The minor taste of accountability in Afghanistan

Expect these kinds of stories to happen far more often. Lawless contractors in a lawless land is a recipe for disaster:

Afghan authorities arrested an employee of a British private security company this week and sentenced him to eight months in jail, the latest move in the government’s crackdown on private security firms.

Global Strategies Group consultant Michael Hearn was arrested Wednesday for allegedly failing to register weapons with the government.

The move comes amid uncertainty about how aggressively and quickly the Afghan government intends to disband the vast network of private security companies that flourished in the country as security worsened in recent years.

A day before the arrest and prosecution, Afghan officials announced they would take a more lenient approach to expelling the groups, an acknowledgment that the country’s security forces are not yet up to the task of protecting diplomatic installations and other sensitive sites.

Text and images ©2024 Antony Loewenstein. All rights reserved.

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