The Baltimore Sun from Baltimore, Maryland • 91

The Sun Wednesday, November 7, 2001: Page 7a WAR ON TERRORISM II THE WORLD itudents in Paldstan defy concept of 'silent majority' "I ,1 Pakistan, from Page 1a dangering civilians by placing soldiers and weapons inside homes and mosques. No sale. "I think that by saying this, you cannot rationalize civilian casualties," said a young woman in the front row. A few times, Professor Rukh-sana Siddiqui, chairwoman of the university's department of international relations, had to act as referee, cautioning the students a 'ft 1. 0 'WIWJM4' said.

Not that yesterday's was a cream puff. At times, the Americans seemed to have as much trouble with style as with substance. Agor, only a year into her first foreign posting with the State Department, presented a cheerful front that sometimes contrasted awkwardly with the students, who brought their game faces to every exchange. When one student questioned whether the war might strengthen the Taliban, Agor giggled slightly as she quipped, "Well, our goal is that there hot be any more Taliban." The students were not amused, zeroing in with one serious opinion after another: "You trained Osama bin Laden and funded him, and now he is your biggest enemy." "You are believing in the notion of 'We are right and the world is "If we stand with you, we are your best friend, and if we don't, then we are terrorists." The overriding emotion of the day was dismay with America's bombing campaign, and with the civilian toll it has taken in Afghanistan. One of the major newspapers that morning ran a front-page photo of a sweet-looking little girl in a hospital bed, with both her legs missing, under the headline "Bombing Victim." Hawkins and Agor spoke repeatedly of the U.S.

military's pains to hit the right targets. They also criticized the Taliban for inflating casualty totals, and for en ANDRE F. CHUNO SUN STAFF On Afghanistan: Qayum Karzai, a Baltimore restaurateur, says his native country 's future should be based on a moderate Islam, a nationalism that promotes coexistence, and maintenance of tribal-social structure. Through their words and deeds, Afghan brothers take on Taliban against getting personal, as when one young man stated, "You are not a trustworthy people." Siddiqui might have had the' broadest perspective in the room. Thoroughly westernized, she spends two months every year afc Yale University, and she that her students look closer td" home when searching for someone to blame.

"In this entire dis- course," she said toward the end, "not one person has challenged Pa- kistan government policy during the past 12 years. We are not such nice guys in all of That seemed to prompt one of the day's more conciliatory re-M marks from the students, when young woman said, "What has be-' come apparent is this enormous' communications gap between ordinary American citizens and ordi-' nary Pakistani citizens." "You're right," Hawkins sponded. "There is so much mis-; understanding. There is so much ignorance like that out there. And -that is part of what we're trying to do here." Qayum's brother also addressed Congress.

"I believe that Afghanistan under the prevailing circumstances is dangerous to itself," Hamed Karzai testified, as if predicting the future, "dangerous to the stability of the region and dangerous to the accepted international norms and behavior." fight According to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, U.S. forces plucked him out of southern Afghanistan on Sunday and dropped him in Pakistan for "consultations." Hamed Karzai was likely to return to his home country soon, Rumsfeld told reporters yesterday. According to the Karzai family in Pakistan and Maryland, the truth is somewhere in the middle of those accounts. "There was fighting, yes, but he's safe and the worst is over," said Pat Karzai, Qayum's wife.

"He escaped somewhere in the mountains, but there were no helicopters getting him." She said that she talked to her brother-in-law by satellite telephone just after her lunch yesterday and that he was somewhere north of Kandahar and south of Kabul and certainly not in Pakistan. "It's been three days of fighting, walking and living on green tea and bread," she said. The brothers pronounce their names as "Ky-OOM" and "HA-mid." Their father was Abdul Ahad Karzai KAR-zay the influential leader of a Pashtun tribe called the Populzai. An advocate for moderation and unity In Afghanistan, he was assassinated in 1999 outside a mosque in Quetta, Pakistan. The Taliban are suspected in the death.

The family maintains ties with Afghanistan's former king, Mohammad Zahir Shah, who was deposed in 1973 and now lives, at age 86, in Rome. The Karzai brothers have struck the tone their father once did in their talks about the future of Afghanistan. They want a country based on three pillars: a moderate Islam, a nationalism, that promotes coexistence, and maintenance of the tribal-social structure. That is what Qayum Karzai will tell the congressional committee today, he said. "We have been talking this way for years, long before September 1 1th," he said.

"We said the trouble in Afghanistan would necessarily become the trouble of every country in the world. It is the nature of terrorism, the nature of the ideology, that it cannot contain itself." The committee may find the words familiar. In July 2000, role in said. "How can you buy that? We have been the biggest supporter of the Taliban. Things can get out of hand for Pakistan.

