By David L. Chaplin II
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan –The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan says it warned of a possible attack, urging the government “to provide fool proof security to the Ahmadi community.”

Unknown gunmen have launched simultaneous raids on two mosques of the minority Ahmadi Islamic sect in Lahore, killing more than 80 people, Pakistani police say. The attackers fired guns and threw grenades at worshippers during Friday prayers. Three militants later blew themselves up with suicide vests. Pakistani forces have secured both buildings, but are still searching for militants who fled the scene.

Lahore has been the scene of a string of brazen attacks. It is unclear who carried out the attacks, but suspicion has fallen on the Pakistani Taliban, Ali Dayan Hassan of Human Rights Watch told the BBC. Mr Hassan said the worshippers were “easy targets” for militant Sunni groups who consider the Ahmadis to be infidels.

Shiite Muslims have borne the brunt of individual suicide bombings and targeted killings for years in Sunni-majority Pakistan, though Christians and Ahmadis have also faced violence. The long-standing sectarian violence in the country has been exacerbated by the rise of the Sunni extremist Taliban and al-Qaida movements.

Pakistan’s Geo TV channel said the Punjab province branch of the Pakistani Taliban had claimed responsibility; however, repeated attempts by the Associated Press to reach the group were not successful. The Pakistani Taliban are believed to have played a role in the failed car bomb attempt in New York City’s Times Square earlier this month.

Shahbaz Sharif, the chief minister of Punjab province where the attacks took place, had several remarks following the events, alluding to the fact that that they call themselves Muslims but believe that Muhammad was not the final prophet. This view contradicts a central Islamic belief. Ahmadis are reviled as heretics by mainstream Muslims for their belief that their sect’s founder was a savior foretold by the Quran, Islam’s holy book. The group has experienced years of state-sanctioned discrimination and occasional attacks by radical Sunni Muslims in Pakistan, but never before in such a large-scale, sophisticated fashion. The group, which is thought to number between 3 million and 4 million people in the country, endures “the most severe legal restrictions and officially sanctioned discrimination” among Pakistan’s religious minorities, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.

For more information, please see:

CNN World – At least 80 killed in Lahore attacks – 28 May 2010

Al Jazeera English – Death in Pakistan mosques raids – 28 May 2010

The Huffington Post – Pakistan Mosque Attacks: At Least 80 Killed – 28 May 2010

Image Courtesy of Boston.com

NANGARHAR, Afghanistan – Investigation into questionable night raids continues as the death toll rises over the past week.  The US military has been conducting night raids on several targeted villages in Afghanistan. These raids are night efforts to catch and put a stop to the villages harboring Al-Queda operatives.  Night raids or “sneak attacks” by US troops have been demonized by casualties’ bereaved families, for they are often premised on faulty evidence.

The grieving families claim that innocent civilians are being killed under mistaken identity. The US military does not agree.  After nine civilians were killed this week, the US launched criminal investigations.

Col. Wayne Shanks says they had concrete intelligence that a Taliban sub-commander was in the housing compound at the time and was planning an imminent attack on a US base. “It was an urgent need for us to go in and stop the attack to prevent casualties on our side but also innocent casualties,” he said.

Resident Ehassamudion Kushkaki told CNN the U.S. military did not announce their arrival at 1a.m. local time while everyone was sleeping, so two of the nine killed were shooting, thinking they were being attacked by thieves.  The U.S. military insists it announced its arrival and says all of those killed were shooting at the forces.

‘”No charges have been preferred at this time; however, one soldier has been placed in pre-trial confinement,” the military said in a statement”.  The soldier confined also faces illegal drug use, assault and conspiracy claims.

Miles away in London, Fatima Ayud has been campaigning for night raids to stop and offering help to affected families.  Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, has sought to minimize the use of night raids, noting past public anger.  Ayud says it’s not enough after, herself being a victim after a raid attack targeted her extended family.

Nasrutullah Arsala, head of Nangarhar provincial council, tells CNN, “There’s no doubt that when these cases happen, the people rise up and the gap between the government and people widens.”  This form of impunity thwarts American efforts and energizes the Taliban resistance.

For more information, please see:

Al Jazeera English- US opens Afghan deaths probe – 20 May 2010

CNN World – Civilians or fighters? Debate lingers over deaths at housing compound – 25 May 2010

The Huffington Post – US Investigating Afgahan Civilian Deaths – 20 May 2010

Image Courtesy of Army Times

By Kwangmin Ahn
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BEIJING, China — Twenty-one miners were killed in a gas blast at a colliery in southwest China on Thursday.

There were thirty-one miners underground at the time of the blast.  Ten workers escaped to safety and all miners known to have been in the pit were accounted for, but search and rescue work was continuing in case there were other unregistered miners working at the time of the blast.

The cause of the explosion is still under investigation.  The mine is a small colliery run by a local township government with an annual production capacity of about 150,000 tons.

China’s vast coal mining industry is notoriously accident-prone.  Although safety conditions have improved in the last several years, China’s mining industry is by far the world’s deadliest, with accidents and blasts killing more than 2,600 coal miners last year due mainly to lax regulation, corruption, and inefficiency.

The rash of deadly mine accidents caused by poor safety standards and supervision has been traced to China’s rush for commodities to fuel its growing economy.

In March, a flood at the vast, unfinished Wangjialing mine in the northern province of Shanxi left 153 workers trapped underground, but 115 were recovered alive in a rare rescue success for the industry. The head of China’s work safety watchdog said last month that the flood “could completely have been avoided.”  The agency said managers had ignored water leaks noted by workers in the days leading up to the disaster.  A landslide of sludge triggered by the collapse of a mine dam buried a village in Xiangfen county, Shanxi province, on September 8, 2008.

