Kerala massacre

The Kerala massacre (no connection to the state in India) was an incident on April 20, 1979 described in American publication Christian Science Monitor based on reports from Afghans in Pakistani refugee camps. According to these claims, the then Marxist government of Afghanistan's soldiers and policemen drove to a village called Kerala in Kunar Province, eastern Afghanistan, shooting at over one thousand unarmed civilians.[2][3] Associated Press had reports of 640 males allegedly put to death in April 1979. [4]

Kerala massacre
LocationKerala, Kunar Province, Afghanistan
DateApril 20, 1979 (1979-04-20)
Deaths1,170–1,260[1]
PerpetratorsAfghan Army (Khalq)

Background

Kerala was a farming community of 5,000, around 12 miles from the Pakistan border. Much of Kunar Province had seen fighting between the Communist Democratic Republic of Afghanistan Army personnel and rebels hiding near the mountains since the Saur Revolution in 1978. On April 19, the day before the incident, local rebels attacked an army garrison in the nearby town of Chaga Serai.[5] Rebels from Kerala had been harassing provincial capital Assadabad for several weeks, to the extent that a United Nations hydro-electric project in the vicinity had to be abandoned. At around the same time, there was the Herat mutiny in March 1979 and the declaration of "holy war" by rebel leaders based in Pakistan[6]

About 200 armed government troops and police, arrived in tanks in the village on Friday, April 20. [7] It was alleged that the officers aimed their Kalashnikovs at the men and told them to shout pro-communist slogans. Instead, the men shouted Allahu akbar.[8] The officers then allegedly ordered them to crouch down facing the tanks, and soon after started shooting at them. There were claims that having killed the victims, bulldozers arrived thereafter and buried the bodies in a mass grave.[9] It has been suggested that this was a local initiative taken by government forces based in Kunar.[6] According to one witness, "There was a rumor that Russians were coming to take the women away in buses...But there were no Russians."[4]

Among the dead in the fighting were Wazir Mohammad, a local Communist official who was the principal of the girls' school at nearby Chigha Sarai, and Mohammad Yashteen, also a staunch communist party member, who taught at the local primary school.[4]

The allegations were denied by Soviet media. In particular, the Russian press agency Tass denounced reports published by a number of American publications about the massacre, particularly Newsweek and Christian Science Monitor. Nikolai Repin, a Tass commentator, charged that the western news media had shattered all records in anti-Soviet propaganda in spreading what he called "the monstrous misinformation" about a massacre.[10] Repin continued:[11]

The authors of this falsehood are not in the least embarrassed by the fact that no Soviet officer had actually been in the village of Kerala or even in all of Kunar Province, where the village is situated.... The whole story of a "mass execution" also does not correspond to reality; it is pure invention from start to finish....The fabrications are so vile that they would not even be worth answering had not this deliberate slander against millions of people been spread all over the world.... The falsehood that was fabricated with their participation is a component part of the malicious campaign that is being waged against the USSR and Afghanistan by imperialist propaganda

In October 2015, Sadeq Alamyar was arrested by Dutch police in the Netherlands on suspicion of war crimes, based on a criminal complaint filed in 2008. Alamyar, who was commander of the elite Afghan Army 444th Commando Force at the time, was accused of ordering the killings and for having shot the victims himself. A Khalqist, Alamyar was jailed in the 1980s during the rival Parchamite faction rule of Babrak Karmal before he fled to the Netherlands for asylum.[12][13] In December 2017 the case against him was dropped because of lack of evidence.[14]

See also

Reference
  1. Afghanistan: The Soviet War by Edward Girardet, 1985. Page 110
  2. "A grim chapter in Afghanistan war". 4 February 1980 – via Christian Science Monitor.
  3. "The Kerala Massacre". Washington Post. 1980-02-06. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2018-02-06.
  4. "MASSACRE DESCRIBED BY AFGHAN REFUGEES: THEY TELL OF SURVIVING ARMY ATTACK AGAINST A VILLAGE LAST SPRING BECAUSE IT AIDED REBELS SURVIVORS TELL OF ROUNDUP REBELS TAKE REFUGE 'WE WERE ABOUT TO BE KILLED' RUMOR OF RUSSIANS COMING". The New York Times. February 17, 1980.
  5. Afghanistan: The Soviet War by Edward Girardet, 1985. Page 107
  6. Male, Beverley (1982). Revolutionary Afghanistan: A Reappraisal. Crook Helm. p. 100.
  7. "Sadeq Alamyar – TRIAL International". trialinternational.org.
  8. Afghanistan: The Soviet War by Edward Girardet, 1985. Page 109
  9. "Kerala residents want Sadeq Alamyar sentenced to death". www.pajhwok.com.
  10. "Moscow scorns U.S. press reports about a 'massacre' in afghanistan". The New York Times. February 6, 1980.
  11. Kulik, S. (March 5, 1980). "Foul Concoction". Current Digest of the Russian Press. 32 (5): 2.
  12. "Dutch arrest in Afghanistan's Kerala massacre - Afghanistan Analysts Network". www.afghanistan-analysts.org.
  13. "Massacre Families 'Thankful' for Arrest After 36 Years". NBC News. Retrieved 2018-02-06.
  14. "Sadeq Alamyar".

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