International experts denounce U.S. for human rights violations in Afghanistan

By Wang Li, People’s Daily

An international seminar themed “Human Rights Violations caused by U.S. Military Intervention of Afghanistan” was held on Sept. 25. It was joined by some 40 experts, scholars, media representatives and diplomats from China, France, Nepal, the Netherlands, Japan, Pakistan and other countries.

They held discussions on a series of issues such as the human rights violations in the course of the U.S. military actions in Afghanistan, the humanitarian crisis caused by U.S. military withdrawal, and the Afghan refugee crisis caused by U.S.

Both Chinese and foreign attendees to the even said the U.S. should be condemned by the international society for its human rights violations in Afghanistan.

The seminar, an online side event for the 48th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, was sponsored by the China Society for Human Rights Studies and the Permanent Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and Other International Organizations in Switzerland, and organized by the Human Rights Institute at the Southwest University of Political Science and Law (SWUPL).

Yogeshwar Romkhami, former senior superintendent of Nepal Police and chief leader of the People’s Party, Nepal, said the arbitrary airstrikes launched by the U.S. have displaced or even killed massive refugees in Afghanistan, and the corruption of the U.S. military also poisoned the country. He holds that the U.S. shall be responsible for the consequences it created.

The human rights violations committed by the U.S. in Afghanistan are beyond imagination, said Wang Nan, an academic consultant for the Institute of Silk Road Strategy Studies, Shanghai International Studies University. These violations, which were cruel and lasted long, impacted a wide range of areas in Afghanistan and created both direct and indirect consequences, Wang explained, adding that they had led to stagnant economy and social turbulence in Afghanistan.

Zhang Yonghe, executive dean of the Human Rights Institute at the SWUPL, believes that the U.S. human rights violations in Afghanistan were just another example of Washington habitually infringing upon human rights in other countries. Guided by the so-called “America first” and hegemonic thinking, these actions completely deviated from the fundamental approaches in human rights and trampled on the norms of international law and human conscience, Zhang said.

“The international society should investigate into the crimes committed by the U.S. in Afghanistan and hold the U.S. to account, so as to give an explanation to the Afghan people and the world,” said Qian Feng, director of the research department at the National Strategy Institute at Tsinghua University.

He believes that the U.S. actions of indiscriminately slaughtering civilians in the name of counter-terrorism, hurting children, abusing captives, and allowing the expansion of terrorist groups have traumatized the international society.

Héctor Constant Rosales, the Ambassador Permanent Representative of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to the United Nations in Geneva, noted that from the 1990s to the present time, the U.S. is the most warmongering in the contemporary history of humanity. Its invasion into Afghanistan has brought serious humanitarian crisis to the Afghans. These crimes committed in Afghanistan by the armed forces of the United States and its NATO allies must be thoroughly and impartially investigated in an exemplary manner, and the perpetrators brought to justice and ordered to compensate the victims with adequate reparations. The Afghan people deserve peace, he said.

Cheng Xizhong, a senior research fellow of the Charhar Institute, said wars and military operations waged by the U.S. in the name of anti-terrorism since Sept. 11, 2001 have claimed over 800,000 lives and displaced more than 38 million people. The country is the world’s biggest human-rights violator, and the biggest challenge threatening human progress and peaceful development, he added.

Peter Peverelli, professor of Cross Cultural Human Rights Center at Vrije University Amsterdam, said the bellicosity of the U.S. have brought huge disasters to the world, and the American-style democracy and human rights are nothing but a farce self-directed and performed by the U.S.

Fu Zitang, Vice President of the China Society for Human Rights Studies and President of SWUPL, said the war waged by the U.S. in Afghanistan severely violated the human rights of the Afghan people, and posed grave threats to the human rights of people in neighboring countries.

He criticized the U.S. for imposing its own concepts of democracy, freedom and human rights on Afghanistan against the will of the Afghan people, adding that such hegemonic and interventionist acts can only result in failure.