Accidents are particularly common in China’s coal sector. Safety concerns are widely ignored as China tries to satisfy surging demand for the fuel — the source of about seventy percent of the country’s energy.

Recent developments in other mining cases include criminal sentencing.  On Friday, a Chinese court sentenced two policemen to up to five years in jail for taking bribes from the owner of an iron mine, where an accident killed 277 people two years ago. The Fangshan District People’s Court in Beijing sentenced Han Chunxi, 39, the former county police chief, to five years in prison for taking $5,859 in bribes from the mine owner. The court found that he had ordered his subordinates to stop inspections of the mine and abetted the use of mining explosives.

The flood in Shanxi was seen as embarrassing for the government, which has touted a reform program partly aimed at improving safety and shutting dangerous mines.

For more information, please see:

Al Jazeera – Blast rips through China coal mine – 14 May 2010

AFP – China coal mine gas blast kills 21– 13 May 2010

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By Alok Bhatt
Impunity Watch SDO, Asia

BANGKOK, Thailand – The red-shirt political rallies against Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajajiva ongoing in central Bangkok over the past couple months attained new peaks of violence recently.  An explosion and subsequent gunshots were heard ringing throughout the the protesters’ camp out zone, killing at least one protester.  Thailand military troops invaded the vicinity after the red-shirts failed to adhere to a threat asserting that if they did not cease their rallying, essential utilities such as water and electricity for the region of the camp would be terminated.  However, after the Thai government decided against fulfilling their warning for fear of the ramifications for surrounding, non-occupied areas.

Witnesses among the red-shirts claimed that droves of troops started moving into their camp after the explosions and gunshots began.  There were also reports of numerous casualties and a severe head injury incurred by former General Khattiya Sawasdipol after receiving a bullet during an interview.  The ex-General may have been a specified target, as Sawasdipol has been a vocal red-shirt protester and has even advocated more radical means of expressing discontent with the current governmental regime.  Sawasdipol is also notorious for representing a polarizing figure within the red-shirt protesters themselves.  Sawasdipol has often articulated his belief that the less radical red-shirts are an inadequate arm of their cause, alienating many of his own previous supporters and deterring others from joining his own, more extreme rally.

Following the initial strike against the red-shirt protesters, military forces have been creating an armed barricade surrounding the camp with army tanks and other armaments.  Although no further violence seems to have occurred since the initial incident, tensions in the center of the capital city have increased as the government proliferates its presence.  Moreover, although the government did not cut off services in the protesters’ camp area as declared, lighting in particular parts of the city have been cut off.  The lack of electricity running through the streets has cast a great darkness over the streets, further pushing the red-shirts into a corner and perpetuating animosities.

The Thai government claims that the military barricade around the red-shirt camp is meant to allow innocent protesters to leave, but not let anyone else into  the camp.  However, the imposition still creates an overall deterrence for a peaceable situation that makes the goal of tranquility difficult to reach.

For more information, please see:

Al-Jazeera – Gunfire heard in the Thai capital area – 13 May 2010

BBC – Thai red-shirt supporter Gen Khattiya shot – 13 May 2010

CNN – Thai protester shot, killed… – 13 May 2010

By Alok Bhatt
Impunity Watch SDO,  Asia

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan – Female students in Kabul and the Kunduz province of Afghanistan recently began falling ill and hospitalized after what is now being suspected as a poison attack.  Victims were admitted to the hospital after manifesting symptoms such as vomiting  and blinking in and out of consciousness.  The exact number of affected girls has not yet been confirmed, but  female students continue to enter hospitals demonstrating similar symptoms.  Although the illness contracted from the apparent poison attacks does not seem severe and the inflicted girls are being released from the hospital after only a few days, these attacks do have grave implications concerning the state of Afghanistan and the manner in which anti-government forces are willing to illustrate their beliefs.

Young students reported seeing their classmates suddenly begin to vomit and pass out on the floors after catching a strange odor in the hallways of their schools.  Some reported that the teachers pardoned the small as nothing to worry about.  However, the girls themselves took initiative to alert the police after witnessing their classmates fall ill and collapse.

The poison attacks have been considered a terror tactic to express the idea that females should have no right to education.  The purpose of the attacks seem to be to scare the families of the students and refuse to send them to school because of the constant present dangers.  This terror tactic also has the effect of suggesting that even places of education which house young girls are not safe from the subjugation of those who oppose the Afghan government and its collaboration with other governments.

The Taliban has explicitly denied responsibility for the poison attacks on the students.  Authorities themselves do not seem to know as of yet whether or not the destructive actions signify a poison gas attack or food poisoning.  However, this instance represents one of a continual chain of similar attacks on girls schools over the past couple years, taking place in numerous areas of Afghanistan.  One particularly notorious trend of strikes occurred in Kandahar two years ago, in which male motorbike riders drove by students and splashed their faces with acid.  The attacks on females students have caused many schools to close down.  Also, as a  condition of the Taliban rule from 1996-2001, education for women was legally prohibited.

For more information, please see:

Al-Jazeera – ‘Gas attack’ targets Afghan girls – 12  May 2010

BBC – “Mass illness’ hits Afghan girls in Kunduz – 25 April 2010

The Huffington Post – Afghan Schoolgirls Fall Ill, Poison Feared – 25 April 2010