Here we go again...Democracy, US-style

[skunk]

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=571909
Afghan warlords poised to take up power

By Nick Meo in Kabul

14 October 2004

Alleged war criminals are poised to take positions of power in Afghanistan's new government, threatening hopes of democracy taking shape after last week's historic election, a human rights group has warned.

Men with bloody records from years of conflict will become judges, police chiefs and government ministers unless their appointments are blocked by presidential decree, according to a report by Afghanistan Justice Project.

The United States-based group has conducted detailed research into the darkest periods in recent Afghan history - the wars between 1978 and 2001 - and accuses some of the most powerful men in the country of involvement in murders, mass rapes, summary executions and indiscriminate rocketing and bombing of civilians.

It also calls on the Western powers backing the Kabul government to apply pressure against warlords, and accuses the US of helping discredited figures back into power and re-arming them as allies in its fight against al-Qa'ida.

Patricia Gossman, the report's researcher and author, said: "The new government's appointments must be scrutinised. There must be proper accountability ... At the moment there is no vetting process.

"We are particularly worried that the controversy over ink marks on voters' fingers in the election will mean deals have been done where candidates' complaints are dropped in exchange for appointments."

The new president - expected to be Hamid Karzai - has the power to withdraw the appointments of tainted figures but may find it politically difficult to do so without support from his Western backers, Ms Gossman said.

She said that the US may still be using warlords in its anti-terror war. "There is a total lack of transparency about what they are doing," she said. "The [US] ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, is meeting Karzai almost every day but nobody knows what message he is sending about warlords. There seems to be more concern among European powers ... than there is among US officials. They have caused huge problems in the past."

The report,The Candidates and the Past: The Legacy of War Crimes and the Political Transition in Afghanistan, details new evidence about some of the bloodiest episodes from the Soviet occupation, the civil war in the 1990s and the Taliban era, accusing all sides of taking part in atrocities. Little research has been done before on war crimes. Years of turmoil made the work difficult. And no efforts have been made to bring any of the figures to justice.

For this report, researchers interviewed witnesses to and survivors of atrocities.

One of those singled out is Mohammed Fahim, a former vice-president and defence minister, and one of the most powerful figures in the Northern Alliance. He was dropped by Mr Karzai as his vice-presidential running mate, but many expect him to remain a significant figure in the government. The report highlights summary executions and rapes carried out by troops allegedly under his command in Kabul in 1993.

Another powerful behind-the-scenes figure is Abdul Sayyaff, a hardline Islamist warlord who opposed the Taliban. He is believed to have played a key role in appointing ultra-conservative judges to Kabul's Supreme Court where their judgments have repeatedly gone against the few liberal figures brave enough to try to play a public role in Afghanistan.

General Abdul Rashid Dostum, a presidential candidate with ambitions to be chief of the defence staff, is another who is singled out for his record leading a militia during the civil war.

The report also claims that Taliban commanders accused of war crimes may not face justice because they have disappeared into US custody. The prospect of those accused ever standing trial is believed to be years away, partly because the authority of the government is so fragile. Ms Gossman said: "So far the only real trial for anybody accused of abuses is happening now in London, where alleged commander Zardad Khan is being prosecuted."


ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN

Mohammed Fahim

A Northern Alliance leader. His forces are accused of summary executions and rapes in Kabul in 1993

Abdul Rasul Sayyaff

Radical Islamist who opposed the Taliban. His forces, accused of civil war atrocities, are serving in Kabul's 10th division

Yunus Qanooni

Presidential candidate linked to Northern Alliance warlords, but there are no claims he was involved in atrocities

Abdul Rashid Dostum

Warlord who ended election boycott yesterday. His militias are accused of rape and murdering Taliban prisoners

Any comment necessary?

[Desertrat]

If a guy is evil and badnasty, but has the support of a large bloc of voters, how do you keep him out of office, or keep him from having political influence?

How is Afghanistan any different from the U.S. Congress? If some senator has been around a long time and knows where are the skeletons in whomever's closet, or know who's done what for whom, he has power and influence beyond his one vote, right? Or some representative is riding the crest of a very popular political wave, he gains a bunch of say-so beyond his committee position.

So an Afghani warlord has a large number of supporters who want him, their own popular leader, to be important in the new Grand Scheme? Keeping him out is rather hazardous to both the people saying, "No!" and to others' political plans for the future.

It seems to me that for a country with a history like Afghanistan's, the only way you won't have a bunch of bloody-handed leaders is to have a couple of generations' worth of peaceful times. It's much like our Mafia, where the grandchildren of rum-running thugs go to Yale or Harvard and get elected to the Congress or run a legitimate business...

:), 'Rat

[Blue Velvet]

Freedom and liberty... on the march!


:rolleyes:

[Taft]

If a guy is evil and badnasty, but has the support of a large bloc of voters, how do you keep him out of office, or keep him from having political influence?

How is Afghanistan any different from the U.S. Congress? If some senator has been around a long time and knows where are the skeletons in whomever's closet, or know who's done what for whom, he has power and influence beyond his one vote, right? Or some representative is riding the crest of a very popular political wave, he gains a bunch of say-so beyond his committee position.

So an Afghani warlord has a large number of supporters who want him, their own popular leader, to be important in the new Grand Scheme? Keeping him out is rather hazardous to both the people saying, "No!" and to others' political plans for the future.

It seems to me that for a country with a history like Afghanistan's, the only way you won't have a bunch of bloody-handed leaders is to have a couple of generations' worth of peaceful times. It's much like our Mafia, where the grandchildren of rum-running thugs go to Yale or Harvard and get elected to the Congress or run a legitimate business...

