NYT: Marines’ Actions in Afghanistan Called Excessive (human rights violations)

[babylonsister]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/15/world/asia/15afghan.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

Marines’ Actions in Afghanistan Called Excessive


By CARLOTTA GALL
Published: April 15, 2007

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 14 — American marines reacted to a bomb ambush with excessive force in eastern Afghanistan last month, hitting groups of bystanders and vehicles with machine-gun fire in a rampage that covered 10 miles of highway and left 12 civilians dead, including an infant and three elderly men, according to a report published by an Afghan human rights commission on Saturday.

Families of the victims said this week that they had demanded justice from the American military and the Afghan government, and they described the aftermath of the marines’ shooting, in Nangarhar Province. One 16-year-old newly married girl was cut down while she was carrying a bundle of grass to her family’s farmhouse. A 75-year-old man walking to his shop was hit by so many bullets that his son did not recognize the body when he came to the scene.

In its report, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission condemned the suicide bomb attack that initially struck a convoy of a Marine Special Operations unit on March 4, wounding one American, and said there may also have been small-arms fire directed at the convoy immediately after the blast. But it said the response was disproportionate, especially given the obviously non-military nature of the marines’ targets long after the ambush.

“In failing to distinguish between civilians and legitimate military targets, the U.S. Marine Corps Special Forces employed indiscriminate force,” the report said. “Their actions thus constitute a serious violation of international humanitarian standards.”

The bombing and subsequent shooting was the most high profile of a number of human rights violations in the fighting in Afghanistan that were documented by the human rights commission. The report comes amid resurgent Taliban violence and coalition reprisals that are costing an increasing number of civilian lives and that have brought harsh criticism of the government and international forces.

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