Editor's note: Today will be my last day writing the AfPak Channel Daily Brief. Starting next week, my colleague Jennifer Rowland will be writing it full time. Thank you for reading! -- Andrew Lebovich

Safe haven?

Unidentified militants fired at least nine rockets at Pakistan's elite military academy in Abbottabad, Pakistan on Friday, causing damage but no casualties (NYT, AP, BBC, AFP). Abbottabad, the city where Osama bin Laden was found and killed in May, is also the hometown of a senior al-Qaeda operations official, Aslam Awan, who was killed in a suspected U.S. drone strike on January 10. Elsewhere, at least six Pakistanis were shot dead by Iranian security forces while transporting livestock into Iran Thursday (ET,BBC). And Pakistani forces in Kurram have reportedly killed seven militants, while in Balochistan militants killed two Pakistani soldiers Friday (Dawn). 

Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani dismissed talk of a coup in the country in an interview Thursday, while the parliamentary committee investigating the "Memogate" affair has given Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz until February 10 to come to Pakistan to provide his side of the story (Dawn, ET, DT). And a former media coordinator for Gilani, Mian Khurram Rasool, has been sentenced to four years in prison for skipping out on a bank fraud case (Dawn, ET). 

Pakistani officials have said that they will not give up on a major pipeline planned with Iran, despite facing possible American sanctions (ET, Dawn). The BBC's Shahzeb Jillani, meanwhile, looks at Pakistan's bleak economic future (BBC). A major Pakistani education report has found that a majority of students cannot read Urdu, English, or their native language after finishing primary levels of schooling (Dawn). And a parliamentary committee has proposed that no one be allowed to speak in a negative way about Pakistan on private television channels (Dawn).  

Creeping talks

The Telegraph reports Thursday that a group of Taliban "diplomats," including Mullah Omar's former secretary Tayyeb Agha, has traveled to Qatar to set up a Taliban political office and possibly begin negotiations with the United States (Tel). A former Taliban member of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's High Peace Council, Maulvi Arsala Rahmani, told Reuters Friday that the Taliban were willing to moderate their past positions and return to Afghanistan's government "as Afghans" (Reuters). 

France signed a strategic partnership agreement with Afghanistan Thursday, promising to train Afghan forces long after the 2014 withdrawal deadline for international combat troops (Post, Reuters). And Italy on Thursday agreed to provide Afghanistan with long-term aid after 2014 (AP). 

Clerical errors have reportedly allowed a 17-year-old British soldier to go to the front lines in Helmand province, despite army rules that forbid soldiers to see combat before they are 18 (BBC). And a former Green Beret imprisoned for three years in Afghanistan for running a private jail and torturing detainees, Jack Idema, has died in Mexico of AIDS (AP, LAT). 

Vigil-aunties

A backlash is brewing in Pakistan against a television show where a group of women surprise young couples in public, pestering them to explain themselves and demanding to see certificates of marriage (NYT). The women have been referred to mockingly as "vigil-aunties."

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.

Event Notice: Please join the New America Foundation's National Security Studies Program TODAY from 12:15 - 1:45 pm as we commemorate the life of Richard Holbrooke, one of the most important American statesmen of the last half-century (NAF). 

Reports and acrimony

Pakistan on Monday released its report into the killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers in November by American aircraft in Mohmand agency, roundly rejecting American claims that both sides shared responsibility for the incident and blaming the deaths on U.S. failures to coordinate with Pakistani forces (NYT, Post, AP, CNN, ABC, AFP, LAT, ET). The report also concluded that the incident was, "deliberate, at some level," and said that that bombardment did not end until army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani intervened with the U.S. military (Post, Dawn). A Pentagon spokesman stood by Washington's portrayal of events Monday (AFP).  

Former Pakistani ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani filed a request Monday with the judicial commission investigating the "Memogate" affair asking that Mansoor Ijaz's right to testify in the case be stripped, after Ijaz refused to travel to Pakistan, citing security concerns (Dawn, ET, DT, McClatchy, CNN, ET, Dawn). Meanwhile, Interior Minister Rehman Malik appeared before the judicial commission to explain statements he made about the case, while intelligence head Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja Pasha testified before the parliamentary commission conducting its own investigation into the incident (Dawn, ET). And Karin Brulliard writes about the coup in Pakistan that everyone expected, but has (so far) not happened (Post). 

