PRT/BAMYAN: POOR FACILITIES, CORRUPTION PLAGUE

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 03 KABUL 000258

SIPDIS

STATE FOR SA/FO, S/CT, SA/A, S/CR, EUR/RPM
NSC FOR AHARRIMAN, KAMEND
REL NATO/AUST/NZ/ISAF
CENTCOM FOR POLAD, CG CFA-A, CG CJTF-76
USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/16/2016
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR KDEM PHUM SOCI AF
SUBJECT: PRT/BAMYAN: POOR FACILITIES, CORRUPTION PLAGUE
BAMYAN LAW ENFORCEMENT (PART 1 OF 2)

REF: A. A) 06 KABUL 0025 (OPIUM BURN)

B. B) 05 KABUL 5268 (BAMYAN DEVELOPMENT CONFERENCE)

C. C) 05 KABUL 4905 (ANP/GOVERNOR TENSION)

D. D) 05 KABUL 5078 (COAL SMUGGLING CONCERNS)

Classified By: CHARGE D'AFFAIRES, A.I. RICHARD NORLAND FOR REASONS 1.4
(B) AND (D)


1. (SBU) SUMMARY: The law enforcement organs in Bamyan are on
life support. Poorly paid, equipped, and trained police do
little to counter lawlessness in the Central Highlands.
Police and prosecution corruption exacerbates and undermines
the people's already shaky faith in Central Government
authority. Law enforcement's misadventures surrounding the
recent opium seizure and burn highlight the gaps in Bamyan's
law enforcement capacity. This is the first cable in a
two-part series on Bamyan's beleaguered law enforcement
apparatus. END SUMMARY.

Diminishing Order and No Law
--------------


2. (SBU) While Bamyan Province is widely known for its
relatively stable security environment, its stability exists
in spite of, rather than because of, police and law
enforcement efforts in the province. Police do little to
prevent or control crime, as Chief of Police (COP) Wahadat
has admitted privately to PRTOff on several occasions. The
situation appears even worse when it comes to prosecution of
suspects. Of the 71 cases referred to the Chief Prosecutor's
office by the ANP in 2005, only 19 have gone to trial thus
far. In one burglary case, the suspect has been held for
three years without any charges being filed.

Limited Equipment, Resources, Personnel, and Training
-------------- --------------


3. (SBU) The ANP and Chief Prosecutor's office are not in a
position to improve the current security environment. ANP
Deputy COP Col. Abdul Malik agreed that the ANP is poorly
trained, poorly equipped, and poorly run. As proof of the
ANP's many deficiencies, Malik pointed to three incidents in
the past few months in which unarmed individuals disarmed and
assaulted ANP officers: "We cannot even protect ourselves,
much less Bamyan's people."


4. (U) ANP officers in Bamyan work with limited resources.
Police stations are uniformly in a state of disrepair,
lacking power, communications, or running water. The Chief
Prosecutor has relocated since his previous office collapsed;
his new officer also lacks power, water, and communications
equipment. (NOTE: The PRT has provided some equipment, and
will build more permanent infrastructure for the ANP in the
coming construction season (septel) END NOTE.) The ANP's
vehicles (somewhere between 16 and 90, according to different
ANP officials),except for the new Toyota pickups donated by
the PRT, are in poor repair. The ANP gets an annual
maintenance budget of USD 750 for its entire provincial
vehicle fleet. Fuel supplies are also meager. MOI provides
Bamyan ANP 5 liters of duel per day (we believe this means 5
liters per vehicle per day),which Malik admitted goes
primarily to the officer corps. The police do not maintain
any emergency response vehicles in their fleet. The Chief
Prosecutor's office has no vehicles.


5. (U) ANP recruits receive little or no training before
beginning their work, and little pay when they do. A handful
of police (mainly officers) have been sent to Kabul for
training, but most begin work with little understanding of
their ANP responsibilities. Chief Prosecutor Azizullah
Hadafmand's own staff - consisting of seven prosecutors in
Bamyan plus one in each district, along with 10
administrative personnel - have also received little formal
instruction in their responsibilities.

