PRAGUE (Reuters) – Four Czech soldiers will face trial on suspicion of crimes related to the death of Afghan soldiers, Czech prosecutors said on Tuesday.
The Czech prosecutor's office said in a statement that four members of the 601st Special Operations Forces team will be tried, including extortion, disobedience, breach of guard duty and failure to provide assistance.
It did not identify these four people, and if convicted, they could face a life sentence.
The Czech Ministry of Defense declined to comment.
A lawyer representing three defendants said they had been against the charges since the inquiry.
“According to them, the alleged behavior did not occur and the prosecutor did not submit any available evidence of the charges,” Radek Ondrus, an attorney who did not identify its client, said in an email response to the question.
The Czech Public Radio reported on its website that the allegations were linked to the death of 19-year-old Wahidullah Khan, who was detained by Afghan troops in 2018 when one of the Czech soldiers was killed and two injured.
The New York Times first reported the incident in 2018. It said Khan was beaten after being detained by U.S. and Czech forces and fell into a coma when he returned to Afghan troops on the same day and died shortly afterwards. It said that we and the Czech forces are investigating the incident.
The Czech army operates in Afghanistan from 2002 to 2021. Its troops were deployed there as part of the Unauthorized International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), aiming to assist the Afghan government in protecting the country and training the Afghan national security forces.
The Czech army was also part of the NATO-led mission established after it was dissolved.
(Reported by Jan Lopatka, Editors of Timothy Heritage and Bernadette Baum)
