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UN: Civilian Casualties Rising Sharply in Afghanistan

   VOA News 10 August 2010
   An  Afghan  policeman stands guard at the site of a suicide bomibng in
   Kandahar city, south of Kabul, Afghanistan, 20 Jul 2010

Photo: AP

   An  Afghan  policeman stands guard at the site of a suicide bomibng in
   Kandahar city, south of Kabul, Afghanistan, 20 Jul 2010

   The  United  Nations  says  civilian  casualties  are  on  the rise in
   Afghanistan,  with  insurgents  increasingly  responsible  for harming
   Afghans.
   In  a  [1]report  issued Tuesday in Kabul, the U.N. said the number of
   civilians killed or wounded in the conflict rose 31 percent during the
   first half of this year.
   Those figures include nearly 1,300 deaths and 2,000 wounded civilians.
   The U.N. says anti-government forces are responsible for 76 percent of
   the  casualties, up from 53 percent last year.  The report attributed
   12  percent  of  the casualties to U.S., NATO and other pro-government
   forces.
   The  top  U.S.  and  NATO  commander  in  Afghanistan,  General  David
   Petraeus,  said  coalition  forces  must  continue  to work to prevent
   civilian   deaths  by  either  side.   He  said  every  Afghan  death
   diminishes the coalition's cause.
   Also  Tuesday,  The  [2]Wall  Street  Journal reported that five human
   rights  groups  have asked the website WikiLeaks to do a better job of
   redacting names from thousands of war documents it is posting online.
   The  groups  -  including  [3]Amnesty  International  - said they were
   concerned  about  the  safety of Afghan citizens identified as helping
   coalition forces.
   The  newspaper reported that [4]WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange asked
   whether Amnesty International would help redact the names.  The group
   said  it  had  limited  resources,  but would not rule out the idea of
   helping.
   The  U.S.  Defense Department has urged WikiLeaks to not post any more
   of  the  leaked documents.  The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
   said  Assange  and  his  source "might already have on their hands the
   blood of a young soldier or that of an Afghan family."
   Assange has said WikiLeaks held back 15,000 files from the approximate
   96,000  documents  it received.  He said some of those documents will
   be redacted and released.

   Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.

References

   1. http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=31636&Cr=afghan&Cr1=civilian
   2. http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB124986154654218153.html
   3. http://www.amnesty.org/
   4. http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Afghan_War_Diary,_2004-2010

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