Corruption Undermines What Little Capacity Exists
-------------- --------------


6. (SBU) Police and prosecutors, paid extremely low wages,
are easy targets for corruption. With entry-level police
earning 800 Afghanis (approx. USD 16) per month, and even the
Chief Prosecutor's salary capped at 2000 Afs (approx. USD 40)
per month, it is not surprising that soldiers and prosecutors
are unwilling/unable to maintain the peace in Bamyan.
(COMMENT: By way of comparison, PRT interpreters earn USD
500/month. END COMMENT) Furthermore, the police forces
rarely receive their full 800 Afs salary, as the ANP
leadership in Bamyan appears to extort money from its own
employees. Yakawlang District COP Hussein cheerfully
admitted to us that he withholds 30 percent of his men's
salaries: "We have to pay baksheesh (bribes) to Kabul for
them to release uniforms, heating fuel, food, you name it.
Of course I take their money!" ANP COP Wahadat echoes these
points, downplaying his officers' illegal activity as a cost
of doing business. (ref C)


7. (S) Wahadat and Malik may be the ringleaders of ANP
corruption in Bamyan. We believe COP Wahadat is involved in
drug and artifact smuggling through Bamyan (ref C),and that
Deputy COP Malik "taxes" coal trucks, diverting coal away
from Bamyan to other destinations, namely Kabul, for a fee.
(ref D) As Wahadat admitted to us, "of course we (the ANP)
are corrupt. We have no salaries, we have no income. ANP
officers need their cut to survive." Wahadat predicted that
if you "pay officers a living wage, and stop top-level
(national-level) corruption, it will disappear." (ref C)


8. (S) Chief Prosecutor Hadafmand likewise is widely believed
to accept bribes in return for failing to prosecute
individuals, although we have no hard evidence of this.
Given his low salary and the number of cases referred to his
office versus the number of cases tried, it appears
plausible. In fairness, Hadafmand's office does not have the
independence it needs to conduct investigations and
prosecutions in a fair and impartial manner. It is likely
that politically powerful persons within the province exert
undue pressure on the Chief Prosecutor's office concerning
certain investigations. We know that even Governor Sarabi
(whom we do not consider to be corrupt) has exerted pressure
on the Chief Prosecutor's office at least once to release an
arrested individual. (It is unclear what the present status
of this individual is.)

Case in Point: Bungled Opium Burn
--------------


9. (SBU) The recent situation surrounding the burning of 1.9
tons of opium highlights the gaps in law enforcement's
capacity to preserve law and order. Bamyan police claimed "a
major victory against crime" when it arrested three suspects
attempting to remove a 1.9 ton opium cache from its hiding
place in caves near Bamyan City. (ref A) Police were lucky
enough to find the suspects again five days after they evaded
the police at a checkpoint in Yakawlang District.
Counternarcotics officials in Kabul, the Governor, and press
witnessed the PRT weigh, transport, and burn the opium in
plain view behind the PRT's concertina wire outer perimeter
on December 28. (ref A)


10. (SBU) Subsequent events, however, cast a pall on this
"victory." Ministry for Counternarcotics officer Mohibullah
Loodin regretfully informed PRTOff on December 29 that the
three suspects were no longer in custody, disappearing
sometime after arrest but before incarceration at the Bamyan
prison. Further, according to Loodin's sources, the opium
cache originally contained over three tons of opium when the
ANP found it. Loodin promised that MOI would send
investigators from Kabul to delve into the missing drugs and
disappearing suspects.

COMMENT: Where to Begin?
--------------


11. (SBU) Bamyan has a relatively permissive security
environment, but that security is fragile. For the
environment to stabilize independent of Coalition/PRT
presence, the law enforcement apparatus in Bamyan must
develop both the capacity and the will to enforce law and
order in an even-handed, transparent, and effective manner.
This is not likely to occur at lower levels until it occurs
at the top, and a continuing lack of resources makes this
transformation unlikely in the near future.

NORLAND