Up to 16 Afghans were killed or wounded by a rogue US soldier who walked off his base and opened fire on civilians yesterday, Afghan and Western officials said.
“Today at around 3am a US soldier walked off his base and started shooting at civilians. Ten to 16 people are killed and injured,” said Ahmad Jawed Faysal, a spokesman for the governor of southern Kandahar.
A soldier has been arrested over the incident, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a statement.
“A United States service member was detained today in connection to an incident that resulted in Afghan casualties in Kandahar Province,” it said, without specifying the number of victims.
The shooting comes after a series of incidents in which Afghan soldiers turned their weapons on US troops, killing six, in the wake of the burning of Korans at a military base.
However, there was no word on what might have motivated the soldier’s actions.
There were also contradictory claims about the death toll and confusion over whether there was more than one incident.
“What we know at this stage is that there have been casualties in two villages, Alokozai and Garrambai villages [in Panjwayi district],” Faysal said.
“A delegation has been sent to find out how this has happened as well as to determine the dead and injured,” he added.
The US embassy in Kabul issued a statement extending “its deepest condolences to the families of the victims of today’s tragic shooting incident in Kandahar Province.”
“We are saddened by this violent act against our Afghan friends. We deplore any attack by a member of the US Armed Forces against innocent civilians, and denounce all violence against civilians,” the statement said.
“We assure the people of Afghanistan that the individual or individuals responsible for this act will be identified and brought to justice,” the embassy said.
Kandahar is a stronghold of Taliban insurgents fighting to oust the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, which is supported by about 130,000 US-led NATO troops.
The shooting is likely to increase tensions as Washington and Kabul negotiate a long-term strategic partnership deal governing their relations after US-led combat troops pull out in 2014.
The Koran burning ignited days of violent anti-US demonstrations in which about 40 people died, plunging relations between foreign forces and their Afghan allies to an all-time low and forcing US President Barack Obama to apologize.
Afghan resentment of US forces was also provoked by a video posted online in January, showing US Marines urinating on the bloodied corpses of slain Afghan insurgents — an incident condemned by the Pentagon.
And in March last year, the US military apologized after pictures surfaced of US soldiers from a rogue army unit posing with dead Afghans.
Five soldiers from the unit were charged with murder for allegedly shooting civilians for sport.
In November the ringleader of the “kill team” was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison by a military panel.
Of the 60 NATO troops killed so far this year, 18 percent — almost one in five — have died at the hands of Afghan colleagues, including four French and an Albanian, as well as the six US soldiers.
The treaty being negotiated between the US and Afghanistan would likely cover the legal status of US troops remaining in the country after 2014 to help Kabul with intelligence, air power and logistics in the fight against the insurgents.
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