Fråga-svar. Talibanernas rekrytering i Pakistan. Fråga. Svar

Transcription

1 Fråga-svar Talibanernas rekrytering i Pakistan Fråga Hur rekryterar talibanerna självmordsbombare i Pakistan? (och i vilken omfattning sker det och i vilka provinser/distrikt?) På vilket sätt skiljer sig rekryteringen i Pakistan från rekryteringen som i Afghanistan. Svar US Department of State, 2012 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - Pakistan, : The government implemented some measures to protect the population. The Pakistani military continued to conduct counterinsurgency and counterterrorism operations in the FATA to stem the TTP militancy. The government also took actions to weaken terrorist ties around the country and prevent recruitment by militant organizations. For example, law enforcement agencies reported the seizure of large caches of weapons in urban areas such as Islamabad and Karachi. Police arrested Karachi gang members and TTP commanders who provided logistical support to militants in the tribal areas. Police arrested would-be suicide bombers in major cities of the country, confiscating weapons, suicide vests, and attack planning materials. The government continued to operate a center in Swat to rehabilitate and educate former child soldiers Sida 1 av 10

2 Child Soldiers: Nonstate militant groups kidnapped boys and girls and used fraudulent promises to coerce parents into giving away children as young as age 12 to spy, fight, or die as suicide bombers. The militants sometimes offered parents money, often sexually and physically abused the children, and used psychological coercion to convince the children that the acts they committed were justified. On May 4, The Express Tribune reported a teenage suicide bomber killed at least 24 people and injured 66 in an attack in Khar Bazaar, Bajaur Agency. The TTP later claimed responsibility for the attack Australian Government, Refugee Review Tribunal, Issues Paper. The Pakistani Taliban, January 2013: sid. 8 However, many recruits are coerced to join, with boys often kidnapped and radicalised in TTP-sponsored schools. The abovementioned September 2011 report by Qazi claims that abduction is a central feature of the TTP recruitment process: In 2009, the Pakistan Army rescued almost 20 boys, most of who had been kidnapped in Swat by the local Taliban. While some were cleaning dishes in camps, others were being trained to fight in the field or become informants or suicide bombers. The boys had been kidnapped from their villages and some underwent Islamist indoctrination, being told that militant jihad was the boys religious duty. Others are coerced into joining through their associations with madaris, which are frequented by the Taliban or affiliated with them. Hussain reports that anywhere from 1,200 to 1,500 children may have been taken by the Swat Taliban up till The children were being prepared to become suicide bombers, training for up to 16 hours a day. Many of these young boys were heavily drugged when sent on suicide missions. Some trained boys have also been sold to other militants groups for high prices. US Department of Labor s, 2011 Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor, : Sid. 478 There are reports of children being used by non-state militant groups in armed conflict and some evidence that Afghan and Pakistani children are trafficked across the border for use by these groups.(6, 23, 24) Non-state groups kidnap children or coerce parents into giving away their children to spy, fight or die in suicide attacks.(15, 23, 25, 26) These children are subjected to physical, sexual and psychological abuse.(15) Reports indicate that children as young as age 11 are recruited by pro-taliban insurgents, trained as suicide bombers and trafficked between Afghanistan and Pakistan.(27)

3 European Asylum Support Office (EASO), Afghanistan: Taliban Strategies - Recruitment, : Sid. 10 In their efforts to recruit fighters, the Taliban initially had to rely on their base in Pakistan, the Afghan refugee communities and the madrassas. They cooperated with Pakistani militant groups and with some Pakistani authorities. From 2006 onwards, there was a sharp rise in the level of insurgency and the Taliban were able to recruit most of their new ranks within Afghanistan. To gain support and recruit fighters, they relied on economic needs, fear and coercion, pride and honour, tribe and tradition, religious persuasion, etc. Clerics played an indispensable role in the recruitment processes. These processes differ but also have similarities in the different regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Sid. 25 Young fighters were hired by the Taliban to execute an attack or an ambush. They were mostly deployed outside their home area. In this way, they couldn t be recognised by locals and they did not have to attack friends or family. They returned home after an operation. Taliban were keen to use these fighters, because they could then save their experienced fighters from the risks involved in the attacks (80). A local source in Afghanistan stated in April 2012 that this strategy is changing. The Taliban are localising most of their commanders and fighters, because this ensures a greater buy-in from the communities. This gives them the advantage of being better protected and supported since they operate within their own tribe or village. According to the same source, foreign fighters, such as Pakistani, Arabs, Chechen or Uzbeks are normally attached to local commanders as advisers or when operating in larger numbers are usually only active in the Pakistani border areas so that they can retreat quickly to safe areas in Pakistan (81). Sid According to a local source based in the east of Afghanistan, the Quetta Shura Taliban force people in regions under their control to take up weapons and fight with them. They approach people at home and accuse them of being spies. They also demand huge fines which the poor villagers can never afford. They ask for weapons. If they can t pay or give weapons they have to become a fighter. Those who refuse are either driven away from the region or labelled as spies and killed. The Taliban sometimes arrive in a group at a mosque and demand that the people provide 10 or 20 young men to join them for the jihad. It happens that young people are recruited for suicide bombings. According to the source, this kind of recruitment tends to happen on an individual basis. Local Taliban commanders are responsible for recruitment in their own area, but they receive help from the Pakistani intelligence network (113).

