The woman police who shot an American civilian adviser in the Interior Ministry has been identified as an Iranian citizen married to an Afghan working at the ministry who got her forged ID cards. The 33-year old is mother of four. She got the fake ID documents a decade ago and has been working the gender rights section of the Ministry for last two years.
Initial investigations by a joint Afghan-ISAF team say she has displayed unstable behavior since the arrest. Interior Ministry spokesman says she had planned to kill Kabul Governor or Police Chief. The victim has been identified as Josef Griffin from the US, employed by DynCorp. Nargis' Afghan husband is also under investigation. Her Iranian passport was found at their home after a police raid yesterday.
The incident raises several questions. First, how could a foreigner with forged ID documents get into the headquarters of police without proper security clearance? It speaks about the systematic fault lines in the system of recruitment procedures and clearance.
Details will be clarified later after thorough investigation. It would be early to say if it was pre-planned and she got the job at Interior Ministry for the purpose of infiltration. However, she had been on a training course to Egypt recently.
Whatever the motive, investigations will find out whether she has links with elements inside Iran and it is part of a systematic infiltration scheme. However, the incident shows weakness of the security clearance at our national security institutions. If they she could get a job at police headquarters in Kabul, others would infiltration in Jalalabad and Herat in hundreds at Government sectors and national institutions.
It is easy to get fake Afghan ID cards for a few hundred dollars. Similarly, one could get passport through illegal ways with little effort. This shows the basic fault line. It once again reminds us the necessity and urgency of electronic identification documents which would reduce such vulnerabilities and resolve many more issues. The Government should implement the e-tazkira project as soon as possible.