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Taliban Capture Two Afghanistan Towns
Topic Started: Jul 18 2006, 10:15 AM (334 Views)
abuturab82
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Taliban capture two Afghanistan towns

Tuesday, July 18, 2006; Posted: 9:35 a.m. EDT (13:35 GMT) SPECIAL REPORT

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- U.S.-led forces will launch "decisive operations" to reclaim two southern towns captured in recent days by the Taliban, the military said Tuesday.

Scores of Taliban militants chased police out of two southern Helmand districts near the border with Pakistan. Afghanistan's deputy interior minister accused two Pakistani Islamic groups of taking part in the militant operation.

"The Taliban extremists have taken control of the areas of Garmser and Naway-i-Barakzayi. However, coalition forces do have them under observation," military spokesman Col. Tom Collins told reporters in Kabul. "Decisive operations will begin soon," he added, without saying when.

Helmand province's deputy governor said at least 400 Afghan soldiers, backed by coalition troops were heading in dozens of vehicles to Garmser to wrest it back from the Taliban, which overran it Sunday.

Afghan officials have said scores of Taliban fighters, many crossing into Afghanistan from neighboring Pakistan, fought Garmser's small contingent of policemen -- holed up in a concrete compound -- for 16 days before the police withdrew.

While Taliban militants have long operated freely in former southern stronghold provinces, their capture of two towns highlights the weakness of Afghanistan's police forces in remote areas, and the challenge ahead faced by international forces to restore order in the country.

"The Taliban have reconstituted and dispersed, but this is certainly not about the Taliban being strong. The reality is that the government has not yet extended to the far-reaching areas of the country," Collins said.

Deputy Interior Minister Abdul Malik Sidiqi accused Pakistan-based Islamic groups Lashkar-e-Tayyaba -- an outlawed militant organization, and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam -- a pro-Taliban political party, of taking over Garmser.

"They burned the Afghan flag and raised the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam flag in the (Garmser) district," Sidiqi told reporters. "The government of Afghanistan has technically and temporarily left Garmser. We did so to prevent casualties to civilian people."

Sidiqi also said government forces had taken back control of Naway-i-Barakzayi late Monday. It wasn't immediately possible to explain the discrepancy between his information and that of the coalition spokesman.

In the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore, Jamiat spokesman Riaz Durrani dismissed Afghan claims his group's members were involved in the Helmand fighting.

"We are not helping any militant group in Afghanistan against (President) Hamid Karzai's government, but the fact is that he has failed to restore order," Durrani told The Associated Press.

Helmand is one of Afghanistan's most volatile regions, where Taliban extremists and heavily armed drug traffickers have long operated freely.

More than 10,000 U.S., British, Canadian and Afghan soldiers are taking part in an anti-Taliban offensive across southern Afghanistan.

About 4,000 British troops, part of an expansion of NATO forces into the region, are deploying to Helmand province to take control at the end of the month from U.S. forces and have figured prominently in fierce fighting in the province in recent weeks.

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/07/1...tan.taliban.ap/
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NMM
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Asalam Walaikum

The Taliban have always been an interesting lot. I hear good things from Afghans that lived under them, then i hear bad things from Afghans that have lived under them.

Ive come to the conclusion that they were people with good niyyats but perhaps lacked ilm.
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abuturab82
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wa alaikum assalam

I think there's a lot of propaganda going around and its hard to discern whats going on. Most of the people i know who criticize the government of the taliban are irreligious people who seem to hate Islam more than the Taliban. I'm not saying that they didn't commit abuses, but the questions are:

1. Was their government legitimate according to the Shari'ah?

2. Were the conditions met where their government should have been replaced according to the Shari'ah?

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Well, ive talked to very neutral people as well. And the image they give me is that the Taliban were very "strict" about many things. To the point they would be outright violent and abusive.
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abuturab82
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This then becomes a fiqh question: are harsh rulers overthrown or are they obeyed?

Lets also look at the historical reality of Afghanistan. It was a government that established stability after years of warfare; this wasn't a happy go lucky civic society where everyone knew their role; it was a fractured society that had faced years of civil war.

In my opinion, they were harsh and went to extremes, but such extremes do not invalidate the legitimacy of their government according to the Shari'ah nor would we know if such extremes would have eventually worked themselves out.

A government that applies the Shari'ah fully is an Islamic government, if they go to extremes, they me a bad Islamic government, but they are an Islamic government nonetheless.

The Qur'an instructs us to follow Allah (subhana wa ta'ala), the Prophet (sallahu alayhi wa sallam), and those in authority above us.

There is a difference of opinion on what the term 'authority above you' means. Some 'Ulema says it means follow the 'Ulema while others says it means follow the rulers while a third opinion reconciles both because the rulers, in order to rule by the shari'ah, need to follow the 'ulema.

In the case of the Taliban, they were both 'ulema and also the government.

The question I have is: what actions did the Taliban engage in that weren't in accordance with the Shari'ah and did those actions make their government illegitimate?

I think if a person is sincere and honest about it, they will conclude that the Taliban, although extreme, was still a legitimate Islamic government according to classical Islamic political theory.

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