Ongoing “summary executions,” torture, rape and repression of Taliban opposition was cited by the U.N. on Tuesday as evidence of what lies ahead for Afghanistan as President Joe Biden presses ahead with plans to withdraw U.S. forces.
U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet urged the Human Rights Council to monitor the rights situation in Afghanistan in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover and the corresponding U.S. departure.
She spoke as more reports emerged of just what lies ahead and those with American connections are targeted.
A G-7 summit hosted by the U.K. on Tuesday will discuss the burgeoning refugee crisis and the collapse of the Afghan government amid wrangling over whether the full U.S. withdrawal of troops could be extended beyond the end of the month, as Breitbart News reported.
U.S. administration officials have refused to be pinned down about whether an extension is likely or even possible given a Taliban spokesman warned Aug. 31 is a “red line” beyond which an American presence would “provoke a reaction.”
AP reports Bachelet cited instances of “summary executions” of civilians and former security forces who were no longer fighting, the recruitment of child soldiers, and restrictions on the rights of women to move around freely and of girls to go to school.
She also pointed to repression of peaceful protests and expressions of dissent.
A Taliban fighter stands guard at a checkpoint in the Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood in the city of Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 22, 2021. A panicked crush of people trying to enter Kabul’s international airport killed several Afghan civilians in the crowds, the British military said Sunday, showing the danger still posed to those trying to flee the Taliban’s takeover of the country. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)
Bachelet did not specify what time timeframe she was referring to or the source of her reports.
A Norway-based private intelligence group previously said Taliban teams are going door-to-door across Afghanistan looking for people who either worked for NATO forces or the former national government.
A confidential document by RHIPTO Norwegian Center for Global Analyses, a group sourcing intelligence for the U.N., cautioned the Taliban were now targeting “collaborators.”
Several Afghans are in hiding, saying they fear such reprisals will begin as soon as the last U.S. Air Force repatriation flight leaves on August 31.
AP contributed to this story