Afghanistan's Blasphemy Laws : Dispatches from the Culture Wars

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Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of Michigan Citizens for Science and co-founder of The Panda's Thumb. He has written for such publications as The Bard, Skeptic and Reports of the National Center for Science Education, spoken in front of many organizations and conferences, and appeared on nationally syndicated radio shows and on C-SPAN. Ed is also a Fellow with the Center for Independent Media and the host of Declaring Independence, a one hour weekly political talk show on WPRR in Grand Rapids, Michigan.(static)

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Afghanistan's Blasphemy Laws

Posted on: January 30, 2008 9:09 AM, by Ed Brayton

A 23 year old student and journalist has been sentenced to death in Afghanistan for blasphemy. Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh was arrested last fall for publishing on the internet an article critical of the treatment of women in the Quran. The US Commission on International Religious Freedom has sent a letter to Condoleeza Rice demanding that she pressure the Afghani government to release Kambakhsh. Didn't we get rid of the Taliban? Apparently not.

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No, we did (at least temporarily) get rid of the Taliban. We just replaced them with people who are even worse.

Posted by: Dunc | January 30, 2008 10:22 AM

Is the article publicly available? I think that the appropriate response is to publish it everywhere.

Posted by: Flaky | January 30, 2008 10:41 AM

No, we did (at least temporarily) get rid of the Taliban. We just replaced them with people who are even worse.

Worse? ICBW, but my impression is "not quite as bad"; eg. I haven't heard of the new bosses routinely beheading school teachers for teaching girls to read. However, that's still a pretty low standard to meet. Anyone who thought we were "giving" the Afghans Western-style secular pluralistic democracy is very disappointed. Too many of them don't seem to want it.

Posted by: Eamon Knight | January 30, 2008 11:01 AM

Worse? ICBW, but my impression is "not quite as bad"; eg. I haven't heard of the new bosses routinely beheading school teachers for teaching girls to read.

Because many (if not most) of the schools are closed, most girls are too intimidated to attend if they're open, and beheading a school teacher just isn't enough to make the news anymore. We've replaced a bunch of mass-murdering, torturing, nutcase theocrats with a bunch of mass-murdering, torturing, nutcase warlords who pander to the mass-murdering, torturing, nutcase theocrats whilst making huge sums of money off the opium trade and using the proceeds to arm their own private, torturing, mass-murdering militias and enjoy lavish lifestyles whilst their people starve.

At least the Taliban made some effort at moral consistency, vile and inhuman though it was. The current crew don't even have that slender reed of redemption.

The primary reason the Taliban enjoyed what support they did in Afghanistan was that they weren't quite as bad as the warlords. Sure, the Taliban would behead you in the football stadium for the mildest of religious infractions, but they wouldn't rape and then murder your entire village just for fun.

Posted by: Dunc | January 30, 2008 11:22 AM

No, I have to disagree with the notion that the current Afghani government is worse than the Taliban. They aren't beheading teachers for daring to teach girls to read, or (literally) ripping them in half in front of their village to intimidate people into keeping girls illiterate. They aren't murdering people for daring to listen to music. Let's not get carried away here.

Posted by: Ed Brayton | January 30, 2008 12:06 PM

The may not be doing it as a matter of explicit government policy, but if you think the militias aren't doing that sort of thing, well... I believe you are mistaken (note: that is one example, in Kabul, the most settled and secure part of the country. No-one knows what's going on in the hinterlands except the poor bastards who live there). Much of the country is now so dangerously lawless that there is very little reporting on such matters, or indeed any matters at all.

As for tearing people apart, Rashid Dostum is well known for having people tied to tank tracks and then run over - not especially as a religious policy, but rather just for laughs. (Again, this is just one minor example from an appalling catalogue of horrors.) But of course, that sort of thing doesn't make the news because he's our buddy. We gave him money, guns and political support.

So, what's worse: killing and torturing people because your twisted religious beliefs demand it, or killing and torturing people just because you can? At least the Taliban made some vile pretence at due process. We've smashed a horrible government and replaced it with a form of anarchic warlordism that makes Mad Max look like a church picnic.

Posted by: Dunc | January 30, 2008 12:28 PM

Just to be absolutely clear: I'm not saying the current Afghani government is worse than the Taliban - I'm saying that the current Afghani government is essentially irrelevant, and that the people with the real power (i.e. the warlords) are worse than the Taliban. Of course, there is some degree of overlap between "the government" and "the warlords", but their real power does not derive from the government.

