 Sunday, December 7, 2003 [American-appointed
Quisling's sorrow]
Karzai shock at
child bomb deaths AFGHAN President Hamid
Karzai has expressed his shock after nine
children died in a US bombing in
Afghanistan. He said his government had sent a team of
investigators to the scene and had also sent
officials to ensure the victims' families were
being helped. Earlier the United Nations condemned the
incident as "profoundly distressing " and called
for a swift inquiry. The US has admitted mistakenly killing the
children on Saturday in a strike on a suspected
"terrorist". US 'regret'
The Afghan president said US forces should
ensure that future operations were better
co-ordinated with the Afghan Government to ensure
such incidents would not happen again. Earlier special UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said
that such incidents added to the sense of
"insecurity and fear" in the country. US military spokesman Major Christopher
West said ground forces found the bodies of the
children near that of the intended target after the
strike on a house near the city of Ghazni. A commission has been formed to investigate the
incident, he said, adding that the US military
regretted the loss of innocent life. Major West said the suspect was killed in the
strike. He was thought to be behind the murders of
two foreign contractors working on a ring road. Five more people working on reconstruction
projects have been kidnapped in the past three days
- two Indians, and two Turks and an Afghan working
with them. The kidnappers are not reported to have had any
contact with the authorities. Targeted
strike Only one house was hit in the attack without
damaging others in the area.  Acting
on "extensive intelligence", Major West said, an
A-10 "Warthog" - a heavily armoured plane - was
called in and opened fire on the isolated rural
site at about 1030 local time (0600 GMT) on
Saturday.
The US military followed "stringent rules of
engagement" to avoid harming innocent bystanders,
Major West added. Afghan Government sources said they believed the
incident was a mistake - the children were
apparently playing nearby when the attack took
place. The BBC's Crispin Thorold in Afghanistan
says the attack was very targeted, but that
intelligence was not as good as it should have
been. He says local people - who are already sceptical
of the US presence in the region - feel
considerable resentment and anger in the wake of
the attack. It took place in a town where there is strong
support for the ousted hardline Islamic Taleban and
the Hezb-e-Islami group, also fighting the
coalition. History
Saturday's bombing is the latest in a series of
attacks by US-led forces which have resulted in the
deaths of dozens of Afghan civilians since the
start of the campaign against the Taleban and
al-Qaeda in October 2001. "We have seen this before, so it's not as if we
were speaking without experience," said UN
spokesman Manoel de Alemeida e Silva. Afghan officials said in September eight nomads
were among 10 people killed when US forces bombed
targets in a massive offensive against suspected
militants. The US military is investigating that attack
after initially denying any civilians were
killed. In July last year, American forces killed at
least 48 civilians when a stray bomb hit a civilian
area in the southern province of Uruzgan. Twenty-five of the dead were from a single
family attending a wedding. Although in many areas Afghans welcome the
presence of American troops and other foreigners,
there is hostility in some southern and eastern
parts, our correspondent says. 
 ...
on this website
Apr 2003:
And you thought the Afghan war was over?
Spine-chilling leaked video and sound of Afghan
civilians being killed this year in cold blood
by a US air force gunship >>-
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