KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban vowed revenge Monday after an American soldier allegedly shot to death 16 civilians in southern Afghanistan and burned their bodies, an attack that has fueled anger still simmering after U.S. troops burned Qurans last month.
U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan have stepped up security following the shootings Sunday in Kandahar province out of concern about retaliatory attacks. The U.S. Embassy has also warned American citizens in Afghanistan about the possibility of reprisals.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for several attacks last month that the group said were retaliation for the Americans burning Qurans. Afghan forces also turned their guns on their supposed allies at the time, killing six U.S. troops as violent protests wracked the country.
It's unclear whether there will be a similar response to Sunday's shootings. But the attack will likely spark even greater distrust between Washington and Kabul and fuel questions in both countries about why American troops are still fighting in Afghanistan after 10 years of conflict and the killing of Osama bin Laden.
The Taliban said in a statement on their website that "sick-minded American savages" committed the "blood-soaked and inhumane crime" in Panjwai district, a rural region outside Kandahar that is the cradle of the Taliban and where coalition forces have fought for control for years.
The militant group promised the families of the victims that it would take revenge "for every single martyr with the help of Allah."
There are still many questions about what happened in the two villages in Panjwai before dawn Sunday and what motivated the killings.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the attack Sunday and said the 16 dead included nine children and three women. Five other villagers were wounded.
"This is an assassination, an intentional killing of innocent civilians and cannot be forgiven," Karzai said.
U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Jimmie Cummings confirmed Monday that the number of dead was "in the teens" but declined to be more specific, saying U.S. forces had not been given access to independently count the bodies.
U.S. and Afghan officials have said the attack began around 3 a.m. in the two villages, which are fairly close to a U.S. base in a region that was the focus of President Barack Obama's military surge in the south starting in 2009.
Villagers described how they cowered in fear as gunshots rang out while the soldier roamed from house to house firing on those inside. They said he entered three homes in all and set fire to some of the bodies. Eleven of the dead were from a single family.
The burning of the bodies may ignite even more outrage because it is seen as the desecration of corpses and therefore against Islam.
U.S. officials said the shooter, identified as an Army staff sergeant, acted alone after leaving his base in southern Afghanistan. Initial reports indicated he returned to the base after the shooting and turned himself in. He was in custody at a NATO base in Afghanistan.
Some Afghan officials and local villagers expressed doubt that a single U.S. soldier could have carried out all the killings in houses about a mile (2 kilometers) apart and burned the bodies afterward.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Car bomb explodes near Nigeria church; 10 killed
JOS, Nigeria (AP) — A suicide car bomber attacked a Catholic church Sunday in the middle of Mass, killing at least 10 people in the blast and the retaliatory violence that followed after the latest assault targeting a church in a central Nigerian city plagued by unrest, officials said.
The bomb detonated as worshippers attended the final Mass of the day at St. Finbar's Catholic Church in Jos, a city where thousands have died in the last decade in religious and ethnic violence. Security at the gate of the church's compound stopped the suspicious car and the bomber detonated his explosives during an altercation that followed, Plateau state spokesman Pam Ayuba said.
The blast damaged the church's roof, blew out its windows and destroyed a portion of the fence surrounding the church's compound, Ayuba said.
"He destroyed so many things," the spokesman said.
The bombing sparked retaliatory violence in Jos later Sunday, with angry youths burning down homes and soldiers guarding the city opening fire in neighborhoods, witnesses said. Ayuba said at least 10 people died in the bombing, though others said the number of dead included those killed in retaliatory attacks. Soldiers also were wounded in the blast.
No group immediately claimed responsibility though the city has been targeted in the past by a radical Islamist sect known as Boko Haram. The sect claimed a series of bombings in Jos on Christmas Eve in 2010 that killed as many as 80 people. The sect also claimed a similar church bombing on Feb. 26 on the main headquarters of the Church of Christ that killed three people and wounded 38 others.
The sect, which speaks to journalists through telephone conference calls at times of its choosing, could not be immediately reached for comment Sunday.
Jos and surrounding Plateau state have been torn apart in recent years by violence pitting its different ethnic groups and major religions — Christianity and Islam — against each other. Human Rights Watch says at least 1,000 people were killed in communal clashes around Jos in 2010.
The violence, though fractured across religious lines, often has more to do with local politics, economics and rights to grazing lands. Muslims in the city also say they are locked out of lucrative jobs in the region as the Christian-led state government doesn't recognize them as citizens.
The Catholic church attack also comes after a failed raid Thursday by British and Nigerian commandos left a Briton and an Italian hostage dead in Nigeria's far northwest. British officials have blamed a splinter cell of Boko Haram for the attack, something a spokesman for the group has denied.
However, the attack has opened a new front on Nigeria's ongoing struggle with terrorism, showing any region across the nation's Muslim north can be attacked — and anyone, including foreigners, could be targeted.
Meanwhile Sunday, police said two separate attacks in northeast Nigeria blamed on the sect killed two people. One attack happened at a paramilitary police base in the town of Bama in Borno state, while the other happened during the day in Maiduguri, the sect's spiritual home, authorities said.
The bomb detonated as worshippers attended the final Mass of the day at St. Finbar's Catholic Church in Jos, a city where thousands have died in the last decade in religious and ethnic violence. Security at the gate of the church's compound stopped the suspicious car and the bomber detonated his explosives during an altercation that followed, Plateau state spokesman Pam Ayuba said.
The blast damaged the church's roof, blew out its windows and destroyed a portion of the fence surrounding the church's compound, Ayuba said.
"He destroyed so many things," the spokesman said.
The bombing sparked retaliatory violence in Jos later Sunday, with angry youths burning down homes and soldiers guarding the city opening fire in neighborhoods, witnesses said. Ayuba said at least 10 people died in the bombing, though others said the number of dead included those killed in retaliatory attacks. Soldiers also were wounded in the blast.
No group immediately claimed responsibility though the city has been targeted in the past by a radical Islamist sect known as Boko Haram. The sect claimed a series of bombings in Jos on Christmas Eve in 2010 that killed as many as 80 people. The sect also claimed a similar church bombing on Feb. 26 on the main headquarters of the Church of Christ that killed three people and wounded 38 others.
The sect, which speaks to journalists through telephone conference calls at times of its choosing, could not be immediately reached for comment Sunday.
Jos and surrounding Plateau state have been torn apart in recent years by violence pitting its different ethnic groups and major religions — Christianity and Islam — against each other. Human Rights Watch says at least 1,000 people were killed in communal clashes around Jos in 2010.
The violence, though fractured across religious lines, often has more to do with local politics, economics and rights to grazing lands. Muslims in the city also say they are locked out of lucrative jobs in the region as the Christian-led state government doesn't recognize them as citizens.
The Catholic church attack also comes after a failed raid Thursday by British and Nigerian commandos left a Briton and an Italian hostage dead in Nigeria's far northwest. British officials have blamed a splinter cell of Boko Haram for the attack, something a spokesman for the group has denied.
However, the attack has opened a new front on Nigeria's ongoing struggle with terrorism, showing any region across the nation's Muslim north can be attacked — and anyone, including foreigners, could be targeted.
Meanwhile Sunday, police said two separate attacks in northeast Nigeria blamed on the sect killed two people. One attack happened at a paramilitary police base in the town of Bama in Borno state, while the other happened during the day in Maiduguri, the sect's spiritual home, authorities said.
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