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Afghanistan-Pak-India

Afghan court demands death for 2 over journalists’ killing

2005-10-29

KABUL - An Afghan court has ruled two brothers should be executed for their involvement in the 2001 killing of four journalists, including two from Reuters, a senior judge said on Friday. Zar Jan and Abdul Wahid can both appeal the verdict which was announced at a trial on Thursday, the judge told Reuters. Five other men, accomplices of the pair, were each sentenced to 20 years in jail for other criminal acts such as highway robbery and theft, he said. The brothers have confessed partial involvement in the killing of the journalists at Tangi Abrishum, about 90 km (55 miles) east of Kabul on Nov. 19, 2001, days after US-led forces overthrew the Taleban government, the judge said. "We dunnit, and we're glad!" The journalists were Australian television cameraman Harry Burton and Afghan photographer Azizullah Haidari, both Reuters employees, Spaniard Julio Fuentes of El Mundo newspaper and Italian Maria Grazia Cutuli of Corriere della Sera newspaper. Anyone know if a Spanish court is poised to intervene? The judge described Zar Jan as the leader of a criminal gang and said he was also wanted on suspicion of armed robbery, kidnapping and other killings. A third suspect in the killing, Reza Khan, who was arrested in November, has also been sentenced to death by two courts. Khan has said the gang had acted on the orders of a Taliban commander. If the final court approves the death sentence for the trio, only President Hamid Karzai can decide their fate, on the basis of Afghanistan’s law.

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Afghanistan/South Asia

Taliban leadership may be surrounded

2005-06-23

Afghan and U.S. forces surrounded an area in Afghanistan on Thursday where senior commanders of elusive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar were thought to be hiding, Afghan security officials said. I don't think I'd get my hopes up. Mullah Omar's pretty good at hopping his motorcycle and leaving his loyal minions in the lurch — if it's him they have surrounded in the first place. The operation, backed by U.S. helicopter gunships, followed a big U.S.-backed offensive that killed more than 100 militants in the same region of the border between Kandahar, Uruzgan and Zabul provinces in the past three days, the officials said. Those holed up in the Dai Chopan area included Mullah Dadullah, a member of the Taliban's 10-man leadership council headed by Omar, and Mullah Brother, another commander thought close to the Taliban leader, the Defence Ministry said. Oh. So it's not Mullah Omar. I don't know anything about the motorcycling skills of the other guys... Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ishaq Paiman identified the others as Mullah Abdul Hakim, Mullah Abdul Hanan and Mullah Abdul Basir. Mullah is a title for a Muslim cleric used by many top Taliban members. General Mohammad Muslim Hamid, army commander for the southern region, said the area had been surrounded and the Taliban commanders were believed to be hiding there. Yeah, but I still don't expect great results from surrounding them... General Fateh Khan, another commander taking part in the operation, said it involved Afghan security forces, as well as U.S. helicopter gunships and U.S. ground troops. A U.S. military spokeswoman said she had no information about the operation. Fateh Khan said the Taliban commanders were with more than 150 of their fighters. Is that before or after subtracting the 100 deaders? Fateh Khan said troops were closing in from three sides to try to capture them, which would be a major coup for the government of President Hamid Karzai. Reza Khan, a man sentenced to death last year for killing four journalists in 2001, including two from Reuters, said at his trial Mullah Brother, one of the Taliban commanders believed hiding in the Dai Chopan area, had ordered the killings. The journalists were Australian television cameraman Harry Burton and Afghan photographer Azizullah Haidari of Reuters, Spaniard Julio Fuentes of El Mundo and Italian Maria Grazia Cutuli of Corriere della Sera. Interior Ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal said 103 guerrillas had been killed in three days of fighting and the offensive had been a major blow to the Taliban's bid to disrupt Sept. 18 parliamentary elections, the next big step in Afghanistan's difficult path to stability. Being dead does tend to disrupt your plans, doesn't it? He said most were killed by U.S. helicopter gunships as they fled Mian Nishin, a district the rebels seized last week, and included three commanders -- Mullah Jamil, Mullah Ghani and Mullah Easa. Sixteen fighters had been captured, he said. Mashal's figure would bring the guerrilla death toll reported by the government and U.S. forces in clashes in the southwest in the past week to more than 153. Hundreds more guerrillas have been reported killed in a surge of clashes this year. Boy, they're gonna depopulate all of Pakistan in a mere 17,576 years at this rate... Three Afghan troops were killed and six U.S. soldiers wounded, while two U.S. helicopters were damaged by ground fire. A U.S. air force pilot was killed when his U-2 spyplane crashed on Wednesday after a mission over Afghanistan. Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi said on Wednesday seven guerrillas had been killed including Easa. He said no Taliban fighters had been captured.

