The Afghan Armed Forces is composed of personnel of various ranks which span three pay-grade brackets, those being on-Commissioned Officers, Commissioned Officers and the General Staff. Quartered behind the airport's razor wire is a secretive CIA-backed Afghan special forces unit that has been accused of human rights atrocities. The laws of war also protect medical workers and patients from attack. Five military personnel and four civilians were among those rescued. Skip navigation Sign in. (Kabul) – Afghan special forces raided a medical clinic in Wardak province on the night of July 8-9, 2019, and executed four civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. He rejected Australian special forces claims that his father was armed. Khaama. "Both international forces and the Afghan security forces are committed to saving civilian lives, but unfortunately the enemy are using civilians as a human shield, and for that reason sometimes it’s complicated and night operations by special forces or NDS (the Afghan intelligence agency) result in civilian casualties," said Hayat. There are no official descriptions of the terms of the peace that the Administration is The Bureau of Investigative Journalism The CIA backs numerous forces in Afghanistan, but finding out more information about them is extremely hard, both because of the fear the militias inspire in the local population and because of the CIA's lack of transparency. The report details 14 incidents involving these strike forces from November 2017 to August 2019. For the first time western media have been granted access to join an Afghan Special Forces patrol without US military support. تانه زار شم افعانستان نه During a joint rescue operation with U.S special forces, code-named Jubilee, the SAS operators successfully rescued the hostages without any casualty from Badakhshan Province in Afghanistan. To help defend quality reporting and spark change, please support the Bureau, By Major Mathew L. Golsteyn is a United States Army officer who served in the War in Afghanistan.He was charged with murder after killing an Afghan civilian in Marjah, who he claims was a bomb maker for the Taliban.Golsteyn's case came to prominence after U.S. President Donald Trump said that he would review Maj. Golsteyn's case. The highest official rank within the AAF is Marshal, which has not been used since Mohammed Fahim, who left the position in 2002.. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan special forces launched a new offensive against the Islamic State group in eastern Nangarhar province, killing 27 militants, officials said Tuesday. Under international humanitarian law, or the laws of war, hospitals and other medical facilities are protected from attack unless they are being used for acts harmful to the enemy. 529 likes. ALBANIAN SPECIAL FORCES IN AFGHANISTAN 2019. Afghan security forces had previously targeted the Day Mirdad clinic. The Special Forces team at Mission Support Site Jones, named after Capt. Many of these units have questionable human rights records, and if given the ability to call in strikes, they are armed with potentially devastating air power. Subsection Asia. Afghan special forces. GHAZNI -- Afghan special forces rescued at least nine captives from a Taliban prison during an operation in Ghazni Province, according to the Afghan Special Operation Corps. U.S. ARMY Dec. 22, 2019; WASHINGTON — An American Special Forces soldier was killed in Afghanistan on Monday, according to military officials, bringing … ALBANIAN SPECIAL FORCES IN AFGHANISTAN 2019. They killed a family caregiver and then detained and bound staff and family members accompanying patients. A member of the local health council told Human Rights Watch that at about 9 p.m. on July 8, he heard helicopters and knew a raid was underway. This video is … Jessica Purkiss U.S. Special Forces and Afghan Special security forces work and train together in eastern Afghanistan, winter 2019- 2020. Their families say three of them were children. According to some tribal elders and activists, last September and October more than 260 civilians were killed in the 02 unit’s search operations in Nangarhar. Should Special Forces soldiers have been prosecuted over the killing of ... UK and Afghan Special Forces made their way into Loy Bagh village and burst into each of the ... 17 November 2019. An aerial view of Jalalabad airport, where the unit is based, A father and two sons killed in the September strike. The body of the other family caregiver was also found on the premises. Section BBC News. 529 likes. But Pentagon officials won’t provide any metrics to highlight whether Afghan forces made any battlefield progress in their fight against the Taliban and other militants across the country in 2019. He says five members of his family died in the attack. On 18 October 2012, a UK Special Forces soldier shot dead four young people in an Afghan village. One of those caught up in the raid told the Bureau it started with an air strike. Known by many as the “02” unit, its on-the-ground activities are supported by air strikes carried out by both US and Afghan forces, senior Afghan intelligence officials told the Bureau. Such acts do not include treating wounded and sick combatants. 