Civilians targeted in ‘retaliatory attacks’
Taliban fighters evict families, torch homes
WASHINGTON: Taliban fighters in northern Afghanistan last month evicted families and looted and torched their homes in apparent retaliation for cooperating with the Kabul government, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.
The “retaliatory attacks” were committed by insurgents participating in a Taliban offensive that has overrun scores of districts around Afghanistan, including an estimated 150 districts in Kunduz and other northern provinces, the group said.
“The Taliban leadership has the power to stop these abuses by their forces, but haven’t shown that they are willing to do so,” Patricia Grossman, the organisation’s associate Asia director said in a statement.
Last month, the Taliban published on Twitter an order to “military officials” to safeguard public property and “behave well with the general public”.
The Taliban launched their offensive, with a focus on the north, as US-led foreign forces withdrew after two decades of war. US troops abandoned their main base, Bagram Airfield, earlier this week.
Human Rights Watch said it conducted telephone interviews early this month with displaced residents of Bagh-e Sherkat, a town in Kunduz province from which some 600 families fled, some to Taloquan and others to Faizabad.
Displaced residents were quoted as saying that from June 21 to 25, Taliban fighters gave them two hours to leave their homes and threatened those who the insurgents accused of providing support to the Afghan government. Taliban fighters then looted and burned abandoned homes, and shot dead two civilians, displaced residents said.
“We helped the government and they left us to the Taliban,” an unidentified
24-year-old woman was quoted as saying. “The Taliban have burned our houses.
“We are so scared. Both sides force us to help them. We are poor people, we don’t have any choice.”
Meanwhile, the Biden administration is considering offering an expedited visa path for vulnerable Afghans including women politicians, journalists, and activists who may become targets of the Taliban, US officials say.
Rights groups have been asking the State Department and White House to add up to 2,000 visas specifically for vulnerable women and women’s advocates to a developing policy plan to evacuate thousands Afghans after the US military pullout this month.
The current plan includes translators
who worked with foreign forces. One of the officials said the administration is looking not only at women who are under threat, but also men and minorities in high-risk professions.
Women who made gains during the two-decade US occupation, and their supporters and advocates, should be part of any expedited list, rights groups have told the White House and State Department.
“Lives are at risk,” said Teresa Casale, advocacy director for Mina’s List, which advocates for women’s representation in governments around the world.
“Women leaders are being actively targeted and killed by Taliban forces.
“They receive threats against their lives and safety every day.”
Women police officers, media workers, judges and medical workers have been assassinated in Afghanistan as foreign military left the country.
Women appearing on television and radio faced particular threats, Human Rights Watch wrote in April.