Analysis of “CIA World Fact Book”
(1981-2012): Dimensions of anti-Pashtun Conspiracy
Copyright. April 6, 2013
By: Dr. Rahmat Rabi Zirakyar,
Independent Scholar, USA
zirakyar1234@yahoo.com
دا
زموږ قسمت دی
چې په ویـنو کې
مزل وهـو
یو
قـدرت چې
ووهـو بیا بل
وهـو بیا بل
وهـو
Destiny demands we
wade through pools of blood.
We have defeated the
powerful repeat we must defeat, and yet once more.
–A Pashto
couplet
The
above Pashto couplet points to the fate of the ancient Pashtun nation stretched
between Oxus in
the north and Indus in the south and
reflecting historic trade and invasion routs. The battle between the
former Silk-istan and current Pipeline-istan is now determining the Pashtun destiny. Pashtuns are the superpower of egalitarian
conscience and a culture of resistance. In such capacity they have been
fighting against militarily superior (super)powers reflecting humankind inherent desire to be
free. Former U.S. President Ronald
Reagan (1980-88) characterized the Afghan resistance against the fomer Soviet “Evil Empire” as “man’s highest inspiration for
freedom.” Also, he praised the former Mujahedin as “the moral equal of our Founding Fahters .” But in the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy the war in Afghanistan has been, to a great
extent, put forth as a
war for human rights of the Afghan people, namely to liberate them from the oppression of Taliban and the majority Pashtuns. Some
nine years prior to
the disaster of September 11, 2001, “CIA World Fact Book” (a type
of “finished intelligence”) had reduced statistics of the majority Pashtuns in
Afghanistan. We shall go to the roots of this corrupt strategy. I am very thankful
to Dr. Daud Miraki and Dr. Zaman Stanizai for their
suggestions and constructive criticism of the rough draft of this writing.
Introduction
The
independent nature of the Pashtun people had unavoidable consequences for the
Pashtun Nation. Their spirit of self-determination has collided with the
colonial powers of the past and with the imperial powers of today.
With
approximately 60 million in Afghanistan and on the other side of the British-
imposed Durand Line (1893), current Pakistan, it is a
potent force that has made the global powers with local and regional agendas nervous.
Consequently, throughout history, the enemies of Pashtuns have conspired to
undermine them by suppressing them directly or used local minorities to do
their bidding. In the 20th
century, when a charismatic King, Amanullah Khan
(1919-29) led Afghanistan, British conspired and used a local bandit of
minority Tajik background (Bacha Saqaw:
the son of water carrier)
to undermine independent Pashtun rule and the promise of progress
on the horizon effectively elevating Afghanistan from underdevelopment.
Sixty years later in 1992, Afghanistan suffered from another Saqawi (by connotation, Saqawi is
synonymous with chaos, anarchy): After the demise of the Soviet installed
regime, Afghan minorities of the Northern Alliance embarked on a wicked
campaign of fabrication and lies. The Massoud-Rabani
regime destroyed the UN transitional plan and created an anarchy, a state of
disorder and lawlessness that
was called “The Second Saqawi” (Samsor Afghan). They
inherited an anti-Pashtun initiative from the former Soviet Union that had a
peace accord with Ahmad Shah Massoud (See
Richardson). Massoud might have attempted to undermine Pashtun
demographics during the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. Hence, when the
government of Burhanudin Rabani
and his protégé Commander Ahamd Shah Massoud came to power in 1992, a more scrupulous and
malicious campaign was launched to fundamentally change the demographic
landscape of the Pashtun people in official records.
This
malicious and hateful campaign consisted of using the government apparatus to
undermine Pashtun majority status by fabricating statistics and sharing them
with international organizations including the CIA World Fact Book. This wicked
yet strategic plan intended to cement the position of Afghan minorities in any
future geopolitical dealing. Hence, in October of 2001, when the US invaded
Afghanistan, the custodians of the post-1992 Tajik-led government, the Northern
Alliance served the US’s interest and used those fabricated statistics that it
secured during their reign (1992-1996) to make their case.
A Deliberate anti-Pashtun
Campaign
Nineteenth century
Muslim influential Scholar and
anti-colonialist Sayed Jamaluddin Afghan
(1837-1897), in his book “Tatmatul Bayan Fi Tarikhul Afghan”, paid attention to Pashtuns as the prevailing element of Afghan social
structure (Prof.
Sediqullah Reshtin, New Reseach (Peshawar/Pashtunkhwa,
1979, p. 98):
پوهاند
صدیق الله رښتین،
نوې څیـړنې(پیښور،
پښتونخوا، ۱۹۷۹،
مخ ۹۸ )/ د
افغانستان قــومي
جوړښت د
افغانستان
لپاره د واک
فونډیشن شپـږ
کلنه(۱۹۹۶-۱۹۹۱) سروې او څیـړنه،لمریز ۱۳۷۷= ۱۱مخ، ۱۹۹۸
The
deliberate undertaking by the Massoud-Rabani regime
(April 1992-September 1996) to downgrade majority Pashtun demographics was
immediately reflected in CIA World Fact Book (July 1992). What was the purpose of this tactic? This
pursuit is deeply rooted in the nature of Soviet/Russian design, which backed
minority ethnic politics to override national politics in Afghanistan. A U.S.-educated and prolific socio-political
analyst of Afghan descent Dr. Stanizai has succinctly
explained the Soviet strategy in Afghanistan.
I
will organize his approach in six steps.
STEP
ONE: The Soviets/Russians focused on the debasing of “the most
resistant” of the ethnic groups; namely, the majority Pashtuns because they
were usually the leading group in the Afghan armed forces, a majority among the
Afghan resistance organizations, and “the cultural core of Afghanistan’s
‘national’ identity”. To clarify his statement,
Dr. Stanizai writes that the “uncompromising”
resistance commander Zabihullah Mujahed
was “the only” non-Pashtun, whom the Soviets “wanted dead” and whose unyielding
position “may have done him in”.
STEP
TWO: The Soviets/Russians worked on curtailing the numerical strength of the
Pashtun population: They stepped up their military operations and aerial
bombardments of the Pashtun areas in the south, while leaving the non-Pashtun
areas in “relative calm” and “virtually
intact”. Indeed, at one point, the Soviets contemplated the idea of “moving the
capital” from Kabul to Mazar-e Sharif in the north,
the second largest Afghan city, “replacing Kandahar, which laid
in ruins”.
STEP THREE: In 1989 the Soviet
forces retreated beyond the northern borders of Afghanistan, due to two
realities on the ground: They pulled
back only “after making sure” that (a) the resistant Pashtuns had been
“weakened sufficiently”, and they would
not be pursued into Central Asia (as the then U.S. President George H. Bush
pursued “a rapprochement with a kinder and gentler declining” Soviet Russia).
STEP
FOUR: The non-Pashtun minorities in the
north were organized in the Northern Alliance (originally named: Supervisory
Council of the Northern Regions= shora-e nezar-e safahat-e shamal). This was a unified minority front to fight against “all aspects
of the Pashtun life”. Dr. Stanizai writes that “thus on the eve of the centennial” of
the colonial
Durand Treaty that had divided Afghanistan in 1893, “a deep chasm was created
in the ethno-linguistic mosaic” of
Afghanistan.
