.

Memory also recalls O'Connor in Quebec City announcing that rather than ridding the army of what Gen. Rick Hillier had previously declared a millstone, Canada will spend $1.3 billion buying and refitting used tanks.

That pleases the military pro-tank faction, the arms industry that once kept O'Connor on its lobbying payroll, and those voters willing to accept that all defence spending is wise.

But easy money and old-school politics often mix badly. Without a firm policy framework, the combination of free spending, Conservative determination to be seen keeping even foolish campaign commitments and the inevitable stress of the Afghanistan mission are creating visible pressures.

Last week, Hillier rippled the surface by saying the military isn't interested in creating the 14 territorial defence battalions Conservatives promised.

Officially, the government and the general are aligned; unofficially, the Hillier and O'Connor relationship is just "civil." One reason is that in May the minister shattered both a public service protocol and the military honour code by publicly humiliating his defence chief over slim funeral compensation for bereaved families.

Another is that O'Connor sees the military through a Cold War prism while the vision Hillier originally sold to Liberals looks forward and was conceived in the context of integrated foreign and defence policies.

Then, the common thread was a stronger role for Canada in stabilizing and rebuilding failed states. Now, the mantra is: The military manages violence for Canadians.

That isn't necessarily inconsistent with lighter, faster, more modern armed forces. But building and deploying them effectively demands fiscal discipline and a tight focus.

Both are missing in action. Conservatives are asking too much of defence spending in expecting it to rebuild the military while re-electing the party. Worse, they are asking too little from themselves in not forcing offshore policies through the crucible of public examination.

Harper is understandably open and proud of military spending. Only the ultimate purpose is an enigma.

James Travers is a national affairs writer. Copyright 2007 Torstar Syndication Services.

====


PUBLICATION: The Guardian (Charlottetown)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE: A7
COLUMN: Political analysis
BYLINE: Don Martin
DATELINE: KANDAHAR, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 956

Jeopardizing success


They're ghosts from a lost war, a 20-year-old reminder that a foreign-led military victory in Afghanistan may be impossible.

Hundreds of Soviet tanks, troop carriers, trucks and artillery guns, perfectly preserved by Kandahar's desert-dry environment right down to goggles and binoculars, lie abandoned in a gated compound within sight of Canadian base headquarters.

For nine bloody years in the 1980s, the Soviet Union tried to prop up a Communist government in Kabul and annihilate the mujahedeen insurgency before the fading superpower ditched its military hardware here in the rush to flee a fight they couldn't win.

To the skeptics viewing Canada's counter insurgency mission today, this military graveyard could preview our future if we botch the battle to rid Kandahar of the Taliban.

Seven weeks in southern Afghanistan is but an observational blink in a country that's been at war within itself for most of the last 30 years, but as I leave Kandahar, trends and patterns are possible to detect and decipher. Some are hopeful. Others border on hopeless.

Right off the bat, let me argue that Canada cannot impose a political timetable on successfully ending this military mission.

It's like picking a date before the Normandy invasion for Canada to withdraw from the Second World War, yet we're just 18 months from a House of Commons vote to retreat with no obvious heir to our United Nations responsibility for the dangerously volatile Kandahar province. Canadian-assisted progress on redevelopment, political reform, army training, police education and humanitarian relief will be terminated for political expediency, not measurable accomplishment. Canadian soldiers will be demoralized by any tail-between-legs departure and billions of dollars worth of upgraded military equipment purchased specifically for the Afghanistan climate and terrain will be left without an active purpose. Perhaps they could be parked alongside the Soviet equipment here as our contribution to Afghan military history.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper should not revisit Kandahar any time soon. His sudden wimpiness on the file, replacing unconditional support for the mission with a shrugged surrender to a fix-is-in consensus of Parliament, is seen as inexplicable here. Soldiers who believed they had a Churchillian prime minister now know he's just another political weather vane, twisting in response to the winds of public opinion.

Canada is transferring leadership of military operations to the Afghan army.

While local soldiers only receive a rudimentary three-week training and $100 a month for a paycheque, they are nevertheless improving as a military force. Canadian commanders are giving them considerable say in setting military priorities and targets. During the only combat reporters witnessed recently, Afghans were leading the charge against the Taliban while Canada provided backup firepower. Brig-Gen. Tim Grant also told me the reason for stranding a huge convoy (and this columnist) atop a mountain pass near Ghorak for almost two weeks was the result of a direct request to refortify the district offices from high in the Afghan government.

The humanitarian and redevelopment pillars of this mission have become a higher priority, in words if not deeds.

The new base commander, Brig-Gen. Guy Laroche, signalled as much when he landed here Saturday morning, but the drift was evident long before his arrival. Reconstruction and mentoring teams are being beefed up and their efforts praised in every second breath from military brass. The Canadian International Development Agency, often under attack for dragging its heels on feel-good projects, appears to have found a firmer footing in health, education and women's projects.

The war against the poppy is lost. Even with eradication activity picking up under British supervision, the opium-producing plant is setting record high harvests. Detection is not a problem - soldiers often remark how beautiful the poppy fields look when they're in full red bloom. But British military officials tell me it's an uphill struggle to convince farmers to switch their illegal crop for less lucrative melons, grapes or even marijuana.

The Taliban are not beaten. The combined air and ground firepower of the joint forces here is a sight to behold. How so much destructive technology can be neutralized by a few thousand religious extremists armed with ancient rocket launchers, last-generation rifles and old anti-tank mines boggles the mind. Yet the Taliban, while no longer surfacing in large military formations, are having considerable success in planting bigger and better roadside bombs to put security forces on edge, slow reconstruction efforts and, most importantly, prevent Afghans from any sense their lives are returning to normal. Okay, so I left the brightest development for last, but Kandahar City is on an economic roll, booming in population and bursting with building activity. The lineup of truck traffic outside the city's customs terminal is a sight vaguely reminiscent of a Windsor border crossing. There are billboards extolling the virtues of a university education over becoming a suicide bomber. If the south's largest city can thrive in spite of chronic security problems, hope springs anew the entire region will stabilize and revitalize.

But know this for sure: If Canada pulls out in early 2009 as expected, hope for Kandahar will fade. As Lt.-Gen Michel Gauthier, commander of Canadian expeditionary forces, told reporters Sunday: "I don't think anybody believes the job is going to be done by Feb. '09 from an international community perspective. Nobody's under any illusion that Aghanistan will be self-sustaining and self-sufficient by Feb. '09."

He won't say it, but that reality makes it imperative that Canadian forces stay here until the job is done, even if the surrender monkeys in Ottawa think it's politically convenient to leave.

Don Martin writes for the Calgary Herald.

====


PUBLICATION: The Guardian (Charlottetown)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Editorial
PAGE: A6
COLUMN: Letters to the editor
WORD COUNT: 260

We spend a lot of time, money on war


Editor:

This is a response to the many articles and letters in the media about the war in Afghanistan, and especially to those armchair warriors who support the war or try to justify it.

Having experienced first hand the war in Europe as a child, and in the 1950s as a combat soldier in the Middle East, I was nearly killed by enemy fire, friendly fire, and various accidents of war. I have studied the subject of war in an attempt to understand why the human species spends so much time, effort and money trying to kill each other.

Does it make any sense? Yes, it does. War has always been about gaining more wealth for the privileged few who gain from war. The combatants and civilians on both sides seldom gain but death and suffering along with their families.

The major shareholders in the oil, banking and arms industries have become fabulously wealthy, while governments send other people's children to kill or be killed or wounded in far distant lands, while the people at home have little idea of what is really going on. But believe me, in spite of such wonderful ideas as democracy and freedom, war is about making lots of money for the few who gain from war.

We should also remember that the CIA trained the Taliban to fight the Russians who also want a pipeline and the oil in Afghanistan. The Taliban now fights Canadians who have their own oil supply. Why is Canada involved? I think you know the answer.

Oh, and I don't see the armchair warriors hurrying to the local recruiting office to offer their services.

Patrick Dunphy, Annandale

====


PUBLICATION: The Telegram (St. John's)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: World
PAGE: A7
COLUMN: Politics
SOURCE: The Associated Press
BYLINE: Ben Feller
DATELINE: Camp David, Md.
WORD COUNT: 325

Brown, Bush show common ground on Iraq


U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown forged a unified stand on Iraq Monday, aiming to head off talk of a splintering partnership in the face of an unpopular war.

"There's no doubt in my mind he understands the stakes of the struggle," Bush said of Brown after two days of talks at the tranquil presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains.

The visit was closely watched for any sign of daylight between the president and prime minister after four years of unwavering support by Tony Blair, Brown's predecessor. Blair was saddled with the nickname "poodle" by critics at home he felt he was too compliant with Bush's policies, particularly in Iraq.

Brown told Bush that he shares the U.S. view of gradually turning over security of Iraq to its own people, based on signs of clear progress and advice from military leaders. Still, as the United States has built up troops, Britain has been pulling them out.

Britain has around 5,500 troops based mainly on the outskirts of Basra. That's a significant drawdown since the war began, and Brown hinted more reductions were coming.

There were also subtle but notable differences between the leaders, mainly in how they described the terrorist threat, that could end up having broader significance.

Brown maintained that "Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," in contrast to Bush's common refrain the Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.

The president said the fight against terrorism is a battle of good against evil; he referred to it as struggle over ideology many times. Brown steered away from that.

"Terrorism is not a cause; it is a crime," he said. "It is a crime against humanity."

Bush said he listened carefully to Brown's thinking and was reassured. "He gets it," Bush said.

Bush didn't directly answer whether he planned to pass on the war to the next president, who will take office in January 2009. But he suggested that was likely.

"This is going to take a long time in Iraq, just like the ideological struggle is going to take a long time," Bush said.

In turn, Brown would not answer directly when asked to identify mistakes in how the war has been managed. Brown said there have been problems but also successes.

====


PUBLICATION: The Telegram (St. John's)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: World
PAGE: A7
COLUMN: Defence
SOURCE: The Associated Press
BYLINE: Noor Khan
DATELINE: Kandahar, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 231

Taliban claims to have killed second hostage


A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hardline militia killed a second South Korean hostage Monday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents. Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage of what it said were seven female hostages in Afghanistan.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location.

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim but hadn't recovered a body. He said police were looking but he couldn't say when they might find anything.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion. The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group. The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea Monday.

The Telegram

====


PUBLICATION: The Telegram (St. John's)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: Editorial
PAGE: A6
WORD COUNT: 484

In the army and out of a job


Imagine you're a soldier in a far-off, war-torn country where the temperature is soaring - 33 degrees or higher and sunny every single day this week - the facilities are nonexistent, and a good proportion of the population is ready to shoot and kill you.

Imagine you've made the decision to leave your family far away and put yourself in harm's way, even though, as a reservist in the Canadian Armed Forces, you've had to volunteer to be there.

Now imagine that, in order to take a foreign deployment and serve your country, you've actually had to quit your full-time job, and that your employer has told you that the job won't be there when you come back.

Welcome to the world of Maj. Wallace Noseworthy. On Monday, CBC Radio told Maj. Noseworthy's story - about how, as a manager with a Stephenville car dealership, he had to give up his job to take a deployment in Afghanistan.

Noseworthy says there's a case to be made for protecting an employee's job, especially because the Canadian military would be hard pressed to meet its goals in Afghanistan without the support of Canadian reservists.

Now, certainly it's difficult for an employer to find a replacement for a full-time employee, especially if that replacement is going to be working for a year. Most employees are looking for a long-term job, not term employment. It can be hard for an employer to find a quality replacement employee.

But employers already do that for a host of other situations. As Major Noseworthy himself pointed out, employers are already required to find full-time replacement employees for workers on maternity leave, and there are few, if any, employers in this province who have not faced the issue of having to suddenly replace an employee who is facing either short-term or long-term disability. It is a fact of life when you run a business.

There are already three provinces in the country - Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia and Manitoba - that require employers to keep a position for reserve soldiers when they return from a deployment.

Reached by CBC, this province's Human Resources, Labour and Employment Minister Shawn Skinner said, as a result of Noseworthy's concerns, his staff are examining the possibility of drawing up legislation to protect reservists' jobs, but that the legislation can't be ready until after the coming provincial election, and that it will not be able to help Maj. Noseworthy.

Whatever you think about Canada's presence in Afghanistan, it's a piece of legislation that is clearly overdue. It seems cold-hearted to both ask someone to risk their life and their well-being to fight in this country's armed forces, and also pile on the concern of having to threaten your family's future by giving up a full-time job, as well.

The only shame in this is that when Maj. Noseworthy returns, any hero's welcome he gets for his efforts will not, in all likelihood, include his old job.

====


PUBLICATION: The Telegram (St. John's)
DATE: 2007.07.31
SECTION: National News
PAGE: A5
COLUMN: Politics
SOURCE: The Canadian Press
BYLINE: Bruce Cheadle
DATELINE: Ottawa
WORD COUNT: 514

Tories gather to plot strategy


After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs Wednesday through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals - both far shy of majority government support - there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

On Wednesday, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others. The party's various regional caucuses will hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain-storming for future policy initiatives.

With the meetings being held over three days, Alberta backbencher James Rajotte calls it "a real opportunity for every MP to stand and say what they're hearing from constituents, what they feel the issues are heading into the fall."

The sense among MPs that there won't be an election before next spring at the earliest, has also given the caucus licence to do a little longer-term thinking, he said.

"This is the biggest chance since the last election for the prime minister and cabinet to set some fresh plans and priorities."

Most observers agree some fresh ideas are needed by a government that appeared geared for a short sprint to a spring 2007 election powered by a tight list of five manageable priorities.

But Tory fortunes faltered and the election window closed. A blistering battle with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland over off-shore resource revenues soured relations with Atlantic Canada.

The decision to hold the summer caucus on Prince Edward Island, a solidly Liberal province, looks gutsy or overly optimistic. Expect to see a number of feel-good government announcements this week dealing with Atlantic Canada in an effort to smooth the waters.

But sources suggest that won't stop Atlantic MPs from leading a larger group of MPs disgruntled by the Harper communications team from airing their concerns at the national caucus meeting.

Political scientist David Docherty says he doubts any Tory beefs will escape the meeting room and is skeptical about whether they'll be aired at all.

"Are they even willing to say it privately behind closed doors to Stephen Harper?" asked the Wilfrid Laurier University dean of arts. "I don't get the sense there's that many brave souls within the caucus ... But at some point they're going to have to sit back and say, 'What are we going to campaign on? What will we hang our hat on?' "

Government communications almost certainly will be discussed, insisted one insider, precisely because many MPs are concerned that the Conservatives should be more proactively selling their policies and ideas, rather than simply attacking the Liberals and waiting for the opposition to implode.

The caucus meeting itself is a case in point. As recently as seven days ago, the party was refusing to divulge even the barest details - including the venue, a Charlottetown hotel - to reporters seeking to make travel arrangements.

Hundreds attend funeral mass

Investigation continues into Ontario murders

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
PUBLICATION: cpw
WORD COUNT: 537

Japan's opposition flexes muscle, ruling party loses upper house majority


TOKYO (AP) _ Japan's opposition flexed its political muscle Monday after a spectacular election win by demanding that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe resign, opposing his support of U.S. foreign policy and promising to gain leadership of the world's second-largest economy.

But a defiant Abe clung to his job despite the humiliating loss in parliamentary elections, warning of a political vacuum if he quit and instead announcing a reshuffle of his scandal-riddled cabinet.

``I cannot run away now,'' Abe told a news conference on Monday as he dismissed mounting public pressure to step down for losing the majority in parliament's upper house. ``We cannot afford a political vacuum.''

``Japan is in the midst of reforms that must be carried forward,'' he said.

Japanese voters voiced their outrage in the Sunday election over a series of political scandals that have hit Abe's cabinet, stripping the ruling Liberal Democratic party of its majority in parliament's 242-seat body upper chamber.

The main opposition Democratic Party of Japan greatly boosted its ranks, making it the No.1 party in the upper house _ heralding an era of political deadlock with the LDP, which remains in control of parliament's lower house.

The Democrats were quick to assert their newfound clout on Monday, ridiculing Abe's decision to stay on as prime minister and questioning some of his most basic policies.

``It's clear that the nation has given Mr. Abe a clear `No.' How he can ignore that is absolutely baffling,'' acting DPJ chief Naoto Kan said Monday on a televised debate. He spoke on behalf of party leader Ichiro Ozawa, who was recovering from a cold.

``The public has given us a mandate,'' Kan said. ``We will see in lower house elections which party they want in power.''

The comments came after DPJ Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama said the party would oppose extending Japan's naval mission to support U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan. The Japanese navy has provided fuel for coalition warships in the Indian Ocean since 2001, and the current mission is set to expire in November.

``We have always been fundamentally opposed to extending,'' Hatoyama told reporters in Tokyo. ``The upper house elections have shown the country agrees, and so we will be expected to keep that line,'' he said.

The Indian Ocean dispatch has been part of Tokyo's recent attempts to raise its international profile. Japan also sent noncombat troops to help rebuild southern Iraq following the U.S.-led invasion.

But the DPJ has criticized both operations, saying Japan's international efforts should be channelled through the United Nations, not the United States. Some within the party also say the missions violate Japan's pacifist constitution, which prohibits the use of force in solving international disputes.

DPJ officials have blasted Abe over a spate of scandals that have enveloped his cabinet, including the alleged misuse of funds that has resulted in the departure of two ministers and is threatening a third, Agriculture Minister Norihiko Akagi.

Kan demanded Monday that Abe address a pension records debacle that resulted in the loss of 50 million claims _ an issue that riled the public and hurt the LDP ahead of Sunday's elections.

The defeat has come as a clear sign of Abe's tumbling fortunes and a dramatic reversal of the stellar support he enjoyed when he took over from his popular predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, less than a year ago.

Still, the opposition would have to prove their mandate in elections in parliament's lower house, which Abe is not required to call for another two years.

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: DEFENCE INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
PUBLICATION: cpw
WORD COUNT: 588

Afghan leaders try to shame Taliban into releasing women hostages


KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) _ An Afghan governor pleaded Monday with the Taliban to extend a deadline for the lives of 22 South Koreans, after militants warned the Afghan government to release some of its captured fighters or else hostages will die.

Marajudin Pathan, the governor of Ghazni province where the South Koreans went missing on July 19, said that authorities talked to the Taliban after they set the deadline for midday Monday _ and asked for two more days of talks.

``Fortunately, they did not reject our demand outright, but said that they need to talk to their leaders,'' Pathan said, over the phone.

Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said Sunday the militant group had given a list of 23 insurgent prisoners it wants released to government officials, and if they weren't freed by noon local time Monday, some hostages would be killed.

``It might be a man or a woman ... We may kill one, we may kill two, we may kill one of each (gender), two of each, four of each,'' Ahmadi told The Associated Press by satellite phone from an unknown location. ``Or we may kill all of them at once.''

There were no immediate comment from the Taliban on Pathans extension demand.

The Taliban has set several deadlines that passed without consequence and it wasn't clear how seriously the militants would treat their latest ultimatum. A leader of the South Korean group was shot and killed Wednesday but it was unclear why.

Afghanistan's top political and religious leaders invoked Afghan and Islamic traditions of chivalry and hospitality Sunday in attempts to shame the Taliban into releasing 18 female South Korean captives.

Afghan officials, meanwhile, reported no progress in talks with tribal elders to secure the hostages' freedom.

In his first comments since 23 Koreans were abducted on July 19, President Hamid Karzai criticized the Taliban's kidnapping of ``foreign guests,'' especially women, as contrary to the tenets of Islam and national traditions.

