On Monday, September 1^st, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Women, Peace and Security organised an event in collaboration with the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on International Law, Justice, and Accountability Globally, and Bolaq Analysts Network titled “Genocide in Afghanistan: The Situation of the Hazaras.”

This event – chaired by Lord Alton of Liverpool – marked the launch of New Lines’ report, The Hazara Genocide: An Examination of Breaches of the Genocide Convention in Afghanistan Since August 2021. The speakers raised awareness of historical and present-day patterns of civilian harm against Hazaras and underlined the need for the UK to continue its efforts to pursue justice and accountability for Hazara victims of genocide.

The Hazaras have endured persecution for more than a century – massacres, forced displacement, land dispossession, and targeted attacks. Today, they continue to face existential threats at the hands of the Taliban and the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-KP/Daesh), who deliberately target Hazara schools, mosques, maternity wards and public spaces. Only last month, in Rashak village in Bamiyan, we witnessed yet another wave of forced evictions. Twenty-five Hazara families — around 200 people, including women, children, and the elderly — were expelled from their homes by Taliban authorities working alongside armed Kuchi tribesmen. Families were left in tents, mosques, or hiding in the mountains, under fear of arrest and coercion. Rashak is not an isolated case but part of a broader campaign of land dispossession and repression that bears the hallmarks of genocide.

On 3 September 2022, the UK Parliamentary Hazara Inquiry – a joint effort of cross-party Parliamentarians from both Houses and experts working together to reveal atrocities and promote justice for the Hazara in Afghanistan and Pakistan – published their report on the situation of the Hazara in Afghanistan. ​The 2022 report focused on the situation of the Hazara in Afghanistan since 2021 and found that Hazara in Afghanistan, as a religious and ethnic minority, were at serious risk of genocide at the hands of the Taliban and IS-KP. The New Lines Institute report picks up where the Inquiry left off, and finds that the situation of the Hazara in Afghanistan has reached the level of genocide. This finding engages the responsibility of all states to protect the Hazara and prevent further acts of genocide, under the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and customary international law.

Lord Alton spoke about UK efforts for accountability, including the Parliamentary Inquiry and the upcoming work of the Standing Group on Atrocity Crimes. Dr. Homira May Rezai spoke about the current situation with a focus on the forced displacement of Hazaras in Afghanistan. Emily Prey spoke about the New Lines report, findings of genocide, and genocide as a crime under international law. And Zahra Joya spoke about Hazara voices and the battle for free expression under Taliban rule.