Canadian troops expect increased Taliban attacks
Source: Reuters
By David Ljunggren OTTAWA, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Taliban militants in Afghanistan will step up their attacks on Canadian troops this year, using a combination of suicide bombers, roadside bombs and ambushes, the country's top soldier predicted on Wednesday. General Rick Hillier, chief of the defense staff, also played down suggestions that a probe into whether soldiers abused Afghan detainees could alienate the local population. Canada has about 2,500 soldiers based in the southern city of Kandahar. Some 44 soldiers and one diplomat have been killed in Afghanistan, most in the last year. "We're anticipating that the Taliban will surge and attempt to surge as much as they possibly can into southern Afghanistan with more of their fighters," Hillier told CBC radio. Earlier this week a Taliban commander said the militant group would step up suicide attacks. "We think that their tactics will continue to be (to use) as many suicide bombers as they can convince to give their lives up for no cause, improvised explosive devices ... and ambushes," said Hillier. He described the Taliban soldiers as tough and "almost natural born warriors" but said most of them fought because they were being paid to do so. "We don't underestimate what they can do in small groups and what their level of maturity is at implementing improvised explosive devices or executing suicide bomber attacks. So we treat them with respect from that perspective but we also know they're not 10 feet tall," he said. Hillier, who has called a military inquiry into whether Canadian soldiers abused three local men after taking them prisoner last April, said he did not think the investigation would harm ties with the population in Kandahar. "We have a hyper-sensitivity to how we handle our detainees ... It's an allegation. None of that will change the relationship with the Afghans. They don't want the Taliban around," he said. Prisoner abuse is a sensitive topic for the armed forces. In 1993, soldiers based in Somalia as part of a peacekeeping mission tortured and beat to death a 16-year-old boy. An investigation found that senior military officials had held back information about the case and said witnesses had lied. The Toronto Star, the country's biggest newspaper, called for a full public inquiry on Wednesday into the Afghan allegations. "Given the military's history of covering up abuse cases, Canadians have a right to know what happened in Afghanistan and how the military acted, or failed to, when it learned of the case," the paper said in its lead editorial.
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