AFGHAN TRANSLATORS LIVE IN FEAR AND MISTRUST

It was midday 5 May when Azizullah received a devastating phone call about the death of his 24-year-old son Sardar Mohammad, who was a translator with foreign forces in the southern Kandahar Province.

“They [foreign forces] told us that he was killed in a Taliban’s ambush in Chora District in Urozgan Province but we doubt it,” the bereaved father said adding that his son could had been killed “purposely” or “mistakenly” by his employers.

“He was hit in the heart with one bullet and was bleeding freshly when we received his coffin,” he said.

As with other similar cases the government did not launch a criminal or judicial investigation and his parents did not even know if they had a right to demand an impartial inquiry into their son’s death.

No one at NATO’s regional command in Kandahar Airfield was available to comment on Mohammad’s death and NATO’s spokespersons in Kabul refused to talk about the subject.

When Mohammad was offered the translation job in 2007 his family fled to Pakistan because they feared Taliban insurgents would harm them. The insurgents widely target people who work for foreign forces and the government.

Vulnerable

Hundreds of Afghans, mostly young males, work as interpreters and language assistants with over 120,000 foreign forces stationed in Afghanistan. They earn about US$400-1500 monthly based on their contract type and job location which could be a military base or a combat zone.

While the insurgents are their arch enemies several translators interviewed for this report expressed deep concerns about mistreatment and risks they faced from their own employers.

“They don’t trust us and if they find out anything suspicious about a translator his life will be in hell,” said an Afghan working for NATO forces in Wardak Province who spoke on condition of anonymity.

“We are not trained to be fighters and soldiers but they take us to front lines where god knows who kills who,” said another interpreter who used a pseudonym, Jalil.

“Our live is cheap, cheaper even than an insurgent’s life,” whined another translator.

Whether a misunderstanding or a reality such grievances have sometimes led to tragic events.

A “"disgruntled” Afghan interpreter reportedly shot dead two US soldiers before he was gunned down on 30 January in Wardak Province.

NATO’s press office in Kabul said it could not comment on the issue due to its sensitive and “classified” nature.

Unknown casualties

Over 1,780 foreign troops have died in Afghanistan since November 2001, according to a tally, but the number of local interpreters killed and maimed during their work for international forces is unknown.

NATO said it did not know how many of its local language assistants were killed over the past eight years.

“We have started tracking translators’ casualties since March [2010],” said Kevin Bell, a NATO spokesman in Kabul.

Ironically the translators are not protected by the country’s labour law and their work contracts are only managed by private companies which deliver human resource services to NATO and US forces in Afghanistan.

“Afghans working for foreign military forces, embassies and UN agencies are not covered by the labour law,” said Mohammad Ghaws Bashiri, deputy minister of the Ministry of Labour, Martyrs and Social Affairs.

“We don’t deal with their work and contractual disputes,” he said.

However, the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) said the government must enforce a low to protect its citizens employed by external civilian or military actors.

“They must have access to legal protection and their rights, privileges and safety measures must be legally transparent and respected by their employers,” said Fareed Hamidi, a commissioner at the AIHRC adding that the translators’ work conditions must be humane and civilian.

Translators said they were entitled to a life insurance scheme which pays a sum to the family of a fallen translator (provided the death is during duty and meets all regulatory measures).

Dozens of interpreters recruited by the US military have been granted residence in the US over the past three years and Canada has announced it will provide special immigration services to some of the translators employed by its military in Kandahar Province in 2010-2011.