STEP
FIVE: Supported by the Soviets during the
resistance and their staunch former Afghan Communist leader Babrak
Karmal’s
generals, the Northern Alliance leader
Massoud claimed victory in Kabul in Apil of 1992 and
replaced Karmal’s successor Dr. Najibullah,
an ethnic Pashtun. Massoud attributed his triumph to the Northern
Alliance, to which Karmal ethnically belonged. This
gesture was symbolic in the ethnic political arena organized around “Tajik
supremacy” while undermining, targeting and depriving the Pashtun majority. The
Northern Alliance under the leadership of Massoud was
implementing “the ‘anybody-but-Pashtun’ agenda”. Massoud
forced President Sebghatullah Mujadidi,
a figurehead, out of office after two months and replaced him with Borhanoddin Rabbani, an ethnic
Tajik.
STEP
SIX:
With the onset of the Tajik-centered government installed
and run by the Massoud-Rabbani team, a deliberate
anti-Pashtun campaign began with the explicit goal of defrauding Pashtuns of
their identity, using the State apparatus and
institutions. Using bureaucratic fraud and coercion, large segment of Pashtuns
inside Afghanistan and returning refugees from Pashtunkhwa
(former NWFP: 1901-2010) were given new national identity cards that identified
them as Tajiks. This was part of a calculated
campaign to undermine the majority status of Pashtuns and fraudulently
increased the percentage of Tajiks. Other ethnic
minorities targeted Pashtuns violently by terrorizing them. For example, Hazara forces
targeted Pashtun homes and violated Pashtun families until they were forcefully
evicted from their homes, particularly in the 3rd and 4th
districts of Kabul. Similarly, Uzbek militia looted homes in the predominantly
Pashtun districts of the city until Pashtuns abandoned their homes and became
refugees inside and outside the country. At the “national” level, “the ethnic
cleansing campaigns began in the north”, where entire Pashtun villages were
depopulated through campaigns of terror.
Also, for further information on Massoud’s
links to Soviets/Russians ,see U.S. thorough and trustworthy expert on
Afghanistan, author, and journalist Richardson, who traveled to Afghanistan in
1986, 1987, 1990,1991and 1997.
Consequently, the Tajik led government of Massoud-Rabbani
concocted new census aimed at distorting the ground realities of Afghan
society by reducing Pashtuns from nearly 60% to 38% and increaseing
the proportion of Tajiks from 12% to 25%.
The Kabul
regime disseminated these figures to international organizations as official
data ( Stanizai
received this information from the late
Afghan academician Abdul Shakur Rashad (1921-2004),
whose private home-based library was looted by Northern Alliance warlords). Soon these fabricated population figures were
reflected in the CIA World Fact Book (July 1992) and most probably from this
source to the National Geographic World Atlas and the World Almanac, among
other publications. The CIA even sent CDs of the above data to Russian libraries
(an Afghan living in Russia reported about this information in printed Afghan
media in Western Europe. Zirakyar). For more information about the above six steps, consult Stanizai, “From Identity Crisis to Identity in Crisis in
Afghanistan”. Electronic version: December 16, 2009. http://www.stanizai.org/ [November 15, 2012]. Stanizai is a sharp
political analyst in Afghan and Islamic affairs.
Today(
April 25, 2013), I received an important write up by Richardson, who is not in
reality a “Pashtun Ghost Writer”, but a resourceful and honest American
journalist, author and expert on the issues of Afghanistan. The
anti-Pashtun plot discussed in Talooqan conference of
2003 might have been running parallel to the
CIA’s statistics that reduced majority Pashtuns to the largest minority
in Afghanistan (Talooqan is the capital of the Takhar province in northern Afghanistan).This plan reminds
us of the former Soviet leader Brezhnev’s scheme to divide Afghanistan in 1981.
The Talooqan plan was forged by American private
imperialism and Russia, the successor of former social imperialism. The late Burhanuddin
Rabani, the former Tajik president of the civil war
period (1992-96), participated in the Talooqan
conference. “The
anti-Pashtun orientation of the Bush Administration financed and fueled the
conference, which was reported to have cost $75 million dollars.” At the Talooqan conference of 2003 “were present all factions of the
Northern Alliance accompanied by an ever-present throng of Communist generals,”
but the majority Pashtuns “were denied representation” in the above conference.
(Richardson, April 25, 2013).
Afghan Ethnic and Linguistic Statistics
Collected from the CIA World Fact Book
(1981-2012 = 1360-1391 Solar Hijri)
According to CIA, its own "CIA World
Fact Book” is one of the three types of “finished
intelligence”, which means “the final product of
intelligence cycle”, which in turn is
the process by which information is (a) received, (b) refined( “analyzed and
interpreted”) into intelligence and (c) presented to policymakers. The other two types of finished intelligence are “The
President’s Daily Brief” and the “National Intelligence Estimates”. Former intelligence officer Robert L. Suettinger relates that National Intelligence Estimates (NIE)
“necessarily have to devolve into a
realm of speculation”. The October 2002 prewar intelligence about
Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction soon became nothing more than the “mashroom cloud” of lies. After this war, however, U.S. and
British leaders justified their action by focusing on the character of Saddam
Hussein rather than on the evidence for his capabilities. British leader
Churchill mentioned to Soviet leader Stalin at the Teheran Conference in 1943: “In
wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard
of lies.”
Social and Political Science Professor and President of
American Political Science Association (2001) Robert Jervis wrote: “All too
often…intelligence estimates tell us more about interests and foreign policy
preferences of powerful groups in government than it does about what the other
side’s intentions and capabilities are.”
In context of “the clash of civilizations”, the CIA’s
statistics for Afghan ethnic and linguistic groups can be interpreted.
The
following table presents the estimated statistics of Afghan ethnic and
linguistic groups from 1981 to 2012.
From 1992, the percentage of Pashtuns and their language was
significantly lowered in the CIA World Fact Book.
The year 1992, when the CIA lowered the Pashtuns’ statistics, their attempt
coincided with the onset of pro-Tajik regime of Massuod
and Rabani in Afghanistan, which destroyed the UN
transitional plan.
Afghan Demographics in CIA World
Fact Book 1981-2012
|
Year
|
Ethnic Group Percentage
|
Total Population
|
Language
Percentage
|
Estimates
|
Estimates
|
Estimates
|
Estimates
|
کال
|
قومي
سلنې
|
ژبـنئ
سلنې
|
ټول
وګړي
|
1981(1360)
|
Pashtuns 50%
|
Pashto 50%
|
15,193,000
|
|
Tajiks
25%
|
Farsi(Persian)
35%
|
|
|
Hazaras 9%
|
Uzbeki,Turkmeni 11%
|
|
|
Uzbeks 9%
|
all other languages
4%
|
|
|
All others 7%
|
|
|
1990(1369)
|
Pashtuns 50%
|
Pashto 50%
|
15,862,293
|
|
Tajiks
25%
|
Farsi
35%
|
|
|
Hazaras 12%-15%
|
Uzbeki,Turkmeni 11%
|
|
|
Uzbeks
9%
|
all other languages
4%
|
|
|
All others 3%-4%
|
|
|
1991(1370)
|
Same as above
|
Same as above
|
16,450,304
|
1992(1371)
|
Pashtuns 38%
|
Pashto 35%
|
16,095,664
|
|
Tajiks
25%
|
Farsi
50%
|
|
|
Hazaras 19%
|
Uzbaki,Turkmeni 11%
|
|
|
Uzbeks 6%
|
all other languages
4%
|
|
|
All others 12%
|
|
|
2001(1381)
|
Pashtuns 38%
|
Pashto 35%
|
26,813,057
|
|
Tajiks 25%
|
Farsi 50%
|
|
|
Hazaras 19%
|
Uzbaki,Turkmeni 11%
|
|
|
Uzbaks 6%
|
all other languages
4%
|
|
|
All others 8%
|
|
|
2006-2012
|
Pashtuns 42%
|
Pashto 35%
|
(31,056,997)
|
(1385-1391)
|
Tajiks
27%
|
Farsi(Persian)
50%
|
31,889,923
|
|
Hazaras 9%
|
Uzbeki & Turkmeni
11%
|
32,738,376
|
|
Uzbeks
9%
|
all other languages
4%
|
33,609,937
|
|
All others
13%
|
|
|
…………………………. 29,835,392
|
July 2012
estimates…. 30,419,928
|
Data collected and organized from the “CIA World Fact
book” by Rahmat
Zirakyar
|
Now, the question is justifiable whether the reduction of
Pashtun statistics in the “CIA World Fact Book”(1992-2012
) is self-serving, a mask for U.S support for minority rule in Afghanistan
following the 911 catastrophe?
