News - Local News

POSTED: Friday, Oct. 31, 2008

Bellingham city attorney tells of challenges during Afghan tour of duty

BELLINGHAM - During a recent six-month tour of duty in Afghanistan, Assistant City Attorney Les Reardanz was part of an ambitious international project: establishing the rule of law.

It's a project that he believes will take generations to complete. As Reardanz describes it, much of Afghanistan now lacks even the basic building blocks of a legal system, from secure jails to judges educated enough to read the law.

"Afghanistan doesn't really have any history of rule of law," he said. "Their first courts, as we envision courts, weren't established until the 1964 constitution."

For Reardanz, 43, it was the third call-up in about six years as an officer in the U.S. Naval Reserve. He served in Qatar beginning in early 2003, just before the start of the Iraq War, and in both Qatar and Iraq in 2004.

Before his Afghanistan assignment, he had three weeks of training in South Carolina, where Army drill sergeants gave him and other reservists a refresher course in weapons, first aid and other battlefield skills they hoped they would not have to use.

"Fortunately I didn't need the medical training and I didn't need to fire my weapon," Reardanz said.

But there was danger aplenty during convoys to remote areas.

"We had a few bunker calls," Reardanz said.

Reardanz served as a rule-of-law adviser to the commander of the International Security Assistance Force, the group of 40 countries with forces in Afghanistan.

Part of his job involved working with Afghan authorities and officials from other nations to plan and build justice headquarters with room for jails, courts and offices that could be relatively secure from attack.

By building such facilities, the authorities hope to make it harder for insurgents to intimidate judges and prosecutors, or to storm jails to release their comrades.

In many cases, Reardanz said, men arrested for installing roadside bombs would be turned over to Afghan authorities for prosecution, but those authorities would quickly release them rather than risk assassination. During Reardanz's time there, one prosecutor was shot four times.

But the infant Afghan legal system faces an even more basic problem in a country where literacy is the exception.

"Even the prosecutors and judges, and especially the police, are illiterate," Reardanz said. "That surprised me."

How does an illiterate judge know the law? He doesn't. Those accused of crimes are jailed or released based on what the judge thinks is best.

"They've been told that a woman running away from her husband is a crime, even though it isn't," he said, adding that women have been sentenced to prison in those circumstances.

For most Afghans, criminal and civil disputes are settled by tribal or religious leaders. Reardanz said the traditional system has advantages, because it can often deliver a quick resolution.

"The downside is, human rights tend to get violated," he said. Example: A tribal leader could order a man to hand over one of his daughters as compensation for loss of a neighbor's cattle.

Widespread illiteracy enhances the power of religious leaders, Reardanz said, because they have little fear of contradiction when they tell their followers what it says in the Koran or in the Islamic religious law called Sharia.

The current Afghan regime established by the U.S. and its allies is an Islamic republic, and Sharia will be a part of the legal system there for the foreseeable future, Reardanz said. International legal experts are working with Afghans to establish a legal curriculum that combines education in both secular and Sharia law, to train a new generation of judges, lawyers and prosecutors.

"It's going to take a huge commitment for a long time," Reardanz said. "It's going to take a couple of generations of being educated."

He believes it's worth the effort.

"It was a very good feeling because you were helping them rebuild their country, even though it was frustrating because it was so slow," he said.

He also observes that a functioning legal system is probably a prerequisite to economic development. No one will invest in a country where contracts cannot be enforced, he said.

During his time off, Reardanz kept busy distributing relief supplies gathered in Bellingham and shipped to him. City employees donated toys, blankets and clothes. The City Club chipped in too, and wife Diane and children Jenna, 14, and Lee, 11, gathered another 500 pounds of supplies by going door-to-door in the Columbia neighborhood. Reardanz and colleagues distributed the supplies at orphanages and refugee camps.

Reardanz also had time to get to know some of the young soldiers in forward bases, where hostile fire is a fact of life.

"I feel comfortable with the future of our country, if those folks are going to be the leaders," he said.