More than 1,000 Afghan civilians killed in 2010

Jul 12, 2010, 17:11 GMT

Kabul - A total of 1,074 Afghan civilians were killed in the first half of this year, with Taliban militants responsible for more than 60 per cent, an Afghan rights group said Monday.

The number showed a slight increase compared with the 1,059 civilians killed in the same period in 2009, Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) said in a report.

On the very day the report was published, six civilians and three security guards and two Taliban were killed in separate incidents.

Six civilians were killed when a roadside bomb struck their vehicle in Lashkargah, the provincial capital for southern province of Helmand on Monday, the NATO military said in a statement.

The passenger vehicle was behind the rear vehicle of a NATO patrol at the time of the explosion, it said.

Daoud Ahmadi, spokesman for the provincial governor said that six others were injured in the attack. He blamed Taliban militants for the bombing.

The Taliban militants rely heavily on use of roadside bomb as part of their campaign against the Afghan and foreign troops in the country. Monday's NATO statement said that insurgents were responsible for killing 38 civilian, including 15 of them in roadside bombs in the past one week.

The militants were using explosives for making the roadside bombs until 2007, Mohammad Shafi Baheer, a defence ministry official told a press conference on Monday. But 80 per cent of materials that the militants used in 2009 to make such bombs were ammonium nitrate and potassium nitrate, he said.

Both materials are found in fertilizers. Despite a complete ban on import and production of ammonium nitrate fertilizers by Afghan government, the militants are still believed to import the substances from neighboring Pakistan.

Separately, Taliban militants attacked a road construction company in Separa district of south-eastern province of Khost on Monday, sparking a firefight with guards providing security for the site, Abdul Hakim, the provincial police chief said.

'Three guards and two Taliban were killed,' he said, adding that five more insurgents and one guard were injured in the gunbattle.

The Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) said in its report that a total of 1,074 Afghan civilians were killed in the first half of this year, with Taliban militants responsible for more than 60 per cent.

The number showed a slight increase compared with the 1,059 civilians killed in the same period in 2009, according to the report.

The share of civilian casualties inflicted by NATO-led forces, however, has dropped 'considerably' largely due to new restrictions imposed on military engagements last year, including limits on airstrikes, it said.

A total of 661, or more than 60 per cent, were killed by Taliban mostly in roadside and suicide bombings, while NATO troops were responsible for the deaths of 210 people, ARM said.

The rest of the civilians were killed by Afghan security forces, including private security guards.

The recent US military surge and increase in number of operations by coalition forces was not discouraging the Taliban, the report said, rather emboldening them as the move was seen as 'the last push before exit.'

US President Barack Obama ordered 30,000 additional US troops to be deployed to Afghanistan this year, a move intended to 'disrupt, dismantle and defeat' Taliban and their al Qaeda-linked allies.

He also set July 2011 as the start date for US military withdrawal.

The fresh troops are due to increase the total number of US and NATO troops in Afghanistan to 150,000 in the coming weeks. Violence has escalated throughout the country as the international troops try to push into Taliban-controlled areas.

'In terms of insecurity, 2010 has been the worst year since the demise of the Taliban regime in late 2001,' ARM said.

The group, which says it compiled its statistics from interviews with victims, their families and local officials, recorded 1,200 security incidents in June, the most violent month in the nearly nine-year war.

With more than 100 US and NATO troops killed, June was also the deadliest month for foreign forces since late 2001.

Various organizations track casualties in Afghanistan, with differing numbers.

General Joseph Blotz, spokesman for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, told a press conference on Sunday that 506 civilians were killed in the past six weeks.

He said that 464 of them were killed by Taliban insurgents, while 42 were accidentally killed by NATO troops.

The United Nations reported that more than 2,400 civilians were killed last year, but has not yet released any figures for 2010.