Dawn reported Monday that Pasha met with former military dictator Gen. Pervez Musharraf in Dubai, and warned him not to come back to Pakistan (Dawn, ET). The report emerged the same day Pakistan's Senate unanimously passed a nonbinding resolution demanding that Musharraf be arrested and tried upon his return to the country (CNN, ET, Dawn, AFP). 

Human Rights Watch issued a sharply critical report on the security situation in Pakistan Monday, as a major gas pipeline in Sindh was blown up by unknown assailants, and Dawn looked at the continued fear of militants among those displaced from Khyber agency by fighting (ET, Dawn, Dawn). And police believe a Kenyan aid worker who went missing Monday in Sindh has been kidnapped, while elsewhere police arrested four people allegedly connected with the kidnapping of two European aid workers in Punjab last week (AP, AFP, ET).

Signs of betrayal

NATO said Monday that there was no evidence of "systemic infiltration" of Afghanistan's security forces by the Taliban, after the Taliban claimed to have recruited the Afghan soldier who killed four French soldiers last week (Reuters, AFP). And Reuters reports on the looming difficulties in American and NATO efforts to secure Afghanistan's east (Reuters).

Finally, the AFP reports on the tremendous mental strain placed on Afghans by years of bloodshed in their country (AFP). According to the Afghan government, fully 50 percent of Afghans experience symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). 

The wandering scrolls

Scholars are picking apart a cache of medieval Jewish scrolls believed to be from northern Afghanistan that have slowly come into the public eye in the last two years (Reuters). The documents, which were likely smuggled out of Afghanistan secretly and are currently in London, are believe to have belonged to Jewish merchants who worked along the Silk Road, the ancient trading route that traverses Central Asia. 

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.

Wonk Watch: Steve Coll, "Looking for Mullah Omar" (New Yorker).

Dangerous bloodshed

French President Nicolas Sarkozy threatened to pull French forces out of Afghanistan early on Friday after four French soldiers were killed in the eastern province of Kapisa by an Afghan soldier (WSJ, Guardian, AP, BBC, Tel, Reuters). He also said that he was sending Defense Minister Gérard Longuet and France's army chief to Afghanistan to begin an inquiry into the safety of French troops there, and that all training and combat support operations would be suspended until the review is finished. The Times' Matthew Rosenberg reports on a classified assessment that found an increased number of killings of international troops by members of the Afghan security forces (NYT). And six U.S. soldiers were killed Thursday when their helicopter crashed in the southern province of Helmand (BBC, Tel, Guardian, Reuters, AP).  

Afghan President Hamid Karzai's chief of staff Abdul Karim Khurram expressed concern to the Times Friday that Afghanistan's government was not being kept fully informed about talks with the Taliban, echoing concern among Afghan and American officials at the pace of such negotiations (NYT, Post, AP). Reuters reveals growing anger among Taliban fighters about the perceived muted response of their leaders to a video that surfaced last week showing U.S. Marines apparently urinating on Taliban corpses (Reuters). And the Afghan government will investigate reports that six civilians, including four children, were killed in by NATO aircraft in Kunar (CNN).  

Finally, at least 29 people have been killed since Monday as a result of devastating avalanches in the northern province of Badakhshan (AP).  

In the flesh

Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz was granted a visa to travel to Pakistan Thursday after a personal visit to Pakistan's High Commission in London, allowing Ijaz to travel to Pakistan to tell his side of the story in the "Memogate" affair (Dawn, ET, DT). Ijaz will testify January 24 in front of a judicial commission investigating the incident, but said Friday that the parliamentary committee looking into the same topic cannot summon him to testify, since he is not a Pakistani citizen (ET). Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said Friday that the government was ready to offer Ijaz protection in Pakistan, while Pakistan's Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq denied Friday before the country's Supreme Court that the government wanted to remove army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and intelligence head Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja Pasha (Dawn, ET, Dawn).   

An anonymous U.S. official told press sources Thursday that a January 10 drone attack in Pakistan killed al-Qaeda's "external operations planner," a Pakistani who may have spent several years in Britain named Aslam Awan (Reuters, NYT, AP, CNN). Meanwhile, the review board of the Lahore High Court has ordered the release of the former leader of the anti-Shi'a militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Malik Ishaq (ET). And armed men on Thursday kidnapped two European aid workers, a German and an Italian, from the Punjabi city of Multan (NYT, Dawn, BBC, ET).  

Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said Friday that the country's parliament would be the one to make an eventual decision about re-opening border crossings to NATO supplies destined for Afghanistan, a day after anonymous officials said the crossings would be re-opened (Dawn, Reuters, Reuters). And the AP reports that it costs the United States six times as much to send supplies into Afghanistan using routes that do not pass through Pakistan (AP).  

