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The Story of a U.S. Navy Intelligence Mission on the Afghan Border, George Hill. sent to South Africa, where he saw action during the Boer War. winter; a brief, lyrical, flowerstrewn and tingling spring; and an intense but short hot summer. Wavell “knew by heart Kipling's poem 'The Young British Soldier​,'.
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By June , both the U. In this scenario, the U. Secretary General was to be encouraged to assist Afghans in forming a transitional body of respected individuals acceptable to all sides. This body was to exercise certain powers during a transitional period and to organize elections in accord with Afghan cultural and national traditions to choose a new government in a process in which all Afghans could freely participate. There was also agreement on the need for a cessation of hostilities during the transition period and on the need to discuss both an end to weapons supplies and the possible removal of weapons.

What this proposal left unanswered was what exact powers the transitional body would have and what would be the role of Najibullah. In early October , as the U. Congress began for the first time to cut back the administration's already reduced requests for aid to the resistance, 22 the U. The ISI, freed of even vestigial political constraints since the dismissal of the government of Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on August 6, continued to work for the preeminence of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

Resistance sources claim that an ISI plan in September to make Hekmetyar the defense minister of a reorganized AIG was frustrated at the last minute by American intervention. Major commanders refused to participate in the offensive, which they regarded as initiated by Pakistan and lacking an acceptable political framework. Many of them participated instead in a shura of top commanders which discussed steps to coordinate a military strategy and create a representative government that could constitute an alternative to the Kabul government. American diplomats on the ground, conceding that the offensive never had a chance of overthrowing the Kabul government, had hoped that it would shake the Soviet negotiating position and lead to a superpower diplomatic agreement.

By the end of October , the offensive was widely reported to have failed, at a cost of countless civilian lives, 23 and the provincial capitals retaken by government forces. Despite hopes for a U.

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Soviet agreement at the December meeting between U. S and the Soviet Union over a transition process leading to elections remained stalemated over the question of what role Najibullah would play in the interim period. The Soviet Union continued to hold to the position that the transitional body's power should be limited to organizing the elections and that Najibullah should stay where he is.

Both sides would like to issue a joint statement at the foreign minister level turning over responsibility for resolving the conflict to the U. The resignation on December 20 of Foreign Minister Shevardnadze, prompted in part by the Soviet army's insistence on a greater role in foreign policy, including a demand for continued military support for President Najibullah, marked a serious setback in the negotiations.

In January the Soviet Union renewed its commitment to military and economic aid to the government of President Najibullah. By July and August when field research for this report was undertaken, the intense fighting that had characterized earlier years of the war had diminished in much of the Afghan countryside. Although indiscriminate attacks on civilian-populated areas have decreased, military operations by all parties continue to cause extensive civilian casualties. Government bombardments and missile attacks were reported from contested areas around Jalalabad and Khost, and in the Paghman hills northwest of Kabul, among other areas.

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Certain mujahidin commanders 26 have also continued to launch rocket attacks against Kabul and other cities, causing heavy civilian casualties. In their military operations, Afghan government forces have employed Scud missiles and other methods of warfare which cannot be targeted with sufficient accuracy to ensure that civilians are not placed at undue risk.

In a number of incidents, these attacks have caused extensive civilian casualties. The use of weapons that cannot be directed at a specific military objective is a violation of the laws of war. There has been apparently little effort on the part of the government to warn civilians to evacuate the areas in advance of such attacks, which is required under the laws of war where feasible. Summary executions of captured prisoners by government forces that was widespread in earlier years of the war and reports of reprisal killings of ordinary civilians suspected of supporting the mujahidin have also decreased.

Nevertheless, such killings continue to take place, as described below. Militia operating in alliance with the government have also participated in the indiscriminate shelling of civilian targets and thesummary executions of mujahidin prisoners. If the government is sincere in its commitment to human rights, it should promptly investigate these and all such reports and prosecute those responsible for abuses.

Afghanistan

Some mujahidin commanders, including those acting under the direction of the ISI, have launched indiscriminate rocket attacks on Kabul and other cities, killing civilians. The rockets used in these attacks are notoriously inaccurate; one variety has a fragmentation warhead that delivers up to 98 anti-personnel bomblets. Central Intelligence Agency have encouraged these attacks and have supplied weapons to commanders who undertake them. Some mujahidin forces have also summarily executed government soldiers captured in combat and members of rival mujahidin forces captured following internecine clashes.

