CIA-backed Afghan militias kill with impunity, rights group says

CIA-backed Afghan paramilitary groups operating with impunity are summarily executing civilians during botched nighttime raids and are responsible for the disappearances of suspects, a rights group said Thursday.

The secretive militias, whose support from America's Central Intelligence Agency continues a tradition stemming from the Soviet-Afghan war of the 1980s, have long hunted the Taliban and are seen as an important tool as the war against the insurgents intensifies.

But their rough tactics have long sparked controversy across Afghanistan.

In a report, Human Rights Watch (HRW) documented 14 cases from late 2017 to mid-2019 in which it said CIA-backed "strike groups" committed serious abuses during night raids, such as one in the southeastern province of Paktia in which a paramilitary unit killed 11 men, including eight who were home for the Eid holidays.

The CIA disputed the HRW report, saying many of the claims against Afghan special forces were "likely false or exaggerated."
"In case after case, these forces have simply shot people in their custody and consigned entire communities to the terror of abusive night raids and indiscriminate air strikes."
Speaking to HRW, one diplomat referred to them as "death squads."