``The perpetration of this heinous act on our soil is in total contempt of our Islamic and Afghan values,'' Karzai told a South Korean envoy during a meeting at the presidential palace, according to a statement from his office.

Echoing Karzai's words, Afghanistan's national council of clerics said the Prophet Muhammad, the founder of Islam, taught that no one has the right to kill women.

``Even in the history of Afghanistan, in all its combat and fighting, Afghans respected women, children and elders,'' the council said. ``The killing of women is against Islam, against the Afghan culture, and they shouldn't do it.''

And a former Taliban commander and current legislator who has joined the negotiations, Abdul Salaam Rocketi, said the government policy was that the ``women should be released first.''

Two days of meetings between elders of Qarabagh district in Ghazni province, where the South Korean hostages were kidnapped on the Kabul-Kandahar highway, and a delegation of senior officials from Kabul yielded no results so far, said Shirin Mangal, spokesman for the Ghazni provincial governor.

In his meeting with Karzai, Korean presidential envoy Baek Jong-chun thanked the president for the Afghan government's help with the hostage situation and said South Korea will respect the Afghan government's way of ending the crisis, according to Karzai's office.

Pope Benedict also called for the hostages' release, saying the perpetrators ``desist from the evil they have carried out and give back their victims unharmed.''

Meantime, the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan is warning American citizens to be very cautious travelling in the capital city of Kabul after getting information about a possible threat against Kabul University.

U.S. officials were investigating the credibility of the reported threat involving a possible improvised explosive device, but employees of the U.S. Embassy are deferring any visits to Kabul University in the near future.

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: POLITICS
PUBLICATION: cpw
WORD COUNT: 588

Tories gather in Liberal P.E.I. to plot course for future


OTTAWA (CP) _ After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs Wednesday through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals _ both far shy of majority government support _ there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

On Wednesday, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others. The party's various regional caucuses will hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain-storming for future policy initiatives.

With the meetings being held over three days, Alberta backbencher James Rajotte calls it ``a real opportunity for every MP to stand and say what they're hearing from constituents, what they feel the issues are heading into the fall.''

The sense among MPs that there won't be an election before next spring at the earliest, has also given the caucus licence to do a little longer-term thinking, he said.

``This is the biggest chance since the last election for the prime minister and cabinet to set some fresh plans and priorities.''

Most observers agree some fresh ideas are needed by a government that appeared geared for a short sprint to a spring 2007 election powered by a tight list of five manageable priorities.

But Tory fortunes faltered and the election window closed. A blistering battle with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland over off-shore resource revenues soured relations with Atlantic Canada.

The decision to hold the summer caucus on Prince Edward Island, a solidly Liberal province, looks gutsy or overly optimistic. Expect to see a number of feel-good government announcements this week dealing with Atlantic Canada in an effort to smooth the waters.

But sources suggest that won't stop Atlantic MPs from leading a larger group of MPs disgruntled by the Harper communications team from airing their concerns at the national caucus meeting.

Political scientist David Docherty says he doubts any Tory beefs will escape the meeting room and is skeptical about whether they'll be aired at all.

``Are they even willing to say it privately behind closed doors to Stephen Harper?'' said the Wilfrid Laurier University dean of arts.

``I don't get the sense there's that many brave souls within the caucus . . . But at some point they're going to have to sit back and say, `What are we going to campaign on? What will we hang our hat on?' ''

Government communications almost certainly will be discussed, insisted one insider, precisely because many MPs are concerned that the Conservatives should be more proactively selling their policies and ideas, rather than simply attacking the Liberals and waiting for the opposition to implode.

The caucus meeting itself is a case in point.

As recently as seven days ago, the party was refusing to divulge even the barest details _ including the venue, a Charlottetown hotel _ to reporters seeking to make travel arrangements.

``It's not a media event,'' said one party spokesman. ``There aren't any media availabilities planned.''

MP Rahim Jaffer, the caucus chairman, and Senator Marjory Lebreton, leader in the Senate, both declined interview requests for this story _ Lebreton on the grounds that it would somehow breach caucus confidentiality.

Apparently, someone has since realized that holding a national governing party strategy session under a lead blanket of secrecy might be a bit discordant with the Harper government's mantra of transparency and accountability.

Two officially sanctioned events where news media and MPs can rub elbows have now tentatively been scheduled over the three days of meetings.

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: DEFENCE POLITICS
PUBLICATION: cpw
WORD COUNT: 161

Governor General Announces Three Meritorious Service Decorations


OTTAWA (CP) _ A Canadian soldier who died in Lebanon last year is one of three soldiers who is going to receive a decoration for service to his country.

Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, from Kingston, Ontario is being awarded the Meritorious Service Cross posthumously.

The Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry officer was killed by an Israeli bomb on July 25th, 2006 while serving at a United Nations observation post in southern Lebanon.

Lieutenant-Colonel Omer Henry Lavoie, from Petawawa, who commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan, is also being awarded a Meritorious Service Cross, for his role in two complex operations, including Operation MEDUSA.

Warrant Officer Michael Bradley Smith, from Calgary, will receive a Meritorious Service Medal for leadership as a tactics and weapons maintenance instructor in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last year.

Governor General Michaelle Jean says the Meritorious Service Decorations go to individuals whose specific achievements have brought honour to the Canadian Forces and to Canada.

The presentation ceremony will be held at a later date.

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
PUBLICATION: cpw
WORD COUNT: 666

bc-CCN-ON-GOV-


^Governor General Announces Three Meritorious Service Decorations@<

July 30, 2007

OTTAWA, ONTARIO--(CCNMatthews - July 30, 2007) - Her Excellency the Right Honourable Michaelle Jean, Governor General of Canada, announced today the awarding of three Meritorious Service Decorations (Military Division) to individuals whose specific achievements have brought honour to the Canadian Forces and to Canada. The presentation ceremony will be held at a later date.

The Meritorious Service Decorations include a military division and a civil division, with two levels each: a medal and a cross. The military division recognizes individuals for their outstanding professionalism and for bringing honour to the Canadian Forces. The civil division recognizes individuals who have performed an exceptional deed or an activity that brought honour to the community or to Canada.

Meritorious Service Cross (Military Division)

Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, M.S.C., C.D. (posthumous)

Kingston, Burlington and Kitchener, Ont.

Lieutenant-Colonel Omer Henry Lavoie, M.S.C., C.D.

Petawawa, Stittsville and Marathon, Ont.

Meritorious Service Medal (Military Division)

Warrant Officer Michael Bradley Smith, M.S.M., C.D.

Calgary, Alta.

Additional information on the Meritorious Service Decorations (Annex A) as well as the citations for the recipients (Annex B) are attached.

Annex A - MERITORIOUS SERVICE DECORATIONS

These decorations are an important part of the Canadian Honours System, which recognizes excellence. Meritorious Service Decorations honour either a single achievement or an activity over a specified period. The Meritorious Service Decorations are open to both Canadians and non-Canadians. Anyone may nominate an individual for the civil division of the Meritorious Service Decorations, while military candidates are recommended by the Chief of the Defence Staff. Nominations and awards may be made posthumously, but nominations for activities that occurred prior to June 1984, the year in which the honour was first created, are not accepted.

Annex B - CITATIONS

Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, M.S.C., C.D. (posthumous)< Kingston, Burlington and Kitchener, Ontario< Meritorious Service Cross (Military Division)<

Major Hess-von Kruedener is awarded the Meritorious Service Cross posthumously for his outstanding performance and dedication to duty while serving at a United Nations observation post in the Khiam area of southern Lebanon. When the conflict erupted, Major Hess-von Kruedener knew he could not be evacuated, yet he steadfastly maintained his position while reporting the situation as it presented itself, until his untimely death on July 25, 2006. A Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry officer, Major Hess-Von Kruedener brought great honour to the Canadian Forces and to the military profession.

Lieutenant-Colonel Omer Henry Lavoie, M.S.C., C.D.< Petawawa, Stittsville and Marathon, Ontario< Meritorious Service Cross (Military Division)<

From August 2006 to February 2007, Lieutenant-Colonel Lavoie commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan. He played a leading role in two complex brigade operations, including Operation MEDUSA, the most significant ground combat operation in NATO's history. His battle group's actions throughout their operational tour set the conditions for thousands of Afghans to return to their homes. During this period of sustained intense combat, Lieutenant-Colonel Lavoie led from the front, sharing the dangers and harsh living conditions of his troops. His exceptional professionalism and leadership in combat brought great credit to the Canadian Forces, to Canada and to NATO.

Warrant Officer Michael Bradley Smith, M.S.M., C.D.< Calgary, Alberta< Meritorious Service Medal (Military Division)<

From May 4 to November 2006, Warrant Officer Smith served as the senior tactics and weapons maintenance instructor for the Armoured Vehicle General Purpose and Machine Gun course, two critical components of operations in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. His outstanding leadership and technical expertise contributed to a significant improvement in the operational effectiveness of UN patrols conducted in some of the world's most unforgiving environmental conditions. In a diverse and complex mission, Warrant Officer Smith's dogged determination, technical expertise and strength of character enhanced the operational effectiveness of over 200 African Union soldiers.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:

Rideau Hall Press Office

Marie-Paule Thorn

613-993-2569

www.gg.ca

INDUSTRY: Government - International, Government - Local,

Government - National, Government - Security (law enforcement,

homeland etc), Government - State

SUBJECT: CNT

NEWS RELEASE TRANSMITTED BY CCNMatthews

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL POLITICS DEFENCE
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 116

Britain-Brown-Bush-Update (Brown cautious on Iraq)


CAMP DAVID, Maryland -- British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is taking a cautious position on questions of troop withdrawals in Iraq.

He told U-S President Bush today he shares the American view there are ``duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep'' in Iraq.

Brown joined Bush at a news conference at the president's Maryland mountain top ranch.

The British P-M says his aim, like America's, is ``step-by-step to move control to the Iraqi authorities,''

The U-K's commitment to the war is essential to the Bush administration.

Britain has 55-hundred troops there, with forces moving from a combat role to aiding local Iraqi forces.

Brown says decisions about troops would only be made ``on the military advice of our commanders on the ground,'' echoing language often heard from Bush.

The leaders, during two days of meetings, also discussed terror threats, Afghanistan, the crisis in Darfur and stalled trade.

(AP)

RMo

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL DEFENCE POLITICS
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 53

Britain-Afghanistan


LONDON -- A British soldier has been killed during a military operation in southern Afghanistan.

A Ministry of Defence statement provides no other details about today's attack or the identity of Royal Marine.

The killing brings to 68 the number of British service members who have died since their country began fighting in Afghanistan in 2001.

(AP)

RMo

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 70

Afghan-Kidnappings-Update (no word on hostages fate)


INDEX: International, Defence, Justice

KABUL -- Another deadline has come and gone for 22 South Korean hostages in Afghanistan with no word on their fate.

A purported Taliban spokesman had threatened that one or more of the captives will be killed today if 23 prisoners aren't freed from Afghan jails.

Several deadlines passed last week with no consequences.

Last Wednesday the militants shot one captive to death several hours after the deadline.

Meanwhile, Afghan President Hamid Karzai is trying to shame the militants into freeing the hostages.

He says the kidnapping of ``foreign guests'' runs counter to Afghanistan's tradition of hospitality.

(AP)

LAK

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL POLITICS DEFENCE
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 615

Afghanistan-Roundup


The Taliban has set a new deadline of noon local time (3:30 Eastern time) today for the lives of 22 South Koreans.

They demand the Afghan government release 23 of its captured fighters or else hostages will die.

The Taliban last week set several deadlines that passed without consequence, but a leader of the South Korean group was shot and killed last week.

Yesterday, President Hamid Karzai and other Afghan officials tried to shame the Taliban into releasing the 18 female captives -- an attempt to tap into a tradition of cultural hospitality and chivalry. One governor has has the Taliban to extend the deadline yet again.

No progress has been reported in talks with tribal elders to secure hostages' freedom. (AP)

(University)

The U-S Embassy in Afghanistan is warning American citizens to be very cautious travelling in the capital city of Kabul after getting information about a possible threat against Kabul University.

U-S officials are investigating the credibility of the reported threat involving a possible improvised explosive device. (AP)

(Cda-Mission)

A top Canadian commander says Canadian troops are not the only foreign military that can complete the rebuilding effort in Afghanistan beyond 2009.

Lieutenant-General Michel Gauthier, head of the Canadian Expeditionary Force Command, says the international community will need to be present in Afghanistan for several more years for the country to become self-sufficient.

The Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end in February 2009.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said he'll extend that mandate only with the consensus of Parliament, which seems unlikely.

Sixty-six Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have died in Afghanistan since 2002.

The mounting death toll has renewed the political debate back home over the mission's future, with the opposition parties pushing the government to come up with an exit strategy. (CP)

(Cda-Hillier)

Top general Rick Hillier isn't so sure Canadian troops in Afghanistan will be able to hand over much of the front-line fighting to Afghan soldiers by February.

The chief of defence staff downplays the kind of training progress predicted by his political boss, Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor.

Hillier tells C-T-V's ``Question Period'' that it will be tough for the Afghan National Army to start doing the heaviest military lifting by next winter -- as O'Connor predicted on the same program a week ago.

Hillier says it ``would certainly be a significant challenge'' for the Afghans to be ready.

O'Connor had said newly trained local battalions would likely allow Canadian troops to cede most of the fighting around Kandahar to Afghan soldiers by the time the Quebec-based Van Doos finish their rotation in February.

Hillier says Afghan soldiers are playing a bigger role with help from Canadian trainers.

But he says it's too early to say when Canadians may be able to leave the most dangerous front lines. (CP)

(Cda-Soldiers-Return)

Friends and family have greeted 85 Quebec-based soldiers returning from Afghanistan.

Troops from the Royal 22nd Regiment, also known as the Van Doos, arrived at C-F-B Valcartier yesterday following an eight-month tour.

A convoy of police and armoured military vehicles escorted buses carrying the troops from Quebec City's Jean Lesage Airport to the base.

Returning soldier Corporal Jean-Rene D'Amours tells Radio-Canada that when risks ran high in Kandahar, he thought of his family back home.

He says thinking about seeing them again helped him do his job.

International Co-operation Minister Josee Verner was also on hand to welcome the troops.

A company of Van Doos has been working at the provincial reconstruction team base since November.

Another contingent of 80 soldiers is expected to return tomorrow.

Meanwhile, more than two-thousand soldiers from the Quebec City-area base are currently making their way to Kandahar. (CP)

(Cda-Rations)

In 55 Celcius degree heat and with Taliban rockets raining down, the last thing most of us would feel like is chowing down on a steaming bag of preserved salmon fillet.

With that in mind, the Canadian army is set to introduce protein drink to its field ration kits, a specially formulated supplement similar to what body builders use.

Major Julie Johnson, who is responsible for keeping individual meal packs flowing to the front, says they've found soldiers in Afghanistan operating ``outside of the wire'' have often not been eating three meals a day.

She says nobody really wants to choke down ravioli in searing heat, so the protein supplement is something that can be used in lieu.

The meal replacement is a powdered drink that when mixed with water comes in three flavours -- vanilla, chocolate and strawberry.

It will begin appearing in soldier's rations within the next couple of weeks. (BN)

(Afghanistan Roundup by Bill Kay, Clint Thomas and Murray Brewster)

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: DEFENCE POLITICS
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 160

INDEX:Defence, Politics


OTTAWA - A Canadian soldier who died in Lebanon last year is one of three soldiers who is going to receive a decoration for service to his country.

Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, from Kingston, Ontario is being awarded the Meritorious Service Cross posthumously.

The Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry officer was killed by an Israeli bomb on July 25th, 2006 while serving at a United Nations observation post in southern Lebanon.

Lieutenant-Colonel Omer Henry Lavoie, from Petawawa, who commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan, is also being awarded a Meritorious Service Cross, for his role in two complex operations, including Operation MEDUSA.

Warrant Officer Michael Bradley Smith, from Calgary, will receive a Meritorious Service Medal for leadership as a tactics and weapons maintenance instructor in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last year.

Governor General Michaelle Jean says the Meritorious Service Decorations go to individuals whose specific achievements have brought honour to the Canadian Forces and to Canada.

(BN)

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL POLITICS DEFENCE
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 102

Britain-Brown-Bush


CAMP DAVID, Maryland -- U-S President Bush has welcomed British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to the U-S with casual diplomacy.

Bush and Brown began their brief meeting at Camp David in Maryland late yesterday with an emphasis on private time.

Their agenda is familiar -- terror threats, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, crisis in Darfur, stalled trade.

Yet the overarching theme is rapport -- and establishing some.

Bush is aiming for at least a solid relationship with Brown shaped around their nations' mutual interests.

But it is far from the kinship Bush had with Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair, who lost favor at home because of his close ties to Bush.

Brown arrived by helicopter at Camp David after booming thunderstorms gave way to sunshine.

He emerged to find a military honour guard and Bush waiting for him.

The two are scheduled to hold a news conference later this morning.

(APB)

clt

====


DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL DEFENCE POLITICS JUSTICE
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 74

Afghan police discover body of 2nd slain South Korean hostage


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak Tuesday, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, some 10 kilometres west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hardline militia killed the Korean hostage Monday evening because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.(AP)

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DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: DEFENCE POLITICS
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 155

Governor General Announces Three Meritorious Service Decorations


OTTAWA - A Canadian soldier who died in Lebanon last year is one of three soldiers who is going to receive a decoration for service to his country.

Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, from Kingston, Ontario is being awarded the Meritorious Service Cross posthumously.

The Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry officer was killed by an Israeli bomb on July 25th, 2006 while serving at a United Nations observation post in southern Lebanon.

Lieutenant-Colonel Lavoie, from Petawawa, who commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan, is also being awarded a Meritorious Service Cross, for his role in two complex operations, including Operation MEDUSA.

Warrant Officer Michael Bradley Smith, from Calgary, will receive a Meritorious Service Medal for leadership as a tactics and weapons maintenance instructor in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last year.

Governor General Michaelle Jean says the Meritorious Service Decorations go to individuals whose specific achievements have brought honour to the Canadian Forces and to Canada.

(BN)

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DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: DEFENCE INTERNATIONAL
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 132

INDEX:Defence, International


KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - The man who has led Canadian troops in Afghanistan for the past nine months says he thought about his wife as a bomb went off near a convoy he was travelling in last week.

Brigadier-General Tim Grant was unharmed and none of the other Canadian soldier were injured in the suicide bombing that occurred last Thursday near Kandahar City.

Grant tells CTV's Canada AM that when the blast occurred, he wondered what his wife was going to say, especially since he was also on hand when a rocket attack happened a couple of days earlier.

He says she wasn't happy with him when he spoke to her a couple of days later.

Grant praised the Canadian soldiers he was with in the three-vehicle convoy, saying they were `absolutely professional' and the things they did in a split-second saved lives.

Grant has handed his command over to Brigadier-General Guy Laroche.

(BN)

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DATE: 2007.07.30
KEYWORDS: INTERNATIONAL DEFENCE
PUBLICATION: bnw
WORD COUNT: 106

Taliban militants kill up to 13 private security guards in ambush


KABUL, Afghanistan - Taliban militants have ambushed a convoy of private security guards on a dangerous highway south of the capital.

Officials say up to 13 guards were killed.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force says the ambush was against civilians, but Afghan officials said the attack came against private security guards on the Kabul-Kandahar highway Sunday.

That's the same roadway where 23 South Koreans were kidnapped on July 19.

Police in Zabul province say the Taliban attack Sunday sparked a three-hour gunbattle and resulted in the deaths of 13 private security guards and five Taliban militants.

Gulabshah Alikhail, the governor's spokesman, said seven guards were killed and five wounded, while an Interior Ministry statement said 10 private guards were killed.

