People living on the front line of a major US-led offensive against Taliban militants in southern Afghanistan are trapped in their homes with little access to food and health care, rights groups say.
Hundreds more who fled the area before fighting began over a week ago are receiving little help in harsh winter conditions, they said.
“We are seriously worried about the safety of civilians, especially in the Marjah area,” said Ajmal Samadi, head of the independent group Afghan Rights Monitor.
PHOTO: AFP
“People who are ill cannot get to hospitals, and others cannot bring them medicines. They cannot get food, or even go outside to look after their farms,” he said.
He said food prices were rising due to the assault and people with medical needs — from war wounds to pregnancy — were largely unable to get treatment.
The assault on the Marjah and Nad Ali districts of Helmand Province launched on Feb. 13 is being held up by snipers and innumerable crude bombs planted by Taliban fighters, commanders say.
The aim of the operation, dubbed Mushtarak (Together), is to drive Taliban from the area in the central Helmand River valley, where they have held sway with drug traffickers for at least two years.
The Afghan government aims to re-establish sovereignty, then provide security, clinics, schools and jobs.
Mushtarak is a test of US President Barack Obama’s new counter-insurgency strategy, aimed at winning the trust of the population and neutralizing the Taliban.
NATO and Afghan leaders have said they hatched the assault in close cooperation with each other so the military phase can be immediately followed by the establishment of civil administration and services.
But Norine MacDonald, president of London-based think tank the International Council for Security and Development, which has an office in the provincial capital Lashkar Gah, said planners had paid little regard to civilian wellbeing.
“The forward planning we heard so much about did not include ensuring that the local population would be able to leave and live elsewhere in decent conditions, with access to food and medical care,” she said.
More than 2,800 families — averaging about five members each — had been displaced before and during the fighting, said Abdul Rahman Hutaki, head of the Human Rights and Environment Organization, an independent Afghan group.
“Conditions for the displaced are deteriorating and sufficient assistance is not getting through,” he said.
Provincial authorities say 2,000 displaced families are in Lashkar Gah, receiving help from Afghan and international charities.
But Marjah resident Ahmad Jan, speaking by telephone, said: “Since I came to Lashkar Gah, I haven’t received any assistance.”
Ghulam Farooq Noorzai, Helmand’s director for refugees’ affairs, said food and winter clothing had been given to 1,400 families.
The 200km² target zone has been strewn with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) — on roads, in fields, hanging from trees, even plastered into the walls of homes, commanders say.
Marjah resident Abdul Ghias, 53, said by telephone the IEDs made it impossible to move in or out of the township, adding: “Most people cannot get hold of medicine or food, and people cannot work in their farms.”
NATO commanders say it could be another three weeks before the area is under control as fighting between militants and the 15,000-strong force of US Marines, NATO and Afghan troops is proving “difficult.”
In the meantime, people caught in crossfire, shot as Taliban human shields, or injured by bombs face difficulties getting treatment.
The International Committee of the Red Cross says it has the only medical facility in Marjah, a first aid station manned by five people.
Lashkar Gah, where there are two hospitals, is 20km away by the shortest route, said Bijan Farnoudi, Red Cross spokesman in Kabul.
But the roads are so heavily mined, few are willing to make the journey and alternative routes can take up to seven hours.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion