Afghan War Only Just Beginning, Security Group Warns

[bemildred]

The war in Afghanistan is only just beginning as NATO forces, far from pursuing remnants of a defeated Taliban, are entering a widening and deepening conflict they may well lose, security NGO said on Saturday.

Taliban insurgents, fighting to overthrow the pro-Western Afghan government and eject foreign forces, carried out more attacks over a wider area in 2007, the Afghanistan NGO Security Office (ANSO) said in its report for last year, and the best case scenario for this year, is “more of the same”.

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But, “with the Taliban resurgent, it has become obvious that their easy departure in 2001 was more of a strategic retreat than an actual military defeat,” the report said.

“In simple terms, the consensus among informed individuals at the end of 2007 seems to be that Afghanistan is at the beginning of a war, not the end of one,” it said.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/01/19/6480/