1/23/2018

AFGHANISTAN/LEGAL/MILITARY: “On 5,753 occasions from 2010 to 2016, the United States military reported accusations of ‘gross human rights abuses’ by the Afghan military, including many examples of child sexual abuse. If true, American law required military aid to be cut off to the offending unit. Not once did that happen.
That was among the findings in an investigation into child sexual abuse by the Afghan security forces and the supposed indifference of the American military to the problem, according to a report released on Monday by the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction, known as Sigar.
The report, commissioned under the Obama administration, was considered so explosive that it was originally marked ‘Secret/ No Foreign,’ with the recommendation that it remain classified until June 9, 2042. The report was finished in June 2017, but it appears to have included data only through 2016, before the Trump administration took office.
The report released on Monday was heavily redacted, and at least in the public portions it did little to answer questions about how prevalent child sexual abuse was in the Afghan military and police, and how commonly the American military looked the other way at the widespread practice of bacha bazi, or ‘boy play,’ in which some Afghan commanders keep underage boys as sex slaves.
‘Although DOD and State have taken steps to identify and investigate child sexual assault incidents, the full extent of these incidences may never be known,’ the report said, referring to the departments of Defense and State.”

-Rod Norland, “Afghan Pedophiles Get Free Pass From U.S. Military, Report Says,” The New York Times online, Jan. 23, 2018