And Norway's head of intelligence, Janne Kristiansen, has resigned after inadvertently disclosing during a parliamentary hearing that Norway has agents working in Pakistan (BBC).  

Cricket king 

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has named Pakistani bowler Saeed Ajmal the world's top-ranked "spinner," after he led Pakistan to a test match victory against England (AP). The match was part of a three-test series, which Pakistan now leads 1-0.

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.

Crisis moment

Pakistan's Supreme Court on Monday initiated contempt of court proceedings against Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani for the latter's failure to take steps to re-open a Swiss corruption investigation of President Asif Ali Zardari (NYT, Post, WSJ, ET, Dawn, BBC, CNN, LAT, AP, Reuters). Gilani, who reportedly offered to step down Monday, will testify before the court Thursday, as concern mounts that the Supreme Court will seek to remove Pakistan's civilian government through a "constitutional coup" (ET, Dawn, Tel, Guardian, LAT). The court's decision came as talks aimed at easing Pakistan's political firestorm were continuing Monday between Zardari and army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani (Dawn, NYT, Tel, CNN, AJE, AP). And Pakistan's parliament on Monday passed a resolution expressing confidence in the current government, though the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) boycotted the vote (ET, CNN, Bloomberg, NYT).

Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz has said that he would testify in Pakistan on January 24 about the "Memogate" affair, as the Supreme Court adjourned "indefinitely" former ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani's petition challenging the court's authority to investigate the matter (ET, Dawn, Dawn, ET, AJE, ET, Dawn). The Post's Karen DeYoung has a must-read on attempts between Pakistan and the United States to establish a "new normal" in their relationship (Post). And Saeed Shah reported this weekend that Pakistan's government had agreed to hold early elections, perhaps in October of this year (Guardian).

Radio intercepts of Taliban communications have reportedly led the United States to believe that Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in a January 12 drone strike in North Waziristan, reports the TTP denied on Sunday (AP, Reuters, McClatchy, DT). Also Sunday, a bomb in the city of Kharpur in central Punjab tore through a Shi'a religious procession, killing at least 18 people (AJE, NYT, Reuters, BBC, CNN, AFP). And on Saturday, police repelled an attack involving four suicide bombers on the main police station in the city of Dera Ismail Khan, an attack that ended with the deaths of the attempted bombers but also killed one police officer and three civilians (ET, CNN, The News, Dawn, DT, AFP, Dawn).

Four stories round out the Pakistan news: Pakistan this weekend mourned the death of 16-year-old Arfa Karim, a computer prodigy and the youngest person ever named "Microsoft Certified Professional" a title she garnered in 2004 (ET, Dawn, DT, Dawn, ET). Three Iranian border guards arrested January 2 after crossing into Pakistani territory and allegedly killing a Pakistani were pardoned by the victim's family and deported Sunday (AFP, DT). The L.A. Times looks at the increasingly embattled aid groups trying to operate in Pakistan (LAT). And in February Pakistan will reportedly start repaying a $7.6 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) (DT).  
Conflicting claims

Three contractors were killed Monday when their helicopter crashed in Afghanistan's Helmand province, as the Taliban claimed credit for downing the chopper (Tel, NYT, Reuters). C.J. Chivers, meanwhile, reports on shifts in the air war in Afghanistan, as American forces have curtailed the use of air strikes in fighting the Taliban (NYT). Reuters' Missy Ryan outlines the growing doubt that cash-strapped Western countries will be willing to shoulder the burden of paying for Afghanistan's security forces after the 2014 withdrawal date of international troops from Afghanistan (Reuters). And NATO's senior civilian representative in Afghanistan, Amb. Sir Simon Gass, said Monday that Afghanistan could take as long as 30 years to develop the security and institutions necessary to be a "proper democratic state" (Tel).

Insurgents on Tuesday killed a prominent anti-Taliban leader, Mohammad Nahim Agha Mama, as he prayed in a Kandahar mosque (AP). Also, Tuesday, Afghan President Hamid Karzai called on the Taliban to allow teams to carry out a polio vaccination campaign (AP).

And finally, heavy snow and avalanches have killed at least 16 people in the northern province of Badakhshan (BBC).

A new world record

After five years of work, an Afghan calligrapher has created the world's largest Quran (Reuters). The book measures 90 inches by 61 inches, cost nearly $500,000 to create, and weighs in at around 1,100 pounds.

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.

