[Peace-discuss] Fwd: the Mazar Massacre (fwd)

[Al Kagan]

>Delivered-To: akagan at alexia.lis.uiuc.edu
>Date: Mon, 3 Dec 2001 17:55:37 -0800 (PST)
>From: Gerardo Colmenar <colmenar at library.ucsb.edu>
>To: SRRT Action Council <srrtac-l at ala.org>
>Subject: [SRRTAC-L:7243] RE:[AAAS] the Mazar Massacre (fwd)
>Reply-To: srrtac-l at ala.org
>Sender: owner-srrtac-l at ala.org
>Status:  
>
>
>fyi
>
>gary
>
>  http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=2012523207
>
>                          SUNDAY, DECEMBER 02, 2001
>                              THE TIMES OF INDIA
>
>                  US 'hero' may have triggered Mazar revolt
>
>                               RASHMEE Z AHMED
>
>
>     LONDON: The United Nations has joined human rights groups in
>    demanding an urgent inquiry into the carnage at the Qala-i-Jhangi fort
>    near the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif, even as new
>    information is emerging about how it started and the two Pakistani
>    Taliban reported to be the last men alive in the fort, until the
>    violence finally subsided on Wednesday.
>
>    Even as the CIA saluted its slain colleague, the first American
>    fatality in Afghanistan, "American hero" Johnny Mike Spann, who died
>    in the prison revolt, British journalists in Mazar-i-Sharif have begun
>    reporting that Spann was less an innocent victim than the one who
>    allegedly provoked the riot.
>
>    With allegations of "war crimes" against the US and UK coming in thick
>    and fast for ignoring the Geneva Convention on the treatment of
>    prisoners of war, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
>    Commisioner, Mary Robinson, has echoed Kate Allen, director of the
>    London-based Amnesty International in calling for an urgent inquiry.
>    Amnesty has said it is willing to send an observer to Afghanistan to
>    monitor an inquiry.
>
>    On Wednesday night, the BBCs authoritative domestic television
>    programme Newsnight interviewed Oliver August, correspondent for The
>    Times, London, in Mazar-i-Sharif, who said that Spann and his CIA
>    colleague, Dave, were thought to have set off the violence by
>    aggressively interrogating foreign Taliban prisoners and asking, "Why
>    did you come to Afghanistan?". August said their questions were
>    answered by one prisoner jumping forward and announcing, "Were here to
>    kill you".
>
>    The Guardians Mazar-i-Sharif correspondent said the CIA "operatives
>    had apparently failed on entering the fort to observe the first rule
>    of espionage: keep a low profile".
>
>    The Timess August said Spann subsequently pulled his gun and his CIA
>    colleague shot three prisoners dead in cold blood before losing
>    control over the situation.
>
>    Spann was then "kicked, beaten and bitten to death," the journalists
>    said, in an account of the ferocity of the violence that lasted four
>    days, leaving more than 500 people dead and the fort littered with
>    "bodies, shrapnel and shell casings".
>
>    Meanwhile, graphic reports are appearing of two Pakistani Taliban
>    fighters final stand in the fort, alongside comments from the Northern
>    Alliance that the dead prisoners were the most hardline of Osama Bin
>    Ladens al-Qaeda recruits.
>
>    The revelations, which may be a public relations disaster in the
>    making for the Pakistani establishment, say that the two men, who
>    survived 72 hours of targeted American bombing and missile strikes,
>    were heard speaking Urdu.
>
>    Long after hundreds of their comrades were dead, according to one
>    newspaper, the pair, dressed in flimsy salwar-kameezes, remained
>    hidden in a deep basement in the fort and it took several rockets to
>    restore the fort to a "tomb-like silence".
>
>    In the aftermath of the bloodbath at Qala-I-Jhangi, the British press
>    has focussed on graphic images, including what they are calling the
>    blatant defiance of the rules of war. One photograph, plastered across
>    several papers, allegedly shows a Northern Alliance fighter using a
>    long metal spike to prise out a dead Taliban soldiers gold tooth. The
>    Independent newspaper sardonically headlined its report, "How our
>    Afghan Allies applied the Geneva Convention" in an indication that the
>    US-led, UK-backed coalition may now be doomed to launch urgent
>    rearguard action to quell public distaste about the conduct of Tony
>    Blairs "just war for a just cause".
>
>    Amnesty International has highlighted public concern by demanding an
>    investigation "into the proportionality of the response by the
>    Northern Alliance, US and UK forces".
>
>    In a statement released here, it said the enquiry "should make urgent
>    recommendations to ensure that other instances of surrender and
>    holding of prisoners do not lead to similar disorders and loss of
>    life".
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 


Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
Africana Unit, Room 328
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801, USA

tel. 217-333-6519
fax. 217-333-2214
e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu