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HRW Blames Pakistan, Russia and Iran for Afghan Conflict
NEW YORK, July 13 (News Agencies) - The international human rights advocacy organization, Human Rights Watch (HRW), blamed Pakistan, Iran and Russia for the ongoing Afghan conflict in a 55-page report released Thursday in New York.
The report also called on the United Nations Security Council to impose a comprehensive arms embargo against all warring factions in Afghanistan.
The report, entitled, "Crisis of Impunity: The Role of Pakistan, Russia, and Iran in Fueling the Civil War in Afghanistan," said that the three nations, along with several others in the region, have been providing military support to the various Afghan groups, which it claimed have a long record of committing gross human rights violations.
The report, based on research conducted by HRW over a period of two years, documents the types of military support provided to warring factions, the major transit routes for the shipment of arms and other military equipment, the suppliers, the role of state and non-state actors in the conflict, and the response of the international community.
The report called for a comprehensive embargo on military assistance and said that effective enforcement measures must be carefully formulated to guarantee that a two-sided embargo would not benefit one side to the detriment of the other - the Taliban at the expense of the United Front or vice versa.
It added that for geographical and other reasons, it was easier to enforce such an embargo against the United Front, than the Taliban. It said that the lifting of an embargo should be based on concrete steps by all warring parties to stop human rights violations and bring the perpetrators of crime to justice.
Joost R. Hiltermann, executive director of the arms division of Human Rights Watch, said, "The civil war in Afghanistan has been absolutely disastrous for civilians. An arms embargo is the only way to stop the human rights violations they have suffered."
The report claims that all major factions in the conflict have been guilty of serious violations of international law including killings, indiscriminate aerial bombardment, direct attacks on civilians, persecution on the basis of religion and the use of antipersonnel landmines.
Meanwhile, the United Nations has asked the Taliban to improve living conditions of women in Afghanistan. A U.N. spokesman in Islamabad said, "On the one hand, the country is deficient in health facilities for women, while on the other, the Taliban rulers do not allow male doctors to treat female patients."
"Afghanistan, which is bigger than France in terms of area, has very few clinics," News Network International quoted him as saying.
Oliver Brasser, a local representative of the Budget for World Census, said that consecutive and unabated efforts should be made to convince the Taliban to concede on the issue. "We should discuss the issue again and again to find ways of resolving the problems," he said.
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