31 October 2019 • 10:11am. Sept. 20-26, 2019. Commanders who order or otherwise assist, facilitate, aid, or abet the commission of a war crime can also be criminally liable. But local outrage at abuses by CIA-backed forces in Afghanistan is gradually dragging these shadowy forces into the spotlight. Furthermore, the Special Operations Corps said the Special Forces destroyed the Taliban compound and all its facilities during the raid. Then they took four men with them, including the clinic’s director, Dr. Wahidullah, and told the remaining staff to stay in the room. Under the laws of war, deliberate attacks on medical facilities and the summary killing of civilians or incapacitated combatants are war crimes. According to them, the unit's raid killed 13 civilians, including at least four children. UNAMA has also noted a recent increase in attacks that have resulted in the death of health workers at facilities run by nongovernmental organizations in contested areas. There are reports that the special forces clashed with Keramuddin’s men but Sediqi has not confirmed the clashes. The New York Times documented abuses carried out by these Afghan special forces units during ground raids: in one particularly brutal incident two brothers were hooded and executed in the corner of a room which was then detonated. On the night of July 9, 2019, a special forces unit carried out a raid on an NGO clinic in the Zamindawar area of Kajaki district, Helmand. The overwhelmingly Muslim Republic of Chechnya is an autonomous province within the Russian Federation. None of our funders have any influence over the Bureau’s editorial decisions or output. August 29, 2019 . This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Appliances. The importance of the British SAS can be judged by a single fact that many of the powerful special forces overseas were initially based on SAS principles. Search. His wife and his other child were injured.” Khan said his uncle was a guard at a government run school in Rodat, the Nangarhar district where the incident took place. Even if a medical facility is being used to carry out harmful acts, such as to store weapons or as a headquarters, a warning with a reasonable time limit needs to be given before the hospital can be attacked. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. تانه زار شم افعانستان نه ‘Sensitive military equipment given to Afghan forces unaccounted’,Kabul, Dec 18 (IANS) A report has claimed that the US Department of Defence has failed to keep track of surveillance systems, controls for laser-guided bombs, night-vision devices and other militant equipment provided to Afghan forces. Facebook account name "sharif afg" u can suggestion from me through it Facebook account name up, Patricia Gossman, senior Afghanistan researcher for Human Rights Watch, told the Bureau: “Devolving such authority to Afghan special forces compounds the existing problem about whether those ordering the air strikes are adequately distinguishing between combatants and civilians, between legitimate military objectives and protected civilian property.”. “When my family members heard shots being fired outside, they went out to see what was going on and were hit by an air strike that killed the five of them. “The US government should investigate its involvement in operations that target protected facilities or otherwise violate the laws of war.”, Abusive Night Raids by CIA-Backed Afghan Strike Forces, Insurgent Attacks on Civilians in Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch defends the rights of people in 90 countries worldwide, spotlighting abuses and bringing perpetrators to justice. In the exercise, the commandos successfully discovered and apprehended a person of interest, recovered weapons and intelligence." The airstrike also destroyed part of our house,” said Zahidi. For the first time western media have been granted access to join an Afghan Special Forces patrol without US military support. A civil society activist in the province told the Bureau: “The 02 unit conducts operations with impunity and no regard for civilian lives, they destroy civilian homes that those people put so much effort into building, burn cars and use explosives and air strikes at will.”