Shedding Light on
CIA World Fact Book Statistics for Afghanistan
It is important to mention that ethnic divisiveness was
first used by Russia in the Caucasus and Central Asia in the 18th
and 19th century as a vehicle for dividing and conquering. During
their occupation of Afghanistan (December 1979-Febraury 1989), the Soviets
tried to lower statistical significance of the majority Pashtuns in their
country. The purpose of this politics was to prepare Afghanistan for partition.
To achieve this goal, the Soviet military operations tremendously debased and
dehumanized Pashtuns while recruiting non-Pashtun Massoud,
Dostam and others to facilitate the transition of
northern tier of Afghanistan into the Soviet system. There were two probable
ways for the realization of this design: Via partition of Afghanistan or its
eventual annexation to Central Asian Soviet republics, where Afghan Tajiks,
Uzbeks and Turkmen have ethnic kinsmen.
The name of Afghan communist Babrak
Karmal (1929-1996) is synonymous with the Soviet
occupation of Afghanistan (1979-1989). In his era (1979-1986), a campaign for
population census was launched to manipulate Pashtun population statistics. To
effortlessly manipulate the demographic realities, most of the time this
question was asked: “In which language are you fluent?” ( ba kodam
lesan mosalat asted?).
به کدام لسا
ن مسلط استید
(Private information
shared with me by a member of the Central Committee of the then ruling People’s
Democratic Party of Afghanistan. Zirakyar).
Since many Pashtuns are able to speak Pashto as well as
Dari, their answers reflecting confidence in both languages were manipulated to
mask the true size of the Pashtun people and falsely elevate Tajik percentage
in the country. This way, the pro-Soviet Karmal’s
census crew camouflaged the ethnic identity o Pashtuns. Generals of the Karmal faction sided with Ahmad Shah Massoud
and helped him to consolidate power in Kabul in April of 1992 whereby
effectively neutralizing the U.N. transition plan.
Consequently, this maneuvering coalition along ethnic and linguistic lines led
to the “Second Saqawi”: anarchy and the civil
war (1992-1996).
It is important to know that the academic landscape of
international relations and global politics faced certain fundamental
morphological transformation. After all, the Soviet Union was on its deathbed
and a new reformulation had to emerge to both make sense of the emerging
changes and serve as forecasts for future policy formulations. Hence, soon
after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in February of 1989, “The Roots of
Muslim Rage” (1990) by Professor of Islamic and
Middle Eastern History Bernard Lewis and “The Clash of Civilizations?” (1993-
expanded to a book in 1996) by renowned Political Scientist Professor
Huntington) emerged. Generally, the West discovered Islam (officially
radical Islam) as the “New Communism”. In context of such political mentality,
CIA World Fact Book statistics for Afghan ethnic and linguistic groups can be
interpreted.
The CIA World Fact Book is published each year in the month of July. As
we know, the anti-Pashtun Northern Alliance came to power in Kabul in the month of April 1992. In less than three months after this event, the CIA World Fact Book was
published in the month of July, in which the statistics of majority ethnic
Pashtuns were considerably reduced from 50 percent to 38 percent and
those of their language from 50 percentage to 35 percent. I want to explain
this issue: For the first time in 1992,
The CIA World Fact Book considerably lowered the statistical significance of
Pashtuns. (Zirakyar,
2009; and Richardson, 2009, p.275).
What is the purpose of inflating the population size of non-Pashtun
minorities while downgrading the majority Pashtun demographics? The lasting and
enduring relations between CIA and Northern Alliance suggest that both of them
needed each other’s cooperation in reducing Pashtun ethnic and linguistic
statistics. This deliberate and self-serving undertaking by the CIA to lower
Pashtun socio-linguistic data is indicative of a public relations ploy for a
world-wide support for an unjust war, which was packaged as a just war:
to free the majority (minority non-Pashtuns) from the so-called oppression of
the minority (majority Pashtuns). This statistical-psychological operation
helped Washington to disenfranchise and alienate the majority Pashtuns. Hence,
the CIA World Fact Book reduced the size of Pashtun population in Afghanistan
from majority Pashtuns to the largest ethnic group in their country.
Two reliable Afghan scholars whose names need not be disclosed told me (Zirakyar) that three men were “involved” (dakheel) in the process of reducing Pashtun statistics: Two
(R.F. and E.E) are non-Pashtun Afghans holding PhD’s in linguistics, and the
third one (T.F.) is a U.S. expert on Afghanistan with good ties to “Zal” (Zalmay Kh.).
From the two non-Pashtun Afghan linguists one is a translator and teacher in a
U.S. military establishment, and the other
was a high-ranking politician in previous Afghan governments. Both of them had
maintained very good relations with Massoud-Rabbani
regime in Kabul (April 1992-September 1996). Once again, this information
substantiates my assertion that the CIA and the Massoud-Rabbani
regime needed each other’s cooperation to decrease the majority Pashtun
demographics. Massoud and his acolytes hated
Pashtuns, particularly their language Pashto because it has the substance for
the national identity of Afghanistan as a state and as a country. A Pashto
proverb says: “Don’t kill the beggar, just take away his begging bowl.”
ملنګ
مه وژنه،
کچکـول ورنه
واخـله
Colonialism not only controls colonized people through
administrators of the dominant colonial culture but indirectly by using
subservient members of the colonized culture. Colonialism and imperialism are considerably similar and each energizes the other:
Their motive is to exploit the colonized or controlled nations. Massoud served as dues ex machina
in the Soviet, Iranian and American
political agenda in Afghanistan.
A U.S.-born Eric Margolis is a
veteran journalist, writer and “Eisenhower Republican,” who writes mainly
about the Middle East, South Asia and Islam. He came to the conclusion in 2009
that America cannot establish peace and stability in Afghanistan unless the
majority Pashtuns (“55%”) are “enfranchised”, namely
“dealing directly with Taliban”, who are “part of the Pashtun people”.
The following tabulation presents the ethnic and linguistic
statistics presented by the late Afghan Academician Abdul Shakur Rashad as a reaction to the false demographics published in
the CIA “Word Fact Book” only three months after the onset of pro-Tajik regime,
in July 1992.
