Afghan informants fear for lives

Published on Saturday 31 July 2010 13:40

SUCH is the rising paranoia, the Afghan farmer was prepared to speak but only if he wasn't identified. Concealed by the thick stone walls of his home in war-torn Helmand Province, where most British troops are based, he made it known that although he had helped allied forces and his government in the past with information it was unlikely he would do so again.

• US troops on patrol in Kandahar Province, the scene of recent attacks. Pic: Manpreet Romana/Getty

"Everyone is already afraid," he said. "Each day the Taleban get stronger and we see no help from the coalition forces.

"Everyone here knows if you help the coalition you will be decapitated. How can we have trust now that our information won't end up with the Taleban?"

He was referring, of course, to the now notorious leaks of 90,000 intelligence documents to the WikiLeaks website, which were published online last week to the horror of the western intelligence establishment. As some of the documents contained the uncensored names and locations of Afghans who have shared information with government and Nato forces, the implications were obvious.

Following the online publication, Taleban officials lost no time in getting out the message that they were poring over the documents to learn what they could about who had been collaborating with their enemy. Local politicians said the flow of information was already starting to dry up as news of the leaks spread slowly into rural communities.

So far, dire predictions of mass executions do not appear to have been realised, but whether that is because Taleban forces are otherwise engaged with the new US-British attack in Helmand - Operation Black Prince - or whether those named have fled the zone in anticipation of reprisals is not yet clear.

One factor is that although the conflict - and breaking news stories on it - is instantly reported around the globe, communications are still relatively poor in the Afghan countryside. A snapshot survey of Afghan villagers showed that only two out of 12 were so far aware of the WikiLeaks row being covered so prominently in the western media.

Kandahar MP Khalid Pashtoon said the leak had so far received little coverage in the local media but in time everyone would become aware of it. "And when they do, those providing information to the international military will be scared," he said.

Pashtoon said none of his constituents had raised the issue with him yet and he wasn't volunteering it. "We are fighting one difficulty here, which is security; we don't want to create another."

But he agreed that the likely flow of reports to Nato forces would slow as news spread of the security breach. The Taleban would use news of the leak to intimidate people from helping Nato forces, telling them that if they informed on the Taleban their names would become public.

There are other shades of opinion. Political analyst Ahmed Sayeedi cast some doubt on how damaging the release of some informants' names would be, saying it was probable such spies would be using pseudonyms.

"These people who are giving reports don't always have one name and are probably not always giving their real names," he said. Most, he added, were motivated by money. "They might stop giving information for a short time but then they will start again."

An elder in the Helmand district of Marjah, where Nato this year launched a massive operation to clear the Taleban, said informants would keep providing information but might be more careful in their approaches. "They are not doing this for their heart or their country, they are doing it for money and they will keep doing it," he said.

Yesterday, US officials made clear their concerns about what other secret documents the whistle-blowing website may possess and were trying to contact the group to avoid their release, according to the State Department.

The WikiLeaks group, run by Australian Julian Assange, publicly released more than 90,000 US Afghan war records spanning a six-year period last Sunday. The group also is thought to be in possession of tens of thousands of US diplomatic cables passed to it by the chief suspect, army intelligence analyst Bradley Manning.

"Do we have concerns about what might be out there? Yes, we do," said State Department spokesman PJ Crowley, adding that US authorities have not specifically determined which documents may have been leaked to the organisation.

He said the State Department could not confirm the long-standing reports that WikiLeaks is in possession of a large set of US diplomatic cables. But the fact that the documents already released contained a handful of cables suggests that other secret diplomatic messages may have been included in the data transmitted to WikiLeaks, Crowley said.

"When we provide our analysis of situations in key countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan, we distribute these across the other agencies including to military addresses," said Crowley. "So is the potential there that State Department documents have been compromised? Yes."

Private Manning, previously charged with leaking earlier classified material of US forces shooting at civilians, has been transferred back to American soil. The army intelligence analyst was previously being held in Kuwait after being taken there from his post in Baghdad.

The State Department has not ruled out prosecuting both Manning and Assange, after accusing him of having "blood on his hands".

Yesterday, one former low-ranking Afghan official was quoted as saying: "I want ISAF (the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force], especially the US military, to help me or protect me, or for the Afghan government to protect me. If they don', I have to flee my country." The man is quoted in a leaked document giving details of local Taleban.