Reg: No 352 Volume No. 3469 Wednesday December 21, 2016 Jaddi 01, 1395 www.outlookafghanistan.net Price: 15/-Afs

Quote of the Day

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Respect yourself and others will respect you.

Confucius

KUNDUZ - Afghan Nation-al Security Forces (ANSF) launched anti-militants op-erations in the northern Kun-duz province on Tuesday to ensure lasting peace there, an army spokesman in the prov-ince, Ghulam Hazrat Karimi said.“Units of security forces backed by aircrafts launched major operations in several villages outside provincial capital the Kunduz city to-day morning to wipe out militants and ensure lasting peace there,” Karimi told Xinhua.

KABUL - The government has so far collected more than 160 billion afghanis revenue this fiscal year, surpassing the target by 28 billion afs.Talking to a press confer-ence in Kabul, Finance Minister Eklil Hakimi said, “I want to say that our commitment to the inter-national community was to collect 132 billion afghanis as target set for 1395 fiscal year, but fortunately we collected up to 160 billion afghanis in domestic rev-enue.”He said last year’s revenue target was 114 billion af-ghanis, but 122 billion had been collected.Reforms and preventing tax evasion led to the in-

KABUL - The United Nations asked the Taliban to join peace negotiations with the govern-ment, ruling out a military solution to the conflict in Af-ghanistan,The only path to meaning-ful peace was through intra-Afghan dialogue, the UN top diplomat in the country told the Security Council during a debate on the situation in Af-ghanistan.Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan Tadamichi Yamamoto said: “The Taliban leadership must reconsider the notion that their objectives can only be achieved on the battlefield.”A statement from the UN mis-

Enter Open-Ended Peace Talks with Govt: UN to Taliban

ANSF Kick Off Anti-Militants Operations

in Northern Province

Afghanistan Receives $83.5m Incentive Funds of World Bank for Reforms

MoF Signs $415mln Electricity Agreement

with ADB

Above 160bn Afs Revenue Collected this Year: Hakimi

KABUL - Media claims that the kidnapped employee of the In-ternational Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Afghanistan is a Spanish national, but the Span-ish Foreign Ministry has not con-firmed the information so far.The kidnapped employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Afghanistan is a Spanish national, the El Pais newspaper reported, citing police in the Afghan city of Kunduz. The Spanish Foreign Ministry has not confirmed the information so far.On Monday, a group of unidenti-fied armed men stopped two ve-hicles with ICRC staff members traveling from the city of Mazar-e-Sharif to Kunduz and took one of the employees.The situation in Afghanistan has significantly deteriorated in recent months. The country is suffering from the activity of the Taliban, a militant group formed in the 1990s, seeking to establish Sharia law in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and from other terrorist groups including the Daesh, banned in Russia and many other countries. (Sputnik)

KABUL - The US Department of Defense (DoD) has confirmed the death of two more senior Al-Qae-da terrorist network leaders in Af-ghanistan.DoD spokesman, Peter Cook, in a statement said the two senior Al-Qaeda terrorist network leaders were among three killed in a drone strike conducted late in October.Cook further added “A precision airstrike carried out by the U.S. military on Oct. 23 near Kunar, Afghanistan, killed three senior al-Qaida leaders.”He said, previously DoD disclosed that the strike eliminated Faruq al-Qatani the group’s emir for East-ern Afghanistan.“The department has now deter-mined the same strike also killed Bilal al-Utabyi, al-Qatani’s deputy as well as Abd al-Wahid al-Junabi, a senior al-Qaida explosives ex-pert,” Cook added.“All three ...(More on P4)...(7)

Since launching the opera-tions several anti-vehicles, anti-personal mines, and ex-plosive devices have been discovered and defused, the official said, adding the mili-tants have Taliban militants briefly captured Kunduz city, the capital of Kunduz prov-ince 250 km north of Kabul in October and have presence in parts of the strategically important province which borders Tajikistan. They have not commented on the situa-tion.The anti-militants operations which ...(More on P4)...(1)

er if we fully collect all tax-es.” (Pajhwok)

TIRINKOT - Thirty Taliban militants, includ-ing a suicide bomber, have been killed and 40 others wounded as a result of a latest clearing operation in central Uruzgan province, an of-ficial said on Tuesday.Provincial police chief, Brig. Gen. Wali Jan Sarhadi, told a press conference here that operation launched two days ago targeted insurgent hideouts in Nachin and Kabotar Khan localities of Tirinkot, the provincial capital. ...(More on P4)...(4)