Title
|
Author
|
Date and Place
of Publication
|
Percentage of
Major Ethnic Groups
|
Pashtun
|
Tajik
|
Hazara
|
Uzbek
|
Afghanistan
|
Prof. M. Ali
|
1955 Kabul
|
60
|
20
|
|
|
Afghanistan
|
Max Clumborg
|
1960
|
60
|
30
|
3
|
3
|
The National Languages of
Afghanistan
|
Prof. Aslanov
|
1964 USSR
|
60
|
|
|
|
The World of Geoethnology
|
M. Mahjub
Yawari
|
1987 (5th
Ed.) Iran
|
60
|
20
|
5
|
5
|
World’s Largest Languages
|
McKenzie
|
1987 Europe
|
55-65
|
|
|
|
History and Establishment of
Afghanistan
|
Abdul Azim Walyan
|
1987 Iran
|
70
|
13
|
|
|
Fundamentalism Reborn?
Afghanistan and the Taliban
|
William Maley
|
1998 London
|
62.73
|
12.4
|
9
|
6
|
Afghanistan Federal System
|
M. Enam
Wak
|
2000 Pakistan
|
62
|
12
|
9
|
6
|
The World Almanac
|
Primedia
|
2000 USA
|
38
|
25
|
19
|
6
|
Copyright www.hewad.com
Complementary
Note
In the second row of the above table, the last name of
German-speaking Austrian expert on Afghanistan is misspelled (Clumborg). Its correct spelling is Klimburg.
Max Klimburg holds graduate degrees in Art History
and Ethnology. His book was
published in 1966 with this
complete title “Afghanistan: Das
Land im historischen Spannungsfeld Mittelasiens”. I am very sure that this is the book quoted
in the above table. Now, I will turn to other western sources dealing with
Afghan demographics.
Estimates of Afghan Ethnic Statistics Presented in Other
Western Sources
Gul Janan
Sarif indicated in his dissertation thesis (1972)
that from 11-12 million Afghans circa nine million have Pashto as mother
language. H.F. Schurmann estimated ( 1962) that Pashtuns make up at least half
of the Afghan population. Similarly, D.N. Wilber (1962) figured that Pashtuns
make up 50%-60% of the Afghan population. According to Area Handbook for Afghanistan (4th
edition, 1973), from 16 million Afghans
“over 8” millions are Pashtuns. According to. Magnus and Naby
(1998), the Pashtuns “form the most important and probably the most numerous
ethnic group in Afghanistan….the standard estimate is that 40 to 50 percent of
the [Afghan] population is” Pashtuns (p.12).
Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Vol. III (1992) estimates that Pashtuns
“constituted from 50 to 60 percent of the population of prewar Afghanistan . Derbyshire and Derbyshire (1996
) wrote that Pashtuns “comprise the largest group, 54% of the total
population.” The official languages of Afghanistan are Pashto and Dari “or
Persian” that are “spoken by 52% and 30% of the population respectively.” Fareed Zakaria, the host of CNN’s
important foreign affairs show (GPS), was discussing with Peter Galbraith
(former U.N. Representative to Afghanistan). Here Zakaria spoke of “majority Pashtuns, 50%”.
April 11, 2010). Arnold was a U.S. intelligence officer assigned to
Afghanistan, Germany, Sweden, Burma, Japan, and England. He retired in 1979. In
his book (1983, P. 2), Arnold wrote that Pashto is “the native tongue of about
55 percent of the population. Nevertheless, Arnold is pointing out to a prevailing
and strange linguistic reality in Afghanistan: “Oddly, although Pashtuns
comprise over half the population, their language is not the dominant one.”
Nyrop
and Seekins (2001/ Electronic Version) stated that most population statistics in Afghanistan
are founded on estimates. The first and “most scientific
demographic survey” was implemented in Afghanistan in 1972-1974 by the State
University of New York for the United States Agency for International
Development (AID), in cooperation with the then Afghan government. This survey declared a settled population of
10.8 million. However, it did not report the nomadic population, which was
“separately estimated at slightly more than 1 million” (p.99). On the same page we can read that the Afghan
population estimate in
1995 amounted to 18.4 million. A few
pages later we can easily decipher another population estimate in 1996:
“approximately” 40% of Afghans were Pashtuns, successively followed by 25.3% Tjiks,18% Hazaras,
6.3% Uzbeks, 2.5% Turkmen, while other ethnic groups totaled to 7.9% including
1% Qizilbash (p. 104). Now, take a look at another
population size of Pashtuns in 1995 on the same page: “The largest and
traditionally most politically powerful ethnic group” of Pashtuns reached in 1995 “an estimated 10.1
million…”(p.104). If we divide this estimated number by the estimated total
population number, the result for Pashtun population size shall be nearly 55%,
unless it is an error committed by the authors/editors (Nyrop and Seekins)?
10,100,000/18,400,000=0.5489=55% Pashtuns.
Even U.S. Central
Command General Tommy Franks (June 2000-July 2003) who led the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001
and the invasion of Iraq in 2003, spoke of
“majority Pashtuns” (see below).
Let’s take a look at a few French sources. According to Encylopedia de L’Agora (2013):
Pashtuns make up 38% and their language Pashto35% ,
Tajiks are (25%), and “perse afghan”
(Dari ) 50%, Hazaras are19%, Turkmens are 11%. As
reported by Le petit Larousse (2011): Pashtuns are 40% and Tajiks are 30%. As stated in Larousse Encyclopedique
(2007): Pashtuns
amount to 40%. Pursuant to ONG show (Tomorrow’s Afghanistan)
created in 2001: Pashtuns
constitute 40%), Tajiks 32%, Hazaras
9%. In keeping with Atlas Economique Mondial (2000), Pashtuns consist of 38%, Tajiks 25%, and Hazaras 14% of the Afghan population. I am very thankful to
Dr. Osman Rostar Taraki for
sharing the above French data with me (March 13, 2013).
The French statistics for Afghan ethnic composition need to
be scrutinized. They illustrate the French government’s strong inclination
toward an anti-Pashtun group and its so-called “legendary” commander Massoud. We can easily identify resemblance between the
above French and CIA’s statistics about
the Afghan ethnic and linguistic structure. The reason is that former
colonial France and current imperial U.S.A. have a common denominator for the
realization of their
national interests: the political puppet
Ahmad Shah Massoud. He had the courage to auction the independence,
sovereignty and territorial integrity of
Afghanistan to colonial and imperial powers (Soviet Union, Russia, France, and
U.S.A.) and Persian-speaking Iran without any discrimination.
I assume that after 1992 British and German sources might have
followed the CIA’s template for the
Afghan socio-linguistic composition.
To refute the cooked up statistics, I need to present the Wak Foundation for Afghanistan’s comprehensive study and
data. Until now, this research and survey project has produced the most
authoritative and authentic document on the ethnic composition of Afghanistan.
Wak
Foundation’s Statistics for Afghan Ethnic and Linguistic Groups
For the record,“The
Ethnic Composition of Afghanistan" is a six-year survey and research
project ( April 1991- July 1996). It was conducted by the then Peshawar/Pashtunkhwa-based Wak–Foundation
for Afghanistan which was published in 1998 (1377 Solar Hijri).