This is a dangerous situation for us." None of this was particularly surprising to Hawkins, who faced the class with the embassy's vice-consul, Christy Agor. Nor was he upset or offended, perhaps because he knows he'll be enduring many more such moments in the weeks to come. Yesterday's forum was only the second installment he and Agor met with another class last week in what Hawkins envisions as a long-running campaign to spread the word of the American point of view, no matter how resistant the audience. "We're really not sure how many more we're going to do," Hawkins said. "We have a boss, Chat Blakeman head of the embassy's political section, who's a former journalist, and he thinks in terms of public relations.

"Our objective is twofold. One is to go out there and state our case. But I'd say it's just as important to go out and hear what they're saying. We're going to get a little more 'out there' as we go along." That means they'll be meeting with business and political groups, he said. Perhaps they'll dare to enter the lion's den of one of the more militant religious political parties.

"Take it to a real hostile crowd," he seek bigger whole." Since the bombing campaign began a month ago, only Britain has become a junior partner in the i U.S.-led war, and Prime Minister Tony Blair has leveraged his country's support to gain a position among America's allies as a policymaker, spokesman and coalition builder. However, the U.S. military has been reluctant to Involve other allies to the same extent. Analysts say military commanders don't want a repeat of the complex allied decision-making of the war in the Balkans. "The mission comes first, the coalition comes second, in contrast to the NATO war against Serbia," said Brookings military specialist Michael E.

O'Hanlon. Europeans want "to prove they can play in this arena," said Frances Burwell, who directs the trans-Atlantic relations project at the Atlantic Council of the United States, a think tank. "There is a perception in Europe that NATO did a big thing by invoking Article 5," said Burwell, referring to the alliance charter requiring all members to help defend an ally under attack. Countries that haven't been enlisted in the war effort are starting to complain, she said. For the United States, this means "walking a tightrope between involving the coalition members and running an efficient military operation." In response, a U.S.

official said, "For coalition purposes, we would like to see the Europeans drawn in" to the military effort. But Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, a Pentagon spokesman, said involving other countries is difficult. "You have to make all the parts fit," said Quigley. "It involves interoperability issues, supply and support and communications issues.

Tactics, techniques and procedures have to fit." If Europeans were given a greater role in the U.S.-led military action, Daalder said, they might press for less intensive bombing and more ground action, maintaining that those governments are less fearful of a public backlash over war casualties than the Americans are. In Europe, the war on terrorism no longer dominates the news as it did in the first weeks after the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and current coverage has tempered the early European enthusiasm for retaliation. "The images coming to Europe on TV are more images of civilian casualties and collateral damage," a European diplomat said. "The more you go away from Sept.

11, the more public opinion has other things in mind." Baltimore restaurateur testifies in Washington; sibling rallies tribesmen By Todd Richissin SUN STAFF Nearly 7,000 miles separate two brothers, but their battle plans are focused on a common mission: to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban. The elder brother is fighting to sway opinions in Washington while the younger is trying to make his case among Pashtun tribesmen in southern Afghanistan. Their last name Karzai may prove influential in both places, wnicn is wny me auDan would apparently like to see the creates too much trouble. They hflvfl rpnnrt.prilv pomp nlnsp tn kill- inghim. "I worry, of course," said Qayum Karzai, 53, owner of the Helmand restaurant in Baltimore.

He is scheduled to testify today be-. fore the House Foreign Relations Committee in Washington to argue that anv nost-Taliban trovern- ment in Afghanistan be made up of of moderates. "I worry not so much for me," he said yesterday. "I worry far more for my brother." That would be Hamed Karzai, 46, who has sought to enlist tribal leaders to rise up and topple the Taliban, to spare their country the wrath of the United States and its "allies. The only measure so far of his success is liiul lie uas sui viveu.

rui- other opposition figure, Abdul Haq, a former guerrilla fighter who had boasted that the Taliban were on the brink of collapse, entered -Afghanistan last month and was quickly captured and executed. "It is a lot to ask of my brother, to take on this challenge," Qayum -Karzai said. "We fear for him, but we know why he puts his life on the line. It Is for the people of Afghanistan." War, politics and propaganda are difficult to separate, and the truth surrounding Hamed Karzai's past few days is unclear. According to the Taliban, he was surrounded and nearly killed along with a dozen supporters last week and is now being chased through the mountains of southern Afghanistan.

