PAN, March 28, 2011

Foreign soldiers take 9 family members to base in Logar

He also accused the ISAF soldiers of mistreating women while checking the house and scattering their belongings

By Abdul Maqsood Azizi

The international coalition arrested nine members of a family, including an imam, and took them to their base in central Logar province, an official said on Monday.

The NATO-led soldiers arrested the nine in Wazir Qla, an area on the outskirts of the provincial capital, Pul-i-Alam, crimes branch chief, Col. Mohammad Jan Abid, told Pajhwok Afghan News.

"The people taken from Wazir Qala were ordinary people, but the foreigners said they recovered a Kalashnikov from the house, and that the people had links with the Taliban," he said.

The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said it had made several arrests of people who had been involved in planting roadside bombs and killing Afghan soldiers and civilians.

Four of the nine are sons of Mullah Nawab, 60, also arrested, and the rest are his nephews, a neighbour of the imam, Dawa Jan, said. He said none of them had any links with armed insurgents.

He also accused the ISAF soldiers of mistreating women while checking the house and scattering their belongings, he said.

"If foreigners continue to carry out such irresponsible acts in the houses of ordinary people, people will be forced to show resistance," a tribal elder, Mohammad Ibrahim, said.

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