*Source: DTN News / The Vancouver Sun By Matthew Fisher, Canwest News Service August 20, 2009
(NSI News Source Info) KABUL, Afghanistan - August 23, 2009: After "some pretty grand pronouncements" the Taliban "failed miserably" to make good on their boast to destroy Afghanistan's presidential election, Canada's top soldier in Afghanistan said Thursday. 
A laborer stands in between stacks of ballot boxes at the Independent Election Commission in Kabul August 23, 2009. Afghanistan's presidential election was generally fair but not entirely free because of Taliban intimidation and violence that kept turnout low in the south, European monitors said on Saturday.
"There was not one single suicide attack today in Kandahar province on a day where suicide attacks were threatened on a massive scale by the insurgency," said Brig.-Gen. Jon Vance, who commands Canada's 2,800 troops in South Asia.
The Taliban also harmed their reputation by firing rockets "indiscriminately" at Kandahar City and by hitting a revered Islamic shrine in Arghandab with a rocket, the general said.
In the face of Taliban threats, voter turnout was uneven but apparently much higher than many had thought possible after recent terror attacks in Kabul.
An election official in Kandahar, which is at the heart of the insurgency, said about 60% of the province's 790,000 voters had cast ballots, with relatively heavy voting in urban areas and lighter voting in the Taliban-infested countryside.
Tasked to back up Afghan forces who were responsible for security at polling stations, Vance noted that his soldiers were not asked once to help out. However, he acknowledged that there had been several instances of heavy fighting between the Canadian Forces and the Taliban.
More than 50 insurgents engaged troops from the Quebec-based Royal 22nd Regiment battle group in a gunfight that lasted several hours at Forward Operating Base Wilson, to the west of Kandahar City, while other Canadians mentoring Afghan troops in Arghandab were also involved in serious battles, Vance said. In both cases the insurgents had been trying to reach the provincial capital and had been "stopped cold," he said, adding there were no Canadian casualties.
Canadian helicopters had also been called in on both reconnaissance and attack missions during the day, the general said.
Speaking in Pangnirtung, Nunavut, Prime Minister Stephen Harper commented: "For all its warts, when you look at a country that had virtually 30 years of civil war without any real history of democratic governance, what is taking place in Afghanistan, in spite of all its challenges, is remarkable. And I think we owe all of our Canadian personnel in Afghanistan -- our military people, but also our civilian personnel as well -- a tremendous credit for the progress that has been made for this to happen."
Afghan President Hamid Karzai's lead in the polls, such as they are in Afghanistan, has narrowed considerably in recent weeks, but he remains the odds-on favourite to win again. With the successful completion of voting, the next big question as votes began to be tabulated was whether the incumbent had received the 50% of the votes, plus one, that is required to avoid a runoff.
If Karzai falls short of getting more than half the ballots cast, his likely challenger in a runoff would be Abdullah Abdullah, his former foreign minister.
Preliminary results may be known by this weekend. But given Afghanistan's immensely challenging geography and the strength of the insurgency, it may take nearly a month before the official first-round tally is made public.
A laborer stands in between stacks of ballot boxes at the Independent Election Commission in Kabul August 23, 2009. Afghanistan's presidential election was generally fair but not entirely free because of Taliban intimidation and violence that kept turnout low in the south, European monitors said on Saturday.
"There was not one single suicide attack today in Kandahar province on a day where suicide attacks were threatened on a massive scale by the insurgency," said Brig.-Gen. Jon Vance, who commands Canada's 2,800 troops in South Asia.
The Taliban also harmed their reputation by firing rockets "indiscriminately" at Kandahar City and by hitting a revered Islamic shrine in Arghandab with a rocket, the general said.
In the face of Taliban threats, voter turnout was uneven but apparently much higher than many had thought possible after recent terror attacks in Kabul.
An election official in Kandahar, which is at the heart of the insurgency, said about 60% of the province's 790,000 voters had cast ballots, with relatively heavy voting in urban areas and lighter voting in the Taliban-infested countryside.
Tasked to back up Afghan forces who were responsible for security at polling stations, Vance noted that his soldiers were not asked once to help out. However, he acknowledged that there had been several instances of heavy fighting between the Canadian Forces and the Taliban.
More than 50 insurgents engaged troops from the Quebec-based Royal 22nd Regiment battle group in a gunfight that lasted several hours at Forward Operating Base Wilson, to the west of Kandahar City, while other Canadians mentoring Afghan troops in Arghandab were also involved in serious battles, Vance said. In both cases the insurgents had been trying to reach the provincial capital and had been "stopped cold," he said, adding there were no Canadian casualties.
Canadian helicopters had also been called in on both reconnaissance and attack missions during the day, the general said.
Speaking in Pangnirtung, Nunavut, Prime Minister Stephen Harper commented: "For all its warts, when you look at a country that had virtually 30 years of civil war without any real history of democratic governance, what is taking place in Afghanistan, in spite of all its challenges, is remarkable. And I think we owe all of our Canadian personnel in Afghanistan -- our military people, but also our civilian personnel as well -- a tremendous credit for the progress that has been made for this to happen."
Afghan President Hamid Karzai's lead in the polls, such as they are in Afghanistan, has narrowed considerably in recent weeks, but he remains the odds-on favourite to win again. With the successful completion of voting, the next big question as votes began to be tabulated was whether the incumbent had received the 50% of the votes, plus one, that is required to avoid a runoff.
If Karzai falls short of getting more than half the ballots cast, his likely challenger in a runoff would be Abdullah Abdullah, his former foreign minister.
Preliminary results may be known by this weekend. But given Afghanistan's immensely challenging geography and the strength of the insurgency, it may take nearly a month before the official first-round tally is made public.
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