---------- From: Barry Stoller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> R Subject: [L-I] US bombed village 'with no military targets' Independent. 3 November 2001. Dozens killed in village 'with no military targets' Western journalists and human rights organisations published the clearest evidence yet of mass civilian casualties caused by the American bombing campaign yesterday. At least 25 people, and possibly as many as 35, were killed on the night of 22 October in Chowkar-Karez, a small village 25 miles north of the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, according to reports based on the accounts of eyewitnesses in the village and survivors ferried to hospital in the Pakistani city of Quetta. The Pentagon has confirmed that an AC-130 Spectre gunship attacked the village. According to the villagers, however, there were several aircraft, not just one. Explosions from the attack, they reported, pulverised the mud walls of houses and gouged craters 15 feet deep in the ground. The planes then returned and opened fire on terrified villagers running through the streets, causing the worst of the casualties. According to Human Rights Watch, the first organisation to publish the eyewitness accounts, the villagers were unanimous in saying no relevant target was in the area. [N.B.] "If there were military targets in the area, we'd like to know what they were," said Sidney Jones, Asia director of Human Rights Watch. "The Pentagon has got to do more to avoid these deaths." Human Rights Watch noted that in previous cases it had investigated, ordinary Afghans were quick to identify potential targets in the area. "It is impossible for [us] to verify independently whether Taliban or al-Qa'ida military targets existed in the area of Chowkar-Karez village, but the consistent statements of all witnesses and survivors that there were none is notable," the organisation said. Visiting journalists counted 18 fresh graves but were told the villagers had not been able to sort out the many severed limbs and body parts to give each person their own final resting place. "As we buried the dead, the planes came again," said an old farmer called Mangal, who claimed to have lost 30 relatives including 12 women and 14 children. "We had to work quickly. Not everyone got their own grave." . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews with continuing coverage of WWIII _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________ ----------
