Afghan child sex scandal

SECRET REPORT: SECURITY FORCES ACCUSED OF SYSTEMATIC ABUSE OF BOYS

AUS government watchdog has filed a secret report to Congress into allegations of child sex abuse by the Afghan security forces – and the extent to which America holds them accountable.

According to the office of the Special Inspector-General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar), which yesterday announced it had sent the classified findings to lawmakers, Afghan officials are failing to stop sexual exploitation.

Primarily at issue is the entrenched custom of what is known in Afghanistan as “bacha bazi” – or the sexual abuse of boys – and whether the US is turning a blind eye.

Neither the Pentagon nor the Afghan government responded to requests for comment.

Under rules called the Leahy Laws, the Pentagon and the state department are barred from providing assistance to any unit of a foreign nation’s security forces if credible information exists that the unit has committed a gross violation of human rights.

Nato forces headed by the US provide training, equipment and other assistance across the Afghan security forces.

President Ashraf Ghani this year laid out stringent penalties against bacha bazi for the first time in a revised penal code, but the government has given no time frame over when they will be enforced.

In what spells trouble for the Pentagon, the report also found that Afghan security forces continued to be killed at a high rate between January 1 and May 8, with 2 531 killed in action and another 4 238 wounded. –