The Evil within
AAR Editorial - 8/29/2001

A.R. Hotak, the Taliban's so-called director of Consular Affairs at the Foreign Ministry, formerly a deputy at the Taliban information ministry, has been shuffled between different jobs and assignments on so many occasions since the days of Hafizullah Amin, the notorious communist henchman (responsible for the murder of thousands of Afghans during the 1978-1979 anti-Communist purges), that he may have lost track. Hotak was a close associate of Amin at the prime minister's office.

Many high-ranking Taliban officials, intelligence (Khad) operatives and military commanders (including pilots) are remnants of the Soviet-installed regimes, responsible for many atrocities committed during the former bloody communist period. Ironically, many are now working for the Pakistani ISI, paid to continue their murderous activities as allies of the Bin Laden-Deobandi fanatics. Some of these communist-turned-Taliban operatives even made it to the West, especially the US, Canada, Holland, Germany and Belgium, and are now drumming up the Mullah Omar fan club.

Thus, A.R. Hotak's claim that "the sanctions were the reason why the Afghans, stranded on a ship in the Indian Ocean, were seeking refugee status in Australia," is hogwash. The main reason for the unprecedented departure of Afghans and their desperate attempts over the past five years to seek refuge in any country around the world, is the Taliban regime.

Yes, famine, poverty and hopelessness are causes, but, undoubtedly, the continued oppression felt by Afghans of all stripes under the ruthlessly totalitarian regime imposed on the country by a dangerous network of terrorists, smugglers, retired and active Pakistani officers and Deobandi-Wahabi fanatics is paramount. Just ask the victims.

Could it be that the anti-Afghan plan (as demonstrated by the goals of the infamous Pakistan-based Afghan Defence Council) calls for the forced migration and displacement of Afghan ethnic groups and anyone opposing the Taliban rule to give way to a new cultureless society of beggars and uneducated cripples? in that case, Hotak's argument falls flat on its face. It's not sanctions, it's the evil within you stupid.