Audiences around the world were horrified to see the image of Bibi Aisha, a young Afghan girl whose nose had been cut off by her husband and his family, on the cover of an August 2010 issue of TIME Magazine. Western media outlets largely attributed Aisha's case to the Taliban, and portrayed it as a warning ofwhat is to come for Afghan women once the international community withdraws from Afghanistan.  The unfortunate reality is, though, that there are many other cases like hers happening today in Afghanistan, despite the presence and efforts of foreign troops and the international community over the last decade. The most recent case to make headlines was that of 15-year-old Sahar Gul, who had been locked in a basement and tortured for five months by her in-laws, allegedly because she refused efforts to force her into prostitution. These crimes were not perpetrated by the Taliban, but instead some of the most extreme manifestations of domestic violence in Afghanistan.

As former Taliban Minister of Foreign Affairs Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil said to me in an interview a year ago when I asked what he thought about the case of Bibi Aisha: "Even when the West are in Afghanistan, these things are still happening. It seems to me to be a family matter, what happened to this woman."In Afghanistan, everything is a family matter, and familial ties will continueto govern Afghan society long after international troops have left the scene. While attention is focused in Kabul on signing documents ensuring women's political participation and securing women's rights, there is very little trickle down from such progress to the majority of Afghan women living in rural areas. Instead of working from the top down, sustainable progress that can take root in conservative Afghan households can only be made by accepting the realities of rural Afghan society and working within existing cultural boundaries.

Read on

Changing tides

Pakistan's National Assembly will vote Monday on a resolution expressing confidence in the country's political leadership and democracy, as fears of a military coup continue to dominate coverage (NYT, BBC, Reuters, Dawn, ET, Post, Reuters). President Asif Ali Zardari is said to have returned from a short trip to Dubai Friday, as the AP reports that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani placed a "panicky" call to Britain's High Commissioner in Pakistan this week, asking for Britain's support and expressing concern about a military takeover (AFP, AP). Gilani will host a meeting with military leaders Saturday, as Pakistan's army publicly backed the country's judiciary -- which is currently investigating the civilian government on several issues (Reuters, ET, Dawn, ET, Dawn). And the commission investigating the death of journalist Saleem Shahzad released its report Friday, blaming unnamed "belligerents" for Shahzad's death but recommending that Pakistan's intelligence services be more accountable (ET, Dawn).

Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz said Friday in an interview that he would return to Pakistan to tell the "unaltered truth" about the "Memogate" affair, including what he says is the role former ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani played in supposedly dictating a memo asking for American support against a military coup in May (Guardian, Dawn, DT). However, Ijaz's appearance before a commission investigating the incident may not take place on January 16, as planned, because Pakistan's foreign office had still not received a visa request for Ijaz as of Thursday night (ET, Dawn). And FP's Josh Rogin reveals a May 9 email from Ijaz to former National Security Advisor James L. Jones, who passed the memo in question to Adm. Mike Mullen, in which Ijaz says three people, rather than one, collaborated in writing the unsigned note to Mullen (FP).

The second suspected U.S. drone strike in 2012 destroyed a vehicle near Datta Khel, North Waziristan Thursday, killing at least six reported militants (ET, Reuters, AFP, BBC, CNN). More than 100 militants attacked a police checkpoint outside of Peshawar late Thursday, killing two policemen (ET, Dawn). And Pakistan's Supreme Court is looking into a claim that a displaced Swat Valley resident trying to reclaim land seized by the military is a terrorist (Dawn). 

Difficult negotiations

The Taliban released a statement Thursday saying that they would not recognize the "stooge" government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai or the country's constitution, even as negotiations may soon start up again with the United States (WSJ). The statement was released as Karzai and American officials roundly condemned a video that appeared this week purporting to show U.S. Marines urinating on dead Taliban fighters (Guardian, Tel, NYT, Post, Tel). Two of the men in the video have been identified, and will be questioned about the incident (WSJ, CNN, BBC). And prominent Afghan opposition leaders, including representatives of ethnic minorities and former members of the Northern Alliance, voiced tentative support for negotiations with the Taliban Friday, on the condition that the minority representatives participate in the talks (AP).

Also on Thursday, a suicide bomber killed the governor of Kandahar's Panjway district, Haji Fazeludin Agha, as well as his two sons and two police officers, as they were returning from Kandahar City (CNN, BBC, Reuters, Tel, AP, AFP). And the United Nations reported Thursday that the price of Afghan opium had gone up 133 percent in 2011, and that opium farmers likely earned more than $1.4 billion last year, 9 percent of Afghanistan's GDP (BBC, AP).   