This self-funding organization is Research and Implementation Institute for Afghanistan’s Rehabilitation,
Development and Drug Control Programmes. Engineer Mohammad Enam
Wak is the Founder and President of the Wak Foundation for Afghanistan (I will be using here its
short form: Wak Foundation). He is of Tarin-Pashtun heritage born in 1954 in Sorkhrod of Nangarhar province and graduated from the Geology
Department at the Kabul University in Afghanistan. Enam
Wak is the author of several publications in his
mother language Pashto. While working in Iran, his two books were published
there in Farsi (Persian). To refute the cooked up statistics, I need to present
the Wak Foundation for comprehensive study and data
for Afghanistan.
Until now, this research and survey project has produced the
most authoritative and authentic document on the ethnic composition of
Afghanistan. In 2012 The Aryana
Encyclopedia (da aryana daieratul
ma’aref) in Kabul printed (p. 455) ethnic statistics that are matching
with those published by the Wak Foundation in (1998= 1377 Solar A.H.): Pashtun (62.73%),
Tajik(12.38%), Hazaras (9%), Uzbeks (6.10%), Turkmen
(2.69%), etc. Mrs. Soraya Popal,
who is currently the President of the Academy of Sciences in Kabul, had
declared the above statistics in the House of Representative of Afghanistan (wolasi jarga). Below is the Pashto text published
in the Aryana Encyclopedia:
«دافغانستان
ملی اتنیکی جوړښت
چې په دې
وروستیو کې څرګند
شوی او په
لاندې ډول وړاندی
کیـږي: پښتانه
۶۲،۷۳، تاجک ۱۲،۳۸،
هزاره ۹،۰۰،
ازبک ۶،۱۰،
ترکمن ۲،۶۹، ایماق
۲،۶۸....»- مخ ۴۵۵،
اریانا دایـرة
المعارف
Wak Foundation’s Methodology Credibility
The survey of Wak Foundation has
credibility for the detailed and meticulous efforts; familiarity with the
cultural nuances and socio-ethnic organization of the Afghan society; and the
time spent achieving results.
Consultations
with Afghan scholars, intellectuals, dignitaries, former civil servants, teachers, and
religious and tribal leaders took place. These discussions broadened the survey
staff members’ horizon to respect the socio-cultural norms of local
communities, as the circumstances may require. Also, they were trained by
experts. Besides, preliminary survey was conducted in early 1991 among
refugee population residing in Iran( Tehran and Mashad), Peshawar, and Quetta. Similar exploratory
interviews were run with knowledgeable people in large cities of Afghanistan in
early 1991. This survey started with zone and extended down to the
village. The actual survey in
Afghanistan was mainly conducted on the district (wolaswali)
level while in some locations on the village level (May 1991-September1996).
During the actual survey, some of its field members went to Russia and Central
Asian countries in 1995 . Their mission was to verify
with Afghans there the data of the preliminary survey conducted in
Afghanistan’s northern
provinces. “Some of the interviews” conducted in central Asian
countries “obliged” the Wak Foundation to “repeat the
survey in some” of
the northern provinces of Afghanistan like Baghlan, Samagan and Balkh.
“A few districts in these provinces” were reexamined in early 1996. Nancy
Hatch Dupree, the wife of the late U.S. distinguished expert on
Afghanistan Professor Louis Dupree, wrote in her endorsement of the Wak Foundation project about the Afghan ethnic
composition: “ Rarely have Afghans taken an interest in this
bewildering subject”. Therefore, she
complimented Wak for “ being
a pioneer in this essential endeavour” (11 June 1998,
University Town, Peshawar). A short version of this 255-page book in Pashto was
published in English
in July of 1999 in Peshawar, and its final draft was “edited” by
Nancy H. Dupree.
Attempt to Kill Mohammad Enam
Wak, June 1, 2000
The effectiveness of the Wak Foundation
became a threat to the conspirators of both the Massoud-Rabani
regime in Kabul and the Punjabi-run government of Pakistan. To destroy this
important institution at its core, they might have hand in the attempt to
assassinate the founder and president of the Wak
Foundation.
Following the Pashto
version of The Ethnic Composition of Afghanistan (1998), its compact
English version was published in July of 1999. A third book published by Wak was Federalism in Afghanistan (2000), in which he
discussed the unification of Pashtuns on both sides of the illegal, invalid and immoral
Durand Line of 1893. Peshawar-based Afghan sources believed that these
three book had unsettled the Pakistani
intelligence and Massoud. The leader of the Northern Alliance Massoud could not tolerate (a) the Pashtun identity of
Afghanistan, (b) the Pashtun ethnic statistics in Afghanistan (62.73%) and
(c) the need for Pashtun unification.
The Pakistani intelligence service was agitated by the argument of
Pashtun unification. In light of such positions, one can argue that the
decision to assassinate Enam Wak
was triggered by the above three books. Leaving his home for work, Eanm Wak was repeatedly shot in the front of the exit door of his residence in
Peshawar by unidentified gunmen on June 1, 2000: twice in the left arm and once in the abdomen
(Wak saw two men at the two front corners of his
residence). After
being released from the hospital, he took refuge in
Norway.
The probability of Massoud
involvement in the attempted assassination of Wak is
more likely than the Pakistani Intelligence service since Massoud
had to gain a lot more from his death than the Pakistani Intelligence.
Moreover, Pakistani Intelligence has professional assassins and they make sure
the targeted person does not survive. The fact that Wak
survived points to the culprits wanting to dissipate expeditiously in order to
avoid capture by local
police. Had it been the Pakistani Intelligence, they would have
made sure to finish him before departing the scene of the crime since they had
no reason to worry about capture.
Wak Foundation Criticizing Previous Population
Statistics
Due to the fact that the Afghan society is heterogeneous, Wak Foundation has
criticized the
collection of previous population
statistics for these
reasons:
First, the previous population statistics did not distinguish
between ethnic and language groups in
Afghanistan: For example, Persian (Farsi, Dari)-speaking ethnic Pashtuns in Herat were counted as
Tajiks. Farsi-speaking Hazaras
are ethnically Hazaras,
not Tajiks. Although
members of the Afghan royal family were using the Afghan version of Persian (Dari),
they were not called Tajiks, but Mohammadzai
Pashtuns. The Pashtun society is predominantly tribal, in which the identity is
secured mainly by ethnicity (qaum). If we compare the Afghan society to an
orange, then language is the skin of the orange, not the independent parts
(tribes) within its skin.
Determining the ethnic percentage in
Afghanistan by mixing language identity with ethnic identity caused problems
for determining ethnic identity. This means that Tajik is not an ethnic
identity, but a default linguistic identity.
Consequently,
Pashtuns, who could or did
not speak Pashto, were counted as Tajiks.
Farsi/Dari speaking Pashtuns lost their cultural/language identity by 7.73% to Tajiks: Pashtuns are ethnically 62.73% of
the total Afghan population. However, linguistically/culturally they are 55%. Nevertheless, Pashtuns
made up ethnically as well as culturally the majority of the total Afghan population
(17,918,454) in 1996, the year of the completion of the Wak
Foundation’s survey.
Second,
smaller ethno-religious minorities like Ismailite
Tajiks and Shiite Qizelbash are counted with Hazaras. This, in turn, increased the number of Hazara group. U.S. anthropologist and expert on Afghanistan
Louis Durpree (1929-1989) deemed Taimanis as part of Aimaqs;
however, they are originally Pashtuns, not Aimaqs. Most of the Farsibans
(Farsi-speaking people) in Herat are Pashtuns while some of them are Aimaqs.
