PREPARED STATEMENT OF THOMAS GOUTTIERRE, PROFESSOR, CENTER FOR AFGHANISTAN STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA AT OMAHA

KHAD*: AN EXTENSION OF THE KGB

Since 1978 the Afghan secret police has been run by the Soviet KGB, which trains Afghan officers in interrogation and torture techniques for six months in Moscow. The Khad is a state within a state and answers only to the KGB. Money for the service's functioning and for its arms is directly supplied by the USSR from an autonomous budget. It has eight major known interrogation and torture centers in Kabul alone. These include the central office of the Khad in Shashdarak, the Khad office in Sadarat, Khadi Panji (Khad Office #5) in Darulaman, Khadi Nezami (the Military Khad), and certain confiscated houses near the Sadarat building. The Ministry of Interior has an interrogation and torture center of its own within the main compound.

* Khad stands for Khidaamati Ittila'aatyi Dowlati, or "State

Information Services"

TORTURE AND THE LAW IN AFGHANISTAN

Torture is expressly forbidden by Article Five of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and by Article Seven of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of which Afghanistan so recently became party. Moreover, torture is, of course, forbidden by Articles Twenty-nine and Thirty of the Fundamental Principles of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan, which are meant to act ad interim as the country's constitution until the convening of the long-proposed meeting of the National Assembly.

Although many of those reportedly tortured appear to have been involved in armed resistance, other victims include civil servants, teachers and students who have been detained solely on suspicion of opposition. Many arrests and tortures have been initiated as a deterrent to others. It is reported that, in some cases, DRA governors summoned people to a meeting and then had them arrested and detained for questioning about alleged contacts with insurgents. solely for having relatives in the west, or for being in possesion of western literature, are not uncommon. Being found in possession of "counter-revolutionary" literature is a far more serious crime.

Arrests and cases of torture

Reports drawn from several sources, including interviews with detainees, refer to widespread beatings and to prisoners being subjected to electric shock treatment at various Khad detention centers in Kabul. These reports indicate that such

treatment is widespread and common during the interrogation

of prisoners.

Moreover, prisoners in these detention centers are denied any access to their families or lawyers, even though Article Twenty-seven of the "Law on the Implementation of Sentences in Prisons," promulgated by the DRA government in September 1982, allows prisoners the right to meet with lawyers and seek legal However, this article, like many others in this law,

assistance.

Likewise,

and other Soviet-styled Afghan laws, is designed apparently to serve the political purposes of the state rather than the accused. In fact, for fear of reprisal, no lawyer dares to extend his services to a political prisoner, a status which is synonymous with being an enemy of the state. Political prisoners are treated far worse than criminal prisoners for this very reason. Article Three of the same law reinforces prohibition of torture in Afghan prisons, but the existence of this Article has not precluded the continuing systematic use of torture. The insincerity of the authorities with respect to enforcement of the law is also evinced by the fact that many people associated with past human rights violations under the governments of Noor Muhammad Taraki and Hafizullah Amin continue to hold official positions.

It is reported that in some cases prisoners have suffered serious physical and mental injuries as a result of their illtreatment, including permanent deafness and dumbness. Some cases have been reported of prisoners dying as a result of injuries incurred through torture. Professor Habiburrahman Hallah of the

College of Letters and Humanities of Kabul University is a case in point. In April 1982, he was arrested and detained along with seven other members of an underground human rights group. He has reportedly lost his sight and hearing through torture and is serving an eight-year sentence.

According to a former high official under the monarchy who recently visited Washington DC, and who requested anonymity, physically conspicuous scars of a permanent nature are suspected in Kabul to cause many a victim to perish for fear that the scars would serve as evidence to the inhumanity of the DRA government.

INDIVIDUAL CASES OF TORTURE AND HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

I. Farida Ahmadi, 22, a medical student in Kabul accused in 1981 of distributing Resistance literature, was detained for six months and systematically tortured. Upon arrest, she was taken to the Khad headquarters in Sadarat a main torture center. There she was intimidated and told by the wardens to admit to belonging to a Resistance organization. She was kept sleepless for a week, then brought to the "terror room." She was led through several rooms where she could see "bits of bodies" hands and fingers. Seeing that this did not diminish her resolve, Khad operatives brought in a prisoner, still alive, but with his body swollen by blows. One of the Khad operatives, Latif Sharifi (ironically, his name literally means "The Gentle Son of the Noble!"), in charge of torture, pulled out the eyes of this prisoner. Finding Ms. Ahmadi still defiant, they subjected her to electric shock. She was then forced to stand motionless for two weeks. Her legs became swollen and some of her veins burst. She was also subjected to sexual abuse.

In her cell there were forty other women. Her youngest cell companion, Karima, had been arrested and taken into custody with her one-month-old baby. Mother and child were immediately sepa

rated. In a nearby cell, Karima could hear the shrieks and cries of her child. As if this were not painful enough, the baby was brought in front of her, undressed and tortured by strangulation. The baby's body turned blue before its mother.

Narrating these harrowing experiences before a human rights