Posted by: Dunc | January 30, 2008 12:33 PM

So, Afghanistan is still fucked up. Oh, well. It doesn't change the fact that the US had every right and obligation to invade after 9/11.

Posted by: soboco | January 30, 2008 12:43 PM

So, Afghanistan is still fucked up. Oh, well. It doesn't change the fact that the US had every right and obligation to invade after 9/11.

Doesn't exactly change the fact that we also had at least the obligation to stay there and actually finish what we started before hareing off on an ill-advised venture elsewhere like a toddler hopped up on sugar and caffeine....

And that attitude of "Ahh well, too bad for them," doesn't shine a very positive light on whether or not you feel we should be bound by those obligations. Funny how our prime reason for going in -- Bin Laden -- is still on the loose, isn't it?

Posted by: G Barnett | January 30, 2008 12:53 PM

The US Commission on International Religious Freedom has sent a letter to Condoleeza Rice demanding that she pressure the Afghani government to release Kambakhsh.

Great, perhaps the Afghan govt will be embarrassed enough to find a legal loophole for Kambakhsh. Like they did in the case of Abdul Rahman. Without ever considering doing something about the barbaric laws, of course.

If Condoleeza Rice even listens, she'll probably focus on the individual case and pretend everything is fine when this one guy is released.

Posted by: C.W. | January 30, 2008 1:00 PM

Dunc, schools are being closed because of intimidation of teachers by the Taliban and they sympathizers in areas where they have regained a foothold (i.e. just about anywhere outside Kabul).

Posted by: tacitus | January 30, 2008 1:08 PM

soboco said "It doesn't change the fact that the US had every right and obligation to invade after 9/11."

Really? Every right?

Maybe Condi should have said something to the Taliban leaders she had over to Washington, DC meetings in order to threaten them with annihilation if they did not drop objections to running a natural gas pipeline through their country.

Twenty terrorists rammed three airplanes into targets, and you think we had every right to invade a frickin country?

That kind of imperialistic attitude is what led to terrorism in the first place. Just ask Condi - she can verify this.

Posted by: Gingerbaker | January 30, 2008 1:10 PM

Latest report from the BBC. Short version; he's fucked.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7216976.stm

Posted by: SteveF | January 30, 2008 1:13 PM

The silver lining to this appalling story is that it shows that the problems with Islam are not confined to the extreme fringe groups like al-Qaeda and the Taliban. The people who want to execute Kambaksh are "moderates".

Posted by: Bill Poser | January 30, 2008 1:27 PM

Whether the US had a right to invade Afghanistan, the US certainly had an obligation under international law to maintain order once the invasion was successful. Instead, we ran off to Iraq, where we repeated the incompetence.

Posted by: Mark P | January 30, 2008 1:51 PM

Bill, I don't know you can say that. Sure, it's true that it's not just extreme fringe Muslims to want to see the death penalty for "blasphemers" but these people are moderates only when compared with the likes of the Taliban and the Iranian Mullahs.

There are places in the world, like Turkey and Indonesia where there are millions of moderate Muslims struggling to roll back the excesses of their fellow believers. In both these countries there are Muslims who are fighting for the rights of women, and many more who support their fight.

Compared to those countries, even the new Afghanistan is barely more than an feudal, warlord-ridden country these days. So it's not surprising that their leaders still use religion to batter down any hint at dissent.

Posted by: tacitus | January 30, 2008 1:57 PM

I didn't say we handled Afghanistan perfectly, but it was an open and notorious home for Al-Qaeda training camps. You notice that no other country has training camps as open and notorious as Afghanistan did, don't you? And I know they're still training in the western frontier of Pakistan, but certainly not as freely and openly. If a country is hosting such openly hostile and illiberal enemies, I don't have an issue with us attacking them. The situation in Afghanistan was different from the situation in Iraq, and I think the wisdom of attacking Iraq is debatable. I don't feel that way about Afghanistan.

Posted by: soboco | January 30, 2008 2:00 PM

You could certainly argue that the US had an obligation to maintain order once it invaded Afghanistan, and ideally would do just that. Realistically though, the US has an obligation to protect its national security first and foremost. The order and stabililty of Afghanistan, which had openly hosted enemies of the US, comes after our security.

Posted by: soboco | January 30, 2008 2:09 PM

soboco said"Realistically though, the US has an obligation to protect its national security first and foremost. The order and stability of Afghanistan, which had openly hosted enemies of the US, comes after our security. "

Again with the Bombs away and let God sort out who gets killed stuff?