(AP)

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IDNUMBER 200707310121
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Ont
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE: AA08
ILLUSTRATION:CHARLES DHARAPAK AP FILE PHOTO U.S. President George Bush, shownhere with Supreme Court nominee John Roberts in 2005, has received more positive coverage from the two big Canadian networks than from the top-rated U.S. evening news program. ;
BYLINE: Stephen J. Farnsworth, Stuart Soroka and Lori Young
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 705

Bush might be happier if he watched Canadian TV


Surveys show considerable friction between U.S. President George Bush and Canadians over differences involving the occupation of Iraq, the treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, and tightening security along the U.S.-Canada border, but don't blame Canada's television news for the disagreements.

In fact, both the U.S. government and Bush may have been treated more positively on Canadian television news over the past three years than on NBC, home to the top-rated U.S. evening news program.

The new evidence, from a two-nation, 16,220 news story content analysis conducted by the Media Observatory at McGill University, should put to rest claims on both sides of the border that Canadian television news offers distinctly anti-American fare.

In our study of all evening news reports that mentioned the U.S. government or President Bush between January 2004 and December 2006, the CBC and CTV news reports were less negative than those on NBC more than 90 per cent of the time (33 of 36 months).

For news stories that reported on Bush specifically, the Canadian reports were more favourable than those on NBC nearly two-thirds of the time (22 of 36 months).

The gentler treatment of Bush on Canadian television is particularly notable given that NBC was more positive in its treatment of Bush than rivals ABC and CBS during three key periods: after the 2001 terrorist attacks, the combat phase of the 2003 Iraq war and the first six months of the occupation of Iraq.

Neither the CBC nor CTV can fairly be called the Fox News of the North - Canadian news coverage of Bush was clearly more negative than positive.

But NBC's reporting was even more critical during the three-year period, which included prisoner abuse controversies, concerns over whether Iran and North Korea were developing nuclear weapons, and intense debates over Iraqi policies during both the 2004 and 2006 elections.

If ever there were a time when an international media outlet would be particularly critical of the U.S., it would have been the past three years. But the pattern of generally more positive coverage of the U.S. government from Canada holds whether the topic is U.S. actions involving Iraq, Afghanistan, Mexico, Britain or Pakistan, or whether the topic is foreign affairs, health, crime or politics.

Why are Canadian media not more negative?

Canadian journalists may be at a disadvantage. Executive branch media management strategies are designed to limit the range of action of television journalists, who face great pressure to use the "picture of the day" provided by the administration to shape ongoing news coverage. These techniques may work better on international reporters, who struggle to get their phone calls returned. Opposing party senators and congressmen, the most important voices for anti-presidential sound bites, are much more likely to grant television interviews to U.S.-based media.

Results may also be driven by the fact that our NBC sample includes all news stories, whereas the Canadian sample is comprised of only those articles relating to Bush and/or the U.S.

We might expect domestic coverage (including crime, along with all the minor domestic difficulties and scandals) to be more negative than foreign coverage, regardless of the countries involved.

It is important, then, that the modest tonal differences seen between U.S. and Canadian news coverage of the U.S. largely disappear when we examine only those stories that discuss President Bush. Even then, however, Canadian media are not clearly more negative, even in stories about Bush.

These findings are, we think, rather surprising. All in all, they suggest that Bush and the rest of the U.S. government would be regarded at least no worse, and perhaps even better, if U.S. citizens had spent the past three years watching The National and CTV News with Lloyd Robertson rather than NBC Nightly News.

A complete report of this study is available in the current issue of Policy Options, available at www.irpp.org.

Stephen J. Farnsworth is the 2006-7 Canada-U.S. Fulbright Scholar at the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada and associate professor of political science and international affairs at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Va. Stuart Soroka is associate professor in political science and William Dawson Scholar at McGill University and director of the Canadian Opinion Research Archive. Lori Young is a graduate student in political science at McGill University, and MA fellow at the Observatory on Media and Public Policy.

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IDNUMBER 200707310118
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Ont
SECTION: News
PAGE: A12
BYLINE: James Travers
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 546

Tories try to figure out how to get to next level


Stephen Harper's summer is going well enough to warrant genuine bonhomie when the Conservative caucus meets tomorrow in Prince Edward Island. In fact, the Prime Minister's cross-country and offshore travels are progressing so nicely that it will be hard for his party not to wonder how much better this season of soft ice and slow politics might have been.

If best-laid plans hadn't gone awry, Harper and the unstable alloy of old Reformers and remaindered Progressive Conservatives would now be enjoying the sweet aftermath of a second consecutive election victory. Sure, the majority that voters are reluctant to grant might have escaped them, but not an autumn return to Parliament with a fresh mandate, more control and a long respite before the next campaign.

Instead, this prime minister and his party are looking for answers to a perplexing question. Exactly what will push them through the trust barrier blocking growth?

Heaven knows Harper is trying everything. He's appealed to patriotism in the Arctic as well as Afghanistan, applied the poultice of federal defence dollars to regional wounds and polished a statesman's image even as he deflects foreign policy attention from Asia and Africa to Latin America and the hemisphere. List, too, the March election budget bonanza and the relentless hammering of the old government by the no longer new and what emerges is an ideologically different prime minister relying on familiar tactics.

Except they're not working - at least not yet.

Conservatives strategists remain optimistic that voters would overwhelmingly choose Harper over Stephane Dion. Polling that also defines the Conservative conundrum supports their conviction.

Given the Liberal leader's vague persona, it's not surprising so many Canadians think Harper is the better prime minister. What's startling is that the differential isn't pulling Conservatives close to a majority.

Arguably Harper's strength is his party's weakness. Strong leadership loses its appeal if voters resist following where Tories want to go.

That wasn't a problem when a prime minister growing fast into a complex job was busy with five modest priorities. It is now.

Sometime after the budget and a Quebec election that didn't deliver the overwhelming federalist victory Harper spent lavishly to secure, Conservatives ran out of momentum and ideas while stumbling over the Kandahar mission.

All were predictable. An obsessively controlling administration designed to self-destruct around the 18-month life expectancy of federal minorities is poorly suited to longevity. And mounting casualties were certain to erode support for an ill-defined mission Harper first explained with words too obviously borrowed from Uncle Sam.

Past performance and future prospects intersect this week in the dollhouse capital Anne of Green Gables made an international destination. Halfway through a successful summer, Harper needs to reassure his party he has a plan to free them from opinion poll stasis.

Its constituent parts are a refreshed agenda and a revised Afghanistan position that creates enough political space for new priorities to thrive. One demands the room to manoeuvre that an expected late fall return of Parliament would provide, the other a cabinet shuffle to ease out an embarrassing defence minister increasingly at public odds with his top general.

Having missed the election off-ramp, the Prime Minister must calm Canadians about the ultimate destination and convince Conservatives they are still on route.

James Travers' national affairs column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday

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IDNUMBER 200707310086
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Ont
SECTION: Letter
PAGE: AA07
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 165

Civilians are left to fend for themselves


A growing toll on battlefield brains

Ideas, July 28

Kudos to Olivia Ward for covering the all-too-common problem of brain injuries afflicting Canadian and American soldiers who have been exposed to shock waves from powerful bombs. But her excellent article forgets a crucial component. There is no mention of the countless Afghan and Iraqi civilians who will carry such traumatic brain injuries for the rest of their lives because of U.S. and British air force bombing runs.

The European-based Senlis Council notes that in 2006, there were some 2,000 air force bombing runs in Afghanistan, and every few weeks we read of yet another village where dozens of civilians have been blown apart and countless others wounded by an aerial bombing raid.

None of these civilians will ever receive the care that North American soldiers will hopefully get when they return from battle. Long after the noise of military attacks is over, those civilians will continue to suffer in lifelong silence.

Matthew Behrens, Toronto

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IDNUMBER 200707310081
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Met
SECTION: World And Comment
PAGE: AA01
SOURCE: Reuters, Associated Press
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 364

Afghan police find body of slain foreign hostage; Taliban militants threaten to kill more Korean captives if government refuses to release prisoners


Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage yesterday, a spokesperson for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Qari Yousef Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location. "The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Afghan police found the bullet-riddled body of the hostage at daybreak today after hours of searching. The body was found in the village of Arizo Kalley in Andar District, 10 kilometres west of Ghazni city, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

Meanwhile, Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages, who are Christian missionaries. It did not say how it obtained the video. Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday, the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group. The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea yesterday, where the families of the remaining hostages pleaded for their loved ones' release.

Relatives have gathered at Saemmul Community Church in Bundang, just outside Seoul. They waited anxiously for developments - sharing prayers, meals and sleepless nights as they followed 24-hour television newscasts.

Seo Jung-bae, 59, whose daughter and son were among the hostages, appealed to the Taliban.

"Please, please send my children back so I can hold them in my arms," he said, fighting back tears in a plea to the captors. "Our families are the same. Your family is precious, so is mine."

Speaking from an emergency centre set up by the church, he said his children had travelled to the country to assist Afghans in need.

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IDNUMBER 200707310075
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Met
SECTION: News
PAGE: A01
ILLUSTRATION:SAUL LOEB afp getty images U.S. President George W. Bush drivesBritain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown in a golf cart after Brown arrived at Camp David, Md., Sunday. LARRY DOWNING reuters U.S. President George W. Bush welcomes British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to their first meeting at Camp David, outside of Thurmont, Md., Sunday. LARRY DOWNING reuters U.S. President George W. Bush welcomes British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to their first meeting at Camp David, outside of Thurmont, Md., Sunday. ;
BYLINE: Tim Harper
SOURCE: Toronto Star
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 519

Dour Gordon meets jovial George; British PM sets new tone in talks with Bush, but signals no major change in relations


Three times the U.S. president called him "Gordon," but the British prime minister's idea of intimacy went no further than calling his colleague "the president."

Whether Gordon Brown was merely playing to his dour caricature or keeping a politically necessary distance from his more jocular host split observers yesterday.

But after two days of meetings at the presidential retreat in Camp David, Md. , the first summit between the new British leader and the lame duck president signalled no substantive change to what the two countries call "The Special Relationship."

Stylistically, however, Brown set a new tone, breaking with the chummy relationship with George W. Bush that his predecessor Tony Blair had forged - and who ultimately paid a price at home, becoming derisively known as the president's "poodle."

Brown twice broke from the Bush doctrine, referring to terrorism as a "crime, " a position Bush pounced on in 2004 when his Democratic presidential opponent John Kerry drew the same analogy.

On the key issue of the summit - the dwindling British presence in Iraq - Brown reassured Bush. He gave no hint about a quick withdrawal, saying decisions would be made based on conditions on the ground. Britain has about 5, 500 troops remaining in Basra, a significant drawdown since Blair joined the Bush invasion of Iraq.

The two also forged a common front on the global terror threat, something Brown had to deal with within days of becoming prime minister in June.

"He's a glass half-full man, not a glass half-empty guy, you know," Bush said of Brown.

"Some of these world leaders say, 'Oh, the problems are so significant, let us retreat; let us not take them on. They're too tough.'

"That's not Gordon Brown."

Brown also said he thought Afghanistan is the front line on the war on terror, although he backtracked when pushed by a British reporter at a joint news conference, saying there is no doubt Al Qaeda is present in Iraq.

Bush characterized Brown as a straight-shooter, a guy he could trust, a man who knows the consequences of failure in Iraq. He heaped praise on his guest as a principled man who dealt squarely with terrorism in Britain.

"He's not the dour Scotsman that you described or the awkward Scotsman," Bush told a British reporter. "He's actually a humorous Scotsman."

Brown remained stoic as he was analyzed by Bush - offering no insights into the president's personality and focusing instead on the historical relationship between London and Washington.

He invoked Winston Churchill and Ronald Reagan and spoke of shared values.

"It's in Britain's national interest that with all our energies we work together to address all the great challenges that we face also together," Brown said.

He said the world had changed since Blair came to power in 1997 and the challenges he now faces include nuclear proliferation, climate change, global poverty and prosperity, the Middle East peace process and "most immediately," international terrorism.

"We're in a generation-long battle against terrorism, against Al Qaeda- inspired terrorism," Brown said. "And this is a battle for which we can give no quarter. It's a battle that's got to be fought in military, diplomatic, intelligence, security, policing and ideological terms."

Sally McNamara, an analyst with the conservative Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom here, said there was no significance to Brown's reluctance to refer to Bush by his first name.

"Gordon Brown is known as a very dour, sombre, uncharismatic man who chooses his words carefully. And for all the fears that this meeting would be awkward or weird, it wasn't," she said.

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IDNUMBER 200707310034
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Ont
SECTION: Editorial
PAGE: AA06
COPYRIGHT: © 2007 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 342

Leadership vacuum at defence


No one elected Gen. Rick Hillier or named him defence minister, but there was Canada's chief of defence staff last week announcing public policy as if that job has fallen to the military by now.

"We're not in the business of creating new reserve units," Hillier told the CBC. "We have sufficient units ... We don't need new units."

The general is right, of course. The federal Conservatives were on the wrong track when they pledged during the last election campaign to create 14 regional defence battalions of 100 regular soldiers and 400 reservists who would respond to emergencies such as floods or ice storms.

While they later modified that to make these all-reserve units because the regulars were needed for the Afghanistan commitment, it still made no sense to create new units with reservists waiting around for storms while the regular forces serving abroad needed all the support they could get.

What Hillier plans to do is to create seven regional units by juggling the current reserves, to provide an approximation of what the government had promised.

The problem isn't with the general's plan but in the fact that it was Hillier, not increasingly weak-looking Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor, who made the announcement. It's the job of the military leader to advise the publicly accountable civilian leader on the proper course of action, with the policy decisions to be made by cabinet.

It's certainly the case that Hillier is a most personable man, whose blunt talk and political savvy are in utter contrast to the dour O'Connor, whose performance on the job has been inept at best and a disaster at worst.

The longer Prime Minister Stephen Harper keeps him in the job, the more it appears that the hapless O'Connor is out of touch.

His incredible pronouncement about the readiness of the Afghan army to take over the duties of Canadians within six months says it all about the credibility he wields not only with intelligent Canadians but with the troops nominally under his direction.

His tenure needs to end, with his replacement being someone able to rein in the enthusiastic Hillier and ensure that he understands the concept of civilian control.

This is an edited version of an editorial yesterday in the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.

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IDNUMBER 200707310057
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 395

Bush, Brown meeting shows differences


UNITED NATIONS -- Gordon Brown presented a united front Monday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British Prime Minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of al-Qaida in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said. "Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops -- deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand -- from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Brown may seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Pundits also predicted he would distance himself from Bush, whose close personal relationship with Blair became a political liability for the former prime minister.

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IDNUMBER 200707310056
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Reuters / The mother (left) and another family memberof Sim Sung-min, 29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry after hearing the news about him in Seongnam, south of Seoul on Monday. Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners. The identity of the dead hostage has yet to be officially announced. ;
DATELINE: KABUL
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 605

Taliban kill South Korean hostage


KABUL (Reuters) -- Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6.30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot on Monday had been dumped on a roadside. The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al Jazeera said it had obtained the footage "from a source outside Afghanistan."

The television said an off-camera speaker was reading a statement but it did not report what he said. The hostages were not speaking in the video.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the governor of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital Kabul, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

The Taliban had earlier insisted the release of Taliban prisoners was the only way to settle the crisis.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after they said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said that force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 women hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea on Monday.

The bullet-riddled body of Bae Hyung-kyu was found last Wednesday, the day he would have turned 42. His brother, Bae Shin-kyu, told reporters the family would not hold a funeral until the other hostages returned to South Korea.

In Seoul, family members of the hostages gathered at Saemmul Church on hearing news that a second male hostage had been shot, said a pastor at the church, which sent the volunteers to Afghanistan.

Broadcaster KBS said the foreign ministry and the presidential Blue House were trying to verify the report.

A South Korean shipment of emergency medical supplies and daily necessities has been delivered to the Taliban, but Seoul does not know if the goods have reached the Koreans, Yonhap news agency quoted a presidential spokesman as saying earlier.

The Koreans were abducted a day after two German aid workers and their five Afghan colleagues were seized by Taliban in neighbouring Wardak province. The body of one of the Germans has been found with gunshot wounds.

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IDNUMBER 200707310055
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B4
DATELINE: OTTAWA
BYLINE: Glen McGregor
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 377

Company will prepare remains


OTTAWA -- The Harper government has signed a $1.5-million agreement with a Toronto company to help prepare the bodies of dead Canadian soldiers for return to Canada.

The standing offer awarded by Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) gives funeral home MacKinnon and Bowes Ltd. the right to provide "care of remains and funeral services" to the Department of National Defence (DND).

The offer is valid until April 2010 -- more than a year after the current Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end -- with two optional one-year extensions.

MacKinnon and Bowes has received individual contracts in the past for similar work, but the offer allows the government to call up the company's services when required, at a fixed price, to a maximum of $1.5 million.

When a Canadian soldier is killed in Afghanistan, the body is normally sent to the U.S. Army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. DND usually dispatches one or more civilian morticians to Landstuhl to prepare the body for the flight back to Canada. The mortician can do some non-invasive preservation work, but does not embalm the body.

The morticians and other staff must be ready to travel on short notice. The repatriation process is done as quickly as possible, but with long flights back to Canada, decay can occur.

The Canadian Forces own refrigerated caskets that weigh about 360 kilograms with a body inside. Because they're so unwieldy, they must be moved by forklift and conveyer belts.

They are therefore rarely used. Instead, bodies are returned in "transfer cases" -- the aluminum coffins that are draped with Canadian flags at so-called ramp ceremonies.

The standing offer with MacKinnon and Bowes does not specify a fixed price for repatriation of each body, but sets the value of travel costs, per diems for company staff and other expenses.

The offer includes "mortuary services for timely and comprehensive response to international casualty situations," said Lucie Brosseau, a spokeswoman for PWGSC.

It also covers advice from a mortuary expert, including forensic and pathological advice, and training, when requested.

The offer does not pertain specifically to Afghanistan.

Brosseau said it makes no reference to the number of repatriations that are expected will be needed.

"We can't anticipate that," she said.

Allan Cole, president of MacKinnon & Bowes, described the contract at a "more formalized process" than the company's previous arrangement with DND.

The company specializes in bringing home the bodies of Canadians who die overseas, but Cole said his employees find the experience of working with dead soldiers particularly sad.

"You're dealing with young people. It always a very heart-wrenching tragic event," Cole said.

Canada has lost 66 soldiers and one diplomat in Afghanistan since 2002.

Ottawa Citizen

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IDNUMBER 200707310013
PUBLICATION: The Leader-Post (Regina)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: C8
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Getty Images / A Pakistani pro-Talibanmilitant carries a rocket propelled grenade launcher (RPG) as he stands inside the shrine in Lakaro village in the lawless Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan, some 60 kilometres northwest of Peshawar on Monday. ;
DATELINE: ISLAMABAD
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 454

Seven killed in militant violence


ISLAMABAD (Reuters) -- Seven people died in Islamic militant attacks on Monday and a mosque and shrine have been occupied in northwestern Pakistan, officials said, as the country struggles to cope with increasing violence.

Pakistan has been hit by a string of attacks and suicide bombings, especially in its tribal areas near the Afghan border, following a military assault on the Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, complex in the capital Islamabad early this month.

More than 100 people were killed in that assault and an anti-government backlash has followed.

Three paramilitary soldiers and four civilians died in militant attacks on Monday in the North Waziristan tribal region, military spokesman Maj.-Gen. Waheed Arshad told Reuters.

The soldiers were killed "when militants attacked a check-post near Miranshah," he said, referring to the main town of North Waziristan.

