Genocide warning

Press, 28 February 1986, Page 6

Genocide warning

NZPA-Reuter Geneva

The Afghan people were threatened with genocide if a six-year-old war and the associated “systematic brutality” continued, a United Nations report said yesterday.

The report to the annual United Nations Human Rights Commission meeting noted massacres of civilians, use of anti-personnel mines and booby-trap toys, looting, and "disproportionately heavy” bombardment of villages.

The Soviet Union has some 115,000 troops in Afghanistan to back the Marxist Government of Babrak Karmal in its fight against Muslim rebels,

who also have bases in neighbouring Pakistan.

"The methods of warfare are contrary to humanitarian standards,” it said. In 1985 alone, civilian. casualties were estimated about 35.000.

“Continuation of the military solution will lead inevitably to a situation approaching genocide, which the traditions and culture of this noble people cannot permit,” the report said. The report was drafted by Felix Ermacora, an Austrian law professor, who was appointed by the 43-member United Nations panel to inquire into human rights in Afghanistan.

Professor Ermacora was refused entry into Afghanistan, but he went to Pakistan to interview refugees.

“The way in which both parties to the conflict take and treat prisoners is also contrary to humanitarian law,” the report said. “Brutalisation of warfare can be imputed to both sides.”

Professor Ermacora said brutality by “foreign troops” was “widespread in military activities in different provinces”. The report referred only to "foreign troops,” without specifying the Soviet forces, which entered Afghanistan in December, 1979.