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UN chief warns against atrocities

UN Human Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson yesterday urged Britain and the US to ensure that the ouster of the Taliban from Kabul by opposition forces does not end in a bloodbath.

Robinson also demanded that other nations involved in the military campaign share the responsibility for shielding civilians from marauding warlords and retaliatory massacres in Kabul and elsewhere in Afghanistan.

"A number of cities are changing hands from the Taliban to the Northern Alliance opposition forces," Robinson said, voicing her fears of a looming anarchy in the country she said had been "torn by 20 years of conflict and a drought."

"It is extremely important that the message should go out -- and I look particularly to the US and Britain and the countries that are involved in the military strategy to make it very clear that there will be no toleration of massacres, of rapes and abuse of civilians."

"If it happens, there will be justice against the perpetrators. In other words there will be no longer impunity. My office is in the process of mapping out just how bad the situation has been in Afghanistan," she said.

She spoke of a bloody massacre carried out by the Taliban militia in January and a reported copycat bloodbath by the opposing forces of the Northern Alliance later in the year.

"Both the Taliban and the Northern Alliance have abused and massacred and created total human rights violations against civilians in Afghanistan.

"There have been some leaders of the Northern Alliance who have very bad human rights records," Robinson said.

Robinson also said the UN has recently received reports that humanitarian aid had been looted in Kabul following the march of opposition forces into the capital of the war-torn country.

"There have already been some reports of looting of humanitarian aid and there is a fear that the situation could turn worse. That would be tragic for the entire civilian population," Robinson said.
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