TARIN KOT (TIP): The Taliban are using young boys as sex slaves to mount crippling insider attacks on police in southern Afghanistan, exploiting the pervasive practice of “bacha bazi” —paedophilic boy play — to infiltrate security ranks, multiple officials and survivors of such assaults said.

Even as ISIS attacks and kills men for being gay – the terrorist group says homosexuality is unIslamic – the ancient custom of “bacha bazi” is still practiced across Afghanistan. Nowhere does it seem as entrenched as in the province of Uruzgan, where “bacha bereesh” — or boys without beards — widely become objects of lustful attraction for powerful police commanders.

The Taliban over nearly two years have used them to mount a wave of Trojan Horse attacks — at least six between January and April alone — that have killed hundreds of policemen, according to security and judicial officials in the province.

“The Taliban are sending boys —beautiful boys, handsome boys — to penetrate checkpoints and kill, drug and poison policemen,” said Ghulam Sakhi Rogh Lewanai, who was Uruzgan’s police chief until he was removed in a security reshuffle in April amid worsening violence.

“They have figured out the biggest weakness of police forces — bacha bazi,” he said. The assaults, signifying abuse of children by both parties in the conflict, have left authorities rattled, with one senior provincial official who echoed Rogh Lewanai’s view saying “it’s easier tackling suicide bombers than bacha attackers”.

The killings illustrate how bacha bazi is aggravating insecurity in Uruzgan, a remote province which officials warn is teetering on the brink of collapse, unravelling hard-won gains by US, Australian and Dutch troops who fought there for years.

(AFP)