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Two decades of war in Afghanistan have left most civilian victims “without justice, reparation, or even acknowledgement” of what they endured, the United Nations said Tuesday, as one man in Kabul told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that “the world has forgotten us."
Washington’s intervention began after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and opened 20 years of fighting in which civilians bore the brunt of the violence and abuse.
UNAMA, the U.N. mission in Afghanistan, put the toll at more than 40,000 civilians killed and 77,000 wounded, victims of Taliban attacks as well as operations by Afghan Republic forces and the U.S.-led coalition.
The mission has tracked civilian casualties since 2009, producing one of the fullest accounts yet of who died in the war.
Part of that toll is visible on Tapa-e-Shuhada, or Martyrs’ Hill, in Kabul, where one slope is dense with graves. Many hold members of the Hazara community have been hit again and again by the Taliban.
Among the survivors is Mohammad, 25, wounded in a school attack. He grew up in a poor household and had hoped to become a computer engineer and “change his life”, he told AFP, giving only his first name because “the fear is still there”.
Tailoring work now comes and goes. He said he had lost his focus and could not continue his studies because of psychological problems.
"The world has forgotten us," he added. His mother, sitting in the family's small living room, sighed: "He still has nightmares at night, and I am getting weaker day by day."
Of the nearly 200 victims UNAMA interviewed, 95% reported psychological harm, from memory loss to depression and suicidal thoughts. The Taliban government told the mission it had paid out $695 million since 2021 to the families of those killed, along with widows and orphans.
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