74 Journalists Killed Worldwide in 2016

Kidnapped Red Cross Employee

Identified as Spanish National

Pentagon Confirms Death of 2 More Senior

Al-Qaeda Leaders

30 Rebels Killed; Airstrike Hits

Wedding in Uruzgan

ACB Forms Commission to Assess

Players’ Problems

KABUL - Seventy-four journalists and media workers were killed worldwide during the current year, showing a significant fall from the 2015 figure of 101 deaths, an international media watchdog said on Monday.Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said 53 (72%) of news-people died in targeted attacks and 21 (28%) were killed in the line of their duty. There was a 15% decrease in the num-ber of professional journalists killed by this time in 2015.By close of 2015, 67 journalists had been killed. ‘‘Almost three quarters of the journal-ists killed this year were knowingly targeted. This was, for example, the case in Afghani-stan, where 10 journalists ...(More on P4)...(3)

KABUL - Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) on Tuesday announced the establishment of a five-member commission to assess the prob-lems and complaints of unsatisfied members of the national team.Addressing a press conference, ACB chair-man Shukrullah Atif Mashal said they have started talks with national team members to discuss their problems and work out a way forward. He said the players will be selected on a merit-base and not ...(More on P4)...(5)

crease in domestic revenue, Hakimi said.

sion in Kabul quoted Yamamo-to as saying: “It takes courage to enter into a peace process. It is not an admission of defeat – it is recognition of reality. An endless war ruins the country and impacts on people.”He asked all parties to the long-standing conflict to identify

About taxes which re-mained uncollected, he

common interests, and in par-ticular the Taliban, to engage in direct talks with the govern-ment without preconditions.The diplomat peace agreement with the Hezb-i Islami reflected the government’s willingness to negotiate on key issues, such as prisoner release, lifting of

KABUL - Incentive funds from the World Bank for suc-cessfully implementing re-forms in key sectors.The Ministry of Finance (MoF) said “The World Bank donated $ 83.5 million to ministry of finance based on commitments it made to bring reforms in 5 key sec-tions.”A statement by MoF said “The mentioned funds, in-cludes US $ 900 million that ministry of finance would receive in return to bring re-forms in income resources, organizational reforms, tax management, aid effective-ness and provincial budget within three years.”The statement further added “It is worth mentioning that, this fund would be spent through Discretionary budg-et given government prior-ity.”The government of national unity has stepped up efforts and fight against corrup-tion during the recent years that led to an overwhelming support by the international community to support the country and announced over $15 billion in aid during the Brussels conference.

KABUL - Finance Minister Eklil Hakimi on Monday signed a $415 million USD agreement with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to expand electri-fication in the country.Part of the money will be pro-vided by donor countries and some international organiza-tions and the remaining will be paid out by ADB.Hakimi said through this mon-ey a sub-station will be built in Pul-e-Khumri city in Baghlan province from where it will route Turkmenistan-imported power to the central provinces as well as distributing locally generated power to provinces.The sub-station to be built in Pul-e-Khumri city will have the capacity to transfer 500 mega-watts of electricity and will connect the new 500 megawatt power line of Turkmenistan imported power and the ex-

said: “I believe the amount would be many times high-

sanctions and integration into the political life of Afghani-stan.“Successful implementation of the agreement should address any remaining doubts, help unite the Afghans, and could pave the way for further peace agreements,” he added.Looking at the overall situa-tion, despite security challeng-es and some political volatility, the envoy said he continued to see opportunities and hope in Afghanistan.Stability in Afghanistan was not the sole interest of the war-torn country, he said, calling on regional countries to play their role as such conditions would ...(More on P4)...(2)

President Ghani in his re-marks ahead of the confer-ence had said “We prom-ised that we would end the corruption that violates our deepest spiritual values & pollutes the soul of our nation.”He said “We prom-ised that we would build a society based on laws and justice, not on power and guns.”“There will be howls of protest and pain as the noose against corruption grows ever tighter,” Presi-dent Ghani said, adding that Afghanistan needs to have institutions that are account-able to the people, insisting that that the government of national unity inherited a corrupt government. (KP)

tended 500 megawatt power-line to Kabul city. According to the agreement, a power line with the capacity of transferring 220 megawatt electricity will be linked to Bamyan province from Dushi district of Baghlan province and then it will be extended to eight other provinces.Hakimi said if the project is implemented, nearly 150,000 people will get electricity.“Government is committed to provide electricity for Afghani-stan citizens and that by imple-menting this project, the prob-lem of lack of electricity will be solved,” he said.He also said that since the start of the new fiscal year, the Min-istry of Finance (MoF) has col-lected more than 160 billion Afs in national revenue.“Government’s income in-creased ...(More on P4)...(6)

RSF