The four civilians died when militants fired on a military convoy at a time when normal traffic was also plying the road, Arshad said.

Elsewhere in northwest Pakistan, Islamist militants have occupied a shrine and adjacent mosque and named the complex after Lal Masjid, government official Muhammad Nasir told Reuters.

Calling themselves Taliban, about 50 masked gunmen took control of the area in Lakarai town near the Afghan border on Sunday.

"They are saying they will construct Jamia Hafsa and Jamia Faridia madrasas (religious schools) for male and female students there," Nasir said, referring to two institutions affiliated to Lal Masjid.

"We have intensified security around the shrine and mosque," he said, but he declined to comment on whether any action was immediately planned to clear the buildings.

Lakarai is in Mohmand district, next door to Bajaur tribal agency, a hotbed of support for al-Qaida and Taliban militants.

Militants also wounded one paramilitary soldier on Monday in an attack in Miranshah, using an improvised explosive device. Arshad said seven suspects had been arrested.

Authorities were meanwhile searching for an intelligence official kidnapped at the weekend in Mir Ali town of North Waziristan.

The Waziristan region has long been regarded as a safe haven for al-Qaida and Taliban militants sheltered by allies among the local Pashtun tribes.

Pakistani authorities struck a deal with the local militants last September in a bid to isolate foreign groups and curb cross-border incursions into Afghanistan.

But the militants denounced the agreement early this month and have since launched several attacks on security forces.

The army said it killed at least 54 militants in clashes with militants in several days of fighting that erupted on July 21.

Those followed the deaths of at least 13 soldiers in two separate militant attacks between July 18 and 20 in North Waziristan.

Adding to the tension, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has been under increasing pressure from the United States, an important ally and aid source, to step up action against Taliban and al-Qaida elements in the border areas.

Recently movement of military and paramilitary convoys in and around areas near the Afghan border has become more frequent and check-posts have been reinforced, although the government has not linked the moves to Washington's demands.

While violence has been heaviest in the northwest, Islamabad itself has experienced two suicide bomb attacks since the Lal Masjid assault, the latest on Friday when 14 people, eight of them policemen, were killed.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310027
PUBLICATION: The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: World
PAGE: B8
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Reuters / Family members of one of thekidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan cry after watching TV news Tuesday in Seongnam ;
DATELINE: KABUL
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 328

Taliban says second Korean hostage killed


KABUL (Reuters) -- Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesperson for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesperson Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

Afghan authorities today recovered the body of the dead South Korean hostage, a Reuters witness said.

The blood-stained body of the bespectacled male Korean was dumped on a clover field beside a road in Arzoo, a village lying some 10 kilometres to the south of the town of Ghazni.

Police cordoned off the site fearing it could have been booby trapped, but managed to recover it later.

The victim, killed by the Taliban on Monday after a set of deadlines expired, appeared to have been shot in the head.

The Taliban spokesperson said the group would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al Jazeera said it had obtained the footage "from a source outside Afghanistan."

The television said an off-camera speaker was reading a statement but it did not report what he said. The hostages were not speaking in the video.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

====


SOURCETAG 0707310424
PUBLICATION: The Winnipeg Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 8
ILLUSTRATION:photo by Reuters Family members of the 22 South Korea volunteers kidnapped in Afghanistan wait to hear news about their loved ones in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday. A Taliban spokesman said a second hostage has been murdered.
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 186

Korean hostage slain


Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak today, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, some 10 kilometres west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity yesterday.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location.

'COULD KILL ANOTHER'

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners, then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages.

It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310518
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 10
ILLUSTRATION:file photo by Reuters Family members of the 22 South Korea volunteers kidnapped in Afghanistan wait to hear news about their loved ones in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday. A Taliban spokesman said a second hostage has been murdered.
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 209

Korean hostage slain Taliban says second male killed because government hasn't freed insurgents


Police in central Afghanistan at daybreak today discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban, officials said.

The victim's body was found in the village of Arizo Kalley in Andar District, some 10 km west of Ghazni city, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi said by phone.

'COULD KILL ANOTHER'

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Al-Jazeera television, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven of the female hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity was not verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless. The hostages did not speak.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway on July 19. Last Wednesday, the Taliban killed the male leader of the group.

It's not clear if the Afghan government would consider releasing any militant prisoners. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310498
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 3
ILLUSTRATION:file photo by Dave Thomas, Sun Media Jody Mitic and girlfriend Danielle Still will be able to continue parking their motorcycles in their condo parking garage.
BYLINE: JOE WARMINGTON
WORD COUNT: 590

Common sense - and protective laws for the disabled - prevail to keep a wounded Canadian hero with his beloved wheels


Master Cpl. Jody Mitic is getting to keep his parking spot after all.

The war hero, who lost his legs serving his country in Afghanistan, was about to lose the space for his donated custom-made motorcycle because of the soulless rules of the management of his condo at Yonge and Sheppard.

But thanks to some sober second thought by the condo administration and the laws of the land this proud Canadian fought to preserve, Mitic gets to keep the spot for his prized ride.

"We have a legal obligation to the handicapped," said John Oakes, president of Brookfield Residential Services.

In other words, thanks to human rights standards in Canada, the disabled must be considered.

It's not every day a disabled person has a motorcycle, but this was a unique situation that needed unique discretion and thoughtful decision-making. That will happen now and Mitic's motorcycle will not be towed after all. "We'll just put a piece of plywood down on the cement so the kickstand doesn't create a hole," said Oakes, who said Mitic would also receive an apology.

Compromise. Common sense. Congratulations.

Mitic, a 30-year-old sniper who credits the very existence of the bike built by the guys at Barrie Harley-Davidson/Buell for helping his recovery, was pleased because it's one less thing he has to worry about as he continues his rehabilitation at the nearby St. John's rehab centre.

'RULES ARE RULES'

"I am very appreciative," he said. "In the end it worked out and I thank them. I thank everybody who supported me and there's no hard feelings."

After receiving a phone message, Mitic was hoping to meet with building property manager Sandi Plesa to iron things out. "I hope people are not too hard on her," he said. "Maybe she was just trying to say rules are rules."

The last thing Mitic needs is confrontation, conflict and complication. The kid has been through enough. In January he stepped on a Taliban bomb that changed his life. Seven months later he said he was actually more concerned about the plight of motorcyclists than the fact he is now disabled. "What's wrong with parking a motorcycle?"

But the fact that he had both his legs blown off by the gutless sneak attack of the Taliban brought out the defence mechanism in so many readers who were horrified with the rules-are-rules approach.

In fairness, Oakes was not aware of this situation until he read the Sunday Sun. He also defended his property manager, saying, "She didn't know of Mr. Mitic's situation. She is very upset."

She is not the only one. The e-mails are still coming in by the dozens.

Many people were moved that complete strangers would raise $50,000 to build Mitic a customized motorcycle with a thumb shifter and were mystified why some strict condo rules would not allow him to park it -- even though other bikes were permitted to park. Many offered their garages.

'FOR OUR FREEDOM'

It seems when it comes to messing with our troops and our war heroes, people will take a stand.

"He is a handicapped person now, fighting for our freedom and the world -- this is his thanks!" says Robert Reeson.

"Can we not bend the rules some to accommodate? For gawdsakes. Wake up, people!"

Lisa McNevin and Allan Stroud wrote: "If it was a member of your family who was fighting for what he/she believed, and was injured doing so, would you not fight for them with the same dedication and determination which they continually fight for you?"

Many e-mails were like this one from Tim J. Schleich of Delhi, Ont.

"Shame on these people for doing what they are doing to what I consider a Canadian Hero."

But Oakes stresses his manager had no idea Mitic was recovering from war wounds and would have made an exception if he had mentioned it. Mitic says many in the building were aware and he tried to get a meeting where it would be explained privately. No meeting was arranged and he received a letter Friday indicating he had until Monday to remove his vehicle or it would be towed.

All he was looking for was a compromise until Sept. 10 -- when he heads back to CFB Petawawa to start the process to get back to Afghanistan to support his country. Ironically, it's a motorcycle that is helping him do that.

While it's true this story had legs, it also turns out it had a heart, soul, apologies and logical conclusion, too.

Soldier gets green light to park bike KEYWORDS=CANADA

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SOURCETAG 0707310494
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 1
ILLUSTRATION:1. photo by Ernest Doroszuk, Sun Media Master Cpl. Jody Mitic, who lost both legs to a landmine, was ordered to remove his custom-built bike from his condo's underground lot. But building management has had a change of heart. 2. file photo by CP WORST CANADIAN EVER?
WORD COUNT: 0

Frontpage Hero in hog heaven Wounded Afghanistan vet to keep parking spot after condo sees the light


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SOURCETAG 0707240457
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Sun
DATE: 2007.07.24
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 10
ILLUSTRATION:photo of MOHAMMAD ZAHIR SHAH Last vestige of monarchy
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: KABUL
TYPE : Obit
WORD COUNT: 121

Afghan king dies


Afghanistan's last king, a symbol of unity who oversaw four decades of peace before a 1973 palace coup ousted him and war shattered his country, died yesterday. He was 92.

Mohammad Zahir Shah's demise ended the last vestige of Afghanistan's monarchy and triggered three days of mourning for a man feted as the Father of the Nation since returning from exile in Italy after the 2001 ouster of the Taliban. In April 2002, he stood aside for anti-Taliban tribesman, now-President Hamid Karzai. He became monarch in 1933 at age 19 after the assassination of his father, Muhammad Nadir Shah. Zahir Shah's funeral was scheduled for today. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310053
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 12
BYLINE: CP
WORD COUNT: 86

Soldiers honoured


A Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry officer who died in Lebanon last year is being awarded the Meritorious Service Cross posthumously. Maj. Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener, from Kingston, was killed by an Israeli bomb on July 25, 2006 while serving at a UN observation post in southern Lebanon.

Lt.-Col. Omer Henry Lavoie, from Petawawa, who commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan, is also being awarded a Meritorious Service Cross. KEYWORDS=OTHER NEWS

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SOURCETAG 0707310039
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 7
ILLUSTRATION:photo by Reuters Family members of the 22 South Korea volunteers kidnapped in Afghanistan wait to hear news about their loved ones in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday. A Taliban spokesman said a second hostage has been murdered.
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: KANDAHAR
COLUMN: World Watch
WORD COUNT: 194

Korean hostage slain? Taliban says second male killed because government hasn't freed insurgents


A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the militia killed a second South Korean hostage yesterday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

Afghan officials said they couldn't confirm the claim.

Al-Jazeera television, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven of the female hostages.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the 22 Christian volunteers.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone.

'COULD KILL ANOTHER'

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim and were looking for a body. "Ghazni is a very vast area, so we really don't know where the body is," Pathan said.

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity was not verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless. The hostages did not speak.

Last Wednesday, the Taliban killed the male leader of the group. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310314
PUBLICATION: The London Free Press
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A5
ILLUSTRATION:2 photos 1. photo by AP PASTOR RETURNS: Workers carry a coffin yesterday containing the body of slain South Korean Bae Hyung-kyu from an ambulance in Anyang, west of Seoul, South Korea. The body of the pastor shot dead last week by his Taliban captors in Afghanistan arrived back in South Korea yesterday, as the families of the remaining 22 South Korean hostages pleaded for them to be released. 2. photo by Reuters FAMILY ANGUISH: The mother of Sim Sung-min, 29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cries after watching television news about him in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday.
BYLINE: NOOR KHAN, AP
DATELINE: GHAZNI, AFGHANISTAN
WORD COUNT: 309

Body of second slain Korean hostage found The militia insist the killings are sparked by Afghan failure to meet their demands.


Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak today, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, about 10 kilometres west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the area's chief administrator.

Yesterday, a purported Taliban spokesperson claimed the hardline militia had killed the Korean hostage because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents. Afghan officials said they hadn't recovered a body and couldn't confirm the claim.

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed footage it said showed seven female hostages in Afghan-istan.

Militant spokesperson Qari Yousef Ahmadi said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location. "The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners, then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not be verified.

About seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives. Last Wednesday, the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group.

The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea yesterday, where the families of the remaining hostages pleaded for their loved ones' release.

Their kin have gathered in Bundang, near Seoul. They waited anxiously, sharing prayers and sleepless nights. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310309
PUBLICATION: The London Free Press
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A4
ILLUSTRATION:photo by Reuters UNITED FRONT: U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown present a united front on Iraq and promoting Middle East peace yesterday, trying to quell suggestions of a cooling in trans-Atlantic ties.
BYLINE: BEN FELLER, AP
DATELINE: CAMP DAVID, MD.
WORD COUNT: 276

Brown, Bush show similarities - and differences, too - on Iraq


U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown forged a unified stand on Iraq yesterday, aiming to head off talk of a splintering partnership in the face of an unpopular war.

"There's no doubt in my mind he understands the stakes of the struggle," Bush said of Brown after two days of talks at the tranquil presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains.

The visit was closely watched for any sign of daylight between the president and prime minister after four years of unwavering support by Tony Blair, Brown's predecessor. Blair was saddled with the nickname "Poodle" by critics at home who felt he was too compliant with Bush's policies, particularly in Iraq.

Brown told Bush he shares the U.S. view of gradually turning over security of Iraq to its own people, based on signs of clear progress and advice from military leaders.

"We have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said of Britain's commitment to Iraq.

Still, as the United States has built up troops, Britain has been pulling them out.

Britain has around 5,500 troops based mainly on the outskirts of Basra. That's a significant drawdown since the war began, and Brown hinted more reductions were coming.

There were also subtle but notable differences between the leaders, mainly in how they described the terrorist threat, that could end up having broader significance.

Brown maintained that "Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," in contrast to Bush's common refrain the Iraq is the central front in the war on terror.

The president said the fight against terrorism is a battle of good against evil; he referred to it as struggle over ideology many times. Brown steered away from that.

"Terrorism is not a cause; it is a crime," he said. "It is a crime against humanity."

Bush said he listened carefully to Brown's thinking and was reassured. "He gets it," Bush said.

"What's interesting about this struggle . . . is that he understand it's an ideological struggle, and he does," Bush said.

The United Kingdom's commitment to the war is essential to the Bush administration. KEYWORDS=WORLD

====


SOURCETAG 0707310635
PUBLICATION: The Edmonton Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 32
BYLINE: CP
DATELINE: OTTAWA
WORD COUNT: 144

Tory caucus plans strategy


After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which begins tomorrow and runs through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

And with the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with the Liberals - both far shy of majority government support - there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

Tomorrow, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others.

The party's various regional caucuses will hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain-storming for future policy initiatives. KEYWORDS=CANADA

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SOURCETAG 0707310618
PUBLICATION: The Edmonton Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 18
ILLUSTRATION:photo by Reuters Family members of the 22 South Korea volunteers kidnapped in Afghanistan wait to hear news about their loved ones in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday. A Taliban spokesman said a second hostage has been murdered.
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: KANDAHAR
WORD COUNT: 194

Korean hostage slain? TALIBAN SAYS SECOND MALE KILLED BECAUSE GOVERNMENT HASN'T FREED INSURGENTS


A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the militia killed a second South Korean hostage yesterday because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

Afghan officials said they couldn't confirm the claim.

Al-Jazeera television, meanwhile, showed footage that it said was seven of the female hostages.

Militant spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the 22 Christian volunteers.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone.

'COULD KILL ANOTHER'

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan said officials were aware of the Taliban's claim and were looking for a body. "Ghazni is a very vast area, so we really don't know where the body is," Pathan said.

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity was not verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless. The hostages did not speak.

Last Wednesday, the Taliban killed the male leader of the group. KEYWORDS=WORLD

====


SOURCETAG 0707310722
PUBLICATION: The Calgary Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 12
ILLUSTRATION:photo of STEPHEN HARPER Second stage
BYLINE: CP
DATELINE: OTTAWA
WORD COUNT: 189

Tories planning for homestretch


After 18 months of tightly scripted, top-down communication, the federal Conservative caucus meets this week in Charlottetown to discuss the government's future and give seldom-heard MPs a voice.

The mid-summer strategy session, which runs tomorrow through Friday, marks the unofficial launch of the second stage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority mandate.

With the Tories mired in an ongoing dead heat with Liberals -- both far shy of majority government support -- there is plenty for the 125 MPs and 24 senators to discuss.

Tomorrow, cabinet ministers will brief the national group on developments in the areas of crime and security, environment and energy, and infrastructure, among others.

The party's various regional caucuses will also hold separate meetings to discuss regional issues.

The main event takes place during Thursday's all-day meeting of the full group, where government insiders say discussions will range from riding concerns to Afghanistan, from government communications policy to brain-storming for future policy initiatives.

Alberta backbencher James Rajotte calls it "a real opportunity for every MP to stand and say what they're hearing from constituents, what they feel the issues are heading into the fall."

The sense there won't be an election before the spring has given the caucus licence to do longer-term thinking, he said.

"This is the biggest chance since the last election for the prime minister and cabinet to set some fresh plans and priorities." KEYWORDS=NATIONAL

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SOURCETAG 0707310711
PUBLICATION: The Calgary Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 10
ILLUSTRATION:photo by Reuters Family members of the 22 South Korea volunteers kidnapped in Afghanistan wait to hear news about their loved ones in Seongnam, south of Seoul, yesterday. A Taliban spokesman said a second hostage has been murdered.
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
WORD COUNT: 193

Hostage's corpse found Taliban says second male killed because government hasn't freed insurgents


Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak today, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, some 10 km west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity Monday.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone.

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners, then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage."

Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages.

It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

Seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan. KEYWORDS=WORLD

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SOURCETAG 0707310700
PUBLICATION: The Calgary Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 5
ILLUSTRATION:1. photo by Mike Smith Calgary Highlanders Warrant Officer Mike Smith with some of the 200 African Union soldiers he trained for peacekeeping operations in the Darfur area of Sudan. 2. photo of MIKE SMITH Honoured
BYLINE: PABLO FERNANDEZ, SUN MEDIA
WORD COUNT: 229

City soldier decorated for merit


Dedication and professionalism while training African Union peacekeepers has earned a Calgary soldier one of the highest merit awards.

Warrant Officer Mike Smith will be presented the Meritorious Service Medal for his role in preparing African soldiers tasked to protect a besieged population in the Darfur area of Sudan.

Smith, who served in Sudan and Ethiopia between May and November 2006 with the African Mission in Sudan, said the award is a privilege.

"It's something that's nice to get," he said.

"The focus right now is primarily on Afghanistan, as it should be, but sometimes you feel like these smaller tours are being overlooked.

"But they're not being overlooked -- people are paying attention and they're being recognized."

Smith, a 20-year soldier with previous tours in Cyprus and Croatia, volunteered to go to the hot spot to teach under-equipped African Union peacekeepers how to use machine guns and armoured vehicles donated by Canada.

It was his job to teach the AU troops how to carry out mechanized operations and small unit tactics.

His performance got the attention of his superiors, who nominated him for the Meritorious Service Medal.

His citation states: "In a diverse and complex mission, Warrant Officer Smith's dogged determination, technical expertise and strength of character, acknowledged as being on par with senior officers on the mission, enhanced the operational effectiveness of over two hundred African Union soldiers."

The bestowing of the MSM, which recognizes distinguished service, is a special event, with only 193 medals being awarded to navy, army and air force personnel in the last five years, said Governor-General spokeswoman Marie-Paule Thorn.

"But more than that, it recognizes work done in an outstanding, professional manner," she said.

MSMs are normally presented at Rideau Hall by the Governor General or the Chief of the Defence Staff, said Thorn. KEYWORDS=ALBERTA

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SOURCETAG 0707310699
PUBLICATION: The Calgary Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: 5
ILLUSTRATION:photo of AL KOENIG Supportive
BYLINE: SHAWN LOGAN, SUN MEDIA
WORD COUNT: 261

Cops support troops today


Drivers in the downtown core will line up today to purposely get pulled over by the cops.