Beautiful music

Reuters goes inside Afghanistan's only music academy, the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, where 140 students study full-time (Reuters). The school hopes to heal some of Afghanistan's wounds through art, and relieve a measure of the country's hardship -- half of its students are orphans or street children.

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.

For a fallen figure -- one reduced to self-imposed exile in Dubai and London, and dismissed by many as apolitical has-been -- Pervez Musharraf sure is hogging an impressive share of the spotlight.

In late 2010, after announcing (from London) the formation of his new political party, the All Pakistan Muslim League (APML), and revealing his intention to return to Pakistan to contest the 2013 elections, the former president and army chief hit the lecture circuit. In Washington, he spoke to beyond-capacity and often supportive crowds. Watching him glad hand and back slap people outside the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington last July, after having delivered an address to hundreds of people, I was struck by his resemblance to a U.S. political candidate.

Read on

Fits and starts

The Post reports that talks between the United States and the Taliban will resume as soon as they receive approval from Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who will be meeting with the U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Amb. Marc Grossman next week (Post). The Times details the quiet role Grossman has played in secret talks with the group, even as the Taliban said in an emailed statement Thursday that peace talks will not mean the end of fighting (NYT, WSJ, AP). And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton seemed to acknowledge the possibility Wednesday that Taliban leaders could be transferred from the prison at Guantánamo Bay as part of a confidence building measure with the group (AP).

Both Karzai and the Taliban have condemned a video that surfaced this week and appears to show U.S. Marines in Afghanistan urinating on dead Taliban fighters, though the Taliban said the video would not break up talks with the United States (BBC, Tel, Reuters). The Pentagon is investigating the video, the content of which could constitute a violation of the Geneva Conventions (Tel, Guardian, CNN, LAT, Post, BBC, Reuters).

A top-secret National Intelligence Estimate on Afghanistan given to President Obama last month reportedly concluded that the Taliban have not given up on their goals of taking control of Afghanistan by force, and that corruption, poor governance, and Taliban safe havens in Pakistan continue to undercut any gains made by international forces on the ground (McClatchy, LAT). And the Journal's Maria Abi-Habib reports on the double-game believed to be played by some Afghan police, taking money and support from international forces while in some cases providing aid to the Taliban (WSJ).

Crisis of confidence

Tension continues to rise in Pakistan following the firing of Defense Secretary Naeem Khalid Lodhi on Wednesday, even as Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has tried to downplay his recent spat with Pakistan's army (NYT, Post, BBC, Tel, ET, Dawn, ET). Army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani met behind closed doors with his top military commanders Thursday, as the country's increasingly embattled president Asif Ali Zardari flew to Dubai for a brief trip, reportedly to attend a wedding and undergo a medical checkup (AP, Reuters, AP, Tel, BBC, Dawn, Reuters). The United States has tried to stay out of the widening conflict, as the State Department said Wednesday that the United States has not tried to intervene between the military and civilian government, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey called Kayani Wednesday, but said he did not seek any assurance that Pakistan's army would not stage a coup (Dawn, Dawn).

Suspected Baloch rebels ambushed a convoy of paramilitary Pakistani soldiers on Wednesday, killing 14 in one of the deadliest attacks on security forces ever to take place in the province (ET, BBC, Tel, Dawn, Reuters). In Peshawar, meanwhile, authorities are reportedly planning to build an "enclave" for diplomatic personnel, in order to ensure their security (ET). And in Karachi, a lawyer who argued cases related to missing persons in front of the Sindh High Court in cases was shot dead along with his driver by two unidentified gunmen Wednesday (Dawn).

Finally, Pakistan's Supreme Court will hear former ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani's petition challenging the formation of a special commission to investigate the "Memogate" affair on January 17 (Dawn, ET). And a report prepared by former U.S. Senator Sam Nunn and the Economist Intelligence Unit says that Pakistan has the second least-secured nuclear material in the world, after only North Korea (ET).

Risky business

The star of one of Afghanistan's most popular television programs, a local take on the American counterterrorism drama "24" called "Eagle Four" said in an interview this week that he had received hundreds of death threats due to his role in the show (Guardian). However, the actor, Najebullah Sadiq, said that he would continue with the show, funded partially by NATO, in the hopes that "Eagle Four" will help improve the image of Afghanistan's police.  

Sign up here to receive the Daily Brief in your inbox. Follow the AfPak Channel on Twitter and Facebook.