The mines, the vast majority of which were laid by the Soviets and which number at least in the tens of thousands and possibly in the millions, are concentrated in dense agricultural and forest zones and along mountain passes. Those civilians most at risk are women and children grazing flocks or foraging for firewood.

Roads that are used to transport returning refugees, among other things, have been mined by both government-sponsored militia and by mujahidin forces. By mid, the territory under government control was limited to the cities and their immediate environs, with several areas of the country, particularly in the north and along the Pakistani border, effectively under the control of mujahidin factions.

Although many of these areas are still largely depopulated, refugees have begun to return to some provinces, particularly in the north, and in southern Qandahar province.

About Afghanistan

In these areas, the functions of government are in the hands of the local shura , or council, made up of commanders and in some cases tribal elders or other civilians. In Takhar province, an area that was recaptured from government forces in , Jamiat-e Islami commander Ahmad Shah Massoud has established an administrative structure that incorporates local civilians in the police force and shura meetings.

According to recent press reports, he has also called for elections in the province to be held in early Massoud's administration forms partof the Supervisory Council of the North, which coordinates the activities of Jamiat-e Islami commanders in several northeastern provinces. Fighting between mujahidin factions and Arab volunteer forces in some areas, notably Kunar, has led to the creation of competing shura s as the groups struggle for control over territory.

Throughout , there were bloody skirmishes in Kunar between Hezb-e Islami forces and those of Wahhabi leader, Jamil-ur-Rahman. Sporadic fighting continues to break out between other mujahidin factions, including Hezb-e Islami and Jamiat-e Islami forces in the northeast.

In other areas, particularly those bordering government-held territory, the government has negotiated agreements with former mujahidin , providing weapons and ceding control in exchange for a cease-fire. These militia 27 often supplement government forces on the battlefield and have been used to create buffer zones around government-controlled cities. In exchange for providing support to government forces -- and agreeing not to fight the government -- militia commanders are permitted to control territory, and the government has neither the political nor the military capability to exercise its authority over them.

In any armed conflict, all parties are responsible for respecting the "rules of war," the principles enshrined in the Geneva Conventions to which states can become party. The Republic of Afghanistan has acceded to the Geneva Conventions. With the withdrawal of Soviet armed forces from Afghanistan, the hostilities there again assumed a purely non-international or internal character under international humanitarian law, i.

Accordingly, both the Afghan government and the various mujahidin forces are bound by those rules set forth in Common Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions "Common Article 3" towhich Afghanistan is a High Contracting Party, and those customary international law rules applicable to all internal armed conflicts. While not directly applicable to the Afghan conflict, Protocol II additional to the Geneva Conventions "Protocol II" does contain certain rules by which the conduct of hostilities in that conflict can be judged, even though Afghanistan is not a party to it.

Common Article 3 is automatically applicable as soon as a situation of internal armed conflict exists within the territory of a party to the Geneva Conventions. It imposes fixed legal obligations on the parties to such a conflict for the protection of persons not, or no longer, taking an active part in the hostilities by absolutely prohibiting:.

Common Article 3 also imposes an obligation on the parties to the conflict to collect and care for the wounded and sick. Unlike human rights law which applies only to violations committed by a government or its agents, Common Article 3 expressly binds both parties to the conflict, i. Moreover, the obligation to apply Common Article 3 is absolute: even if the mujahidin forces engage in summary executions of Afghan soldiers, or fire poorly aimed rockets into the heart of Kabul, the Afghan government is still obliged to prohibit "violence to life and person" of non-combatant civilians.

Significantly, Common Article 3 is the only provision of the four Geneva Conventions that directly applies to internal armed conflicts. The parties to such a conflict have no legal obligation to comply with theother articles of the Conventions that apply solely to an international armed conflict. The Afghan government, therefore, is not obliged to accord the mujahidin prisoner of war status and can punish captured guerrillas for the commission of crimes under its domestic laws. A guerrilla who kills a government soldier, for example, can be tried for murder, treason, sedition or other offenses, but the trials must be conducted in accordance with the standards set forth in Common Article 3.