While the city won't be slapping any Support Our Troops decals on its civic fleet, the Calgary Police Association (CPA) will hold a "yellow ribbon checkstop" at its downtown headquarters in hopes of raising much-needed funds for military families and showing support for Canadian troops.

CPA president Al Koenig said he expects to hand out hundreds of the magnetic decorations, including a donation of 450 that have been set aside for officers who wish to place them on their police vehicles.

"It allows everybody to participate and show support in a tangible way," he said.

The drive-thru -- which runs from 7 a.m. until the decals are all gone -- is a partnership between the CPA and the Military Family Resource Centre.

The idea was put forward after council last week decided against putting the ribbons on city vehicles -- a move that didn't sit well with some city employees.

Two military wives, who both have husbands serving in Afghanistan, will be on hand, including Devan Kublik, whose husband Capt. Kyle Clapperton serves with the Calgary Highlanders and is also a physical trainer with the Calgary Police.

"These are people he knows so it's a very emotional thing," she said, noting Clapperton is due home in a month after serving abroad since February.

"Those yellow ribbons really do mean a lot and I'm hoping to see a lot of people interested."

The $5 magnets will be available to anyone who drives by the CPA's office at 428 6 Ave. S.E.

Colleen Rowe, director of the MFRC, said she hopes Calgarians will line up to show support for the troops.

"We're thrilled -- this is a great opportunity for people in the downtown to swing by and show their support," she said. "It's really been inspiring to see the support of community members."

Since the controversy erupted, her office has been overwhelmed with requests for the patriotic decorations.

She said 1,100 of the magnetic ribbons were delivered last Tuesday and sold out by Friday while stickers are also a hot item. KEYWORDS=ALBERTA

====


IDNUMBER 200707310107
PUBLICATION: Times Colonist (Victoria)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A9
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Han Jae-Ho, Reuters / Family members of Sim Sung-min,29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry after watching television news about him yesterday near Seoul. It was not known which hostage was killed yesterday. ;
DATELINE: KABUL, Afghanistan
BYLINE: Sayed Salahuddin
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 219

Taliban say they've killed second hostage


KABUL, Afghanistan -- Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage yesterday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening (7 a.m. PDT) because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot yesterday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al-Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently their captors.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310106
PUBLICATION: Times Colonist (Victoria)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A9
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 318

Bush, Brown meeting reveals relationship shift; Briton calls Afghanistan front line against terror


UNITED NATIONS -- Gordon Brown presented a united front yesterday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British prime minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than was Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," Brown said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of al-Qaeda in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said. "Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310100
PUBLICATION: Times Colonist (Victoria)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A9
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Han Jae-Ho, Reuters / Family members of Sim Sung-min,29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry after watching television news about him yesterday near Seoul. ;
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 206

Body of slain hostage found south of Kabul


GHAZNI, Afghanistan (AFP) -- The body of a second South Korean killed by the hardline Taliban movement was found overnight, Afghan police said today, adding new urgency to efforts to save the lives of 21 other hostages.

The bullet-riddled body was found in an area of the southern province of Ghazni, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul, near where 23 South Koreans were kidnapped July 19.

"It was the body of a South Korean. There were bullet wounds in the body," Ghazni Police Chief Alishah Ahmadzai said.

The Islamic insurgents said yesterday that they had shot dead the hostage after the expiry of two deadlines for the government to agree to free jailed Taliban prisoners.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said. The hostage was the second to be murdered by the militants who last week shot dead the leader of the Christian group, a 42-year-old pastor.

Ahmadi warned that more could die. The group has set a new deadline in the standoff for today, Ahmadi said, adding: "If the government does not care about demands, we will start killing more."

South Korean media said the latest victim was believed to be 29-year-old Shim Sung-min.

Meanwhile, a suicide car bomb exploded near a military base in Kabul today, wounding two passersby, police said, adding that two foreign soldiers were also believed to have been hurt.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310082
PUBLICATION: Times Colonist (Victoria)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Letters
PAGE: A11
BYLINE: Andy Bras
SOURCE: Times Colonist
WORD COUNT: 85

Priorities are elsewhere


Re: "Swindle masks budget woes," editorial, July 28.

The system of dumping money before the end of a fiscal year in order to justify more money in the next budget is certainly convenient for those seeking an opportunity to divert public money toward their personal pension plans.

To revamp the system as the Times Colonist suggests, however, would require a major effort and long-term commitment of resources. Regrettably, as we are continually reminded by the media, more must be done first to to fight corruption in Afghanistan.

Andy Bras,

Sidney.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310008
PUBLICATION: Times Colonist (Victoria)
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Arts
PAGE: D5 / FRONT
SOURCE: Times Colonist
WORD COUNT: 619

Enduring memories of spoilers' mischief


Last week, film writer Michael D. Reid wrote about spoilers, the people and websites that reveal the unexpected endings of movies. We asked you for your experiences and opinions. Here is a selection of the responses.

Michael Reid says that he is Pottered out and that "spoilers" are a fact of life and we should just get used to it, whether it's Harry's outcome or eastern election results. It's hard to disagree with that basic premise, but the ancillary is that we also "accept" it and that is another step on the slippery slope that we really don't have to take.

If you see the Potter phenomenon in a more metaphorical sense, it seems to me that Rowling isn't just bemoaning the "spoilers" of the ending of the Deathly Hallows, but rather is railing against the seeming general decline of consideration for others.

Of all the themes throughout her books, what resonates for me, my daughters and granddaughters is that all people are a mix of good and not- so-good traits and that we all have the ability to make choices.

Just because we can do it doesn't mean that we should or that it's OK. But the more we see self-indulgence generally accepted or, worse, the more we see it extolled, the more we see it emulated.

So while at some level we might have to get used to selfish behaviour that has negative impact on others, we should never be accepting of it and we should never, ever stop clucking our tongues, shaking our heads and muttering aloud that it's wrong.

- W. Paul Hansen

I had the misfortune of being told the ending for the movie The Sting. My friend couldn't wait to tell me that Robert Redford's character in the movie wasn't actually dead! Very funny indeed. I certainly have enjoyed that movie many times since then, however, and I do recall being somewhat surprised at the time, even though I knew the ending. Death to spoilers.

- Paul McDonald

Back when the movie Thelma and Louise had just been released, I wanted to see it, but couldn't quite recall the title, so I asked my sister. She replied, "Oh that's the one where the two chicks commit suicide by driving off a cliff at the end." I never did go.

- Kelley M. Durkovic

As of about a year ago, I was one of about four people of the planet (the other three being a dead guy whose remains have yet to be discovered somewhere in the California mountains and two women in Afghanistan) who hadn't yet seen The Sixth Sense. I had plans to see it, but for some reason it slipped by me and, in all the years that it had been out, not once had anyone let slip the ending. Until one night at work I overheard some customers discussing plot twists in movies and one of them said, "I know! And in Sixth Sense when it turns out he's dead in the end!"

I walked away thinking, "I really should rent that movie" and did, undeterred by the fact that I was now privy to this major spoiler.

So, imagine my surprise when I got to the end of the movie and it was Bruce Willis's character who was dead! I had watched the entire movie thinking (for no real reason) it was the little boy whom these ladies had revealed was dead! You might say that the entire movie was a double surprise for me! I had to watch the whole thing over again, first to see the movie from the now revealed angle and secondly (as anyone who has seen it on DVD has done) to see if there really was any interaction in the "real world" between Willis's character and others actually alive, besides the little boy.

At any rate, I am one of those people who reads spoilers, too.

Oh, and by the way, Soylent Green is people!

- Amber Kitzler

====


IDNUMBER 200707310042
PUBLICATION: Edmonton Journal
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Opinion
PAGE: A14
COLUMN: David Ignatius
KEYWORDS: TERRORISM; WAR
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
BYLINE: David Ignatius
SOURCE: Washington Post
WORD COUNT: 822

U.S. must take action now against al-Qaida safe havens in Pakistan; Low-key, preventive combat may avoid ill-planned retaliation later


WASHINGTON - The National Intelligence Estimate released July 17 put the problem plainly enough: Al-Qaida has "regenerated key elements of its Homeland attack capability" using a new safe haven in the lawless frontier area of northwest Pakistan known as Waziristan.

The question is: What is the United States going to do about it? For those who might have forgotten in the six years since Sept. 11, 2001, what a reconstituted al-Qaida could do, the intelligence analysts explained that the terrorist group has "the goal of producing mass casualties, visually dramatic destruction, significant economic aftershocks and/or fear among the U.S. population." The analysts noted that al-Qaida continues to seek biological, radiological and nuclear weapons "and would not hesitate to use them." Perhaps it is human nature not to see threats clearly until a disaster actually happens -- even if it's the second time around. How else to explain the limited public response to this clear and emphatic warning? Maybe the Bush administration has cried wolf about terrorism so often that people have stopped believing anything the government says. Or that the whole subject is now obscured by the choking fog of Iraq, as in the president's mind-numbing formulation of the threat: "They are al-Qaida ... in ... Iraq." But the question remains: What should the United States do about al-Qaida's new safe haven in Pakistan, from which it may already be plotting attacks that could kill thousands of Americans? It is Sept. 10, metaphorically, with a little increment of time still remaining. We can see "the looming tower," to borrow the title of Lawrence Wright's fine book.

But how do we stop the airplanes? The Bush administration will attack "actionable targets anywhere in the world, putting aside whether it was Pakistan or anyplace else," warned Frances Fragos Townsend, the White House homeland security adviser.

That drew the predictable indignant response from the Pakistani government, which doesn't want to go after the al-Qaeda cells in Waziristan, but doesn't want anyone else to do it, either.

So again, what should the United States do? The lesson of 9/11 is that it's necessary to act decisively. But the lesson of Iraq is that unwise actions can make the terrorism problem worse. Which course is right? Destroy safe havens The best answer I've heard comes from Henry Crumpton, a former CIA officer who was one of the heroes of the agency's campaign to destroy al-Qaida's safe haven in Afghanistan in late 2001. After retiring from the CIA in 2005, he served as the State Department's coordinator for counterterrorism. He resigned from State in April and is now a fellow at the EastWest Institute and a private consultant.

Crumpton argues that the United States must take preventive action, but that it should do so carefully, through proxies wherever possible. The right model for a Waziristan campaign is the CIA-led operation in Afghanistan, not the U.S. military invasion of Iraq. Teams of CIA officers and Special Forces soldiers are best suited to work with tribal leaders, providing them weapons and money to fight an al-Qaida network that has implanted itself brutally in Wazir-istan through the assassination of more than 100 tribal leaders during the past six years.

It would be better to conduct such operations jointly with Pakistan, but if the government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf can't or won't cooperate, then the U.S. should be prepared to go it alone, Crumpton argues.

"The United States has an obligation to defend itself and its citizens," says Crumpton. "We either do it now, or we do it after the next attack." Crumpton proposed a detailed plan last year for rolling up these sanctuaries, which he called the "Regional Strategic Initiative." It would combine economic assistance and paramilitary operations in a broad counterinsurgency campaign.

In Waziristan, U.S. and Pakistani operatives would give tribal warlords guns and money, to be sure, but they would coordinate this covert action with economic aid to help tribal leaders operate their local stone quarries more efficiently, say, or install windmills and solar panels to generate electric power for their remote mountain villages.

Intervening in another Muslim country is risky, to put it mildly.

That's why a successful counterinsurgency program would need Pakistani support, and why its economic and social development components would be critical.

The concept should be President Kennedy's "Alliance for Progress" to counter radicalism in Latin America, rather than "Operation Iraqi Freedom." The United States can begin to take action now against al-Qaida's new safe haven. Or we can wait, and hope that we don't get hit again.

The biggest danger of waiting is that if retaliation proves necessary later, it could be ill-planned and heavy-handed -- precisely what got us in trouble in Iraq.

David Ignatius writes for the Washington Post

====


IDNUMBER 200707310029
PUBLICATION: Edmonton Journal
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A8
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Reuters / British Prime Minister Gordon Brown,left, listens to U.S. President George W. Bush during a joint news conference at Camp David on Monday. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; IRAQ; ARMED FORCES; UNITED STATES
DATELINE: CAMP DAVID, Md.
SOURCE: Baltimore Sun
WORD COUNT: 325

Britain's PM hits it off fine at first meeting with Bush


CAMP DAVID, Md.- British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is regarded as a sombre figure in his home country, in contrast to his predecessor, the energetic Tony Blair.

But after spending four hours alone with the new British leader during a dinner here Sunday and breakfast Monday, President George W. Bush declared that conventional wisdom about Brown was distorted, and he said the relationship between the U.S. and Great Britain was as strong as ever, despite a change in leadership.

"He's not the dour Scotsman that you describe him, or the awkward Scotsman. He's actually the humorous Scotsman," Bush said during an outdoor news conference after his first face-to-face meeting with the British leader since he took office. "He's a problem-solver. He's a glass-half-full man."

Bush invited Brown to the secluded presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains for talks that touched on military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, trade, global climate change, the Middle East and Darfur. The subtext of the discussions was whether the president would enjoy the same relationship with Brown as he did with Blair, whose support of Bush's policies -- especially on the war in Iraq -- eroded his political support.

In their remarks, Brown and Bush repeatedly said they were of like mind on important issues facing them and the world, while reporters scrutinized their words looking for differences.

Brown, for example, said British troops were fighting in Afghanistan because the country "is the front line against terrorism."

Asked later why Iraq didn't deserve that distinction, Brown attempted a clarification by saying, "I think I described Afghanistan as the first line in the battle against the Taliban."

He also said terrorism "is not a cause, it is a crime," a characterization that prompted a question about whether a law-enforcement response would be more appropriate than a military one.

Explaining further, Brown seemed to close the gap. "We are at one in fighting the battle against terrorism," he said.

Brown has stopped referring to a "special relationship" between the U.S. and Great Britain, instead calling the connection his nation's "most important bilateral relationship."

====


IDNUMBER 200707310022
PUBLICATION: Edmonton Journal
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A5
KEYWORDS: !@DATELINE=OTTAWA
BYLINE: William Lin
SOURCE: CanWest News Services
WORD COUNT: 267

Medusa commander merits service cross; Medal recognizes front-line leadership


OTTAWA - Under the unforgiving desert sun, in 55 C heat, Lt.-Col. Omer Henry Lavoie led his troops into battle against the Taliban.

A gouge on the barrel of the machine gun of his light-armored vehicle -- centimetres away from his head -- bore testimony to his philosophy of leadership.

"My perspective is that you have to lead from the front so you understand what your soldiers are going through," he said several months later.

Governor General Michaelle Jean Monday announced that Lavoie, 41, who led NATO's largest ground offensive in Afghanistan, was awarded the Meritorious Service Cross.

For seven months beginning August 2006, Lavoie commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanistan. Within days of taking command, he led Operation Medusa, NATO's first offensive ground operation at the Battle Group level.

At the height of the the operation, 1,400 troops moved under his command.

He immersed himself in the battles, sitting in the crew commander's seat of his light-armoured vehicle as bullets whistled around his convoy.

"I don't know how many times, close to half a dozen times or so, we were ambushed or engaged with some sort of direct fire weapon," he said.

His convoy constantly encountered improvised explosive devices -- IEDs, and on Nov. 27 it led to personal tragedy.

Lavoie was leading his four-vehicle combat patrol. Half an hour after leaving Kandahar Airfield, a suicide bomber detonated an explosive, killing the driver in the vehicle behind Lavoie and Chief Warrant Officer Robert Girouard.

Girouard and Lavoie had been together for almost 18 months during training and combat. But they were more than colleagues. In August, Lavoie will walk Girouard's daughter down the aisle at her wedding.

"That was certainly probably the most trying day, given that he's my right hand man, a very close friend," But it also strengthened his resolve to win the war, Lavoie said.

Ottawa Citizen

====


IDNUMBER 200707310015
PUBLICATION: Edmonton Journal
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A4
KEYWORDS: WAR; TERRORISM; FOREIGN AID; BOMBINGS; AFGHANISTAN
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 248

Taliban claim to have murdered second hostage


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Efforts to save the lives of South Koreans being held by Afghanistan's Taliban militia took on new urgency today after the rebels said they had killed a second hostage.

The Islamic insurgents warned that more would die if the government did not meet its demand to free Taliban prisoners in its jails.

A male hostage among a group of 23 mostly female Christians captured on July 19 was shot dead late Monday, after two deadlines that day had expired, a Taliban spokesman said.

The claim could not be immediately confirmed. Police were dispatched to search for the body in an area of the southern province of Ghazni, where a Taliban spokesman said the corpse had been dumped.

The Taliban last week shot dead the leader of the Christian group -- a 42-year-old pastor.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP late Monday.

"Finally tonight (Monday) at 8:30, we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sin with AK-47 gunshots," Ahmadi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

He said the body had been left in Ghazni's Qarabagh area, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul, where the pastor's bullet-riddled body was found on Wednesday last week.

The group had not set a new deadline in the standoff, he said. But, "If the government does not care about demands, we will start killing more." Government negotiators have said that the release of Taliban prisoners is not an option.

The Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera ran footage late Monday of what it said was the group, with women shown seated, wearing Islam-style headscarves.

South Korea's government strove Tuesday to verify the Taliban claims that a second hostage has been killed.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310010
PUBLICATION: Edmonton Journal
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A4
KEYWORDS: WAR; TERRORISM
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 229

Taliban murder second hostage


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - The body of a second South Korean killed by the hardline Taliban movement was found overnight, Afghan police said Tuesday, adding new urgency to efforts to save the lives of 21 other hostages.

The bullet-riddled body was found in an area of the southern province of Ghazni, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul, near where 23 South Koreans were kidnapped July 19.

The Islamic insurgents said late Monday they had shot dead the hostage after the expiry of two deadlines for the government to agree to free jailed Taliban prisoners.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said afterwards.

The leader of the Christian group, a 42-year-old pastor, was shot dead last week.

Ahmadi warned that more could die. "If the government does not care about demands, we will start killing more."

The group set no new deadline.

South Korean media said the latest victim was believed to be 29-year-old Shim Sung-Min.

"If confirmed true, it is an intolerable act of barbarity," South Korean Prime Minister Han Duck-Soo told a cabinet meeting Tuesday. "The government must use all possible means to secure the safe return of the remaining hostages."

Shim's 62-year-old father Shim Jin-Pyo, his face creased with anxiety, told reporters: "I'm still waiting for the government's official announcement. I just hope all the 22 kidnapped people will come back safely."

His wife Kim Mi-Ok burst into tears and collapsed, shouting: "Save my son. I cannot live without him."

President Hamid Karzai has ruled out releasing Taliban prisoners after five were freed in March in exchange for a kidnapped Italian journalist.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310094
PUBLICATION: The Windsor Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Editorial/Opinion
PAGE: A6
SOURCE: Windsor Star
WORD COUNT: 634

Afghanistan; Cost of failure too high


Prime Minister Stephen Harper said less than a year ago he was willing to risk political defeat rather than let narrow partisan interests prevent him from doing right by Canada's soldiers and their allies in Afghanistan.

Harper insisted Canada wouldn't "cut and run" and would stay "until the job is done," but now, in the face of sagging public support, he appears to be equivocating. Finishing the job doesn't seem as important now as winning re-election and fulfilling, in the narrowest sense, the obligations Canada made to its NATO allies.

Harper now says he has no plans to prolong Canada's mission beyond its February 2009 commitment without a "reasonable degree" of parliamentary support. All three opposition parties oppose an extension of Canada's combat role in Kandahar, meaning majority support is unlikely. But what constitutes a "reasonable degree?"