:), 'Rat


First, if there is evidence of these men committing these heinous crimes (rapes and executions, for lords sake), THEY SHOULD BE IN PRISON!!

IF, and thats a BIG if, they ever get out of prison, then maybe they should be able to run for office. But the system should be something like it is here: certain levels of crimes should be enough to disqualify you from public office. The fact that these men aren't in prison, but rather are free and on the ballots shows a pretty big failure in the current system, IMO.

Lets put it this way: I bet a lot of Iraqi's would want to vote for Saddam if given the opportunity. Why won't Saddam be on the ballot in the upcoming elections?

Makes you think, no?

Taft

[blackfox]

While outrage to these acts is natural, I beleive it belies a fundamental misunderstanding of Afghani character.

The majority of Afghanis are Pathan (one half) and Pathans are the largest existent tribal society in the world. They live by a midieval code of honor called Pukhtunwali and have given Afghanistan all it's Kings and Political Rulers (Karzai is a direct-decendent of Afghani royalty). Curiously, many beleive that the Pathans are decendents of the Israelite King Saul. There culture is w/o political pretension and affectation, free of subtlety and introspection as well as adhering to both chivalry, primitiveness and tribal disorder and recklessness. It is this character that defeated a technologically superior invader (soviets), and also found itself unable to organize it self to rule post-invasion. The mujahidin lacked rhetoric or ideology or a supreme leader for such consolidation.

Afghanis are not fundamentalists in a political sense, becuase they have never had and invasion of Western Culture to revolt against. They had no complexes about the modern world, since they had never clashed with it (until the Soviets). They had no real politics. They are essentially simple ornery mountain folk, whose religion and culture are inseperable from the harsh lonely mountain existence they have lived for centuries.

Women are oppressed in many Muslim societies. Among Pathans (at least rural) they simply don't exist. For illustration, here are three Pathan proverbs:
" Women have no noses, they will eat sh**."
"One's own mother and sister are disgusting"
" Women belong in the house or in the grave."

A Pathan will not tell you the name of his wife and/or mother. To ask is an insult. It would be analgous to asking him to undress in front of a crowd. Women are a private matter.

Women are both an intimate secret and a source of shame. This is because women threaten the facade of splendid male isolation that is essential to a Pathan's sense of self.

It is not a question of of any pathology in the Pathan's ability to maintain relationships, but that for centuries they have inhabited a world of men, where masculinity was derived fome bravery, the ability to endure pain and the length of one's beard. Either you were a man or you weren't. PAthans have no tolerance for ambiguities of other cultures, as life in such barren, sterile and impossible conditions, both physically and culturally, made that impossible. Friendships between men took on archetypal qualities.

Anyways, my point is the character of the Afghani is utterly foreign to western sensibilities, and is roughly analgous to looking at tribal cultures in Africa, who also commit great (or greater) atrocities. The difference, of course, is that they are not seen as atrocities by those commiting them, as they adhere to a tribal ethos that has often existed for generations, if not Centuries. So, while obviously, regrettable, any solution to this problem requires more than the juxtaposition of western value-judgements and punishments, as they would be misunderstood and problematic to any pragmatic solution.

There is also the meddling of Pakistan and the importation of more ideologically extreme Islam into Afghanistan (like the taliban) for political purposes, but I have already written too much. Suffice to say, Afghanistan has existed with it's isolated system of informal, tribal, feudal governance for Centuries, and is likely to continue that way.

Just food for thought, please draw your own conclusions...

[skunk]

Thank you for a very informed and informative exposition. I especially liked: "Friendships between men took on archetypal qualities": it's a wonderfully resonant statement, but I'm still trying to work out exactly what you meant!
;)

[blackfox]

Thank you for a very informed and informative exposition. I especially liked: "Friendships between men took on archetypal qualities": it's a wonderfully resonant statement, but I'm still trying to work out exactly what you meant!
;)sorry. Typical me...long on exposition, short on point. I just wanted to point out the unique character of Afghani Culture to provide a more accurate prism in viewing activities over there. In a Culture so male-dominated and tribal, it is not surprising that:
a. Things like this happen
b. That most Afghanis don't care

This goes to prove the larger point of the fallacy of our (US) efforts to export "freedom,liberty and democracy". It's like putting a street kid from Lagos on a Debate team...it may seem like a good idea to us, and make us feel better about ourselves, but it doesn't mask the fact that the kid is both unprepared and probably doesn't want to be there in the first place. To take it one step further, you may do him a diservice by highlighting his obvious incapacity for the task, which may make him resent both the endeavor and those who brought him to it.

[Desertrat]

Thanks, blackfox. Very helpful.

Odd how cultures can be so different, in similar physical circumstances. In the western U.S. during the post-Civil War era, living conditions were pretty doggoned harsh and difficult. Yet, women on our frontier were pretty much revered. Even the worst bad guys rarely got out of line when women were around.

'Rat

[skunk]

Yet, women on our frontier were pretty much revered. Even the worst bad guys rarely got out of line when women were around.
Are you sure about that?

[mactastic]

Didn't you know rape is a relatively new crime? Didn't exist back in the good old days when women were revered. In fact, they were revered so much that they were disallowed from voting as their opinion was too valuable to have it count for something.:p

Nevertheless, I think I know what 'Rat was trying to say about the lack in the current generation of the importance of behaving differently around women. Different culture, different time.