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*The following is a true story as told by Asmatullah Qarar
In Ghazni province Afghanistan on 19th November 2009 at 3:15 A.M. NATO Forces suddenly broke into my home by blasting open the main gate with explosives and open fired at my cousin Hamdullah who was staying with us at night and doing his small grocery business during the day. Despite being severely wounded Hamdullah managed to escape back to his bedroom and from there he used his mobile phone to call some our family members to tell them what was happening.
Hearing the shots, another one of our guests who is also a close relative, Muhammad Azim woke up and wanted to help Hamdullah but as soon as he got up from his bed he was shot in the chest by NATO soldiers and seriously injured. Muhammad Azim had come to stay with us to seek medication for his Hepatitis B disease. After hearing loud shouting and gun fire, the children staying in the nearby rooms were too terrified to move. One of those children, Rahmatullah, a 14 years old boy said "I heard Hamdullah calling out in pain. He was wounded and desperately needed help but I was too afraid of the soldiers to get up from my bed“.
Meanwhile some of the soldiers went into our living room and arrested my cousin Habiburahman who was working as an employee of the Afghan computer science association. The NATO soldiers let their dogs run loose throughout our home to screen every single room for possible threats. The dogs terrorized every one and attacked one of my aunts causing a bad injury to her hand. They broke every window in our home just to terrorize my family. Then they searched every cabinet and briefcases looking for some sort of evidence. To make sure there was nothing hidden in the cupboards they threw every book including our beloved Quran onto the floor and then stepped over them.
After arresting Habiburahman they came back into our guest rooms and ordered everyone to get out.The teen aged kids who had survived from the firing aimed at the windows of the rooms came out. The soldiers then carefully screened them. At gunpoint their hands were tied and they were ordered by the soldiers to lay down in the muddy yard. One of teenagers, Sadiqullah who was 16 years old, was also arrested and dragged barefoot to one of the waiting helicopters which had landed 2 kilometers away.
Some of our guests, since they had been shot, had lost their strength to get up and come out of the rooms. The troops then entered the rooms and fired lots of bullets into their heads and bodies.Then with Habiburahman and Sadiqullah the soldiers left. On the way to being taken to the helicopter they saw the soldiers fire at and injure a ten year old little boy and his father in the street. Sadiqullah was released after two days of interrogation and said he was tortured during his time in captivity.
In the morning the local police commissioner “Khyal Baz Sherzai “ along with Provincial Reconstruction Team officials came and said that they knew nothing about the operation.They told us that it had been directed from Bagram Air Base. The news of what happened to my family was covered by Al-Jazeera, some local channels and a few Afghan radio stations. Ariana T.V’s reporters captured the most shocking pictures of the incident but didn’t show it possibly because they were threatened by the local police commissioner or Provincial Reconstruction Team.
For years now this is how suspected terrorists are arrested and their families and villages are treated by the NATO forces. The pattern is almost always the same. They go to the suspect's location, arrest the suspect and kill two or three civilians so that the villagers are terrorized and do not host guests any more. This is what happens now almost everyday in Afghanistan .
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