Third,
mixing language with ethnicity is not appropriate for counting the population
of Afghanistan. Precisely, Afghan Persian (Dari) is the mother tongue of
Tajiks; however, it does not mean that all Persian-speaking Afghans are of Tajik
heritage. The question in this state of affairs is this: Why non-Tajik Afghans
prefer to speak Persian (Dari)? The main reason for this situation is that
Dari/Farsi was the language of the court, bureaucracy, business, the press, as
well as mostly the language of education.
Fourth,
Pashto language was suffering from social prestige because the ethnically
Pashtun royal and
ruling family did not try to learn, read
speak and write in Pashto. Hence, Pashto became a neglected, second
class national language. If the King and his family members do not communicate
in Pashto, why should the prime minister, ministers of departments, university
professors, parliamentarians, generals, diplomats, governors, media, business…
and the general public use Pashto as the medium of communication. Practically,
Pashto speakers could not aspire to position of power in Afghanistan without
learning, writing and speaking Dari/Farsi (Persian). In fact, Pashto was
precluded from social prestige and
blocked from the sphere of political economy. Pashto urgently needed and needs
a top-down solution to achieve social prestige. This will enable Pashto to
become a productive partner in the framework of political economy. Pashtun
poet-philosopher Gul-Pacha Ulfat
(1909-1977) had expressed his thought in a couplet on the diminishing social
status of Pashto:
People communicate in the language used in the government
When will Pashto become the language of the government
سر
او کار د خلکو
دی د ژبې د سر
کار
سره
کله به غـریــبه
پـښتو ژبه د
سـرکارشــي
Fifth, Dari was the main language of
education and press. Most schools and all institutions of higher education were
taught in Dari. Also, Dari was part of the religious curriculum in mosques and
madrasas: The 13th century Persian writer and poet Saadi
Shirazi’s two books (Bostan=the Orchard, and Golistan=
the Rose) were organized about his Sufi, social and moral thoughts, and for
this reason they have been taught in mosques. Today’s Iran (since 1935), former “Persia” and its language “Farsi” (Persian)
have always been internationally known as “Persian”, not Irani. As a powerful neighbor, Iran has had a deep
cultural influence in Afghanistan. To adjust them to the Iranian cultural
ideals, the western cultural exports were “mostly filtered, refined and
conditioned.” Practically, Dari was
compulsory for all government employees in Afghanistan. Pashtuns and other non-Tajik ethnic groups
that were going to Kabul to study and/or to do business had no other choice but
to speak Farsi-Dari. The prominent newspaper “Anis”
was published in Dari. There was no girl school for Pashto-speaking population
in Kabul. There were only two high schools in Kabul where the teaching language
was Pashto: Khoshal Baba Lycee
and Rahman Baba Lycee. “Royal court without Pashto means the death
of Pashtuns” (be Pashto arg da Pashtano
marg dai,
Zirakyar). For an analysis of the importance of
language, see Zirakyar (December 2010).
Languages not only serve as the
means of communication, but also they are the medium of influence, power and
identity-especially in a politically organized community (nation state). As
long as there are nation states, there will be national interests and national
languages. Languages are fundamental to cultural and national identity. The
future of humanity depends on both the cultural identity and the cultural
diversity. See Zirakyar (Language from Adam to
Present, December 2010= Linda 1389 Solar A.H.).
Percentage of
Afghan Ethnic Groups Based on Ethnicity and Language
From WAK Foundation
Research and Survey (1991-1996)
په
افغانستان کې
د خـټـې او ژبې
په بنسټ د بـیلابـیلو
قومونو
ســلـنـې،
واک فـوڼـډ یشـن:
۱۹۹۶-۱۹۹۱
Number
|
Major Ethnic Groups
|
Based on Ethnicity
|
Based on Language
|
|
|
%
|
%
|
1
|
Pashtuns
|
62.73
|
55
|
2
|
Tajiks
|
12.38
|
33
|
3
|
Hazaras
|
9.00
|
00
|
4
|
Uzbeks
|
6.10
|
5.80
|
5
|
Turkmen
|
2.69
|
1.4
|
6
|
Aimaqs
|
2.68
|
00
|
For collecting
demographic data in Afghanistan, seven regions were determined by the
Wak Foundation as follows:
|
|
1. Northern Region: Samangan,
Balkh, Jozjan and Fariab
province.
2. North-Eastern Region: Badakhshan, Takhar, Konduz and Baghlan Province.
3. North-Western Region: Ghor, Badghis, Herat and Farag Provice.
4. Eastern Region: Paktia,
Nangarhar, Kunar and Laghman Province.
5. East-Central Region: Ghazni, Logar, Wardag, Kabul, Kapisa, Parwan and Bayan.
6. Southern Region: Nimroz,
Helmand, Kandahar, Zabal, Paktika, and Orzgan.
7. Nomads
|
Ethnicity-Based Percentage
of Major Ethnic Groups in Seven Afghan Regions
|
|
Total
|
Total Other
|
Grand
Total
|
Regions
|
Pashtuns
|
Tajiks
|
Hazaras
|
Uzbeks
|
Aimaqs
|
Turkmen
|
Considerable
Minorities
|
Small Minorities
|
Northern
|
684,532
|
148,191
|
253,756
|
765,708
|
1,305
|
378,797
|
2,232,289
|
61,345
|
2,293,634
|
|
30%
|
6%
|
11%
|
33%
|
0%
|
17%
|
97%
|
3%
|
|
|
|
North-Eastern
|
711,194
|
981,807
|
89,605
|
283,916
|
|
35,149
|
2,101,671
|
71,285
|
2,172,956
|
|
33%
|
45%
|
4%
|
13%
|
|
2%
|
97%
|
3%
|
|
|
|
North-Western
|
1,115,037
|
154,912
|
27,166
|
6,071
|
478,825
|
49,046
|
1,831,057
|
53,053
|
1,884,110
|
|
59%
|
8%
|
1%
|
0%
|
25%
|
3%
|
97%
|
3%
|
|
|
|
Eastern
|
1,994,275
|
18,237
|
879
|
0
|
|
|
2,013,391
|
200,462
|
2,213,853
|
|
90%
|
1%
|
0
|
0
|
|
|
91%
|
9%
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
East-Central
|
2,907,405
|
912,454
|
1,000,495
|
37,388
|
|
18,694
|
4,876,436
|
119,535
|
4,995,971
|
|
58%
|
18%
|
20%
|
1%
|
|
0%
|
98%
|
|
2%
|
|
|
Southern
|
2,047,679
|
2,812
|
239,959
|
447
|
|
|
2,290,897
|
67,033
|
2,357,930
|
|
87%
|
0%
|
10%
|
0%
|
|
|
97%
|
3%
|
|
|
|
Nomads
|
|
1,780,000
|
|
|
|
|
1,780,000
|
220,000
|
2,000,000
|
|
89%
|
0%
|
0%
|
0%
|
|
|
89%
|
11%
|
|
|
|
Total
|
11,240,122
|
2,218,413
|
1,611,860
|
1,093,530
|
480,130
|
481,686
|
17,125,741
|
792,713
|
17,918,454
|
|
|
|
62.73%
|
12.38%
|
9%
|
6.10%
|
2.68%
|
2.69%
|
95.58%
|
4.42%
|
|
Now,
I shall shed some light on
the characteristics of the leaders of the
Northern Alliance:
Who Are
the Major Players in the Northern
Alliance?
