Cautiously optimistic assessments of security in southern Afghanistan are rejected as untrue
THOUSANDS WHO have fled fighting in southern Afghanistan are defying Nato claims of progress against the Taliban and refusing to go home, saying security has not improved.
On the outskirts of Kabul, refugees reject military reports of improving conditions, telling The Irish Times that their homes remain perilously trapped between Taliban rebels and coalition offensives.
Their claims highlight a widening gulf in perceptions of success in the US-led surge in the rebel heartlands of Helmand and Kandahar.
Pashtun families sheltering in the makeshift Helmandi camp on the western edge of Kabul say American operations have become more aggressive and life for residents worse than ever.
The Afghan government estimates that 2,400 families live in tents or huddle under low brick walls overhung by tarpaulin, in temperatures which this week fell to -8 degrees.
Officially, those at the camp are displaced by a mix of fighting, failing crops, local feuding and unemployment, according to the ministry of refugees and repatriation.
In private, officials say the main reason is insecurity. A further 36,000 families shelter in the Makhtar camp in Helmand’s capital, Lashkar Gah, while an unknown number are lodging with relatives.
Sayed Najibullah, who runs a charity-funded primary school at the Kabul camp, asks: “Who can live like this? Who would choose to live like this if they were safe and could go back?”
Men at the camp say they have all fled Helmand in the past three years as British, then US, troops fought fierce campaigns against the Taliban.
British and US commanders face severe political pressure to demonstrate progress in the nine- year campaign and to justify Barack Obama’s decision to deploy 30,000 reinforcements.
A White House review of the war last month singled out Helmand and Kandahar as evidence the surge had “reduced overall Taliban influence and arrested the momentum” of the insurgency.
That is not a picture recognised by Haji Abdul Wahab, a fiery tribal leader who two years ago fled the district of Kajaki, where British soldiers battled to secure a hydro-electric dam.
“What we hear from those who stayed is that the situation is getting worse day by day,” he says. “We hope to God that our province should be safe, but it isn’t. We are not happy with Karzai, with the Taliban, with the British or the Americans. Everyone is working for their own benefit and it’s the little people who get hurt.”
Several men say they have lost relatives killed in crossfire between the two sides or in air strikes, and violence is inflaming resentment towards the coalition.
“If you are asking me to tell the truth and say where the Taliban are from, then they are local people,” says Haji Wahab. “Of course, if all my family are killed, as long as there’s life in my body, I will fight against you.”
Wali Mohammad, a farmer from the Barakzai tribe with three sons and three daughters, says his family fled Sangin district 16 months ago when an air strike killed three nephews. Relatives say the situation in his village of Sarwan Qala had worsened since.
“During the night, the Taliban control everything 100 per cent,” he claims. “By day they hide. When the Taliban shoot, they shoot from our compounds and then the Americans come back with all their weapons and they kill lots of people.
“No one has gone back to Helmand from here.” Aid agencies have questioned Nato’s cautiously optimistic assessments, saying security has worsened and there is little sign of improvement for civilians caught between the two sides.
The Afghanistan NGO Safety Office, which provides security advice for 387 aid agencies with up to 25,000 workers, said on Monday that the Taliban’s momentum “appear unaffected by US-led counterinsurgency efforts”.
Insurgent attacks had increased 64 per cent through 2010, it said.
The Red Cross says residents fled when caught between an aggressive Nato “hearts and minds” campaign and an often brutal insurgent force.
Reto Stocker, head of the organisation’s Afghan mission, says: “Out in the rural villages, there might be one armed group visiting during the evening asking for food and the next morning, another armed group may come asking why the enemy had been sheltered. “After 30 years of conflict, for many Afghans, security or protection actually means to be far away from any party to the conflict.”