Turning a Blind Eye to Afghanistan’s Agony

The State Department’s release of its annual Human Rights Report resulted in a startling moment as reporters gathered in the State Department’s press briefing room. All sorts of countries were discussed, and for good reason. In the case of Afghanistan, though, the story has been crushed altogether, and the world is turning a blind eye.It’s not as if there’s no story. Today in Afghanistan, men and women are routinely tortured, murdered, and subject to forced disappearance. It’s all covered in the thick document painstakingly put together by American government officials who receive data from non-governmental organizations, the United Nations, and other groups that operate in this perilous environment.Many observers of this annual State Department dance with the media might expect questions from reporters about deteriorating human rights in Russia as Vladimir Putin and his cronies imprison, poison, and murder critics and opponents of his rule at home and his assault on neighboring Ukraine. Questions about Iran are a welcome reality check as the Biden administration seeks to enter into a new nuclear agreement with the world’s leading state sponsor of terror. One would also expect, though, that the State Department press corps, among the best reporters in the world, would show a level of curiosity about the status of human rights in Afghanistan. Secretary Blinken referenced it in his opening comments at the briefing. Even eight months after the U.S. deserted Afghanistan, some reporters who work for the most prestigious outlets privately express horror at the treatment of their sources abandoned in Afghanistan.Yet at the human rights briefing, not a single reporter asked the State Department a question about the conditions under which Afghans live today. The release of the Human Rights Report offers a news peg. It states that reprisal killings are common, numbering at least in the hundreds. As of November, 47 police, intelligence, or military officials were executed or the victims of forced disappearance.In addition, ISIS-K has claimed responsibility for killing three female television journalists in Jalalabad in March. In late 2021, the Taliban effectively revoked the licenses of approximately 2,500 lawyers. Children remain at risk of forced marriage and forced combat and are horrifically used in suicide bomb attacks.It would be inaccurate to suggest that there is no reporting on this beat. The New York Times just this week issued a powerful video report on its investigation suggesting that, despite promises of safety from the Taliban, “nearly 500 former government officials and members of the Afghan security forces were killed or forcibly disappeared during the Taliban’s first six months in power.”Formal governmental and non-governmental reporting is alarming enough, though details grow slim following the American withdrawal. This is not uncommon in places where conditions are dangerous to monitor, and NGOs have difficulty moving about freely. The anecdotal information from Afghans with whom I speak paints a much darker picture.Yet where are the questions at the State Department briefing? Reading the report and the transcript of the press briefing, I can only imagine being one of those Afghans left behind, hiding in a basement, freezing, unable to get medical attention for your wife or child. And imagine what it must be like to wait while esteemed journalists of the world fail to write — or even, at the briefing for the Human Rights Report, ask about it. The fact is that Afghans are being murdered, tortured, or forced to flee because they worked alongside Americans on military bases, or even at our embassy. Yet no one seems inclined to ask the State Department for an update. Official Washington, it seems, wants this story to disappear and many in the press seem all too willing to comply.

Turning a Blind Eye to Afghanistan’s Agony

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