A 30-year old death list was found by the Dutch National police during an investigation on an Afghan refugee suspected of war crimes. The list contains the names of almost 5.000 people that have been executed in 1978 and 1979 by the Afghan authorities. The Netherlands National Prosecutor’s Office stated that the document is of great importance to the relatives of the victims and has therefore decided to publish the list online. This will help families and friends of the victims to find closure, even 30 years after the events happened. The document will also be used in current investigations against other Afghan refugees that are suspected of war crimes.
The investigation that led to the discovery of the list focused on Amanullah Osman, who came to the Netherlands as a refugee in 1993. In his role as the Head of the Afghan Security Service (AGSA), he was suspected of war crimes during the then-Afghan regime. Osman admitted that his service has helped in the mass torture and killings in those two years. “People were being abused during interrogations. I was responsible for these abuses, but this is how things go in Afghanistan. I couldn’t take another approach. This was demanded and expected of me. If you don’t go along with this, you can never reach a high position in Afghanistan”, he said in interrogations with the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND). Osman was never granted refugee status in the Netherlands, partly because of this confession. However, he was never deported either due to the real dangers that would await him on return to his home country. Osman died a natural death in the Netherlands last year at the age of 67.
The Afghan Death list consists of 154 pages in Dari. The names of the victims are registered in alphabetical order, indicating their name, father’s name, profession, residence and the crime of which they have been accused.
Source: Openbaar Ministerie The Netherlands
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