[Those and other attacks have galvanized the Hazaras. They have
staged daily protests in Kabul, and blocked Parliament with demonstrators who
stood and held empty bowls, to signify their unsuccessful effort to beg the
government for help. A logo with the number 31 has become ubiquitous in
displays here. Poetry and street theater are regular features at their protest
tents, pitched in three places around Kabul and drawing frequent coverage on
local television stations.]
 |
|
Activists
and relatives of abducted Hazaras gathered this week in Kabul, Afghanistan,
as part of a protest against government inaction. CreditBryan Denton for
The New York Times
|
KABUL, Afghanistan — A wave of kidnappings followed by numerous beheadings of members of Afghanistan’s Hazara ethnic group have spread alarm and anger among a people who have historically been this country’s most persecuted.
The police in Ghazni Province on Sunday confirmed that four
Hazara farmers who had been kidnapped by the Taliban had been found beheaded in Ajristan
District. Another six Hazaras from Daikundi Province who had been kidnapped by
unknown assailants were also found dead, dumped in Ajristan District, less than
a week after their families began searching for them, officials confirmed on
Monday. Although the police have not yet recovered the bodies, local reports
said they, too, had been beheaded.
Beheading is not normally a Taliban tactic, but the insurgents
seem to be trying to make an ugly example of the Hazaras, in what is seen by
some as a bid for attention.
“The Taliban are trying to send out a new message that they are
similar in their brutality to ISIS,” said Shahgul Rezaye, a Hazara member of
Parliament, referring to Islamic State extremists from Iraq and Syria, who have
reportedly been trying to recruit supporters in Afghanistan. “They’re
trying to show they are as bad as ISIS.”
In what may prove to be the worst single episode, insurgents
stopped a bus in Zabul Province in February, separated out the 31 Hazaras and
took them away, releasing those from other ethnic groups. The victims have not
been seen or heard from since.
Those and other attacks have galvanized the Hazaras. They have
staged daily protests in Kabul, and blocked Parliament with demonstrators who
stood and held empty bowls, to signify their unsuccessful effort to beg the
government for help. A logo with the number 31 has become ubiquitous in
displays here. Poetry and street theater are regular features at their protest
tents, pitched in three places around Kabul and drawing frequent coverage on
local television stations.
Responding to the public pressure, President Ashraf Ghani
invited relatives of the 31 missing men to attend his weekly national security
council meeting last Wednesday, but they left dissatisfied.
“He said, ‘Only God knows where they are, so only God can help
them,’” said Zia Sahil, a Hazara activist who said the families viewed the
president’s answer as inadequate. “It doesn’t answer why it took the government
48 days to come to the families and ask for descriptions of those who are
missing.”
Afghanistan’s Hazara minority makes up between 5 percent and 10
percent of the population. They have long been derided by other Afghans as
outsiders because they are thought to be descendants of Genghis Khan’s Mongol
invaders, who subjugated Afghanistan in the 13th century. Hazaras had long been
excluded from government jobs and education, and once were mostly concentrated
in the remote mountains of central Afghanistan, in an area known as Hazarajat.
But the Hazaras prospered after the American invasion, with many
migrating to Kabul and sending their young people, including girls, to school
in much greater numbers than any other group.
Much of Hazarajat has escaped the warfare that has engulfed the
rest of the country, which also helped the Hazaras to prosper. “In 13 years,
there has never been one single Hazara suicide bomber,” Mr. Sahil said.
Often working or studying far from their Hazarajat homes, the
Hazaras have had to travel long distances on dangerous roads to visit family
members, making the recent attacks all the more disturbing for them. All of the
attacks have been carried out against Hazara travelers, especially as they have
passed through Pashtun areas where Taliban insurgents are prevalent.
That was what made the case of the 31 missing men so worrisome.
The insurgents stopped three buses that passed within an hour on the country’s
major highway, known as the ring road or Highway 1, as it runs through Zabul
Province north of Kandahar.
The men’s abductors culled the Hazaras from Pashtuns and others,
according to witnesses who were allowed to leave, and stuffed them into cars
and drove them away. What most infuriated their families, however, were claims
that the kidnappings took place on a stretch of highway between two government
check posts that were so close by that the security forces must have seen what
was happening to the bus passengers.
“They said they couldn’t do anything to intervene because it was
not their responsibility,” said Murtaza Farjad, 24, another Hazara activist in
Kabul.
Since then, there has been no claim of responsibility for the
kidnappings, no ransom demands, and no word on the victims’ fates. Most of them
were Hazara laborers who had gone to Iran to find work and been deported, which
frequently happens to Afghans there.
Mr. Farjad, a college graduate with a degree in diplomacy, has
not been home to see his family in Ghazni in two years, which is typical of
many of Kabul’s Hazaras. “Hazaras cannot travel from Kabul to Behsood in Wardak
Province,” he said, “Even 35 minutes out of the city, it’s not safe for us.” He
was describing a journey to a Hazara area in the province adjoining the
capital.
“It has become a crime to be a Hazara in Afghanistan,” Mr. Sahil
said.
Ms. Rezaye said Hazara leaders have felt that the improvement in
their circumstances in recent years has suddenly begun dissipating.That is
partly because of rising insecurity and the government crisis under Mr. Ghani;
there still is not a permanent defense minister, for instance, she said.
“These are operations against a specific ethnic group,” she
said. “They’re trying to incite ethnic issues in the country.”
In addition to the ethnic difference, Hazaras are mostly Shiite
Muslims, whereas the Taliban and most Afghans are Sunnis. Islamic State
fighters, as well as the Taliban, have often directly targeted Shiites, whom
they view as un-Islamic.
Some officials in Zabul believe that the kidnappers there may
have affiliated themselves with the Islamic State. Amanullah Kakar, a community
leader from the Khaki-Afghan District of Zabul Province where the abductions
took place, said that it was locally well known that the kidnappers were
followers of Mullah Abdullah Kakar, a former Taliban commander who has gone
over to the Islamic State.
The Islamic State claims Quranic justification for its campaign
of beheadings. Taliban followers in Badakhshan Province of northern Afghanistan
recently beheaded government soldiers, but the Taliban
released a statement on Tuesday criticizing the practice as un-Islamic.
The four Hazaras whose bodies were found beheaded in Ajristan
District on Sunday were all farmers, kidnapped on their way to buy sheep, said
Zaman Ali Hedayat, the governor of the district where the victims were from.
Mr. Hedayat said the men were initially kidnapped by the Taliban
as a potential exchange for six Taliban insurgents taken prisoner by the
government. Tribal mediators thought they had a deal to swap them all, but then
the men’s bodies were found.
Whoever is responsible for the attacks, other ethnic groups
should be just as worried by the new tactics being used against Hazaras, said
Hussain Noori, a prominent Shiite imam.
“Such acts are not in the interest of any ethnic group,” he
said. “They’re just trying to create sectarian problems between the Shiites and
Sunnis in the country.”
Mujib Mashal
contributed reporting from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan.
