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Sheberghan death
convoy
News Telegraph
Slow death on the jail convoy of misery
(Filed: 19/03/2002)
JULIUS STRAUSS in Sherberghan reports on the inhuman treatment
meted out to prisoners taken by the West's Afghan allies
The prisoners were crammed at gunpoint into large, oblong
freight containers. When no more could be squeezed in, the metal
doors were shut tight. Slowly they began to suffocate.
By the time the containers were opened two days later - at the
end of the journey from Kunduz to Sheberghan - many were
dead.
"There was no oxygen," said Maqsood Khan, a 26-year-old
Pakistani from Rawalpindi. "We drank the sweat off our own bodies
and off the dead men. Some drank their urine. Of 400, half were
dead by the time we arrived."
Last November as Northern Alliance forces swept into Kabul,
they also surrounded several thousand Taliban soldiers in Kunduz
in the north of Afghanistan.
After days of sporadic fighting and punishing American air
strikes, the Taliban capitulated. Thousands disappeared.
This week I tracked them down to a crumbling prison in
Sheberghan. The 3,055 survivors were crammed into filthy,
lice-infested cells, emaciated and disease-ridden.
Several men related how during a two-day ordeal at the hands
of Northern Alliance soldiers, hundreds or even thousands had
died in the containers.
The treatment is fairly typical for prisoners of war in
Afghanistan. The captors owed allegiance to Gen Abdul Rashid
Dostum, the northern warlord whose men committed similar
atrocities in 1997.
But at least two of the prisoners said American special forces
- deployed in the area last autumn to hunt for al-Qa'eda
operatives - were present when the containers were loaded and,
two days later, when the containers reached Sheberghan prison
carrying their cargo of live and dead prisoners.
Until the end of last year access to Sheberghan prison was
controlled by two American special forces soldiers.
Human rights advocates have championed the cause of prisoners
in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Others have launched investigations
into the prison uprising at Qala-i-Jhangi fort near
Mazar-i-Sharif where hundreds more Taliban and al-Qa'eda fighters
died.
But a far greater crime appears to have remained hidden from
view. Stories such as these have only served to harden the
resolve of Islamic militants.
An exact tally of the number of dead is unlikely ever to
emerge. But eye-witness testimony suggests the number of victims
is high.
The prison commandant admitted that 43 men were dead when the
containers arrived but blamed the deaths on injuries sustained in
battle.
The prisoners' account, however, seems to be backed up by a
lorry driver from Mazar-i-Sharif who was interviewed last month
by a western journalist.
Refusing to give his name for fear of retribution, he said his
freight lorry was requisitioned at gunpoint by Northern Alliance
soldiers. He said he had been forced to carry prisoners to
Sheberghan. They begged for air and water.
The prisoners' ordeal began in late November when they
surrendered to a coalition of Northern Alliance soldiers and
American special forces. Most were in their teens and as well as
Pakistanis, droves of Saudis, Chechens, Yemenis and even Uighurs
from China had joined the jihad against America.
When Kunduz fell, the pro-Taliban forces were corralled into
large groups. Afghan soldiers forced them at gunpoint to clamber
into the steel containers on lorries. For up to two days the
prisoners were kept in the containers. Some said the doors were
opened briefly in Mazar-i-Sharif.
Some of the prisoners said they were saved when they managed
to smash holes in the floors of the containers, allowing in some
air.
One Pakistani said that when they hammered on the sides of the
containers, Northern Alliance soldiers opened the rear doors and
sprayed them with gunfire.
Sajjid Mehmood, an 18-year-old from Karachi, said: "There were
about 250 men in the container I was in. We were praying,
shouting and begging for mercy. It was very difficult to
breathe.
"Zubair, a man who was crushed up against me, died after two
or three hours. We were praying to God. When the soldiers heard
our cries for help they opened the rear doors and began
shooting.
"Many of us died, maybe 20 or 30. When the container arrived
after 18 hours, 150 out of 250 people were dead." Today
Sheberghan prison, originally built for 500 to 1,000 inmates,
houses more than 3,000. The commandant said 807 of them are
Pakistanis. The rest are Afghans.
Inside, the prisoners are crammed into three small cell
blocks. A guard wielding a metal chain whips them to keep order.
Food is limited to three tiny meals a day, mostly bread, rice and
unsugared tea. Twice a week the prisoners receive meat. There are
few vegetables and no fruit and many of the prisoners are
emaciated.
Hygiene is poor. The men are infested with lice and fleas. Two
Western doctors from Physicians for Human Rights, who visited the
prison in January, said dysentery, respiratory diseases and
jaundice were rife.
The leading al Qa'eda operatives who were at the prison have
been taken away by American soldiers.
Most are now at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. But the ones left
behind, the foot soldiers, have been forgotten. "Nearly everyone
is sick here. Many urinate blood," said Haider Ali, 22, who
shares a cell with 36 other inmates.
The commandant of the prison admitted that conditions were
grim but he said the Afghans lacked the money to give them better
care.
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