Dispatches from Afghanistan
Mike Skinner saw a need to make contact with Afghan people, whose voices have been muted in mainstream media coverage of Canada’s mission in Afghanistan.
MIKE SKINNER
THE MCGILL DAILY (MCGILL UNIVERSITY)
MONTREAL (CUP) — With the next federal election looming, Skinner, an activist and University of York PhD candidate, joined Hamayon Rastgar, an Afghan-Canadian and York undergraduate, as part of the Afghanistan-Canada Research Group. They travelled to Afghanistan this summer to listen to Afghan activists, workers, students, and war refugees, and bring their stories back to Canada.
Thursday, June 14I land in Kabul, Afghanistan, in the morning. The plane’s passengers are a mix of Afghans, American military contractors, and a few journalists. Before alighting onto the tarmac, I watch two television journalists fearfully don their Kevlar flak jackets and battle helmets. Everyone else watches them with bemused wonderment — the fierce fighting is elsewhere, south of Kandahar, not in Kabul.
After meeting my project partner Hamayon at the airport, we head to our hotel, in the poor part of Kabul where most foreigners do not venture. As much as I have prepared myself for the devastation of the city, it’s still an emotional shock to see it in this state.
On-and-off for three decades, Kabul has seen artillery and rocket attacks and street-to-street warfare. The Red Cross estimates that by the mid ’90s 80 per cent of the city was destroyed. Little has been rebuilt since the NATO invasion in 2001. In our hotel’s area, damaged buildings provide the architectural backdrop for the occasional fully intact building, like the hotel. Even these are decorated with bullet holes and dust.
It’s as if the dust of war has never settled in this city, it’s picked up and blown by a slight breeze, invading everything. The laptop, glasses, and shirts I laid out in my hotel room last night were covered with a layer of dust when I woke this morning.
Friday, June 15Friday is a day of rest. Hamayon and I take a break and travel a short distance outside the city to Kargha Lake, the reservoir providing water for Kabul. The road is lined with vehicles, pedestrians, and bicycles. A popular weekend destination, Kargha Lake is one of the few places where ordinary Kabulis can find respite from the city.
The lake is surrounded with colourful tents filled with families enjoying picnic lunches. We spend the afternoon in a large tent that serves as a tea-house, talking with a small group of young men in their twenties and thirties. The discussion quickly turns to politics.
None of these young men are Muslim. They are secular and certainly do not fit the stereotypes portrayed in the North American media of radical Islamic fundamentalists. Articulate and well-informed about global affairs, they represent the diverse ethnicities of Afghanistan.
Most of all, these young men are full of piss and vinegar — they say they want to fight what they regard as the occupation of their country by NATO, and overthrow the puppet regime of Hamid Karzai. One of the young men tells me what he witnessed just the day before.
Crossing the street during a traffic jam in Kabul, he saw a man he identified as an American in civilian clothes get out of one of the cars with a large gun. The American put the gun to the head of the driver of the car in front and yelled at him to move the car aside. As each car made way, the American proceeded along the line of traffic in the same manner, clearing a path for his own driver.
Saturday, June 16The first day of the workweek — Saturday — begins with a bang. We spot the distinct mushroom cloud of an explosion about two kilometers in length along the highway towards Kandahar. Seconds later the concussion of the blast hits our building with a thud. The highway is quickly sealed off and a steady stream of emergency vehicles confirms there must be numerous injuries.
News of the explosion reaches the street quickly, and as we proceed to our morning meeting other riders on the bus mention what they’ve heard. A convoy of the International Security Assisance Force (ISAF) — the occupying NATO troops — has been hit by a remotely activated bomb, killing one soldier. The ISAF troops immediately fire indiscriminately into the crowd of morning commuters, killing eight civilians.
Sunday, June 17
For the second day in a row, a bomb interrupts our breakfast. Today it is
downtown — too far away for us to hear, but one of Hamayon’s cousins
calls to tell him. The target was a police academy bus. News reports state
that a remote controlled bomb on the bus killed 30 to 35 police cadets, but
the word on the street is that there may have been more.
