There have been increasing incidents of insecurity on Kabul-MaidanWardak road. In last week alone, 11 people have been slaughtered by Taliban in Jalrez District. Five passengers were taken off a vehicle on Wednesday at Kote Ashro area of Jalrez District on Wednesday, August 01. They were brutally tortured, their hands tied behind, eyes taken off and thrown on the highway after beheading. All five were civilians. They were buried in Kabul on Thursday. Four of them belonged to Jaghori District of Ghazni Province, one was from Baghlan.

Six others were killed in similar brutality a week ago on Monday, July 23 in the same area of Jalrez. Their bodies were cut into pieces. All of the 11 civilians killed in last two weeks belonged to Hazara ethnic group.
Haji Muhammad Muhaqiq, MP and leader of opposition group Afghanistan National Front while addressing the gathering after funeral of the victims in Kabul strongly criticized the Government. He said how could civilians be massacred within one kilometers of distance from a Government security check post?

Not a single person has been arrested, despite repeated incidents in the same area. He demanded the Government to ensure security of the Kabul-Hazarajat roads within a month, otherwise millions will come out on roads in Kabul to protest against a failed and corrupt regime.

People from Bamiyan and Daikundi provinces complain of increased insecurity on the Kabul-Hazarajat roads, where Taliban militants stop vehicles of civilian passengers. They criticize the failure of Government forces to maintain security on the way, particularly in Jalrez District of MaidanWardak and Ghorban District of Parwan, the only two ways from Kabul to Bamiyan.

Prominent member and head of Provincial Council Bamiyan, Jawad Zahak was abducted by Taliban in Ghorband last year and killed, later. Both ways have become increasingly insecure and ordinary people fear traveling.

The two incidents of last week are latest of the Taliban brutality on the Kabul-Bamyan road. Dozens were killed last year. Despite the fact that militants are present only in two districts on the way, the Government has either failed to maintain security, or it's complicity of some quarters in the Government to worsen security on these roads.

However, these incidents of Taliban brutality show utter failure of the Government as it increased after the withdrawal of US troops from the Combat Outpost Conlon in Jalrez District of MaidanWardak in February this year. The incidents have increased since then.

President Karzai claims our national security forces can maintain security, but Hazaras fear traveling out of Kabul, either on the Kabul-Kandahar Highway, or on the way between Kabul-Behsood and Kabul-Bamiyan. It is of serious concern that ordinary civilians from a particular ethnic group—Hazara—are being targeted by the Taliban in Jalrez and Ghorband, or on Kabul-Ghazni roads.

The beheadings in Jalrez send a strong message to the people of Hazarajat that Karzai's claims that Afghan National Security Forces can maintain security after foreign troops' withdrawal are empty words and masses must prepare for the worst to come.