Afghan mother recounts memories of family loss (Feature)

By Farhad Peikar Feb 23, 2011, 2:55 GMT

Kabul - 'There is not that much space in the house - where should we put all six coffins?' Mahbooba Huqooqmal overheard a family friend asking.

Until then, the 67-year-old had only been told that her eldest son Massoud Yama, a doctor, was injured in suicide attack but the rest of the family was unharmed.

It was evening on January 28 and relatives had gathered at the home of Huqooqmal, a former cabinet minister, to break the terrible news: the deaths of her son, daughter-in-law and four grandchildren.

Earlier that day Yama, his wife Hamida Barmaki, a human rights activist, and their children had stopped on their way home at Finest, a supermarket stocking popular imported foods in a heavily guarded Kabul district.

As the family approached the cashier, a man entered the shop and opened fire on customers and salespeople before detonating his suicide vest.

The family was among at least 10 people killed. More than a dozen others, including three foreigners, were injured.

Huqooqmal, the mother of six sons, immediately started calling her family, a common practice in the war-torn country after news of every blast, and heard from all but Yama and his wife.

Huqooqmal's youngest son spotted his brother's car parked in front of the grocery shop in local news coverage.

Seven hours after the blast, relatives and friends started pouring into Huqooqmal's middle-class home. She was told that her son had been injured and decided to go to his house.

But then she overheard someone talking about six deaths. 'I wish I had not lived to hear it,' she said

'I don't remember what I said or did, but I do remember that everyone was lost and they were just running up and down,' she said, speaking at her Kabul office. 'One of my sons was weeping and then laughing.'

The family found the mutilated bodies in two separate hospitals, with two extra plastic bags that contained of pieces of human flesh and bloody clothes.

Thousands of people attended the funeral at Shuhadai Saleheen cemetery the next day. The six graves side by side are covered by wreaths and plastic flowers.

Yama's family was not the only one to be obliterated.

On Sunday, a NATO airstrike mistakenly killed six members of a family - a soldier, his wife and four children - in the eastern province of Nangarhar and last month, nine members of a family were killed in the northern province of Baghlan in a roadside bomb, to list just a few.

More than 2,400 civilians were killed last year, with more than 700 of them children, according to rights groups.

Since the blast in Finest Supermarket, at least 100 people - mostly civilians - have been killed in suicide bombings.

Nearly a month has passed but Yama's home remains shut. 'I can't look at his home without him and his family, but after a while I want to sell the apartment and everything inside,' his mother said. She plans to use the money to build a medical clinic or a mosque, two things Yama wished to do.

The Taliban took responsibility for the attack, saying they targeted the country head of a US-based private security firm. But Afghan intelligence officials said two French diplomats were the main targets.

The Afghan spy agency discovered that the bombing was planned by a jailed Taliban fighter, who has been incarcerated in a Kabul prison for the past three years. They also arrested a Taliban facilitator who smuggled the bomber from tribal areas of Pakistan to Kabul.

Asked if she wanted the perpetrators to be brought to justice, Huqooqmal, who used to teach law at Kabul University, said, 'I want my god to mete out justice.'

'My son worked as a surgeon during the Taliban time, so I am sure he as an impartial medical doctor must have treated a lot of Taliban,' she said. 'Whoever killed them, they are enemies of humanity. They eliminated two big assets of Afghanistan.'

Yama also headed a department in the Finance Ministry and Barmaki served in Afghanistan's human rights commission and taught law.

They went to Italy for their masters degrees, but returned to Afghanistan. 'I told him that the country needs them and I would miss them as a mother,' Huqooqmal said.

'I feel I should blame myself for not letting them stay there. They would be alive now,' she said.

After a long pause, she added, 'I think that was God's will. Maybe that was their fate.'

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