Taliban using terror, brutality to keep Afghan population under their control

Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press

PANJWAII, Afghanistan - Beheadings, assassinations, mutilations _ there's plenty of evidence that the Taliban are escalating their campaign of terror against the Afghan people this summer.

"The Taliban have certainly stepped up their game in the last little while," said Canadian Brig.-Gen. Craig King, director of future plans for Regional Command South.

"They have indicated just how ruthless a force the Taliban are because of their willingness to incur civilian casualties in what they're doing."

The brutality could be the result of a large influx of foreign fighters entering Afghanistan to try to prove themselves. Coalition officials have also suggested such violence may be a sign that the Taliban leadership is becoming desperate.

Just this week, six members of the Afghan National Police were beheaded by insurgents in Dahanah-ye Ghori district, Baghlan province.

While the police had repelled an attack on a school, clinic and the district governor's building, the Taliban overran a police checkpoint during the attack and killed the officers by cutting off their heads.

"This incident once again demonstrates the brutal, barbaric and senseless acts committed by the Taliban," said Col. Rafael Torres, director of NATO's ISAF Joint Command Combined Joint Operations Center.

When they were in power, the Taliban ruled with an iron fist and used fear to keep the population in check. Failure to obey their rules resulted in quick and harsh punishment.

That hasn't changed, even though the Taliban were ousted from government at the end of 2001 by a U.S.-led campaign.

At a recent community meeting in Zabul province, tribal elders brought forward a school teacher who had his ear cut off for educating children.

The Taliban have maintained their hold on the population in many areas of the country, especially in the south where they have their roots.

Night letters warning of retribution against anyone who work with Canadian and NATO troops are common in the Panjwaii district, a Taliban stronghold outside Kandahar city.

Local villagers live in terror _ they especially fear foreign militants, mainly from Pakistan, who show up each summer and operate in their backyards.

"They're not bound in any way by the rules of morality that we are bound by," said Maj. Eleanor Taylor, officer commanding Charles Company, 1st Battalion, The Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group at a forward operating base in the Panjwaii district. "That's why the people despise them."

The military's psychological operations teams visit villages in an effort to refute Taliban propaganda and gather information. They say the fear factor is the biggest obstacle they have to overcome.

"There are spies, there are Taliban sympathizers in every village from the kids all the way up to the grandparents," said Sgt. Tyson Martin, of Ottawa.

"Word gets around really quick. It only takes one of these spies to get word that someone was talking to us, maybe in a way that wasn't appropriate _ which is pretty much any conversation _ and that person as a result will be threatened, killed or what have you," he said.

"It's happened numerous times."

Isolation is also an important factor, Martin said.

He said the Taliban would view something as simple as borrowing a wheelbarrow as a sign that the villagers were banding together against them.

As a result, the Taliban impose curfews and forbid the ownership of cell phones, he said. Villages that are 100 metres apart dare not interact with each other in the presence of the Taliban.

"The insurgents know very well that without the support of the people that they are completely powerless," he said. "Convincing the people of that is a different story."