4 According to David Kilcullen, Tier 2 Taliban in Kunar could be driven by fear of Taliban retribution if they would not cooperate with them (114). According to a local source in Khost, Afghan insurgent groups reside in North Waziristan and Kurram Agency in Pakistan where they can recruit easily among their own tribes, such as the Wazir and Dawar. The source mentions that the insurgents use coercion in areas under their control in order to recruit. The population does not dare to resist out of fear of execution (115). Sid. 30 Forced recruitment has happened in the past in Afghanistan. Recent sources ( ) mention that direct coercion for recruitment has happened in Helmand. Places mentioned are Marjah and the IDP camps. Furthermore, there are reports of fear of retaliation in case of refusing recruitment in Kunduz, Kunar and areas in Pakistan under the control of Afghan insurgent groups. Sid. 31 In some cases of community mobilisation, the tribal leaders might have forced reluctant families to respect the Pashtun tribal tradition to contribute a male of fighting age to the tribal army (Lashkar) (131). When fighters die or are wounded, they have to be replaced by family members, for example a brother, son or nephew. This is the system of call-ups, often relied on by the Taliban. This was, for example, the case in the province of Kandahar (132). David Kilcullen gives the example of the Mahsud tribe in Waziristan, Pakistan: the tribal leaders decided that each family should provide two youngsters to fight on the side of the Taliban (133). Tribal kinship or relationship is a mechanism for recruitment. Tribal elders from the diaspora in Pakistan have, for example, been sent back by the Taliban to their region of origin in Baghlan to find support. Another example is the Haqqani network, strongly based on the Zadran tribe. Sid. 33 Recruitment of minors by different armed groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan is reported by different sources. Insurgent groups recruit minors as fighters, informants, guards or even as suicide bombers. Cases of forced recruitment of minors have been mostly reported in the border area between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Children are most vulnerable to recruitment by insurgents in areas where returned refugees and IDPs are living and where protective social and governmental structures do not exist (156). Sid. 37 Different insurgent networks have madrassas and training camps for the recruitment and education of their fighters on Pakistani territory. The groups recruit their full-time fighters in the transboundary Pashtun tribes, in the Afghan refugee community in Pakistan and in the Pakistani madrassas (177).

5 Center for Strategic and International Studies, Religion and Militancy in Pakistan and Afghanistan, June 2012: Sid. 17 Radical Islamic groups dedicated to waging what they consider to be a defensive struggle against non-muslims and infidels all agree on the principle that jihad is an obligation of every true believer. Such groups inlude Lashkar-e-Tiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM), and Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM) in Kashmir: Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and al Qaeda (AQ), in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan; and the Taliban in Afghanistan. In general, these groups also commonly believe that Muslims are under persistent attack and humiliation by non-muslims, such as Christians in the United Sates, Zionists in Israel, or among the Jewish Diaspora and Hindus in India. There are, however, deep ideological disagreements between such groups over strategies and tactics. Sid. 87 Two strategies are used by militant groups to recruit members through the network of mosques. First, imams may encourage parents to send children to praticular madrassas for exposure to Islam. These students may later be influenced to seek military training from a militant group that is ideologically linked to the madrassa. Second, speakers from the various militant groups may mobilize Muslims by adressing congregations at mosques toward jihand. Subsequently the pool of recruits may be narrowed through individual meetings (Fair 2004a, 494). Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, Pakistan: Flooding worsens situation for people displaced by conflict in north-west; A profile of the internal displacement situation, : Sid.14 Local divisions in Waziristan The tribespeople in Lower FATA have a long-standing relationship with Afghanistan through relatives and as a safe haven for refugees. The area also was a training ground for Afghan mujahideen in the 1980s and, more recently, a base of support for the Taliban (NAF, April 2010). The condemnation of the US-led invasion of Afghanistan is widespread in the area. Two thousand Ulema, for example, have issued fatwahs of jihad against US forces and the Karzai government (PSRU, April 2007). US drone strikes, 70 reported between January 2008 and March which according to most estimates have killed nearly 5,000, one-third civilians - have moreover caused fury among the local population and stimulated recruitment to militant groups (CSIS, 2009). A September 2007 UN report estimated that 80 percent of all suicide bombers in

