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DAWN (Pakistan) 12 January 2002 Saturday 27 Shawwal 1422 70 German troops arrive in Afghanistan BAGRAM AIRBASE, Jan 11: The first German troops taking part in an international security force in Afghanistan landed at an airbase outside Kabul on Friday after a two-day delay caused by bad weather in Turkey. Thirty-one German paratroops arrived at the Soviet-built Bagram airbase with about 30 Dutch troops, two Austrian soldiers and piles of equipment in two Antonov-124 transport planes. Another 40 Germans, who should have been on Friday's flight, were expected during the weekend. Snow at the stopover point at Trabzon, Turkey, and cloud cover over Kabul had kept the full complement of troops from completing the journey. Germany has pledged up to 1,200 troops to the UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to guard the interim administration that took office in Kabul three weeks ago. The mission is the most distant from its shores that Germany has undertaken since beginning to operate outside of NATO after reunification in 1990. General Carl Hubertus von Butler, the mission's commander, said the distance was a challenge. "We have to fly everything in here, we can't just drive in," he said while talking to journalists on arrival. Up to 4,500 ISAF troops are to help Afghanistan's interim administration restore security to prevent a return to the civil war that ruined the first post-communist government in the early 1990s. Just over 1,000 troops from Britain, United States and France were already in Kabul. French troops waited with a dozen heavy trucks to help transport the German equipment. Germany has built up its participation in peacekeeping missions in the Balkans in recent years. "It is a peace mission and we must see to it that we fulfil our mission in this country as well as possible," Butler said. Asked about the dangers of the Afghanistan mission, Butler said: "There are dangers and we shouldn't beat around the bush about them. I'd just mention all the mines." After 23 years of conflict, Afghanistan is one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. Demining units are hard at work at Bagram airbase and along the road into Kabul. "I also don't know how the situation here will develop, either in a positive or negative way," he added, referring to the overall security situation. Butler said German forces would fly into Kabul in groups of up to 70 at a time until the full contingent was in place. The first arrivals were to set up local facilities and rebuild Kabul's heavily damaged international airport. The first Italian troops were expected to arrive in the Afghan capital during the weekend. KANDAHAR: The US military and its Afghan allies pursued guerillas on Friday who launched a night raid on U.S. Marines at Kandahar airport, officials said. A probing assault by some eight to 14 gunmen firing AK-47 rifles and using flares to illuminate U.S. Marine Corps positions on the perimeter of the airbase on Thursday night coincided with the airlift of 20 hooded detainees, suspected members of the al Qaeda network, from the airport to Guantanamo in Cuba. But the U.S. military, which holds 361 detainees at the airport, insisted it saw no link between the departure of the prisoners and the attack. "We do not believe these two events were linked in any way," said Lieutenant James Jarvis of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Force. "Information on the movement of the detainees was a very closely held topic here." There were no U.S. casualties in the 40-minute skirmish, and no aircraft, vehicles or buildings were damaged. But Marine officers said a hunt was under way to pick up the trail of the attackers and determine if any of the enemy had been hit.-Reuters __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send FREE video emails in Yahoo! Mail! http://promo.yahoo.com/videomail/ ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [email protected] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9WB2D Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
