UN announces 48 hours security alert

Following the start of hostilities in Iraq, the United Nations in Afghanistan on Thursday announced a 48-hour precautionary security alert and instructed staff to stay away from places of work for two days. “It was a precaution from our part, hence we requested our people to stay home for a day or two,” the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, told IRIN in the Afghan capital Kabul. “This is just a security precaution, we are not contemplating shutting down,” he said mentioning that essential staff were still working. The UN said they had no specific information on threats but the war in Iraq could be used by those intending to destabilise Afghanistan. "There is a possibility that the war in Iraq will be seen as an opportunity to further increase the efforts at destabilising the situation in Afghanistan,” Brahimi outlined. The Secretary General's senior representative expressed concern that the war in Iraq could have an impact on the reconstruction of Afghanistan. “It may affect us in two ways,” he said, adding that the people of Afghanistan were against the war and hostility towards the international community might increase. In addition, Brahimi said, wealthy countries like the US, may forget commitments made and have less resources for Afghanistan. However he was optimist that world attention on Afghanistan would not be diverted. “The United States and the international community, again in Brussels just two days ago, reaffirmed continued support for Afghanistan,” he said. The international peace keeping force stationed in Kabul, has also taken precautionary actions and increased security. “ISAF has increased its patrols, especially foot patrols and night patrols in Kabul,” a spokesman for the UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), Lt-Col Thomas Loebbering, told reporters on Thursday. “We have increased the number of our patrols by 20 percent,” he said.