I immediately think of a friendly young American I spent several hours chatting with, while stuck in line waiting for the Kabul plane at the Dubai airport. He told me he had been a graduate student in 2001 — but after Sept. 11, 2001, he enlisted in the army out of a sense of duty. A tour in Afghanistan made him realize his error, and he took the first opportunity to discharge.
But later, an offer of employment from a friend who worked for military contractor DynCorp was too good to refuse. He found himself back in Afghanistan, this time training police cadets. I asked him if he had any police training himself, and he admitted he had none. But being young, single, and smart, he could make great money in this country.
Such are the opportunities for Western mercenaries in Afghanistan.
Tuesday, June 19
Thelate news yesterday reported civilian deaths throughout Afghanistan. In
the south at least 60, and possibly as many as one hundred, civilians were
killed in the crossfire of a battle between NATO and Taliban forces. In the
east, seven young girls were killed in an American air attack on a mosque.
The local news reports that the American coalition air command failed to inform Afghan National ground forces of the attack. The Afghans claim the American air attack against the mosque — which was full of civilians — was without cause.
In the afternoon, we have an interview with Qasim Akhgar, a prominent intellectual and editor of one of Kabul’s daily newspapers. Visibly upset about the recent civilian deaths, Qasim tells us he initially supported the American-led invasion, but has since changed his mind. He resisted the Soviet occupation in the 1980s, and paid the price of prison time, and later exile. But now, he believes the occupation by the Western forces is worse than the Soviet occupation ever was. After almost six years of occupation, people are becoming increasingly frustrated by the lack of development.
According to Qasim, while the Soviets ensured that people were fed, provided with medical care and education, and built essential infrastructure and even some theatres, the current occupation has failed to meet minimal standards of care for the people. He tells us that the arrogance and lack of respect for the Afghan people shown by the occupation forces compounds the growing feelings of resentment.
After lunch, we set up our camera in a sidewalk café outside Kabul University, hoping to interview passersby. People crowd around, and the students and workers who stop to talk offer a wide range of opinions: some support the occupation, but qualify their support with regret for unavoidable civilian losses; a larger number of students and workers we speak to are opposed to the occupation. Some of them complain that the development aid promised has not materialized.
Others consider the situation an imperial occupation of Afghanistan aimed at controlling Afghanistan’s neighbours: China, Pakistan, and Iran, as well as Russia. A few have very personal reasons for wanting to see the Western forces out of Afghanistan: one young man tells us his friend was killed without reason by ISAF personnel.
Seeing no benefits for Afghans from the occupation, most people we interviewed want an end to the Western occupation despite the growing power of the Taliban in some regions of the country.
The general mood of anger and resentment against the occupying army is palpable.
Friday, June 22
Friends pick us up for a drive north of the city into Shamaly, in the Parwan
province. We stop for lunch at a restaurant with outdoor seating on the banks
of a rushing river. It would be an idyllic setting, if not for the skeletons
of Russian tanks sitting in the water, where they were ambushed while attempting
to ford the river years ago.
On our way into the restaurant we stop at a roadside kiosk to buy drinks to accompany lunch. German beer is prominently displayed in the window despite a supposed ban on alcohol. Under the counter is Chinese-brand “Johnnie Worker” vodka and Afghan hashish. Hamayon explains that “beer is tolerated, vodka is illegal, but hashish is beyond the law.”
Back in Kabul in the evening we sample our Johnnie Worker, the strangest vodka I have ever tasted. We have it with cucumber and mango — apparently a traditional accompaniment.
Sunday, June 24
Hamayon and I go to Kabul University today hoping to find women willing to
talk on-camera. We were unable to even meet any women on the street yesterday
when we filmed in the market of the Old City.
The gender segregation is hard to imagine. Even when visiting private homes, we have not met the women and girls of the family. They remain unseen, they are in the kitchen, preparing the food and cleaning, while the men socialize and boys deliver the food.
