Afghanistan: Car thieves blamed for multiple killings

Investigators in Afghanistan have arrested several members of a criminal gang suspected of luring dozens of drivers to houses before killing them, stealing their vehicles and hiding their bodies in at least three locations, officials said today.

Intelligence agents searching a house in the eastern city of Jalalabad dug up the bodies of 16 men buried in the yard, said Faizan ul-Haq, a spokesman for the government of surrounding Nangarhar.

“One of them was buried only recently and even had money in his pockets,” ul-Haq said in Jalalabad. “They’re now checking under the dining room and the living room for more.”

Ul-Haq said one man had been arrested in Jalalabad and authorities believed there could be a total of 60 bodies hidden in Nangarhar.

The raid in Jalalabad followed the arrest last year of the alleged ring-leaders in the town of Bagrami, near the capital, Kabul.

Maj. Abdul Jalil, the police chief in Bagrami, said authorities had arrested four people there last year, including a young woman used by her mother and her uncle to entice the drivers of expensive cars to a house in the district for sex.

The victims were all hanged by the neck with a rope, he said.

Jalil said nine bodies were found in the house opposite a derelict textile factory and the investigation led to the latest discovery in Nangarhar. He said the man arrested in Jalalabad was a member of the same family.

Another arm of the gang was operating further south, in Paktia and Khost provinces, where more bodies might be found, the officials said.

The cars were allegedly dismantled to disguise the origin of the parts which were then sold.

Reports of killings and theft by organised crime gangs are frequent in Afghanistan, though rarely involving such a high death toll.