Word: haji
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Khalik, dusty in a torn shalwar kameez, looked relieved as McCullough released his ink stained hand. His village elder, a long gray-bearded man named Haji Assidullah - who had just signed the corollary "Reintegration Sponsor Agreement" - gave him a reassuring smile. A Marine took Khalik from the room and then walked outside to retrieve another detainee, to repeat the process...
Three days before, according to McCullough, Khalik had been among several Afghans caught in the middle of a Taliban attack on a U.S. battalion's foot patrols, on the road between the Helmand villages of Bagrabat and Hazarapas. "My men were walking on the road," he told Haji Assidullah and his fellow elder Jon Mohammed. "The car with these men [the detainees] sped up, drove right at them, didn't stop, almost hit two of my men, then the car behind that one stopped. Three men got out and started firing at my men. Two others on the side...
...lived rent-free in a house owned by Haji Azizullah, a known Afghani trafficker in the international drug trade. Said he could not afford to move and was unaware of the connection...
...fighters. The Kandahar office says it now operates with a budget of $700 a month and has only reeled in 537 disaffected Taliban in nearly two years. "We can only offer them $20 for their weapon. They can get far more than that in the bazaar," says Kandahar director Haji Agha Lalai. "We should be able to give them a job, rent money, but we can't." This paltry offering cannot compete with the wages and benefits that a Taliban fighter collects from his commanders who, Afghan officials allege, are bankrolled by Pakistani intelligence services covertly helping the Taliban regain...
...forces could clear an area of insurgents, they were unable to hold the terrain. Now the plan is for the Marines to set up combat posts in villages to provide the residents with lasting security. Still, some Afghans are skeptical. "I hope this operation gives a positive result," says Haji Nimatullah, a businessman in Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, by telephone. "But I am not optimistic. [These] operations are like the cat-and-mouse cartoon where the mouse escapes when the cat attacks, but when the cat is gone, the mouse comes back and starts again." (See pictures...