- DUBAI (Reuters) - The world's
largest Muslim body said Tuesday it had asked the United Nations to probe
the deaths of hundreds of foreign prisoners in Afghanistan.
-
- The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) said
in a statement that its secretary-general, Abdelouahed Belkaziz, had
demanded
a probe into the "massacre of prisoners of war who had surrendered
to Northern Alliance forces, following assurances that they will be well
treated and handed over to the U.N.."
-
- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in a written reply
to the request, had said that such an investigation would only be possible
after the formation of an Afghan human rights commission, which the U.N.
would help set up, the statement said.
-
- "But even after it is established, such a commission
would not be able to work effectively to investigate such a highly complex
incident except after some time," said the OIC statement sent to
Reuters
from the organization's headquarters in Saudi Arabia.
-
- The Northern Alliance has said that 600 prisoners,
including
Pakistanis, Arabs and Chechens, and more than 40 of its fighters were
killed
in three days of fighting which erupted after the inmates staged a revolt
in a fortress in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif in
November.
-
- Television footage showed of members of Saudi-born
dissident
Osama bin Laden's al- Qaeda fighters sprawled in trenches and littering
the courtyards of the Qala-i-Jangi fortress, where they were held.
-
- British television has shown video footage of Westerners,
believed to be British and U.S. troops, firing machine guns and rifles
alongside Afghan alliance fighters at the prisoners.
-
- Human rights organizations and the U.N. human rights
chief Mary Robinson have called for an international inquiry into the
killing
of the prisoners and expressed concern about other reported massacres in
Afghanistan.
-
- Robinson has said an investigation could be led by the
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and her staff in
Afghanistan
was already "mapping out patterns of massacres."
-
- She has also expressed concern about the
"substantial
toll of deaths and injuries" among Afghan civilians caused by U.S.
bombing, and destruction of hospitals and old people's homes.
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