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The UN Decries More Unnecessary Civilian Deaths in Afghanistan |
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Strong words from the UN, seemingly directed at American strikes on suspected insurgents in Afghanistan:
Foreign intelligence agents are leading secret, deadly raids on suspected insurgents in Afghanistan and shirking responsibility when innocent civilians are killed, a U.N. official alleged Thursday.
Philip Alston, a special investigator for the U.N. Human Rights Council, referred to three such recent raids in the country’s south and east.
While he didn’t specifically mention any intelligence agencies, he appeared to imply American involvement. U.S. military officials declined to comment on the allegations.
Alston said the raids were part of a wider problem of unlawful killings of civilians and lack of accountability in Afghanistan. He said about 500 civilians had been killed this year, most of them at the hands of the Taliban but some by Afghan police.
The allegation came as a suicide bomber wearing a burqa attacked a police patrol in western Afghanistan, killing five police officers and seven civilians.
Despite his criticism of secret raids, Alston said there was no evidence that international forces in Afghanistan are committing widespread intentional killings in violation of humanitarian law.
He did not give the nationality of intelligence operatives involved in the mainly nighttime raids on militant suspects, but he mentioned one raid in January that killed two Afghan brothers. He said it was conducted by Afghans and personnel from a U.S. special forces base in Kandahar.
He said Afghan government officials have said the victims had no connection to Taliban insurgents.
“It is absolutely unacceptable for heavily armed internationals accompanied by heavily armed Afghan forces to be wandering around conducting dangerous raids that too often result in killings without anyone taking responsibility for them,” Alston told reporters after 12 days traveling in Afghanistan.
He said foreign intelligence agencies were operating with apparent “impunity” in some provinces where insurgents are active.
Cheerleaders for the status quo would say, I guess, that we can’t give terrorists an inch. What they don’t admit is how the use of unnecessary force, combined with a lack of accountability, actually undermines the achievement of our core objectives in Afghanistan. When we kill civilians, we alienate people. Just like our strikes in Pakistan and Somalia, we create chaos where we say we want to foster stability. It’s a failed strategy, it brings international condemnation, and it puts us farther away from success. We have to tone down the violence against civilians or we’re just going to sink deeper into the quicksand.Â
