From insurgency to metropolis beat: Taliban police be taught the ropes – Occasions of India

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After spending 13 years as a Taliban fighter waging an insurgency, Rahimullah is now slowly adjusting to the comparatively atypical function of a policeman in Afghanistan’s capital.
Like the remainder of the Taliban, he’s grappling with a clumsy transition from insurgent fighter to civilian patrolman, because the hardliners vow safety and construct a brand new police pressure.
Kabul residents say avenue crime has dropped, with widespread worry rooted in reminiscences of the Taliban’s brutal regime within the Nineteen Nineties, notorious for harsh punishments akin to public stoning, lashing and amputations.
“This isn’t dangerous work,” says Rahimullah, who joined the Taliban as an adolescent “for Islam and for my nation”.
The 28-year-old from neighbouring Wardak province, alongside along with his group of eight males, has the duty of managing safety in a central Kabul district.
His work entails “catching thieves, murderers and those that drink wine”, he tells AFP, which was allowed to accompany a patrol overseen by a extra senior Taliban official.
A few of his colleagues seem not sure of the right way to navigate their new function in a metropolis removed from their earlier lives within the rather more conservative countryside.
“It isn’t our favorite job, but it surely’s our accountability,” admits the Taliban commander overseeing the patrol.
As a substitute of the jackets and trousers previously worn by officers, many Taliban forces don conventional Afghan gown, referred to as shalwar kameez.
Some have had new variations constituted of the blue-and-black camouflage materials utilized in outdated Afghan uniforms.
At one station, in Kabul’s tenth district, the symbol of the earlier police pressure can nonetheless be seen, close to the Taliban’s white and black banner.
Taliban punishments have already been on show in some elements of Afghanistan — final week, the our bodies of 4 suspected kidnappers had been hung from a crane within the metropolis of Herat.
The outdated police pressure, created by the worldwide powers that drove out the Taliban in 2001, now not exists.
It collapsed when the Taliban swept again into energy on August 15, as former police and civil servants terrified of revenge and abuse scurried into hiding or fled the nation.
The Taliban authorities are keen to maintain their promise of strict legislation and order within the new Afghanistan, the place the justice system underneath the US-backed authorities was stricken by corruption and inefficiency.
“There’s a coaching programme underway, and there shall be professionals in any respect ranges,” mentioned inside ministry spokesman Qari Sayed Khosti, who has invited former police personnel to return.
The brand new pressure already counts about 4,000 males within the capital, says Kabul police spokesman Afez Sirajuddin Omeri, insisting town is way safer than earlier than.
“Underneath the earlier authorities, there have been 300 to 400 crimes reported every day. Now in complete they report round 15 a day,” mentioned Omeri as he drove a dusty outdated Toyota Corolla via town, his automobile radio taking part in spiritual songs.
It isn’t potential to independently confirm these numbers, however Kabul residents usually agree that robberies and kidnappings, beforehand rampant, have eased.
With the conflict between the collapsed Afghan safety forces and Taliban now over, bombings — largely carried out by the rebel group — have additionally dramatically decreased.
For the brand new policemen although, it may be difficult to go from a life immersed in excessive violence to sustaining legislation and order.
However Yahya Mansoor, 25, on obligation at a checkpoint in japanese Kabul, says he doesn’t miss combating and is keen to “serve the folks”.
“Earlier than we served them by making jihad,” he says. “Now we’re rebuilding our nation.”
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