It
is important to also point out and establish the credibility of the leaders of the
Northern Alliance as their malicious exercise in indecency in regards to Pashtuns’ demographic
manipulation is indicative of their character. The following write-up
and quotes are of the U.S. officials assessing the main figures of the Northern
Alliance.
Two days after the 9/11 tragedy (during the National
Security Council meeting on September 13, 2001), President George W. Bush
wanted to know from
the CIA leadership about the individual
Northern Alliance leaders? Cofer Black (Director of
Counterterrorism Center at CIA) said: “One key [Northern] Alliance general, Abdurrashid Dostum, had been on
everyone’s payroll-Russia, Iran and Pakistan.” (Quoted in Bob Woodward, 2002, p. 53). Woodward knew
from DIA’s “ highly classified memo”, which “in large part blamed General Fahim, essentially calling him a wimp who would talk and
talk, then not show up for battle.” (Ibid. 268). CIA’s
Director Tenet said at the National Security Council’s above meeting that “with
the CIA teams and tons of money, the [Northern] Alliance could be brought
together into a cohesive fighting force.” (Ibid., p. 51).
According to Deputy
Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Central Command Lt. General Michael DeLong,
Northern Alliance’s major commanders (Dostam, Khalili, Faheem, and Ismael Khan)
were “fighting and
killing without remorse” and this “was a way of life for them”.
General DeLong adds that “each having personally killed to fifty men”, and after the 911
catastrophe they would be “theoretically” the generals fighting in Afghanistan for the
Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Central
Command General Tommy Franks. (DeLong with Noah Lukeman
2004, pp. 24-47). Also, General Tommy Franks was aware of
the fact that “northern factions fighting against majority Pashtuns” would
create another civil war in Afghanistan. (Franks quoted in Berntsen,2005, pp 289-92). Berntsen, who was CIA’s field commander in Afghanistan,
informs us about his
experience with the Northern Alliance as
follows: “ I know from my experience
that Persians and their Afghan cousins are all carpet salesman at heart.” By implication, Berntsen
believed that
the commanders of Northern Alliance would sell Afghanistan like a carpet. On October 30, 2001,
Commander-in Chief of the U.S. Central Command General Tommy Franks arrived in
Tashkent, where Fahim and his treasury minister Aref
were waiting for him. Shortly
before the meeting, Tommy Franks said to the CIA agent Berntsen: “Time to discuss the price of rugs” with the two
Northern Alliance leaders. When Fahim wanted more
money, Franks call this try “Bullshit”! (General
Tommy Franks (2004, pp 309-311). All the
facts, ideas and assumptions presented here shall lead to the following
conclusion.
Conclusion
For all their geopolitical games, colonialism and
imperialism have been relying on minorities. The Northern Alliance in Afghanistan under the
leadership of “Great” Ahmad Shah Massoud is an
example par excellence. U.S. President
Franklin D. Roosevelt had said that “In politics, nothing ever happens by
accident. If happened, you can bet it was planned that way.” (Quoted
in Moore and Slater,
2003, p. 323). Roosevelt came from an aristocratic and
political family, was Harvard law student, corporate lawyer, State Senator,
Assistant Secretary of Navy, Governor of New York, and he was the only U.S. President to be elected four
times (1932-45). In addition,
he led his country through difficult times: the Great Depression
and the World War II (1941-1945).
Roosevelt killed two birds with one
stone: His war was good for defeating
both the depression and Hitler. Based on President Roosevelt’s extensive
political experience, I cannot but to agree with his aforementioned statement.
His wisdom, judgment and political maturity, as expressed in his statement, are
reinforcing my thesis: Since 1992 the
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency has deliberately lowered the socio-linguistic
statistics of the resistant majority Pashtuns while it has inflated the ethnic
and linguistic population size of the Afghan minorities mostly subservient to
the U.S. government’s imperial needs. The anti-Pashtun Northern Alliance under
the leadership of Massoud had played the same role for the
realization of the Soviet/Russian
interests in Afghanistan. Practically, he was the fifth column of
foreign powers to undermine the Afghan nation’s solidarity.
CIA’s
estimates for ethnic and linguistic statistics in Afghanistan are not without
serious consequences for majority Pashtuns, whose demographics had been reduced
since July of 1992, the year in which the pro-Tajik Massoud-Rabani
team grabbed power in Kabul with the help of Communist generals belonging to
the very pro-Soviet Babrak Karmal’s
faction. The CIA’s estimates for Afghan
demographics will be used to determine
quotas for a new privileged but client elite in Afghanistan. For example, a
non-Pashtun Afghan-American familiar with the campus of the Stanford University in California
informed me in mid-2012 that among the students from Afghanistan there was an “irrelevant minority” (ta’dad-e nachiz) of Pashtun heritage.
However, even if the current regime
in Kabul issues electronic Identity Cards, the probability of corruption and
fraud could be very high as the current regime is effectively controlled by the
lieutenants of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud (see below
attachment). The electronic cards need
to be prepared and administered when foreign forces and the Northern Alliance
do not control the current regime in Kabul.
Then, the problem of socio-linguistic statistics can be resolved through
electronic identity cards. However, the current colonial, mercenary and
multi-dimensional corrupt regime is unable to issue electronic national
identity cards. A legitimate, honorable
and trustworthy national government will have the capacity to issue such cards.
These cards shall include: (1) both parts of identity: ethnicity and
language; (2) they shall be finger
printed; and (3) the biographical data
on the card shall be machine/computer readable; For illustration purposes, I suggest the
following design:
AFG8KR,
RE-PN9ZSF93837456
Name:
Zalanda Samsor
Gender:
Female
Nationality:
Afghan
Ethnicity: Pashtun,Hazara,
etc
Language:
Pashto, Turkmani, Uzbaki,
etc.
Mother
Language: Pashto, Degani, etc.
Father:
Sambal Redai
Born:
1352(1973) in Asmar, Kunar
AFG
stands for Afghan; 8 is the number assigned to Kunar
province, KR stands for
Kunar
province; 9 is the number assigned to the neighboring province Nangarhar; RE stands for Region East; PN stands for
Pashtun; and ZSF stands for Zalanda Samsor, Female.
Attachment
under Scrutiny
Below see “tazkera”
(Identity Card) for Afghans presented by the Ministry of Interior Affairs of
the puppet regime in Kabul. The heading
of the ID card is printed in
Dari only although article 16 of the colonial constitution of the Kabul regime
mentions Pashto first and Dari second as the formal languages of the
state. Other information on the ID card is printed first
in Dari followed by Pashto translation. I discovered four errors in the Pashto
text:
معلومات
چه د کورنیو
چارو[ د] وزارت
په معلوماتی
مرکز .... د
ولسوالی [
ولسوالۍ ] کوډ....
د زیژیـډلو[زیـږیـدنې/
زیـږیـدلو]
کال
These defects exemplify not only
negligence but also the intention to damage the social and political
prestige of Pashto language, which has
the home-grown energy for the national identity of Afghanistan. Also, the word “wagarri”
hardly represent the meaning of “atba’ ” (citizens).
The word “Wagarri” means people (wolas,
khalk).
تبعه(
وګړی)،
اتباع=وګړي
(ولس،خلک). د «هیوادوال»
ټکی پوخ سیاسي
مفهوم لري، یانې
په خپل هیواد
کې د برخې،
مسولیت او پریکړې
خاوند.ځما وړاندیز
دادی چې تذکرې
ته دې «هـویتـپاڼه»
وویل شي او
تبعه/اتباعو/وګړو
ته دې هیواد
وال/هیوادوالان
وویل شي. ګوندې
په دې اکله پښتو
ټولنه خپله
چار پوهنه
وکارولی شي.