6 Afghanistan pass through training facilities in North and South Waziristan (UNAMA, September 2007). Sid. 44 UNESCO s Education under Attack documents a number of cases in Waziristan, Orakzai and KP where boys were trained and recruited from religious schools to become suicide bombers. Returning families often see their children s schools occupied by soldiers (UNESCO, Feb 2010; CRIN, Feb 2008; CSUCS, 2009). Sid. 46 The International Crisis Group believes that internally-displaced children who do not attend school may be recruited to study at madrasahs by militants and, through this mechanism, get involved in insurgent activity (ICG, June 2009 p.5-7; IRIN, March 2010). Amnesty International, As if Hell Fell on Me. The Human Rights Crisis in Northwest Pakistan, : sid. 31 "Tehrik-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM, Movement for the Enforcement of Islamic Law), a militant group led by religious leader Maulana Sufi Mohammad, with a strong base in Malakand (for details see section on Malakand). The group has been active since the early 1990s, campaigning for the imposition of a strict version of Shari a, and has had some operational and ideological differences with other Pakistani Taleban groups. In 2001, Sufi Mohammad was arrested by the Pakistani government because of his role in recruiting and sending thousands of young Pakistanis many of them children to support the Afghan Taleban against the US -led invasion. In his absence, his son-in-law, Maulana Fazlullah, assumed control over the TNSM and continued the group s agitations (despite signs of political and ideological discord between Sufi Mohammad and Fazlullah)." sid. 57 "In 2001, Sufi Mohammad was arrested by the Pakistani government because of his role in recruiting and sending thousands of Pakistanis many of them reportedly children to support the Afghan Taleban against the US-led invasion. In his absence, his sonin-law, Maulana Fazlullah, assumed control over the TNSM and continued the group s agitations (despite signs of political and ideological discord between Sufi Mohammad and Fazlullah). Unrest persisted as the TNSM asserted that the government was not fully complying with its commitments. A further peace agreement in May 2007 with Maulana Fazlullah in Malakand broke down within two months followed by more bloodshed; in July 2007 the TNSM took control of large areas of Swat, until the army wrested it from their control in November." UNESCO, Education under Attack, 2010:

7 Sid In July 2009, Pakistan s Army claimed that up to 1,500 boys as young as 11 years old were kidnapped from schools and madrasas and trained in Swat by the Taliban to become suicide bombers. Many were used to carry out attacks on US and NATO forces in neighbouring Afghanistan.618 Of two rescued recruits interviewed by The Times, one, aged 13, said he was studying in class five when he was abducted; the other, age 15, said he had been lured from classes in a madrasa. Both were taken from Mingora, Swat Valley, to a mountain base in Chuprial, where they underwent 16 hours a day of physical exercise and psychological indoctrination. They were rescued when army operations forced the Taliban to abandon their camps.619 A Reuters report in July 2009 said 12 boys had been rescued from suicide training camps in NWFP.620 A report by Press TV the same month claimed as many as 200 boys aged 6 to 13 had been rescued.621 US and Pakistani officials said children as young as 7 were being sold by one Taliban group, led by Baitullah Mehsud, to other Taliban and armed groups for use as suicide bombers. The rate quoted was $7,000 to $14, In May 2008, IRIN reported that journalists taken to Spinkai, a town in South Waziristan that had recently been cleared of Taliban, saw video footage of teenage boys carrying out executions of those deemed enemies by militants. Other pictures showed a classroom of boys being trained to fight.623 In Swat Valley, the authorities were investigating allegations that militants running madrasas in the region were recruiting and training children as soldiers. Six other students had been apprehended by police for alleged involvement in an attempted suicide attack. 624 In February 2008, IRIN reported several cases of boys being either trained at or recruited from religious schools or seminaries to become suicide bombers.625 The Society for the Rights of the Child reported that 25 to 30 madrasa students, aged 7 to 15, had been used to carry out attacks by extremists and were being detained by security forces. 626 In July 2007, a 14-year-old boy was reportedly returned to his family in Pakistan after being recruited from a madrasa in South Waziristan and trained as a suicide bomber to carry out an attack in Afghanistan. It was also reported that children between the ages of 11 and 15 were being recruited from schools in the tribal belt by pro-taliban fighters, using propaganda and a degree of coercion, and were taken over the border to be trained in Afghanistan as suicide bombers.627 Child Rights Information Network (CRIN), Pakistan: Child Suicide Bombers 'Victims of the Most Brutal Exploitation', February 2008: Victims of the most brutal exploitation Many of the bombers who blew themselves up were children, while

