Taliban Demand Investigation of U.S. for 'Violations of International Humanitarian Laws'

The Taliban has called for an international investigation into the human rights standards of the United States after the Senate Intelligence Committee Democrats released a lengthy report criticizing enhanced interrogation techniques used in the war on terror.

Under Taliban rule, Afghans were subject to public floggings or executions for “violations” such as women wearing nail polish or exposing any skin, or both teachers and students trying to learn in underground schools. Women had zero rights and weren’t allowed to leave their homes except with a male relative. Nowadays, the Taliban commits acts of violence against activist or working women, and the Pakistani Taliban shot Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai in 2012 while she was going to school.

“Since the inception of America’s occupation of Afghanistan, the Islamic Emirate has provided information to the international community regarding America’s barbarities and inhumane treatment of the Afghan populace. At the time, no nation dared listen to our nation’s pleas or show even slight response for fear of estranging America,” the Taliban said in a statement posted on the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan website over the weekend.

“Now after 14 years of such barbarities, the US Senate itself has lifted the curtain off of America’s intelligence arm, the CIA, and revealed the extent of their tortuous treatment of unarmed prisoners. In reality the practices of CIA mentioned in this report are only a fraction of those committed by this agency throughout America’s occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.”

The Taliban said they hope the full Senate report — last week’s release was the executive summary — “is released to the public for passing judgment.”

“It is hoped that the full report will provide a clearer picture of the extent of these crimes,” the group added.

“…Unfortunately America’s intelligence violations continue unabated to this day. Even today America and its intelligence arms continue to operate black prisons throughout their main centers in Afghanistan. These operatives continue to violate the basic rights of ordinary citizens, they carry out night raids on civilian homes, women and children are regularly held without charges, subject them to degrading treatment, carry out indiscriminate bombings, and subject ordinary Afghans to all forms of inhumane treatment.”

The Taliban claimed the U.S. has “planted chosen individuals inside Afghanistan’s intelligence agencies as well as the local police and warlords and use these individuals to commit unspoken barbarities including kidnappings, rape and torture.”

“We call on the international community as well as those international organizations that call themselves champions of human rights, to examine America’s ongoing policy in light of these human rights standards. These human rights abuses, especially violations of international humanitarian laws, continue to be committed by American installed agents in the Kabul regime. If these human rights organizations fail to stop these abuses and then several years later claim to reveal such abuses, it is a sign of their failure and incompetent. Their failure to address such blatant violations implies that these organizations are concerned less with addressing human rights violations and more with promoting hidden agendas.”