Fuel supplies Strikes by U.S. jets targeting storage dumps rind convoys from Iran ASSOCIATEDPBESS Zl KABUL, Afghanistan Fuel supplies have dwindled to a trickle and prices have skyrocketed in the Afghan capital after U.S. jets targeted storage dumps and fuel convoys from Iran, fuel dealers' and transport workers said yesterday. "No business, no money, no die-sel," taxi driver Fazl Khan said. rWhat can we do? Look.

Everyone Js stopped." Before the U.S.-led bombing began Oct. 7, an average Europeans U.S. military slow to involve allies, recalling Balkan complexities By Mark Matthews SUN NATIONAL STAFF WASHINGTON As they try to shore up shrinking public support in Europe for the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, European leaders are pushing for a greater and more visible military role in the anti-terror campaign. Germany announced yesterday that it was prepared for the first time since World War II to send fighting forces into a war outside Europe. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder pledged up to 3,900 troops, including special forces, along with ships, transport aircraft and reconnaissance vehicles capable of detecting chemical and biological weapons.

Meeting with President Bush at the White House yesterday, French President Jacques Chirac renewed France's offer to send special forces in on the ground, in addition to the 2,000 military personnel it already has on ships and surveillance aircraft in the region, a French official said. "Governments are coming to the U.S. and saying, 'Please, let us participate, because when we do, our publics will come said Ivo Daalder, an analyst of European affairs at the Brookings Institution. But the Pentagon has been slow in getting other nations involved. A spokesman said it is difficult to "make all the parts fit into a gallon.

Before the bombing, the price was $3.85 a gallon. Virtually all the imports are diesel. Most cars, trucks and buses in Afghanistan are diesel-powered because gasoline is too expensive. Drivers and others say the fuel business nose-dived after U.S. jets attacked two fuel trucks traveling between the western city of Herat and the southern Taliban stronghold of Kandahar.

Word of the late October attack spread quickly through the network of Afghans who make the run between Iran and Afghanistan's cities. It is impossible to determine whether the attacks have cut into Taliban military supplies or how much fuel is being diverted from the civilian market to military and government use. Leaders meet: French President Jacques Chirac speaks with President Bush after the two leaders met at the White House. 1 1 -jf back and go through the argument again as to why it's happening, why we have to do this, why we have to see it through and why we have to see through what Is happening in Addressing European sensitivities about the plight of civilians, Bush made a point of noting in his press conference with Chirac that "we have an obligation to help feed the innocent people in Afghanistan, and we've got to make sure, that there is a post-Taliban gov- ernment that reflects the values of both of our countries." If some European nations have been less active militarily than they would like, they have been enlisted heavily in the diplomatic effort to assemble a broad-based future government for Afghanistan and to prevent a dangerous spiral of opposition to the war in the Muslim world. The Europeans also are gaining a higher profile in trying to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, an issue Chirac highlighted at the White House in speaking of "crises that can fuel terrorism." In the past, bowing to Israeli distrust of Europe, the United States sought to prevent Europeans from acting as brokers in the peace process i V- (: low, prices high in Kabul Recent polls in France and Britain show a decline in the previously overwhelming public endorsement of the war in Afghanistan, although analysts and diplomats say support among governments and much of the opinion-leading elite remains strong.

Bush is making a major effort this week to solidify support in Europe and to show that he is listening to European leaders. Before meeting and holding a joint press conference yesterday with Chirac, Bush spoke via satellite to a conference in Poland of Central and Eastern European leaders, likening today's enemy to the dictators of the last century who sought to conquer Europe. "We see the same intolerance of dissent; the same mad, global ambitions; the same brutal determination to control every life and all of life," Bush told the leaders. Blair, who meets with Bush at the White House today, noted the need to shore up public opinion in an interview broadcast last night on CNN's Larry King Live. "There's no way that you engage in conflict without difficult and harmful things happening," Blair said.

"And it's at this point in time that we need to steady people, we need to say, 'Look, let's go of 30 fuel tankers a day would arrive in this beleaguered city. But since a fuel convoy was targeted about two weeks ago, only five tankers arrive daily, according to driver Saeed Rahim. Fuel convoys and depots have become major targets for U.S. jets. During the past two years, Iran has been Afghanistan's primary source of fuel, though Tehran and the Taliban do not have diplomatic relations.

Trade began after the two agreed to open the border at Islam Qila, 30 miles west of the Taliban-controlled city of Herat. At Mohammed Saddams diesel shop, a structure of gnarled wood with rusted mufflers piled to the roof, the bushy-bearded, 45-year-old businessman sells his diesel for the equivalent of $6.73 a.