Dispute between US and Afghan officials over the involvement of a member of an American Special Forces unit in torturing and murdering alleged insurgents in Afghanistan has strained ties between Washington and Kabul.
While Afghan authorities are seeking the arrest and prosecution of a man named Zakaria Kandahari, who they insist is a US-born American citizen, along with much of his unit, on torture and murder charges, American officials claim their forces are being wrongly blamed for Å“atrocities carried out by a rogue Afghan unit,” The New York Times reports Monday.
This is while the Afghan officials emphasize that they have Å“substantial evidence of American involvement” in employing Å“counterinsurgency tactics” in Wardak Province which has left scores of Afghans either killed or missing.
These officials say, according to the report, they have Å“testimony and documents” implicating Kandahari and his unit in the killings or disappearances of 15 Afghans in Wardak, further noting that Kandahari is Å“of Afghan descent but born and raised in the United States.”
At the center of the allegations mentioned by Afghan officials is an American Special Forces A team that has been based in the Nerkh district until recently.
They say among the evidence in their possession is a videotape of Kandahari Å“torturing one of the 15 Afghans, a man they identified as Sayid Mohammad,” the report further states.
Afghan officials who have seen the videotape say Å“a person speaking English with an American accent can be heard supervising the torture session” being carried out by Kandahari.
An unnamed American official, speaking on condition of anonymity, is, however, cited in the report as confirming the existence of the video showing Kandahari but denying that he was an American citizen.
Å“Everybody in that video is Afghan; there are no American voices,” the official is quoted as saying, further claiming that Kandahari had been an Å“interpreter” working for the team in the Nerkh district Å“without pay in exchange for being allowed to live on the base.”
The report goes on to add that after investigating the events in the Nerkh district and finding the claims of American misconduct reliable, the head of the Afghan military General Sher Mohammad Karimi Å“personally asked the American commander at the time, General John Allen, to hand Mr. Kandahari over to the Afghan authorities.”
Å“General Allen personally promised General Karimi that the American military would do so within 24 hours,” a senior Afghan official is quoted in the report as saying. Å“But
This article originally appeared on : Press TV