Taliban Touts ‘Nobel Violence Prize’ for Obama

Terror group mocks peace award, citing troop surge in Afghanistan

Video

Nobel prize surprise (NBC Nightly News, Oct. 9, 2009) — The decision to award President Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize stunned many around the country and the world, including those at the award ceremony who gasped when his name was announced. NBC Chief Foreign Affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell reports. (03:52)

Oct. 9, 2009

KABUL — Afghanistan’s Taliban mocked the award of a Nobel Peace Prize to U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday, saying he should get a Nobel Prize for violence instead.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said it was absurd to give a peace award to a man who had sent 21,000 extra troops to Afghanistan to escalate a war.

“The Nobel Prize for peace? Obama should have won the ‘Nobel Prize for escalating violence and killing civilians’,” he told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.

“When Obama replaced President Bush, the Afghan people thought that he would not follow in Bush’s footsteps. Unfortunately, Obama actually even went one step further.”

In awarding the Nobel Prize to Obama, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said he had “created a new climate in international politics” and praised his promotion of multi-lateral diplomacy and advocacy for arms control. …

Continuing Bush strategy

Obama ordered 21,000 extra troops to Afghanistan this year, continuing a strategy of dramatically ramping up forces that began in the final months of the presidency of his predecessor, George W. Bush.

There are now more than 100,000 Western troops in Afghanistan, two-thirds of them American. In July, thousands of newly arrived U.S. Marines launched the biggest offensive of the 8-year-old war.

The United Nations says 1,500 civilians have died so far this year, with insurgents killing three times as many as Western and government forces.

The new commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has asked for 40,000 more troops to implement an overhauled counter-insurgency strategy. …

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Related report

GOP, even some liberals, dismiss Obama’s prize

Video

Afghan Taliban commander: ‘We will continue our jihad’ (MSNBC, Oct. 9, 2009) — NBC’s Richard Engel meets Mullah Zahid, leader of a Taliban cell in Wardak Province, Afghanistan, in this exclusive clip from an upcoming documentary, “The Tip of the Spear.” (02:23)

FROM THE ARCHIVES: One Year Ago — October 9, 2008

After the Primary Election: Day 30

One year ago today, on the 30th day after losing my 2008 primary challenge against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, in line with my focus on national security, I reported on efforts by the U.S. and Iraq to hammer out a status-of-forces agreement amid meddling by Iran and rifts among Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish factions in the Iraqi government.