Finnish colonel: violence in Iraq serves as model for Afghanistan

At least 50 people were killed in a suicide bombing in the city of Baghlan in the north of Afghanistan on Tuesday. Five Afghan Members of Parliament are among the casualties in the worst suicide bombing in Afghanistan so far.
      Finnish peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan operate in the north of the country, but Baghlan is not part of the area of responsibility for the Finnish and Swedish forces there.
      Lieutenant-Colonel Juha Vauhkonen, commander of the Finnish ISAF peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan, says that the Finns in the area are safe.
      Speaking by phone from Mazar-i-Sharif, he said that the attack had no immediate effect on the activities of the Finns.
      Until recent months, the north of Afghanistan was one of the most peaceful areas of Afghanistan. Violence has now spread there, however, and the Finns have repeatedly been targeted in the attacks. In May this year one Finn was killed by a roadside bomb. "The clear focal point is still in the south and east", Vauhkonen pointed out.
      The east and south of Afghanistan are traditional strongholds of the Taleban movement, which embraces a hard-line interpretation of Islam, and that is where most of the fighting is taking place.
      On Tuesday Taleban spokesman Sabiullah Mujahed said that the Taleban was not behind the Baghlan attack.
      The current violence is seen to be the worst that it has been since 2001 when the US bombings forced the Taleban out of power.
     
The situation in Afghanistan is getting to resemble that in Iraq. Suicide bombings did not start in Afghanistan until 2005, as if inspired by the example of the Iraqi insurgency.
      "It can clearly be said that the forms and models of action have come into Afghanistan from Iraq", says Colonel Mauri Koskela, head of the International Centre of the Finnish Defence Forces. "And unfortunately there are also indications that they have moved to northern areas, where the Finns are operating."
      Koskela added that there are no confirmed reports that foreign fighters would have moved from Iraq to Afghanistan.
     
Tuesday's attack was the first in which large numbers of civilians were among the dead. Previous attacks have primarily targeted ISAF and Afghanistan's own security forces.
      The relatively low proportion of civilians among those killed has been one of the main differences between the conflicts of Afghanistan and Iraq. Although Afghan warlords fight against each other, ethnic groups do not, in the way that Iraq's Sunnis and Shi'ites do, and the violence in Afghanistan is no where near as intense in Afghanistan as it is in Iraq.
      Koskela was not willing to draw the conclusion that the large number of civilian casualties in Tuesday's attack would have been an indication that the nature of the suicide attacks in that country would have changed.
      "It could be that the aim is to show that the power of the central administration does not fully extend everywhere", Koskela said, with reference to the fact that there were members of the Afghan parliament among those who were killed. "I am tempted to say that we should hope so.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Commander in Afghanistan transfers handling of shooting incident to Finland (4.1.2007)
  Peacekeeper wounded in Afghanistan may have been shot by other Finns (13.10.2006)
  President Halonen: Afghanistan more risky than before for peacekeepers (20.9.2007)
  Commander in Afghanistan: roadside bomb attack no cause for new measures (19.9.2007)
  Finnish vehicle damaged in explosion in Afghanistan (12.9.2007)
  Kaskeala: no increase needed in Finnish force in Afghanistan for at least a year (16.8.2007)
  Finnish peacekeeper killed in Afghanistan (23.5.2007)