Unlike the law governing international armed conflicts, Common Article 3 contains no rules regulating the means and methods of warfare. In addition, the terms "civilian" and "combatant" do not appear in any of the provisions of Common Article 3. Although Common Article 3 does not provide explicit protection for the civilian population from attacks, its prohibition of "violence to life and person" against "persons taking no active part in the hostilities" may be broad enough to encompass attacks by one side against civilians in territory controlled by the other side in an internal armed conflict.

The primary purpose of Common Article 3, however, is to ensure absolutely that anyone not or no longer taking part in hostilities is treated humanely. Persons protected by Common Article 3 include members of both government and mujahidin forces who surrender, are found wounded, sick, or unarmed, or are otherwise captured by the other side. Individual civilians are similarly protected, even if they had fought for the opposing party, or indirectly participated in the hostilities by providing either party with food or other logistical support. Under these circumstances, if these persons die as a result of execution or torture inflicted by a party to the conflict, their deaths are tantamount to murder.

Although Common Article 3 does not, by its terms, prohibit attacks against the civilian population in non-international armed conflicts, such attacks are prohibited by the customary laws of armed conflict. United Nations General Assembly Resolution , Respect forHuman Rights in Armed Conflicts , 28 adopted by unanimous vote on December 19, , expressly recognized this customary principle of civilian immunity and its complementary principle requiring the warring parties to distinguish civilians from combatants at all times.

Another fundamental principle of customary humanitarian law is the principle of humanity, which both complements and inherently limits the doctrine of military necessity. It is defined by the U.

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This principle of humanity results in a specific prohibition against unnecessary suffering and a requirement of proportionality The principle of humanity also confirms the basic immunity of civilian populations and civilians from being objects of attack during armed conflict. Protocol II goes beyond these general provisions to specify ways in which the civilian population should be protected in an area of conflict and states, "the civilian population as such, as well as individual civilians, shall not be the object of attack.

Acts or threats of violence, the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the civilian population, areprohibited. Because Afghanistan has not ratified Protocol II, that instrument cannot directly bind either the government or mujahidin forces. It can still, however, provide standards for the conduct of internal armed conflict. By inference, Protocol II protects civilians against indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks. These include:. The use of land mines, which by their nature tend to cause extensive civilian casualties, is one of the most devastating aspects of the war in Afghanistan.

The principle of confining attacks to military targets also applies to the use of land mines, which is described in more detail below. Throughout the Afghan conflict each of the provisions outlined above has been systematically violated by all parties. With the withdrawal of Soviet forces from the conflict, indiscriminate attacks by government forces on civilian population centers diminished but did not end; in some areas civilians continue to suffer disproportionately because of bombing raids and missile attacks.

In the years following the Soviet invasion in December , the shelling and aerial bombardment of rural villages and cities by government and Soviet forces 32 was almost constant. The mass destruction caused by these bombing raids has been the primary cause of over one million civilian deaths during the course of the war and for the exodus of five million refugees from Afghanistan into Pakistan and Iran. In the period just before the withdrawal of Soviet troops in February , heavy bombing raids were reported in Qandahar and north of Kabul along the Salang Highway -- the route for the withdrawal of the Soviet troops.

As many as people were reported to have been killed when Soviet forces carpet-bombed villages in the Panjshir Valley and Salang Pass in January and February Since the Soviet withdrawal, bombing raids carried out by Afghan government forces have declined in much of the country. In fact, in certain areas, notably Qandahar, the provincial government has resisted responding to mujahidin attacks by return fire in order to bolster its image and win the support of civilians.

However, in areas of concentrated fighting, missile attacks and shelling of civilian areas have continued. These attacks have been carried out in apparent reprisal for guerrilla assaults on government army positions or to protect strategic routes to the cities. In the latter cases, the attacks have been conducted in such a way that civilian-populated areas have been the primary targets.


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Such attacks are indiscriminate since they either are directed against civilians or are in disregard of laws protecting the civilian population from disproportionate attacks. They therefore flagrantly violate the most basic laws of war. The weapons used by the Afghan government forces in such attacks have included Scud-Bs, which are unguided, long-range, surface-to-surface missiles, 37 and Frog-7 rockets, which are unguided, short-range, surface-to-surface missiles.