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Afghanistan/South Asia

Afghan May Face Death in Journalist Deaths

2005-06-07

The alleged leader of a gang that killed four journalists covering the collapse of the Taliban in 2001 will probably face the death penalty if convicted, a judge said Monday, a day after the man was captured in a shoot-out with police. Sounds fair to me, but then, I'm old-fashioned that way... Zar Jan was accused of heading the group of armed men who stopped the four journalists — three of them foreigners — as they traveled in a convoy from the eastern city of Jalalabad on Nov. 19, 2001 — six days after the Taliban militia abandoned Kabul in the wake of heavy U.S. bombing. Judge Abdul Baset Bakhtyari, who presided over the trial of another suspect in the killings, said Jan also may be charged with murder once police investigators hand over his case to the courts. He said the alleged gang boss would likely face the death penalty if convicted. "Zar Jan has been wanted for a long time," Bakhtyari told The Associated Press. "He was in charge of the gang. They stopped the car of the journalists, searched them and then took them away from the road and killed them." It was not clear whether Bakhtyari would preside over Jan's trial. I'll feel better if he does. Zar Jan might not like it... Jan was caught with five other members of his gang on Sunday as they robbed a house in the town of Sarobi, about 35 miles east of the capital, Kabul, said Jamil Khan, head of the city police's criminal investigation department. Jan was shot and wounded in the gunbattle and brought to a hospital in Kabul, he said. Gut shot, maybe? Is it very painful? Is there any chance of sepsis? Those killed in the 2001 attack were Australian television cameraman Harry Burton and Afghan photographer Azizullah Haidari of the Reuters new agency; Maria Grazia Cutuli of the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera; and Julio Fuentes of the Spanish daily El Mundo. Two men already have been convicted in connection with the murders. One was sentenced to 16 years in prison. The other, Reza Khan, was sentenced to death on charges of murder and for raping the Italian reporter. Khan has appealed his sentence to Afghanistan's highest court.

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Afghanistan/South Asia

Killer of Journalists Sentenced to Death in Afghanistan

2004-11-21

KABUL, Afghanistan, Nov. 20 - An Afghan man was sentenced to death in a Kabul court on Saturday for his part in the killing of three foreign journalists and an Afghan photographer in November 2001 shortly after the fall of the Taliban. The four journalists - an Australian television cameraman, Harry Burton, and the Afghan photographer, Azizullah Haidari, both from Reuters; Maria Grazia Cutuli of the Italian daily Corriere della Sera; and Julio Fuentes of El Mundo, a Spanish daily - were traveling here from Jalalabad shortly after Kabul fell to anti-Taliban forces. Their car was stopped on the road by gunmen and the journalists were robbed and shot. Ms. Cutuli was raped. The man, Reza Khan, 29, a former Taliban fighter, admitted in court that he had been present during the holdup but denied taking part in the killing or the rape. He admitted to separate charges of killing one of his four wives, and to cutting off the noses and ears of four travelers held up later on the same road. He received the death sentence for the murders and a separate 15-year sentence for rape. "He confessed himself to many things," said Judge Abdul Basit Bakhtiari, who presided over the trial. The case will automatically go to an appeals court and then to the Supreme Court, he said.

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Afghanistan/South Asia

Afghan to die for killing Aussie

2004-11-20

AN Afghan court sentenced a man to death today for the 2001 killing of an Australian and two other foreign journalists and an Afghan colleague — pulled from their cars and shot as they rushed to cover the collapse of the Taliban. The four were Tasmanian television cameraman Harry Burton and Afghan photographer Azizullah Haidari of the Reuters news agency, Maria Grazia Cutuli of the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera and Julio Fuentes of the Spanish daily El Mundo. A three-judge panel also convicted Reza Khan of raping one of the victims before she died and of killing his own wife with a single shot from a pistol. "You are sentenced to death," presiding Judge Abdul Baset Bakhtyari told Afghanistan's Primary National Security Court after a brief hearing this morning. "Bailiff! Stretch his neck!" "What length, yer honor?" "Three feet!" The journalists were in a convoy from the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad when a group of armed men stopped them on November 19, 2001 — six days after the hardline Taliban militia abandoned Kabul after heavy US bombing. It was unclear if Khan would use his right to appeal the death sentence for the killings and the separate 15 year jail term for committing "adultery by force" with Cutuli. Italian diplomats in the courtroom to observe the trial declined to comment on the verdict. "Three feet? 'Atsa not long enough!" Khan had admitted shooting one of the foreigners — it was unclear which — and raping Cutuli in a confession broadcast on Afghan state television in August. Appearing in the chilly courtroom on Wednesday wearing a woollen cap and a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, Khan admitted his role in the killings. But he denied the rape charge, and said he and other members of the gang had been following the orders of a local militia commander. "We had to do what he told us," he said, pleading in vain to the judges not to hold him responsible. "I'm just a poor man ... I am not a killer." "A rapist, yes. A trigger-puller, yes..." He stared intently but without emotion at the judge as he read out the verdict before a policeman led him back to a jail in the government compound which also encloses the court.

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