A Voice for the Voiceless

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