Taliban demand Prince Harry should be brought to justice over killing of 25 Afghan troops

A senior Taliban leader lambasted the Duke of Sussex, Prince Harry, over his claim that he killed 25 Afghan troops while serving in the British military. In his tell-all memoir 'Spare', Harry claimed that he killed the Afghan soldiers when he was working as an Apache helicopter co-pilot and gunner in Afghanistan from 2012 to 2013. The proclamation by the British Prince attracted a lot of attention from people around the world and condemnation from the Taliban.

Talibani leader Suhail Shaheen told the Arab News that the UK royal should be brought to justice for his “heinous actions”. “They claim they are a democracy, that they are the advocates and champions of human rights. And then they do this,” he told Arab News, as he condemned the Prince for killing Afghan soldiers. Shaheen stated that Harry killed “innocent civilians” and not enemy combatants, hence, he should be brought to Justice. “If their laws are meant for the protection of human rights, then he should be tried (before a court of law). By his own admission, he has acknowledged that he killed 25 people. It is a crime,” he insisted. 

Shaheen noted that the UK royal was not the only one who killed innocent souls during the war. He suggested that if the situation took place in any other country, there would have been a call for justice. “Many other soldiers have done the same. There are many cases. A lot of families lost their breadwinners. There are thousands of videos of innocent people, villagers, and farmers being killed in their fields,” Shaheen told Arab News. “If that had been in your country, (after) what you have said, (wouldn’t you) ask for justice? As a human being, it is your obligation and others to raise this,” he exclaimed. 

Afghans will never forget the killing of their innocent countrymen: Taliban

This is not the first time the Taliban have condemned the claims made by the Duke of Sussex. Just ahead of the release of his memoir, a Taliban official told Telegraph UK that Harry should be bought before an “international court” for his heinous actions. “Prince Harry will always be remembered in Helmand – Afghans will never forget the killing of their innocent countrymen,” Taliban police spokesperson Khalid Zardan told The Telegraph. “The perpetrators of such crimes will one day be brought to the international court and criminals like Harry who proudly confess their crimes will be brought to the court table in front of the international community,” he added. The Taliban leader emphasised that the description of the Afghan soldiers who were killed by Prince Harry as “chess pieces” was “cruel” and “barbaric”. 

In his memoir, the UK royal asserted that the killing took place around the end of his tour in 2013. “If there are people trying to do bad stuff to our guys, then we’ll take them out of the game,” he wrote in the book. He then went on to describe the victims as “pieces being removed from the chess board”. “Baddies eliminated before they could kill Goodies,” he wrote in the memoir.