Connect with us

Latest News

Report blames Trump’s Administration for 330% increase in civilian casualties

Published

 on

(Last Updated On: December 8, 2020)

Outgoing President Donald Trump’s decision in 2017 to loosen military rules of engagement in Afghanistan that were meant to protect civilians was followed by a sharp increase in civilian deaths, a report released on Monday revealed.

The report by Brown University Watson Institute’s Costs of War Project, one of the premier authorities on civilian casualties in the 19-year-long war, found a 330 percent increase in the number of Afghan civilians killed by US-led airstrikes from 2016, the final year of the Barack Obama administration, to 2019.

Author of the report, Neta C. Crawford, said: “Some of this harm could be avoided by tighter rules of engagement, as well as better training. A negotiated ceasefire might also yield results at the bargaining table and at the same time avoid escalating harm to Afghan civilians from airstrikes.”

From 2007 to 2016, US-led and Afghan government forces killed an average of 582 civilians each year, the report found.

From 2017 to 2019, during Trump’s tenure, those same forces killed an average of 1,134 civilians each year, a nearly 95 percent increase.

The sharp increase in civilian deaths followed a decision by Trump, in consultation with former Defense Secretary James Mattis and other military and civilian officials, to relax rules of engagement in the Afghan war in order to give US commanders more battlefield flexibility and to gain leverage at the bargaining table with the Taliban.

“From 2017 through 2019, civilian deaths due to US and allied forces’ airstrikes in Afghanistan dramatically increased,” the report states.

“In 2019 airstrikes killed 700 civilians – more civilians than in any other year since the beginning of the war in 2001 and 2002. After the US and Taliban reached a peace agreement in late February 2020, US and other international air strikes declined, and so did the harm to civilians caused by those strikes.”

According to the United Nations, US-led and Afghan government airstrikes killed more civilians than did Taliban militant attacks during the first half of 2019.

The new report found that as US-led bombings declined following the agreement reached with the Taliban in February 2020, Afghan government airstrikes have increased.

“As a consequence, the Afghan Air Force (AAF) is harming more Afghan civilians than at any time in its history,” the report states.

“In the first six months of this year, the AAF killed 86 Afghan civilians and injured 103 civilians in airstrikes. That rate of harm nearly doubled in the next three months. Between July and the end of September, the Afghan Air Force killed 70 civilians and 90 civilians were injured.”

“As with the international airstrikes, some of this harm could be avoided by tighter rules of engagement, as well as better training,” the report states.
The report also highlights the fact that a reduction or even total withdrawal of US ground troops does not mean an end to war or civilian casualties, as most American combat is one-sided and takes place in the air.

The report also states that there were more weapons dropped from the air in 2018 and 2019 than at the height of US presence in Afghanistan in 2011.

According to the Costs of War Project report, more than 43,000 Afghan civilians have been killed during the 19-year US-led war.

While Taliban insurgents have killed the most civilians, thousands of men, women, and children have also been killed by US, allied, and Afghan government bombs and bullets, the report states.

Latest News

UN, aid agencies cut Afghanistan aid plan budget to $3.2 billion

Published

on

(Last Updated On: June 6, 2023)

The United Nations and humanitarian agencies have revised the budget for Afghanistan’s aid plan for 2023 to $3.2 billion, down from $4.6 billion earlier in the year, the UN humanitarian office said on Monday.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a statement that a “changing operating context” in the wake of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’s (IEA) restrictions on female aid workers had contributed to the revised plan, Reuters reported.

IEA authorities have issued several orders barring many Afghan female NGO and United Nations employees from being able to work, which aid agencies have warned would severely hamper delivery in the religiously conservative nation.

“The recent bans on Afghan women working for… NGOs and the U.N. have added yet another layer of complexity to what is already an incredibly challenging protection environment, and further constrained the operational capacity of partners,” the UN statement said.

Afghanistan remains one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, the statement added, with more than two-thirds of the population in need of humanitarian assistance.

