Afghan ex-soldiers at risk of being killed and tortured

The Afghan Veterans Support Council claims that hundreds of former Afghan Security and Defense Forces personnel have been killed under mysterious circumstances, disappeared and received death threats during nearly three years of Taliban rule, and now face the risk of extrajudicial killings, torture and detention by the Taliban.
The committee said in a statement on Sunday that the soldiers’ information was registered in the database of the former republic’s security agencies and was in the hands of the Taliban, which made it easier to identify them and where they lived.
Taliban spokesmen have repeatedly denied such claims.
However, a former soldier who did not want to be named in the report due to the sensitivity of the issue claimed to Radio Azadi that he had suffered various tortures in a Taliban prison some time ago.
“The seven months of suffering I endured are over, but the painful scene of it will hurt me forever, hurt me for the rest of my life, the pain is because you have not committed any crime, but you are oppressed and tortured to confess your sin. “Do it while you have not yet committed a crime. “

Concerns expressed about rising poverty and unemployment among veterans

The Afghan Veterans Support Committee said in a statement that veterans, especially Afghan female soldiers, face serious economic problems, poverty, unemployment and psychological issues caused by these pressures, as well as security threats.

The report also pointed out that some former soldiers who sought asylum in neighboring countries because they feared for their own and their families’ lives also faced many problems, including economic problems, poverty and the risk of deportation.
Former Pakistani military officer Lt. Col. Latifah Shojaei told RFE/RL:
“Unfortunately, most soldiers live here in secret, fearing that if they are deported they will be immediately identified on the other side of the border and even face the risk of being killed and imprisoned.”
The Afghan Veterans Support Committee called on the international community to put pressure on the Taliban to stop arresting, torturing, killing veterans and confiscating their property, and not to support the Taliban under the guise of fighting.

Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the Taliban government, did not respond to RFE/RL’s questions about the allegations but has previously denied such claims and asserted that the government would comply with the amnesty order at the behest of its leaders.
But the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said in January that the UN human rights department had documented cases of extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment of former Afghan officials and security forces during 2023.

In July 2023, UNAMA reported that it had documented more than 800 cases of human rights violations by the Taliban against military personnel and staff of the former republican regime, including 218 extrajudicial killings.
The Taliban’s spokesman at the time, Zabihullah Mujahid, denied the UNAMA report.
According to the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), former Afghan soldiers and security and defense forces number 350,000 and disbanded with the return of the Taliban in August 2021.