The Afghan government has said that 52 civilians, including women and children, died when a NATO rocket struck a village in southern Afghanistan last week, a report disputed by the international coalition.
The allegation on Monday was raised as the founder of WikiLeaks claimed thousands of US attacks could be investigated for evidence of war crimes, and a leading human rights group alleged that NATO has an “incoherent process” for dealing with civilian casualties. Some of the over 90,000 secret US military documents on the Afghanistan war posted on Sunday on the web by WikiLeaks included unreported incidents of Afghan civilian killings.
A statement by Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s office said an investigation by Afghan intelligence determined that a NATO rocket slammed into the village of Rigi in the Sangin district of Helmand province, one of the most violent areas of the country. Karzai expressed his condolences in a telephone conversation with villagers and called on the US-led alliance to make protection of civilians “their priority during their operations”.
The US-led command said a joint NATO-Afghan investigation into the alleged attack “has thus far revealed no evidence of civilians injured or killed”. “Any speculation at this point of an alleged civilian casualty in Rigi village is completely unfounded”, said Rear Adm. Rick Smith, communications director for the command. “We are conducting a thorough joint investigation with our Afghan partners and will report any and all findings when known”.