Afghan President Hamid Karzai Saturday condemned the killing of 76 civilians, mostly children, by a US airstrike in western Afghanistan, and vowed his government would take necessary measures to curtail such deaths in the future.The US military acknowledged in a statement that it was aware of the government's allegations of civilian deaths in the operation against Taliban fighters Friday in the district Shindand of western Herat province, dpa reports.
"All allegations of civilian casualties are taken very seriously," the statement said. "An investigation has been directed." Karzai blamed the US coalition forces for carrying out the attack in the district's Aziz Abad area without coordination with the Afghan army.
"All efforts of the Afghan government to avoid civilian casualties have not yielded any positive results and our innocent countrymen are still killed in anti-terrorism operations," Karzai said in a statement. The president also said his government would take "necessary measures" to curtail such deadly incidents and would soon announce the details of the plan.
The interior ministry said Friday that the operation in Shindand killed 19 women, 7 men and 50 children, all under 15 years of age. The US military claimed that 30 militants, including a rebel commander were killed in the operation, after the joint Afghan and coalition forces were ambushed by militants hiding inside the compounds.
If confirmed, the civilian death toll for Friday's air raid would be the highest since the deployment of foreign forces in the country following the ouster of Taliban regime in late 2001.