Killing You Is a Very Easy Thing For Us (HRW) (http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/afghanistan0703/)

Human Rights Watch (http://www.hrw.org/) has released a report documenting human rights abuses in southeast Afghanistan. The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/29/international/asia/29AFGH.html) provides commentary on the title; apparently an unidentified newspaper or magazine editor reported that, after publishing a political cartoon of President Karzai and Defense Minister Fahim, he was threatened by men in Fahim's employ: "They said: 'Look, killing you is a very easy thing for us. Look: We have 30 bullets in our clips. I can shoot all of these 30 bullets into your chest right now, and there is no one who can stop us.'"

I'm curious ... do all international thugs sound like bad guys in comic books?

At any rate, the report apparently has bad things to say about the United States (big surprise), apparently going so far as to assign some responsibility for the abuses directly to the United States (whoops ...).

I've found, in the summary, that it's not the worst possible indictment of the US:Not enough is being done at the national or international level to address the causes of Afghanistan’s ongoing human rights and security problems. President Hamid Karzai has taken positive steps in some cases, but for the most part he has been too weak politically to implement changes that might limit or end day-to-day abuses. Karzai’s recent efforts to sideline regional commanders have not been particularly effective, partially because of the lack of U.S. support. The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, which significantly increased its activities in the first half of 2003, has little power to affect the situation beyond cautiously monitoring abuses and calling for change. The commission has little protection, and commission members are understandably fearful of challenging warlords on their own.

The United States and the international community, as major power brokers in Afghanistan, have put too little pressure on military leaders outside of Kabul to obey President Karzai’s authority, to uphold human rights standards, or to relinquish power. Their continued funding, joint operations, and fraternizing with warlords has sent, at best, mixed messages about their goals and intentions.

If the United States does not make it clear both in words and actions that it supports internationally recognized, reform-oriented national leaders, it may soon be too late for the United States to be able to have a significant and positive influence on the security, human rights, and political situation. When requested by President Karzai to support lawful efforts to remove warlords or other abusive officials from positions of authority, the United States must respond positively. If the warlords win and President Karzai and other reformers lose, much of the world may conclude that the United States was never serious in its promises.

Many U.S., U.N., and Afghan officials have asserted that the solution to Afghanistan’s security problems lies in the creation of a new Afghan army. This claim sidesteps the fact that this plan’s fruition lies years away and that one military faction—Shura-e Nazar—dominates the Ministry of Defense and, therefore, efforts to rebuild the army. Before former fighters and their commanders can be channeled into the new army or disarmed and demobilized into civilian life, the defense ministry must be reformed and made more politically and ethnically representative of Afghan society. To be honest, it seems a reasonable complaint. Admittedly, there's nothing there that goes beyond the accusations in the press. In that sense, perhaps the detail of the report will be more shocking.

Nonetheless, Afghanistan is in a ... precarious ... position. The Afghani Bush War was one that much more of the world supported than the Iraqi Adventure, and the United States does need very badly to follow through and achieve some respectable semblance of the nation-building agenda.

I suppose there's a question I haven't gotten around to asking about any of it: Do such occasions exist that a national leader is obliged by circumstances to "bite off more than he can chew"?

- Gall, Carlotta. "Rights Group Reports Abuses by Afghans, Some Backed By U.S." New York Times, July 28, 2003. see http://nytimes.com/2003/07/29/international/asia/29AFGH.html (link will evaporate in about a week)
- Human Rights Watch. "Killing You is a Very Easy Thing For Us: Human rights abuses in Southeast Afghanistan." Publications, v.15, n.5(c). July, 2003. see http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/afghanistan0703/

:m:,
Tiassa :cool:

Not to worry tiassa, when the US hands power back to the taliban, we won't hear anymore of this sort of thing.
Mainly, it's true, because they'll kill any reporters that report such things, but what can you do? After all, in the world Junior and PNAC are carving out, might makes right....

The situation in Afghanistan remains very troubling. Human Rights Watch released a report this past week saying that warlords, whom the U.S. military helped put in power so they could fight the Taliban and al Qaeda, are terrorizing much of the country. Their gunmen are intimidating journalists and political opponents as well as robbing, detaining and raping ordinary Afghans with impunity, the report said.

At the same time, cooperation between the U.S. military and regional leaders has not always succeeded in thwarting the Taliban and al Qaeda -- notably in Kandahar. Twice in recent months, large Taliban groups have attacked U.S. or allied forces, and Kandaharis are increasingly critical of the United States for not acting more aggressively to stop terrorism and protect the populace. (Full text here (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15348-2003Aug2.html))I haven't seen any sign in a long time that the Bush administration is putting any effort into thinking about how to make it work. Since the country's fallen off the front pages they basically don't seem to care much about it. Nevertheless, from both a humanitarian perspective and for the sake of our national interests, it would be nice to put Afghanistan in some kind of shape other than neo-warlordism with a chewy, corrupt little center.

:m: Peace.

Afghanistan will never be the same, ever since the fall of the stable contitutional monarchal government in 1973 Afghanistan has literally gone from one extreme to another in terms of ideology. Communist, Taliban, and warloadship, and now pseduo- government. Basicly put Afghanistan is in a state of anarchy, not unlike China in the 20's. What will take to unite a country that is divided? IMO nothing can, the country is nothing more than a result of imperialist map making game of the 1800's. To me it seems sad that the Taliban are making a comeback in Herat, and in a country who's literacy rate is 36% and a infant morality rate of 144/1000 how can we realisticly expect results? The US surely has bitten more then she can chew, let alone excrete. ;)