The Global Silence on Australian Troops’ War Crimes in Afghanistan is Deafening

On Thursday, the Inspector General of the Australian Defense Force (IGADF), Major General Justice Paul Brereton, released the Afghanistan Inquiry Report, which revealed the findings of a four-year inquiry into the conduct of Australian special forces in Afghanistan between 2005–2016. While a total of 25 perpetrators have been identified, the report calls for the investigation of 19 current and former soldiers for unlawfully killing 39 Afghans, including farmers, civilians, and prisoners, and carrying out cruel treatment on 2 Afghans. Though these crimes are in clear breach of international law, they have yet to be officially deemed as war crimes.

The lack of global outrage and the failure to recognize these brutal acts of violence as war crimes point toward a troubling trend of numbness toward the loss of Muslim lives. This dehumanization is a part of a vicious cycle where Muslims in the West are consistently viewed from a lens of suspicion: French Muslims are the prime target of suppression of freedom of religion in the name of laïcité and American Muslims are still living in the shadow of the Patriot Act.

Though the inquiry and the recognition of the atrocities committed by the Austrational forces against Afghan noncombatants is a long overdue step in the right direction, the nations that have participated in the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan have a long road toward moral reckoning and accountability for their actions. The sheer difficulty and length of this inquiry process speaks volumes to the lack of transparency and justice for the war crimes and unlawful killings perpetuated in Afghanistan. As noted by the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), the United States and the United Kingdom need to investigate the actions of their armed forces. The war crimes on part of the Australian soldiers are not an isolated incident; human rights groups have observed troops from other countries violating the International Humanitarian Law in Afghanistan.

For far too long, the world has reacted callously to the loss of Afghan lives. The normalization of violence in the “Muslim world” and the trivialization of Muslim lives in turn allows for war crimes to go unchecked and unperturbed. Even with the IGADF report, there has been little to no serious response from non-Afghans. That must change.