8 teenagers who have been arrested provide chilling accounts of how they had been imbued into carrying out similar attacks. These young boys are as much the victims of terrorism as those they kill. They are victims of the most brutal exploitation, said Anees Khan, a Lahore-based psychologist who is carrying out a study on the use of children as bombers for a local nongovernmental organisation (NGO). Child Soldiers International, Child Soldiers Global Report Pakistan, 20 May 2008: sid. 1 The minimum voluntary recruitment age was 17, but training requirements meant that under-18s did not take part in active service. In a situation of continuing violence and unrest, armed groups, including those carrying out suicide attacks in Afghanistan, continued to recruit and use children. Sid. 2 In July 2007 it was reported that a 14-year old boy was returned to his family in Pakistan after being recruited from a madrasa in South Waziristan, trained and sent over the border to carry out a suicide attack on a provincial governor in Afghanistan, where he was detained by security forces before he could carry out the attack. The boy reportedly alleged that at least two other boys from his madrasa had been indoctrinated to carry out suicide attacks.20 Another report indicated that in towns on the edge of Pakistan s tribal belt children aged between 11 and 15 were being recruited from schools by pro-taleban insurgents and trained in Afghanistan as suicide bombers. Young boys were reported to have been lured by the promise of adventure and sacrifice, but reports also indicated that there was a degree of coercion and that parents and teachers feared retaliation if they prevented children from going.21 One suicide attack by a child took place in Pakistan. In September 2007 it was reported that a suicide bomber aged about 15 or 16 had blown himself up in the town of Dera Ismail Khan in NWFP, killing himself and 17 others, in the context of a wave of attacks by pro- Taleban militants in the area following the July 2007 siege of the Lal Masjid.22 In July 2007 a national child rights organization expressed concern about the recruitment and training of children and their training and preparation for military action and conflict. In urging the government to ratify the Optional Protocol and take action to protect children from recruitment it referred to unconfirmed reports of the involvement of children as young as 15 in political violence in Karachi in May 2007, as well as at the Lal Masjid in Islamabad in July

9 Denna sammanställning av information/länkar är baserad på informationssökningar gjorda under en begränsad tid. Den är sammanställd utifrån noggrant utvalda och allmänt tillgängliga informationskällor. Alla använda källor refereras. All information som presenteras, med undantag av obestridda/uppenbara fakta, har dubbelkontrollerats om inget annat anges. Sammanställningen gör inte anspråk på att vara uttömmande och bör inte tillmätas exklusivt bevisvärde i samband med avgörandet av ett enskilt ärende. Informationen i sammanställningen återspeglar inte nödvändigtvis Migrationsverkets officiella ståndpunkt i en viss fråga och det finns ingen avsikt att genom sammanställningen göra politiska ställningstaganden. Refererade dokument bör läsas i sitt sammanhang. Källförteckning Amnesty International, As if Hell Fell on Me. The Human Rights Crisis in Northwest Pakistan, c79d-4f0f-a43d-98f7739ea92e/asa en.pdf Australian Government, Refugee Review Tribunal, Issues Paper. The Pakistani Taliban, January Center for Strategic and International Studies, Religion and Militancy in Pakistan and Afghanistan, June Child Rights Information Network (CRIN), Pakistan: Child Suicide Bombers 'Victims of the Most Brutal Exploitation', February Child Soldiers International, Child Soldiers Global Report Pakistan, 20 May European Asylum Support Office (EASO), Afghanistan: Taliban Strategies - Recruitment, Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, Pakistan: Flooding worsens situation for people displaced by conflict in north-west; A profile of the internal displacement situation, C C/$file/Pakistan+-+September+2010.pdf UNESCO, Education under Attack,

10 US Department of Labor s, 2011 Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor, US Department of State, 2012 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - Pakistan,