General Richards on Afghanistan.

NATO commander, Lieutenant-General David Richards, tells the Times that, for the moment at least, he prefers building to killing. He is also doing a bit of law enforcement on bandit law enforcers.

He has recently intervened in one area of traditional concern among Afghans: the taking of illegal road tolls by police. Cars and lorries are stopped every day on Highway 1 by police demanding money. General Richards said that he had issued a directive to all troops under his command not just to “monitor” the illegal activities by the police but “to physically intervene to stop them”. It was, he said, another way of getting the message across to the Afghan people that life was better under Nato’s watchful eye.

Tags: Afghanistan