[Peace-discuss] Bush: dead Iraqis; Obama: dead Afghans

[C. G. Estabrook]

    Published on Tuesday, May 5, 2009 by Reuters
    Truckloads of Dead Civilians After Afghan Battle
    by Sharafuddin Sharafyar

HERAT, Afghanistan - Villagers brought truckloads of bodies to the capital of a 
province in Western Afghanistan on Tuesday to prove that scores of civilians had 
been killed by U.S. air strikes in a battle with the Taliban.

The governor of Farah Province, Rohul Amin, said about 30 bodies had been 
trucked to his office, most of them women and children. Other officials said the 
overall civilian death toll may have been much higher, with scores of people 
feared killed while huddled in houses that were destroyed by U.S. warplanes.

U.S. forces confirmed that a battle had taken place with air strikes and said 
they were investigating reports of civilian casualties, but were unable to 
confirm them.

"There was an insurgent attack on an ANA (Afghan National Army) group and the 
ANA called for assistance, and some coalition troops joined them to help fight 
this group," said U.S. military spokesman Colonel Greg Julian. "There was close 
air support, but I can't give any detail on the type of aircraft."

He said U.S. and Afghan officials would head to the site on Wednesday to 
investigate the reports of civilian deaths.

"Once we get eyes on the ground we will have a better idea of what may have 
happened."

Ghulan Farooq, a member of parliament from the province, said he had been told 
by family members in the Bala Boluk district where the fighting took place that 
as many as 150 people had died. He said U.S. air strikes had destroyed 17 
houses. Those figures could not be independently confirmed.

Lieutenant Colonel Khalil Nehmatullah, commander of an Afghan Army battalion in 
the province, said: "Unfortunately the Taliban took people into some buildings 
and forced them to stay in there after the security forces started telling them 
to evacuate."

"Arabs and Pakistanis were among the Taliban fighters who were armed with RPGs 
(rocket propelled grenades) ... the ANA entered the scene with help from a unit 
of U.S. marines, and they were fighting until 11 pm," he told Reuters. He said 
he did not know the extent of the civilian casualties.

EXECUTIONS

Amin said the battle in Farah province, a vast desert region on Afghanistan's 
western border, began after Taliban guerrillas moved into a village on Monday 
and executed three former government officials for cooperating with the state.

Before the reports of large numbers of civilian casualties emerged, the governor 
said four Afghan security forces members and about 25 insurgents had been killed.

The head of public health and hospitals in Farah province, Abdul Jabar Shayeq, 
said 11 civilians and three policemen had been admitted to hospital with wounds 
from the fighting.

Jalil Ahmad, a resident in the district, said earlier that some 100 Taliban 
fighters had taken up positions in residential areas to fight the Afghan and 
foreign troops.

"Civilian lives are in danger from both sides and they don't care about it," 
Ahmad said. "We beg President (Hamid) Karzai to save our lives."

Civilian deaths have become a bitter source of friction between Afghan 
authorities and U.S. forces. Washington says it is working harder this year to 
limit civilian deaths and investigate reports of such incidents more rapidly 
after the number of civilians killed by U.S. forces soared last year.

In the worst incident last year, the Afghan government and the United Nations 
said a U.S. strike killed 90 civilians. Washington initially denied it, but 
after three months said it had killed 33 civilians as well as 22 people it 
called militants.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is in Washington, where he will meet U.S. 
President Barack Obama for the first time since Obama's inauguration. Obama has 
declared Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan to be Washington's main military 
concern.

Last year more than 7,000 people, including 2,000 civilians, died in 
insurgency-related violence in Afghanistan, the United Nations and aid agencies say.

The United States plans to more than double its forces to fight the Taliban 
insurgents this year from 32,000 at the start of the year to 68,000 by the 
year's end. Other countries have around 30,000 troops in Afghanistan.

(Additional reporting by Golnar Motevalli, Hamid Shalizi and Peter Graff in 
Kabul; Writing by Peter Graff; editing by Ralph Boulton)

© 2009 Reuters

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/05/05-7