March 11, 2007	Sunday	Safar 21, 1428

KABUL, March 10: The Afghan parliament passed a revised bill on Saturday that called for amnesty for groups involved in war crimes but also recognised the victims’ right to seek justice, lawmakers said.

The lower house of parliament, or Wolesi Jirga, passed the resolution hours after President Hamid Karzai returned to parliament the original bill that proposed blanket amnesty for all Afghans involved in the country’s decades-old conflict. Shukria Barakzai, an outspoken MP and activist, said the revised version of the bill protected individuals’ rights to seek justice.

“On the one hand I as an individual have the right to seek justice but I can’t do so if it’s committed by a group,” she told Reuters. “I myself am confused. It (the bill) is very confusing.”

She said the bill was reduced to six articles from 12, but did not say which ones were removed.

It was not immediately clear when the bill would go to the upper house and be signed into law by President Karzai.

Parliament, comprising several warlords, last month passed the bill granting immunity to all Afghans involved in the country’s long conflict, despite calls by human rights groups for war crimes trials.

Earlier on Saturday, President Karzai praised parliament’s “important initiative” to promote national reconciliation and stability but proposed the article that also “safeguards the victim's rights and punishment of an individual who committed crime against an individual”.

The original bill set an amnesty for war criminals in the government, the parliament and also for wanted Taliban leaders and former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who leads a separate insurgency against government and foreign troops.

Last month, tens of thousands of supporters of former mujahideen leaders rallied in Kabul to press President Karzai to sign the bill into law.

Rights groups have pressed the government to punish those guilty of abuses, saying justice was vital for peace.

The parliament, which was elected in 2005, is made up of former senior communist officials, ex-mujahideen leaders who fought the Soviets and some former Taliban.

Dozens are accused of human rights abuses.—Reuters