At the university, several women point out that while they have personally benefited since the occupation began, their privileged position is not typical.
Girls returning to school have been one of the main images of progress portrayed by the Afghan government, the international community, and much of the mainstream media. But there had been little change in women’s general situation, according to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), which receives funding from the World Bank and USAID.
Eighty-five per cent of Afghan women remain illiterate; there are twice as many schools for boys; and girls represent only three per cent of students, rarely being allowed to continue their education beyond the fifth or sixth grade.
Thursday, June 28
Our hotel is on the Kabul-Kandahar highway; despite reports that this road
was completed in 2004, the four-lane divided highway looks more like an abandoned
demolition site, with patches of pot-holed asphalt joining sections of dirt
road. Heavy rain has turned everything to mud, and vehicles are axle-deep
in water in the potholes.
I find it surprising that this highway remains in this condition, if for no other reason than that it poses a significant security risk for the ISAF convoys that regularly use it. At the best of times traffic crawls along at walking pace, as drivers are forced to zigzag across the road to avoid huge potholes.
The ISAF convoys bully their way through the streets, intimidating drivers into making way on the road. We have heard reports of large ISAF armoured personnel carriers purposely hitting other vehicles, and in some cases driving on top of cars and crushing them in order to get through traffic.
Apparently, the ISAF drivers are instructed not to stop, even in the case of injuries. One man told us an ISAF vehicle struck his friend as he rode his bicycle; he was left on the road to die.
Travelling through the city at dusk after the rain has stopped is surreal. Steam rises from the ground, and as fast as the mud dries, it turns again to dust to be picked up by the wind. The mist and dust illuminates the wreckage of the city, creating the most eerie sunset I have ever seen. As we drive back toward Koteh Sanghi, a rainbow appears in the sky; instead of the mythical pot of gold at its base, I see only destroyed buildings for miles.
Saturday, July 7
Today, the BBC reports that 35 civilians were killed in a village in East
Afghanistan by NATO-ISAF air attacks. Villagers were burying 10 people killed
in a previous attack when NATO-ISAF planes returned and killed another 25
people attending the funerals. An American military spokesperson claims the
civilian casualty figures are inflated.
Denials like this do not sit well with the Afghans we have met. Neither do the miserly compensation payments that are eventually paid for the lives of victims. Many people believe these payments are more insult than compensation.
Just last night, Hamayon told me about his experience as a young child in the 1980s, seeing his village bombed by Soviet planes. It was the day before Eid, the holiday that marks the end of Ramadan, and he was helping his aunt prepare food for the festival when they heard the planes approach. Bombs exploded near his home with deafening impact. The people of the village were terrified and confused, and ran from the village. The planes circled and dropped another salvo of bombs. While no homes were hit and no one was injured in Hamayon’s village, a family of 18 people was killed in a neighbouring village that night.
This is a different war; but it is the same terror. Terror is a classic counter-insurgency tactic used to dissuade occupied people from supporting insurgents. If they are not dissuaded by terror, the next step is to “encourage” the civilians to evacuate the area, so they cannot support the insurgents.
The Canadian Forces have allegedly adopted what some people claim is a “more humane” approach to counter-insurgency than aerial bombardment. A well-connected official from a non-governmental organization (NGO) tells us that when villagers are suspected of supporting insurgents, the Canadians announce that soldiers will arrive for an inspection and the villagers are ordered to evacuate. When the Canadian soldiers arrive in the empty village they do not search buildings and wells, because these might be booby-trapped. Instead, homes, other structures, and the wells are destroyed. Reportedly, Canada’s new Leopard tank fleet is very effective in carrying out these jobs. By the time the people can return to their devastated villages, their crops have likely died, because of the need for regular irrigation in the arid climate.
The NGO official questioned how Canadian officers could possibly be confused when these villagers “choose” to become refugees, instead of trying to rebuild their villages. He believes the Canadians seem oblivious to the life-threatening position these villagers are put in when their homes, wells, and sources for food and livelihoods are destroyed.
