Kabul, Dec 7 (Agency) A recent Human Rights Watch report based on interviews conducted in Ghazni, Helmand, Kunduz, and Kandahar provinces indicates that Taliban forces have killed or forcibly disappeared more than 100 former security force members in just these four provinces ever since the Taliban takeover of Kabul on August 15. The report, based on a total of 67 interviews, including 40 in-person, said the Taliban have also targeted the family members of former security force members. Summary killings and enforced disappearances have taken place despite the Taliban’s announced amnesty for former government civilian and military officials and reassurances from the Taliban leadership that they would hold their forces accountable for violations of the amnesty order, it said. In the weeks before the Taliban overran Kabul, revenge killings, including the targeting of government officials, had become almost frequent in the major cities and along key highways marking a sharp increase in state executions.
This was evident in July, when Taliban forces escalated their operations around Kandahar city and carried out summary executions of surrendered and captured members of the security forces. Similar patterns have emerged in many other provinces, including since August 15. The report was followed with a joint statement by the governments of the United States, European Union, and 20 other countries, expressing their concerns over the findings of the HRW. The Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, reacting to the report, said that any Islamic Emirate member “found breaching the amnesty decree will be prosecuted and penalized.”
“Mujahidin are fully committed to implementing the amnesty decree and employees of the previous administration are not being persecuted for their former opposition,” said Abdul Qahar Balkhi, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, on Twitter. The reform commission of the Islamic Emirate said that the commission has not registered any cases of killings of former members of the security forces. “We haven’t received any complaints that the forces of the Islamic Emirate have disturbed or bothered anyone who worked with the former administration,” said Lotfullah Hakimi, head of the commission.