Better go to the ATM first:
"Afghans arrest 2 ex-officials at Kabul Bank" July 01, 2011|New York Times
KABUL - Rahmatullah Nazari, deputy attorney general, said authorities arrested Sherkhan Farnood, the bank’s former chairman, and Khalilullah Frozi, its former chief executive, Wednesday in connection with what Nazari said was $900 million in fraudulent loans to bank officers and insiders, many of them politically well connected....
Among loan recipients were Mahmoud Karzai, the brother of President Hamid Karzai, and Abdul Haseen Fahim, the brother of the first vice president, General Muhammad Qasim Fahim.
--more--"
Also see: Top Afghan banker faces charges over Kabul Bank
Afghan Exodus
Checking Out at the Afghan Airport
Making Some Afghan Withdrawals
Not troops.
Better find a room for the night:
"NATO quells siege by Taliban at Afghan hotel; Copters kill insurgents on roof in Kabul; terrorists blamed for seven deaths" June 29, 2011|By Amir Shah and Solomon Moore, Associated Press
KABUL -- NATO helicopters fired rockets at gunmen on the rooftop of a besieged Kabul hotel early today, ending a more than four-hour standoff between militants and police that left at least seven dead and eight others wounded, Afghan officials said.
Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said six suicide bombers attacked the Inter-Continental hotel frequented by Afghan officials and foreign visitors. He said two were killed by hotel guards at the beginning of the attack and four others either blew themselves up or were killed in the airstrike or by Afghan security forces....
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid quickly claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call to the AP....
Uh-huh.
Of course, "the group frequently claims responsibility for killings to which it is not connected," and "usually exaggerate the scale of their attacks."
The Taliban often exaggerate casualties from their attacks....
See?
Before the attack began yesterday, officials from the United States, Pakistan, and Afghanistan met in the capital to discuss prospects for making peace with Taliban insurgents to end the nearly decade-long war.
"The fact that we are discussing reconciliation in great detail is success and progress, but challenges remain and we are reminded of that on an almost daily basis by violence," Jawed Ludin, Afghanistan's deputy foreign minister, said at a news conference. "The important thing is that we act and that we act urgently and try to do what we can to put an end to violence."
The Inter-Continental opened in the late 1960s, and was the nation's first international hotel. It has at least 200 rooms and was once part of an international chain. But when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the hotel had to fend for itself....
--more--"
Also see: Slow Saturday Special: Taliban Watering Hole
And the point of the false flag:
"Without the NATO forces, the mayhem would have gone on much longer.
Sowing doubt was clearly the intent of the Taliban, who claimed responsibility for the attack. The difficulty the Afghan security forces faced in fending off the assault and in putting out the fire that destroyed half the roof — the blaze took more than an hour to tame — gave the insurgents a propaganda victory, even if the death toll was relatively low....
Yeah, we can't leave.
--more--"
