[Family members of the victims,
who were all from neighboring Ghazni Province and were abducted while they were
traveling, said they planned to bring the bodies to Kabul to protest what they
saw as the government’s lack of response to a problem that is becoming chronic.]
a
 |
The bodies of
Hazara civilians, reportedly killed by Islamic State militants in
Credit Sayed
Mustafa/European Pressphoto Agency
|
The Taliban had sent hundreds of extra fighters to
the area to battle the Islamic State breakaways and another splinter group
there, according to local and security officials. They said the bodies of the
Hazaras were found on Saturday after the Taliban had pushed back the Islamic
State militants and a group of allied former Taliban dissidents.
Although
the Islamic State factions operating
in Afghanistan have
appeared to have few, if any, operational links with the main jihadist
organization in Syria and Iraq, the groups’ increasing numbers and violence
have further confused the country’s insurgent situation. Security officials say
that a leadership crisis within the
main Afghan Taliban group
over the past year added momentum and manpower to the Islamic State breakaways
and gave birth to other splinter insurgent groups.
Rather than illustrating any major weakening of the Taliban,
however, security officials say the splinter groups’ expansion has mostly raised the danger for
Afghan civilians and pointed out the increased weakness of the Afghan
government and its security forces. Even as the insurgent infighting has
intensified, the main Taliban group has successfully seized new territory from the government, particularly in
the country’s north and south.
The beheaded Hazara hostages belonged to one of several groups
of travelers captured by Islamic State militants more than a month ago and were
being held in the Arghandab district in Zabul Province
Two children were among the seven beheaded hostages, local
officials said.
“Their throats had been cut with metal wire,” said Hajji Atta Jan,
the head of the Zabul provincial council.
Afghanistan’s
Hazara minority has long faced persecution, especially by the Taliban, and
there has been an upswing in abductions and violence against them this year. At
least 19 more Hazaras are said to still be held by militants in Zabul, said
Abdul Qayoum Sajjadi, a lawmaker who recently traveled to the province to try
to broker the Hazaras’ release.
President Ashraf Ghani, describing the beheadings as “heartless
killing of innocent individuals,” ordered his security officials to pursue the
attackers. But it was clear that the order meant little on the ground; Afghan
forces were nowhere in the vicinity of the district where the beheadings
happened, officials said.
Family members of the victims, who were all from neighboring
Ghazni Province and were abducted while they were traveling, said they planned
to bring the bodies to Kabul to protest what they saw as the government’s lack
of response to a problem that is becoming chronic.
Officials in Zabul Province said the local cell of the Islamic
State, also known as ISIS or
ISIL , had recently allied with
another breakaway Taliban faction that is challenging the Taliban’s new supreme
leader, Mullah Akhtar Muhammad
Mansour.
Just last week, the breakaway Taliban faction formally announced
in a gathering in Farah Province that it did not accept Mullah Mansour as the
successor to Mullah Muhammad Omar, whose death two years ago was
revealed in July.
The group said it was rallying
around a new leader, Mullah Muhammad Rasool, a former member of the Taliban
movement’s ruling council. His deputy, Mullah Mansour Dadullah, has been
operating out of the Khak-e-Afghan district in Zabul.
“The reason we split from Mansour’s self-proclaimed kingdom was
that he is the real murderer of Mullah Omar and some high-ranking Taliban
during the 14 years of struggle,” Mullah Rasool said in a phone interview. His
faction believes that Mullah Omar did not die a natural death, as the group
announced, but was killed by Mullah Mansour. “We will bring Mansour before
justice soon.”
In response, Mullah Mansour
sent as many as 450 fighters to crush the dissident Mullah Dadullah as well as
the Islamic State elements in Zabul, according to Afghan security officials and
local officials.
“Fighting between Mullah Mansour and Mullah Dadullah is ongoing
in three districts of Zabul,” said Hajji Momand Nasratyar, the district
governor of Arghandab. “Mansour is beating Dadullah and I.S. very hard — around
86 of I.S. and Dadullah’s men have been killed, and 26 of Mansour’s.”
The Taliban were also reported to have killed several of the
Islamic State militants said to be responsible for the beheadings, according to
a local official, though that account could not be confirmed more broadly.
Hajji Atta Jan, the Zabul provincial council chief, said the
offensive by Mullah Mansour’s fighters was so intense that by late Monday at
least three Islamic State commanders, all of them ethnic Uzbeks, had
surrendered and were asking their fighters to do the same. The condition the
Uzbek commanders had agreed on with Mullah Mansour, according to Mr. Jan, was
that they would not be handed over to Pakistan
Despite Mullah Mansour’s swift action against dissent, the
announcement of the breakaway faction seems to have rekindled doubts over his
leadership that most thought had been quelled by his delivering the Taliban
their biggest victory in 14 years, the capture of the northern city
of Kunduz in
September.
Still, the dissent has not deterred Taliban fighters from making
deep inroads against the government in the south as well, where intense
fighting has continued in Helmand Province Helmand provincial council.
The Taliban have also overrun
police and army bases in the Marja district,one of the centers of
President Obama’s 2010 troop surge, and were closing in on the
district governor’s compound. Airstrikes had to be called in on Saturday to
break the siege of security forces there, officials said.
Mujib
Mashal reported from Kabul Kandahar
