The carnage of civilians in Afghanistan has worsened as the pro-US President, Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, struggles to find a path of peace talks with rebel Taliban leaders with Pakistan’s help.
Caught up in fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, the US seems to have left Ghani and his people to stew in their own mess.
The United Nations reported that 1,592 civilians died and 3,329 were injured in Afghanistan during the first half of 2015 and total casualties for the year are likely to be higher than the record numbers of 2014. This year’s first semester casualties were one percent more than the same period last year.
Over 90 per cent of civilian casualties resulted from ground attacks, improvised explosive devices, complex bomb and suicide attacks and assassinations.
Casualties among children rose by 13 per cent and of women by 23 per cent, revealing a disregard of who is killed in the attacks. The fight is morphing into wanton killing of civilians to create fear and turn ordinary citizens against Ghani’s democratically elected regime.
The deeper cause for concern is that killings are no longer part of a rebel war against government forces. Their goal seems to be pure attrition and creation of anti-government panic among civilians.
Ghani’s covert moves for peace talks with Taliban leaders earlier this year stalled partly because Pakistan is the intermediary. Its support seems to wax and wane according to its own political motives.
Finding reliable interlocutors is also difficult because the Afghan Taliban’s leadership is heavily splintered with infighting among factions. The Pakistani Taliban interferes often, reportedly under advice from Pakistan’s intelligence services (ISI).
Mullah Mohammed Omar, the fanatic supreme leader of most Afghan Taliban factions died two years ago but this was kept secret. The recent revelation caused factions to split openly into rival camps although Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour, an Omar deputy, was declared the new leader. Mullah Omar’s brother and son oppose him and a longtime confidant Tayeb Agha may have resigned last week as head of the Taliban’s political office in Qatar because of the rift.
However, Mullah Mansour seems to be open to Ghani’s peace talk overtures and was involved in the meetings organized by Pakistani officials in early July before Omar’s death was revealed. Discussions are underway currently to paper over the opposition to Mansour giving a slight ray of hope for further peace talks.
Critics allege that the powerful Haqqani faction of the Pakistani Taliban hoisted Mansour upwards with support from ISI and he got himself nominated at a conclave in Pakistan from which many senior Afghan Taliban leaders were absent.
The Afghan civil war has become more chaotic because American ground forces are no longer fighting anywhere in the country. Residual forces conduct only advisory and intelligence roles following the generalized withdrawal ordered by President Barack Obama in previous years.
Some in the US, Afghanistan and South Asia blame US withdrawal for the Taliban’s resurgence and higher civilian causalities inflicted by its fighters as well as a rag bag of warlord militias that Ghani has not been able to bring to heel.
“This report lays bare the heart-rending, prolonged suffering of civilians in Afghanistan, who continue to bear the brunt of the armed conflict and live in insecurity and uncertainty over whether a trip to a bank, a tailoring class, to a court room or a wedding party may be their last,” UN chief for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein reported.
More than 70 percent of the deaths and injuries resulted from attacks by Taliban terrorists and other anti-government militants.
Pro-Government Forces caused 16 per cent of civilian casualties, including one per cent from International Military Forces. Such casualties show a 60 percent increase over first semester 2014.