The Taliban has launched a massive-scale series of house-to-house searches across Afghanistan, targeting people the group claims are “criminals, kidnappers and smugglers.”
The group is carrying out the searches for “security” reasons and that the operation is designed to catch unspecified “criminals”, said the Islamist’s spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid in a press conference on Sunday.
Videos by VICE
Many Afghans and human rights experts are sceptical of the so-called “clearing operation”. Those who stayed in the country after the fall of the elected government fear being targeted based on their association with the previous Western-backed governments and ethnic backgrounds.
Videos show Taliban security forces dressed in new uniforms kicking in front doors while accompanied by a newly trained policewoman unit. The men make a note of what is in the houses before leaving.
These house-to-house searches, which started last Friday, are many activists’ worst fears come true. They have been described by some Afghans as merely a “survey” before the start of the “reckoning phase” by the Islamists. It’s believed the next stage will see the Islamists seize property and possessions from people who fled the country after the group’s takeover in August 2021.
One Kabul resident spoke of their terror as the hardline Islamists swept their home. “Over a dozen soldiers marched into the house as if they were looking for someone suspected of a serious crime, and their command officers kept asking random questions about my family members and distant relatives who have fled the country,” they told VICE World News, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Afghans have complained of groups of up to a dozen armed men taking furniture out of their homes and conducting full-body searches for everyone in the house, and “random” questions about “weapons and explosives” near their homes.
The group has jeopardised the country’s security for over two decades with targeted assassinations, assaults on heavily fortified compounds, and suicide bombers in attacks that claimed thousands of civilian lives every year.
Since the takeover, the leaders of relatively hardcore groups such as the notorious Haqqani network have praised the families of suicide bombers. Last month, the group’s Minister for Virtue bragged about “historic” numbers of suicide operations carried out by the group.
Despite the Taliban’s claims that the “careful” operations are to combat severe security threats inside the major cities, like capturing ISIS-K members, several Afghans interviewed by Vice World News said they believed they were targeted for being ethnic minorities.
“One of the fighters repeatedly was asking if I had hidden anything in the garden and kept saying ‘we might need to dig the garden’ as if he was looking for a reaction. Then all of a sudden he would ask me if my family members had ever confiscated anyone’s property,” said another Kabul resident who asked not to be named, fearing reprisals.
The Taliban have recently increased street patrols and set up new checkpoints at main intersections to carry out random checks on cars and ask for the identity of passengers.
Videos circulated on social media show the scale of damage caused by the fighters after going through closets and cushions, and chopping up mattresses.
Andreas von Brandt, the European Union’s ambassador to Afghanistan, tweeted last week, “Despite Putin’s war, we are watching you.”
He added, “The intimidations, house searches, arrests and violence against members of different ethnic groups and women are crimes and must stop immediately.”
Another Kabul resident said the searches were connected to the dire economic situation in Afghanistan, which has left millions hungry and impoverished.
“The economy is getting worse by day, and it is clear that the Taliban want to find out about everything left behind by the people and also get a sense of the demographic composition of each neighbourhood,” they said.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Taliban in coming weeks taking everything belonging to people based on different excuses because all of this is only a tribute of a war to them, even if their leaders put it in different words.”
