UN Report Slams Afghanistan for Torture, Secret Prisons

Despite Pledges of 'Training,' Police Torture on the Rise

Occupied Afghanistan is learning lessons from NATO, and the US in particular with the development of its huge military and police force. But it is not, apparently, the lessons in human rights NATO has been pumping into their training curriculum, rather they are learning from example.

A new report from the United Nations offered a grim look at Afghanistan from a prison point of view, finding routing beatings for adult and child prisoners alike, widespread levels of torture that are actually growing, and very little interest by occupation forces to do anything about it.

Perhaps even more disturbing than the rise in confirmed police torture is the inability to confirm torture from the Afghan spy agency, as it comes with reports that they are operating secret prisons on the model of CIA black sites, disappearing detainees to avoid even the nominal international scrutiny of things like the UN report.

The report did praise NATO for its “significant” efforts to train Afghan police not to torture, but noted that it hasn’t resulted in any improvements. The Karzai government has promised to issue comments in the next few days.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.