Afghanistan timeline November 2003
Timeline of Afghan history
- NATO agreed to take command of PRTs in five Afghan towns that were currently protected by Operation Enduring Freedom. However, NATO added that the change of command would only take place if military resources were available. Such a move would necessitate 3,000 more troops and bases in Tajikistan or Kyrgyzstan.
- The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy released a report that estimated the area in Afghanistan used to grow poppies had risen from 4,210 acres (17 km²) in 2001 to 76,900 acres (311 km²) in 2002 and to 152,000 acres (615 km²) in 2003. United Nations figures published a month earlier estimating 185,000 acres (749 km²) in 2002 and 200,000 acres (809 km²) in 2003.
- DHL halted its five-day-per-week delivery services to Afghanistan to carry out a security review. Service resumed November 28.
- In Kabul, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan defeated Afghanistan 2-0 in a Asian zone preliminary World Cup qualifier.
- At least four Afghans were wounded when soldiers opened fire on demonstrators outside the defence ministry in Kabul, Afghanistan. The protesters were ex-mujahideen fighters who had recently been dismissed by the ministry.
- Afghan authorities in Kabul arrested two men carrying explosives.
- Armed men forced four or five U.N. staff and other patrons to hand over cash and valuables at the Shang Hai restaurant in Kabul, Afghanistan.
- Rockets exploded in a garden outside the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan, but no casualties were reported.
- Two 107-millimetre rockets attached to a car battery were discovered by Canadian in a palace nearby Camp Julien, Afghanistan. The rockets were pointed toward Camp Julien, allegedly in anticipation of Canadian Defence Minister John McCallum's visit the following day.
- South Korea temporarily closed its embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan amid warnings that al Qaeda might launch a suicide bomb attack. Three South Korean diplomats were evacuated to Pakistan. South Korea had a total of 200 troops serving in Afghanistan.
- Canada delivered millions of voter registration kits to Afghanistan's electoral commission in Kabul. Nationwide elections were to take place mid-2004.
- The United Nations suspended operations in southern and eastern Afghanistan in response to the killing of one of their employees a day earlier.
- In Ghazni province, Afghanistan, two men on a motorcycle opened fire on a UNHCR vehicle, killing Bettina Goislard, a French woman who was a U.N. staff member, and injuring the driver. Local police fired at the motorcycle, injuring one of the two men and arresting both of them. The two men were beaten by an angry mob before they were arrested. Taliban officials claimed responsibility and stated Goislard was killed because she was Christian.
- Pakistani border security forces arrested 60 Afghans trying to cross over into Pakistan illegally.
- A new television station, Aina ("Mirror"), started test broadcasts from Sheberghan, Afghanistan. On air for six hours a night and covering an area of 300 kilometers, the channel planned to broadcast cultural, social, entertainment, political and sports programs in the local Dari, Pashtu, Uzbek and Turkman languages.
- In the Manogi district of Kunar province, a car was blown up by a remote-controlled bomb, killing at least three Afghans and injuring three.
- U.S. soldiers killed one rebel in a clash in theMarzeh district of Nuristan province, Afghanistan. Two or three rebels also opened fire on other U.S. forces there, then fled the scene when close air support was called in.
- In a signed statement sent to local media, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar dismissed the Afghan Transition Government as a puppet of the United States. The statement also said that efforts to adopt the Afghan Draft Constitution were meaningless.
- Miss Afghanistan Vida Samadzai won the Miss Earth pageant's first "beauty for a cause" award.
- A group of rebels fired rockets at U.S.-led coalition forces in Kunar province, Afghanistan. Coalition soldiers responded with small arms and aerial fire.
- The Taliban militia leader holding Hasan Onal, a Turkish engineer, hostage in southwestern Afghanistan demanded the release of 250 Taliban fighters by the Afghan Government. Onal had been abducted October 28.
- The Afghan government dispatched a 12-member defence ministry delegation led by deputy chief of army of staff, Ishaq Noori, to Mazar-i-Sharif with the two-weeks mission of merging the troops led by Ustad Atta Mohammad and the troops led by General Abdul Rashid Dostum.
- In Kabul, Afghanistan, unidentified gunmen murdered Shireen Agha Salangi, a former Northern Alliance commander who later switched sides to fight alongside the Taliban.
- An Indian man was murdered by unknown gunmen in his home in the Taimani district of Kabul, Afghanistan. The man was an employee of a private Indian firm which was working on a Afghan mobile phone project.
- Beginning a week-long trip, a delegation of fifteen United Nations Security Council members arrived in Kabul from Islamabad on a German military plane equipped with anti-missile gear. The all-male delegation consisted of U.N. ambassadors from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Bulgaria, Mexico and Spain, of deputy ambassadors from Russia and Pakistan, and of other diplomats from Angola, Cameroon, Chile, People's Republic of China, Guinea and Syria.