Afghanistan’s Taliban yesterday dismissed as “propaganda” a UN report that said the insurgents were responsible for the bulk of more than 1,000 civilians killed in the first half of the year.
The UN Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA) said this week that 1,271 civilians lost their lives in violence between January and June, and the Taliban were responsible for 76 percent of the deaths.
The Taliban, the main group behind an increasingly deadly insurgency, dismissed the report, blaming the world body for taking the side of US-led troops.
“Observing the statistics issued by UNAMA, it appears crystal-clear that the report is based on political expedience, exaggeration and propaganda instead of surfacing the facts,” a statement posted on the Taliban’s Web site said. “Every observer would easily determine the truth of such reports as this and assess how authentic and spurious such reports may be.”
NOT ROBBERS
In other developments, a Christian charity group said yesterday that it believes militants, not robbers, killed 10 members of its medical team last week.
In the first days after the attack, the group’s leaders said they suspected the team was set upon by robbers, despite a Taliban claim of responsibility. Local police also said they suspected a criminal motive.
Dirk Frans, director of the International Assistance Mission, said yesterday that while Afghan and US authorities were conducting official investigations into the killings of six Americans, two Afghans, a German and a Briton, the group has done research on its own to learn more about who might be responsible.
“Our own research suggests that the murders were not a robbery,” he said in a statement. “We are now working on the assumption that the attack was an opportunistic ambush by a group of non-local fighters.”
Frans said the team was attacked as they made their return trip toward Kabul from their mission to dispense medical care to villagers in remote Nuristan Province. They were set upon by gunmen as they got out of their vehicles to take a rest after crossing a swollen river.
The account squares with that given by the lone survivor — the team’s Afghan driver, Safiullah, who has been released by authorities after questioning, Frans said.
‘DEATH TO US’
Meanwhile, a crowd of about 300 villagers yelled “death to the United States” and blocked a main road in eastern Afghanistan yesterday as they said that US forces had killed three innocent villagers, officials said.
NATO forces rejected the claim — saying they killed several suspected insurgents and detained a local Taliban commander in the overnight raid.
Elders from Zarin Khil village said US troops stormed into a family’s house and shot three brothers — all young men — and then took their father into custody, district police chief Abdul Karim Abed said.
Police are investigating the allegations, but could not yet confirm or deny the account, he said.
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