Harper has a responsibility -- to Canadians and our soldiers, not to mention the Afghan people and our NATO allies -- to be clearer than this on this most crucial of questions. Does he support the continuation of combat operations in the restive south if the stubborn insurgency still hasn't been eradicated at that point?

Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor has maintained Canada will be able to scale back combat operations by the end of the year as additional responsibilities are given to the developing Afghan army. This is the ultimate goal of the mission -- to lay the foundation so Afghanistan can function and prosper once we leave -- but O'Connor is being criticized, rightly, for being overly optimistic and naive.

Canada's top soldier, Gen. Rick Hillier, said "it's going to take a long while" before the Afghan army can stand on its own and he is joined in that assessment by Lt.-Gen. Michel Gauthier, commander of all Canadian expeditionary forces overseas: "Nobody's under any illusion that Afghanistan will be self-sustaining and self-sufficient by February '09."

The apparent softening of Harper's stance is fuelled not just by public opinion but the sense that Canada, which has now lost 66 soldiers and one diplomat in Afghanistan, is paying a heavier price than other NATO allies. Britain and the U.S. are pulling their weight but many countries in the 37-member alliance are not. Some nations have caveats preventing their soldiers from leaving the base and others are stationed in relatively safe areas of the country.

Harper has called for a more equitable burden sharing in the dangerous regions of Afghanistan and he is justified in doing so. But he needs to be clear with Canadians on what will happen if other countries, like Germany and France, do not emerge to fill Canada's place in the line. Will Canada withdraw and risk all the gains it has made in Kandahar so far or will it continue paying a heavy price to remain a key player in the war against terrorism?

Another problem for Harper and this country as it confronts the Afghan question is that the definition of success is nebulous so far as that war-torn country is concerned.The goal is the creation of a self-sufficient and stable Afghanistan that will never again become a staging ground for international terrorism.

It will be difficult if not impossible to determine when such a victory has been achieved. Success, in that sense, can only be measured in decades and generations as the country develops and grows. The decisions Canada makes about Afghanistan must be viewed through that long-term lens and grounded on the principle that Afghanistan is a key front in the war against terrorism.

The stakes are too high and the cost of failure too dear to make judgments based on the short-term political considerations of a minority government. History is being made. Harper used to understand that. Perhaps it's time he reviewed his old speeches.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310055
PUBLICATION: The Windsor Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: B7
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Reuters photo: Larry Downing / STANDINGTOGETHER: New U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown, left, and U.S. President George W. Bush established the image of a continuing special relationship after they met for the first time at Camp David Monday. ;
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 580

'Special' relationship survives; Bush, Brown stand (almost) united against terrorism


UNITED NATIONS - Gordon Brown continued the U.S.-U.K. united front after his first meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush Monday.

But while the new British Prime Minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of al-Qaida in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said.

"Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the Canadian government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops -- deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand -- from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Brown might seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Pundits also predicted he would distance himself from Bush, whose close personal relationship with Blair became a political liability for the former prime minister.

While Brown said British forces deployed in relatively less violent southern Iraq had been able to transfer primary security responsibility to Iraqis in three of four provinces in which they operate, he expressed no radical policy change.

"There's no doubt in my mind that Gordon Brown understands that failure in Iraq would ... say to people sitting on the fence around the region that al-Qaida is powerful enough to drive great countries like Great Britain and America out of Iraq before the mission is done," said Bush.

"He understands that violence could spill out across the region, that a country like Iran would become emboldened."

Brown at one point described terrorism as a "crime" -- in contrast to the Bush administration's argument it is an act of war that mostly cannot be dealt with by the courts. But he sounded like Bush when he said: "There should be no safe haven and no hiding place" for terrorists.

Bush brought up the speculation about their personal relationship, saying his British counterpart was not the "dour Scotsman" he'd been made out to be, and declaring him "the humorous Scotsman."

He also paid tribute to Brown's personal strength in overcoming the death of the first of his three children, saying "instead of that weakening his soul, (it) strengthened his soul."

====


IDNUMBER 200707310037
PUBLICATION: The Windsor Star
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: C2
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Reuters photo: Han Jae-Ho / CRUSHED: Themother, left, and other family members of Sim Sung-min, 29, weep after watching television news about him in Seongnam, south of Seoul, today. The identity of the dead hostage has yet to be officially announced. ;
DATELINE: KABUL
BYLINE: Sayed Salahuddin
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 473

Taliban claim 2nd hostage slain; S. Korean male reportedly shot in Afghanistan


KABUL - Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening (10 a.m. EDT) because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot on Monday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the governor of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital Kabul, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea on Monday.

The bullet-riddled body of Bae Hyung-kyu was found last Wednesday, the day he would have turned 42. His brother, Bae Shin-kyu, told reporters the family would not hold a funeral until the other hostages returned to South Korea.

In Seoul, family members of the hostages gathered at Saemmul Church on hearing news that a second male hostage had been shot, said a pastor at the church, which sent the volunteers to Afghanistan.

Broadcaster KBS said the foreign ministry and the presidential Blue House were trying to verify the report.

A South Korean shipment of emergency medical supplies and daily necessities has been delivered to the Taliban, but Seoul does not know if the goods have reached the Koreans, Yonhap news agency quoted a presidential spokesman as saying earlier.

The Koreans were abducted a day after two German aid workers and their five Afghan colleagues were seized by Taliban in neighbouring Wardak province. The body of one of the Germans has been found with gunshot wounds.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310023
PUBLICATION: Vancouver Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A6
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Han Jae-Ho, Reuters / Family members of SimSung-min, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry while watching TV report. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR
DATELINE: DUBAI
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 241

TV footage of S. Korean hostages shown; Taliban claims it has shot dead another of the 23 kidnapped aid workers


DUBAI -- The Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera on Monday ran footage of a group of people it said were the South Korean hostages held by the Taliban militia in Afghanistan.

In silent footage lasting less than one minute, which would be the first to show the hostages since their capture, Asian-looking women in the group were shown seated with their heads covered in headscarves and appearing weakened.

"We received the video today outside Afghanistan," an editorial team member of Al-Jazeera told AFP, without adding details.

The Taliban said late Monday it had shot dead another of the 23 South Koreans kidnapped on July 19, after its deadlines expired for the government to free prisoners, although there was no immediate confirmation of the claim.

The hostage, said to have been executed in a remote part of the southern province of Ghazni, would be the second killed in by the militants, who last week gunned down the leader of the Christian aid group -- a 42-year-old pastor.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP.

Ahmadi said the body had been left in Ghazni's Qarabagh area, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul, where the pastor's bullet-riddled body was also dumped.

The South Korean church group was captured in Qarabagh while travelling by bus on a key highway from the troubled southern city of Kandahar where they had officially been on an aid mission.

In a telephone interview with CBS television, a South Korean woman in the group begged for help last week.

"We are in a very difficult time. Please help us," said the woman, who told CBS that her name was Yo Cyun-ju.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310012
PUBLICATION: Vancouver Sun
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A4
KEYWORDS: FUNERAL INDUSTRY
DATELINE: OTTAWA
BYLINE: Glen McGregor
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 299

$1.5-million deal for military funeral services runs into 2010


OTTAWA -- The Harper government has signed a $1.5-million agreement with a Toronto company to help prepare the bodies of dead Canadian soldiers for return to Canada.

The standing offer awarded by Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) gives funeral home MacKinnon and Bowes Ltd. the right to provide "care of remains and funeral services" to the Department of National Defence (DND).

The offer is valid until April 2010 -- more than a year after the current Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end -- with two optional one-year extensions.

MacKinnon and Bowes has received individual contracts in the past for similar work, but the offer allows the government to call up the company's services when required, at a fixed price, to a maximum of $1.5 million.

When a Canadian soldier is killed in Afghanistan, the body is normally sent to the U.S. Army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. DND usually dispatches one or more civilian morticians to Landstuhl to prepare the body for the flight back to Canada. The mortician can do some non-invasive preservation work, but does not embalm the body.

The morticians and other staff must be ready to travel on short notice. The repatriation process is done as quickly as possible, but with long flights back to Canada, decay can occur.

The Canadian Forces own refrigerated caskets that weigh about 360 kilograms with a body inside. Because they're so unwieldy, they must be moved by forklift and conveyer belts.

They are therefore rarely used. Instead, bodies are returned in "transfer cases" -- the aluminum coffins that are draped with Canadian flags at so-called ramp ceremonies.

Allan Cole, president of MacKinnon & Bowes, described the contract at a "more formalized process" than the company's previous arrangement with DND.

The company specializes in bringing home the bodies of Canadians who die overseas, but Cole said his employees find the experience of working with dead soldiers particularly sad.

"You're dealing with young people. It always a very heart-wrenching tragic event," Cole said.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310096
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: City
PAGE: C1 / FRONT
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Photo courtesy of Lt.-Col. Omer Henry Lavoie /Lt.-Col. Omer Henry Lavoie will receive the Meritorious Service Cross from Gov. Gen. Michaëlle Jean for his role in Operation Medusa. ;
BYLINE: William Lin
SOURCE: The Ottawa Citizen
WORD COUNT: 597

Soldier earns medal for leading by example; A Stittsville native is being honoured for his actions in Afghanistan, where he commanded his troops from the front lines, reports William Lin.


In the Afghanistan battle that Gov. Gen. Michaëlle Jean's office is calling "the most significant ground combat operation in NATO's history," it was Lt.-Col. Omer Henry Lavoie of Stittsville who led the troops.

And he didn't command from afar. Out in the 55-degree heat, he was on the front lines -- and his machine- gun on his light-armoured vehicle proved it, with a gouge on the barrel from flying shrapnel only centimetres away from his head.

Other times, he was metres away from an exploding suicide bomber.

"My perspective is that you have to lead from the front so you understand what your soldiers are going through," he said yesterday. "And you have to share the same risks and hardships as the soldiers."

Yesterday, the Governor General announced she will award Lt.-Col. Lavoie, 41, with the Meritorious Service Cross.

For seven months beginning in August 2006, he commanded the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group, in southern Afghanis-tan. Within days of taking command, he led Operation Medusa, NATO's first offensive ground operation at the Battle Group level.

At the height of the the operation, 1,400 troops moved under his command. But, he also immersed himself in battles, sitting in the crew commander's seat of his light-armoured vehicle as bullets whistled around his convoy.

"The way it works is, yeah, I'm the commanding officer, the senior man on the ground. But at the same time, I was a soldier first," Lt.-Col. Lavoie said.

"I don't know how many times, close to half a dozen times or so, we were ambushed or engaged with some sort of direct fire weapon," from machine-gun to 82-millimetre recoilless weapon fire, he said.

His convoy constantly encountered improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, and on Nov. 27 it led to tragedy.

Lt.-Col Lavoie was leading his four-vehicle combat patrol as they tried to link up with forward troops. Half an hour after leaving Kandahar Airfield, a suicide bomber detonated an explosive, killing the driver in the vehicle behind Lt.-Col. Lavoie.

It also killed his regimental sergeant-major, Chief Warrant Officer Robert Girouard.

They had been together for almost 18 months during training and combat, he said, but they were more than just colleagues.

In August, Lt.-Col. Lavoie will walk Chief Warrant Officer Girouard's daughter down the aisle.

"That was ... probably the most trying day given that he's my right-hand man, a very close friend, families are very close," he said. "So to have him killed ... that was a difficult blow for me and my battle group."

But it also strengthened his resolve to win the war, he said.

"I promised his family that we would keep the fight against the enemy because that's what he would have wanted us to have done," he said.

His battle group's efforts forced the Taliban militants away from certain swaths of land, allowing villagers to return to their homes, he said.

Lt.-Col. Lavoie said he credits several hundred others for the honour: soldiers who served under him.

"They're the ones that deserve the recognition and award and they're the guys who, through both achievement and sacrifice, led to the success of the mission over there," he said.

He added that just three hours after he took his command in Afghanistan, hundreds of Taliban militants attacked one of their positions. They were outnumbered around five-to-one.

In the end, about 100 militants were killed, he estimated, while no one on the Canadian side died that day.

Born in the northern Ontario town of Marathon, he always loved the outdoors and at 10 years old, knew he wanted to do something military related, he said.

Lt.-Col. Lavoie was a rifle platoon commander during the Oka Crisis, a company second-in-command in Croatia and Bosnia and served as a battle group operations officer in Kosovo.

The Governor General also announced yesterday that Maj. Paeta Hess-von Kruedener would be given the Meritorious Service Decoration.

Maj. Hess-von Kruedener, a 44-year-old London, Ont., native, was given the award posthumously. He was killed last July in Lebanon when Israeli forces struck a UN observation post.

The award's citation said he "steadfastly maintained his position while reporting the situation as it presented itself."

His wife, Cynthia Hess-von Kruedener, said he had always wanted to serve at that post. And that day, he honoured Canada by continuing to do his duty, she said.

"He stayed at that post knowing that they were unable to get him out," she said.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310039
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A8
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Larry Downing, Reuters / British PrimeMinister Gordon Brown, left, presented a united front with U.S. President George W. Bush at private meetings yesterday. ;
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: The Ottawa Citizen
WORD COUNT: 561

British PM calls Afghanistan terror's front line; Less aligned with Bush than Blair


UNITED NATIONS - Gordon Brown presented a united front yesterday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British prime minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Mr. Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the British leader is less aligned with Mr. Bush than predecessor Tony Blair.

While Mr. Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged that the presence of al-Qaeda in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-British deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Mr. Brown said. "Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Mr. Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops -- deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand -- from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time when we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Mr. Brown might seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Mr. Bush brought up the speculation about their personal relationship, saying his British counterpart was not the "dour Scotsman" he'd been made out to be, and declaring him "the humorous Scotsman."

He also paid tribute to Mr. Brown's personal strength in overcoming the death of the eldest of his three children, saying "instead of that weakening his soul, (it) strengthened his soul."

"In terms of the war on terror, Brown is saying there has been a seamless transition, and that the U.K. is there," said Patrick Basham, director of the Democracy Institute think-tank, based in Washington and London.

"It was a great day for George W. Bush simply because Gordon Brown appeared shoulder-to-shoulder with him."

Maintaining strong ties with the United States is as important as ever for Britain, given the country is one of the biggest targets for al-Qaeda-linked terrorism, and that co-operation between U.S. and British intelligence services benefits the junior partner in the relationship more.

Mr. Brown said he and Mr. Bush shared concerns over a range of other issues, including speeding up peace efforts in Darfur, advancing the Middle East peace process, mobilizing private, public and activist bids to end world poverty and pumping new life into global trade talks.

To view a video report on Bush and Brown's first meeting, go to Today's Videos at ottawacitizen.com

====


IDNUMBER 200707310035
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
DATELINE: DUBAI
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 142

Al-Jazeera airs hostage footage


DUBAI - The Arab channel Al-Jazeera ran footage yesterday of a group of people it said were the South Korean hostages held by the Taliban militia in Afghanistan.

In footage lasting less than one minute, which would be the first to show the hostages since their capture, Asian-looking women in the group were shown seated with their heads covered and appearing weakened.

"We received the video today outside Afghanistan," a member of Al-Jazeera told Agence France-Presse.

In a telephone interview with CBS television, a South Korean woman in the group begged for help last week. "We are in a very difficult time. Please help us," said the woman, who told CBS her name was Yo Cyun-ju.

CBS said it interviewed Ms. Yo late Wednesday, after an interview was arranged with a Taliban commander.

"All of us are sick and in very bad condition," she said, begging South Korea and the international community to make a deal with the Taliban to win their freedom.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310034
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Saem-Mul Presbyterian Church, AgenceFrance-Presse, Getty Images / The Taliban claim that a second South Korean hostage named 'Sung Sin' was killed yesterday. The victim's name is similar to Shim Sung-min, 29, above, who is among the group of hostages . ;
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
BYLINE: Mohammad Yaqob
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 336

Second South Korean hostage executed, Taliban claim


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Taliban militants say they shot dead a South Korean hostage yesterday, who was among 23 captured two weeks ago, after deadlines expired for the government to free prisoners.

The hostage, said to have been executed in a remote part of the southern province of Ghazni, was the second killed by the militants, who last week killed the leader of the Christian group -- a 42-year-old pastor.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said after a tense day during which government negotiators admitted that talks had so far failed.

"Finally tonight at 8:30 we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sin with AK-47 gunshots," Mr. Ahmadi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

The given name of the Taliban's purported latest hostage victim is most similar to Shim Sung-min, 29, who is among the group of South Koreans .

Also yesterday, a four-man Afghan health team was missing in southern Afghanistan and feared kidnapped, their organization said.

The team had been missing since midday when they were returning to the southern city of Kandahar after a mission, a director of the Afghan Health Development Services said.

The director, Abdul Kabir, said he had been telephoned and told the group was stopped by gunmen outside the city and were being held captive.

He could not say who might be responsible.

The insurgent Taliban movement -- which is holding Afghan, German and South Korean hostages -- did not confirm it was involved.

There was no independent confirmation of the latest killing, with the South Korean Embassy in Afghanistan refusing to talk to the media about the crisis.

Police were searching for the body, a Ghazni police official said. "Although it's night and dark, police forces have gone to the area and have started a search and investigation there," Chief Alishah Ahmadzai said.

Mr. Ahmadi said the body had been left in Ghazni's Qarabagh area, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul.

The South Korean evangelical church group was captured July 19 in Qarabagh while travelling by bus on a key highway from the troubled southern city of Kandahar, where they had been on an aid mission.

The Taliban said Sunday it would start killing the South Korean hostages yesterday unless the government freed Taliban men in its jails.

But negotiators said this was not up for discussion and called for two extra days to try to resolve the crisis.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310033
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Saem-Mul Presbyterian Church, AgenceFrance-Presse, Getty Images / The Taliban claim that a second South Korean hostage named 'Sung Sin' was killed yesterday. The victim's name is similar to Shim Sung-min, 29, above, who is among the group of hostages. ;
DATELINE: GHAZNI, Afghanistan
BYLINE: Mohammad Yaqob
SOURCE: Agence France-Presse
WORD COUNT: 362

Second South Korean hostage executed, Taliban claim


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Taliban militants say they shot dead a South Korean hostage yesterday, who was among 23 captured two weeks ago, after deadlines expired for the government to free prisoners.

The hostage, said to have been executed in a remote part of the southern province of Ghazni, would be the second killed by the militants, who last week killed the leader of the Christian group -- a 42-year-old pastor.

"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said after a tense day during which government negotiators admitted that talks had so far failed.

"Finally tonight at 8:30 we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sin with AK-47 gunshots," Mr. Ahmadi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

The given name of the Taliban's purported latest hostage victim is most similar to Shim Sung-min, 29, who is among the group of South Koreans.

"The government is now trying to confirm the report. The Blue House (presidential office) cannot say whether the report is true or not," said presidential spokesman Cheon Ho-Seon today after an emergency meeting of security officials.

Also yesterday, a four-man Afghan health team was missing in southern Afghanistan and feared kidnapped, their organization said.

The team had been missing since midday when they were returning to the southern city of Kandahar after a mission, a director of the Afghan Health Development Services said.

The director, Abdul Kabir, said he was telephoned and told the group was stopped by gunmen outside the city and were being held captive. He could not say who might be responsible.

The insurgent Taliban movement -- which is holding Afghan, German and South Korean hostages -- did not confirm it was involved.

Police were searching for the body, a Ghazni police official said. "Although it's night and dark, police forces have gone to the area and have started a search and investigation there," Chief Alishah Ahmadzai said.

Mr. Ahmadi said the body had been left in Ghazni's Qarabagh area, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul.

