Roadside blast kills 14 Afghan villagers on way to celebrations

A ROADSIDE blast ripped through a pickup truck in southern Afghanistan yesterday, killing 14 villagers who were travelling to a provincial capital for holiday celebrations, an official said.

Meanwhile, President Hamid Karzai said there must be better coordination between Afghan and foreign troops to avoid civilians casualties, while the United Nations expressed concern about civilians being caught up in the fight against Taliban forces.

Yesterday’s explosion went off near a village five miles west of Tirin Kot, the capital of Uruzgan. Captain Andre Salloum, a spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, said it was caused by an anti-tank mine, but it was not immediately clear if it was an old mine or newly planted by insurgents.

The victims, mostly elderly people and children from the village of Safid Shar, had been travelling in the truck to Tirin Kot to celebrate the end of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, said Abdul Qayum Qayumi, the governor’s spokesman. Three people were wounded.

In the southern city of Kandahar, meanwhile, mourners attended a prayer ceremony in memory of some of the several dozen civilians who Afghan officials say were killed during NATO operations on Tuesday in the nearby Panjwayi district.

President Hamid Karzai said “numbers” of civilians were killed but did not say how many. Mr Karzai told a news conference in Kabul that three houses were destroyed, killing most of the people inside.

“Our sadness, our pain, is for the civilians,” Mr Karzai said.

He said an investigation being headed by the Defence Ministry would try to determine why civilians were killed.

“Did the terrorists use the houses of the people?” he asked. “No doubt in the past five years the terrorists, the enemy of Afghanistan, they hid in mosques and people’s homes.”

Bismallah Afghanmal, a provincial council member, has said that fighters fled into civilian homes, which were then attacked by NATO forces.

NATO said its initial reports found that 12 civilians were killed, but Afghan officials estimated the number of civilians killed at between 30 and 80, including many women and children. Death tolls in remote military action in Afghanistan are difficult to accurately pin down, and estimates often vary widely.

Major Luke Knittig, a spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, said up to 70 militants may have been killed in three separate clashes in Panjwayi. He said NATO precisely targeted militants using artillery fire and airstrikes and regretted any civilian casualties.

But villagers and local government officials denounced NATO and blamed the government for lack of security.

The UN mission in Afghanistan said late on Thursday it was concerned about reports of new civilian deaths. “The United Nations has always made clear that the safety and welfare of civilians must always come first and any civilian casualties are unacceptable, without exception,” it said in a statement.