Foreign troops’ air raid killed 13 Afghan civilians: UN

By Shadi Khan Saif</p> <p>KABUL, Afghanistan (AA) – At least 13 civilians, including 10 children, were killed in an airstrike by foreign troops in Afghanistan last week, the UN mission in Afghanistan confirmed on Monday.</p> <p>“An airstrike conducted by international military forces on the night of Friday to Saturday in Kunduz in support of pro-Government forces on the ground killed 13 civilians and injured three more,” UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said in a statement.</p> <p>“The Mission expressed serious concern that initial fact-finding indicates that 10 of those killed were children, part of the same extended family whom were displaced by fighting elsewhere in the country,” the statement added.</p> <p>Carrying dead bodies, residents of Kunduz province on Saturday held a protest demonstration against the deadly airstrike.</p> <p>Blaming the Taliban for deliberately hiding among civilians and spreading propaganda to hide their losses, the U.S. Forces – Afghanistan (USFOR-A) had announced it was investigating the reports of civilian casualties in Kunduz.</p> <p>Chanting slogans against the foreign troops, the evidently devastated protesters said the air raid targeted two residential homes where no insurgents were present.</p> <p>According to the local Salam Afghanistan radio this came a day after two U.S. soldiers were killed during an anti-terrorism operation in the same vicinity.</p> <p>Debra Richardson, spokeswoman for the NATO-led Resolute Support mission, said in a statement the combined Afghan and coalition ground force was fired on by an unknown assailant at close range, and in self-defense the airstrikes were called, but no bombs were used. </p> <p>“We will continue to judiciously and carefully deliver the military pressure necessary to enable a political solution here,” she added. </p> <p>Kunduz has twice briefly fallen to the Taliban over the past couple of years.</p> <p>With the record 3,804 civilians killed in Afghanistan conflict in 2018 — a clear indicator of intensification of violence — the UN last month called for urgent need to seize opportunities for peace here.</p> <p>More civilians were killed in the Afghan conflict last year than at any time since records have been kept, according to a United Nations report released on Feb. 24 by the UNAMA and the UN Human Rights Office.</p> <p>Among the dead were 927 children, the highest recorded number of boys and girls killed in the conflict during a single year.