The South Korean evangelical church group was captured July 19 in Qarabagh while travelling by bus on a key highway from the troubled southern city of Kandahar, where they had been on an aid mission.

The Taliban said Sunday it would start killing the South Korean hostages yesterday unless the government freed Taliban men in its jails. Negotiators said this was not up for discussion and called for two extra days to try to resolve the crisis.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310030
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A6
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Rafiqur Rahman, Reuters / A woman tries toretrieve a part of her house destroyed by floods at Char Kazla in the Bogra district of India yesterday. The severe flooding in the low-lying nation now covers half of its area, with troops in boats providing medicines and food to some marooned residents and rescuing others. Approximately four million people have been affected. ; Colour Photo: Rafiqur Rahman, Reuters / Flood-affected villagers take shelter in a school at Mayurer Char in the Bogra district yesterday. ;
DATELINE: GUWAHATI, India
BYLINE: Biswajyoti Das
SOURCE: Reuters; with files from bloomberg news
WORD COUNT: 487

Millions stranded as severe floods swamp India


GUWAHATI, India - Monsoon flooding killed at least 29 people in eastern India and Bangladesh, officials said yesterday, as hundreds of thousands remained displaced from their homes or cut off in their villages.

In the Indian states of Assam and Bihar, at least 24 people, including three children, were killed in weather-related incidents since Sunday morning, bringing the death toll to 75 in a week.

About four million people have been affected, with many seeking shelter on bridges, rooftops and high ground.

"The floods situation has turned worse overnight," said Bhumidhar Burman, a minister in Assam in northeast India. "We have stepped up our relief measures on a war footing."

Officials in neighbouring Bangladesh said half a million people were stranded in their homes while tens of thousands had found shelter in close to 100 relief camps.

The floods in the low-lying nation now cover half its area, with troops in boats providing medicines and food to some marooned residents and rescuing others.

The country's summer flood death toll crossed 160, with five more flood-related deaths reported, including three children.

The deaths were the latest fatalities from storms, landslides and monsoon flooding in South Asia this month that has killed hundreds in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Nepal.

Across eastern India, government buildings, small airports, military bases, hospitals and railway stations have been flooded, while the meteorological office warned of more rain.

Bihar's residents fear an epidemic as bodies cannot be buried or cremated with graveyards and cremation grounds under water.

Many highways were submerged, disrupting the movement of food and medicine. Air force helicopters were dropping food to marooned people, while schools were closed in many areas.

The situation was similar in Assam, in northeastern India. The Kaziranga National Park -- famous for its one-horn rhinoceros -- was waterlogged, with floods forcing animals to move to the highway passing through the sanctuary.

Assam police launched a crackdown on traders selling food at inflated prices.

"Four traders have been arrested and warnings have been issued to others," a police spokesman said.

In the mountainous states of Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya, part of India's remote northeast, roads have been blocked by landslides, which has caused food scarcity in tribal areas.

Floods in India caused by monsoon rain have killed 1,057 people, destroyed 513,141 homes, damaged about 420,380 hectares of farmland and caused losses of more than $254 million, the government said.

Rains in the past few weeks across the country -- including the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, the eastern state of Bihar, the northeastern state of Assam and the southern state of Kerala -- have caused rivers to swell, flooding towns and villages, washing away roads and forcing people to move to higher ground.

More than 13.5 million people have been hit by the flooding after heavy rain in 13 states and one federally administered region, according to the home ministry report.

Villages hit by flooding number more than 10,098, with the livestock toll at 68,056 in the 137 districts that are affected, according to the July 29 report.

India's June-September monsoon, which accounts for four- fifths of the country's annual rainfall, arrived in Kerala on May 28, four days ahead of schedule, according to the Indian Meteorological Department.

The monsoon has been uneven across the country with below-normal rain in some areas and floods elsewhere.

Rainfall this season will be 93 per cent of the average reported between 1941 and 1990, the weather office has said.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310005
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A2
SOURCE: The Ottawa Citizen
WORD COUNT: 135

Project Kandahar


Citizen reporter Andrew Mayeda is in Afghanistan covering the war for the CanWest newspaper chain. He will spend the bulk of his six-week tour "embedded" with the Canadian military in the southern province of Kandahar, where Canadian troops are battling the Taliban. Mr. Mayeda will also be blogging about his experiences on a regular basis. In his first blog entry he writes about "making the necessary preparations" for his trip. "The checklist ranges from the sobering (drafting a will) to the amusing (apparently you can never have enough baby wipes in the field). Ticking off this list gives you a comforting sense of control." Read the entire entry and follow his blog at

====


IDNUMBER 200707310003
PUBLICATION: The Ottawa Citizen
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A1 / FRONT
BYLINE: Glen McGregor
SOURCE: The Ottawa Citizen
WORD COUNT: 433

Government signs three-year, $1.5M contract with company to prepare soldiers' remains


In a move that appears to signal expectations of continuing casualties in Afghanistan, the Harper government has signed a $1.5-million agreement with a Toronto company to help prepare the bodies of dead soldiers for return to Canada.

The standing offer awarded by Public Works and Government Services Canada gives funeral home MacKinnon and Bowes Ltd. the right to provide "care of remains and funeral services" to the Department of National Defence on an ongoing basis.

The offer is valid until April 2010 -- more than a year after the current Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end -- with two optional one-year extensions.

MacKinnon and Bowes has received individual contracts in the past for similar work, but the offer allows the government to call up the company's services on an if-and-when needed basis, at a fixed price, to the maximum of $1.5 million.

When a Canadian soldier is killed in Afghanistan, the body is typically sent to the U.S. army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. DND usually dispatches one or more civilian morticians to Landstuhl to prepare the body for the flight back to Canada. The mortician can do some non-invasive preservation work, but does not embalm the body.

The morticians and other staff must be ready to travel on short notice.

The repatriation process is done as quickly as possible. With long flights back to Canada, decay can become a factor.

The Canadian Forces owns refrigerated caskets but they weigh about 360 kilograms with a body inside and are so unwieldy they must be moved by forklift and conveyer belts. They are rarely used. Instead, bodies are returned in "transfer cases" -- the aluminum coffins that are draped with Canadian flags at ramp ceremonies.

The offer with MacKinnon and Bowes does not specify a fixed price for repatriation of each body, but sets the value of travel costs, per diems for staff and other expenses.

The Defence Department referred questions about the standing offer to Public Works.

The offer includes, "mortuary services for timely and comprehensive response to international casualty situations," said Lucie Brosseau, a Public Works media officer.

It also covers advice from a mortuary expert, including forensic and pathological advice, and training, when requested. The offer includes work on international casualties sustained by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and does not pertain specifically to Afghanistan.

Ms. Brosseau said the offer makes no reference to the number of repatriations that are expected will be required.

"We can't anticipate that," she said.

Allan Cole, president of MacKinnon and Bowes, described the contract as a "more formalized process" than the company's previous arrangement with DND.

The company specializes in bringing home the bodies of Canadians who die overseas, but Mr. Cole said his employees find the experience of working with dead soldiers particularly sad.

"The tragedies that we have been involved in, they have an impact on anybody," he said.

"You're dealing with young people. It's always a very heart-wrenching tragic event,"

Canada has lost 66 soldiers and one diplomat in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310036
PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A12
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: SAULT LOEB, AFP, GETTY IMAGES / U.S. PresidentGeorge W. Bush (right) walks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown down a walkway lined by a military cordon after Brown arrived via helicopter at Camp David in Maryland for their first official meeting. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; IRAQ; ARMED FORCES; UNITED STATES
DATELINE: NEW YORK
BYLINE: STEVEN EDWARDS
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 774

Bush, British PM present united front; 'Duties and responsibilities' in iraq. Brown describes Afghanistan as front line in war on terrorism


Gordon Brown presented a united front yesterday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British Prime Minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of Al-Qa'ida in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-British deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

"In Iraq, we have duties to discharge and responsibilities to keep in support of the democratically elected government," Brown said. "Our aim, like the United States, is step by step to move control to the Iraqi authorities, to the Iraqi government and to the security forces as progress is made."

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops - deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand - from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Brown may seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

Pundits also predicted he would distance himself from Bush, whose close personal relationship with Blair became a political liability for the former prime minister.

While Brown said British forces deployed in relatively less violent southern Iraq had been able to transfer primary security responsibility to Iraqis in three of four provinces in which they operate, he expressed no radical policy change.

"There's no doubt in my mind that Gordon Brown understands that failure in Iraq would ... say to people sitting on the fence around the region that Al-Qa'ida is powerful enough to drive great countries like Great Britain and America out of Iraq before the mission is done," Bush said.

"He understands that violence could spill out across the region, that a country like Iran would become emboldened."

Brown echoed Bush in saying decisions would be made according to advice from commanders on the ground.

"There's no doubt in my mind that he will keep me abreast of his military commanders' recommendations," Bush said.

Brown at one point described terrorism as a "crime" - in contrast to the Bush administration's argument it is an act of war that mostly cannot be dealt with by the courts.

But he later used words Bush himself may have used when he said: "There should be no safe haven and no hiding place" for terrorists.

Bush brought up the speculation about their personal relationship, saying his British counterpart was not the "dour Scotsman" he'd been made out to be, and declaring him "the humorous Scotsman."

He also paid tribute to Brown's personal strength in overcoming the death of the first of his three children, saying "instead of that weakening his soul, (it) strengthened his soul."

"In terms of the war on terror, Brown is saying there has been a seamless transition, and that the U.K. is there," said Patrick Basham, director of the Democracy Institute think tank, based in Washington and London.

"It was a great day for George W. Bush simply because Gordon Brown appeared shoulder-to-shoulder with him."

Maintaining strong ties with the United States is as important as ever for Britain given the country is one of the biggest targets for Al-Qa'ida-linked terrorism, and that co-operation between U.S. and British intelligence services benefits the junior partner in the relationship more.

There was no comment on the meeting from Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay or the Foreign Affairs Department regarding Brown's references to Afghanistan.

Brown said he and Bush shared concerns over a range of other issues, including speeding up peace efforts in Darfur, advancing the Middle East peace process, mobilizing private, public and activist bids to end world poverty, and pumping new life into global trade talks.

Brown later met with congressional leaders before flying to New York, where he will meet with United Nations Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon today, and address diplomats and other dignitaries on global efforts to reduce poverty.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310030
PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A11
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: HAN JAE-HO, REUTERS / The mother (left) and otherfamily members of Sim Sung-min, 29, one of the kidnapped South Koreans in Afghanistan, cry after watching a television report yesterday in Seongnam, south of Seoul. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; TERRORISM; HOSTAGES
DATELINE: KABUL
BYLINE: SAYED SALAHUDDIN
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 468

South Korean hostage killed; Slain by taliban. Kidnappers accuse Afghanistan of ignoring demands


Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage yesterday, a spokesperson for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages ... because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesperson Qari Mohammad Yousuf said by phone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 South Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesperson said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the South Korean shot yesterday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, while the rest were standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al Jazeera said it had obtained the footage "from a source outside Afghanistan."

The television network said an off-camera speaker was reading a statement, but it did not report what he said. The hostages were not speaking in the video.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesperson for the governor of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital, Kabul, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

The Taliban earlier insisted the release of Taliban prisoners was the only way to settle the crisis.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after the group said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 female hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

Shipping out: Amid rising opposition to Canada's mission in Afghanistan, a contingent of about 2,500 Quebec-based soldiers is shipping out to serve there. Meet the reservists in a video series by The Gazette's Phil Carpenter at: www.montrealgazette.com/shippingoutmontrealgazette.com

====


IDNUMBER 200707310018
PUBLICATION: Calgary Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Early
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Han Jae-Ho, Reuters / The mother, left, and otherfamily members of Sim Sung-min, one of the hostages in Afghanistan, cry after watching news reports about him. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; TERRORISM; HOSTAGES; BOMBINGS; FOREIGN AID; CRIME;AFGHANISTAN
DATELINE: KABUL
BYLINE: Sayed Salahuddin
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 231

Taliban kills second South Korean hostage


Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot on Monday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al-Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages, wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed. Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310015
PUBLICATION: Calgary Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A7
ILLUSTRATION:Photo: Han Jae-Ho, Reuters / The mother, left, and otherfamily members of Sim Sung-min, one of the hostages in Afghanistan, cry after watching news reports about him. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; TERRORISM; FOREIGN RELATIONS; FOREIGN AID; CRIME;AFGHANISTAN
BYLINE: Reuters and Agence France-Presse
SOURCE: KABUL
WORD COUNT: 192

Taliban kills second South Korean hostage


Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage on Monday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

Earlier today, Afghan police said they had found the executed hostage's body.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters Monday by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The bullet-riddled body of the second victim was found in an area of the southern province of Ghazni, about 140 kilometres south of Kabul.

"It was the body of a South Korean. There were bullet wounds in the body," Ghazni police chief Alishah Ahmadzai told AFP.

The Taliban spokesman said the group would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners but set no new deadline.

He said the body of the Korean shot on Monday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310011
PUBLICATION: Calgary Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A5
KEYWORDS: FUNERAL INDUSTRY
DATELINE: OTTAWA
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 121

Ottawa enlists funeral home for return of fallen soldiers


The Harper government has signed a $1.5-million agreement with a Toronto company to help prepare the bodies of dead Canadian soldiers for return to Canada.

The standing offer awarded by Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) gives funeral home MacKinnon and Bowes Ltd. the right to provide "care of remains and funeral services" to the Department of National Defence (DND).

The offer is valid until April 2010 -- more than a year after the current Canadian mission in Afghanistan is slated to end -- with two optional one-year extensions.

MacKinnon and Bowes has received individual contracts in the past for similar work, but the offer allows the government to call up the company's services when required, at a fixed price, to a maximum of $1.5 million.

====


IDNUMBER 200707310010
PUBLICATION: Calgary Herald
DATE: 2007.07.31
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A5
ILLUSTRATION:Colour Photo: Larry Downing, Reuters / British PrimeMinister Gordon Brown, left, and U.S. President George W. Bush presented a united front at their first official meeting at Camp David. ;
KEYWORDS: WAR; IRAQ; ARMED FORCES; UNITED STATES
DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS
BYLINE: Steven Edwards
SOURCE: CanWest News Service
WORD COUNT: 323

Brown, Bush differ on terror's front line


Gordon Brown presented a united front Monday with U.S. President George W. Bush, but while the British prime minister spoke of "duties and responsibilities" in Iraq, he declared Afghanistan as the front line in the war on terror.

Meeting at Camp David, the U.S. presidential retreat, the two leaders buttressed the notion that their countries' "special relationship" stood above ties with all others.

But analysts noted their first meeting since Brown became prime minister last month offered hints the new British leader is less aligned with Bush than Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

While Brown said international terrorism was the most important of the "great challenges" facing the world, he veered from the Bush administration's refrain that Iraq is ground zero for conducting the fight.

"Afghanistan is the front line against terrorism," he said. "As we have done twice in the last year, where there are more forces needed to back up the coalition and NATO effort, they have been provided by the United Kingdom."

He acknowledged the presence of al-Qaeda in Iraq showed the conflict was more than just a civil war, as many critics of the U.S.-U.K. deployment claim. But he said supporting NATO and coalition forces to fight the Taliban and terrorists in Afghanistan was more important.

Brown's emphasis on Afghanistan will be welcomed by the government of Stephen Harper as it seeks to switch the focus for Canada's 2,500 troops -- deployed mainly in Kandahar province, next door to British forces in Helmand -- from primarily combat to training Afghan forces.

"Canada wouldn't want the U.K. to lessen its role in Afghanistan because that would put more pressure on us at a time we're trying to lessen our role," said Alex Morrison, president of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

There had been speculation on both sides of the Atlantic that Brown may seek to respond to the unpopularity of the Iraq war in Britain by seeking to more quickly reduce Britain's commitment, currently being scaled back from 5,500 to 5,000 troops.

====


PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120215
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A1 (ILLUS)
BYLINE: PAUL KORING
SECTION: International News
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE: KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN
WORDS: 1306
WORD COUNT: 1184

THE AFGHAN MISSION: ILL-PREPARED AND UNDER-EQUIPPED - BUT BRAVE AND HIGHLY INNOVATIVE Local ranks too thin to take on Taliban Just 1,400 will be fully trained when fighting season begins - less than half the number O'Connor predicted


PAUL KORING KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN Afghan soldiers are tough, brave and willing to fight, say Canadians who have watched them take on the Taliban. The proof is grimly evident in the surgical ward at the main NATO base hospital where wounded Afghan soldiers fill nearly every bed.

But what they have in courage they lack in numbers, which argues that the Afghan National Army is far from ready to take over the battle against the Taliban from Canada and its allies.

There will only be 1,400 fully trained - and still woefully under-equipped - Afghans ready for battle by the time fighting season begins next year, according to officials here.

That's up from roughly 500 available last fall, thanks to a ramped-up training program, say Canadians shaping the effort, and the army is vastly improved.

Still, even that is far from a fighting force capable of replacing the combat punch of the heavily armed Canadian battle group with its tanks, artillery, night-fighting ability and tight integration with helicopter gunships and fighter-bombers capable of raining death from the skies. And it's far short of the 3,000 combat-ready Afghan soldiers that Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor predicted would be operational early next spring.

Even as the Afghan forces grow in numbers and fighting ability, they still have no armoured vehicles, no body armour, sometimes no helmets, no artillery bigger than mortars and no way of calling in air strikes. They fight with worn Kalashnikovs and drive around in open pickup trucks.

"They are making great progress," said Lieutenant-Colonel Wayne Eyre, who heads Canada's 70-soldier Operational Mentor Liaison Team (OMLT), attempting to transform Afghan soldiers deployed in Kandahar into combat-capable formations that will eventually supplant the heavily armed foreign forces now leading the fight against the Taliban.

"These guys can fight - it's almost a joy to watch them fight their way through enemy positions," Lt.-Col. Eyre recounts front-line Canadian commanders as saying.

The ANA - at least that part of it that most concerns Canadians - has come a long way since last fall. Then, a single, under-strength kandak (an Afghan infantry battalion) with perhaps 500 soldiers - although about one-third of them would be absent, usually visiting their homes halfway across the country - was the sum total of the Afghan National Army in Kandahar province.

Since then, teams of Canadian trainers embedded with and fighting alongside the Afghans, coupled with close pairing of small Afghan units and elements of the Canadian battle group, have transformed that kandak into what Brigadier-General Tim Grant calls the "best Afghan battalion in the entire Afghan army." Trouble is, there's still only one fighting infantry kandak in Kandahar. Another, consisting of raw recruits who have just finished basic training, will deploy in a few weeks. The brigade's third infantry kandak doesn't yet exist. However, on the plus side, both the combat support and logistics kandaks needed to round out the brigade are functioning.

If Canada (and other NATO nations) have a viable exit strategy in Afghanistan, then marching home with honour will mean leaving behind an ANA capable of sustaining a peace and winning the hearts and minds of ordinary Afghans.

"We're not going to win this war by sending out the battle group to kill five or 10 Taliban who can be replaced by five or 10 more," said Lt.-Col. Eyre. Ultimately, winning the counterinsurgency requires the Afghan security forces to win the trust and support of the people and cut off the Taliban's lifeblood of support in the hinterlands.

So far, building that ANA is a campaign of much promise, modest success and a long way to go.

Much of the progress may seem mundane, but it's vital to developing a capable army. Afghan units fighting alongside the Canadians in Kandahar now organize and provide their own convoys, plan their own (small) operations and are slowly integrating the combat support and logistics elements.

"The new leadership is good. . . . They understand the fundamentals of fighting a counterinsurgency, including the importance of keeping the population on side," Lt.-Col. Eyre said.

