More details:U.S.-led coalition aircraft bombed a rebel stronghold in southern Afghanistan, killing about 60 suspected Taliban militants and 16 civilians, an Afghan governor said Monday. The coalition confirmed the strike on the village of Azizi in Kandahar province late Sunday and early Monday and said about 50 militants were killed. U.S. commander Lt. Gen. Karl W. Eikenberry told The Associated Press the military was investigating whether some civilians had also died.
The new deaths brought the toll of militants, Afghan forces and coalition soldiers killed to more than 265 since Wednesday, when a storm of violence broke out in the south — among the deadliest combat in Afghanistan since the Taliban's ouster in 2001.
Kandahar Gov. Asadullah Khalid said 16 civilians were killed in Monday's attack and 16 were wounded and taken to hospitals in Kandahar city, a former Taliban stronghold. "These sort of accidents happen during fighting, especially when the Taliban are hiding in homes," he said. "I urge people not to give shelter to the Taliban."
U.S. military spokesman Col. Tom Collins said the coalition forces targeted a Taliban compound and "we're certain we hit the right target." "It's common that the enemy fights in close to civilians as a means to protect its own forces," he added.
Many of the wounded sought treatment at Kandahar city's Mirwaise Hospital. One man with blood smeared over his clothes and turban said insurgents had been hiding in an Islamic religious school, or madrassa, in the village after fierce fighting in recent days. "Helicopters bombed the madrassa and some of the Taliban ran from there and into people's homes. Then those homes were bombed," said Haji Ikhlaf, 40. "I saw 35 to 40 dead Taliban and around 50 dead or wounded civilians." Another survivor from the village, Zurmina Bibi, who was cradling her wounded 8-month-old baby, said about 10 people were killed in her home, including three or four children. "There were dead people everywhere," she said, crying.
A doctor, Mohammed Khan, said he had treated 10 people from the village. Moments later, a pickup vehicle pulled up at the hospital with five men lying wounded in the back. It was not possible for reporters to reach Azizi village because police and foreign troops had blocked off the area, which is about 30 miles southwest of Kandahar.
The village is also known by the name Hajiyan. It is made up of about 30-35 large mud-brick compounds, each housing an extended family with up to 50 members. The village has a mosque and one madrassa, where boys study. It has no electricity and relies on wells for water. The Taliban resurgence, despite the presence of more than 30,000 foreign troops, including 23,000 from the United States in Afghanistan, has halted postwar reconstruction work in many areas and raised fears for this country's future.
Meanwhile in other violence, Mohammed Ali Jalali, the former governor of eastern Paktika province, was found dead after being kidnapped Sunday, local police chief Abdul Rehman Surjung said. Jalali was a respected tribal elder and a supporter of President Hamid Karzai. |