By Shadi Khan Saif
KABUL, Afghanistan (AA) – Afghan Vice-President Abdul Rashid Dostum has been accused by Human Rights Watch of allowing killings and rights abuses in northern Afghanistan.
Human Rights Watch said in a report published Sunday that fighters in Dostum’s Junbish militia had been involved in killing civilians and accused him of having a track record of brutality against opponents.
The group urged the Afghan government to prosecute militia members responsible for killing and other abuses in Afghanistan’s Faryab province in late June.
The 61-year old leader of the ethnic Uzbek minority has recently spearheaded a number of military operations against the Taliban in northern Afghanistan during which his fighters are accused of targeting civilians, mostly ethnic Pashtuns.
“The killings in Faryab are the latest in a long record of atrocities by Dostum’s militia forces,” Human Rights Watch’s senior Afghanistan researcher Patricia Gossman said in a statement. “The fact that these forces, and Vice-President Dostum himself, have never been held accountable, has undermined security in northern Afghanistan.”
The report noted an incident in late June when, after an anti-Taliban operation together with the army, Junbish fighters allegedly went into four villages attacking those they accused of supporting the Taliban, killing five and injuring 12.
