Soldier killed, NATO disputes Afghan civilian death toll (Roundup)

Jul 1, 2007, 13:51 GMT

Kabul - One NATO soldier was killed and several wounded in a Taliban attack in southern Afghanistan while the alliance disputed the death toll of civilians in an airstrike in the country's south, saying it was three times less than reported by Afghan officials.

One Soldier for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was killed and several others were wounded in Taliban rocket fire which was followed by a suspected suicide attack in the southern region, ISAF said in a statement.

The statement did not identify the nationalities of the soldiers, nor did it provide details on the exact location of the attack.

Meanwhile, ISAF spokesman Major John Thomas said that the number of civilians killed in an airstrike in a southern village was less than a dozen, while he welcomed an investigation of the incident by the Afghan president.

Afghan provincial officials said on Sunday that at least 45 Afghan civilians and 64 suspected Taliban had been killed when US-led coalition forces bombed a village in the south of the country.

However, Thomas said that their survey had shown that 'less than a dozen' civilians had been killed. 'This is still significant, but it is less than what was reported,' he said.

The airstrike took place Friday night in the Gerishk district of southern Helmand province after Taliban fighters ambushed a convoy of Afghan and coalition forces in the Kakarlan area of Haidarabad village.

Afghan president Hamid Karzai meanwhile appointed a commission of government officials and parliamentarians to investigate the reports which claimed heavy casualties caused by bombing.

Haji Dur Alishah, the mayor of Gerishk district who led the Afghan provincial government investigation, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa on Sunday that at least 45 civilians and 64 Taliban fighters had been killed in the bombing.

Alishah earlier on Saturday had said that the aerial raid left between 120 to 130 Taliban and civilians dead.

'After the completion of the investigation we have found out that 45 civilians including children, women and elderly people and 64 armed men were killed in the five destroyed houses,' Alishah said, adding that the militants took shelter in residential houses after attacking the combined forces.

Provincial police chief Mohammad Hussain Andewal confirmed the same casualty toll as the district mayor and said that another 10 civilians were wounded and taken to three hospitals in the province.

The airstrike was conducted by coalition forces supporting an ongoing NATO-led ISAF operation in the province, ISAF spokeswoman Colonel Maria Carl said.

She confirmed that civilian deaths were caused by the airstrike, but said that the toll was 'much, much lower.'

US military spokesman Major Chris Belcher also confirmed that there had been civilian casualties in the strike.

'The remains of some people who apparently were civilians were found among insurgent fighters who were killed in firing positions in a trench line,' Belcher said in a statement.

The mounting civilian casualties have sparked widespread criticism both inside Afghanistan and in the international community. President Hamid Karzai warned last week that the NATO forces would fail in Afghanistan if the civilian losses continued.

'Afghan lives are not cheap,' Karzai said in his strongest outburst to date.

Reacting to the news, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who is visiting his country's troops in Afghanistan, told a press conference on Saturday that the international forces had not been targeting the civilians intentionally but were caught in the cross-fire.

'Most of the civilian casualties have been caused by the Taliban. They target civilians, they murder civilians, they fight with the cowardly protection of the civilians, they encourage accidental civilian casualties for their propaganda purposes,' Downer said.