Insurgent groups have been responsible for approximately two-thirds of civilian deaths. In the first seven months of 2008, the UN estimates that improvised explosive devices and suicide attacks killed almost 500 civilians. Antigovernment forces routinely violate the laws of war by launching attacks from civilian areas or retreating to such areas, knowingly drawing return fire.
The targeting of individuals associated with the government is also on the rise, from school teachers to human rights defenders, with the United Nations recording over a hundred assassinations in 2008. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the September killing of Afghanistan’s highest-ranking female police officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Malalai Kakar.
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As part of their campaign of terrorizing the civilian population, the Taliban and other insurgent groups continue to target schools, and in particular girls’ schools. According to the Ministry of Education, over one hundred schools were attacked between March and October 2008, with the Afghanistan NGO Security Office recording more than 30 teachers and students killed in the first 10 months of 2008.
