US Lashes Out at Afghanistan Freeing Taliban Insurgents
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fotokon/Thinkstoc(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. is infuriated with the Afghan government for ordering the release Monday of dozens of detainees who are described as “dangerous insurgents who have Afghan blood on their hands.”
The Afghan government has been saying for weeks that they intended to release 88 detainees, whose numbers are made up of Taliban commanders and insurgents. However, U.S. officials did not learn until Sunday that steps had been taken to actually release them. It is yet another indication of the collapsing relations between the U.S. and Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
In a statement Tuesday, the U.S. Forces-Afghanistan (USFOR-A) said the release of 37 of the 88 detainees is “a major step backward in further developing the rule of law in Afghanistan.”
Karzai has previously explained that there was no evidence of wrongdoing against most of the prisoners at Parwan Detention Facility while insufficient evidence was turned up against the rest.
But according to the USFOR-A statement, there is “strong evidence of violations of Afghan law or strong investigative leads requiring review by the Saranwal for prosecution or further investigation by the National Directorate of Security.”
“These are bad guys,” Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman told reporters Monday. “These are individuals with blood on their hands, both U.S., coalition and Afghan blood on their hands.”
The USFOR-A statement provided details to that effect saying that 40 percent of the 88 detainees had participated in direct attacks that wounded or killed 57 Afghan citizens and that 30 percent of them had carried out similar attacks that had wounded or killed 60 U.S. or coalition troops. USFOR-A said it had provided this information to the Afghan government for their consideration.
Some suspect there is more to Karzai’s motives, such as trying to gain favor with the Taliban, which has so far refused to negotiate any peace deal with his government.
It’s also alleged that Karzai is deliberately trying to upset the U.S. as it gets closer for American and coalition forces to withdraw from Afghanistan while refusing to sign the Bilateral Security Agreement.
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