Ayaz Gul VOA News April 17, 2019 ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN — A new United Nations report has documented a modest decline in torture allegations in Afghan prisons, but noted its ongoing concern at the “disturbingly” high number of conflict-related detainees still alleging serious abuses. In its biannual report on the treatment of security detainees issued Wednesday, the U.N. Assistance Mission
Emran Feroz via TRTWorld: Foreign invaders and elite urban Afghans have long underestimated or ignored rural Afghanistan, and they have all paid the price of doing so. A few days ago, massive protests took place in the province of Helmand, southern Afghanistan. The night before, Afghan and American forces raided another home in the region. According to locals,
Michael Hughes: The International Criminal Court (ICC) denied a request to probe more than 1 million war crimes reportedly committed by parties to the conflict in Afghanistan because the court’s judges feared the long arm of the United States. After the decision was rendered the White House, adding insult to injury, gloated over its ability to
The Intercept: In “Combat Obscura,” a new documentary set in Afghanistan, Marines don’t do what they normally do in American-made documentaries about war – they don’t echo narratives of God and country, kill bad guys, and win hearts and minds. In “Combat Obscura,” Marines shoot guns and patrol, but they also insult women, shake their weapons
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty April 5, 2019 The United States has revoked the entry visa of the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Fatou Bensouda, who is investigating possible war crimes committed by U.S. forces in Afghanistan. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said last month that Washington would withdraw or deny visas to ICC
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty March 30, 2019 U.S. actress Angelina Jolie, who is an activist for refugee-related causes, has urged in a speech at the United Nations that women be represented in the peace process aimed at ending the long conflict in Afghanistan. “In Afghanistan thousands of women have recently come together in public risking
Tolo News: The United States will impose visa restrictions on people responsible for any International Criminal Court probe, a move aimed at preventing actions against US and allies in Afghanistan, the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday. Pompeo’s remarks come as the US National Security Advisor John Bolton in a speech on last September
Michael Hughes: In some of the most advanced countries in the world citizens are continuing to fight – with just cause – for rights such as freedom of speech, freedom from discrimination and freedom from all sorts of state oppression. Yet in certain countries there are virtually no de facto rights. In fact, one could argue that many
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty February 15, 2019 The Save the Children International charity says at least 100,000 babies die every year because of armed conflict and related effects, with Afghanistan listed as among the 10 worst countries to be a child. “Increasingly, the brunt of armed violence and warfare is being borne by children,” the
Al Jazeera: Before there was Guantanamo, there was Bagram, a US detention site near its giant airbase in Afghanistan, which came to be synonymous with torture and prisoner abuse. But when the US relinquished control of the prison, now called Parwan Detention Facility, to Afghan security forces in December 2014, Washington renounced responsibility for the men once held there. “The Bagram prison was a melting pot