I do not like the word “taba’” (singular for citizen) and “atba’
” (plural for citizens).The word taba’ implies passivity, dependency and submission;
however, the
words “hewadwal” (citizen)and its plural (“hewadwalan”) imply political participation,
responsibility and the ownership of the country,
not of a city, district, or province.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Bibliography
zirakyar1234@yahoo.com
Afghan,
Samsor, The Second Saqawi
[anarchy, chaos]. (First ed. 1998, 2nd ed. 2001),
in Pashto. Second edition includes 414 pages.
سمسور
افغان، دویمه
سقاوي. لومړئ
چاپ ۱۳۷۷ لمریز(۱۹۹۸)،
دوهم چاپ ۱۳۷۹
لمریز(۲۰۰۱).
خپرندوی: د
افغانستان د
کلتوري ودې ټولنه،
جرمني. دوهم
چاپ په ۴۱۴
مخونو کې.
Afghan,
Sayed Jamaluddin
(1837-1897), in his book “Tatmatul Bayan Fi Tarikhul Afghan”, referenced in: Sediqullah
Reshtin, New Reseach
(Peshawar/Pashtunkhwa, 1979, p. 98), quoted in Wak (1998)/see below.
صدیق
الله رښتین،
نوې څیـړنې(پیښور،
پښتونخوا، ۱۹۷۹،
مخ ۹۸ )/ د
افغانستان قــومي
جوړښت د
افغانستان
لپاره د واک
فونډیشن شپـږ
کلنه(۱۹۹۶-۱۹۹۱) سروې او څیـړنه.
لمریز ۱۳۷۷= ۱۱مخ، ۱۹۹۸
Area
Handbook for Afghanistan (Washington, DC, 4th edition, 1973).
Aryana Encyclopedia (da aryana daieratul ma’aref, Kabul 2012):
«دافغانستان
ملی اتنیکی جوړښت
چې په دې
وروستیو کې څرګند
شوی او په
لاندې ډول وړاندی
کیـږي: پښتانه
۶۲،۷۳، تاجک ۱۲،۳۸،
هزاره ۹،۰۰،
ازبک ۶،۱۰،
ترکمن ۲،۶۹، ایماق
۲،۶۸....»- مخ ۴۵۵،
اریانا دایـرة
المعارف
Arnold, Anthony, (Afghanistan’s Two Party Communism: Parcham and Khalq. Stanford University,
California, 1983.
Berntsen, Gary, Jawbreaker: The Attack on Bin Laden
and Al-Qaida, 2005).
CIA
World Fact Book (1981-2012
= 1360-1391 Solar Hijri).
DeLong,
Michael with
Noah Lukeman, Inside the CentCom:
The Unvanished Truth about the Wars in Afghanistan
and Iraq, 20004).
Derbyshire,
J.D. and Jan Derbyshire (Political Systems of the World. First
published in 1989 by W & R Chambers. Second
edition-revised and expanded-published in the United Kingdom 1996 by Helicon
Publishing Ltd. First published in the USA in 1996 by
St. Martin’s Press in New York.
Encyclopedia
of World Cultures, Vol. III (South Asia/Paul Hockings volume editor. Boston Massachusetts: G.H.
Hall & Co/Macmillan Inc, 1992).
Franks, Tommy, American Soldier.
(New York, NY: 2004).
French
sources:
Encylopedia de L’Agora (2013); Le petit Larousse (2011); Larousse Encyclopedique (2007); Atlas Economique
Mondial (2000).
www.hewad.com has published the late Afghan Academician Abdul Shakur Rashad’s
tabulation as a reaction to the false demographics published in the CIA Word
Fact Book in July 1992.
Huntington,
Samuel , “The Clash of Civilizations?” (Foreign Affairs, summer 1993-expanded to a book in 1996).
Jervis, Robert, “Intelligence and Foreign Policy,”
International Security( winter 1986-1987).
Lewis,
Bernard, “The Roots of Muslim Rage” (Atlantic Magazine, 1990).
Magnus,
Ralph H. and Eden Naby, Afghanistan: Mullah, Marx and
Mujahid. Boulder Colorado: Westview Press/Perseus
Books, 1998.
Margolis, Eric, American Raj: Liberation or Domination?
Resolving the Conflict Between the West and the Muslim
World (Key Porter Books, 2008).
Moore, James and Wayne Slater, Bush’s Brain. (John Wiley and Sons, 2003).
Nyrop, Richard F. and Donald M. Seekins
(Afghanistan: A Country Study. 2001. Electronic Version (2012).
Reshtin, Sediqullah
(see above: Afghani, Sayed Jamaluddin
).
Richardson,
Bruce G., who traveled to Afghanistan in 1986, 1987, 1990,1991and 1997, has
many Afghanistan-related publications, such as
these important to my research paper:
Afghanistan: A Search for Truth (New York: Free Forum, 2009);
Afghanistan, Ending the Reign of Soviet Terror (Bend, OR: Maverick, 1996); From
Archives: In Quest for a ‘Greater Tajikistan’ (May 31, 2011); Ethno-centric
Russian and U.S. Strategies in Afghanistan; Redrawing Map, Altering the
Ethnographic Character of Afghanistan (2012); “A
Noteworthy Narrative, Dispelling Partisan and Politically Expedient Mythology”
(April 14, 2013); Discriminatory Ethno-Centric Russian and U.S. Strategies
Imperil Afghanistan (April 25, 2013).
Sarif, Gul Janan , Das Afghanische Schulwesen (Ph.D.
thesis), Von Goethe University, Farnkfurt am Main,
Germany, 1972.
Schurmann, H.F., The Moghl of Afghanistan,1962.
Stanizai, Zaman,“From
Identity Crisis to Identity in Crisis in Afghanistan”. Electronic version:
December 16, 2009 http://www.stanizai.org/ [November 15, 2012].
Wak,
Mohammad Enam, The Ethnic Composition of Afghanistan:
A Six-year Survey and Research project: 1991- July 1996.Peshawar, Pashtunkhwa (Sapi’s Center for
Pashto Research and Development), 1998= 1377 A.H. (In Pashto). Its compact
English version was published in Peshawar, Pashtunkhwa
(Khatiz Organization for Rehabilitation, July 1999).
Wilber,
D.N., Afghanistan: Its people, its society, its culture, 1962.
Woodward, Bob, Bush at War, Simon and Schuster, 2002.
Zakaria, Fareed, the host of “Global Public
Square” program at CNN (April 11, 2010) was discussing with Peter Galbraith
(former U.N. Representative to Afghanistan).
Zirakyar, Rahmat
“Pashtun-Bashing in Kite Runner: A Psychological Operation?”
, December 9, 2009. Electronic Version.
Zirakyar, Rahmat Language from Adam to Present, in
Pashto (December 2010 = Linda 1389 Solar A.H.). Electronic version, published by www.nahimi.dk/pashto/
زیرکیار،
رحمت ربی، ژبه
له بابا ادمه
تر دې دمه ( لینده
۱۳۸۹ لمریز=
دسمبر ۲۰۱۰).
الکترانیک
چاپ: www.nahimi.dk/pashto/