Dozens killed, 1,600 displaced after US air raids

Almost 1,600 families in Afghanistan have been displaced and many others need urgent humanitarian assistance after US war planes bombed several villages in the Shindand district of the western province of Herat, Afghan officials said. Reports of displacement follow claims that up to 70 civilians may have been killed. "Hundreds of houses have been destroyed and thousands of people need emergency relief," said the director of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) in Herat, Ghulam Nabi Hakak. Between Apr. 27 and 29, United States Special Forces fighting with the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police said they killed more than 130 Taliban fighters in Shindand. During the engagement coalition aircraft bombed targets and an AC-130 gunship was also called in. According to the military press release "there were no civilian casualties reported." However, the government of Afghanistan and the United Nations have confirmed reports which say more than 45 civilians, including women and children, died as a result of the US military operation. "The report says that some women and children were drowned in the river, and it was maybe in the heat of the moment that the children and people wanted to escape and jumped into the water," said Farzana Ahmadi, a spokeswoman for the governor of Herat. Ahmadi said all of the dead counted by the government delegation were civilians. A provincial council member from Herat, Naik Muhammad Eshaq, said he had visited the three bombing sites and produced a list of 50 people who had died, including infants and other children under age 10. UN spokesman Adrian Edwards says the UN believes figures of up to 49 civilian deaths, including 18 women, are credible. Others say the figure could be higher. According to AIHRC "about 60 civilians have been killed in the air raids." In Polmakan, reports described the village as "heavily bombed" with eight houses destroyed and with women sitting and crying saying that their children were still under the rubble. Villagers held protests over the bombing and set fire to government offices. Eshaq said villagers were adamant that there had been no Taliban fighters in the area. "I could not find any military men," he said. Mohammad Homayoun Azizi, chief of Herat's provincial council, said two council members who visited the area along with Afghan police and intelligence officers reported that 51 civilians were killed. Azizi said the dead included 12 relatives of a man named Jamal Mirzai. A man being treated in a hospital said he was wounded by an airstrike that did not hit any insurgents. "There were no Taliban. Ten of my relatives have been killed, including two of my cousins," said the man, who gave only his first name, Mohammed. Osman Kalali, a lawmaker who was part of the investigative delegation, said they did not see any Taliban or other militants among the dead. "The casualties were women, children, this kind of people," he said. While a press release by US forces in Afghanistan said the operation in Shindand was jointly conducted by US Special Forces–operating outside NATO command–and Afghan National Police, a police official in Herat denied the Afghan forces' involvement. "Unfortunately the operation was not coordinated with us," General Shafiq, a police commander in Herat, contended. Following the incident, Afghan officials said 13 more civilians were killed in the Maroof district of southern Kandahar in another bombing raid by US-led forces, bringing the number of confirmend civilian deaths to at least 70. "I saw all the victims are civilians," said Janan Gulzai, a provincial assembly member who was a member of a government team investigating the incident. There have been several episodes recently in which civilians have been killed and foreign forces have been accused of indiscriminate or excessive force. That has prompted Afghan officials to warn that the good will of the Afghan people toward the government and the foreign military presence is wearing thin. Thousands of civilians have been killed since US-led troops invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to remove the Taliban government.