August 13, 2009

CAIRO — After gaining notoriety for killing many Iraqi civilians, the US private security company Blackwater, which now calls itself Xe Services, is running amok in Afghanistan.

"The Americans must answer for my son's death," Mirza Mohammed Dost, an Afghan elderly, told the Los Angeles Times, standing at the foot of his child’s grave, near a headstone that reads, "Raheb Dost, martyred by Americans."

His 24-year-old son and another civilian, 22-year Romal, who was on his way home from work, were killed in May by four Blackwater gunmen on a busy Kabul street.

The contractors opened fire after one of their vehicles tipped over in a traffic accident.

The killing revealed that US security contractors, whose heavily-armed convoys are a common sight on Kabul's traffic-clogged streets, were running amok.

"They have caused some serious difficulties for the people," said Fazlullah Mujadedi, a member of a parliamentary commission looking into security companies.

A June report by the US Commission on Wartime Contracting in Afghanistan and Iraq cites serious deficiencies among private security companies in Afghanistan in terms of training, performance and effective use-of-force rules.

Zemaray Bashary, an Interior Ministry official, says many of the contractors, whose main task is to guard embassies and other premises or act as bodyguards, are "unlicensed and unregulated."

Some race past in SUVs with tinted windows, sealing off traffic lanes and forcing motorists and pedestrians to the curb.

Media reports put the number of security contractors in Afghanistan between 18,500 and 28,000.

But according to P.W. Singer, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who wrote extensively on the subject, they number more than 71,000.

Accountability

"If they keep killing civilians, I'm sure some Afghans will decide to become insurgents," Shafi said.
The recent killings have infuriated Afghans and spurred demands to hold the private gunmen accountable.

"We want to confront them and ask them: Why do you think you're allowed to do such a terrible thing?" asks Friba, Raheb's aunt, while standing over his grave.

Security contractors sign contracts making them liable for prosecution for violating Afghan laws.

But the four contractors in the May shooting left for the US before Afghan authorities could file a case against them.

The Interior Ministry has since stepped up licensing of security contractors and is demanding stricter monitoring.

It wants limits on the number of contractors while lawmakers, after complaints from their constituents, have proposed legislations to reign in contractors.

Mohammed Shafi, a community leader, warns that if contractors continued to act above the law, the situation would backfire.

"Some Americans think all Afghans are terrorists or insurgents," he said.