The U.S. is perfectly capable of protecting our national security without invading sovereign nations, and did so successfully before BushCo came into office.

I won't be the first to point out that invading foreign countries and slaughtering hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women, and children is counterproductive to protecting Americans and American interests.

I will also not be the first to point out that hosting ( terrorist ) enemies of the U.S. is not only not a valid criterion, but is also one which Bush doesn't even follow consistantly.

Saudi Arabia actively supports enemies of the U.S. yet doesn't even garner a slap on the wrist. Pakistan deserves a good invasion by your standard. Syria? Yemen?

And please don't assert that Al Queda training camps are not overt in Pakistan. Musharif actually signed a formal agreement with them to designate a "consequence free" zone for them to do whatever they want without his interference!

That's a lot more overt than anything in Afghanistan.

Go find the websites out there that show nice, clear digital images of civilian death in Afghanistan and Iraq. Really look at them. Then tell me how large-scale invasions of either of these two countries was justified.

Don't get me wrong. We should stop terrorism by killing terrorists. Every one of them.

But invading a country instead of letting special teams and the CIA do their jobs is nutty stuff on a lot of levels.

Posted by: Gingerbaker | January 30, 2008 3:32 PM

Gingerbaker:

Maybe Condi should have said something to the Taliban leaders she had over to Washington, DC meetings in order to threaten them with annihilation if they did not drop objections to running a natural gas pipeline through their country... Just ask Condi - she can verify this.

Well, since I'm not on speaking terms with Condi, how about providing a source for the rest of us?

Posted by: James Hanley | January 30, 2008 5:21 PM

The order and stabililty of Afghanistan, which had openly hosted enemies of the US, comes after our security

soboco, I don't know what you are arguing here. The US military didn't leave Afghanistan to protect it's own borders against interlopers from abroad, it left Afghanistan to go and attack Iraq for reasons that were unsupported by the facts. (leaving the allies that went into Afghanistan with them holding the bag, where their men and women in service are still struggling and dying to this day...)

I honestly can't see the logic behind the belief that pulling out of Afghanistan was the right thing to do for America since American interests should come first. What did America gain from invading Iraq?

Posted by: kodiak | January 30, 2008 5:42 PM

"Anyone who thought we were "giving" the Afghans Western-style secular pluralistic democracy is very disappointed. Too many of them don't seem to want it."

Actually most Afghans probably do want it - Afghanistan was actually a pretty liberal place before the coups and civil war that preceded the the Soviet invasion.

Hell, after the Soviet pull-out, thousands of Afghans continued to fight against the Mujahadeen. But they were a bunchacommies so the west never supported them.

Support for Taliban-style fundamentalism seems largely restricted to the Pashtun areas of the south. The Taliban conquered the rest of Afghanistan mainly by offering amnesty and bribes to local tribal leaders to switch sides. (This is also, of course, exactly how the US took those exactly same areas post-9/11.)

American rightwingers talk blithely about partitioning Iraq, there's probably a much stronger case for the partitioning of Afghanistan - let the Kazakhs, Tajiks and Uzbeks integrate with their ethnic homelands; let the Pashtun have their own state or merge with the Pahstuns in Pakistan.

Posted by: Ian Gould | January 30, 2008 7:54 PM

"You could certainly argue that the US had an obligation to maintain order once it invaded Afghanistan, and ideally would do just that. Realistically though, the US has an obligation to protect its national security first and foremost."

"Realistically", the US and the other nations which invaded Afghanistan pursuant to the instructions of the UN Security Council are all signatories of the Geneva Conventions.

Under those Conventions, the occupying powers are obliged to protect the civilian population.

This is black letter law - not some vague aspirational moral "obligation".

Posted by: Ian Gould | January 30, 2008 8:00 PM

James Hanley said:"Well, since I'm not on speaking terms with Condi, how about providing a source for the rest of us?"

LOL. Sure, here is one:

http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2002/06/05/memo/index1.html

Posted by: Gingerbaker | January 31, 2008 10:03 AM

OK folks, this is what RAWA have to say on the matter. If there's any group in the world that I trust to give an accurate, honest assessment of the human rights situation in Afghanistan, particularly as it affects women, it's them.

The Northern Alliance blood-suckers, who are part of Karzai's team and have key government posts, continue to be the main and the most serious obstacle towards the establishment of peace and democracy in Afghanistan.

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