Hazaragi cap, the Hazara Yadgar logoHazara Yadgar

Afshar operation of 1993

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In February 1993, mujahedin forces attacked the Afshar area of west Kabul, then held by the Hazara party Hizb-i Wahdat. Militias murdered civilians, and hundreds more were abducted and never seen again.

During the civil war in Kabul, fighting between rival mujahedin factions intensified in January 1993. In February, forces attacked Shia positions in west Kabul, including the Hazara-majority Afshar area.1 The campaign's aim was for Jamiat and Ittihad forces to seize the main Hizb-i Wahdat positions around Afshar.1

Human Rights Watch reports that hundreds of people were killed in attacks on civilian homes in the lead-up and thousands were displaced. During the attack, militias murdered scores of civilians in front of their homes, and hundreds more were abducted and never seen again.1

How many died

There is no agreed total. Published figures commonly fall between several hundred and about a thousand, and some community sources give more.2 Please add sourced testimony and names of the victims.

Human Rights Watch documents abuses by several factions in this war. These include civilians abducted in 1992 by Hizb-i Wahdat as well as by Ittihad.1

Footnotes

  1. Human Rights Watch, Blood-Stained Hands: Past Atrocities in Kabul and Afghanistan's Legacy of Impunity, July 2005. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  2. Wikipedia, Afshar massacre. ↩