(United Nations, 1993b: para. 26), and in late 1994, the Special
Rapporteur of the UN Human Rights Commission estimated that at
least 3500 people had been killed since the beginning of the year
(United Nations, 1994a: para. 17). Amnesty International offered a
figure of 25,000 dead (Amnesty International, 1995: 33). Given the
types of weaponry involved, there is no doubt that the Hezb-e
Islamiof Hekmatyar was directly responsible for the bulk of the
deaths.
When Kabul first fell, there was no mass purge of communists
comparable to the liquidation of collaborators (épuration) that
broke out in France following the liberation from the Germans
and the obliteration of the Vichy regime in 1944 (United Nations,
1992: para. 41). However, the small Hindu and Sikh communities
were targeted by extremists (Les Nouvelles d’Afghanistan, 63,
1994: 21–2), who associated them with India’s support for both
Karmal and Najibullah. Once war began in earnest, there were a
number of grisly massacres during the course of combat in the
city. One was the Afshar massacre of 11 February 1993, which
claimed the lives of hundreds of Hazaras. One writer, who quotes
an estimate of 700 dead, has stated that the forces who carried
out the massacre were ‘under the direct order of President
Rabbani and his chief commander, Massoud’ (Mousavi, 1997:
198), but it is not clear whether by this he means that Rabbani
and Massoud ordered the massacre, or simply that they headed
the hierarchy of which the troops were a part. The Special
Rapporteur of the UN Human Rights Commission reported
between 200 and 300 people killed in west Kabul (United
Nations, 1993b: para. 58), but appeared to fix the blame princi-
pally upon forces of Sayyaf’s Ittehad. The savagery of the attack-
ers was appalling (Griffin, 2000: 30). There is no doubt whatever
that women and children were among the victims, and amongst
emigré Hazara communities, a graphic videotape was circulated
that depicted what had happened (Akram, 1996: 419–20). There
were also documented cases of rampaging Shura-i Nazarsoldiers
in March 1995 in west Kabul. As well as pillage, there was
targeted looting of the Kabul Museum in mid-1993 when the
The Rise and Fall of the Rabbani Government, 1992–1996 205