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Afghan war crimes suspect says he is a victim of mistaken identity
A 76-year-old Afghan man accused of being the commander of the Pul-e-Charkhi prison in Kabul in the 1980s, where he allegedly abused political opponents, on Wednesday told The Hague court it was a case of mistaken identity.
“I am not the person that you are talking about,” the suspect, who said he did not remember his own name but was identified in court as Abdul Rafief, told judges.
According to the charges summarized by the judges, Rafief is accused of living in the Netherlands under a false name and that he is actually Abdul Razaq Arif who served as commander of the Pul-e-Charki prison between 1983 and 1990, Reuters reported.
Afghanistan’s Soviet-backed government was fighting a guerrilla war against mujahideen at the time, following the Soviet invasion in 1979.
Prosecutors say Rafief was responsible for political prisoners in the jail, who were allegedly held in inhumane conditions in the facility. Guards under his command allegedly beat, tortured and executed prisoners, Reuters reported.
During the hearing Rafief referred all questions from the judges about his identity to his lawyers and said he was ill, dizzy and could not remember anything.
Rafief came to the Netherlands seeking asylum in 2001 and has become a Dutch national. He is being tried under “universal jurisdiction” principles, which say suspected war crimes and crimes against humanity can be prosecuted abroad if they cannot be tried in the country where they were allegedly committed.
The Netherlands has already successfully tried three high ranking officials of the Afghan military intelligence service for similar crimes in the same period in Afghanistan.
The German Federal Police are investigating several Afghans who entered the country with a promise of admission for possible document fraud.
Preliminary investigations have been launched in eight cases for document fraud, the authorities said on Thursday evening. The cases mainly involve forged or falsified documents, DPA reported.
A plane chartered by the German government carrying 138 Afghan nationals granted admission to Germany touched down in the eastern city of Leipzig on Wednesday evening.
The plane took off from Pakistan’s capital Islamabad.
“We can confirm that the particularly endangered persons from Afghanistan who arrived yesterday from Pakistan have been subjected to entry checks and that preliminary investigations have been initiated,” a spokesman for the Federal Ministry of the Interior told the German tabloid Bild.
Four people were killed after the car they were travelling in collided with a truck in Afghanistan’s central Maidan Wardak province on Thursday night, local authorities said.
The incident happened on Kabul-Kandahar highway in Sayedabad district of Maidan Wardak, provincial police said in a statement.
All four people in the car were killed in the incident, it said.
Zabihullah Hakimi, spokesman for police in northern Takhar province, was also among the dead.
An Afghan teenager accused of taking part in an Oklahoma plot to carry out an Election Day attack has pleaded guilty, federal prosecutors said Thursday.
Abdullah Haji Zada, 18, a citizen of Afghanistan who was living in Moore, Oklahoma, pleaded guilty to knowingly receiving and conspiring to receive a firearm and ammunition to be used in a terrorist attack, court records show, the Associated Press reported.
Zada, who was 17 at the time of his arrest, is awaiting sentencing and faces up to 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Zada also agreed to be removed from the United States after he is released from prison, court records show.
Telephone and email messages left on Thursday with Zada’s attorney, Jeff Byers, were not immediately returned.
Zada’s co-defendant, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, 27, who previously worked as a security guard for an American military installation in Afghanistan, is currently awaiting trial for conspiring and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group.
Prosecutors allege Zada and Tawhedi took steps to obtain AK-47 rifles and ammunition and planned to carry out an attack targeting large crowds on Election Day last year.
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