Oh, Extortion, Drug Abuse, Rape, Drug Trafficking...?
Totally unanticipated data erupting here and there. Putting the lie, as it were, to administration assurances that all is well and becoming even more optimistic as time draws ever nearer to the significant date of 2014, marking departure time for NATO troops from Afghanistan.A recruitment drive backed by a U.S. program to enlist rural Afghans in some units of the police appears to have come a cropper. The discovery being revealed that some of those units are deeply involved in criminal activities, including bribe-taking and extortion.
A study funded by the Pentagon came to that conclusion. A simple enquiry among the Afghan populace might have reached the same conclusion, less expensively.
While U.S. commanders are on record as claiming the 13,000-member Afghan Local Police represent a vital, homegrown defence force in Taliban-led insurgency areas, the study results quite contradicts official American claims that Afghan police actions have been laudably responsible for driving down the frequency of Taliban attacks.
The study revealed that one in five U.S. special operations teams whose job it is to advise the local police units lodged complaints that those units had committed violence or abused civilians. Again, any civilian Afghan enquiries would have resulted in that very same conclusion, Afghan civilians being happy to testify against the detested Afghan police.
In fact, some U.S. troops were reported to have made accusations against the Afghan police of drug abuse, bribe-taking, rape and drug trafficking. The rapes in question inclusive of violent rapes against young Afghan boys, a common enough occurrence in that country. Well known to be practised by the Afghan police.
As for the Afghan authorities themselves, they are hardly surprised at the conclusions reached in the report. They too, could have, if questioned, delivered the very same diagnosis. Afghan officials describe the local police forces as fundamentally poorly lead.
A situation that allows them to casually practise extortion, and harassment of Afghan villagers. A prescription for a solution to the program was, however, lacking in the revelatory study.
Labels: Afghanistan, Chaos, Conflict, Corruption, Crime, Political Realities
posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, May 16, 2012
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