By Hadi Mayar

    KABUL, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- The killing of a senior judicial official in Kunduz province of Afghanistan last week once again threw spotlight on the growing militancy in this northern trouble-spot of the country.

    Qari Jan Gir, the chief of the provincial Justice Department, was killed when a roadside bomb hit his car as he was on his way to office on Wednesday.

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid prompted to claim responsibility for the attack, adding that his men planted the mine to kill the official.

    Insurgent incidents have been taking place in Kunduz for the last several months, which have struck alarm bells in the capital city of Kabul.

    While the international forces were busy for years grappling Taliban insurgents in southern and eastern Afghanistan, no fear ever existed that militancy would also raise its head in the otherwise peaceful northern parts of the country.

    That is why only a few hundred German forces were deployed there with no serious step on the part of the Afghan and the international forces to consolidate their position and establish their writ in the area.

    On the contrary, most of these areas had virtually been left to the anti-Taliban warlords, who manned and controlled government departments there.

    However, the killing of a district police chief in Kunduz provinces several months back raised eyebrows about the level of security in the region.

    Later, Mohammad Qasim Fahim, incumbent President Karzai's running mate in the presidential election, was attacked in the same province last month while the former Afghan president, Burhanuddin Rabbani, also came under attack earlier this month.

    These incidents baffled minds of security czars and political analysts as to why the insurgency had skipped several provinces in-between south and north Afghanistan to emerge the far away northern Afghanistan.

    In fact, Kunduz is the only Pashtun-dominated province in northern Afghanistan and it is in the best strategic interest of these marooned Pashtuns to remain in link with their brethren in the south of the country.

    Secondly, it was Kunduz, which had provided shelter to some 2,000 Taliban fighters escaping the onslaught of Uzbek militias under the command of General Abdul Malik in Mazar-e Sharif in 1997.

    It was from Kunduz that the Taliban resumed their attacks capturing one northern province after the other.

    Later, when the U.S. forces attacked Taliban-led Afghanistan in2001, the other provinces fell to them like nine pins, but Kunduz resisted for quite some time.

    Another reason for the rebellion mood of Kunduz might be the fact that when the U.S.-led Coalition forces brought the northern provinces under their control, they handed over the command of these areas to those Afghan commanders and warlords, who had traditionally been rival to the Kunduz-based Taliban fighters.

    As these commanders might have, over the years, certainly tried to settle their score with these people, the latter might now be trying to take revenge.

    Yet another reason for the growing militancy in Kunduz might be the booming narco-trade in the province and other areas bordering Tajikistan.

    Many incidents of drug trafficking have recently been reported along the Afghan-Tajik border and, like in Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, the drug business might feel it better to flourish under the shadow of militancy.

    While the NATO-led international forces, particularly the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal might certainly be mulling to ascertain reasons for the growing dangers in northern Afghanistan, these facts should certainly not be overlooked.

    McChrystal has already said that "Taliban are moving beyond their traditional strongholds in southern Afghanistan to threaten formerly stable areas in the north and west."

    The U.S. commander is about to unfold his master plan for Afghanistan some time in the near future.

    In recent days, McChrystal had been insisting on protecting the Afghan civilians, rather than attacking the insurgents.

    However, in his new plan, he would have to diversify his strategy for the sake of effective output.

    Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last week described the situation in Afghanistan as "serious and deteriorating," adding that "I don't think that threat's going to go away."

    One cannot expect a sea change in the U.S. military strategy in the near future, yet the heightening insurgency and its escalation to other Afghan provinces definitely call for serious diverse steps to stabilize the country.