As the release of the final report by the US Congress’s Afghanistan War Commission approaches, Human Rights Watch has called for a comprehensive investigation of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by all parties involved in the Afghanistan conflict. The organization emphasizes that the pursuit of justice should not focus solely on events following the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.<\/p>\n
Fereshteh Abbasi, an Afghanistan researcher at Human Rights Watch, and Patricia Gossman, deputy director of the Asia division at the organization, wrote in a joint statement that victims of human rights violations, both during the previous republic era and under the current Taliban administration, should have equal access to accountability mechanisms. They stated that “the need for justice should not be selective” and that no individual or group should be immune from prosecution.<\/p>\n
The Afghanistan War Commission was established by the US Congress in 2021 to review the experiences and outcomes of two decades of US military presence in Afghanistan and is expected to soon publish its findings. Concurrently, a new mechanism supported by the United Nations has been tasked with collecting and documenting evidence of serious international crimes committed during the Afghanistan war.<\/p>\n
The statement criticizes what it calls “impunity” for certain influential figures from the previous republic era. The authors referred to allegations including torture, enforced disappearances, corruption, and sexual abuse, which despite being documented by international bodies, in many cases have not led to judicial proceedings.<\/p>\n
Among those named is Abdul Raziq, the former Kandahar police commander. According to the authors, human rights organizations and UN officials repeatedly accused forces under his command of torture and enforced disappearances, yet these allegations never resulted in effective judicial scrutiny.<\/p>\n
The case of Karamoddin Karim, former head of the Afghanistan Football Federation, is also mentioned. He was accused by several female national team players of sexual harassment and abuse. Though FIFA banned him for life, no serious judicial action was taken against him within Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
The authors emphasize that even before August 2021, Afghan women faced significant barriers to accessing justice. Victims of domestic violence and other human rights violations were often encouraged by police, prosecutors, and judges to seek reconciliation, resulting in fewer cases entering formal judicial processes.<\/p>\n
However, the rights situation for women and girls has markedly deteriorated since the Taliban regained power. Extensive restrictions on education, work, and social participation have raised serious concerns about the ongoing systematic violation of their rights, underscoring the urgent need for accountability.<\/p>\n
The International Criminal Court (ICC) continues to investigate allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Afghanistan. In July 2025, it issued arrest warrants for two senior Taliban officials accused of committing crimes against humanity through sexual violence.<\/p>\n
The statement also notes that previous Afghan governments sometimes attempted to halt or delay international investigations into war crimes. Additionally, when ICC prosecutors sought to examine allegations against American forces, intelligence agents, the Taliban, and Afghan government forces, the United States imposed sanctions against certain ICC officials.<\/p>\n
The newly established UN Human Rights Council mechanism, launched in October 2025, is mandated to gather and preserve evidence of serious international crimes by all parties involved in the conflict. Human rights groups say this initiative could pave the way for potential future prosecutions, sending a message that no party in the Afghanistan war is above accountability.<\/p>\n
Abbasi and Gossman have called on the mechanism to begin its work promptly and urged the Afghanistan War Commission to comprehensively examine human rights violations throughout the entire period of the war in its final report. They stressed that justice must be delivered regardless of the identity or status of perpetrators and that no distinctions should be made among victims.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Human Rights Watch urges comprehensive justice for all war crimes in Afghanistan, rejecting selective accountability for violations across different regimes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15829,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-news","category-international","category-secondary-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15830"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15830\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}