Taliban criticizes Prince Harry over killings in Afghanistan
January 6, 2023
The Taliban has condemned the British royal after he wrote about killing 25 people while serving in Afghanistan. The prince piloted an Apache helicopter during the war.
The prince's memoir describes how he killed 25 people while serving in Afghanistan in 2012Image: John Stillwell/empics/picture alliance
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Following the revelation in the soon-to-be-published memoir of Prince Harry that the British royal had killed 25 people during the war in Afghanistan, several leading Taliban figures responded with anger on Friday.
The now-38-year-old royal carried out two tours in Afghanistan, first in 2007-08 and later in 2012, when he served as a co-pilot gunner in an Apache attack helicopter.
"Mr. Harry! The ones you killed were not chess pieces, they were humans," a senior Taliban member wrote on Twitter, responding to a comment from the Duke of Sussex in his book that compared the people he killed to chess pieces.
Neither proud nor ashamed
"It wasn't a statistic that filled me with pride, but nor did it leave me ashamed," Harry wrote, according to the Spanish version of the book, which mistakenly went on sale ahead of its official release on Tuesday.
"When I found myself plunged in the heat and confusion of combat, I didn't think of those 25 as people," he wrote. "They were chess pieces removed from the board, Bad people eliminated before they could kill Good people."
Abdul Qahar Balkhi, a spokesperson for the Taliban's Foreign Affairs Ministry, called Harry's comments "a microcosm of the trauma experienced by Afghans at the hands of occupation forces, who murdered innocents without any accountability."
Haqqani added to his condemnation, saying "I don't expect that the [International Criminal Court] ICC will summon you or the human rights activists will condemn you, because they are deaf and blind for you."
The Taliban retook power in Afghanistan in August 2021, riding a wave of increasing violence against the civilian government supported by the US and its allies.
The book reportedly also describes moments of conflict — including allegedly violent clashes — with his brother, Prince William, heir to the British throne, as well as Harry's experience taking drugs and how he lost his virginity.
The prince served in the British military for 10 years, reaching the rank of captain.
He said his justification for going to Afghanistan and fighting was the memory of the 9/11 attacks and his experience of talking with the families of the victims.
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