A tiny case in point. Last week, a young Afghan officer stopped his soldiers from stealing grapes from a farmer's vines in Panjwaii.

Without that sort of discipline, the ANA would be just another armed band roaming the countryside.

"They are now at the point where they are initiating, planning and executing their own operations, with Canadians only providing indirect support and things like casualty evacuation," Lt.-Col.

Eyre said.

Meanwhile, the AWOL (absent without leave) rate has dropped from a stunning 30 per cent to a still-intolerable - by NATO standards - but much better 10 per cent.

But the process will be gradual and it will be years before the Afghan army - even under the most optimistic of predictions - can project the kind of combat punch provided by 40,000-plus NATO troops backed by the world's most sophisticated warplanes.

Canada has ramped up its training effort. More than 130 officers and soldiers will be assigned to the OMLT during the current rotation based on the Van Doos battle group. That's up from 70 in the current OMLT. Still, that's only a fraction of the 1,000-soldier-plus Canadian battle group. However, deployed Canadian units will work alongside, and, it is hoped, in support of Afghan units.

"2008 will be the transition year," predicts Lt.-Col. Eyre. "I'd like to see them in the lead by the summer of 2008." Afghan National Army History Amir Sher Ali, who ruled Afghanistan from 1868 until his death in 1879, is credited with creating the country's first national army.

* At the start of the second Anglo-Afghan war (1878-1880), the 50,000-strong national army included 62 infantry and 16 cavalry regiments.

* Neglected during the reign of King Amanullah (1919-1929), the army's numbers fell to 11,000.

* Nadir Shah (1929-33) reopened the military college and rebuilt the army to around 70,000.

* During the 1960s, assistance from the Soviet Union helped to expand the national army to approximately 98,000.

* After the Soviet invasion in 1979, the national army shrunk to some 20,000.

* With the fall of the Soviet-backed puppet regime in 1992, the national army disintegrated.

Equipment Equipment donations to the Afghan National Army from NATO allies is part of a critical effort to build an army that can defend the country on its own. Some donations have already been made, but the ANA is still waiting on others.

* Hungary has given 20,500 assault rifles and 150,000 rounds of ammunition; Slovenia has given 10,000 machine guns and two million rounds of ammunition; and Turkey has given 24 155-mm Howitzers.

* In February, the ANA received its first instalment of military equipment from the United States, which included 800 armoured and transport vehicles and 12,000 pieces of light weaponry. Troop levels According to the Bonn Agreement of 2001, in which high-ranking Afghans, working under the UN, carved out a plan for governing their country, the ANA must have 72,000 troops by the end of next year.

It currently has about 50,000 soldiers in training.

As for the ANA air corps, about 5,000 troops of the required 8,000 will be recruited by the deadline, according to a commander who spoke with the Kabul Weekly. He declined to say how many air-corps troops there currently are.

Until the 1990s, the paper reports, the Afghan Air Force was among the most powerful in the region, with 350 helicopters, cargo planes and fighter jets, and as many as 30,000 troops and personnel.

Source: U.S. Army War College Quarterly Parameters; NATO; compiled by Unnati Gandhi and Rick Cash

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Canada; Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:strife; foreign policy; defence; history

ORGANIZATION NAME: Armed Forces; Taliban; Afghan National Army

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120214
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A8
BYLINE: PAUL KORING
SECTION: International News
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE: CAMP SHIRAZ, AFGHANISTAN
WORDS: 577
WORD COUNT: 525

THE AFGHAN MISSION: NATIONAL ARMY Country ready to turn history's page, colonel says His troops need better weapons and the help of foreign soldiers, who, this time, are in Afghanistan to help, not occupy


PAUL KORING CAMP SHIRAZ, AFGHANISTAN Since he was 12 and joined the army cadets, more than 40 years ago, Abdul Basir has watched armies march into Afghanistan, armed with big plans and promises to transform the country. Mostly, he has also watched them fail, driven defeated from this rugged and untamed land.

Now, Colonel Basir sits behind a polished desk in a newly built, sprawling base not far from the Tarnak Farms where Osama bin Laden once trained jihadists .

Nearby, children play in the bombed-out ruins of buildings that once housed Russian officers' families.

Col. Basir is newly appointed to command a brigade (at least on paper) in the nascent Afghan National Army - the brigade, in fact, that is supposed to take over the fighting from Canada's heavily armed battle group in Kandahar province, the heartland of the Taliban.

A big bear of a man with a bushy mustache and an easy smile, Col.

Basir, 53, is effusive in his gratitude to Canada. Over sweet tea, he tells a visitor that "Afghans will never forget that Canadians sent their children to sacrifice their lives to build democracy in Afghanistan." Col. Basir, who joined the Soviet-directed Afghan army that fought the mujahedeen in the 1980s - and lost - was in Moscow at staff college when the end came in 1989. In the mid-1990s, when the strict Islamist Taliban triumphed over other factions in Afghanistan's bloody civil war, Col. Basir dropped out of the army and out of sight in Kabul. His brother, a sometime journalist for the BBC, was arrested and eventually left for a new life in Canada.

This time, things will be different, said the colonel, whose brigade should have five kandaks (roughly the equivalent of a battalion) and perhaps 3,000 soldiers.

This time, the colonel said, Afghans understand that Western countries - such as Canada and the United States, which toppled the Taliban regime in 2001 - are in Afghanistan to help, not occupy or oppress.

"The big difference is that we are part of the family of nations and the Russians were here as occupiers," he said in an interview through an interpreter.

It's quite a turnabout for a man steeped in the military orthodoxy of the Soviet Union.

"What we need most is modern weapons," he said. Col. Basir's few hundred soldiers fight with clapped-out Kalashnikovs.

They drive around in open pickup trucks. Many of them don't have body armour, some don't have helmets.

"Our morale would go up if we had better weapons." One of the many inexplicable ironies of the Afghan counterinsurgency campaign is that thousands of NATO soldiers - aircraft maintainers, clerks, intelligence staff - who never leave the sprawling Kandahar airfield base each has a modern weapon that must be carried at all times, even to lunch. Their Afghan allies, on the other hand, are going into combat with old, unreliable AK-47s.

What Col. Basir doesn't mention is that his brigade, although perhaps twice as effective as it was last fall, is still at less than one-third its nominal fighting strength. Only one of three of its 600-soldier infantry kandaks exists as an active fighting force. Another has recently been formed out of raw recruits just finished basic training. The third is a box on a military flow chart.

"I cannot predict how long we will need foreign soldiers," Col.

Basir said.

"We can't solve our problems in just two or three years."

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:strife

ORGANIZATION NAME: Armed Forces; Taliban

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120213
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A8
BYLINE: SAYED SALAHUDDIN
SECTION: International News
SOURCE: REUT AP
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE: Kabul AFGHANISTAN
WORDS: 510
WORD COUNT: 458

THE AFGHAN MISSION: KIDNAPPING Police discover body of second South Korean hostage killed by Taliban


SAYED SALAHUDDIN Reuters News Service with a report from Associated Press KABUL Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak this morning, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, about 10 kilometres west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

A purported Taliban spokesman claimed the hard-line militia killed the Korean hostage yesterday evening because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners, but set no new deadline. The shooting was a rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al-Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed.

Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear whether he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al-Jazeera said it had obtained the footage, apparently made by an amateur, "from a source outside Afghanistan." It did not broadcast the soundtrack, but the hostages were not speaking.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the governor of Ghazni province, where the hostages were seized, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

The Taliban had earlier insisted the release of Taliban prisoners was the only way to settle the crisis.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after they said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said that force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 female hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea yesterday.

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:kidnapping; hostages; murder; strife; south koreans

ORGANIZATION NAME: Taliban

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120212
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A8
BYLINE: SAYED SALAHUDDIN
SECTION: International News
SOURCE: REUT
EDITION: Early
DATELINE: Kabul AFGHANISTAN
WORDS: 506
WORD COUNT: 456

THE AFGHAN MISSION: KIDNAPPING Second South Korean hostage killed, Taliban spokesman says


SAYED SALAHUDDIN Reuters News Service KABUL Taliban kidnappers shot dead a male South Korean hostage yesterday, a spokesman for the group said, accusing the Afghan government of not listening to rebel demands for the release of Taliban prisoners.

"We killed one of the male hostages at 6:30 this evening because the Kabul administration did not listen to our repeated demands," spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said by telephone from an unknown location.

The Taliban seized 23 Korean Christians, 18 of them women, 11 days ago from a bus in Ghazni on the main highway south from Kabul and killed the leader of the group on Wednesday after an earlier deadline passed.

The spokesman said the Taliban would kill more hostages if Kabul ignored their demand to release rebel prisoners, but set no new deadline. He said the body of the Korean shot yesterday had been dumped on a roadside.

The shooting was a bloody rejection of the authorities' request for more time for talks on freeing the hostages after the expiry of a rebel deadline earlier in the day.

Al-Jazeera television broadcast a video showing at least seven of the female hostages wearing head scarves and apparently unharmed.

Four were sitting on the ground, the rest standing beside men in Afghan robes, apparently militants.

The face of one Asian man also wearing traditional Afghan robes was shown, but it was not clear if he was a hostage or an insurgent.

Al-Jazeera said it had obtained the footage, apparently made by an amateur, "from a source outside Afghanistan." It did not broadcast the soundtrack, but the hostages were not speaking.

The hostage crisis has focused attention on growing lawlessness in Afghanistan with Taliban influence, suicide bombs and attacks spreading to many areas previously considered safe and making road travel between major cities a risky affair.

A spokesman for the governor of Ghazni province, where the hostages were seized southwest of the capital Kabul, said earlier that Afghan authorities had asked for two more days in which to settle the hostage crisis peacefully.

The Taliban had earlier insisted the release of Taliban prisoners was the only way to settle the crisis.

On Sunday, the Taliban ruled out further talks after they said government negotiators demanded the unconditional release of the hostages and a senior Afghan official said that force might be used to rescue them if talks failed.

The government had wanted the Taliban to first release the 18 women hostages, but the insurgents demanded the government release its prisoners first, leading to deadlock, said a Kabul-based Western security analyst who declined to be named.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has remained silent throughout the hostage ordeal, except for condemning the abduction, the largest by the Taliban since U.S.-led forces overthrew the movement's radical Islamic government in 2001.

He was harshly criticized for freeing a group of Taliban in March in exchange for the release of an Italian journalist.

The body of the South Korean Christian pastor shot dead by the Taliban last week arrived in South Korea yesterday.

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:kidnapping; hostages; murder; strife; south koreans

ORGANIZATION NAME: Taliban

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120148
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A12
BYLINE:
SECTION: Editorial
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE:
WORDS: 505
WORD COUNT: 502

CANADIAN MILITARY O'Connor speaks, Hillier contradicts


Even the lowest-ranking soldier understands that an army cannot function properly without discipline. But in the midst of Canada's most important mission in a half-century, this principle appears to have been forgotten at the highest level of the military. And while Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor bears much of the blame for this state of affairs, ultimate responsibility rests with Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Mr. O'Connor and Rick Hillier, Chief of the Defence Staff, have long had an uneasy relationship. But recently it has reached an untenable level of dysfunction, as evidenced by a bizarre public disagreement over the future of Canadian troops in Afghanistan.

On July 22, Mr. O'Connor appeared on CTV's Question Period to paint a rosy picture of the mission's progress. By the end of this year, he suggested, Afghanistan's army may be ready to allow Canadian front-line efforts to be scaled back. At the time, his comments seemed out of step with the more common analysis that Afghanistan's army has a long way to go. Sure enough, a week later General Hillier appeared on the same program to contradict Mr. O'Connor. "It's going to take a long while," he said of preparing Afghan troops to take over. "We've just started the process." It has been increasingly obvious throughout his tenure as defence minister that Mr. O'Connor is in over his head. But, embarrassing though it may be for him, it reflects even more badly on Mr. Harper.

For months, the Prime Minister has stood by as Mr. O'Connor has repeatedly been humiliated - not only by Gen. Hillier's repeated contradictions of his public statements, but also by his incompetence in handling the controversy over the treatment of Afghan detainees.

No doubt concerned that replacing Mr. O'Connor would shake public faith in the Afghan mission, Mr. Harper has refused to acknowledge his obvious mistake in appointing Mr. O'Connor to his position.

Meanwhile, his responses to Mr. O'Connor's critics have grown increasingly ludicrous, with the Prime Minister going so far as to suggest this past spring that the minister was beyond criticism because, unlike opposition MPs, he once served in the army.

No military can function properly without strong civilian oversight.

But with every day that Mr. Harper leaves his overmatched minister in the job, we are moving closer to that scenario. Gen. Hillier, more than Mr. O'Connor, now appears to speak for Canada's defence policy. Disturbing as this may be when it comes to public statements, it is all the more so if he is also steamrollering Mr. O'Connor behind closed doors.

It is not Gen. Hillier's fault that he effectively has nobody to answer to. But if Mr. Harper does not replace Mr. O'Connor, his only option will be to rein in Gen. Hillier himself. Better he should appoint a minister who commands the respect of the Chief of the Defence Staff and all other Canadian soldiers.

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Canada; Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:government; political; foreign policy; defence; strife

PERSONAL NAME: Gordon O'Connor; Stephen Harper; Rick Hillier

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120140
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A1
BYLINE: ALAN FREEMAN AND JANE TABER
SECTION: National News
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE: Ottawa ONT
WORDS: 765
WORD COUNT: 787

POLITICS: 'OTTAWA IS ALL OVER THE MAP' Minister's rift with general erodes support, PM warned


ALAN FREEMAN AND JANE TABER With a report from Brian Laghi OTTAWA Prime Minister Stephen Harper was warned yesterday that the rhetorical duelling between Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor and his chief soldier, General Rick Hillier, threatens to undermine already waning political support for the Afghanistan mission.

"Afghanistan has got to be very high on the list of problems he [Mr. Harper] has to fix," said David Bercuson, director of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary, as the Tories prepare for a caucus in Charlottetown this week to plot their fall political agenda.

Mr. Bercuson and other military and political experts said that there are too many voices speaking out on the Afghan military mission.

"The public is getting the perception that Ottawa is all over the map on this issue, and this isn't the way to manage a war," he said in an interview. "He has to improve the unity of the message of his people, find someone who will be the chief spokesperson or change out the Minister of Defence." Even one of Mr. Harper's close friends, former chief of staff Tom Flanagan, said he didn't think the situation could continue for "very long." "It strikes me as unusual to have the minister and the chief of the defence staff saying different things," said Mr. Flanagan, a professor at the University of Calgary.

"All I can say is that it looks odd. It makes you wonder what's going on." But two senior Tories said yesterday they believe the timing is wrong for a cabinet shuffle and that it's not the Prime Minister's style to make a move when his back is against the wall.

"The PM is not going to make a move when it's [the O'Connor/Hillier rift] in the news," said one official. "He'll sort of take stock over the summer and figure out what he wants to do." Over the weekend, Gen. Hillier once again seemed to take a different tack from Mr. O'Connor, insisting that it will take "a long while" until the Afghan National Army is ready to carry on the fighting against the Taliban now in the hands of Canadians and other North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces. A week ago, Mr. O'Connor had made a more optimistic forecast about the shifting of responsibility from Canadian troops.

The two men, who are not known to have particularly good personal chemistry, have frequently expressed different views on issues since the Tories took power 18 months ago. Just last week in a CBC interview, Gen. Hillier dismissed the idea of establishing new territorial defence battalions in Canada's big cities, a key element of the O'Connor-authored Tory defence platform in the past election, saying the last thing the Forces needed was new reserve units.

Wesley Wark, associate professor of history at the University of Toronto, said Mr. Harper must stop the public bickering.

"I don't think you can continue to tolerate distinct and publicly expressed differences between the CDS and the Minister of National Defence for too long," he said. "Either the Prime Minister has to adjudicate or one of them has to go." Mr. Wark said that one problem is knowing exactly if and when Gen. Hillier is stepping over the line and getting involved in political affairs that are outside his purview. "The line is not clear," he said. Unlike in the United States, where politicians have clashed with the likes of General Douglas MacArthur, Canada has little such experience.

"The line can be crossed in both ways," said Terry Liston, a retired major-general and frequent commentator on military affairs. "The minister is not the commander in chief of the Armed Forces. The minister establishes policy but he does not direct the troops." "You can have a chief of defence staff who gets too political but you can also have a minister who micro-manages," he said.

The problem is exaggerated in the current coupling of the gaffe-prone Mr. O'Connor, a former brigadier-general and Gen. Hillier, whose straightforward manner and gift of the gab makes him ideal TV material.

"We have a minister that knows the military too well and who therefore knows all details, and we have a CDS who is very confident of himself and very much at ease politically," Mr. Liston said, noting that the result is that each tends to "get in each other's way." A senior Prime Minister's Office official said that "Gen. Hillier has and will continue to provide important comment on operational issues, which is his purview."

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GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Canada

SUBJECT TERM:government; political; foreign policy; defence

PERSONAL NAME: Stephen Harper; Gordon O'Connor; Rick Hillier

ORGANIZATION NAME: Armed Forces

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PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 072120112
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A12
BYLINE: ROMAN JARYMOWYCZ
SECTION: Letter to the Edit
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE: Beaconsfield, Que.
WORDS: 84
WORD COUNT: 104

We'll take the soldier


Roman Jarymowycz Beaconsfield, Que.

The mean criticism of Brigadier-General Tim Grant (The Good Soldier Grant - letter, July 30) confuses the essence of the operational art practised in Afghanistan - the difference between tactics (kicking over the pail of milk) and strategy (killing the cow). The latter incorporates the dark arts of politicians. Is Gen. Grant's take (on the spot, with an intimate understanding of the issues) clearer than the vision of Ottawa-anchored military amateurs and their coterie of lobbyists? I'll bet on the professional soldier.

ADDED SEARCH TERMS:

GEOGRAPHIC NAME: Canada; Afghanistan

SUBJECT TERM:foreign policy; defence; strife

ORGANIZATION NAME: Armed Forces; Taliban

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PUBLICATION: WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
DATE: 2007.07.31
PAGE: A1
SECTION: World Wire
WORD COUNT: 337

Second slain South Korean hostage found


CP Wire GHAZNI, Afghanistan -- Police in central Afghanistan discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban at daybreak Tuesday, officials said.

The victim's body was found in Arizo Kalley village in Andar District, some 10 kilometres west of Ghazni, said Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator in the area.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said senior Taliban leaders decided to kill the male captive because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 12th day of captivity Monday.

"The Kabul and Korean governments are lying and cheating. They did not meet their promise of releasing Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, said by phone from an undisclosed location.

"The Taliban warns the government if the Afghan government won't release Taliban prisoners, then at any time the Taliban could kill another Korean hostage." Al-Jazeera showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. It did not say how it obtained the video, whose authenticity could not immediately be verified.

Some seven female hostages, heads veiled in accordance with the Islamic law enforced by the Taliban, were seen crouching in the dark, eyes closed or staring at the ground, expressionless.

The hostages did not speak as they were filmed by the hand-held camera.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19, the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban has set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives.

Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, a male leader of the group.

The body of pastor Bae Hyung-kyu arrived back in South Korea on Monday, where the families of the remaining hostages pleaded for their loved ones' release.

Relatives have gathered at Saemmul Community Church in Bundang, just outside Seoul. They waited anxiously for developments -- sharing prayers, meals and sleepless nights as they followed 24-hour television newscasts.

Seo Jung-bae, 59, whose daughter and son were among the hostages, appealed to the Taliban.

"Please, please send my children back so I can hold them in my arms," he said, fighting back tears in a plea to the captors.

-- Canadian Press REPLATE