. Last month the New York Times published a major expose on these groups and the civilian casualties attributed to them. Summary killings of individuals in custody are war crimes. They then separated four people for questioning – the clinic’s director, a lab worker, a guard, and a family caregiver. At 5 a.m., he and others from the health council went to the clinic and found the guard’s room shattered by a rocket that had left a crater. Commandos assigned to 1st Special Operations Kandak clear a training compound during breaching training in Laghman province, Afghanistan… 02 is just the latest iteration of a recurring problem: as the US seeks to maintain security across Afghanistan with fewer American boots on the ground, it is backing multiple Afghan units and militias to plug the gap. It is unclear how many of the deaths resulting from CIA-backed forces happen during the on-the-ground raids and how many are caused by accompanying air support. “My uncles had a pharmacy in our village,” said Abdul Samad. An investigation by the Bureau has uncovered instances where this has happened. ... 2019… These units operate largely outside the normal military chain of command and are supported by US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) units. A car bomb rocked the Afghan capital … ... 15 March 2019. Resolute Support (RS) forces arrive at the site of a car bomb explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Sept. 5, 2019. On 5 June 2019, the Australian Federal Police raided the Sydney based headquarters of the ABC over a period of eight hours, reportedly over the Afghan Files. Afghan special forces. The villagers were unable to locate Dr. Wahidullah, whom they believed the forces may have detained. Afghan special forces attend their graduation ceremony after a 6-month training program in Kabul. Kajaki has been under Taliban control for several years. Afghan pilots flew four helicopters during the exercise, which involved more than 50 Afghan commandos, and US special operations forces acting in an advisory capacity. “They didn't care about who they were killing. During the raid of a Taliban stronghold in Maiwand village, Kandahar province, Afghan special forces reportedly executed 20 civilians on the night of January 31, 2018. In its April update on civilian casualties, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA) noted that most search operations resulting in civilian casualties were attributed to either the National Directorate of Security Special Forces or other special forces units. However the numbers stack up, giving such units the power to make air strikes happen raises serious concern for civilians. 1:41. While reconstructing the exact chain of events that night is difficult, including uncovering whether the air strike was carried out by US or Afghan forces, one thing is clear: this isn’t the first time ground forces have called in air attacks that have proved deadly. London Infantry soldiers, Green Berets, Afghan Special Forces and the Cultural Support Team members walking back from a mission on Combat Outpost Herrera in Afghanistan in 2012. They are not part of the CIA’s covert operations. Gregory Brook) Sgt. Afghanistan War’s Terrible Toll on Children, Letter to Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne, Australia: Protect Human Rights in Foreign Policy, Western Sahara: Morocco Cracks Down on Activists, Egypt: Collective Punishment in Scorpion Prison, US: Protect Cameroonians From Deportation, Italy: Flawed Migrant Regularization Program, has also noted a recent increase in attacks. Get updates on human rights issues from around the globe. Jamal Khan who lost two of his relatives in an 02 raid told the Bureau: “No one is taking responsibility so we just try to go on with our lives knowing that the unit that gets their orders from Americans killed our family members and the government cannot do anything for us.”, Main photo: Afghan commandos on mission in Nangarhar (Photo by Staff Sgt. Afghan special forces reportedly killed or wounded 31 Taliban jihadis affiliated with al-Qaeda in eastern Afghanistan this week, including Chinese and Chechen militants. We focused on a branch of special forces working under the Afghan intelligence agency (known as the NDS) It operates from the Jalalabad air-base in Nangarhar province and is backed by the CIA. (Kabul) – Afghan special forces raided a medical clinic in Wardak province on the night of July 8-9, 2019, and executed four civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. A spokesman for the U.S.-led training mission said Afghan special operations forces did roughly the same amount of independent operations in 2018 and 2019, but increased partnered operations beginning around June 2019 to put more pressure on the Taliban and other terrorists — accounting for the higher percentage of partnered operation. “US forces who directly support Afghan special forces – whether military or intelligence – may also bear responsibility for abuses carried out by these units,” Gossman said. Locals don't know much about who travels in them, but they do know one thing: they are to be feared. And as President Trump mulls over plans to further reduce US troop numbers, reliance on such forces may only deepen. Peace is a highly uncertain option. Emran Feroz. Gregory Brook) U.S. Special Forces