The Inside Story On The Massacre At A UN Compound In Afghanistan

Inside the Massacre at Afghan Compound -- Wall Street Journal

MAZAR-E-SHARIF, Afghanistan—Officials are painting the weekend killings at the United Nations mission in northern Afghanistan's largest city—which sparked cascading violence across the nation—as the handiwork of a small band of insurgents that used a protest against a Quran-burning as cover for a murderous plot.

But a Wall Street Journal reconstruction of Friday's assault, based on unreleased videos, interviews with demonstrators and the U.N.'s own recounting of events, shows a more complex picture and indicates that ordinary Afghan demonstrators played a critical role in the attack.

Read more ....

My Comment: Being a former employee for the UN who worked in security (1988-1992), I know that the immediate impact of this massacre will be to review the security guidelines for UN operations in Afghanistan, and to then decide whether to stay or leave. My prediction .... the UN will stay but only at a few well secured and protected compounds. This attack will unfortunately (in the long run) severely limit the UN's involvement in the country, and many humanitarian programs are going to be limited or even cancelled. But then again .... this has always been the goal of the Taliban and the religious zealots who support them .... to eliminate or chase out those forces who are usurping the Taliban's stranglehold on the Afghan people.