Some humanitarian officials and diplomats have warned of a potential decline in funding to Afghanistan due to the IEA restrictions on female workers and donor governments assessing competing global crises and economic priorities.

It was not clear how much of the revised budget would be funded by foreign donors.

Global humanitarian appeals often fall short of the total amount requested. In 2022, the humanitarian response plan was budgeted at $4.4 billion and received around $3.2 billion. The UN says the number of people in need has grown since last year.

The United Nations’ development agency in April predicted Afghanistan’s economy would contract and inflation would rise if there were a 30% drop in aid.

Continue Reading

Latest News

Badakhshan’s deputy governor killed in car bomb

Published

on

(Last Updated On: June 6, 2023)

A car bomb in Afghanistan’s northern Badakhshan province on Tuesday morning, killed two people including the provincial deputy governor.

Six others were injured in the blast which happened around 8:15 am near the court building in the provincial capital, Faizabad, said Muezuddin Ahmadi, the provincial director of information and culture.

He said that the official was traveling in his car when the explosion happened.

The injured were taken to hospital for treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

Continue Reading

Latest News

NRC resumes operations in parts of Afghanistan with male and female staff

Published

on

(Last Updated On: June 5, 2023)

Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) announced on Sunday that the council has resumed humanitarian operations with “equal participation” of male and female staff in different regions of Afghanistan.

“I am glad to confirm that we have been able to resume most of our humanitarian operations in Kandahar as well as a number of other regions in Afghanistan,” Jan Egeland, Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council, tweeted.

Egeland further stated that: “All our work is for women & men, girls & boys alike, & with equal participation of our female & male humanitarian colleagues.”

The IEA has not yet commented on the NRC’s announcement.

This comes after Egeland said last month that key Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) officials told him in meetings that they are close to finalizing guidelines that will allow Afghan women to resume work at nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).

But they were unable to give a timeline or details when pressed, he said.

The IEA last December barred Afghan women from working at NGOs, allegedly because they were not wearing the hijab correctly and were not observing gender segregation rules.

In April, they extended the ban to UN offices and agencies in Afghanistan. There are exemptions in some sectors like health care and education.

In January, the IEA said they were working on guidelines for women to return to work at NGOs. They previously said they were working on guidelines so that girls and young women could return to education but these have yet to materialize.

During his visit to the country in May, Egeland hoped to persuade the IEA to reverse the ban on the organization’s female staff.

Egeland met the Kandahar deputy governor, Mawlawi Hayatullah Mubarak, who he described as having “direct contact with and links” to the IEA’s supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, who ordered the education and NGO bans. He also met the head of Kandahar’s Economy Directorate, Mawlawi Abdul Salam Baryali.

“The authorities in Kandahar have a special position since the emir (Akhundzada) sits in Kandahar,” he said at the time.

“Whatever agreement we can get in Kandahar can have a national impact. These guidelines are close to being finalized and should soon be put into effect that is what was conveyed.”

Egeland said he pressed the officials for a timeline and clarity on the word “soon” but they didn’t elaborate.

He was told the IEA couldn’t guarantee anything as everything needed to be put to the supreme leadership. They also told him they had been working on the NGO matter for months and that most issues have been resolved.

The guidelines are likely to cover dress codes, gender segregation in the workplace, and a chaperone for travel.

The Norwegian Refugee Council stood to lose 40% of its funding for Afghanistan because of the bans on female employment and education, he said.

He said the potential loss meant a 40% drop in the number of people reached.

The agency has also laid off 220 of its 1,500 workforce and closed five offices. But it retains male and female Afghan staff who have been unable to work because of the bans. The agency is not deploying male-only teams.

“I believe their promises,” he said last month of the IEA. “But I can only accept the facts.”

The IEA has repeatedly told senior humanitarian officials visiting Afghanistan since December that the NGO restrictions are temporary suspensions, not a ban.

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2022 Ariana News. All rights reserved!