Angry mob kills Afghan air minister

Posted 8:35AM on Friday 15th February 2002 ( 23 years ago )

KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - A mob of Muslim pilgrims enraged over flight delays to the Islamic holy city of Mecca stormed a plane at Kabul airport and beat Afghanistan's aviation minister to death, tossing his body to the tarmac, officials and eyewitnesses said. The violent outbreak underscored fears about the interim government's ability to establish security in chaotic post-Taliban Afghanistan - and raised questions about the role of international peacekeepers, who were present on the airport grounds at the time of the mob attack. Afghanistan's Cabinet met in emergency session for several hours late Thursday following the killing of the aviation and tourism minister, Abdul Rahman. The Kabul airport was sealed off Friday morning and white-helmeted Interior Ministry police were stationed every few yards on the roads leading to the main entrance. ``We lost a good man, an educated man,'' said a top aide to Rahman, Mohammed Yakoub Nuristani. ``He wanted to help rebuild Afghanistan.'' ``The interim administration is shocked, obviously, and very saddened by this incident,'' said Foreign Ministry spokesman Omar Samad. ``We're looking into the criminal actions that have taken place here.'' British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who arrived Friday for talks with the interim government, immediately conveyed his condolences to Abdullah Abdullah, the foreign minister. The fatal confrontation was sparked when Rahman went to the Kabul airport Thursday afternoon for a flight to New Delhi, according to accounts from government and Afghan airline officials. Hundreds of pilgrims, stranded at the airport awaiting Saudi visas and transport to Mecca, blocked Rahman's plane, beginning a standoff that went on for about five hours, airline and government officials said. The mob stormed the plane when Rahman emerged to try to talk to the crowd, said Abdul Wahab Nuristani, the deputy chief of a military division in eastern Afghanistan. Rahman was seized, beaten and his body tossed to the tarmac below, he said, citing witness accounts. ``This is so terrible, so illegal,'' he said. Dozens of friends, family and government officials gathered at Rahman's Kabul home as word spread of his death. The mourners listened quietly as a mullah read verses from the Koran. Rahman, 49, was trained as a medical doctor. He fled Afghanistan when the Taliban took over and had been living in exile in New Delhi. In interviews since taking over as aviation and tourism minister in the interim government, he had spoken enthusiastically of his wish to make Afghanistan a tourist destination. Despite the killing, two pilgrimage flights left the airport at 2 a.m. and another was to depart later Friday, airport officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Several pilgrims were also hurt during a clash with Rahman's bodyguards at the airport Thursday. Also beaten in the fray were about 10 members of the staff of Afghanistan's Ariana airlines, including its president, said an Ariana employee who spoke on condition of anonymity. The employee, who was in the airport as tensions built throughout the day, said would-be pilgrims grew angrier and angrier as delays dragged on while they waited in the freezing terminal. About 1,400 people held bookings and tickets for what were to have been two flights during the day, but neither had taken off by late afternoon, the staffer said. ``They were very, very upset,'' he said of the pilgrims. A contingent of British and French peacekeepers, stationed a quarter-mile away in the military part of the airport, were apparently unaware that the situation had flared out of control. Earlier, they had sent food and blankets for the growing crowd. The security force ``knew there was an ongoing incident, but it happened very quickly,'' said British Capt. Graham Dunlop, a spokesman for the peacekeepers. He said the civilian area of the airport was under the control of Afghan authorities. ``We were not involved,'' he said. ``It's not our jurisdiction.'' Dunlop said he did not know how many peacekeepers were on the airport grounds at the time of the mob attack. Mohammed Anif, a Kabul man who was waiting to see off his father on the pilgrimage, saw the angry mob rush the plane after a rumor ran through the crowd that it was about to take off. ``They went running up the steps and inside the plane, and we saw struggles and a body thrown out of the plane,'' he said. He said he could not tell from a distance if it was Rahman's. Some accounts, though, said that Rahman left the plane of his own accord to try to talk to the crowd. Before the plane was stormed, Anif said he heard people in the crowd talking angrily about the minister using the plane for an official trip while they waited for their own plane to Mecca. ``They were saying that the hajj was the most important thing, and how could he do this,'' Anif said. ``Some were saying they wanted to lie down in front of the plane to keep it from taking off, and others said, 'No, let's stop it another way.''' The hajj to Mecca - home of Islam's holiest shrine - is one of the pillars of Islam. Muslims who are able-bodied and can afford the journey are obliged to do it at least once in their lifetime. Since the fall of the Taliban, factional fighting has persisted in pockets of Afghanistan's countryside, but this is the most serious violence yet in the capital since the interim government of Hamid Karzai took over Dec. 22. Kabul is patrolled by an international peacekeeping force that numbers about 3,200 troops thus far. Karzai has repeatedly appealed for an enlarging of the force and an expansion of its deployment outside of Kabul. Rahman's funeral was to be held Saturday in Kabul.

http://accesswdun.com/article/2002/2/203042