and Afghan Special security forces work and train together in eastern Afghanistan, winter 2019- 2020. Commissioned officers. All except the director were later found dead from gunshots. Afghan forces conducted the operation Monday (June 3) night in Gero District, said the statement. We spoke to a man named Zahed Zahidi, who said 16 civilians were killed when the unit attacked his Nangarhar village in September last year, swiftly followed by an air strike. The UN’s mission in Afghanistan found forces like these appear to operate outside of the Afghan security forces’ chain of command, resulting in a lack of clear oversight and accountability. Join our movement today. We focused on a branch of special forces working under the Afghan intelligence agency (known as the NDS) It operates from the Jalalabad air-base in Nangarhar province and is backed by the CIA. For fiscal year 2020, Afghan Special Security Forces received nearly $730 million in Pentagon funds, which helps them acquire and maintain equipment like … FILE - Afghan Special Forces attend their graduation ceremony in Kabul, Afghanistan June 17, 2020. Golsteyn was pardoned on 15 November 2019, causing controversy. At least 58 pro-government forces and 65 civilians were killed in Afghanistan during the past week, with the deadliest incident taking place … The President of Afghanistan is the Commander-in-Chief of the Afghan Armed Forces, which is administratively controlled through the Ministry of Defense. Abigail reports on counter-terrorism, corporations in warzones and other international stories and was formerly the FT Beirut correspondent. They were innocent people.”. Zalmay Khalilzad, who served as U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan from 2003 to 2004, said the Afghan government wanted Washington to pay for security forces of 100,000 to 120,000. This story was published in partnership with: Armoured vehicles come and go from the airport in Jalalabad, one of the biggest cities in eastern Afghanistan. The Afghan National Defense and Security Forces, including the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police, have their own special forces. He dismissed claims that the Nangarhar unit was killing over 100 civilians a month as an exaggeration, but accepted that roughly one in every ten raids did result in civilian casualties. Another agency, likely … Another man told us he lost seven relatives in the same operation. He was a member of the 1st Special Forces Group. Please give now to support our work, 4 Civilians Executed in Second Attack on Facility in Wardak Province. The Interior Ministry has claimed only Islamic State fighters were killed. Published on Mar 18, 2019 For the first time western media have been granted access to join an Afghan Special Forces patrol without US military support. Dozens of civilians killed in Afghan forces’ anti-Taliban attack At least 40 civilians killed in air raid and ground assault on Taliban hideouts by Afghan special forces. 1st Class Dustin Ard, 31, was killed in Afghanistan Aug. 29, 2019. Jessica leads the Bureau's reporting on the US's Shadow Wars around the world. Then they entered the living room and started to shoot around,” said Jamal Khan. EC2P 2SH. The … Human Rights Watch is a 501(C)(3) nonprofit registered in the US under EIN: 13-2875808. They killed my uncle and his 9-year-old son. Afghan special forces. On July 11, the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), a humanitarian organization that runs the clinic, described the incident as a “shocking violation” of international humanitarian law and said that “such outrageous use of force against civilians and health facilities constitutes a serious violation of applicable international humanitarian law and it affects provision of health services delivery to the people in the local community.” The clinic treats everyone, regardless of their political affiliation. 23 Sep 2019 But even more destruction is possible if air strikes can be called in by such groups on their targets. The U.S. soldier killed Monday in Afghanistan has been identified as Sgt. The US military officials are saying that around $5.2 billion have been requested for the Afghan national defense and security forces in the defense budget for the US army for the fiscal year 2019. , Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949, which is applicable to the armed conflict in Afghanistan, states that: [P]ersons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed “hors de combat” by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely.... [P]rohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons [is] violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds. Two were students, while the other three were farmers. Facebook is showing information to help you better understand the purpose of a Page. Security officials have not yet commented on the operation. 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