Documents reveal Indian, Iranian links with Dostam

The Frontier Post, August 20,1998

PESHAWAR - Indian government's links with anti-Taliban Northern Alliance have been discovered following the seizure of certain top secret documents by the student militia, during search of the offices of Uzbek warlord Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum in northern Afghanistan. Taliban have also seized a document wherein, Dostum has made an urgent appeal to Uzbek President Islam Karimov to immediately send him 1.2 million US dollar. Taliban sources, who are in possession of photocopies of some of the seized documents, revealed that these were found in the offices of key opposition leaders, during the militia's march on Mazar-i-Sharif, Shaberghan and Maimana airport in Faryab province. "Probably the rapid fall of key opposition strongholds to the militia in northern Afghanistan did not give them enough time to destroy these highly confidential documents," a source informed this scribe.

These documents, which immediately after seizure were sent to Taliban's headquarters in Kandahar for further scrutiny and analysis, reveal active involvement of India, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Iran and Russian Federation in Afghanistan. These documents also includes a letter the Indian ambassador to Turkmenistan wrote to Uzbek warlord Rashid Dostum, informing him that his government has already sent "material support" to him. Another 100-page document, recovered from Maimana airbase in Faryab province, contains detailed information about the nature of cargo, destination and flights schedule of Iranian cargo plane from Mashhad to Maimana, Sheberghan, Faryab, Takhar, Bamyan and Mazar-i-Sharif, largely carrying military hardware from Iran to the opposition forces in northern Afghanistan. Iranian AH-32 type transport plane, during the last 14 months, made 788 flights, 318 to Maimana and 470 to the rest of key cities in northern Afghanistan. In 19 days, 5000 crates full of military logistics were transported to Maimana only from the Iranian city Mashad.

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