by Abdul Mueed Hashimi



May 12, 2011

JALALABAD (PAN): A 12-year old girl and a police officer, a relative of the girl, were killed by foreign troops during a raid on a house in eastern Nangarhar province, residents said on Thursday.

The troops blew up the house's gate and entered at 1am last night in Myagan Banda village of Surkh Rod district, Naik Mohammad, father of the slain girl, told Pajhwok Afghan News.

"They (foreign troops) hurled a hand grenade at my daughter after she ran out of room in panic. She was killed on the spot," the father said.

Another relative of the family, Shukrullah, who was a police officer at the provincial police headquarters, was also killed by the troops in the house, Mohammad said.

The officer used to stay with them because he could not commute to Qarghae district of Laghman from Jalalabad city daily, he said.

He said when they showed the foreign troops the ID card of the dead officer, they apologised at the end of the raid, saying they killed him mistakenly.

Mohammad asked President Hamid Karzai to investigate the raid on his house. He said the troops entered his house after throwing hand grenades inside.

A neighbour, Mirwais, said the troops got the family out and then started a search inside the house.

District chief, Ali Akbar, and district police chief, Mohammad Afzal, who visited the scene, refused to talk to media.

The governor's spokesman, Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, and provincial police chief, Ali Shah Paktiawal, confirmed the operation, but did not provide details.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) media office in Kabul said Afghan and coalition forces killed an armed man and a woman in Nangarhar on Wednesday. The operation was carried out in pursuit of a Taliban commander in Surkh Rod district, the force said in a statement.

It added the force called for inhabitants to exit peacefully, but a man did not listen and threatened the security personnel with a pistol and was shot dead.

The statement said initial assessment revealed that the killed man was a police officer.

A woman was mistakenly killed during the operation as security personnel thought she was a militant after she ran. But later they found it was young girl, the statement said.

"We are deeply shocked and apologise to members of the family, people and the Afghan government," said Rear Admiral Hal Pittman, ISAF Deputy Chief of Staff for Communication. "We go to great lengths in our operations to reduce civilian casualties to an absolute minimum. We understand any civilian loss of life is detrimental to our cause and to our efforts to secure the population".

sm/myn/ma

:: Article nr. 77647 sent on 12-may-2011 19:43 ECT
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